New Ghosts, Old Dreams

"On my list of books I felt I needed to have a source book with documents produced by thinkers and activists of the time with as wide a variety of Chinese voices possible. New Ghosts, Old Dreams: Chinese Rebel Voices is a series of collections of speeches and writings of the time, pulled together by Geremie Barmé and Linda Jaivin. It’s an unusually creative and varied contribution. It brings in artistic currents, it brings in some voices from history — the figures from China’s past that rebels in 1989 found appealing. It’s an unusual book, it’s more of a collage than a straightforward collection of documents, but even that unwieldiness helps capture something significant about the movement. It was partly carefully reasoned speeches, partly rock and roll, partly youth movement, partly intellectual counter-culture movement — as well as a more straightforwardly political movement. There was a way in which it was a festival. Some of the photos are very powerful. They show people dancing, during the period before it became a standoff between the troops and the students. So I think it’s important to get that side of it in, which Geremie Barmé does. He also has a chapter, “Beijing Days, Beijing Nights” in the Unger book. He’s a very hard to categorize cultural historian and cultural analyst of China. Linda Jaivin is an experienced translator and novelist and has also written about Chinese rock music. The things they bring to that project — a historical sensibility but also an interest in the popular culture of contemporary China — makes the book stand out."