Chapter 37 15. Excitement and Doubt in the Torrent

When I returned to school from the countryside, I was immediately in a fiery atmosphere.On the campus, on the improvised bamboo mats, on the walls of every building, and in the corridors of the dormitories, there are big-character posters everywhere.The spearheads of these big-character posters were probably directed at the collapsed old Beijing Municipal Party Committee, school party committees, and general branches of various departments.In the third student canteen, an internal big-character poster column was opened to expose and criticize Peng, Luo, Lu, Yang and other big figures.However, this internal and external boundary was quickly broken.People were very excited, discussing enthusiastically in groups of three or four.Nie Yuanzi's big-character poster was posted on May 25. From posting to broadcasting, within a few days, the teachers and students staying at the school were divided into two factions.When we returned to school, the outcome had already been decided. The faction of Bao Luping was depressed, while the faction of supporting Nie Yuanzi was elated, giving speeches everywhere, introducing his glorious combat experience to the audience who had just returned to school.

My mood is conflicted.On the one hand, infected by the surrounding atmosphere, I was also extremely excited.The school leader who had always been dictating on the stage was suddenly overthrown. Although he was sent to a working group, the school was still in a quasi-anarchic state, and the normal system no longer worked.Lenin once called the revolution a grand festival of the people, and it was indeed a festive scene at that time.A revolution means a temporary vacancy of power. The people have always been under strict control, but now they suddenly have no parents, and they have become children without control, brimming with the joy of being free for the first time.The secrets of some important people revealed by the big-character posters are all kinds of strange and unimaginable, which also opened my eyes.On the other hand, I have strong hidden worries and even fears in my heart.In fact, as early as half a year ago, Yao Wenyuan's article commenting on "Hai Rui Dismissed from Office" was published in the newspaper, and this kind of worry had already begun.I don't know the inside story of high-level struggles, but making extremely far-fetched interpretations and speculations about literary works and academic articles, based on which frightening accusations are made in politics, can't help but make me feel sad.Along with common sense, common sense is also broken. If the breaking of common sense liberates people, the breaking of common sense confuses people.The devil has been released from the bottle, and no one knows what kind of magic it will cast.

With this kind of contradictory mood, I lingered in front of the big-character poster every day, reading greedily, surprised and excited.Peking University is a forest of big-character posters, and I plunged into it.One day, I suddenly saw Guo Shiying's name on a big-character poster, with a scary cross in red ink.The big-character poster listed several crimes committed by the school party committee, one of which was covering up the reactionary student Guo Shiying.My mind suddenly went crazy.The feeling at that time was that when I was roaming in the forest of big-character posters, I accidentally saw my friend hanging from one of the trees.I immediately fled from the big-character poster area and wandered around the campus aimlessly, full of ominous premonitions.

Shortly after returning to school, the June 18 incident occurred at Peking University.Since the main place where this incident happened was in front of the 38th floor where I lived, I witnessed the whole process. On the morning of June 18, some students of the Department of Philosophy arrested the "gangsters" in the department and began to criticize them on the steps at the entrance of the building.The so-called "gangsters" refer to the rightists in Peking University's social education in the philosophy department, including our grade director Mr. Chen, and they refer to the people in power in the school and other departments.Things developed extremely rapidly, and students from other departments followed suit, and arrested "gangsters" at their department or school level.In the student dormitory building, only the 38th floor has high steps in front of the building, which is very suitable for "fighting ghosts".Those beastly students took the wire baskets containing toilet paper from the toilet, put them on the heads of the victims, and poured black ink and red and blue ink on their heads and faces, forcing them to kneel, fist and kick, and fight. Bi escorted to the campus parade.In this atrocity, a student in our class was active.I stood there speechless, shivering, shocked by the ugliness of people.

After the June 18 incident, the working group asked everyone to discuss the incident and learn lessons.A new round of debate started, with three schools of thought.One school of thought said it was a revolutionary incident, which is very good. The theoretical basis is Mao Zedong's "Investigation Report on the Peasant Movement in Hunan".One faction said it was a counter-revolutionary incident, in which counter-revolutionaries made trouble, and there were even black backgrounds.One school of thought said it was a mistake.I hold the third opinion, the starting point is still common sense, and I feel that this kind of violation and insult to the person has nothing to do with the revolution and counter-revolution, and is purely a criminal offense.The debate was inconclusive and quickly turned into a debate on the nature of the working group.Because the working group tended to think that this was a counter-revolutionary incident, radicals put up big-character posters, saying that the working group's reactionary line had become a stumbling block to the revolution and must be driven away.Just when the spontaneous debates were in full swing and stalemate, the Central Cultural Revolution Group came to Peking University. On July 25th and 26th, it held a ten-thousand-thousand debate meeting in the East Playground for two consecutive nights.It is called a debate, but in fact it has reached a conclusion, which is to affirm the June 18 incident and expel the working group.

These two debates shocked me greatly, and made me have clear doubts about the Cultural Revolution for the first time.Out of admiration for Mao Zedong, people also have considerable respect for Jiang Qing, and I am no exception.At that time, most people did not understand Jiang Qing's history and personal qualities, and were full of curiosity about this first lady who had suddenly become a red-horn on the Chinese political stage.However, witnessing her perform in public for the first time, I couldn't help but be dumbfounded.What surprised me the most was her domineering behavior, insulting Zhang Chengxian, the team leader, like a grandson, and her public avenging of private revenge, discussing private family affairs in front of thousands of people.In the second debate, the situation became clear, and those who supported the working group no longer had the right to speak. Standing on the stage were middle school students from the "Red Flag" High School Affiliated to Peking University. Its leader, Peng Xiaomeng, was a girl with a sharp tongue. speak.Jiang Qing cheered for him and shouted: "Whoever is not revolutionary, go away!" When the crowd was furious, Kang Sheng added fuel to the fire and announced sharply: "Zhang Chengxian is not just a reactionary line, he is an anti-party, anti-socialist and anti-revolutionary Reactionary line!" As soon as the words were finished, Peng Xiaomeng and others raised their belts and pulled them towards Zhang Chengxian, while the members of the Central Cultural Revolution Group on the stage all watched from the sidelines.When making a concluding speech, Jiang Qing became more and more excited as she said, "I want to sue", and began to criticize in detail how Zhang Shaohua took advantage of Mao Anqing's mental illness to live with him, and what a bad woman Zhang Shaohua's mother was. Finally, he shouted hoarsely: "Our family doesn't have such a daughter-in-law! We don't admit that there is such a daughter-in-law!" There was an echoing voice immediately in the venue: "Take Zhang Shaohua out to show the public!" Zhang Shaohua was a Peking University student at the time, but fortunately she had already Escaping, not at the scene, temporarily escaped the catastrophe.

After the debate, that night, I wrote down the performance of Jiang Qing and Kang Sheng in my diary, as well as my confusion and disgust.During that time, I still maintained the habit of keeping a diary, and recorded many confusions one after another.As the movement moved forward and people suffered, these diaries became my heartache, and they were the first documents I destroyed. Like most students at the time, I embraced the personality cult of Mao Zedong with naive enthusiasm.In my mind, he is nothing less than a god, even occasionally thinking that Chairman Mao has the same physiological activities as ordinary people, such as excretion, feels unbelievable, as if it is a kind of blasphemy.Now people will find this idea ridiculous, but I have communicated with people and found that there were many people who had the same thoughts as I did at the time.I am not completely superstitious about Mao, but I also have elements of genuine convincing.In the early days of the Cultural Revolution, some of his unpublished speeches were copied and spread like wildfire. After reading it, I was really impressed by his genius.In particular, he criticized the current education system for destroying talents, which was so heartwarming, it seemed to express the aspirations of us suppressed students.Therefore, although I often have things that I can't figure out about the Cultural Revolution, I still force myself to understand and adapt to it positively.Some eye-catching slogans that appeared in the newspapers, such as "revolution that touches the soul", "advance in strong winds and waves", and "care about national affairs", were endowed with a romantic color in the eyes of me, a petty bourgeoisie, and also tempted me to work hard to conform to this trend. field sports.I felt the difficulty of understanding and adapting, so I found the reason from myself.I said to myself: Since this movement is unprecedented, its development process will continue to exceed my imagination, which is unacceptable for a person like me who has always been right-wing. alert.Therefore, in the first big-character poster I wrote, "Several Issues Concerning the Current Movement", I particularly emphasized that the main danger of this movement has always been right deviation.I knew in my heart that this argument was not based on any kind of political analysis and was really just a veiled expression of my own self-doubt.At that time, many students from other places came to Beijing to join the series. I was surprised to find that they were scrambling to read and copy this big-character poster, and filled it with comments of approval.I also wrote a big-character poster titled "Rebellion is Justified, Seizure of Power is Justified", which took place around September or October 1966. Because I quoted a sentence from Zhu De that I read from a tabloid at the beginning, the entire article ended It was misrepresented as "Comrade Zhu De's Speech".Not long after, I received leaflets with this title in Beijing Foreign Studies University, Yan'an, and Chengdu, and the content was exactly my big-character poster.I forgot what I wrote in detail, but it probably means that only seizing power can make the rebellion come true. It is a logical deduction.I wrote very few big-character posters during the Cultural Revolution. These are the two main ones, which are all so-called theoretical thinking. Although they did not harm specific people, they also played a bad role in fanning the flames.I mention this now not as a confession, but to illustrate the general atmosphere of the time, and I am not one of the very few prophets who have been able to transcend this atmosphere.