Culture

Author: Jung Chang. Publisher: Flamingo, (4.5/5).


Wild Swans is Jung Chang’s autobiography and follows the lives of three generations of Chinese women. The book begins with Jung Chang’s concubine grandmother and follows her struggle for independence during the upheaval of her society in Manchuria, a Japanese-occupied province in Northern China.
China changed rapidly during the twentieth century and this is shown in the world Bo Qin/De-hong, Jung Chang’s mother, is born and raised in. Her mother’s attitude and choices at a young age shape the rest of her life and her future children. Her mother joins the Communist Party at an early age and for the rest of the book the Communists are ever present.
Jung Chang’s parents are both Communist Party officials, trying to create the China of their ideals. Her father’s decisions relating to his family often made me cry. In his eyes, the needs of the party and the country come before the family. As a high official he had the power to obtain special or certain privileges for his family. During their travels as a couple, they had to walk from the northern city of Tianjin to Nanjing. Jung Chang’s mother was in dire pain during this walk as she was pregnant. Her husband did not help to relieve her suffering. Instead, Jung Chang’s mother had to walk hundreds of kilometres in her delicate state, causing her to miscarry and nearly die.
Wild Swans weaves together the personal lives of the family and the wider political events occurring in China during the twentieth century. I am interested in Chinese political history so I found it fascinating to see how the big and small decisions made by Chairman Mao, the Communist leader of China, affected Jung Chang and her family. At one stage when Jung Chang was at high school, Mao ordered all grass to be removed because it was too bourgeois and western.
This book will inform you about the important events in China under the Communist regime in an entertaining, accessible way. The personal struggle of the characters makes you aware of their fear and the way a regime can alter the mindset of both individuals and a whole nation. It is a long book, containing over 671 pages, but don’t let that put you off. It flows very well which makes it easy to read. I recommend everyone should read it, even if you are not interested in Chinese politics. Overall it is a tragic but uplifting family memoir.