Tian Han was a native of Changsha and one of the founders of modern Chinese drama. In 1932, he was introduced by Qu Qiubai to join the Communist Party. Over his lifetime, he created more than 60 spoken dramas and operas, over 20 film scripts, more than 20 traditional opera scripts, and nearly 2,000 song lyrics and poems. In 1935, he wrote the lyrics to “March of the Volunteers,” the theme song for the film Children of Troubled Times, scribbling them on a cigarette box and handing them to Nie Er for composition. In 1949, Mao Zedong adopted it as the national anthem. Tian Han became Director of the Arts Bureau of the Ministry of Culture.

When the Cultural Revolution began in 1966, Tian Han’s play Xie Yaohuan was condemned as a “poisonous weed.” In 1967 he was imprisoned, and in 1968 he died of illness while in solitary confinement. His ashes were given the alias Li Heng, and their whereabouts later became unknown. It may be said that he died without a burial place.

Thinking that the author of the national anthem of the People’s Republic of China could not be omitted, Mao requested the Jade Emperor to summon Tian Han’s spirit for a conversation. Upon meeting Tian Han, Mao spoke bluntly: “The Cultural Revolution wronged you and caused you to die unjustly in prison.”

Tian Han replied: “During the Cultural Revolution struggle sessions, I suffered every humiliation. I spent my life writing drama, yet I was struggled against on the very stage in Guilin where Tian Han and An E had once watched Empress Dowager Cixi attend a performance in the 1940s. On February 17, 1967, I was thrown into Qincheng Prison. A special task force for the Tian Han case was established under the direct leadership of the Central Special Case Group. In prison they forced me to kneel on the ground and drink urine.

“In July 1967, because of coronary heart disease and diabetes, I was sent under the alias Li Wu to Hospital 301. While receiving treatment, I was also interrogated. On December 10, 1968, I died from heart disease complicated by uremia. I was only 70 years old. Before I died, I longed for my mother. I wanted to shout ‘Long live Mother’ and beg to see her, but I was not permitted. I also missed my wife, my son, and my good friends in the arts—Nie Er, Hong Shen, and others—as well as my younger brother Tian Hong, who had been labeled a rightist.

“Speaking of my mother, Yi Keqin—you already knew her as early as 1919 and once sought her help. At that time I was studying in Japan, and you asked my mother to contact me to help you purchase books. In 1933, Jiang Qing—then still called Li Yunhe—attached herself to the famous dramatist Zhao Taïmou and his wife Yu Shan, and worked as a small clerk in the Qingdao University Library. Later she lived with Yu Shan’s younger brother, Yu Qiwei, an underground Communist Party member. After Yu Qiwei mysteriously disappeared, Li Yunhe was introduced by Yu Shan to come to Shanghai and seek refuge with me. My mother personally cooked Hunan dishes to entertain her. You and your wife are both the kind who burn the bridge after crossing the river and repay kindness with ingratitude.

“When my mother celebrated her hundredth birthday, my younger brother Tian Hong, labeled a rightist and far away in Hunan, had to make many efforts before the organization approved his trip to Beijing to pay his respects. She died without ever knowing that I had already died in prison.”

Mao said: “What you speak of is all in the past. It is true that I failed your mother and failed you as well. But we should not cling endlessly to history. We should recognize your contribution to history. Your life’s contribution was enormous, especially your ‘March of the Volunteers,’ which became the national anthem. It is sung throughout the country and known throughout the world.”

Tian replied: “The ‘March of the Volunteers’ that I wrote—actually, you had no qualification to take it as the national anthem of the state you founded. ‘March of the Volunteers’ was meant to inspire the people to fight Japan. During the eight years of the War of Resistance, did you fight Japan? You hid in Yan’an in comfort, closed the doors to carry out Party rectification, purged and killed people, consolidated your dictatorial power, and even colluded with Wang Jingwei’s puppet regime, maintained secret contacts with the Japanese army, and provided them with intelligence to strike Chiang Kai-shek’s forces. You even shamelessly told the Japanese: thank you for helping me defeat Chiang Kai-shek. By taking ‘March of the Volunteers’ as your national anthem, you insulted the soldiers and civilians who fought in the War of Resistance.”

Mao said: “In fighting Chiang Kai-shek, I indeed lacked moral justification. He endured eight bitter years of war and achieved victory in the War of Resistance; then I fought him to seize power. By a twist of fate, I won and drove Chiang Kai-shek to Taiwan. After the founding of the state, we could not immediately find someone to compose a national anthem, so your ‘March of the Volunteers’ was taken to decorate the façade.”

Tian said: “The New China you ruled became a ‘bloody China’ over thirty years, with tens of millions of compatriots dying at your hands. After your death, your successor Xi Jinping has continued your tyranny. Even Hong Kong, whose ‘one country, two systems’ arrangement was guaranteed by law for fifty years, Xi Jinping now seeks to reduce to a single system—complete dictatorship and autocracy. The people of Hong Kong, facing the loss of their freedom, have risen to resist. The young representative Joshua Wong recently went to New York to seek help, while overseas students bought by the Chinese Communist Party sang the national anthem in protest. The poison of the national anthem runs deep. My song was used as the national anthem, and I feel profound guilt. This is my greatest regret.”

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