Becoming Madame Mao - Anchee Min [68]
Madame Mao Jiang Ching is content yet bored at the same time. She is getting tired of her role as a housewife. She realizes that she cannot be satisfied with a house full of children, hens, roosters, goats and vegetables. Her mind needs stimulation. She needs a stage. She begins to exercise her role the way she sees it. She reads documents that pass across Mao's desk. She learns that the United States has entered the war. She learns that Hitler is being pushed out of the Soviet Union and that the Japanese are in retreat. The Chinese Communist Party has expanded and is the largest political group in the world. Her husband has become a household name and a symbol of power and truth.
What has become of me? the actress asks herself. Fairlynn occupies a seat in the Party's convention while she, as Mao's wife, can't even attend its opening.
Fairlynn sits among the delegation in the front row and is voted a speaker for the nation's intellectuals. During a break Fairlynn pays a visit to Madame Mao Jiang Ching. She congratulates her on her husband's rise to power and asks if Madame Mao compares herself to Madame Roosevelt. Fairlynn describes Madame Roosevelt, her achievement in American politics and Western history.
The wife of Mao listens as she washes her husband's and children's clothes in a bucket. The water is freezing. She washes the bowls, woks and scrubs the chamber pot. Her hands are swelling with frostbite. The soap slips through her fingers.
One night I try to discuss Madame Roosevelt with Mao. You are not Madame Roosevelt. He kicks off his shoes and blows out the candle.
Suddenly I am depressed. For the rest of the month I try to read.
But there is no way I can concentrate. An incident almost took place as I neglected my duty—Nah nearly fell into the manure pit—and it makes me put down the books.
The tailor comes to accompany me, but I send her back. I no longer want to hear the news.
Mao holds small meetings at home. He doesn't tell me ahead of time. He doesn't tell me who will be coming either. It's his style. He just sends Little Dragon for them on his terms. It can be three o'clock in the morning or midnight. They are expected to share a meal and discuss battles. I am supposed to put out food and go to war in the kitchen. Sometimes a cook or the guards help me. But it is my job to clean up afterwards.
I am playing a strange role: a queen who is a maid.
At the convention Mao is elected the Party's sole boss. Liu Shao-qi, who has built the Communist network in Chiang Kai-shek's white territories, is voted the second boss. Vice Chairman Liu Shao-qi has praised Mao highly in his acceptance speech. Little Dragon excitedly updates me with the details of the convention. Liu Shao-qi mentioned Mao's name one hundred and five times! The guard expects me to be thrilled, but I can hardly hide my misery.
At bedtime, afterwards, the wife again asks if she can be given a seat at the convention. The husband switches the tone of his voice.
I can't give anybody a seat. One has to earn it.
The wife sits up. You don't think I have earned it?
He doesn't answer but makes a sigh.
She wipes her tears. Well, I need a chance to earn it then.
Mao produces a list of books for me to read. He is giving me the prescription he gave to Zi-zhen. Marx, Engels, Lenin, Stalin, The Three Kingdoms and The Record of History. But I won't be reading them. Not one of them. I already know what kind of pills are in his bottle. Not only do I refuse to become Zi-zhen, I am determined not to be a stagehand in his political theater.
***
As Jiang Ching tries to break onto his stage, Mao launches a movement called Rectify the Style of Work. The year is 1942. At first it is considered a routine political examination, then it turns into terror. All of a sudden "traitors," "reactionaries," and "Chiang Kai-shek's agents" are caught everywhere.