Wild Swans is that type of book that’s always in book swaps, secondhand shops for rock bottom prices and lying around in the most random places, like hostel bookshelves and your mother-in-law’s living room. Usually, the copy is beaten up with the spine broken in multiple places and the jade green colour faded to obscurity, giving it a façade of cheapness. For example, I got mine at Shopee for less than RM10 (or US$2). And if you’d think what’s inside is as cheap as its shell, you’d be dead wrong.
The fact that it’s ubiquitous as a secondhand book means that many have read it, and these books have perhaps exchanged through a few hands. Being banned in the author’s country of birth, it may be a controversial book by default, as talking about China is naturally a controversial topic. But I believe that what Chang captured here is an important slice of history and a book that deserves to be more widely read.
The flight of the three swans
At the end of the Qing Dynasty, China was a mess of warlords imposing their own laws, changing allegiances as the winds change and those living “below” them really had a miserable existence, unless you can leverage guanxi and profit from your personal and professional networks. Thankfully, Chang’s family did. Her great-grandfather, who was sly enough to contrive a situation to make the visiting warlord’s general fall in love with his daughter was a prime example. Ultimately, he managed the elopement of his daughter as a concubine, and because of this connection became someone with loftier status, one who could also afford his own concubines.
The daughter, Jung Chang’s grandmother (named Yu-Fang), was practically made a prisoner in her own home, unable to get out unsupervised, warned sternly that cheating on her husband would result in a horrible death and discouraged from visiting her parents. What’s more, she had always felt that the servants would plot against her, leaking untrue stories lest they profit from her. This was also the time when China was terminating their foot-binding policy for young women, as back in the old days, helpless women with small feet were considered more feminine and would affect the masculine elan in a man to protect her, before of course, devouring her. But this tradition meant breaking your feet eventually, and over the years would be a source of physical pain.
But when the general invited her to join his distant harem in his native hometown, she ran away and returned to her own village. But when he died, she was a free woman. Her marriage to a local doctor, Dr Xia, who was considerably older than her promised her sustained happiness. It’s not that easy however, as when his family became jealous, to the point that Dr Xia’s eldest son accidentally killed himself, they moved away and started again poor. But at least she was happy.
China’s warlord era passed by to the Japanese occupation to the Kuomintang era, a regime quick to disappoint. When the communists took over Manchuria in the 1930s, the new era for China’s tumultuous history was about to begin. At this time, Yu-Fang had given birth to De-Hong, Jung Chang’s mother, who following her life and times, also became a staunch communist. She fell head over heels with Wang Yu, a sort of war hero from Southern China and their story, and how they raised a family of five in the country’s most turbulent time, is the essence of the book.
Out of the kiln, into the furnace
Jung Chang would be around the seventies now, but the Asian genes are good and she would have looked like a woman a decade younger. It is difficult to imagine that she had gone through the period in time where Mao Zedong was still in power, thus experiencing everything first-hand at the eye of the storm. Chang’s father after all, held a significant post in the regime’s machinery.
The book is a microcosm of what was life like during the Great Leap Forward, which unsurprisingly, was more of a great leap backwards. Its consequences to everyday people were severe as it led the country to famine and ultimately, leading to the cultural revolution. It is easy to think of it as a political book rather than a family saga, but it is a deeply personal book, and one that may have left the author exhausted. Chang would not have published another book for another fourteen years.
Though the book was the tale of the three generations of women, it is also deeply personal in the sense that Chang was navigating through her own inner conflict of which two men were the fulcrums of the book: her father and Chairman Mao. In almost every page, the decisions of these two men would impact the livelihood of Chang’s family, and it would also impact her individual values to shape her to who she would become.
Wang Yu was a war hero when he met De-Hong, a man so immersed in his own principles that he would put other families first before his own. He would give half his house so that it can be used as a school, would not take his wife to ride with him in the jeep to the point that she miscarried, would give up the front seats to a ballet show to an inferior so as not to reek of favouritism.
I would argue that Wang Yu is the tragic hero of the story, that even with the world falling apart around him, he would still follow his beliefs to a tee. We are left feeling frustrated, knowing what we know now through history books, that when he was betrayed and became a scapegoat himself that he would follow orders and remain a man intact. The cost of this of course, is in the strain of his family and his own mental health. After Wang Yu was arrested, he needed psychiatric treatment which included electric shocks.
The other man that defined the book is Chairman Mao. In every page since the communists defeated the Kuomintang in Manchuria, he became an imposing figure — the rationale for the existence of the people themselves. Chang as a young girl was enamoured by this figure, until her disappointment as she grew older, seeing that the man does not equate to the ideas the nation was built upon. Her family’s enemies became higher figures in the state, and those who would give their life for the ideals were left to rot as traitors.
But make no mistake, though the two men in Jung Chang’s life were imposing figures in the novel, the novel is a love song for Chinese women — for their resilience and strength despite the disadvantages of being born in Chinese society. Being a woman is not easy, being a Chinese woman even more so. This is especially true during the time of Chang’s grandmother when she was a mere device for her father’s promotion in life, her legs tied breaking her bones to make her look more “attractive” and she was labelled a disgraced woman for having been a concubine. Yet, she was instrumental in supporting her grandchildren when their parents were under arrest.
Chang’s mother was also the backbone of the family. Despite her lowly position, she was able to make the connections appropriate to secure Chang’s future into university, which ultimately led her to a life in Britain. Her siblings also enjoyed lofty careers overseas when the dust settled. After the death of her father, De-Hong was instrumental in clearing the family name, fighting for the honour of the family and preventing any future blockers for her children’s future.
Wild Swans remain a unique autobiography with the family dimension and the political dimension constantly interacting and clashing, pushing and pulling characters together and apart. There is a lot to unpack here. It is a snapshot of history, through China’s most polarising time where human cruelty and brutality were prevalent. It is not an easy book to read because of this and may leave one feeling empty and depressed. Yet, it is an undeniably beautiful book and ends in a note which can leave the reader, and the author herself feeling hopeful. It is an affirmation of our humanity.
