Red Scarf Girl: A Memoir of the Cultural Revolution [Paperback]

Ji-li Jiang (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: 1999

Ji-li Jiang was twelve years old in 1966, the year that Chairman Mao launched the Cultural Revolution in China. An outstanding student and much-admired leader of her class, Ji-li seemed poised for a shining future. But all that changed with the advent of the Cultural Revolution, when intelligence became a crime and a wealthy family background invited persecution'or worse. For the next three years Ji-li and her family were humilated and reviled by their former friends, neighbors, and colleagues and lived in constant terror of attack. At last, with the detention of her father, Ji-li was faced with the most dreadful decision of her young life: denounce him and break with her family, or refuse to testify against him and sacrifice her future in her beloved Communist Party.

Told with simplicity, innocence, and grace, this unforgettable memoir gives a child's eye view of a terrifying time in twentieth-century history'and of one family's indomitable courage under fire.

--This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

Editorial Reviews

From School Library Journal

Grade 5-9. This autobiography details the author's experiences as a teenager during the Cultural Revolution. Though wanting to be devoted followers of Chairman Mao, Jiang and her family are subjected to many indignities because her grandfather was once a landlord. Memoirs of the period are usually larded with murders, suicides, mass brainwashing, cruel and unusual bullying, and injustices. Red Scarf Girl is no exception. Where Jiang scores over her comrades is in her lack of self-pity, her naive candor, and the vividness of her writing. The usual catalogue of atrocities is filtered through the sensibility of a young woman trying to comprehend the events going on around her. Readers watch her grow from a follower into a thoughtful person who privately questions the dictates of the powers that be. She witnesses neighbors being beaten to death, her best friend's grandmother's suicide, the systematic degradation of her father, and endless public humiliations. At one point, Jiang even enters a police station to change her name in a confused attempt to dissociate herself from her branded and maligned family. She makes it very clear that the atrocities were the inevitable result of the confusion and fanaticism manipulated by unscrupulous leaders for their own petty ends. Ultimately, her resigned philosophy attaches no blame: this is what happens when power is grossly abused. The writing style is lively and the events often have a heart-pounding quality about them. Red Scarf Girl will be appreciated as a page-turner and as excellent discussion material for social studies curricula.?John Philbrook, formerly at San Francisco Public Library
Copyright 1997 Reed Business Information, Inc. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

From Kirkus Reviews

A child's nightmare unfolds in Jiang's chronicle of the excesses of Chairman Mao's Cultural Revolution in China in the late 1960s. She was a young teenager at the height of the fervor, when children rose up against their parents, students against teachers, and neighbor against neighbor in an orgy of doublespeak, name-calling, and worse. Intelligence was suspect, and everyone was exhorted to root out the ``Four Olds''--old ideas, old culture, old customs, and old habits. She tells how it felt to burn family photographs and treasured heirlooms so they would not be used as evidence of their failure to repudiate a ``black''--i.e., land-owning--past. In the name of the revolution, homes were searched and possessions taken or destroyed, her father imprisoned, and her mother's health imperiled--until the next round of revolutionaries came in and reversed many of the dicta of the last. Jiang's last chapter details her current life in this country, and the fates of people she mentions in her story. It's a very painful, very personal- -therefore accessible--history. (Memoir. 11-15) -- Copyright ©1997, Kirkus Associates, LP. All rights reserved. --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

Product Details

• Paperback: 285 pages
• Publisher: Scholastic Inc (1999)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0439063000
• ISBN-13: 978-0439063005
• Product Dimensions: 7.5 x 5.1 x 0.9 inches
• Shipping Weight: 2.4 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.3 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (128 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,236,943 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

More About the Author

Ji-li Jiang is the author of Red Scarf Girl (an ALA Notable Book), her own account of growing up in China under the Cultural Revolution. Born in Shanghai in 1954, she was a science teacher before coming to the United Sates in 1984. In 1992 she started a company, East West Exchange, to promote cultural exchange between Western countries and China. She lives near San Francisco, California.

Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

34 of 35 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars The Most Compelling Memoir in The World!, August 5, 2000

By 

Andalucia (USA) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Red Scarf Girl: A Memoir of the Cultural Revolution (Hardcover)

First of all, I must say this book deserves ten stars, not five. Ji-Li Jiang tells the story of her life being completely torn apart by the Cultural Revolution and her own thoughts and beliefs on Chinese Communism. Ji-Li, a distinguished student, is condescended at school because of her family's past. She watches in terror as her favorite teachers are being harrassed at school, people's homes being ransacked, and her father being put in detention at his work building. Red Gaurds (enforcers of the Cultural Revolution) are everywhere, and they make sure that every well-to-do man, woman, child, is punished for being who they are. Insulting posters of propaganda turn up all over the city and Ji-Li's school. During all of the turmoil, Ji-Li is forced to choose between her family and the prestige and honor she has worked so hard for. Because of her family's political background, she loses the chance of getting into one of the best jounior high schools in China. Ji-Li begins to hate her ancestors for being who they were and she even begins to hate herself. She wishes that she were poor, so that she would not be ostracized for her way of living. However, despite all of her struggles, Ji-Li is determined to rise above those who stopped her from being who she wants to be. This is a wonderful book that I could not put down. Read this, and enjoy.

21 of 22 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars The Cultural Revolution -- a review by Charlie, age 10, March 5, 2004

A Kid's Review

This review is from: Red Scarf Girl: A Memoir of the Cultural Revolution (Paperback)

Red Scarf Girl is about a memory of the Cultural Revolution. Ji-li Jiang is the main character. She also has a brother called Ji-yong Jiang and a little sister called Ji-yuong Jiang. She has a friend, An-Yi, who often helps her when she has a problem. Ji-li Jiang had a rich family. Being rich in China at that time could cause families to be separated. It could cause families who were rich five months ago to have to live in a cottage working on a farm, getting whipped by the farmers who owe the land they're working in. It could even cause them to be killed! Ji-li is aware of all of this, and is trying to keep her family safe.

This is not a fiction book -- it is a memory about what Ji-li Jiang thought about the Cultural Revolution. You might think that this book is a girl book; but it's really about how people lived in the Cultural Revolution. If you like humor, this is not the book you're looking for -- it has a little humor in it, but it really is a sad story. Nothing goes well in the story. All the cliffhangers keep the reader in the story to see what happens next. Not all chapters end with cliffhangers, but sometimes there is a cliffhanger in the middle of a page which make the reader read a lot faster to see what happens to the person or what happens next. This book is a really detailed story about how people lived during the Cultural Revolution.

14 of 14 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars My Opinion of Red Scarf Girl, December 18, 2002

A Kid's Review

This review is from: Red Scarf Girl: A Memoir of the Cultural Revolution (Hardcover)

Red Scarf Girl was thought provoking and compelling book. The book is a memoir of one girl's experiences during the Chinese Cultural Revolution, a movement launched by the Communist government and its leader Chairman Mao, to purge China of people who did not follow the Communist ideals. At the start of the book the protagonist, a young girl named Ji-Li, is a Communist Party poster child. She believes in Chairman Mao and dreams of a career in the Chinese government. When she learns that her grandfather was a landlord (a group scorned by the government) she considers renouncing her family to follow the Communist party.
While reading Red Scarf Girl I often felt annoyed at Ji-Li because of her blind faith in the Communist party despite the horror going on around her, and I was impatient for her to come to her senses. Even so, it must have taken great strength for Ji-Li to write what she felt at the time because she seriously contemplated leaving her family, almost changing her name so she wouldn't be associated with them. Events of the Cultural Revolution are not always pleasant to read, but the book was hard to put down. By the end of the story I had gained a greater understanding and appreciation for the people such as Ji-Li who had to make those impossible choices. I thought that Red Scarf Girl was engrossing and memorable and I highly recommend it.