Sublime

In January 1969, every middle school in Chengdu was sent to a rural area somewhere in Sichuan. We were to live in villages among the peasants and be “reeducated” by them. What exactly they were supposed to educate us in was not made specific, but Mao always maintained that people with some education were inferior to illiterate peasants, and needed

According to the Ministry of Education, more than 80 percent of Chinese students returned after completing their studies abroad, which, in historical terms, was unprecedented. There had never been another authoritarian nation in which so many prosperous and educated young people left to study in democratic societies and then willingly came back.

economy overseen by the Communist Party. Zhu is a tall, angular man, known for his energy and impatience. Larry Summers, the former treasury secretary and president of Harvard, once estimated Zhu’s IQ at 200. As mayor and premier, Zhu had all kinds of nicknames alluding to his determination: One-Chop Zhu, Zhu the Boss, even Madman Zhu, for his will

Mao offered a magic cure to the peasants: “doctors” who could be turned out en masse—barefoot doctors. “It is not at all necessary to have so much formal training,” he said. “They should mainly learn and raise their standard in practice.” On 26 June 1965 he made the remark which became a guideline for health and education: “The more books you read,

A number of educators who attended Dewey’s lectures and classes subsequently tried to incorporate his ideas into Chinese schools. One of these figures was Hu Yanli, who eventually became the principal of Chengdu’s most important primary school.