21 "Giving Charcoal in Snow"
二十一 “雪中送炭”
——My Siblings and My Friends (1967-1968)
——姐弟们、朋友们(1967—1968年)
Throughout 1967 and 1968, while Mao struggled to set up his personal power system, he kept his victims, like my parents, in a state of uncertainty and suffering.
1967年和1968年间，(此处删去4行)，我家像许多其他受害者一样，并没有被蓄意饿死。我的父母仍然按月领工资，尽管他们不仅没有工作做，而且是斗争折磨的对象。省委大食堂还是照常营业，一方面让造反派吃饱以搞革命，一方面也给我们这些走资派家庭饭吃。我们和所有城市居民一样，也有配给的东西。
Human anguish did not concern Mao. People existed only to help him realize his strategic plans. But his purpose was not genocide, and my family, like many other victims, were not deliberately starved. My parents still received their salaries every month in spite of the fact that not only were they doing no work, they were also being denounced and tormented. The main compound canteen was working normally to enable the Rebels to carry on with their 'revolution," and we, like the families of other capitalist-roaders, were fed. We also got the same rations from the state as everyone else in the cities.
Much of the urban population was kept 'on hold' for the revolution. Mao wanted the population to fight, but to live.
城市里的人大都什么工作也不做，只搞革命，但毛既要中国人互相斗争，也要他们活下去。
He protected the extremely capable premier, Zhou Enlai, so that he could keep the economy going. He knew he needed another first-class administrator in reserve in case anything happened to Zhou, so he kept Deng Xiaoping in relative security. The country was not allowed to collapse totally.
他保护了精明能干的总理周恩来，使经济能够运行。他也清楚得储备另一位第一流的治国人才，以防周恩来有何不测，所以他也保证了邓小平的安全，毛泽东不想让中国分崩离析。
But, as the revolution dragged on, large parts of the economy slipped into paralysis. The urban population increased by several tens of millions, but virtually no new housing or other service facilities were built in the towns.
但是，当他的革命没完没了时，经济大部分陷于瘫痪。城市人口增加了好几千万，却很少盖新住宅，公共设施更别提了。
Nearly everything, from salt, toothpaste, and toilet paper to every kind of food and clothing, either was rationed or disappeared completely. In Chengdu there was no sugar for a year, and six months passed without a single bar of soap.
几乎所有的东西——从食盐、牙膏、卫生纸、布匹到各种食品，不是凭票供应，就是完全从货架上消失了。整整一年内，在成都买不到食糖，半年里竟买不到一块肥皂。
Starting from June 1966, there was no schooling. The teachers either had been denounced or were organizing their own Rebel groups. No school meant no control. But what could we do with our freedom? There were virtually no books, no music, no films, no theater, no museums, no teahouses, almost no way of keeping oneself occupied except cards, which, though not officially sanctioned, made a stealthy comeback. Unlike most revolutions, in Mao's there was nothing to do. Naturally, "Red Guardship' became many youngsters' full-time occupation. The only ways they could release their energy and frustration were in violent denunciations and in physical and verbal bat ties with each other.
从1966年6月起，学生们不再上课了。教师不是被批斗，就是也组成了自己的造反派。不上课就表示没有人管，但是年轻人能利用这种自由干些什么事呢？没有书、音乐、电影、戏剧、博物馆、茶馆，几乎上没有什么路子可以消磨时间——人们只能偷偷打扑克牌，当然官方没有明说可以打。跟绝大多数革命不一样，毛泽东的革命叫人无所事事。结果，当红卫兵就成了许多年轻人唯一可做的事。暴力批斗会、写标语、喊口号、武斗等成了他们唯一能发泄青春活力的方式。
Joining the Red Guards was not compulsory. With the disintegration of the Party system, control over individuals loosened, and most of the population was left alone. Many people just stayed idle at home, and one result was an explosion of petty fights. Surliness replaced the good service and polite behavior of the pre-Cultural Revolution days. It became extremely common to see people quarreling on the streets with shop assistants, with bus conductors, with passersby. Another result was that, since no one was looking after birth control, there was a baby boom.
加入红卫兵并不是强迫性的，随着旧共产党体制的土崩瓦解，政权对个人的控制松弛了，人们有独自行事的机会，许多人只是懒懒散散呆在家里做“逍遥派”。精力无处发泄的后果之一是琐碎无聊的争斗，暴戾之气取代了文革前的祥和、讲礼貌的气氛，街上到处有人吵架。另一个后果是，没有人管计划生育，文革中人口猛增两亿多。
The population increased during the Cultural Revolution by two hundred million.
By the end of 1966 my teenage siblings and I had decided that we had had enough of being Red Guards.
1966年还没完，我们姐弟就结束了当红卫兵的日子。那时，父母当了“阶级敌人”，儿女被要求划清界限，有不少人确实这样做了。(此处删去一句)。我认识的人中，有人改了姓，以示与父亲脱离关系；有人从来不去看望被关的双亲；还有人甚至在大会上批斗自己的父母。
Children in condemned families were supposed to 'draw a line' between themselves and their parents, and many did so. One of President Liu Shaoqi's daughters wrote wall posters 'exposing' her father. I knew children who changed their surnames to demonstrate that they were disowning their fathers, others who never visited their parents in detention, and some who even took part in denunciation meetings against their parents.
Once, when my mother was under tremendous pressure to divorce my father, she asked us what we thought. Standing by him meant we could become 'blacks'; we had all seen the discrimination and torment such people suffered.
母亲处在要她和父亲离婚的巨大压力之下。一天，她问我们的看法。继续和父亲在一起意味着我们会变成“狗崽子”，我们亲眼见过这类孩子受到歧视和虐待。
But we said we would stick by him, come what may. My mother said she was pleased and proud of us. Our devotion to our parents was increased by our empathy for their suffering, our admiration for their integrity and courage, and our loathing for their tormentors. We came to feel a new degree of respect, and love, for our parents.
但是我们说，不管怎么样，我们要跟着父亲。母亲说她很高兴，为我们感到骄傲。我们对父母的忠诚在他们遭受迫害时变得更加强烈了。我们心痛他们受的苦，钦佩他们的骨气，厌恶迫害他们的人。在文革这场大动乱中，我们对父母滋生了一种新感情。
We grew up fast. We had no rival ties no squabbles, and no resentment of each other, none of the usual problems or pleasures of teenagers. The Cultural Revolution destroyed normal adolescence, with all its pitfalls, and threw us straight into sensible adulthood in our early teens.
我们也迅速脱离童稚，姐弟间没有嫉妒、竞争、口角，没有一般十几岁孩子通常的麻烦，也没有他们的欢乐。文化大革命摧毁了我们正常的青春期，使我们早熟。
At the age of fourteen, my love for my parents had an intensity that could not have existed under normal circumstances. My life revolved entirely around them. Whenever they were briefly at home, I would watch their moods, trying to provide amusing company. When they were in detention, I would repeatedly go to the disdainful-looking Rebels and demand a visit. Sometimes I would be allowed a few minutes to sit and talk with one of my parents, in the company of a guard. I would tell them how much I loved them. I became well known among the former staff of the Sichuan government and the Eastern District of Chengdu, and an irritation to my parents' tormentors, who also hated me for refusing to show fear of them. Once Mrs. Shau screamed that I 'looked straight through' her. Their fury led them to invent the accusation, printed on one of their wall posters, that Red Chengdu had given my father treatment because I had used my body to seduce Yong.
在十四岁时，我对父母的爱是超乎寻常地强烈，我的整个生活都围绕着他们。每当他们短暂在家时，我总是小心注意他们的情绪，尽力让他们开心。在他们被关押起来时，我不断去见那些恶狠狠的造反派，要求见父母亲。见不见得到，我都设法让他们知道我是多么爱他们。我因此在父母亲部门的造反派中出了点名，引起迫害我父母的那些人恼怒。他们恨我，还因为我有意显得不怕他们。一次姚女士对我咆哮，说我不把造反派放在限里，进省委宣传部如入无人之境。他们的愤怒使他们在一张大字报上造谣，说“红成”为我父亲治病是因为我引诱了翁。
Apart from being with my parents, I spent most of my abundant free time with friends. After I came back from Peking in December 1966, I went for a month to an airplane maintenance factory on the outskirts of Chengdu with Plumpie and Ching-ching, a friend of hers. We needed something to occupy ourselves, and the most important thing we could do, according to Mao, was to go to factories to stir up rebellious actions against capitalist roaders. Upheaval was invading industry too slowly for Mao's liking.
除了父母，我大部分的自由时间都和朋友们一起度过，1966年12月从北京回来后，我和小胖、她的女友青青一块去了成都郊外一家飞机维修厂，在那里呆了一个月。那时我们没事干，正好毛泽东又因为工厂变革开展不起来而要年轻学生去“煽风点火”。
The only action the three of us stirred up was the attention of some young men from the now defunct factory basketball team. We spent a lot of time strolling on the country roads together, enjoying the rich evening scent of the early bean blossoms. But soon, as my parents' suffering worsened, I went home, leaving Mao's orders and my participation in the Cultural Revolution behind once and for all.
我们三个姑娘在工厂唯一煽起来的风、点起来的火是一群小伙子的注意。他们属于该厂正陷于瘫痪的篮球队，我们一起到郊外散步，享受大片早春蚕豆花的浓香。很快我父母的情况恶化，我就回家了，把毛泽东的命令和参加文革的义务都一古脑儿抛开。
My friendship with Plumpie, Ching-ching, and the basketball players lasted. Also in our circle were my sister Xiao-hong and several other girls from my school. They were all older than I. We would meet frequently in the home of one or another of us, and linger there for the whole day, and often the night as well, having nothing else to do.
我和小胖、青青及篮球队员们的友谊保持了下来，在我们这个圈子里，还有我姐姐小鸿和我们学校里的几个女孩子，她们都比我年长。我们经常在各自家里聚会，一呆就是一整天，有时干脆留宿。除此之外，我们无事可做。
We had endless discussions about which of the basketball players fancied whom. The captain of the team, a handsome nineteen-year-old called Sai, was the center of speculation. The girls wondered whether he liked me or Ching-ching more. He was reticent and reserved, and Ching-ching was very keen on him. Every time we were going to see him, she would meticulously wash and comb her shoulder-length hair, carefully iron and adjust her clothes to look stylish, and even put on a little powder and rouge and pencil her eyebrows. We all teased her gently
我们对哪个篮球队员喜欢哪个姑娘谈了又谈。焦点是队长，一位长得很帅的十九岁男孩，叫“山”，他不爱开口，姑娘们就猜他到底是不是喜欢青青。青青非常喜欢他，每次见他之前，总是紧紧张张地把她那头垂肩的黑发洗了又洗，梳了又梳，仔仔细细地又熨又拉她的衣服，以看上去漂亮些。她甚至还扑了一点粉，擦了一点口红，用炭笔轻轻画眉毛。我们大家都友善地跟她开玩笑。
I was also drawn to Sai. I could feel my heart pound whenever I thought of him, and would wake up at night seeing his face and feeling feverishly hot. I often murmured his name and talked to him in my mind whenever I felt fear or worry. But I never revealed anything to him, or to my friends, or even to myself explicitly. I only timidly fantasized about him. My parents dominated my life and my conscious thoughts. Any indulgence in my own affairs was immediately suppressed as being disloyal. The Cultural Revolution had deprived me of, or spared me, a normal girlhood with tantrums, bickerings, and boyfriends.
我也被山先生吸引，一想起他就心跳加速，有时夜里醒来会看见他的脸，感到浑身发热。时不时，我还喃喃地叫他的名字，害怕或担心时，会自言自语地同他说话。但是我从来没有对他、对朋友，甚至对自己表露过这种感情，只是羞涩地想着他。我父母的遭遇支配了我的生活，支配了我的思想，我不允许自己想一点自己的事，把这看作是对不起爸爸妈妈。文化大革命剥夺了我正常的少年生活，使我没有过拌嘴、耍脾气和交男朋友的少女生活。
But I was not without vanity. I sewed big blue wax-dyed, abstract-patterned patches on the knees and seat of my trousers, which had faded to pale gray. My friends would laugh at the sight of them. My grandmother was scandalized, and complained, "No other girls dress like you."
但我并不是没有虚荣心。我把几大块蜡染的抽象派图案式的蓝布片补到已褪色成灰白的裤子膝盖和臀部，叫朋友们一看见就笑。我姥姥也莫名其妙说：“谁家女孩子像你这身打扮的。”
But I insisted. I was not trying to make myself look beautiful, just different.
但是我坚持要穿，我不是想把自己打扮漂亮，只是想跟别人不一样。
One day one of my friends told us that her parents, both distinguished actors, had just committed suicide, unable to stand the denunciations. Not long after, news came that the brother of another gift had killed himself. He had been a student at the Peking Aeronautical College, and he and some fellow students had been denounced for trying to organize an anti-Mao party. He threw himself out of a third-floor window when the police came to arrest him.
一位朋友的父母都是名演员，一天，她告诉我们：他们双双自杀了，因为无法忍受批斗。不久之后，另一位姑娘的哥哥也自杀了。他是北京航空学院的学生，和一些同学被指控组织反对毛泽东的政党。警察来抓他时，他跳出三楼窗户。
Some of his fellow 'conspirators' were executed; others were given life sentences, the normal punishment for anyone attempting to organize an opposition, which was rare.
他的伙伴有的被处死，有的被判处终身或长期监禁——这是对付任何想组织反对党者的通常处罚。极严的惩罚使组织反对党的情形很少发生。悲剧成了我们日常生活的一部分。
Tragedies like this were part of our everyday life.
The families of Plumpie, Ching-ching, and some others were nor hit. And they remained my friends. They were not harassed by my parents' persecutors, who could not extend their power to that degree. But they still ran risks by not swimming with the tide. My friends were among the millions who held sacred the traditional Chinese code of loyalty 'giving charcoal in snow." The fact that they were there helped me through the worst years of the Cultural Revolution.
小胖子、青青和其他一些朋友的家庭没有遭殃，可他们一直是我的朋友。迫害我父母的人权力没大到无孔不入，没有给他们施加压力。当然，朋友们仍因不随波逐流而承担风险。像千百万人一样，他们奉行中国传统道德：“雪中送炭”。他们的友谊使我熬过了文化大革命最黑暗的岁月。
They gave me a lot of practical help, too. Toward the end of 1967 Red Chengdu began to attack our compound, which was controlled by 26 August, and our block was turned into a fortress. We were ordered to move from our third-floor apartment into some ground-floor rooms in the next block.
她们也给了我很多实际的帮助。1967年底，“红成”开始进攻由“八·二六”派控制的省委大院，我们那座公寓大楼被改建成堡垒。我们奉令从三楼住宅搬到隔壁那幢楼底层的一套房间。
My parents were in detention at the time. My father's department, which would normally have looked after the move, now only gave us our marching orders. As there were no furniture-removal companies, without the help of our friends my family would have ended up without a bed.
我父母当时正被拘留。照例我父亲单位本应负责这次搬家，但是现在他们只是简单下令要我们走。那时根本没有搬家公司，要不是朋友们帮助，我们就连床也没有了。
Still, we moved only the most essential furniture, leaving things like my father's heavy bookcases behind; we could not lift them, let alone can them down several flights of stairs.
即便如此，我们也仅搬走最必需的家具，父亲那些笨重的书柜只好放弃了，我们挪都挪不动，更不用说抬下三楼了。
Our new quarters were in an apartment already occupied by the family of another capitalist-roader, who were now ordered to vacate half of it. Apartments were being reorganized like this all over the compound so the top floors could be used as command posts. My sister and I shared a room. We kept the window facing the now deserted back garden permanently shut, because the moment it was opened, a strong stench would flood in from the blocked drains outside. At night, we heard cries for surrender from outside the compound wall, and sporadic shooting. One night I was awakened by the sound of shattering glass: a bullet had come through the window and embedded itself in the wall opposite. Strangely, I was not frightened. After the horrors I had been through, bullets had lost their effect.
我们的新家原属另一个走资派，他家原占有两套房间，现在得让出一套给我们。大院的房子就这样重作安排，腾空楼上的房子作制高点。我姐姐和我合用一个房间，我们总是死死关着那面对着荒废后花园的窗户。因为一打开，淤塞的下水道恶臭味就会充满屋子。晚上我们躺在床上常听院墙外面高喊投降的声音，还有不时的枪响声。一天晚上，我被玻璃破碎声惊醒，原来一粒子弹射穿窗户，嵌入对面的墙壁。奇怪的是，我并没感到害怕。生活中的恐怖太多，子弹已经失去威慑力。
To occupy myself, I began writing poetry in classical styles. The first poem with which I felt satisfied was written on my sixteenth birthday, z5 March 1968. There was no birthday celebration. Both my parents were in detention That night, as I lay in bed listening to the gunshots and the Rebels' loudspeakers blaring out blood curdling diatribes, I reached a turning point. I had always been told, and had believed, that I was living in a paradise on earth, socialist China, whereas the capitalist world was hell. Now I asked myself." If this is paradise, what then is hell? I decided that I would like to see for myself whether there was indeed a place more full of pain. For the first time, I consciously hated the regime I lived under, and craved an alternative.
我开始在闲暇时写古体诗。第一首令我满意的诗是1968年3月25日，我十六岁生日那天写成的。当时的气氛照常是很黯淡，没有人帮我庆生，我父母都在拘留中。晚上，我躺在床上，听着远处的枪声、造反派的扩音器声及令人毛骨悚然的叫骂声。对我而言，此刻是个转折点：过去的教育使我相信生活在人间天堂——社会主义中国，而资本主义世界是黑暗的地狱。现在我问自己：如果这是天堂，地狱又是什么样子呢？我真想看一看还有什么地方比这里更痛苦。第一次，我自觉憎恶自己的社会，渴望能有另一种选择。
Still, I subconsciously avoided Mao. He had been part of my life ever since I was a child. He was the idol, the god, the inspiration. The purpose of my life had been formulated in his name. A couple of years before, I would happily have died for him. Although his magic power had vanished from inside me, he was still sacred and un doubtable? Even now, I did not challenge him.
不过，我在潜意识里仍然避免指责毛泽东。从我孩提时代起，他就是我生命的一个部分，他是神，是偶像，是主宰，我活在世上的意义和他息息相关。几年前我还会高高兴兴地为他牺牲。现在虽然他的魔力已大不如前，但他仍然是神圣的，不容置疑的，甚至在此刻我也没有想到反对他。
It was in this mood that I composed my poem. I wrote about the death of my indoctrinated and innocent past as dead leaves being swept from a tree by the whirlwind and carried to a world of no return. I described my bewilderment at the new world, at not knowing what and how to think. It was a poem of groping in the dark, searching.
就是在这种黑暗中摸索、探寻的心情下，我想好了我的诗，描写过去那种被灌输、单纯的日子已消逝了，好像一树黄叶被飓风吹落，卷向天边，一去不返。我也描绘新世界所带给我的迷惘，因为我不知道该想什么，怎么去想。
I wrote the poem down, and was lying in bed going over it in my head when I heard banging on the door. From the sound, I knew it was a house raid. Mrs. Shau's Rebels had raided our apartment several times. They had taken away 'bourgeois luxury items' like my grandmother's elegant clothes from the pre-Communist days, my mother's fur lined Manchurian coat, and my father's suits- even though they were Mao-style. They even confiscated my woollen trousers. They kept coming back to try to find 'evidence' against my father. I had grown used to our quarters being turned upside down.
我写好诗后，躺在床上开始推敲。突然一阵急促的敲门声，我马上反应过来：又是抄家。姚女士的造反派已光顾我家好几次了，找整我父亲的证据。他们拿走了所有“资阶级奢侈品”，像我姥姥在共产党建立政权之前所穿的雅致的绸缎衣服、我母亲的狐皮大衣，以及我父亲的毛料制服——即使是道道地地的毛装。他们甚至把我的御寒毛裤也抄走了。我已经对家被翻个底朝天习以为常了。
I was seized with anxiety about what would happen if they saw my poem. When my father first came under attack he asked my mother to burn his poems; he knew how writing, any writing, could be twisted against its author.
这次我却一下紧张起来：他们发现我的诗怎么办？记得父亲开始被批判时，叫母亲把他的诗都烧掉。他很清楚，任何作品都可能被断章取义地歪曲，用以陷害作者。
But my mother could not bring herself to destroy them all.
我母亲舍不得把所有的诗都烧完，保留了一些写给她的。结果造反派以这些诗为“罪证”，专门开了几次批斗会折磨我父亲。
She kept a few which he had written for her. These cost him several brutal denunciation meetings.
In one poem my father poked fun at himself for failing to climb to the top of a scenic mountain. Mrs. Shau and her comrades accused him of 'lamenting his frustrated ambition to usurp China's supreme leadership."
父亲在一首诗里，曾自嘲没登上四川峨嵋山顶峰：“虽无壮志攀金顶，却有闲情涉玉溪”。姚女士和她的同伙据此硬说他有野心，要篡夺最高领导权。
In another, he described working at night:
在另一首诗里，父亲描绘自己熬夜工作的情形：“灯随深夜白，走笔到天明。”
The light shines whiter when the night grows darker,
My pen races to meet the dawn... The Rebels claimed he was referring to socialist China as 'dark night," and that he was working with his pen to welcome a 'white dawn' - a Kuomintang comeback (white was the color of counter revolution). In those days it was commonplace for such ridiculous interpretations to be forced upon someone's writings. Mao, who was a lover of classical poetry, did not think of making it an exception to this ghastly rule. Writing poetry became a highly dangerous occupation.
造反派说他把社会主义中国描绘成“漫长的黑夜”，说他用自己的笔迎接天边发白——国民党反攻回来(白色是象征反革命的颜色)。诸如此类歪曲文学作品荒唐可笑的解释，当时大为风行。毛泽东虽然喜欢古体诗词，(此处删去一句)，但写诗仍是危险的消遣。
When the pounding on the door began, I quickly ran to the toilet, and locked the door while my grandmother answered Mrs. Shau and her posse. My hands trembling, I managed to tear the poem into tiny pieces, throw them into the bowl, and flush the toilet. I searched the floor carefully to make sure no pieces had fallen out. But the paper did not all disappear the first time. I had to wait and flush again. By now the Rebels were banging on the door of the toilet, curtly ordering me to come out immediately.
我太清楚这种危险性了，一听到敲门声，就飞快跑进厕所，拴上门。姥姥去开门时，我努力控制住颤抖的双手，把诗稿撕得粉碎，抛进便池内，放水冲掉。我仔细搜索地面以确保没有碎片落下，但是冲一次水并没把碎片冲干净，我只得等着再冲一次。造反派已经来到厕所门边了，敲着门命令我马上出来，我没有答理。
I did not answer.
My brother Jin-ming also got a fright that night. Ever since the Cultural Revolution had started, he had been frequenting a black market specializing in books. The commercial instinct of the Chinese is so strong that black markets, Mao's greatest capitalist Mte noire, existed right through the crushing pressure of the Cultural Revolution.
我弟弟京明这晚也受了惊。从文革一开始，他就常去专门买卖书籍的黑市。中国人做生意的天赋是如此强烈，毛泽东最反对的资本主义活动——自由市场，居然还能在文化大革命的狂风暴雨中存活。
In the center of Chengdu, in the middle of the main shopping street, was a bronze statue of Sun Yat-sen, who had led the 1921 republican revolution which had overthrown 2,000 years of imperial rule. The statue had been erected before the Communists came to power. Mao was not particularly keen on any revolutionary leaders before himself, including Sun. But it was politic to lay claim to his tradition, so the statue was allowed to stay, and the patch of ground around it became a plant nursery. When the Cultural Revolution broke out, Red Guards attacked emblems of Sun Yat-sen until Zhou Enlai slapped a protection order on them. The statue survived, but the plant nursery was abandoned as 'bourgeois decadence." When Red Guards began raiding people's houses and burning their books, a small crowd started to gather on this deserted ground to deal in the volumes which had escaped the bonfires. All manner of people were to be found there: Red Guards who wanted to make some cash from the books they had confiscated; frustrated entrepreneurs who smelled money; scholars who did not want their books to be burned but were afraid of keeping them; and book lovers. The books being traded had all been published or sanctioned under the Communist regime before the Cultural Revolution. Apart from Chinese classics, they included Shakespeare, Dickens, Byron, Shelley, Shaw, Thackeray, Tolstoy, Dostoyevsky, Turgenev, Chekhov, Ibsen, Balzac, Maupassant, Flaubert, Dumas, Zola, and many other world classics. Even Conan Doyle's Sherlock Holmes, who had been a great favorite in China.
在成都市中心区最繁华的春熙路边，竖立着一尊孙逸仙先生的铜像，这是共产党掌权以前立起来的。当时很少提及毛泽东之前的革命领袖，包括孙先生，但是出于政治考虑，(此处删去一句)。孙先生的铜像被保暗下来了。周围的草地成了一个苗圃，买卖花卉。文化大革命开始后，红卫兵闹闹嚷嚷要砸烂全中国所有的孙逸仙先生的纪念物。只因周恩来出面发出一道保护令，孙先生的铜像才幸存下来。而苗圃荒废了，说是腐朽的资产阶级爱好的玩意儿。当红卫兵开始抄家焚书时，一群人聚在这块地方买卖那些逃过大火的书籍。来这里露面的，各色各样的人都有：有红卫兵，他们想倒卖没收来的书籍赚零用钱；有不甘寂寞的生意人，他们嗅到了钱的气味；有教师、研究人员一类的学者，他们不想使自己的藏书付之一炬，又怕继续保存它们惹来大祸；当然还有那些热爱读书的普通人。上市交易的书一般是在1949年共产党夺权后至文革开始这段时间出版的。除了中国古典文学之外，还有莎士比亚、狄更斯、拜伦、雪莱、萧伯纳、萨克莱、托尔斯泰、陀斯妥也夫斯基、屠格涅夫、契诃夫、易卜生、巴尔扎克、奠泊桑、福楼拜、大伸马、小仲马、左拉等许多作家的名著，柯南道尔笔下的福尔摩斯，在中国非常受欢迎。
The price of the books depended on a variety of factors.
书的价格取决于多种因素。
If they had a library stamp in them, most people shunned them. The Communist government had such a reputation for control and order that people did not want to risk being caught with illegally gotten state property, for which they would be severely punished. They were much happier buy privately owned books with no identification marks.
如果书上有图书馆的印章，价格就会大跌。大多数买主那时仍然对公家财产敬而远之。共产党多年的铁腕统治已树立了控制和秩序的威望，如果被捉到“盗窃国家财产”的罪证，将受到严厉惩处，大家宁愿买私人藏书。
Novels with erotic passages commanded the highest prices, and also carried the greatest danger. Stendhars Le Rouge et le Noir, considered erotic, cost the equivalent of two weeks' wages for an average person.
色情小说在共产党掌权后发行量非常少，所以卖价最高，当然买这种书也要冒很大的风险。司汤达的《红与黑》被认为有情爱描述，能卖到极高价，相当于一般人两星期的工资。
Jin-ming went to this black market every day. His initial capital came from books which he had obtained from a paper recycling shop, to which frightened citizens were selling their collections as scrap paper. Jin-ming had chatted up a shop assistant and bought a lot of these books, which he resold at much higher prices. He then bought more books at the black market, read them, sold them, and bought more.
京明经常出入这个书籍黑市。他最初的资金来源是一捆捆从废旧物资收购站买来的书。有些吓怕了的市民们把自己的藏书当作废纸卖给废品收购站，京明和一位收购站店员拉上关系，成捆地用废纸价买下这些书籍。然后他再分门别类地以高价卖到黑市。在他很快通晓各种书籍价格之后，就在黑市上买书转卖。他先自己看，看完后再卖掉，再买更多的。
Between the start of the Cultural Revolution and the end of 1968, at least a thousand books passed through his hands. He read at the rate of one or two a day. He only dared to keep a dozen or so at any one time, and had to hide them carefully. One of his hiding places was under an abandoned water tower in the compound, until a downpour destroyed a stock of his favorites, including Jack London's The Call of the Wild. He kept a few at home stashed in the mattresses and the corners of our storeroom. On the night of the house raid he had Le Rouge et le Noir hidden in his bed. But, as always, he had torn the cover off and replaced it with that of The Selected Works of Mao Zedong, and Mrs. Shau and her comrades did not examine it.
从文化大革命开始到1968年底，几千册书流经他的手。他抓到机会，每天以两本的速度贪婪地阅读。每次从自由市场交易下来，他只敢在手边保存十几本书，带回省委大院后小心翼翼藏好。他的一处藏书地点是省委大院内一座废弃的水塔后面。一天，一场大雨毁掉了他藏在这里的心爱书籍，包括杰克、伦敦的《野性的呼唤》。他也把一些书偷偷带回家，藏在床上的草垫下面或贮藏室的黑暗角落里。就在抄家那天晚上，正好有本《红与黑》藏在他的床上。不过他耍了个花招，把藏在家里的书都包上了《毛泽东选集》旧皮，姚女士和她的同志们没有想到要检查。
Jin-ming dealt in other black-market goods as well. His enthusiasm for science had not waned. At the time, the only black market dealing in scientific goods in Chengdu traded in semi-conductor radio parts: this branch of industry was in favor because it 'spread Chairman Mao's words."
京明也在别的黑市上进进出出。他对科学的热爱并没有因文革而降温。那时，成都唯一一处科学器材的黑市交易无线电零件、半导体材料，因为当时半导体、无线电工业可以“传播毛主席的声音”而得以发展。
Jin-ming bought parts and made his own radios, which he sold at good prices. He bought more parts for his real purpose: testing various theories in physics which had been nagging him.
京明买了零件，自己安装成收音机后，再以高价卖出。这样他就有钱买更多的零件来达成他真正的目的：实验种种一直困扰着他的物理理论。
To get money for his experiments, he even dealt in Mao badges. Many factories had stopped normal production to produce aluminum badges with Mao's head on them. Collecting of any kind, including stamps and paintings, had been banned as a 'bourgeois habit." So people's instinct for collecting turned to this sanctioned object although they could only deal in it clandestinely. Jin-ming made a small fortune. Litfie did the Great Helmsman know that even the image of his head had become a piece of property for capitalist speculation, the very activity he had tried so hard to stamp out.
为了赚钱维持自己的科学实验，他甚至买卖毛泽东徽章。这段时间，许多工厂都停止正常生产，转而制造各式铝质毛泽东头像的徽章，优劣精粗，触目皆是。那时，各种收藏如集邮、搜集绘画等都被禁止，说是“资产阶级恶习”。人们嗜好收藏的本能就集中到了毛的徽章上——当然只敢暗地里交易。京明靠这项交易发了一笔小财。伟大舵手的光辉形象竟然也成了投机商品。
There were repeated clamp downs? Often truckloads of Rebels would arrive, seal off the streets, and grab anyone who looked suspicious. Sometimes they sent spies who pretended to be browsing. Then a whistle would blow and they would swoop on the dealers. Those who were caught had their belongings confiscated. They were usually beaten. One regular punishment was 'bloodletting' stabbing them in the buttocks. Some were tortured, and all were threatened with double punishment if they did not stop. But most came back, again and again.
黑市不断被取缔，常是几辆满载造反派的卡车突然风驰电掣般开来，截断整条街，捉拿看似可疑的人。有时派来许多暗探，假扮买卖人模样，混到正热心交易的目标身边，一声哨子响，立即抓住这些人。被抓人的所有物品、钱财统统被没收，还被毒打。一般惩罚是“放血”——用刀子戳屁股。释放前都受到警告：下次再犯，惩罚加倍。但人们照来不误，黑市上仍满是做交易的熟面孔。
My second brother, Xiao-her, was twelve at the beginning of 1967. Having nothing to do, he soon found himself involved in a street gang. Virtually nonexistent before the Cultural Revolution, these were now flourishing. A gang was called a 'dock," and its leader the 'helmsman." Everyone else was a 'brother," and had a nickname, usually with some connection with animals: "Thin Dog' if a boy was thin; "Gray Wolf' if he had a lock of gray hair. Xiao-her was called "Black Hoof' because part of his name, her, means 'black," and also because he was dark, and was swift at running errands, which was one of his duties, as he was younger than most of the gang members.
我的二弟小黑在1967年初时十二岁，因为无所事事，加入街头兄弟队。这类集团在文革之前几乎不存在，现在盛行起来了。一个兄弟伙称为一个“码头”，领头的叫“舵爷”。伙内每个成员都是“兄弟”，都有一个绰号，一般和动物有关系。如果男孩子很瘦，就叫“瘦狗”。有一撮灰发叫“灰狼”。小黑的绰号是“黑蹄”，原因是他的名字有个“黑”字，皮肤又黑，此外，帮伙内跑腿做事也十分敏捷，他是他那个兄弟伙中最年少的。
At first the gangsters treated him as a revered guest, because they had rarely known any high officials' children.
起初，兄弟伙待小黑像客人似的客气，因为这些人很少能和高干子弟交朋友。
Gang members tended to come from poor families, and had often been school dropouts before the Cultural Revolution. Their families were not targets of the revolution, and they were not interested in it, either.
他们多来自贫困家庭，文革前常因种种理由离开学校。他们的家庭不是文革的斗争对象，他们自己也无心卷进这场运动。
Some boys sought to imitate the ways of the high officials' children, disregarding the fact that the high officials had been toppled. In their Red Guard days, the high officials' children favored old Communist army uniforms, as they were the only people who had access to these through their parents. Some street boys got the old gear through black-market trading, or dyed their clothes green. But they lacked the haughty air of the elite, and their green was often not quite the right shade. They were sneered at by high officials' children, as well as by their own friends, as 'pseuds."
尽管高干现已倒了楣，看上去大有永世不得翻身之势，兄弟伙的一些孩子还是爱模仿高干子弟的派头。文革初期红卫兵运动时，高干子弟嗜爱共产党绿军服，因为只有他们才有可能通过父母的关系得到这些装束。有些街头男孩子就设法通过黑市搞来一些看上去不太走样的旧衣服，染成绿色。但是他们还是缺乏那股子神气，而且染的颜色也不是很正确，一看就是冒牌货。这些可怜的孩子们成了他们的朋友和高干子弟双方嘲笑的对象，讥讽他们是“业余高干”。
Later the high officials' children switched to wearing dark-blue jackets and trousers. Although most of the population was wearing blue at the time, theirs was a particular shade, and it was also unusual to wear the same color top and bottom. After they had made this their distinguishing sign, boys and girls from other backgrounds had to avoid it, if they did not want to be treated as pseuds. The same went for a certain kind of shoes: black cord uppers with white plastic soles and a white plastic band showing in between.
突然之间，高干子弟转了风向，都穿清一色的深蓝色军便装和中山服。虽然在文革期间，绝大多数人都穿蓝色，但高干子弟的“蓝”蓝得很特殊：颜色很深，从头到脚清一色。脚上的鞋也有特殊样式：黑灯芯绒面配上白色塑料鞋底，鞋底和鞋面之间嵌着一条黑塑料带。在他们选择定下这种打扮后，别的阶层的孩子要不想被嘲笑成“业余高干”的话，就得避免了。
Some gang members invented their own style. They wore many layers of shirts under an outer garment, and turned out all their collars. The more collars you named out, the smarter you were considered to be. Often Xiao-her wore six or seven shirts under his jacket and two even in the boiling summer heat. Jogging pants always had to show under their shortened trousers. They also wore white sneakers without laces, and sported army caps, with cardboard strips tucked inside to make the peaks stick up so they looked imposing.
一些街头孩子于是创了自己的时髦风格：在一件外套内穿上许多层衬衫或运动衫，把领子一层层翻出来，翻出来的领子越多越时髦越潇洒。小黑经常在夹克下面穿六七件衬衫或运动衫，即使是炎炎夏日也要穿两件以上。穿在里面的运动裤则从有意裁短的外裤下面露出来。他们穿白色或蓝色的橡皮底、帆布面运动鞋，但不系鞋带。他们也戴军帽，用硬纸板垫在里面，使周边挺起来，希望能看上去仪表堂堂，像个大人物模样。
One of the main ways in which Xiao-her's 'brothers' occupied their empty days was stealing. Whatever they got, their haul had to be handed over to the helmsman to be divided up evenly among them. Xiao-her was too afraid to steal anything, but his brothers gave him his share without demur.
小黑的兄弟伙终日四处游荡，消磨时光的方式之一是偷东西。不管偷到什么，都得拿出来，上交给舵爷，由他平均分配。小黑胆小，不敢偷，他的“兄弟伙”没有表示异议就分给他一份。
Theft was extremely widespread during the Cultural Revolution, particularly pick pocketing and stealing bicycles. Most people I knew had their pockets picked at least once. For me, shopping trips often involved either losing my own purse or seeing someone yelling because their purse had been stolen. The police, who had split into factions, exercised only token surveillance.
在文化大革命期阔，小偷到处都是，特别多的是摸钱和偷自行车。我认识的大多数人都有皮包被扒的经历。我每次上街买东西，不是自己的钱被偷，就是见到有人在尖叫哭喊抓扒手。警察已分裂成几派，无人对盗窃执法。
When foreigners first came to China in large numbers in the 197os, many were impressed by the 'moral cleanliness' of the society: a discarded sock would follow its owner a thousand miles from Peking to Guangzhou, cleaned and folded and placed in his hotel room. The visitors did not realize that only foreigners and Chinese under close surveillance received such attention, or that no one would dare to steal from foreigners, because taking even a handkerchief was likely to be punished by death. The clean folded sock bore no relation to the real state of society: it was just part of the regime's theater.
外国人于七十年代大批来到中国时，许多人都称赞中国人社会道德好。一双被扔弃的短袜会紧跟它的主人跨越千山万水，从北京追到广州，洗得干干净净，折得整整齐齐，重新放到主人的旅馆房间里。外国来访者没有意识到只有外国人和受到密切监视的中国人才会享受到这种照料。他们也不知道，没人敢偷外国人的东西，因为既便是只偷了一条手帕也会有被判死刑的危险。那双洗净折好的袜子并没反映社会的真实情况，只是在演戏。
Xiao-her's brothers were also obsessed with chasing gifts. The twelve-and thirteen-year-olds like Xiao-her were often too shy to go after gifts themselves, so they became the older boys' messengers, delivering their error fiddled love letters. Xiao-her would knock on a door, praying that it would be opened by the girl herself and not her father or brother, who was sure to slap him across the head. Sometimes, when fear got the upper hand, he would slip the letter under the door.
小黑的兄弟伙也以追逐女孩子为乐。像小黑这样的小男孩因为太害羞，是不敢跟姑娘们正面交锋的，于是成了大男孩的信差，负责传递错别字连篇、语法混乱的情书。小黑扮演的角色是去敲女孩子的家门，那时他总是祈祷：来开门的是女孩子本人而不是她父母或兄弟，后者肯定会迎头就是一巴掌。有时，他实在太害怕，就把信从门缝里塞进去。
When a girl rejected a proposal, Xiao-her and other younger boys became the tool of revenge of the spurned lover, making noises outside her house and firing catapults at her window. When the girl came out, they spat at her, swore at her, shook their middle fingers at her, and yelled dirty words which they did not fully understand. Abusive Chinese terms for women are rather graphic: 'shuffle' (for the shape of her genitals), 'horse saddle' (for the image of being mounted), over spilling oil lamp' ('too frequent' discharge), and 'worn-out shoes' (much 'used').
当女孩拒绝求爱对，失恋的人会想办法报复，小黑和别的少年就成了工具，不是去姑娘家门口大吵大闹，就是用弹弓打碎她家的玻璃窗。姑娘一出门，小男孩们就一拥而上朝她吐口水，叫骂他们自己也不会懂的脏话。中国语言里骂女人的话是极有声有色的，如：“梭叶子——妇女的生殖器；“马鞍”——即骑上去的形象；“漏灯盏”——性交次数太多；“破鞋”——“用”得太旧。
Some girls tried to find protectors in the gangs, and the more capable ones became helms women themselves. The girls who became involved in this male world sported their own picturesque sobriquets, like "Dewy Black Peony," "Broken Wine Vessel," "Snake Enchantress."
有些女孩子只得在兄弟伙里找保护人，更能干的，自己就成了女舵爷。那些卷进这种男性世界的姑娘给自己取了些生动的绰号，如“黑牡丹”、“破酒壶”、“女蛇妖”。
The third major occupation of the gangs was fighting, at the slightest provocation. Xiao-her was very excited by the fights, but much to his regret, he was endowed with what he called 'a cowardly disposition." He would run away at the first sign that a battle was turning ugly. Thanks to his lack of bravado, he survived intact while many boys were injured, even killed, in these pointless exchanges.
兄弟伙的第三大消遣是打群架，只要稍受挑衅就大打出手。小黑对打群架非常兴奋，遗憾的是，他的胆子实在算不得大，每当有恶斗征兆出现时，他的办法是拔腿就跑。多亏他缺乏所谓大丈夫气概，他没缺胳膊、断腿。当时许多孩子在这些毫无意义的打斗中受伤，甚至死亡。
One afternoon, he and some of his brothers were loitering about as usual when a member of the gang rushed over and said the home of a brother had just been raided by another dock, and this brother had been subjected to a 'bloodletting." They went back to their own 'dockyard' to collect their weapons sticks, bricks, knives, wire whips, and cudgels. Xiao-her tucked a three-section cudgel into his leather belt. They ran to the house where the incident had occurred, but found that their enemies had gone and their wounded brother had been taken to a hospital by his family. Xiao-her's helmsman wrote a letter, peppered with errors, throwing down the gauntlet to the other gang, and Xiao-her was charged with delivering it.
一天下午，他和一些兄弟伙像往常一样四下闲逛，一个兄弟飞快跑来报信，说一个兄弟的家被另一个码头的人抄砸了，这个兄弟本人也被放了血。大家一听，群情激昂，马上跑回自己码头“仓库”取武器：木棍、砖头、刀子、钢鞭及铁棒，小黑把一根三节棍掖在腰带里。他们迅速跑到出事地点，发现“敌人”已经撤走了，受伤的兄弟已被父母送往医院。小黑的舵爷写了一封错字连篇的挑战书，由小黑负责送到对方的码头去。
The letter demanded a formal fight in the People's Sports Stadium, where there was plenty of space. The stadium no longer hosted any kind of sport now, competitive games having been condemned by Mao. Athletes had to devote themselves to the Cultural Revolution.
信中提出到空旷的人民体育场决斗。体育场此刻已不再用来举行体育比赛了，毛泽东说那是“锦标主义”，而且运动员也得全心投入文化大革命。
On the appointed day, Xiao-her's gang of several dozen boys waited on the running track. Two slow hours passed, then a man in his early twenties limped into the stadium.
It was "Lame Man' Tang, a famous figure in the Chengdu underworld. In spite of his relative youth, he was treated with the respect normally reserved for the old.
在约定的那天，小黑的兄弟伙邀约了七八十个男孩子，在跑道上等待，眼巴巴地等了两个多小时，才见一个二十岁刚出头的小伙子一瘸一拐出现了。他是成都市黑社会有名的唐跛子，虽然还很年轻，但已“德高望重”。唐
Lame Man Tang had become lame from polio. His father had been a Kuomintang official, and so the son was allocated an undesirable job in a small workshop located in his old family house, which the Communists had confiscated. Employees in small units like this did not enjoy the benefits available to workers in big factories, such as guaranteed employment, free health services, and a pension.
跛子是因小儿麻痹症变瘸的。他父亲曾是国民党官员，他只能去做那种无人肯干的活儿，在一家街道工厂当工人，那里的工人没有国营工厂工人的福利待遇，如铁饭碗、公费医疗和养老金。那家工厂就建在共产党没收的他家住宅里。
His background had prevented Tang from going on to higher education, but he was extremely bright, and became the defaao chief of the Chengdu underworld. Now he had come at the request of the other dock, to ask for a truce.
唐跛子的家庭背景也使他不能接受高等教育，但此人脑袋很灵光，很快成了成都黑社会的首脑。眼下他是应另外那个码头之邀来讲和的，他先掏出几盒最好的香烟，散发给所有在场的人，然后拿出一封道歉信：赔偿一切损失，包括受伤者的医疗费。小黑的舵爷不得已地接受了：唐跛子的面子很大，很难对他说“不”字。
He produced several cartons of the best cigarettes and handed them around. He delivered apologies from the other dock, and their promise to foot the bills for the damaged house and the medical care. Xiao-her's helmsman accepted: it was impossible to say no to Lame Man Tang.
Lame Man Tang was soon arrested. By the beginning of 1968, a new, fourth stage of the Cultural Revolution had started. Phase One had been the teenage Red Guards; then came the Rebels and the attacks on capitalist-roaders; the third phase had been the factional wars among the Rebels. Mao now decided to halt the factional fighting. To bring about obedience, he spread terror to show that no one was immune. A sizable part of the hitherto unaffected population, including some Rebels, now became victims.
不久后，唐跛子就被逮捕了。1968年初，文化大革命的第四个阶段开始了。第一阶段是中学生、大学生的红卫兵运动；第二阶段是造反派斗争走资派；第三阶段是造反派内部的派系武斗。现在毛泽东总算决定停止派系之战，新的恐怖又制造出来，以表明谁不听话都不行。于是，一大批迄今还没受冲击的人，包括造反派，成了牺牲品。
New political campaigns were cranked up one after another to consume new class enemies. The largest of these witch hunts "Clean Up the Class Ranks," claimed Lame Man Tang. He was released after the end of the Cultural Revolution in 1976, and in the early 1980s he became an entrepreneur and a millionaire, one of the richest men in Chengdu. His dilapidated family house was returned to him. He tore it down and built a grand two-story edifice.
整人的名堂层出不穷，有一个称为“清理阶级队伍”。就在这次浪潮中，唐跛子遭了殃。直到文化大革命1976年结束对他才从监狱里放了出来。八十年代初，他奇迹般地变成了一位企业家、百万富翁，是成都市最有钱的人之一。他家被占用的住宅现在退还给了他，他把它重建成一幢颇为洋气的两层楼房。
When the craze for discos hit China he was often to be seen sitting in the most prominent spot, benignly watching the young boys and girls of his entourage dancing while he slowly counted out a thick wad of bank notes with emphatic, deliberate nonchalance, paying for the whole crowd and reveling in his new found power money.
在成都最豪华的舞厅内常能看见他坐在显眼处，以长者的神气看着同来的少男少女跳舞。他不跳，只付钱，用一种故作漫不经心的姿态点厚厚一叠钞票，支付所有在场者的花费。他在享受新获得的权力——金钱。
The "Clean Up the Class Ranks' campaign ruined the lives of millions. In one single case, the so-called Inner Mongolia People's Party affair, some ten percent of the adult Mongolian population were subjected to torture or physical maltreatment; at least twenty thousand died. This particular campaign was modeled on pilot studies of six factories and two universities in Peking, which were under Mao's personal supervision. In a report on one of the six factories, the Xinhua Printing Unit, there was a passage which read: "After this woman was labeled a counter revolutionary, one day when she was doing forced labor and the guard turned his eyes away, she rushed up to the fourth floor of the women's dormitory, jumped out of a window, and killed herself. Of course, it is inevitable that counter revolutionaries should kill themselves. But it is a pity that we now have one less "negative example." Mao wrote on this report: "This is the best written of all the similar reports I have read."
这都是后话了。1968年的“清理阶级队伍”运动抓了唐跛子，也毁掉了数百万人的生活。仅所谓“内蒙古人民党”一案就约有十分之一的成年蒙古族人遭受迫害，至少有两万人致死。当时所谓“六厂二校”经验是清理阶级队伍的典范，(此处删去一句)。六厂之一的北京新华印刷厂有这么一段报告：“在给这个女人戴上反革命分子帽子之后，在劳动时，她趁着看管她的民兵一时疏忽，就以最快的速度冲上女宿舍的四楼，跳楼摔死了。当然，反革命自杀是难免的，但是少了一个反面教员。”毛泽东在这个资料上批道：“在我看过的同类材料中，此件是写得最好的。”
This and other campaigns were managed by the Revolutionary Committees which were being set up all over the country. The Sichuan Provincial Revolutionary Committee was established on 1 June 1968. Its leaders were the same four people who had headed the Preparatory Committee the two army chiefs and the Tings. The committee included the chiefs of the two major Rebel camps, Red Chengdu and 26 August, and some 'revolutionary officials."
一连串以各种名目整人的大小运动都是由全国各地纷纷建立的革命委员会指挥的。四川省革委会于1968年6月2日成立，核心领导仍然是那四个主持筹备委员会的人——张、梁、刘、张。委员会包括“红成”和“八·二六”两大造反派的头目，以及一些“革命干部”。
This consolidation of Mao's new power system had profound effects on my family. One of the first results was a decision to withhold part of the salaries of the capitalist roaders and only to leave each dependent a small monthly cash allowance. Our family income was cut by more than half. Although we were not starving, we could no longer afford to buy from the black market, and the state supply of food was deteriorating fast. The meat ration, for instance, was half a pound per person per month. My grandmother worried and planned day and night to enable us children to eat better, and to produce food parcels for our parents in detention.
新权力体系的建成对我们家有重大的影响。首先是走资派的工资被扣发了，家里每人每月只给发一定数量的生活费，现在我们家的收入少了一半多。虽然我们没有挨饿，但是已买不起黑市上的东西了。国家供应每况愈下，例如肉每月只有半斤。我姥姥一天到晚都在操心，怎样才能使我们这些孩子吃得好一点，怎样才能送食物给被拘留的女儿、女婿。
The next decision of the Revolutionary Committee was to order all the capitalist-roaders out of the compound to make room for the new leaders. My family was assigned some rooms at the top of a three-story house which had been the office of a now defunct magazine. There was no running water or toilet on the top floor. We had to go downstairs even to brush our teeth, or to pour away a cup of leftover tea. But I did not mind, because the house was so elegant, and I was thirsty for beautiful things.
省革委的另一个决定是命令所有的走资派统统搬出省委大院，腾出房间给新当官的。我们家搬进一栋三层楼小洋房的顶层，这里原是个杂志社，现在关了门。顶楼没有自来水也没有厕所，我们洗脸刷牙，甚至倒掉一杯剩茶水都得下楼。但是我并不在意，小楼是如此之优雅，生活中我已好久没有看到美丽的东西了。
Unlike our apartment in the compound, which was in a featureless cement block, our new residence was a splendid brick-and-timber double-fronted mansion with exquisitely framed reddish-brown colored windows under gracefully curving eaves. The back garden was dense with mulberry trees, and the front garden had a thick vine trellis, a grove of oleander, a paper mulberry, and a huge nameless tree whose pepper like fruit grew in little clusters inside the folds of its boat-shaped brown and crispy leaves. I particularly loved the ornamental bananas and their long arc of leaves, an unusual sight in a non-tropical climate.
我们在省委大院里住的是单调无特色的水泥大楼，而新住所是一栋别致的砖木结构两面对称的楼宇。弯弯的八角屋檐下，精工细雕的窗棂泛出柔和的棕红色。后花园种满了桑树，前园则有一个大葡萄架、一丛夹竹桃、一棵茂密的枸树，还有棵巨大的不知名的树，果实像胡椒籽，含在船形的褐色脆荚里。我特别喜爱那儿棵少见的芭蕉，长长的弧形叶子，给人梦的遐想。
In those days, beauty was so despised that my family was sent to this lovely house as a punishment. The main room was big and rectangular, with a parquet floor. Three sides were glass, which made it brilliantly light and on a clear day offered a panoramic view of the distant snowy mountains of west Sichuan. The balcony was not made of the usual cement, but of wood painted a reddish brown color, with "Greek key' patterned railings. Another room which opened onto the balcony had an unusually high, pointed ceiling about twenty feet in height with exposed, faded scarlet beams. I fell in love with our new residence at once.
在那些日子里，“美”成了受鄙视的概念，我们竟会被赶到这可爱的地方作惩罚。我们分到的主要房间是长方形的，又大又亮，木条镶嵌的地板，三面全是玻璃窗。每逢天晴，隐隐可见远远的川西雪山。阳台不像一般的是水泥，而是木头的，也漆成棕红色，围栏上是云字希腊花纹。另一间朝阳台开的卧房有二十多高，一根褪色的猩红房梁横贯在半空中。我马上爱上了我们的新住宅。
Later I realized that in winter the rectangular room was a battlefield of bitter winds from all directions through the thin glass, and dust fell like rain from the high ceiling when the wind blew. Still, on a calm night, lying in bed with the moonlight filtering through the windows, and the shadow of the tall paper mulberry tree dancing on the wall, I was filled with joy. I was so relieved to be out of the compound and all its dirty politics that I hoped my family would never go near it again.
后来我才意识到在冬天时，那间满是窗户的大房间是寒风驰骋的战场；卧房每当刮风，尘土就像下雨一般从高高的天花板上飞下来。尽管如此，在风清夜静时，躺在床上，看月光透过窗户洒到床前，看高高的枸树影子在墙壁上婆娑起舞，我的心里就充满了欢乐。我为能搬出省委大院，逃脱那儿肮脏的政治环境而感到轻松。我希望我们家永远不要再进那个大院。
I loved our new street as well. It was called Meteorite Street, because hundreds of years before a meteorite had fallen there. The street was paved with crushed cobblestones, which I much preferred to the asphalt surface of the street outside the compound.
我也很喜欢我们的新街道，它的名字是“支机石街”。几百年前，有一块巨大的陨石落到这里，传说它是支撑天上织女的纺织机的石头。这街道用碎鹅卵石铺成，我喜欢它远胜过省委外那条柏油路。
The only thing that reminded me of the compound was some of our neighbors, who worked in my father's department and belonged to Mrs. Shau's Rebels. When they looked at us it was with expressions of steely rigidity, and on the rare, unavoidable occasions when we had to communicate, they spoke to us in barks. One of them had been the editor of the closed-down magazine, and his wife had been a schoolteacher. They had a boy of six called Jo-jo, the same age as my brother Xiao-fang. A minor government official, with a five-year-old daughter, came to stay with them, and the three children often played together in the garden. My grandmother was anxious about Xiao-fang playing with them, but she dared not forbid him our neighbors might interpret this as hostility toward Chairman Mao's Rebels.
只有一件事时时使我想到省委大院——我们的一些邻居，他们在我父亲部里工作，并属于姚女士的造反派。一看到我们，他们就铁着个脸，当不可避免和我们交谈时，用的也是训斥的口气。邻居中有一位是关了门的一家杂志社编辑，妻子是位中学教师，他们有个男孩子，名叫小小，和我小弟弟小方年龄相仿。一次，一个机关干部带着五岁的女儿来串门，住在他家。三个孩子老凑一块儿玩耍。我姥姥对小方和他们一起玩是说不出的忧虑，但她不敢禁止——邻居也许会说这是仇视毛主席的造反派。
At the foot of the wine-red spiral staircase which led to our rooms was a big half-moon-shaped table. In the old days, a huge porcelain vase would have been placed on it with a bouquet of winter jasmine or peach blossom. Now it was bare, and the three children often played on it.
通往顶楼我家的是一圈圈暗红色螺旋形扶梯。底部有一个很大的半月型桌子，过去上面放着一个大瓷花瓶，插着一束梅花或桃花。现在什么都没有了，三个孩子经常在上面玩。
One day, they were playing 'doctor': Jo-jo was the doctor, Xiao-fang a nurse, and the five-year-old girl the patient.
一天，他们玩“医生和病人”：小小扮医生，小方扮护士，五岁的女孩扮病人。
She lay on her stomach on the table and pulled her skirt up for an injection. Xiao-fang held a piece of wood from the back of a broken chair as his 'needle." At this moment, the girl's mother came up the sandstone steps onto the landing. She screamed and snatched her daughter off the table.
她趴在桌上，撩起裙子准备让小方“打针”，小方拿起一根小木棍作他的“针”。就在这时，女孩子的母亲从楼外沙石梯上走了进来，她尖叫起来，从桌子上一把抓起女儿。
She found a few scratches on the child's inner thigh.
Instead of taking her to a hospital, she fetched some Rebels from my father's office a couple of streets away. A crowd soon marched into the front garden.
她在女儿大腿内侧发现一些擦伤，她的反应不是带小孩子去医院，而是跑到两条街外的省委宣传部召来一群造反派，吵吵嚷嚷挤了一院子。
My mother, who happened to be home for a few days from detention, was immediately seized. Xiao-fang was grabbed and yelled at by the adults. They told him they would 'beat him to death' if he refused to say who had taught him to 'rape the girl."
我母亲当时碰巧从拘留所回家呆几天，马上被抓了下来，小方也被抓住了，大人们围着他大吼大叫，威胁要打死他，逼他说出是谁支使他“强奸”小女孩。他们想强迫他承认是他哥哥们支使的。
They tried to force him to say it was his elder brothers.
Xiao-fang was unable to say a word, even to cry. Jo-jo looked badly scared. He cried and said it was he who had asked Xiao-fang to give the injection. The little girl cried, too, saying she had not had her injection. But the adults shouted at them to shut up, and continued to hector Xiaofang. Eventually, at my mother's suggestion, the crowd, jostling my mother and dragging Xiao-fang, stormed off to the Sichuan People's Hospital.
小方一句话也说不出来，连哭好像也不会哭。小小看上去也吓坏了，哭着说是他要小方打针的。小女孩也哭起来，说并没有真打。但是大人们叫这两个小孩闭嘴，继续吓唬小方。最后，在我母亲建议下，人群推着我母亲，拖着小方，吆三喝四地朝四川省人民医院走去。
As soon as they entered the outpatients' department, the angry mother of the girl and the dramatically heated crowd started to make accusations to the doctors, nurses, and the other patients: "The son of a capitalist-roader has raped the daughter of a Rebel!? The capitalist-roader parents must be made to pay!" While the girl was being examined in the doctor's room a young man in the corridor, a complete stranger, shouted, "Why don't you grab the capitalist roader parents and beat them to death?"
一进候诊室，小女孩的母亲和造反派们就怒气冲冲地对医生、护士和别的病人说：“走资派的儿子强奸了造反派的女儿！一定要和这个走资派算账！”当医生在房内给小姑娘检查时，一个陌生的年轻人在走廊上大声嚷道：“为什么你们不打死这个走资派呢？”
When the doctor finished examining the girl, she came out and announced that there was absolutely no sign that the girl had been raped. The scratches on her legs were not recent, and they could not have been caused by Xiao-fang's piece of wood which, as she showed the crowd, was painted and smooth. They were probably caused by climbing a tree. The crowd dispersed, reluctantly.
医生检查完毕，出来宣布：没有任何迹象显示这个女孩被强奸过，腿上的擦伤不是新伤痕，而且不可能由小方的那根小木棍引起。为了证明这一点，她举起小木棍给大家看它漆得很光滑，大腿上的伤痕可能是小孩爬树造成的。人群不情愿地散开了。
That evening, Xiao-fang was delirious. His face was dark red and he screamed and raved incoherently. The next day, my mother carried him to a hospital, where a doctor gave him a large dose of tranquilizers. After a few days he was well again, but he stopped playing with other children. With this incident, he practically said goodbye to his childhood at the age of six.
那天晚上，小方发高烧满床乱爬，脸通红，眼睛瞪着，嘴里不停地说胡话。第二天我母亲带他去医院检查，医生给他开了大量的镇静剂。几天以后，他恢复了，但是他不再和别的孩子一起玩了。从此，六岁的小方就告别了童年。
* * *
Our move to Meteorite Street had been left to the resources of my grandmother and us five children. But by then we had the help of my sister Xiao-hong's boyfriend, Cheng-yi.
搬到支机石街，靠的也是姥姥和我们五个孩子。但是那次我们有我姐姐小鸿的男朋友——正谊的帮助，正谊的父亲曾是国民党政府职员，1949年以后找不到合适的工作，一部分原因是他的背景，另一部分原因是他患有肺结核、胃溃疡。他只得做些临时工，打扫街道或在公共水管处当收费员。六十年代初的大饥荒时，他和太太都又饿又病，死在重庆。
Cheng-yi's father had been a minor official under the Kuomintang and had not been able to get a proper job after 1949, partly because of his undesirable past and partly because he had TB and a gastric ulcer. He did odd jobs like street cleaning and collecting the fees at a communal water tap. During the famine he and his wife, who were living in Chongqing, died from illnesses aggravated by starvation.
Cheng-yi was a worker in an airplane engine factory, and had met my sister at the beginning of 1968. Like most people in the factory, he was an inactive member of its major Rebel group, which was affiliated with 26 August.
正谊在一家飞机发动机厂当工人，1968年初认识我姐姐。像这家工厂许多工人一样，他也参加了厂里的“八·二六”派，但不是积极分子。
In those days, there was no entertainment, so most Rebel groups set up their own song-and-dance troupes, which performed the few sanctioned songs of Mao quotations and eulogies. Cheng-yi, who was a good musician, was a member of one such troupe. Though she was not in the factory, my sister, who loved dancing, joined it, together with Plumpie and Ching-ching. She and Cheng-yi soon fell in love. The relationship came under pressure from all sides: from his sister and his fellow workers, who were worried 'that a liaison with a capitalist-roader family would jeopardize his future; from our circle of high officials' children, who scorned him for not being 'one of us," and from the unreasonable me, who regarded my sister's desire to live her own life as deserting our parents. But their love survived, and sustained my sister through the following difficult years. I soon came to like and respect Cheng-yi very much, as did all my family. Because he wore glasses, we took to calling him "Specs."
在那些完全没有娱乐活动的日子里，造反派大都成立了自己的唱歌、跳舞队伍——文艺宣传队——以为消遣，演唱一些毛泽东的语录歌及颂扬他的歌曲。正谊爱好音乐，参加了厂文艺宣传队。虽然我姐姐并不是这家工厂的工人，但她喜欢跳跳蹦蹦，于是和小胖、青青也参加了。她很快就和正谊坠人爱河了。他们的关系引起各方面的反对，正谊的姐姐和他的同事担心他和走资派联姻会毁了他的前程，我们的高干子弟圈子嫌正谊不是干部子弟，而我则不近情理地把我姐姐想拥有她自己的生活看作是背弃父母。但是他们仍继续交往，这股爱情力量支持我姐姐度过了文革的艰难岁月。我和全家人不久就都喜欢上了正谊，十分尊重他。因为他戴眼镜，我们都叫他“眼镜”。
Another musician from the troupe, a friend of Specs, was a carpenter and the son of a truck driver. He was a jolly young man with a spectacularly large nose which made him look somewhat un-Chinese. In those days the only foreigners whose pictures we saw often were Albanians, because tiny, faraway Albania was China's only ally even the North Koreans were considered to be too decadent. His friends nicknamed him "AI," short for "Albanian."
文艺宣传队的另一位“音乐家”是正谊的朋友，木匠，卡车司机的儿子。他是个快快活活的年轻人，有一只奇特的大鼻子，使他看上去不太像中国人。在文革时期，我们能从照片上看到的外国朋友都是阿尔巴尼亚人，当时这个小小的、遥远的国家是中国唯一的盟友——甚至连北朝鲜也被认为是堕落的“修正主义”国家。于是他的朋友们都他“阿尔”。
AI came with a cart to help us move to Meteorite Street. Not wanting to overtax him, I suggested we leave some things behind. But he wanted us to take everything. With a nonchalant smile, he clenched his fists and proudly flexed his taut, bulging muscles. My brothers poked the hard lumps with great admiration.
阿尔拉来一辆板车帮我们把家具搬到支机石街，为了不使他负担过重，我提议放弃一些笨重的家具，但他坚持要我们带走所有东西。他脸上挂着若无其事的微笑，握紧拳头，得意地露出自己隆起的块块肌肉。我的弟弟们都羡慕地用手指戳那些硬邦邦的疙瘩。
AI was very keen on Plumpie. The day after the move, he invited her, Ching-ching, and me to lunch at his home, one of the common windowless Chengdu houses with mud floors, which opened directly onto the pavement. This was the first time I had been in one of these houses. When we reached Al's street, I saw a group of young men hanging about on the corner. Their eyes followed us as they said a pointed hello to AI. He flushed with pride, and went over to talk to them. He came back with an animated smile on his face. In a casual tone he said, "I told them you were high officials' children, and that I had made friends with you so I could lay my hands on privileged goods when the Cultural Revolution is over."
阿尔很喜欢小胖，那次搬家后，他邀请小胖、青青和我到他家去吃饭。这是一个普通成都居民住的临街连沿房，没有窗户，泥巴地面，我是第一次走进这种住宅。当我们到达阿尔住的街道时，我看见一群年轻人站在街角，眼光跟着我们。他们对阿尔打了个招呼，阿尔挂着有点得意的神气，走过去和他们搭话。回来时，脸上换成了活泼的微笑，有意漫不经心地对我们说：“我告诉他们，你们都是高干子弟，我和你们交上朋友，文革完了好走后门买高级商品。”
I was stunned. First, what he said seemed to suggest that people thought officials' children had access to consumer goods, which was not the case. Second, I was amazed at his obvious pleasure at being associated with us, and the prestige this clearly gave him in the eyes of his friends. At the moment when my parents were in detention and we had just been thrown out of the compound, when the Sichuan Revolutionary Committee had been established and the capitalist-roaders had been ousted, when the Cultural Revolution seemed to have won, AI and his friends still apparently took it for granted that officials like my parents would come back.
我愣住了。他们似乎以为高干子弟以前都有特权买高级消费品，而我很清楚并非如此。我也很惊讶地显然觉得和我们交朋友很光彩，好像提升了他在朋友心目中的地位。这是怎么回事呢？我的父母还在拘留中，我们刚被撵出了省委大院，四川省革委会刚成立，走资派被打倒了——总之，文化大革命已经胜利了。但是阿尔和他的朋友们显然相信我父母这样的干部还会东山再起。
I was to encounter a similar attitude again and again.
Whenever I went out of the imposing gate of our courtyard, I was always aware of the stares from people on Meteorite Street, stares which were a mixture of curiosity and awe.
我一次又一次遇到别人以类似的态度看待我们。每当我跨出我们住处那道高高的黑漆大门时，我能感觉得到支机石街居民们注视的眼神，混合了好奇和敬畏的神情。我看得出来，老百姓心里都明白，革命委员会只是过眼烟云。
It was clear to me that the general public regarded the Revolutionary Committees, rather than the capitalist roaders, as transient.
* * *
In the autumn of 1968 a new type of team came to take over my school; they were called "Mao Zedong Thought Propaganda Teams." Made up of soldiers or workers who had not been involved in factional fighting, their task was to restore order. In my school, as in all others, the team recalled all the pupils who had been in the school when the Cultural Revolution started two years before, so they could be kept under control. Those few who were out of the city were tracked down and summoned back by telegram. Few dared to stay away.
1968年秋季，一支新队伍接管了大、中、小学校，称作“工人、解放军毛泽东思想宣传队”，由士兵或那些没有卷入派战的工人们组成，职责是恢复秩序。和其他学校一样，我们学校的宣传队马上把所有文革开始时在校的学生叫回学校管束。查到不在成都的学生下落后，发出电报召回，很少有人敢拒不返校。
Back at school, the teachers who had not fallen victim did no teaching. They did not dare. The old textbooks had all been condemned as 'bourgeois poison," and nobody was brave enough to write new ones. So we just sat in classes reciting Mao's articles and reading People's Daily editorials.
回到学校里，即便是那些没有受迫害的教师也不敢教书。所有教材全被说成是“散布资产阶级毒素”，没有人敢写新的。我们只好坐在教室里一遍遍地背诵毛泽东的文章，阅读《人民日报》社论。
We sang songs of Mao's quotations, or gathered to dance 'loyalty dances," gyrating and waving our Little Red Books.
我们也唱毛泽东语录歌，集体跳“忠字舞”，随着音乐节拍，扭动身体，手里摇晃小红书。
Making 'loyalty dances' compulsory was one of the major orders issued by the Revolutionary Committees throughout China. This absurd twisting was mandatory everywhere: in schools and factories, on the streets, in shops, on railway platforms, even in hospitals for the patients who could still move.
要大家跳“忠字舞”是全中国所有革命委员会发布的重要命令之一。这种荒唐可笑的舞蹈在当时到处可见，学校、工厂、街道、商店里、火车站台上，人人都在跳。甚至在医院里，只要能走动的病人都被叫起来舞蹈。
On the whole, the propaganda team sent to my school was fairly benign. Others were not. The one at Chengdu University was hand-picked by the Tings because the university had been the headquarters of their enemy Red Chengdu. Yan and Yong suffered more than most. The Tings instructed the propaganda team to put pressure on them to condemn my father. They refused. They later told my mother that they so admired my father's courage that they decided to take a stand.
我们学校的宣传队还算宽厚，有的宣传队就不是这样了。成都大学的宣传队是“二挺”亲自选派的，因为这所大学是他们的对头“红成”的司令部。翁和颜这下遭了大难，“二挺”下令要宣传队对他俩施加压力，要他们揭发、批判我父亲。翁、颜拒绝了。后来他们告诉我母亲，他们钦佩我父亲的骨气，决心挺起腰杆子来。
By the end of 1968, all university students in China had been summarily 'graduated' en masse, without any exam, assigned jobs, and dispersed to every corner of the land.
1968年底，中国所有在校大学生一齐“毕业”了，没有通过任何考试，都分配了工作——被打发到全国四面八方。
Yan and Yong were warned that if they did not denounce my father, they would have no future. But they stuck to their guns. Yan was sent to a small coal mine in the mountains of east Sichuan. This was just about the worst job possible; the work conditions were extremely primitive and there were virtually no safety measures. Women, like men, had to crawl down the pit on all fours to drag the coal baskets out. Yan's fate was partly the result of the twisted rhetoric of the time: Mme Mao had been insisting on women doing the same kind of work as men, and one of the slogans of the day was Mao's saying "Women can hold up half the sky." But women knew that when they were given the privilege of this equality they were in for hard physical labor.
宣传队警告翁和颜，如果他们不揭发我父亲，他们的前途就完蛋了。他们两人没有屈服，结果被分发到四川东部山区的一处小煤矿坑做工，这是可能分配到的最坏的工作。那里工作环境非常差，几乎没有什么安全设施，女人也得像男人一样伏在地下爬进低矮的坑道，用人力拖着煤筐把煤炭拉出来。颜的遭遇部分是因那个时代歪曲的漂亮话：毛夫人一直坚持说男人能做的，女人也能做。毛泽东的口号是：“妇女能顶半边天。”但是女人都知道，要叫你去做重活儿时，就说是给你平等。
Immediately after the expulsion of university students, middle-school pupils like me discovered that we were to be exiled to faraway rural and mountainous areas to do back breaking farm labor. Mao intended me to spend the rest of my life as a peasant.
把大学生都打发走后，轮到中学生了。我们很快就发现大家都得“上山下乡”去做繁重劳累的农活，毛泽东要我一辈子当农民。