by, Jung Chang
Chang's memoirs fall someplace between a historian's broad view and a novelist's deeply personal story . She has a beautiful way of chronicling a good deal of political history and still portraying how the events actually felt. She puts a face on tragedies that effected millions of people. This book changed my worldview of politics.
Wild Swans is a poignant look through the eyes of three generations of women living through the turmoil of 20th century China. Chang describes the traumatic events of communist and maoist China. The contrasts between the lives of women born only decades apart is very telling. Chang's grandmother grew up during the age of warlords, concubines and foot binding. The end of the Japanese occupation and the Kuomintang/Communist struggle to create a new China infiltrates her life and the lives of her family members on a very real level. Chang's mother became a communist revolutionary only to be denounced, incarcerated and tortured during the cultural revolution. The author herself grew up during a transitional time of political upheaval and terrifying atrocities. Chang's descriptions of the cultural revolution were particularly disquieting to me.
The capacity of everyday citizens to turn to violence and evil is truly unsettling. The atrocities commited by friends, neighbors and coworkers during the cultural revolution disturbed me to my very core. The most unsettling of Mao's heinous abilities was his ability to pit people against each other. My stomach hurt just reading about it.
While reading this book I couldn't help but feel gratitude for the freedom, education, and basic humanitarian rights I enjoy.
If by chance you plan to read this on Kindle, know that the editing is VERY poor. There are a lot of mistakes.
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