Mao's last dancer / Li Cunxin.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Li, Cunxin, 1961-

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Li, Cunxin, 1961-.

Li, Cunxin.

Ballet dancers--China--Biography.

Ballet dancers.

Defectors--China--Biography.

Defectors.

China.

Genre:

Biographies.

Autobiographies.

Physical Description:

xvii, 451 pages, 8 unnumbered pages of plates : illustrations, genealogical table ; 24 cm

Place of Publication:

New York : Putnam, [2003]

Summary:

In a small, desperately poor village in northeast China, a peasant boy sits at his rickety old school desk, interested more in the birds outside than in Chairman Mao's Red Book and the grand words it contains. But that day, some strangers come to his school -- Madame Mao's cultural delegates. They are looking for young peasants to mold into faithful guards of Chairman Mao's great vision for China. The boy watches as one of his classmates is chosen and led away. His teacher hesitates. Will she or won't she? She very nearly doesn't. But at the last moment, she taps the official on the shoulder and points to the small boy. "What about that one?" she says. This is the true story of how that one moment in time, by the thinnest thread of chance, changed the course of a small boy's life in ways beyond description. One day he would dance with some of the greatest ballet companies of the world. One day he would be a friend to a president and first lady, movie stars, and some of the most influential people in America. One day he would himself become a star: Mao's last dancer and the darling of the West. Here is Li Cunxin's own story, one that very nearly vanished, like millions of other peasants' lives, amid revolution and chaos. It is a story of courage, of a mother's love, a boy's longing for freedom -- a beautiful, rich account of an inspirational life, told with extraordinary honesty, dignity, and pride.

Contents:

A Wedding: Qingdao, 1946 xi

Part 1 My Childhood

1. Home 3

2. My Niang and Dia 20

3. A Commune Childhood 37

4. The Seven of Us 55

5. Na-na 70

6. Chairman Mao's Classroom 81

7. Leaving Home 104

Part 2 Beijing

8. Feather in a Whirlwind 123

9. The Caged Bird 140

10. That First Lonely Year 154

11. The Pen 168

12. My Own Voice 180

13. Teacher Xiao's Words 201

14. Turning Points 220

15. The Mango 236

16. Change 245

17. On the Way to the West 255

18. The Filthy Capitalist America 266

19. Good-bye, China 282

Part 3 The West

20. Return to the Land of Freedom 303

21. Elizabeth 314

22. Defection 325

23. My New Life 339

24. A Millet Dream Come True 351

25. No More Nightmares 365

26. Russia 379

27. Mary 392

28. Going Home 408

29. Back in My Village 416

30. Another Wedding: Qingdao, 1988 431

The Li Family Tree 447.

ISBN:

039915096X

OCLC:

52520661