I
thought of my father, who had died so young. He had had his dreams
and visions of a new society in which people would no longer suffer
from poverty and would be masters of their own land. Now the remains
of my father were buried in the Mausoleum for Revolutionary Martyrs
in Xiamen. He had died in his last effort to evacuate his comrades
and other persons whose names he knew had appeared on Kuomintang’s
blacklist. On every Chinese New Year’s Eve since Liberation, government
officials would call on Mother with kind words and token gifts.
On my trips home, I would stop at Xiamen,
pay a visit to the mausoleum and pick a sprig from the fir trees that
sheltered the mausoleum. Under the mausoleum was a great cave two
stories deep. Remains of the dead—thousands of them—all officially
recognized martyrs, were kept in earthen pots and placed on wooden
shelves. I went down there during a visit in December 1966 when I
decided to place my Red Guard’s band on
the pot holding my father’s remains. The cave was dark and oppressive,
but I felt neither disgust nor dread—nobody in my situation would,
knowing that it was his dear one who lay there. On climbing out of
the cave, I felt more keenly my attachment to my father and to the
cause for which he had died. The inscription "Long live revolutionary
martyrs" on the memorial shielding the mausoleum now shone in
resplendent sunlight. It was the calligraphy
of Marshal Chen Yi, whose personality I adored and whose inscription
I had treasured.
(Click
image to enlarge.)
Yannan's late father
Yannan,
Li-qing, Hong, Wei, and Fangfang (niece) on the mausoleum in
1983
Yannan
as a Red Guard in the first year of Cultural Revolution
(1966)
Yannan and his mother and brother
paying respect to the mausoleum during the Cultural Revolution.
The big-character poster in the background is part of a slogan
that says “Carry the revolution to the end!”
Yannan's
mother, brother, and niece in front of the memorial to the mausoleum
in 2001
This inscription, "Long live revolutionary
martyrs", was the calligraphy
of Marshal Chen Yi, whose personality I adored.
Yannan
and Li-qing with Fangfang (niece) in about 1986