The Corpse Walker: Real Life Stories: China from the Bottom Up

I have just finished reading The Corpse Walker by Liao Yiwu. While I have read some of the stories in other publications, this is the first time I have read all the stories in a single volume. The Corpse Walker consists of 27 oral histories told by ordinary people in China. The author, a Chinese activist, is also one of the most censored writers in China today. Through the stories, Liao reveals the real China of a previous era and vividly brings to life the ways in which the Cultural Revolution, the Great Leap Forward and the Anti-Rightist Movement affected people in China, "from the bottom up". The resilient nature of the Chinese also emerges in these oral histories - the reader also senses that many subjects have adjusted to the lot dealt to them by the New China. However, in several stories, Deng Xiaoping's role as a positive change agent in (communist) China is held in very high regard.

Liao compiles his stories from notes and his memory to bring history alive - history of this type cannot be revealed in orthodox textbooks. The stories subtly reveal the essence of the Chinese cultural, political and social architecture in the everyday lived experience of a wide range of ordinary (and in many ways quite remarkable) people - from the corpse walker, a mourner and a Abbot to a petty official, a Red Guard and a thief. An array of others, including a  Falun Gong member, a mortician, a street musician, a feng shui master and a prisoner also tell their own stories.

I have friends who are the children of people labeled by the Red Guards as "intellectuals", "bourgeois" and "counter-revolutionaries" during the Cultural Revolution and therefore, suffered significantly and were denied an appropriate education. However, many children of the same Red Guards have tried to make amends over the years by providing opportunities and resources to the children whose parents suffered so much under Mao's revolution. A similar story emerges in one of Liao's stories.

Despite the problems and poverty endured by many of Liao's subjects, both their humanity and Chinese cultural character emerge in their stories. While Liao lets his subjects tell their own stories, he also challenges them on occasions, seeking clarification or presenting an alternative view on the issue at hand. The Corpse Walker is a powerful text and a great read for anyone wanting to understand the deep nature of Chinese society.