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The Writings of Chairman Mao Tse-tung

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Comrade Mao Tse-tung
Comrade Mao Tse-tung

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The Great ‘Marxist-Leninist’ Theoreticians

The Writings of Chairman Mao Tse-tung

Chairman Mao Tse-tung was one of the small group of towering giants produced as a result of the struggles of the workers and peasants throughout the world in the 19th and early 20th centuries. (The others were Karl Marx, Frederick Engels, Vladimir Ilyich Lenin, Joseph Stalin and Enver Hoxha.)

Selected Works – published during the period of Socialism

The decision to published a comprehensive collected of the written works of Chairman Mao Tse-tung was taken in the early days of the Great Socialist Cultural Revolution, appearing in many world languages in a very short period of time. However, the 4 volumes produced during that period only went up to 16th September 1949, a couple of weeks before the Declaration of the People’s Republic. For this reason the ‘official’ Selected Works only includes these 4 volumes.

Selected Works, Volume 1, FLP, Peking, 1967, 362 pages.

The First and Second Revolutionary Civil War Period – March 1926 – August 1937.

Includes many important works such as:

Analysis of classes in Chinese Society

A Single Spark can Start a Prairie Fire

On Practice

On Contradiction

Selected Works, Volume 2, FLP, Peking, 1967, 484 pages.

The Period of the War of Resistance Against Japan (I) – July 23rd 1937 – May 8th 1941

Includes many important works such as:

Combat Liberalism

Problems of Strategy in Guerrilla War Against Japan

On Protracted War

On New Democracy

Selected Works, Volume 3, FLP, Peking, 1967, 304 pages.

The Period of the War of Resistance Against Japan (II) – March 1941 – August 9th 1945

Includes many important works such as:

Reform Our Study

Talks at Yenan Forum on Literature and Art

On Coalition Government

The Foolish Man who Removed the Mountains

Selected Works, Volume 4, FLP, Peking, 1969, 472 pages.

The Third Revolutionary Civil War Period – August 13th 1845 – September 16th 1949

Includes many important works such as:

Talk with the American Correspondent Anna Louise Strong

Correct the ‘Left’ Errors in Land Reform Propaganda

Carry the Revolution Through to the End

Index to Selected Works (and Selected Military Writings)

An academically produced index of the four ‘official’ volumes of the Selected Works of Chairman Mao Tse-tung which might be found useful.

Index to Selected Works of Chairman Mao, Union Research Institute, Hong Kong, 1968, 190 pages.

Selected Works – produced in the early stages of the counter-revolution

Only one further volume of the Selected Works of Chairman Mao Tse-tung was produced by the state-run Foreign Languages Press in Peking. It was produced whilst the coup for the leadership of the Communist Party of China was still in progress. Produced within a year of the Chairman’s death was probably too short a time for serious political ‘revision’ to have occurred but this has to be considered when referring to contentious issues that might appear in this volume. Although there was an intention to continue the production of the Selected Works nothing else appeared after Volume 5. (The ‘Publication Note’ on pages 5-6 gives an idea of the situation of flux at the time of publication.)

Selected Works, Volume 5, FLP, Peking, 1977, 534 pages.

The period of the Socialist revolution and Socialist Construction (I) – September 21st 1949 – November 18th 1957

Includes interesting, and some important, works such as:

Liu Shao-chi and Yang Shang-kun Criticized for breach of Discipline in Issuing Documents in the Name of the Central Committee Without Authorization

Combat Bourgeois Ideas in the Party

On the Correct handling of Contradictions Among the People

Concordance of proper nouns in the five-volume English language Selected Works of Mao Tse-Tung, compiled by Harry M Lindquist and Roger D Mayer, Centre for East Asian Studies, University of Kansas, 1968, 72 pages.

Selected Works – collected together outside of China

Once it became clear that the Chinese Revisionists would not be publishing more of Chairman Mao’s Selected Works (or that they couldn’t be trusted if they did) various groupings around the world made attempts to glean through the mass of paperwork and try to determine what might have been produced by the Chairman. This was not as difficult as it might first be thought. Chairman Mao had a very distinctive style and anyone steeped in his work would be able to make a more than intelligent guess whether a work was by him or not. This was especially the case during the early days of the Cultural Revolution when many editorials or unsigned articles were almost certainly from the pen of the great Socialist leader.

The first of those (under the name Volume VI) goes away from the style of the first Five volumes in that it attempts to pick up articles and writings that might have been omitted from those earlier volumes.

Selected Works, Volume VI, Kranti Publications, Secunderabad, India, 1990, 343 pages.

From April 1917 – April 1946

Includes titles such as:

Oppose Book Worship

The League of Nations is a League of Robbers

To be Attacked by the Enemy is not a bad Thing but a Good Thing

A revised, and more complete, edition was published in 2020.

Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung: Volume VI (2020), Kranti Publications, Secunderabad, India, 2020, 448 pages.

Selected Works of Mao Tse-tung: Volume VII (2020), Kranti Publications, Secunderabad, India, 2020, 464 pages.

Letters, telegrams and directives from September 23rd 1949 to November 17th 1957.

Volume VIII is a work in progress but we have access to to downloadable version, of what has already been produced, so that is included here.

Selected Works, Volume VIII – partial, Maoist Documentation Project, 2004, 353 pages.

From January 1958-1961

Includes titles such as:

Red and Expert

Communes are Better

Critique of Stalin’s ‘Economic Problems of Socialism in the USSR’

Volume IX, produced in India in 1994, returns to the format first used in China in 1967. What’s important about this edition is that this is the first attempt to cover some of the crucial years of the Great Socialist Cultural Revolution (1966-1976) in any depth.

Selected Works, Volume IX, Sramika Varga Prachuranulu, Hyderabad, 1994, 474 pages.

From May 1963 – September 12th 1971

Includes articles such as:

Where do the Correct ideas Come From?

The Soviet Leading Clique is a Mere Dust Heap

Talk at a Meeting of the Central Cultural Revolution Group

Speech to the Albanian Military Delegation

The Writings of Mao Zedong, 1949-1976, Volume 1, September 1949-December 1955, edited by Michael Y. M. Kau and John K Leung, ME Sharpe, New York, 1986, 771 pages.

The Writings of Mao Zedong, 1949-1976, Volume 2, Janauary 1956-December 1957, edited by Michael Y. M. Kau and John K Leung, ME Sharpe, New York, 1992, 863 pages.

A critique of soviet economics by Mao Tse-tung, with an introduction by James Peck, Monthly Review Press, New York, 1977, 157 pages.

Mao’s critique of two Soviet books; Political Economy – A Textbook and Joseph Stalin’s Economic Problems of Socialism in the USSR.

Mao Zedong On Diplomacy, FLP, Beijing, 1998, 516 pages.

This is a strange one, taking into account where (Beijing) and when (a 1998 translation of the Chinese edition of 1994) it was published. This doesn’t mean that the translations are not accurate or complete (although they might be) but in reading them we must have, at the back of our mind, why were they produced at that particular time.

Mao Zedong on Dialectical Materialism, Nick Knight, ME Sharpe, New York, 1990, 295 pages.

A detailed look at some of the essays that Chairman Mao produced whilst in Yenan in 1937. This was to culminate in the seminal works of On Contradiction and On Practice.

For Mao – Essays In Historical Materialism, Philip Corrigan, Harvie Ramsey and Derek Sayer, Humanities press, New Jersey, 1979, 207 pages.

Chairman Mao talks to the people – Talks and Letters – 1956-1971, edited by Stuart Schram, Pantheon Books, New York, 1974, 352 pages.

A collection of documents which were published in China as part of the struggle against counter-revolutionaries within the Party during the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution.

The Secret Speeches of Chairman Mao – From the Hundred Flowers to the Great Leap Forward, edited by Roderick MacFarquhar, Timothy Cheek and Eugene Wu, Harvard Contemporary China Series No 6, 1989, 561 pages.

Speeches from 1957 and 1958.

Mao Papers – Anthology and Bibliography, edited by Jerome Ch’en, Oxford University Press, London, 1970, 221 pages.

The Thought of Mao Tse-tung, Anna Louise Strong, Communist Party of Great Britain, ND, 36 pages.

The following volumes contain various material produced by Chairman Mao in the years before the declaration of the People’s Republic of China in October 1949. They have been collected from numerous sources and their validity and accuracy cannot be verified. As with all collections of Mao’s writing published after his death, whether in China or outside, these have to be treated with care. The very title of the books (Mao’s Road to Power) should already start the alarm bells ringing. There are too many entities with an agenda to distort what he had written but are included here with the aim of making as much material as possible available to those with an interest in the ideas of one of the most significant thinkers of the 20th century.

Mao’s Road to Power – Volume 1, Revolutionary Writings 1912-1949, Volume 1 – The pre-Marxist period, 1912-1920. edited by Stuart Schram, ME Sharpe, New York, 1992, 639 pages.

Early writings of the young Mao Tse-tung as he was developing his own ideas before adopting Marxism as the basis of his ideology.

Mao’s Road to Power – Volume 2, Revolutionary Writings 1912-1949, Volume 2 – National Revolution and Social Revolution, December 1920 – June 1927, edited by Stuart Schram, ME Sharpe, New York, 1994, 543 pages.

The period in the 1920s when Mao was involved with both the Kuomintang and the young Chinese Communist Party, having an impact upon both.

The following volume (No 3) is in two parts due to file size limitations.

Mao’s Road to Power – Volume 3 – Part 1

Mao’s Road to Power – Volume 3 – Part 2

Revolutionary Writings 1912-1949, Volume 3 – From the Jinggangshan to the establishment of the Jiangxi Soviets July 1927 – December 1930, edited by Stuart Schram, ME Sharpe, New York, 1995, 771 pages.

Writings by Mao about the development of the Chinese Communist Party.

The start of Mao’s interest, and study, of military strategy and tactics.

Mao’s Road to Power – Volume 4, Revolutionary Writings 1912-1949, Volume 4 – The Rise and Fall of the Chinese Soviet Republic 1931-1934, edited by Stuart Schram, ME Sharpe, New York, 1997, 1004 pages.

The period of the Chinese Soviet republic in Jianxi and inner-Party struggles within the Communist Party of China

Mao’s Road to Power – Volume 5, Revolutionary Writings 1912-1949, Volume 5 – Toward the Second United Front, January 1935 – July 1937, edited by Stuart Schram, ME Sharpe, New York, 1999, 737 pages.

Covering the period of The Long March.

The following two volumes (Nos. 6 and 7) are also in two parts due to file size limitations.

Mao’s Road to Power – Volume 6 – Part 1

Mao’s Road to Power – Volume 6 – Part 2

Revolutionary Writings 1912-1949, Volume 6 – The New Stage, August 1937 – 1938, edited by Stuart Schram, ME Sharpe, New York, 2004, 867 pages.

The time of the United Front with the Kuomintang against Japanese aggression.

The period in which Mao outlined his interpretation of Dialectical Materialism in works such as On Contradiction and On Practice.

Mao’s Road to Power – Volume 7 – Part 1

Mao’s Road to Power – Volume 7 – Part 2

Revolutionary Writings 1912-1949, Volume 7 – New Democracy, 1939-1941, edited by Stuart Schram, ME Sharpe, New York, 2004, 897 pages.

The period of the development of guerrilla warfare and the establishment of base areas behind Japanese lines.

The tactic of flexible united fronts with the Kuomintang and various other groupings.

Mao’s Road to Power – Volume 8

Revolutionary Writings 1912-1949, Volume 8 – From Rectification to Coalition Government, 1942-July 1945, edited by Stuart Schram, Routledge, New York, 2015, 1436 pages.

When Chairman Mao stressed the necessity of aligning Marxist-Leninist theory with the Chinese reality, the Rectification Campaign.

The Thought of Mao Tse-Tung, Stuart Schram, Cambridge University Press, London, 1989, 242 pages.

Poetry

Mao Tse-tung Poems, FLP, Peking, 1976, 53 pages.

Many people may be surprised to learn that Chairman Mao was also an accomplished poet. Although one of the world’s most revolutionary thinkers his poetry very much follows the traditional style developed over the centuries.

Selected Readings

In the late 1960s/early 70s, as well as producing the Four Volumes of the Selected Works, the Foreign Languages Press also produced a volume of Selected Readings. This single volume contained many of the most important, and most studied, of Chairman Mao’s writings during the period of the Cultural Revolution – not just in China but in many countries of the world.

Selected Readings, FLP, Peking, 1971, 504 pages.

Mao Tse-Tung on Revolution and War, edited and with notes by M Rejai, Doubleday, New York, 1970, 452 pages.

A selection of articles prompted by the events of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution.

Writings on Military Affairs

It is sometimes forgotten that as well as being the principal theoretical leader of the Chinese Revolution Chairman Mao was also a very able military commander. During his lifetime various collections of writings devoted to military affair were published. Although useful in a military sense to this day it is important top remember Chairman Mao’s dictum of always ‘putting politics in command’ – without that military success will always be transitory.

Selected Military Writings, FLP, Peking, 1963, 408 pages.

Contains articles such as:

Why is it Red Political Power can Exist in China?

On Correcting Mistaken Ideas in the Party

Problems of War and Strategy

Manifesto of the Chinese People’s Liberation Army

On Protracted War, FLP, Peking, 1967, 116 pages.

Not just a treatise on warfare but one of Chairman Mao’s most important contributions to Marxist-Leninist theory.

Six Essays on Military Affairs, FLP, Peking, 1972, 393 pages.

Six of the most important and relevant essays that Chairman Mao wrote related to the successful outcome of a military campaign.

On Guerrilla Warfare, US marine Corps, Washington, 1989, 128 pages.

A pamphlet with the basic principles of Guerrilla Warfare that was widely disseminated throughout ‘Free’ China after it was first published in 1937. Produced by the US military, thereby proving the importance of ‘knowing your enemy’. Surprisingly not published in the Selected Works.

Mao Zedong’s Art Of War, Liu Jikun, Hai Feng, Hong Kong, 1993, 277 pages.

A look at Chairman Mao’s military strategy as it was put into practice in the National Liberation War against the Japanese invaders and then the Civil War against the reactionary Kuomintang forces under the leadership of Chiang Kai-shek.

Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung – The ‘Little Red Book’

Produced in millions, in dozens of languages, in the late 1960s and early 1970s, here we have short quotations that distil the essence of Mao Tse-tung Thought.

Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung, FLP, Peking, 1966, 312 pages.

Literature and Art

From the very early days of the struggle to free his country from foreign domination Chairman Mao was aware of the importance of literature and art in any National Liberation struggle as it enabled the oppressed people to establish their own, independent identity. This was developed as the successful struggle of the Chinese People against the Japanese invaders developed into a Civil War for the establishment of a Socialist state. The importance of literature and art probably reached its apogee in China during the Great Socialist Cultural Revolution when the likes of Peking Opera was adapted to represent the struggles and desires of the working people. That theoretical basis came from Mao’s writings during the Anti-Japanese war of Resistance.

Mao Tse-Tung on Art and Literature, FLP, Peking, 1960, 145 pages. (Contains a lot of underlining.) An early compilation, with slightly different contents from the 1967 version (below).

On Literature And Art, FLP, Peking, 1967, 162 pages.

Includes:

Talks at the Yenan Forum on Literature and Art – May 1942

Reform Our Study

Oppose Stereotyped Party Writing

The Problem of Culture, Education and the Intellectuals

Talks at the Yenan Forum on Literature and Art, FLP, Peking, 1967, 42 pages.

Two presentations given at the conference in May 1942.

Five documents on Literature and Art, FLP, Peking, 1967, 12 pages.

Five very short articles addressing the issue of the importance of literature and art in the building of Socialism

Mao Zedong’s Talks at the Yan’an Conference on Literaure and Art, a translation of the 1943 text with commentary, Bonnie S McDougall, Centre for Chinese Studies, University of Michigan, 1980, 112 pages.

A new translation of Chairman Mao’s ‘Talks at the Yenan Forum on Literature and Art’ together with a commentary on the elements of literary theory that it contains.

On Philosophy

Separating Chairman Mao’s writings into different ‘categories’ is always going to be problematic as all aspects of the struggle are inter-related. This pamphlet, of four essays, was one of those most studied during the period of the Great Socialist Cultural Revolution.

Four Essays on Philosophy, FLP, Peking, 1966, 136 pages.

Contains:

On Practice

On Contradiction

On the correct handing of contradictions among the people

Where do the correct ideas come from?

The Wisdom of Mao Tse-tung, Philosophical Library, New York, 1968, 114 pages. (Quite a lot of underlining.)

Contains the three important articles; On Practice, On Contradiction and On New Democracy.

Five Essays on Philosophy, Foreign Languages Press, Utrecht, 2018, 189 pages.

On Contradiction Study Companion, Redspark Collective, Foreign Languages Press, Paris, 2019.

On Practice and On Contradiction, November 8th Publishing House, Ottawa 2022, 101 pages.

Individual Pamphlets

Before the publication of the Selected Works and Selected Readings (downloadable above) many individual pamphlets were produced of the writings of Chairman Mao in the early 1960s, in advance of the Cultural Revolution. Some of those are reproduced below. More will be added as and when they become available.

China and the Second Imperialist World War, International Publishers, New York, 1939, 50 pages.

Addresses and interviews by Chairman Mao between May and October 1939.

China’s New Democracy, Progress Books, Toronto, 1944, 72 pages.

An article written by Chairman Mao in 1940 before the war in Europe expanded to include the Soviet Union and before its extension as a World War.

People’s Democratic Dictatorship, Lawrence and Wishart, London, 1950, 40 pages.

Speeches made by Chairman Mao in 1949, just before the declaration of the People’s Republic of China.

On the tactics of fighting Japanese Imperialism, FLP, Peking, 1960, 41 pages.

Comrade Mao Tse-tung here explains, in great detail, the possibility and the importance of re-establishing a united front with the national bourgeoisie on the condition of resisting the Japanese.

On Strengthening the Party Committee System, FLP, Peking, 1961, 9 pages.

NO revolution of workers and peasants has achieved a modicum of success, with a chance of lasting more than the 61 days (which includes a week of slaughter of the Communards) of the Paris Commune in France (1871), WITHOUT an organised M-L Party. Get it wrong and the revolution will fail, thousands of workers will die and the revolution will be put back more than a generation.

Our study and the current situation, Appendix: Resolution on certain questions in the history of our Party, FLP, Peking, 1962, 90 pages.

This was a speech made by Comrade Mao Tse-tung at a meeting of senior cadres in Yenan on April 12th 1944 on the subject of the discussions about the history of the ‘Left’ elements within the Party between 1931 and 1934.

Report on an Investigation of the Peasant Movement in Hunan, FLP, Peking, 1965, 52 pages.

This article was written in March 1927 as a reply to the carping criticisms both inside and outside the Party then being levelled at the peasants’ revolutionary struggle. Comrade Mao Tse-tung spent thirty-two days in Hunan Province making an investigation and wrote this report in order to answer these criticisms.

Notes On Mao Tse-tung’s ‘Report on an investigation of the peasant movement in Hunan’, Chen Po-ta, FLP, Peking, 1966, 56 pages.

Preface and Postscripts to Rural Surveys, FLP, Peking, 1966, 8 pages.

Written by Chairman Mao in 1941 in an effort to encourage Party comrades to understand the contemporary situation rather than get caught in thinking that matters don’t change.

A Single Spark can start a Prairie Fire, FLP, Peking, 1966, 18 pages.

Even when is looks like there are so many problems surrounding us that a revolutionary change is impossible we have to remember from a small acorn a mighty oak can grow – all it needs is the right conditions – and under capitalism those conditions are created by the next crisis around the corner!

Chairman Mao Tse-tung’s important talks with guests from Asia, Africa and Latin America, FLP, Peking, 1966, 9 pages.

In May and June 1960 in Tsinan, Chengchow, Wuhan and Shanghai, Chairman Mao received delegations and other friends from the countries and regions in Latin America and Africa and from Japan, Iraq, Iran and Cyprus, who were then visiting China.

Current Problems of Tactics in the Anti-Japanese United Front, FLP, Peking, 1966, 14 pages.

Chairman Mao wrote this outline for a report he made on March 11th 1940 at a meeting of the Party’s senior cadres in Yenan.

For the Mobilization of all the Nation’s Forces for victory in the War of Resistence, FLP, Peking, 1966, 10 pages.

This was an outline for propaganda and agitation written by Chairman Mao on August 25th 1937 for the propaganda organs of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party. It was approved by the enlarged meeting of the Political Bureau of the Central Committee at Lochuan, northern Shensi.

On the question of Agricultural Co-operation, FLP, Peking, 1966, 36 pages.

This was a report delivered by Chairman Mao on July 31st 1955 at a conference of secretaries of provincial, municipal and autonomous regional committees of the Communist Party of China.

Talk with the American Correspondent Anna Louise Strong, FLP, Peking, 1967, 8 pages.

Two conversations of Chairman Mao with an American journalist, when the war of liberation against the Japanese invaders had been won and the war against the US/UK /Western imperialist war was taking place against the Kuomintang – the US puppets of what became Taiwan – was still in full force. She was a true friend or revolutionary China and wrote many books to this effect.

The Orientation of the Youth Movement, FLP, Peking, 1967, 16 pages.

This was a speech delivered by the Chairman on May 4th 1939 at a mass meeting of youth in Yenan to commemorate the twentieth anniversary of the May 4th Movement. It represented a development in his ideas on the question of the Chinese Revolution.

Analysis of the Classes in Chinese Society, FLP, Peking, 1967, 13 pages.

ALL revolutionary movements, whatever country or epoch, need to understand the society in which they are working. A knowledge and understanding of the balance of class forces is vital for the success, or failure, of the revolution.

Why is it Red Political Power can exist in China? FLP, Peking, 1967, 15 pages.

This article was part of the resolution, originally entitled ‘The Political Problems and the Tasks of the Border Area Party Organization’, which was drafted by Comrade Mao Tse-tung on October 5, 1928 for the Second Party Congress of the Hunan-Kiangsi Border Area.

On the People’s Democratic Dictatorship, FLP, Peking, 1967, 21 pages.

This article was written on June 30th 1949 to commemorate the twenty-eighth anniversary of the Communist Party of China.

To be attacked by the enemy is not a bad thing but a good thing, FLP, Peking, 1967, 5 pages.

To be attacked by the enemy is not a bad thing but a good thing.

You know when you are following a correct line when the capitalist and imperialist attack your policies.

Three fundamental articles, FLP, Peking, 1967, 12 pages.

Three revolutionary ‘parables’;

Serve the people

In memory of Norman Bethune

The foolish old man who removed the mountains.

Urgent Tasks following the Establishment of Kuomintang-Communist Co-operation, FLP, Peking, 1968, 16 pages.

The need for China to resolve internal differences in order to present a United Front against the principal enemy, the Japanese imperialist aggressors

Win the masses in their millions for the Anti-Japanese National United Front, FLP, Peking, 1968, 14 pages.

This was the concluding speech made by Chairman Mao at the National Conference of the Communist Party of China held in May 1937.

People of the world unite and defeat the US aggressors and all their running dogs

A call by the Chairman for the people of the world to stand up against US imperialism. As valid now as when it was written. Published as a supplement to the weekly political and informative magazine ‘Peking Review’.

People of the world unite and defeat the US aggressors and all their running dogs Published in China Reconstructs, 1970, No. 5, Supplement No. 2.

Marxism and the Liberation of Women, Quotations from Karl Marx, Frederick Engels, VI Lenin, Joseph Stalin and Mao Tse-tung, Union of Women for Liberation, London, n.d., mid-1970s?, 64 pages. Includes a statement of aims of the Union of Women for Liberation.

Record of the Conversation from Chairman Mao’s Audience with the Albanian Women’s Delegation and Albanian Film Workers, May 15 1964, Wilson Centre Digital Archive, ND, 7 pages.

On the Communist Press, Lenin, Stalin and Mao Tsetung, Canadian Communist League (Marxist-Leninist), n.d., 200 pages.

The works of Chairman Mao in languages other than English

The writings of Chairman Mao Tse-tung were produced in many different languages. Here we present a few in Spanish.

Citas del Presidente Mao Tse-tung, Ediciones en Lenguas Extanjeras, Pekin, 1967, 208 pages.

‘El pequeño libro rojo’ de citas de las obras del Presidente Mao Tse-tung.

Comentarios sobre el Manual de Economia Politica Sovietico, Lima SA, Peru, ND, 166 pages.

Los comentarios del Presidente Mao sobre el Manual de Economía Política Soviético (un libro de texto por Comunistas) y sobre el libro Problemas Económicos del Socialismo en la URSS de José Stalin.

La guerra de guerrillas, Editorial Huemul, Buenos Aires, 1973, 91 pages.

Un pequeño libro con los principios fundamentales de La guerra de guerrillas, originalmente publicada en 1937.

Cinco Tésis Filosòficas, Lima, Peru, ND, 112 pages.

Sobre la Práctica

Sobre la Contradicción

Sobre el tratamiento correcto de las contradicciones en el seno del pueblo

Discurso ante la conferencia nacional del PCP sobre el trabajo de propaganda

¿De dónde provienen las ideas correctas?

The death of Chairman Mao Tse-tung

The edition of Peking Review that announced the death of Comrade Mao Tse-tung, Peking Review, No 38, 1976.

Eternal Glory to the Great Leader and Teacher Chairman Mao Tse-tung, FLP, Peking, 1976, 40 pages.

Memorial speech by Hua Kuo-feng and the decision to construct the memorial hall in Tien an Men Square, Peking.

Contemporary Translations and Commentaries

Chairman Mao’s Primary Directives, Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party: Document 4 (1976), issued by the General Office of the Central Committee, March 3, 1976, 2 pages. Includes critical comments by Mao on Deng Xiaoping and his associates.

Mao’s Talk with Members of the Politburo who were in Peking, May 3, 1975 – with extensive notes and context information added, 15 pages.

More on China …..

The Great ‘Marxist-Leninist’ Theoreticians

The ‘East is Red Square’ Nanjiecun

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The East is Red Square, Nanjiecun

The East is Red Square, Nanjiecun

Nanjiecun (South Street Village) is in Linying County, Henan Province in the central part of the People’s Republic of China. What makes this place special (with a population of no more than 13,000 people) is the fame it has achieved as being ‘the last Maoist Commune in China.’ 

Whether it’s really possible for such a small place to maintain a Socialist Revolution is more than questionable, having to depend upon both loans from the Chinese capitalist banks as well as external, Japanese, investment. It can really be no more than a tolerated anomaly, a curiosity or a tourist theme park. If it ever posed a threat to the present day ‘capitalist roaders’ in Beijing then Nanjiecun would be crushed, both literally and figuratively, out of existence. 

The fact that Nanjiecun exists (as does the politics and the actions of its people in the village of Marinaleda, in southern Spain) only goes to show the limitations of a small group of people attempting to build something better in a huge ocean of exploitation and oppression. Their efforts may be applauded and, at times, admired but we should never forget that to extend such ‘experiments’ demands the destruction of the present capitalist structure and until that is achieved (on a long-term, multi-generational basis) all is but chimera.

However, the merits or otherwise of Nanjiecun are not the subject of this post. A proper analysis of what has happened there – and why only there – since the destruction of Socialism in China would need a thorough study to understand why the Chinese people, in general, have rejected a past where the potential for the betterment of all has been rejected for the benefit and advancement of a relatively few corrupt thieves who are now some of the richest people int he world. It would also require a proper analysis of how we actually measure ‘poverty’. Capitalist standards are only concerned with ‘things’ and not the, sometimes, financially unquantifiable social capital that Socialism brings – the ‘iron rice bowl’ in the Chinese context.

No, this post is concerned with a single area of this present day commune – The East is Red Square.

In the Socialist societies in Europe (including the Soviet Union) the Communist Parties sought to commemorate the revolutionary past (and present) with statues. (One of the fallen statues, of Frederick Engels, from the Ukraine has even been recently installed anew in Manchester.) This preponderance of statues was not the case – at least to the same extent – in China. Yes, there were innumerable posters of Chairman Mao and his image was everywhere, on posters, in paintings and on the badges worn by most of the population. However, statues as such were relatively few. This means that when a statue has been installed – at the same time as the renegades within the Communist Party of China are going further and further away from Chairman Mao’s ideas – there’s always a story behind the decision, although sometimes that story might be difficult to find.

The large statue of Chairman Mao in front of the railway station in Dandong (the principal border crossing point between China and the Democratic People’s Republic of Korea) is a case in point. So far I have failed to find out any information of why or when.

The situation is clearer in Nanjiecun.

The people in the village decided to reject and roll back the ‘de-collectivisation’ and privatisation that was becoming the norm in China with Deng Xiaoping’s claim that ‘to get rich is glorious’. Selfishness, that had been challenged in the years following Mao’s declaration of the People’s Republic in 1949, was turned into a virtue and the predominantly peasant population of the country fell back into the insularity and individuality of their backward, pre-revolutionary, rural culture. 

Nanjiecun’s ‘experiment’ must have been relatively successful in the 1980s as there was enough surplus for them to pay for the installation of a large statue of Chairman Mao in what is now known as ‘The East is Red Square’. The statue was erected in 1993 and I assume it was inaugurated on the 26th December – the centenary of Chairman Mao’s birth.

At some time in the next decade the four large portraits of the ‘greats’ of Marxism-Leninism – Karl Marx, Frederick Engels, Vladimir Ilyich Lenin and Joseph Stalin – were added to the monumentality of the square. (I, personally, would have added a fifth – Enver Hoxha of Albania – but I know a number of Maoists would not agree.)

There’s always a potential problem when it comes to Socialist art – nuance can be everything. To give an idea of how this is an issue I’ll refer to capitalist commentators who can ‘see’ subversion in a painting or a musical score produced in the Soviet Union that went unnoticed by the authorities (i.e., the ‘intellectuals’ were too clever for the ‘stupid’ Communists) only seconds after arguing that art is ‘apolitical’ and that capitalist art doesn’t aim to perpetuate the system. It’s not their analysis I dislike and detest – it’s their crass hypocrisy

I’ve always argued that art IS political and so it’s valid to critically evaluate any new monuments or ‘celebrations’ of the past (in whatever form they might take place) that might be appearing in China. As the present leader, Deng IV, seems to be attempting to take on some of the trappings of Mao – stripped of any revolutionary, Communist ideology – this might become an issue in the not too distant future.

It’s possible to attack Mao by praising Mao – this was something that took place during the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution. After attacking the so-called ‘personality cult’ of Mao from the late 1970s those enemies of Maoism could well create a new ‘personality cult’ of Mao based solely on the person.

Chairman Mao in Dandong

Chairman Mao in Dandong

The Chinese Revisionists and Counter-revolutionaries have been unable to achieve the same rejection of Mao as happened in the Soviet Union with Lenin and Stalin or in Albania with Hoxha. Mao is still seen in China, by the overwhelming majority of the population, as a great Chinese leader – millions still queue every year to visit the Mao Mausoleum in Tienanmen Square in Beijing. It’s possible, therefore, that those who seek to establish greater legitimacy and maintain their hold on power will try to play the nationalist card and turn Mao into a purely ‘Chinese’ personality – the antithesis of how Mao would have seen his achievements – thus turning the country inward. This is not that far-fetched as it might seem as the level of nationalistic fervour has been stoked up in recent years to justify China’s imperialistic ambitions.

All this doesn’t accept what made Mao great in the first place – that was the taking of Marxism-Leninism, applying it in the Chinese context and by learning from both the success and mistakes of the past Socialist revolutions developing the theory of the Cultural Revolution and taking Marxism to a new level, (although becoming a bit of a mouthful) to Marxism-Leninism-Maoism.

The statue of Mao in Dandong is one such example of this new, depoliticised, depiction of the great Chinese leader. There’s nothing on, or around, the statue which refers to what made him such a great leader in the first place, his uniqueness as a leader of the world proletariat and peasantry – his being a revolutionary Communist. It’s a great statue but you get the impression that, like the statues of the Roman Emperors, you could just replace the head with whoever was in power at the time and there would be no real difference. As it stands at the moment it’s just a statue of a 60 year old wearing a big overcoat who, for some unknown reason, has his right hand raised and pointing to some unknown location in front of him.

The statue of Mao in Nanjiecun doesn’t suffer from that defect. Coming from those who knew the importance of the politics, of the necessity of a Communist Party, of the necessity of a revolutionary ideology, all these attributes are represented in the statue itself in a very simple and almost unobtrusive manner, but there nonetheless, – and that’s the star on the cap he holds in his hand.

The Red Star

The Red Star

As I’ve written in a number of posts about the Albanian lapidars (such as the mosaic on the Historical Museum, the mosaic of Bestrove, the Durres monument to the anti-Fascist struggle, amongst others) where the star has often been the target of the fascists and reactionaries – eradicate that and they think they can eradicate Communist politics. So including it in a ‘new’ monument the people of Nanjiecun made their own political statement.

That political statement was made even stronger with the addition of the four portraits of the Marxist ‘Greats’. Whether whoever designed the layout of the square considered how it would look when completed what we have now is a history of the development of Marxism thought through; successes and failures; revolutions and counter-revolutions; twists and turns; suffering and sacrifice; elation and despair, to arrive at where we are now with Maoism being the pinnacle of the development of the revolutionary theory of the working class. We are not in a situation that we would have wished just over a hundred years after the October Revolution of 1917 but we are where we are. At least the revolutionary theory has moved forward. Whether we make the most use of all that history is another matter.

In a sense the statue and portraits in The East is Red Square are in a bit of a time warp – that of the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution. Mao’s image is of what he would have looked like in the mid 1960s and the paintings of the four Marxists are almost exact copies of the coloured posters that were available throughout the world from the late 1960s until the counter-revolutionary coup of Deng and his goons after the death of the Chairman in September 1976.

JV Stalin

JV Stalin

The portraits are behind Mao as he looks to the east. In front of him, on either side, are two large billboards with a lot of text in Chinese characters. (In fact for a Socialist political monument there’s a lot of text full stop – including on the plinth upon which Mao stands. Although unusual it shows the level of literacy that the Socialist state had achieved during the time of Communism. The people can actually understand what is written – unlike most religious locations throughout the world where emphasis is upon image due to the high level so of illiteracy.) 

The one on Mao’s right also carries an image which looks very much like the photo of him making the declaration of the People’s Republic in Tienanmen Square in October 1949. Unfortunately I’m not able to understand Chinese characters but would surmise that the text is that very declaration.

Declaration of the People's Republic of China 1949

Declaration of the People’s Republic of China 1949

On his left the image is of an older Mao, probably from the 1960s, so I would hazard a guess that the text is from one of the exhortations he made from the podium over the Gate of Heavenly Peace to the massed Red Guards in Tienanmen Square.

The area has changed over the years. I’ve seen photos where there were trees behind the statue. They might have been OK as bushes but started to become a bit much after a few years and they have been removed so the immediate area around the statue is now clean and clear. I’ve also read that there was a permanent ‘guard’ at the site but there was no evidence of that during the (regrettably short) time I was there. Also there was no music playing (as is often reported) so don’t know if this is the now permanent situation.

I made a number of mistakes and got to the village quite late in the afternoon and many of the places immediately next to the square were closed so I wasn’t able to get a feeling of how the area had been developed for the growing number of tourists that visit Nanjiecun. 

Getting there

It’s possible to stay in the Commune’s own hotel, which is located right next to the square. The problem is one of communication as the staff only speak Mandarin.

If a day trip is all that is looked for then getting to Linying railway station is the best bet and then walking a kilometre or so or getting a taxi to the village. There are also regular buses from Zhengzhou (the nearest big tourist destination) to Linying.

GPS:

33.80611111

113.95416667

DMS:

33º48’21.9”

113º57’15.2”

 

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Train Travel in China – things you need to know

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Nanning East Railway Station

Nanning East Railway Station

As I’ve recently made a number of long train journeys on the Chinese Railway system I thought it might be useful to record some information that might make it easier for others to do so in the future. At times doing anything independently in China can be daunting but perhaps up-to-date information, without (hopefully, too much) negativity will help ease the pain. What makes China difficult is the language, the lack of signage that helps when you really need it and the seeming impossibility (at the times you most need it) to find out where to go for the information you are after.

Perhaps the first thing to mention about train travel in China is the fact that the railway stations are becoming vast, huge structures that make European main line railway stations look like small town stops in comparison. Although older stations were big those that are being built now dwarf those of the past and can become a problem for unwary travellers. Added to this is the increase in the number of indigenous travellers (the reason for the huge stations) and a perceived security threat which means that both persons and luggage undergo a check before anyone can enter the main building concourse. (Similar, but not as vigorous, security checks also take place on all the stations of the Beijing Metro system.) This can lead to long queues to even enter the station before you have to look for, and get to, the relevant waiting area/platform.

Nanning East Railway Station - What you can and cannot have in luggage

Nanning East Railway Station – What you can and cannot have in luggage

Buying tickets

The process of buying tickets has improved vastly in the last few years – thanks to the internet. The queues in railway stations used to be interminable – and can still be long – and the system was very confusing (and lack of anything other than Chinese characters over the windows didn’t help). Now you can find out timetables, book and buy tickets on your own computer/smart phone. One site I’ve used with no problems whatsoever is Ctrip. You pay a percentage commission on the ticket price but it saves a lot of problems and the commission is not that great – Chinese railways being relatively cheap compared to those in western Europe.

There is, however, the matter of picking up the actual ticket itself which can be very dependent on the location of the station – some seem to be better organised than others. If you are faced with a seeming infinite number of ticket windows and you haven’t encountered a friendly and helpful staff member then look for a sign in one of the windows that says ‘The dining time is 12.30 – 13.10’ – in English. The actual time might differ slightly but this is the window to which foreigners were directed in the past, before the advent of internet booking. (In Guangzhou Station, for example, this is window 82 in Ticket Office No 3.) Present the printed out voucher (or whatever is on your phone via the app) – a 9 digit number preceded by an E – plus your identification, normally a passport, – a photocopy will do – which has the same information that you filled in at the time of booking.

This process shouldn’t really take that long, it all depends on the queue so it makes sense to arrive at the station in enough time to take account of contingencies.

As even the locals are using the internet for booking tickets there are more and more automatic machines being installed in the major stations. Unfortunately all the instructions are in Chinese and you have to present your ID to an electronic reader. I doubt whether it would accept a foreign document. The installation of these machines is the main reason that queues for tickets no longer go around the block.

The ticket office is sometimes outside of the actual area identified as secure – it seems to very much depend upon local preferences – but be prepared to show ID to enter to get your ticket (and depart if on another day). At some time before getting on to the actual concourse you will have to go through a security scan – of both yourself and your luggage. This might also be before or after your ticket has been checked, either manually or by a machine. I’ve not come across any standardisation in the process. However, it doesn’t normally take too long as there are enough people to process the crowds that go through major Chinese Railway Stations. You will all have read or heard about the ‘greatest migration in human history outside of war’ that takes place every year during the Spring Festival (Chinese New Year) but that movement goes on every day in numbers which are unimaginable in Europe.

Guangzhou Railway Concourse

Guangzhou Railway Concourse

At the station

Once on the concourse you can normally forget any helpful signs in English and you have to depend upon your own wits and common sense. It seems as if all the signage up to now has been designed with the distinct aim of trapping you into a sense of complacency. Apart from anything else watch what others do – and on your first time through a station arrive in plenty of time so you can learn enough of the basics without getting into a panic as the clock ticks.

Use the combination of the train number and the time to identify your particular train and to learn the number of the platform. The barrier in the waiting room won’t be opened much more than about 20 minutes or so before the train’s scheduled departure time. Once it does there will normally be a stampede but as seats are allocated you don’t have to join the rush – as with the rush to get on planes this panic is so that people can store their luggage in the limited space.

Depending upon the age of the station there will possibly be two gates, one with a blue notice and one with a red one above them. These refer to the colour of your ticket. Blue is for the vast majority of travellers. The red is for those who have requested some sort of special assistance or who fall into the category of being accorded a privileged status. This includes the elderly and the disabled. As a foreigner it would not be considered amiss if you counted yourself in this category and would normally pass through the red channel without difficulty. In China foreigners are considered to be not quite complete people and together with the idea that you are a guest in their country this situation creates a strange relationship. The red tickets are checked manually and the blue (normally) go through the automatic gates. The gates are likely to close 5 minutes before the train’s scheduled departure time.

Although, from my experience, the trains in China are quite reliable I did encounter a couple of cancellations. That would have been less of a problem if I had been able to understand the signs. If you see something similar to that in the picture below, or a board with a paper sign appears the other side of the barrier where you expected to leave, then head straight to the booking office to exchange your ticket for the next available train. Any delay might mean you will find that seats are limited or non-existent on the next train to your destination. Although the railway company must know of these cancellations long before the train is due they tend to leave any notification of this to the very last minute.

Cancelled Train Notice

Cancelled Train Notice

Once through those gates the ticket will not be checked as you get on the train UNLESS you have a sleeping berth. That ticket will be checked by the attendant standing smartly to attention at the door of the carriage. In the sleeping carriages, soon after departure, you will hand your ticket to the attendant and you will be given another card in its place. This is so the attendants know exactly where you are getting off. This can be very handy if you are due to arrive at your station at three o’clock in the morning. You effectively get a knock up call just in case you oversleep. The returned ticket will then allow you to exit the station.

At intermediate stations the passengers who are leaving the train will get off before the new passengers are allowed on the platform – at least at the larger stations and cities. This avoids any mad crush as people rush for all available space.

It might be worthwhile here emphasising that there’s no real notice given about when the train will depart – for example there are no announcements made on the platform or in the train itself. Yes an announcement will be made (although only in Chinese) about where the train is bound, where it has come from and on which platform it can be found but not its imminent departure. This means that if you are one of those who likes to get off at stations don’t stray too far way from your train so you can keep an eye on departure preparation activity.

Sleeping and overnight trains

As we’re on the sleepers some more information. The sleeping compartments are basically of two kinds, called soft and hard sleepers. It doesn’t mean that in the hard sleeper you are sleeping on hard wooden boards, the difference between the two is the soft has four berths and the hard six to each compartment. In the ‘hard’ carriage this makes for a tight squeeze (66 people in total in 11 bays) and seating space is at a premium once everyone wakes up. In the ‘soft’ the space is useable during the day as well as the night without anyone really being put out as the compartments are those that used to exist on virtually all railway systems before the introduction of open carriages. The ‘soft’ compartments have doors whilst the ‘hard’ open directly out into the corridor – so the level of privacy is very different.

Soft Sleeper Compartment

Soft Sleeper Compartment

The difference in price between the two is, very roughly, about 30%. On the other hand a simple seat would cost half the price of a hard sleeper and a third of that of the soft sleeper.

The beds will be partially made up when you board. The pillow and duvet piled up at one end – that’s for you to sort out how and when you wish. The temperature is normally quite well controlled in these carriages but you will probably welcome the warmth that the duvet provides in the early hours of the morning, if not before.

In each compartment of the soft beds there will be a water flask in a container on the floor and beside that a small rubbish bin. There will also be one power socket which accepts the two small round pin plug and the two or three flat pin plug. You are amongst the privileged in this day and age. Power is at a premium for charging mobile phones and there are no sockets in the seating carriages of the train (apart from the High Speed Trains). That means that after someone has been on the train for any length of time they will be searching for a power socket with the same intensity as a junkie looking for his/her fix. As a foreigner, especially if you are in a carriage by yourself/selves, and the door is open during the day you are quite likely to get asked for access to this source of such importance.

There are also a couple of sockets in the corridor of the carriage and these also get visits from the hoi poloi. However to get power from these sockets you are very much out in the open and are more likely to be chased by the attendants if seen. In the compartments they are more likely to get away with being in a part of the train where they are not technically supposed to be. Whether they get chased very much depends upon the attendants. Travel ‘soft sleeper’ and you are travelling in the small, First Class section of the particular train. Why, when everyone knows that the demand for power is so great that sockets aren’t available in all parts of the train is a question I’m not even going to bother to ask.

Soft Sleeper Corridor

Soft Sleeper Corridor

At the head of each berth there is a reading light so you can continue to read or whatever once the main light has been switched off. From my experience Chinese travellers are early to bed once the train gets moving (the same happens on long distance buses as well) and there won’t be a great deal of movement after 22.00.

Each compartment door can be locked from the inside. If you do so you can expect to be awoken in the middle of the night if someone has a berth booked in your compartment. They can always get in quietly by getting the attendant to open the door with their key but someone might be impatient to get to bed themselves. However, the lock does provide a greater security and peace of mind.

In the corridor there are fold down seats between the windows. These are useful places if you find the compartment a little claustrophobic and it offers an opportunity to look out the window and contemplate the problems of the world – although this is one of the reasons for undertaking such long distance train journeys in the first place, isn’t it?

At one end of the carriage there will be a constant supply of hot drinking water from a boiler. This causes a constant stream of visitors either to make tea or to rehydrate the box of E number chemicals that pose as food under the name ‘instant noodles’.

Most such carriages also have a toilet at either end. It’s likely that one of them will be the squat version. Bring your own toilet paper – you should be doing that as you travel anyway. At one end there will be the carriage attendant’s room and next to that will be a wash room with three wash basins and cold water taps.

Smoking is not permitted at the seats or in the sleeping compartments on these types of trains (the more ‘traditional’ type compared with the high speed versions now more common on the Chinese railway where smoking if forbidden throughout) but is permitted in the area between carriages so don’t be surprised to get a whiff of the acrid smell of burnt tobacco from time to time.

Eating

There will be a restaurant car, very likely next to the carriage/s with the soft sleeper berths which are normally in the middle of the train. This was problematic a few years ago as the staff would be reluctant to approach a foreigner if they couldn’t speak any English. To avoid a problem of communication you could be ignored. That has changed now and menus will in English as well as Mandarin and the staff might also be more competent in English. Travellers have to be reasonable in these situations – how many workers on European railways are multilingual, especially in the UK? A simple dish, which includes rice, will cost (in 2017) about 30 RMB – about £3.00.

However, if you choose not to go to the restaurant car trolleys constantly ply along the corridor during the whole of the journey selling the sort of cold convenience foods that are found in supermarkets, the likes of crisps and Chinese speciality snacks as well as the ubiquitous ‘instant noodles’. Fruit wrapped in cling film will also make a showing. At recognise meal times (around 06.00, 12.00 and 18.00) one or two hot meal options will be available, freshly made in the restaurant kitchen, for example, hot porridge and noodles for breakfast. If you are keen on alcohol then you have to bring it yourself – it’s not sold from the trolleys that ply the corridors and neither is it available at station stops when there might be more than a few minutes before departure.

From my experience they can move through the soft sleeper carriages quite quickly as often many of the doors will be closed so you either have to listen out for them and move quite fast or hang around the entrance of the compartment at meal times. As an example of price, in 2017, a bowl of breakfast noodles, which I thought were tasty enough, was 10 RMB, about a pound sterling.

Eating is different on the High Speed Trains. There’s no restaurant as such, the journeys being of a much shorter duration, and meals and drinks will be brought to your seat once it has been ordered from the staff who pass along the carriages. A basic meal and a drink will cost about 25 RMB, about £2.50. There are also power points at each seat – although their location makes using them with an adapter impossible.

Staying connected

Free WiFi is also on offer in the soft sleeper area. I found this a bit hit and miss. You connect to the provider on the list that looks like a list of symbols and shows ‘excellent’ as the level of reception. A screen will come up with all the instructions in Chinese but below them is a large green button. I found I had to click on that to get any further. On my journeys the reception was erratic. It will also send alarm signals to your email server who will send security messages to the allocated email address.

Beijing Railway Station Platform

Beijing Railway Station Platform

‘Essentials’ for long distance, over-night travel

Virtually all passengers who will be travelling overnight in a sleeping compartment will change into the sort of clothing that they would have if they were in their own homes – in Asia there’s a distinct demarcation line between the ‘street’ and the home. And if only for one or two nights the train becomes the home. So after arriving in smart outdoor clothing most of the passengers will be seen dressed in the likes of track suits – both the men and the women. A pair of slippers or flip flops would also be useful.

It’s unlikely that anyone would really have trouble sleeping in the soft sleeper. Apart from the creaks and groans, squeaks and moans from the train carriages themselves you are, more or less, insulated from the rest of the world. That might not be the same in the hard sleeper carriages where there is a higher concentration of people, together with their snores and nightmares. At least there it is dark when people go to sleep, that is not necessarily the case in the seating parts of the train.

Wherever you might find yourself there’s a local solution to sleeplessness which also includes an element of local culture. That is to drink the Chinese liquor baijiu. This is, normally, made from grain and is a clear liquid. Normally around 52% proof a couple of these will knock out most people if they have had a long day travelling.

There are a couple of hurdles, nonetheless. Some of the cheaper options can smell similar to paint stripper so it’s not a drink to appreciate in the same way as you might a half decent wine. Next is overcoming the first mouthful. You know how strong it is as the lips become slightly numb on first contact. As the liquid passes down the throat the burning sensation lasts only a short time as it takes a small piece of the lining with it. After that it’s plain sailing. A few of these and you will be the one keeping everyone else awake. And it won’t, unless you really want to, break the bank. A bottle of 500ml in a local supermarket cost 10.80 RMB – that’s equivalent to just over a pound sterling.

Another ‘essential’ is a box of tea bags. I’m old enough to remember Lipton’s tea in the UK. You don’t see it there at all now but whoever owns Lipton’s doesn’t care as it has an intro in some of the most populous countries on the planet. Why worry about the demise of the corner shop in England when they can sell their products in hundreds of thousands of locations in China with a population of 1.5 billion and climbing. Such goods are ‘aspirational’ for those who want to consider themselves internationalists in the new capitalist China and although the tea might not be as good as that produced for the tea ceremonies it is more than adequate for a lengthy train journey. As stated before hot water is permanently available in the public areas of the train.

Another travelling essential is an unbreakable drinking container. I favour the stainless steel cups that are used for water in Indian vegetarian restaurants. Cheap and virtually indestructible when travelling.

High Speed Trains

The network of High Speed Trains is expanding so rapidly in China that the slower way of travelling might be under threat in the near future. But it comes, at a price, literally. For example, on a High Speed Train, the journey from Nanning (in Guangxi) to Beijing will take just under 14 hours and will cost: 914 RMB 2nd Class, 1,379 RMB 1st Class and 2,853 RMB Business Class. On the other hand the slower, overnight train will take 23½ hours and will cost: 751 RMB Soft Sleeper and 487 RMB Hard Sleeper. It all depends upon whether you are time or money poor.

The fast rains have their charm, reaching speeds of 310 Km per hour, but like all high speed trains around the world the experience is sterile and you feel separate from the environment through which you are travelling.