Jung Chang (Wild Swans author) — Living through history's largest man-made famine

**Jung Chang** (0:00)
My father spoke up against Mao's policies. He was arrested, tortured, driven insane.
My mother was under tremendous pressure to denounce my father. She refused, and my mother was made to kneel on broken glass. She was paraded in the streets where children spat at her and threw stones at her. The desire to write never left me. In the following years, when I was working as a peasant and as a barefoot doctor, as a steelworker and electrician, I was always writing in my head with an imaginary pen.

**Dwarkesh Patel** (0:42)
Today, I have the pleasure of interviewing Jung Chang. Her first book, Wild Swans, has sold over 15 million copies worldwide. The US diplomat George Kennan described the Gulag Cargo Pelago. He said, this is the greatest and most powerful single indictment of a political regime ever to be leveled in modern times.
And when I read that quote, I realized that this is exactly how I describe your books, Wild Swans, obviously, but also your biography of Mao, titled Mao, The Unknown Story, both of which we'll talk about today. It is a true honor to speak with you.

**Jung Chang** (1:17)
Thank you very much for having me.

**Dwarkesh Patel** (1:19)
So we will get it to Mao and his atrocities in a second, but let us begin by, would you mind laying the scene for us? What was it like? You grew up under, in China, under Mao.
Let's begin there. What was it like as you started to grow up during this time?

**Jung Chang** (1:35)
I was born in China, in Sichuan, in 1952 So I grew up under Mao.
When I was a child, I led quite a privileged life because both my parents were communist officials, and we lived in this compound with, you know, servants, cooks, drivers. It was a very class-ridden society, and I grew up so much taking class and privilege for granted that when I first came to Britain, I thought Britain was wonderfully classless. And of course, my views were slightly modified over the years.
And then in 1966, when I was 14, Mao launched his Cultural Revolution, which was his great purge. And my father spoke up against Mao's policies.
So as a result, he was arrested, tortured, driven insane. He was exiled to a camp and died tragically and prematurely. And my mother was under tremendous pressure to denounce my father. She refused. As a result, she went through over a hundred of these ghastly denunciation meetings, which were everyday features in China at the time. And basically the victims were put on the stage, and their arms were ferociously twisted to the back and their heads were pushed down. They were kicked and beaten. My mother was once made to kneel on broken glass. She was paraded in the streets while children spat at her and threw stones at her. But she survived. And today she still lives in Chengdu, at age 92 My family was scattered. And I was exiled to the edge of the Himalayas and worked as a peasant. And then as a barefoot doctor, which was a doctor basically without any training. Because Mao had said, the more books you read, the more stupid you become. So schools were closed, you know, the books were burned.
I mean, China was literally a cultural desert without books, cinemas, theaters, museums for 10 years. And then I became an electrician. And again, there was no training. So I had five electric shocks in one month.
And then in 1973, partly after Nixon's visit to China, I mean, but more also because for the internal political reasons, and universities began to reopen. And I was able to get into Sichuan University to learn English.
But, you know, our teachers had never seen foreigners themselves, because China had been closed to the outside world after the Communists took power in 1949 So our textbooks were written by these teachers who had never been abroad. I remember the first lesson was Long Live Chairman Mao. And the second lesson was greetings. Because the Chinese in those years, when we bumped into each other, and we said, Where are you going? Have you eaten? So those were the English greetings I learned. So when I first came to London, I used to go around and ask people where they were going and whether they had eaten.
Well, the only foreigners I had spoken to were some sailors in the port in South China, where we as English language students were sent to practice our English. So I was 23
But of course, we were at the port eagerly waiting for our sailors, and we had no idea what must be on their minds, how different this must be from the expectation of a port life. In 1976, Mao died and China began to change. And in 1978, there was a national exam to select the people to go abroad. For the first time under communist rule, going abroad was based on an academic basis. And so I did very well at the exam. So I became one of the first 14 people to come to Britain. And I, as far as I know, I was the first person to get out of Sichuan province, a province then of 90 million people to come and study in the West. So when I got my doctorate in linguistics at the University of York in 1982, I became the first person from communist China ever to get a doctorate from a British university. So, okay, so I was in Britain, and for 10 years, I didn't want to think about the past because it was too painful. And my father died, my grandmother, who brought us up, died. And there was two, you know, I just wanted to spend time enjoying the West.