Pilfering was common in Communist China’s state-owned enterprises, as the Party secretaries were slack in guarding properties that belonged to the government and poorly paid workers felt it fair compensation for their low pay. The...

One of the most ugly aspects of life in Communist China during the Mao Zedong era was the Party’s demand that people inform on each other routinely and denounce each other during political campaigns. This...

For so many years, the official propaganda machinery had denounced humanitarianism as sentimental trash and advocated human relations based entirely on class allegiance. But my personal experience had shown me that most of the Chinese...

I would say, if you like, that the party is like an out-moded mathematics…that is to say, the mathematics of Euclid. We need to invent a non-Euclidian mathematics with respect to political discipline.

As I stood in the room looking at it for the last time, I felt again the cold metal of the handcuffs on my wrists and remembered the physical suffering and mental anguish I had...

We were meant to survive because of our minds’ ability to reason, our ability to live with frustration in order to maintain our virtue. We wore smiling masks while dying inside.

Mientras contemplaba al presidente tendido en el sarcófago de cristal, recordé la sensación de cataclismo que había tenido dos años antes al oír la noticia de su fallecimiento; el desengaño al descubrir que en el...

Numa terra de asfixia nos beijamos como se egoistamente quiséssemos roubar o oxigênio um do outro e sobre a frieza nós deslizamos até nos abraçarmos um no outro com todo amor, todo amor próprio necessário...

Mas mesmo assim escrevo cartas de amor, grito pedidos de socorro, envio para o espaço sideral meu desespero humano na esperança de chegar aos ouvidos e mãos de quem me entenda.

Como agir sem pressupor? Sem arriscar um experimento à queima-roupa? Pra que viver sem expectativas? Sem a esperança de um prazer desinibido? Aspiro inspirações, inspiro aspirações e vivo elucidações líricas até expirar de vez o...

Na vida a injustiça me arruína, na arte eu faço justiça com as minhas próprias mãos.

An army of the people is invincible!

But it also had many large posters with messages of a more peaceful nature. These extolled the country’s economic achievement since the Cultural Revolution, which was supposed to have liberated the forces of production and...