Feather in the Storm: A Childhood Lost in Chaos by Emily Wu, Larry Engelmann Page B
Book: Feather in the Storm: A Childhood Lost in Chaos by Emily Wu, Larry Engelmann
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Authors: Emily Wu, Larry Engelmann
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in other universities and high schools rallied in support. They accused teachers and administrators and local government officials of opposition to Chairman Mao. Revolutionary committees were organized to coordinate and carry out a new revolution.
Our hopes for better times faded as quickly as the pop of firecrackers on New Year’s Eve.
————
On the morning of June 1, following the radio broadcast describing the excitement in Beijing, students at Anhui University suspended classes, formed revolutionary committees and seized control of the campus.
Papa walked to his literature seminar early that morning to find anempty classroom. He went upstairs searching for his students. He found them packed into a room heatedly debating “revolution” and composing posters.
He reported the situation to the chairman of his department. The chairman advised, “The only thing to do is to wait in your classroom for the students to return. If they don’t return today, they will tomorrow, and if not tomorrow, then next week. Be patient. This whole thing will blow over in a short time.”
Papa returned to his classroom and sat at a desk. Overhead he heard the thunder of footsteps rushing back and forth and excited outbursts of singing and strident chanting. He gazed out the window and listened and worried. He paged through his lecture notes and replaced them in a folder. At the end of the hour he came home.
The next morning he proceeded to his classroom, and his students did not appear. He came home before the full hour passed.
On Friday he did not go to his class.
Classes were suspended for the next several years at Anhui University. The only times Papa faced his students after June 1 were when they dragged him from our apartment to beat him and denounce him or cage him up with other faculty members in dormitory rooms from which they extracted him periodically for further abuse.
The Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution had come to Hefei.
13
On the morning of June 4—a Saturday and the day after my eighth birthday—I arose early and went to a nearby market to do the family grocery shopping. Despite the early hour, scores of students scurried about, huddled in small groups and conferring excitedly. Several large posters had been affixed to the walls of campus buildings and students gathered in front of them.
When I returned home, several thousand students and outsiders crowded the campus sidewalks and lawns, shouting, singing and reading aloud. The disturbances that began on Wednesday had become a mania. A typhoon of noise and activity swirled around me. Students rushed by, their eyes fixed on the walls where posters had just been displayed or where people were congregating. I recognized some of Papa’s students.
Posters were pasted on every building, tree and utility pole on campus. The wall around the campus had been transformed into an unbroken palisade of posters. Wire and rope had been strung between trees, poles and buildings. Reed mats were tied to them and posters affixed to the mats. Most posters were the size of two or three newspaper pages. But some were as big as bedsheets, constructed from a dozen newspaperpages. Each was filled from top to bottom with bold red-and-black slogans, discourses, accusations, revelations, caricatures and cartoons.
I navigated my way through the turbulent sea of enthusiasts and carried the groceries to our apartment. After I’d put away the food I returned to campus and wandered through the crowd looking, reading and listening.
I was jostled by students eager to get closer to some poster or to move on to another. Students gushed in a steady stream from buildings where they constructed and composed posters, the ink dripping from the trailing paper and sprinkling the sidewalks, grass and bystanders. My bare feet were soon speckled with red and black. The shirts and trousers of students were doused in ink, and their forearms and hands were stained. A group wedged its way through
Our hopes for better times faded as quickly as the pop of firecrackers on New Year’s Eve.
————
On the morning of June 1, following the radio broadcast describing the excitement in Beijing, students at Anhui University suspended classes, formed revolutionary committees and seized control of the campus.
Papa walked to his literature seminar early that morning to find anempty classroom. He went upstairs searching for his students. He found them packed into a room heatedly debating “revolution” and composing posters.
He reported the situation to the chairman of his department. The chairman advised, “The only thing to do is to wait in your classroom for the students to return. If they don’t return today, they will tomorrow, and if not tomorrow, then next week. Be patient. This whole thing will blow over in a short time.”
Papa returned to his classroom and sat at a desk. Overhead he heard the thunder of footsteps rushing back and forth and excited outbursts of singing and strident chanting. He gazed out the window and listened and worried. He paged through his lecture notes and replaced them in a folder. At the end of the hour he came home.
The next morning he proceeded to his classroom, and his students did not appear. He came home before the full hour passed.
On Friday he did not go to his class.
Classes were suspended for the next several years at Anhui University. The only times Papa faced his students after June 1 were when they dragged him from our apartment to beat him and denounce him or cage him up with other faculty members in dormitory rooms from which they extracted him periodically for further abuse.
The Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution had come to Hefei.
13
On the morning of June 4—a Saturday and the day after my eighth birthday—I arose early and went to a nearby market to do the family grocery shopping. Despite the early hour, scores of students scurried about, huddled in small groups and conferring excitedly. Several large posters had been affixed to the walls of campus buildings and students gathered in front of them.
When I returned home, several thousand students and outsiders crowded the campus sidewalks and lawns, shouting, singing and reading aloud. The disturbances that began on Wednesday had become a mania. A typhoon of noise and activity swirled around me. Students rushed by, their eyes fixed on the walls where posters had just been displayed or where people were congregating. I recognized some of Papa’s students.
Posters were pasted on every building, tree and utility pole on campus. The wall around the campus had been transformed into an unbroken palisade of posters. Wire and rope had been strung between trees, poles and buildings. Reed mats were tied to them and posters affixed to the mats. Most posters were the size of two or three newspaper pages. But some were as big as bedsheets, constructed from a dozen newspaperpages. Each was filled from top to bottom with bold red-and-black slogans, discourses, accusations, revelations, caricatures and cartoons.
I navigated my way through the turbulent sea of enthusiasts and carried the groceries to our apartment. After I’d put away the food I returned to campus and wandered through the crowd looking, reading and listening.
I was jostled by students eager to get closer to some poster or to move on to another. Students gushed in a steady stream from buildings where they constructed and composed posters, the ink dripping from the trailing paper and sprinkling the sidewalks, grass and bystanders. My bare feet were soon speckled with red and black. The shirts and trousers of students were doused in ink, and their forearms and hands were stained. A group wedged its way through
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