China Today by Edgar Faure
St. Marlin's Press, 1958
205 pp. US$4.50
Reviewed by Geraldine Fitch
The author, M. Edgar Faure, was twice Prime Minister of France (1952 and 1955). He has also been Minister of Foreign Affairs, Minister of Justice, Minister of Finance and National Economy, and chairman of the Foreign Affairs Committee of the National Assembly of which he is still a member. A lawyer by training, he represented France at the Nuremberg trials, has traveled extensively, and is the first Western statesman to have visited both the Chinese mainland and the Soviet Union. He speaks Russian.
The title of his book, "The Serpent and the Tortoise," refers symbolically to two promontories on opposite sides of the Yangtze River, at a point where (since 1957) a great bridge spans the river between Hankow and Wuchang. Mao Tse-tung composed a poem in 1937 (which the author erroneously refers to as the year of the Long March), stating that the river divided North and South like the Serpent and the Tortoise.
In 1956 Mao wrote another poem about the "bridge of iron" which would be thrown across, so men would forget that "once there was here an impassable chasm." Then the author raises this question: "Are capitalism and communism going to face each other indefinitely like these two promontories?", or are we to admit that they correspond to different stages of the technical life of humanity, and that it is possible to establish a link between the one and other?
In M. Faure's words: "Between East and West, as between the Serpent and the Tortoise, are we to throw a bridge? So that one day 'men will forget that once was here an impassable chasm'?"
It seems to me a prize underestimate of Communism to label it "a different technical stage" in human development. It is also a false comparison to equate North and South China to "capitalism and communism," for the ratio would be something like 10,000 to 1. Even Mao stretches his poetical license to speak of "an impassable chasm" between them. For men passed back and forth by ferry—not so smoothly or quickly as over a bridge—but train-ferries made regular connections for through travel from the south to points north of the river, and all manner of river craft made crossings at other points. A man who sees no greater ideological difference between East and West today than between North and South China (where no enmity existed and no civil war was ever waged on any such geographical grounds) is bound to come up with some bizarre ideas. As M. Faure does.
Had the author said that the chasm between capitalism and communism is like that between free China on Taiwan (which he calls Formosa) and mainland China, he would have had a valid comparison. But he is among those who, without coming to see what goes on here, can blithely dispose of ten million people (more than of all Australia, nearly as many as in Canada, and about one fourth as many as in France), and also the free soil they occupy, as a fiction. Yes, according to this distinguished son of a country which once fought to the death for liberty, "Our principal trump card, at the moment, is to renounce a fiction." This "fiction of the China of Taipeh (sic)" still has "an exchange value." The author says, "Soon it will have less, soon it will have none at all" So his idea is to hasten and bargain away a free island and millions of free people, and (without consulting them) sell them down the river for as high a price as possible in currying favor, with whom? The people of China? Not at all; it could only be with their slave-drivers.
For this author makes the same mistake as many another in confusing the Peiping regime with the people they have enslaved. He does not realize that Peiping no more speaks for the people than a cat for the canary it has swallowed. Selling out Formosa, while it has some "exchange value," would in no way ameliorate the fate of the intellectuals sent to field labor on the mainland, the women separated from husbands and children to build roads in Tibet, the people who have lost the liberty, equality and fraternity once so prized in France.
These thoughtless, (but nonetheless cruel,) things the author has said overshadow the keen observations he made at times, and the good intentions he undoubtedly had to be objective. But unless he also visited free China-as did his fellow-Frenchman, Robert Guillain, - how could he compare the accomplishments under forced labor and those of free men?
Yet we must be fair and mention some of the realistic things the author said. He noted that the minority parties in Red China "have no divergence of doctrine or programme either with each other, or with the Communist Party." When he asked if it were possible to form new parties, he was told that it was on one condition: "that they accept socialism." They cannot put up candidates in an election, nor raise their voices as an opposition. They receive foreign visitors, giving the impression that there are independent groups in China. They may be in the National Assembly, but not to oppose anything. It makes the middle classes "feel flattered not to have disappeared altogether."
The author was perceptive in describing the year 1950 to 1952 as a "re-moulding campaign" for everyone, remarking "The river of reform rolled confessions along like pebbles." But the most garrulous submission did not guarantee impunity. Things quieted down. And then came the paroxysm of the Hu Feng affair, when this well-known writer sent a memorandum to the Central Committee of the Party about the five daggers planted in the brain of writers: 1) Necessity of adopting a Marxist viewpoint; 2) fusion of writers with workers and peasants; 3) the remoulding of thought; 4) the use of a national style; and 5) the use of literature for political aims. The regime seemed surprised and embarrassed, and incapable of stopping, in its first onrush, this "movement directed against it."
In his description of the Three-anti's and the Five-anti's, the author could see that the regime planned the disorganization of certain economic sectors, even down to wretched second-hand dealers - not just well-to-do business men. He indulges in a bit of irony about Westerners who see weakness, and the crackup of Chinese Communism, whichever way Mao moves, especially when their information comes from the official Jen Min Jih Pao. Yet he admits getting information from the same source himself. As a clever writer, he remarks on how little the people said when urged to speak freely: "They dared to say that they had not dared to speak; but what they had not dared to speak, they did not say." He writes with great lucidity about the "100 flowers" campaign. He is himself ironical about the recantations of literary men and artists, because he can feel with them, as (it would seem) he cannot with ordinary men and women.
Nowhere does he speak out like the great Spanish scholar Madariaga, who says that one cannot be for the people and for their oppressors at the same time. For M. Faure to advocate recognition of the Peiping regime, and reestablishing cultural contacts is to discourage the millions of people who want-not cultural contacts for their tyrants but - Freedom for themselves.
What Is the Matter with Lolita?
By Y. Z. Chang
Two of the best-sellers that achieved phenomenal success last year were written by Russians whom the Communists in Moscow do not like. Pasternak's Doctor Zhivago owed the initial impetus of its successful sweep partly to its criticism of the Communist system, though the novel has considerable merits of its own. But Lolita, the work of Vladimir Nabokov, a Russian emigre now residing in the United States, received no assistance from any extraneous consideration. Readers flocked to the book, not because its author was a persecuted critic of the Communist system, but because they heard the book is immensely interesting. It is indeed a very important publication.
Critical opinions, however, differ substantially on the value of Nabokov's novel. Some reviewers found it very comical; one of them described it as "the funniest book I remember having read." Others did not find it so funny, but were greatly impressed by its qualities as a story and considered it as an effective and powerful novel. Flattering descriptions like "a strong, a disturbing book" and "a distinguished novel" bestowed by men like Graham Greene indicated that though the book did not make them roar with laughter, they were favorably impressed by it as a work of fiction. Less vociferous was the voice of adverse critics who did not like the book. But they were firm, though unheard, in their condemnation of the novel as "a vile story."
It should be pointed out that these three conflicting views are all true. Nabokov's novel tells an effective story which is original but filthy - a tale of criminal and sinful passion ending in a gory vendetta. It has a small number of characters - a teenage girl named Lolita, her unfortunate mother who died early, a sordid hero-villain who bore the comic name of Humbert Humbert and cohabited in sin with Lolita until she was lured away by a shadowy villain-pervert who paid with his own life for his successful attempt, for a short while only, to get hold of the teenager. Humbert Humbert is an amusing caricature of a scholar who had fallen under the influence of a foolish but fatal infatuation for a girl of twelve. Nabokov told the story of his misadventure in an effective and distinctive style which satirized the cult of love and youth as well as the pomposity of the scholars, and a vein of sly humor runs throughout this account of pornographic adventure. There is no doubt but Lolita is a book that contains all the ingredients to make it a popular success.
But is it really an uproariously funny book? The answer is: Yes and no, it all depends. Because we really have no reason to doubt the veracity of those who called it a very funny book; nor is there any reason to doubt the sincerity of those who did not laugh. It is after all a simple fact that there are two kinds of comic books and characters. One kind has what we may call a universal appeal: it makes every reader, young; or old, roar with laughter. The second kind makes some readers laugh loudly, but fail to move the others. This is not at all surprising. Browning's Pied Piper of Hamelin is a universal favorite, whose comical charm nobody can resist. But though no one likes to admit it, Alice in Wonderland leaves some readers flat. It does that, not because these readers fail to understand its meaning, but because in no part of the work is the comic element strong enough to move these readers to laughter. Likewise, W.S. Gilbert's Mikado and Iolanthe have a comic appeal for all readers, but his Pinafore and Pirates of Penzance have an appeal only for some readers and fail in the case of others. This is not a great and novel discovery in the field of criticism; but it is a phenomenon that requires and deserves further study by scholars. Now the comic elements in Lolita belong to the second kind that possesses what we may call a limited appeal. That is the reason why while it leaves some readers flat, it strikes others as uproariously funny.
What are the comic elements in Nabokov's novel that make some readers laugh so merrily? They are comic elements in an indivisible and homogeneous synthesis that includes satire, awkwardness of situation in which Humbert Humbert often finds himself, surprise, and verbal drollery. Nabokov, it is clear, had set out deliberately to tickle the funny bone of the readers with a preposterous, yet gripping story of smut and revenge. The names of characters, such as Humbert Humbert for the hero, Lolita for the sorry heroine, and Widow Haze, were all selected with an eye towards their comic value. In itself, the strange story of a middle-aged man falling madly in love with a hoydenish girl of twelve contains an element of preposterousness, or surprise, calculated to excite boisterous laughter. Equally comical is the satire on love, youth, and pompous scholars. To those who have a taste for this kind of comedy, Lolita contains a whimsical humor that is irresistible. On the other hand, there are readers for whom this kind of humor has no appeal.
For this kind of reader, Nabokov's book has a stark, poignant story of infatuation, illicit romance and violent revenge, which holds the attention of the reader from cover to cover. It also has a distinction of style that commands the attention, if not respect and admiration, of the astonished readers. Hence the immense popularity of the book at the present time. But it also possesses qualities that fascinate, amaze, and repulse. The story of carnal dalliance between Lolita and Humbert contains details and hints that are frankly pornographic. The characters are in all cases shabby characters who move in a depressingly sorry world, with nothing to look forward to. For readers who are sensitive to things like that, Lolita is a repulsive novel, though not uninteresting. Thus the three different views of the novel mentioned at the beginning of this discussion are all correct. It is only a question of from what angle the book is viewed.
When the manuscript of Lolita was first offered to prospective publishers in America, it was turned down by all of them as unfit for general consumption. The success of the writer's next book Pnin changed the situation and induced an enterprising, but not very squeamish, publisher in Paris to undertake the publication of the strongly flavored but uproarious book. A brave lady agent called the attention of an American publisher to the successful performance of this once generally rejected work, and the book came back to America. A century or so ago, the publication of such a story was unthinkable to a respectable publisher. Today an adverse critic will have great difficulty to get into print if he wishes to criticize a book like this on moral grounds. It only serves to show what great lengths the revolt against what was regarded as Puritanic squeamishness and restraint started by men like Ibsen and G. Bernard Shaw has reached. With the publication of Lolita and the wide acclaim accorded to it, the pendulum of anti-moral revolt has reached the other extreme and readers now have a chance to examine the private lives of what some may call unspeakable people who formerly were universally shunned and ignored.
More than two thousand years ago, Plato attacked poets and story-tellers who told smutty stories. He considered them to be undesirable characters who should be kicked out of civilized society. About four hundred years ago, Philip. Gosson attacked the theatres and dramatists of Merrie England. Their attitude was regarded as harsh and somewhat unreasonable by moderate observers. It will be interesting to speculate whether the publication of books like Lolita may not provoke another angry attack upon ribaldry and obscenity in literature.
Lolita is undeniably an effective and strong book. To many readers, it is a masterpiece, very funny and very fine. But it is undeniably also a dangerous book capable of leading some readers—both adult and juvenile—far astray. It will not do merely to scoff at the scruples of old fashioned critics and readers who condemn it.