"A Journey between China's Past and Present" (#127, Topic F)

Our daughter, visiting us with our son-in-law and two grandchildren for Mother's Day, brought me a book by Peter Hessler, Oracle Bones (2006), mainly on the strength of a review by her thesis supervisor at Yale, Jonathan Spence (New York Times, 4/30/06). Even before reading the review, I knew the book would take an antagonistic view of China -- after all, if one wants to have one's book on China be on any bestselling list, one has to denounce her, the more severe the better. This author certainly did not disappoint. In a Chinese newspaper, I read that, nowadays, there is a large number of Euro-Americans drifting from city to city and from job to job in China, peddling their being Americans in the hope of striking it rich; if such a drfiter can speak Chinese, making him/her bilingual, so much the better. Our author seems to fit into this mold. He began by teaching English in a rural area of China, and then got an assignment to do an "article about [Chinese] history." As to Nanjing Massacre, he prefaced his "research" by aligning himself with Japan's "right-wing groups," quoting their views with apparent delight. "For the Chinese, it [the Nanjing massacre] remained one of the most sensitive wounds of her past, and they hated the idea of any outsider telling them what had or hadn't happened." (p 18) Yes, indeed; how can a Euro-American opportunist, with a limited knowledge of China's language and culture and a short stay in China, be able to contribute? But, our author was brave. So, one afternoon, he visited the Memorial to the Nanjing Massacre -- which, incidently, I also visited last September and, thus, have a general idea of its exhibits. A display of black-and-white photographs -- "document[ing] his [Japanese soldier's] own worst moments" -- caught our author by surprise; they are so difficult to reconcile with our author's preconceived notions. And then comes the punch line -- he blamed all these on these soldiers!!. "Many Japanese troops had been stupid enough to take pictures and get the film developed at Shanghai camera shops." So, if this "photographic evidence of the Nanjing Massacre" did not exist, it would be much easier for an outsider, such as the author in question, to tell others that it hadn't happened. But, more was yet to come. Our author, after seeing "a three-photo series of a Chinese man getting beheaded [before, during and after -- "with a head rolling in the dust"]" realized that he "couldn't bear to do any more research in Nanjing." So much for "research" that does not jive with preconceived notions. So much for a book purported to be an impartial Euro-American view of China's past and present.