Ba Jin was a towering literary master of the twentieth century, renowned both in China and abroad. During the Cultural Revolution, he too was subjected to baseless denunciations and sent down for labor reform. For six years he wrote endless self-criticisms and confessions. His wife was persecuted and died of illness. Ba Jin lived to be one hundred years old; in his final years he was, in effect, in a vegetative state, and his request for euthanasia was denied.

More than forty years after Mao’s death, whenever he thought of Ba Jin—hailed as “the conscience of China,” who after the Cultural Revolution wrote works such as Random Thoughts and proposed the establishment of a Cultural Revolution Museum—he wished to ask him how he viewed the launching of the Cultural Revolution. He therefore submitted a request to the Jade Emperor, who approved and arranged their meeting.

Mao, always curious about names, began directly: “You are surnamed Ba. I’ve heard that because you admired the anarchist Bakunin, you took the first character of his name as your pen name’s surname.”

Ba Jin replied: “That explanation is incorrect. During the 1920s when I was studying in France, I had a close classmate named Ba Enbo. He was talented and idealistic, but he fell into depression and committed suicide. At that time I was translating Kropotkin’s works. I combined the names of the two of them—Ba and Jin—and thus came ‘Ba Jin.’ Later it simply became established. My children returned to the ancestral surname Li. Once the name Ba Jin became known, it didn’t matter.”

Mao said: “So that’s the origin. When you mention Kropotkin, I recall that in my youth, when I ran Xiang River Review, I once proposed learning from Kropotkin’s methods—opposing large-scale chaos and ineffective bomb revolutions and bloody uprisings.”

Ba Jin responded: “Kropotkin founded ‘anarchist communism,’ advocating mutual aid and cooperation, the abolition of private property, the elimination of inequality, and distribution according to need. I admired him deeply. Of course, looking back now, it was all utopian. You once believed in Kropotkin’s anarchism; in my view, the Cultural Revolution was the product of your former anarchism combined with Leninism.”

Mao replied: “That’s a novel analysis—I’ve never heard it put that way. In any case, the Cultural Revolution wronged you greatly. You were denounced for years, sent down for labor, isolated and investigated, endlessly forced to write self-criticisms. Your wife was persecuted to death, leaving you to live out your days in loneliness. That was a great regret.”

Ba Jin said: “The Cultural Revolution subjected me to inhuman treatment. My home was ransacked. I was locked in a basement gas-stove room, dragged onto stages for struggle sessions. Wenhui Daily published long articles such as ‘Thoroughly Expose the Counterrevolutionary True Face of Ba Jin’ and ‘Smash and Stink the Reactionary Authority Ba Jin.’ Liberation Daily published ‘Completely Overthrow and Discredit Ba Jin, Mortal Enemy of the Proletarian Dictatorship.’ I spent years in cadre schools for labor reform, unable to return home.”

Mao said: “That must have devastated you physically and mentally.”

Ba Jin continued: “My wife, Xiao Shan, was punished by being made to sweep the streets every day until she was exhausted, and was cursed as ‘Ba Jin’s stinking wife.’ She suffered immense physical and psychological torment and developed cancer. I wrote pleading for 100 yuan in medical expenses. In 1972 she died in loneliness at only fifty-five. We had loved and depended on each other for thirty years. Her death was the greatest blow of my life. I kept her urn in my bedroom. In Random Thoughts, I wrote that after my death my ashes should be placed in the same urn as hers. The books she translated remained at my bedside.”

Mao said: “For decades you wrote many works—Family, Spring, Autumn, Fog, Rain, Electricity, countless novels and stories—bearing witness to a century’s upheavals and igniting the hearts of many. But after Liberation, for decades, there seemed to be no major works from you, only some short pieces, not especially prominent.”

Ba Jin replied: “That is true. The short pieces I wrote were often timely works of little significance. The political atmosphere after Liberation made people cautious and fearful; we did not dare to write. In 1962, at the Writers’ Congress, I said there was a lack of freedom of speech, that people had become idle, avoiding mistakes, afraid of those holding sticks, preferring to repeat what others had said many times, speaking vaguely, losing writers’ courage and sense of responsibility. At the end of that speech, I still flattered you, saying your literary thought illuminated the entire hall—because everyone said so, and I had to repeat it.”

Mao asked: “You published articles during the campaign to criticize Lin Biao and Confucius, didn’t you?”

Ba Jin answered: “Yes. I wrote ‘The Criminal Life of Confucius,’ a piece against my conscience, which has filled me with guilt ever since. Indeed, for thirty years I wrote nothing of real value. In 1972, not long after my wife died, I was told that my case would be handled as a contradiction among the people, that I would not wear the label of counterrevolutionary, that I would receive a living allowance and could do some translation work. So I resumed translating Turgenev’s Virgin Soil.”

Mao said: “Later you began writing Random Thoughts.”

Ba Jin replied: “Yes. I felt it my responsibility to expose that shocking great deception, so that future generations would not suffer disaster again. For ten years I endured torment; I could not swallow all my bones and dissolve them—I had to write out what was inside me. I began in 1979 and finished in 1986, five volumes totaling about half a million words. Unexpectedly, it immediately resonated with many writers and readers, sparking a wave of reflection and inspiring others to write their own ‘random thoughts.’”

Mao said: “That was your most valuable contribution in your later years. You truly deserved to be called ‘the conscience of intellectuals.’”

Ba Jin replied: “It is regrettable that thirty years have passed, and my proposal to ‘establish a Cultural Revolution Museum’ has seen no response. Books telling the truth about the Cultural Revolution still cannot be published. Yang Jisheng’s Cultural Revolution history The World Turned Upside Down could only be published in Hong Kong in 2016.”

Mao said: “To fully disclose the truth of the Cultural Revolution might cause an earthquake-like shock domestically and affect the stability of Zhongnanhai. My successors have their difficulties.”

Ba Jin responded: “The Germans established museums about Hitler’s Holocaust, and nothing chaotic happened. The disaster of the Cultural Revolution was even more severe than Hitler’s Holocaust. History must be preserved and openly criticized. Regrettably, your thirty years of rule brought great calamities, yet they are still covered up. Books exposing the Cultural Revolution cannot be published. You have never confessed your crimes. Your successors still imitate you—promoting personality cults, silencing discussion, forbidding criticism of the central authorities. You must thoroughly reflect, publicly confess, and eradicate your pernicious influence.”

Mao said: “Yes, you are right. I am asking the Jade Emperor for forgiveness, so that I may leave the eighteen levels of hell and appear in dreams to those in power, urging them not to launch another Cultural Revolution.”

Ba Jin replied: “Your words sound fine. I will judge by your actions.”

With that, he rose and took his leave.

NEXT: 82. Cao Yu (1910–1996)