Jonathan Spence

The Contexts of Maoism

In 1971 a new book for the reading of Elementary Chinese was issued in Peking. A post-Cultural Revolutionary work, it contained almost no references to socialism that might embarrass western bourgeois readers: the reader was led into the Chinese language through a traditional world of teachers, pens and pencils, chairs and tables. But on the middle of page 156, in the section on numbers and dates, the compilers made an important statement of ideology in a neat, short-hand way; three examples were given for the student who was seeking to master a year, month and day sequence: March 18, 1871 November 7, 1917 October 1, 1949.