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Notes
- 1.
Liang always seemed to be seeking total control over the self, and he admired anyone who seemed to have achieved it. Both of these men, Lin and Wu, were able to fall asleep at will. As sleep was always one aspect of his life over which he never had control, he was exceedingly impressed by those who had this “talent.” Probably because Mr. Liang’s mind was always hyperactive, he had difficulty with sleep throughout his life, beginning at a young age. As I reminded him a few minutes after this, he had been greatly impressed by a Hypnotism performance he saw in 1912. He took the performance as further evidence of the power of the mind over the body. It obviously made a powerful impression, as he recalled it decades later and mentioned it in his writings.
- 2.
Alone among the various people Liang admired, Mr. Wu Yongbo (Wu Guanqi) seems to be the only one who apparently left no mark on history and historical scholarship. I suspect that the biography Mr. Liang wrote for him is the only thing published about him.
- 3.
The Analects 15.6 (《论语卫灵剬·15》,六章).
- 4.
Once again, it appears that every one of Liang’s early friends, acquaintances, family, family friends—as well as everyone he admired—were anti-Yuan Shikai. He mentions this kind of opposition to Yuan again and again as a manifestation of integrity and nobility. At the time of Yuan’s attempt to reestablish the monarchy (with himself as the monarch), Liang was just 20 years old, in Beijing, and had just become an active member of society. After the Republican Revolution itself, the Monarchist movement was the first major political crisis he encountered. It seemed to have left a lasting impression.
- 5.
Yu Qingtang (1897–1949) was a Columbia University, Teacher’s College Ph.D. who had a successful career in academia, and for a time was also involved in the penal system in Jiangsu. She worked in social education, women’s education and adult education. Professor Yu also published on rural education, which is probably why she and Mr. Liang were friends. She was the director of the Social Education Bureau in the Department of Education in 1949, but died that year.
- 6.
This is the second of the first two lines of the poem “A Short Poem Written at the Moment When a Rising River Looked Like a Rolling Ocean” (《江上值水如海势聊短述》), which go “I was stubborn by nature and addicted to perfect lines, fought to the death to find words that startle.” (为人性僻耽佳句,语不惊人死不休) Indeed, this would be an accurate assessment of Liang, one which he himself makes. He was “stubborn by nature,” by his own admission.
- 7.
It is this “fault” of Liang’s that was partly responsible for his stubborn adherence on his own views, no matter what the cost.
- 8.
It would appear that Mr. Liang did read some of the various classic colloquial language novels, including those at the end of the Qing Dynasty, but he certainly didn’t read much fiction. For the most part, he maintained the orthodox Confucian attitude toward works of fiction—that such things were not quite worthy of the attention of a proper gentleman. Mr. Liang seldom saw films or plays, and seemed to have little patience with them. Mr. Hu Yinghan told me of an incident that took place in the Zouping County town in the 1930s. An acting troupe performed a contemporary drama. Such an event was exceedingly rare in rural Zouping so apparently most of the rural reconstruction institute students attended. Mr. Liang, however, left early in the play.
- 9.
Kawakami Hajime (1879–1946) was an early member of the Japanese Communist Party, and Marxist scholar. His autobiography (Jijoden《自叙传》) was published after his death in 1946. In it, he refers often to Confucius and Chinese Confucian texts, which is perhaps why Liang sought out the book. Although he was a pioneer Marxist scholar in Japan, he still proclaimed throughout the book that his major life priority was spirituality. He had, moreover, an exceedingly eclectic concept of spirituality. It is easy to see why Liang was attracted to him.
- 10.
Ma Yifu (1883–1967) was educated in Europe, America, and Japan, and in fact authored works on the history of European literature. He was known primarily, however, as a master of Chinese, especially Confucian philosophy. Mr. Ma was also a noted seal and woodblock carver. As Mr. Ma was a cloistered academic, one assumes that it was his scholarship, not his social or political activities, that Liang admired so much.
- 11.
The original name of this piece is Herrn Eugen Dührings Umwälzung der Wissenschaft (Mr. Eugen Dühring’s Revolution in Science) but in English it has been known under the name “Anti-Duhring.” Perhaps the most popular and enduring of Engels’ writings, this was an important document in the construction of the theory of Historical Materialism. Duhring took political and military force to be the primary forces shaping history, while Engels argues that economics is the primary force shaping history. Liang must have liked it especially because it is a relatively lucid exposition of Marx’s fundamental ideas and concepts.
- 12.
This exchange doesn’t make any sense in English, in that the word I used, “tou,” is usually translated “to steal,” which of course constitutes “theft.” The word “tou” often implies the synonyms for theft, such as filch or pilfer, that imply covertness. Another meaning of “tou” used as an adjective is “surreptitious.”
- 13.
Roxane Witke, Comrade Chiang Ch’ing (Boston, 1977).
- 14.
About many matters, including this sort, Mr. Liang was quite naive and ill-informed.
- 15.
I think that Mr. Liang may have been thinking of “Evita” Perón (María Eva Duarte de Perón). Madame Gandhi’s entry into politics was through her father and grandfather, not her husband. She was a Congress Party leader in her own right and was Prime Minster of India for 15 years, and her rule ended with her assassination in 1977. There are no resemblances to Jiang Qing. There are, however, many parallels between Eva Perón and Jiang Qing. “Evita,” as she came to be known, left home at an early age to seek her fortune on the stage in the big city, exactly as Jiang Qing did. She married Juan Domingo Perón before he took power (as Jiang Qing did with Mao) and was officially (as Jiang Qing was, in a fashion) titled “Spiritual Leader of the Nation.” Unlike Jiang Qing, however, Evita’s posthumous career has been glorious and long. Evita is still remembered with great fondness by many Argentineans, and she has been the subject of popular entertainments worldwide (such as the musical play and movie “Evita”). One doubts, on the other hand, if anyone anywhere remembers Jiang Qing with fondness, if she is remembered at all.
- 16.
Throughout these interviews, Liang never mentions a major change in his life style due to the Cultural Revolution. After he and his wife were ousted from their original home, they were housed in one small room in another part of Beijing. Most of the room, I was later told, was taken up by the bed. He had no proper desk or library or the other accoutrements of a scholar. His wife’s health started failing and, from what I had heard later, was semi-comatose for her last years. At least during these interviews, he never mentions any of this, even in response to my repeated questioning.
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Alitto, G.S. (2013). August 17, 1980. In: Has Man a Future?. China Academic Library. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-35816-6_6
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