and then each with a one night asking if i wanted to write a book and i said sure. >> i was on a lot of ambient at the time spent the look on your face. >> just like on c-span, they're saying "america, you sexy bitc bitch." >> it will be after midnight when we err this program. the way ms. mccain tells us program this is how you two met. >> that is exactly accurate spent and you asked her to go on to a book a? >> i proposed to her over twitter that would write a book. >> why did you agree? >> i had just gone through a really bad breakup. sorry, it's really funny when i say it. and a career thing that didn't work out. we had a full-time project. >> she was having a temporary moment of sadness. >> this was in oslo -- this was

an awesome opportunity. legitimately i thought it was an interesting idea and i thought i would probably get no other time in my life to do something so fun and ridiculous and over the top and exciting and serious at the same time. >> so a blue state atheist liberal and the republican christian red state or got together. what's the tone of the book? >> i think it is surprisingly positive. before we embarked on this project i think when michael and i were having initial discussions and we were e-mailing back and forth about the concept of the book, both of us knew enough about each other to know that we weren't really going to be nasty towards each other and make it personal, although it happens a bit in the book. this was a serious a social experiment to see a few people. >> you say serious. >> can go together in a band and

do, and the friends and discover america in 2012. >> it is a romp for america. >> so the two you got into an rv and just took off the? >> with two other people, yes. >> we had a driver, cousin john who is a prominent character in the book, and steffi who is also a character i in the book. the four of us in his rv driving across america talking to people. >> we both are frustrated with the climate and if i'm at of american politics right now. when he was talking that writing a book, i said what i fell in love with america and started to understand americans with being on the road for two years. we indeed probably hundreds of people. we talked to hundreds of people and i think what fascinate us most is americans are still posited even a big we're in a dark time in a dark recession but everybody still believes in america. i mean, there were some people

that were negative but there's this big getting of we're in this together. we're in america and we're in our time. we just thought it could write a positive book, had a more positive spin like yes we're in this together, we are possibly more polarized than ever, but if the two of us who are crazy by our own admission can come together and write a book that we think, although champion over the top and irrelevant, talk about american politics and it positively can hopefully influence the other people. it is a book for people that are interested in politics but i've never been interested in preaching to the converted. i like people that are turned off in politics and don't want anything to do with it. those of the people i want to get interested. so what better way? >> she's amazing. you would never know she is on the campaign trail for two years. she's amazing at this. i'm kind of blown away. i'm in a little bit of all. >> when you would watch a meghan

mccain interview people, what was the reaction? >> well, my initial reaction to make them, i was a fan of first before we met because i thought here's a republican, to my liberal jaded mind was talking sense. i'm going to be diplomatic. they are crazy. megan i thought if somebody who is festival, speaks in a coherent way about issues that i think have some relevance in a way i can understand. i thought if i was ever going to be a buddy to the republican, i would want to be buddies to her. the last name to me was more of an entrée. i got an who she was because of the lasting but irrelevant. i met her dad. she does not care for me. her mom and i get along faithfully. >> my mother and my brother who is over there laughing. and my sister loves them, too.

and my other brother barely know she. of my father, he doesn't -- >> i got a lot of it from senator mccain. >> i think now he has read come he has read half of it, and i think he understands that we speak to a different audience but i am always focused to a different audience. i to my father because i sort of been accused of being brutally honest but i write as much to understand as we understood there and for me talking about my life and how i feel about american politics is always very lethargic. not to put another person but i love maya angelou. she's a bit more in common than we do a portrait i readably this book, that is the basis of why we did that, why we're doing this. it's silly and its over the top but it's also serious. >> what was your most memorable stop in a red state? >> i fell in love with branson. >> both of us. >> brands into me was just the best. i sort of thought i'm going to

roll into branson, i'm going to isn't that correct isn't that correct on this place, make fun of this place, going to hate this place. it could not have been more fun, warmer, more gregarious. we went to dolly parton's dixie stampede. i thought this would be ridiculous. i never had more fun at a live theatrical experience. i've been to broadway. i've seen dustin hoffman. dolly parton puts dustin hoffman to shame. you have guys riding on horses, there's buffalo, it comes with a dinner. you eat with your hands. >> american flags. >> it is the finest theatrical experience i've ever had in my life. >> dolly parton's dixie stampede, they were so passionate so wonderful. >> did they tend to be republican? >> you would think, right? >> it is a dry county, i think. it is family-friendly, bible belt.

we went on to las vegas and had a very racy, r-rated experience. then we went to branson which was family-friendly and christian meier all accounts. which is awesome time. i had an existential crisis in branson, missouri, and i saw jacob smirnov perform, but that's -- >> meghan mccain, experience in a blue state that you either enjoy or fell in love with? >> the blue state that i enjoyed. i had a really nice time in connecticut meeting his family. connecticut, right? >> yes. >> talking to his family and his friends about their perspectives comes from his family friends were not fans of my family. i'm guessing my family showed him a good time and his friends, not like me but whatever. but all wet a great time and it's interesting to have your world when you're thrust into which others will object if they sit up front, your stereotypes and prejudices you may have.

>> there's a stereotype that republicans are more fun than democrats, and having spent time on the road with a lot of republicans, i can absolutely confirm that isn't true. republicans are a lot more fun than democrats spent we like to have a good time and again for the democrats to stick any of your views change in this book? >> no. >> oh, come on. >> i fired a gun. megan's brother tied me to shoot. i like that a lot. >> your brother who served in the marine? >> yes. we had a great time shooting. it wasn't really about changing minds so much as it was just trying to the other person's point of view without judgment and without prejudice. and i think i changed your mind more than you change mind. >> i had my mind changed on quite a few different things. not, i mean, i don't know if we are allowed to say this on

marijuana legalization. i had it. when we were on the road it's going that a lot of people. we just saw a lot of people, i saw a lot of people gave good cases for economical why should we change. once they start doing research on this, a possible financial benefits and really why we are increasing so maybe put so many reasons, my opinion has been change which sort of a scary thing to admit because he can't it go so against the republican orthodoxy and i feel like it's just one more thing right wing conservatives will use against me. but this book. >> william f. buckley was a big supporter. >> yes, sir was. possibly mario cuomo at this point. andrew, i'm sorry. but bloomberg? it's just a i don't a i do another scary thing but that was in the book of all the issues that i had that i finally really don't get a lot of time to discuss and we have a friend whose father studies drugs, i

just speak he is studying the effects of hallucinogenic as therapeutic for ptsd victims, and he's made a pretty compelling case. >> that was one thing that really changed me. >> y. olive garden? >> who doesn't love the olive garden? i love the olive garden. i eat all the time i'm on the road. we love fast food and chain hotels. actually the basis of our relationship. we both love licking to him, red roof inn, olive garden, mc donald's, burger king, we both love pringles, soda. both of us don't care about our health of that much. >> who picked the tidal? >> the title was naked. i could take no credit for it. >> we were touring the capital with one of my father's interns and his to do so to india showing us the statue of liberty for you and the congressional hole. he was saying, as you knows, the never sets of our she's tasting

-- she's facing east. it'edge ridiculous thing to sayd they were like lightbulbs, that's really funny. spent its charming, right? you are delighted. >> he doesn't know what to do. >> what is the goal, michael ian black on what is the goal? >> is really about getting, as meghan said, people who are not in politics, at least it had a conversation. what do i want for my government, what do i care about, what do i believe in. and just to get people to start asking the question. it's not for long. it's not for people who spend all day reading political. it's for people who just may be feel intimidated by those people. about people who care about the country but don't even have a way to interest start talking about this.

that's what this book is about. it mirrors my own political education. meghan i think was really fortunate to have come from a family that is heavily involved in. i didn't. i was sort of a born democrat, but the way i was a born jew. just born into but i never really spending time thinking about it so i was old. once i start doing that, start think about what i believe what i believe, or even if i believe, that's spurred the question to all this book is not having a good time and having people start to ask the question. >> and again i feel like my past so far in politics has been bring a different audience, especially on people. i used to speak to colleges all the time, and many college students would speak to them, they are so disenchanted from politics right now. and everything is so polarized and they don't want to be a part of an they don't want to use their voice because why? and i think if we can use humor

to get a very serious message across, i think that's very powerful. >> meghan mccain, michael ian black, meghan mccain, your third book. what are your first to? >> my first was a children's book about my father and my second one was dirty sexy politics which is a memoir about my time on the campaign spent michael ian black am also your third book. >> it is. my first one was called my custom van. my second one is called you are not doing it right. >> co-authors coming out in the summer of 2012, "america, you sexy bitch: a love letter to freedom." thank you for being on c-span. >> thank you. >> here are the best selling nonfiction books according to "usa today."

>> wenguang huang appeared at the "chicago tribune" printer's row lit fest to discuss his book, "the little red guard," his memoir of growing up in central china during the 1970s. that's next on booktv.goodternoo >> good afternoon, everybody. okay is this on? okay. grea so it gives me great pleasure to say hello to you at lit festrifc today. journalist and man who also happens to be a good friend of mine, wenguang.

as i said, he's a reporter and writer and journalist who has been doing national and international reporting, let's say since 1990, i think it's fair to say? >> yeah. >> he is now writing besides the book that we're going to talk about today, he's now writing for "fortune" magazine, he writes for "the new york times," christian science monitor. he's also written for printers row journal which some of you may be aware of that is part of a membership program that we have at "the chicago tribune." and he is a translator of several works. he's worked with the author of the corpse walker, and wen translated that here, and i think the other is "god is red." >> yeah. >> which is about christianity in china, in today's china. we're here to talk today about "little red guard." and "little red guard" is a

memoir by wen. it's been reviewed very positively in not only "the chicago tribune", but in the new yorker, in "the new york times" and, i believe, that this weekend a review is coming out in "the washington post." do i have that right? >> yeah. >> so, um, thanks for coming and, again, it's a privilege to be here with wen and hear him talk about this book that has been greeted with such acclaim. so welcome, wen. >> thank you. [applause] thank you very much for coming. [applause] >> i'd like to start off by talking about the kind of coming off of the introduction, um, done a lot of journalism in your career. you are a reporter, a translator of nonfiction, you've done some translating and written and done books for that, but your first book you chose to be a memoir rather than a piece of reportage. why was that decision made?

>> i think this has lots to do with the immigrant experience. as some of you are my friends here today know that i came to chicago in 1990 acting like most immigrants who first arrived in this country, and you try to get yourself assimilated, and you try to be just like any other americans. and for the first ten years i was here, i work as a journalist. you feel very comfortable interviewing other people about their life stories and about their life in chicago, and i tried very hard to be a good american. and i felt like i tried very hard to overcome my chinese accept, i -- accept, i tried to imitate npr. [laughter] i didn't want even go to china town because it was related too much to my past. you know, all these efforts to forget about your past and then try to start a new life here. and after about 15 years i felt like i'd been very successfully

career wise or life, i have a house here in chicago, i felt like each time i come to chicago, i feel very much at home. but when there is a certain stage where you feel like you are assimilated, but on the other hand, the past keeps coming back to me. and i'm sure a lot of people who have gone through the same experience will have similar feeling that the first part of your life, i came here when i was 25. and the past started to come back, i started to wrestle with the questions about my grandmother who raised me when i was a little boy and about my parents, my mom and father especially. i had a difficult relationship with my father for years. there was a certain tension. i felt like he was too old-fashioned, and i always wanted to be somebody completely different from him.

i strove very hard to do that. and then when you reach a certain age, you get -- you're looking back, you say, wow, there is that genetic factor that i can't really be somebody else different. even i started to talk like him, and i start to -- you look at yourself in the mirror, people say, wow, i just look like my father. so at this point, you know, and then i felt very strongly that i had to write something about it. and also i've noticed that while writing the memoir is that you have a story, and you want to write about it. i thought about this for years, but then it has to be sometimes like stating your mind, letting it ferment for a while. sometimes you have to remain ferments to reach the certain pungent and spicy flavor. and it took me years, i've been thinking about this, these stories for a long time, and sometimes i talk with other journalists. they would talk about birthdays.

oh, when i was young, i had a birthday, we use a hard boiled egg. they loved the stories, they say, oh, you should write something about it. but you always wait, wait until two years ago i felt like i was ready. and i was laid off from a corporate job that i worked for. i said, i'll have the one year to work about it, to work on the book. and then when it's ready, it came out very quickly. it was very hard to find the structure. and once i found the structure, it took me a month and a half, it just poured out. and then i kept revising it. and that was the reason -- it was a lot of of uncomfortable moments, like you talk about the inner journalist and writing about your own. it's great to hear other people tell their stories, you know, you feel detached, jot down and write good stories. when it came to my own, it was very hard because when i decide to write about it, it's a lot of uncomfortable moments about my relationship with my grandma, with my mother and my father and all the memories started come

out. and for about two to three weeks, i couldn't sleep until sometimes before i went to bed, i would say, oh, i need to go to bed early, and i'd start to think about what to put in the book. and the past came up, and the next thing i knew it was 5:00 in the morning or 6:00 in the morning. it was very painful. but once everything came out, i tried to find a structure. once that was done, it's very therapeutic. >> so let's talk about the structure. "little red guard" refers to children in communist china when the time wen was growing up, the time of chairman mao. they were the students who were considered the defenders of the revolution and the defenders of mao's principles, kind of like the pioneers in the soviet union that kind of inculcated the ideology into the young. but the conceit or the structure, let's say, that runs throughout the book is about wen's grandmother and her fear

of death and her insistence that she be buried in the old ways with the old traditions rather than cremated which was what the communist authorities had demanded all people do during that time. and so the conceit is the tension in the household between the grandmother and the father and wen's mother and how that played out for wen. so when you talk about the structure, you're talking about using that, your grandmother's fears about death and desires about death and the coffin as the through line, is that right? >> right. >> do you want to talk a little bit ant how you came upon -- about how you came upon that? >> great. when i first start thinking about writing the book, there was so many stories that were floating around. and i couldn't find out way to put them in a proper structure. and one day i was walking, and then i suddenly thought my grandma's coffin, because for

years and years i thought i'd forgotten about it, but it just kept coming up. it was when my grandma, when she was 73, and she suddenly became obsessed with death. and then she just, she was very healthy, but there was a chinese saying, saying that 73 and 84 are the two thresholds, that a lot of people die during these two years. she just suddenly told my father she wanted to be ready, and she wanted a grand sendoff. she wanted a coffin, and she wanted to have a barrel. and my father was a communist party member. of course, he was very torn because if this had been this country, it wouldn't be very difficult. but in china even now a burial in major cities is banned because of practical reasons, of course, you don't have enough space. and the other one is for ideological reasons. during the 1970s all the coffins associated with all the

bad things about the past, the traditions were considered not revolutionary enough. so that, that whole coffin caused so much tension, and my father spend the next 17 years preparing for the coffin. and we, the whole family was impacted. so when i hit upon this, i said maybe i should use this coffin to start out and then string everything about china around this how we prepared this coffin and give people an idea of what china was like in the '70s, '80s and even now. so once i found the structure, it came very easily. so throughout the whole thing i use the coffin as a metaphor for what's, what was china then and what is china now. i would just use a very simple one talking about in the old days coffin was this black, sinister thing, and everybody, you have to be hided away from

the public, and my family used to put it in my bedroom, would cover it up with a different table cloth or with a newspaper so people wouldn't see. and everything build. if you got caught and then they would, my father could have lost his job, and all the punishment. but nowadays coffin suddenly becomes a very auspicious symbol because coffin, the chinese word also rhymes with the word fortune and promotions. so sometimes everybody in china today in their relentless pursuit of money, material wealth right now, we're going through all capitalistic. and the coffin suddenly becomes this very auspicious thing. i heard that sometimes if you give a gift to somebody, government official be, you just give them a little miniature coffin. they put it on your, they put it on their desk. [laughter] it's a reminder of their fortune

and upcoming promotion. [laughter] >> so if you have a meeting with mayor emanuel, don't follow that. [laughter] >> that's why we were joking when the original title of my book was called "coffin keeper." and i thought it would be great for the chinese readers when they read "the coffin keeper" is such an auspicious thing if you give someone a copy. but my publisher said, well, it's kind of a little different here. if people buy a book for christmas or for father's day or mother's day, by the way, here is a copy of "the coffin keeper." [laughter] so we decided to change it to "the little red guard," even though people could miscon true it as -- misconstrue it as a political book. even though it's about my family all the way through to the present.

so that's how the structure came about. >> i'm going to digress and talk about the corpse walker, and if you could just give a quick synopsis, because i think it's a fascinating book and a fascinating story. it's called the corpse walker, and wen translated it here. what is a corpse walker? >> a corpse walker is another chinese traditional practice, also actually related to the book. in china people believe that if you, you are worn in aville -- born in a village or born in a city, and no matter how far away you wander around the world, when you die, you have to be back in the village, you have to be buried just like my grandma, even though she left home when she was young, they moved to a different city, they were there for years and years. but when they die, when you die, you have to come back because there's a chinese saying that all fallen leaves have to return to their roots. so in china in the old days when the business people, when they would go to business in other

parts of the country and they would die suddenly, and for the rich people, wealthy people, if you could afford it, you'd hire these people because there was no cars or airplanes to transport these bodies back. so those wealthy people, they would go and hire these kung fu masters. they would go to the certain place where the person died. and then it's normally in the fall and winter time, so they would inject some of the mercury into the nose so they won't prevent decay, and then one person will carry the dead body and then cover it up with a black robe. the other person would be the guy to rotate, and it would take, like, a week or 20 days for the person to carry the person all the way back to the village. because otherwise they said you will be a wandering ghost. you could never be reunited with your family in the rest of the

life. so this is what the whole book was talking about. one of the stories in the book i translated is about during the transition period when the communists took over china in 1949 during the transition period when the old and new, the new society and the old traditions, how they clashed. but in my book is my grandmother was even though we didn't have to hire a corpse walker to walk her home, but we prepared several ways in case she died f she died in the summer -- if she died in the summer, my dad would have bribed some people on the railroad who worked there, and we would cover her up because it was a seven-hour train ride. we'd have to take her home. if it being in the winter time, we would have a truck driver try to take her home. it took years and years to build this network so we could, in case anything happened to grandma. and we would take her home. but then those who have not read

the book, i won't tell something. and then throughout the whole process it took a huge toll on our family life. and even now as the eldest son, i was supposed to, if my father pass away, i was supposed to carry around the -- my grand ma still, she's still buried near my hometown, but not her native town because the changes going on in china is like you cannot even go back to china because change is taking place so fast, and all the cemeteries are being totally demolished. so that's the sad part of china today. >> so that tension that that caused and grand ma's wish -- grandma's wishes caused within the family, what i find so remarkable and compelling about the book is how that's set within the tension of a family going through the changes in china at the time. and so that conflict between the old-fashioned rules and the old-fashioned ways and what --

and the modern ways whether they were communist or just the modern world is a central part of the book. and i just wanted to ask you, did you, did you see that when you started writing it? did you see that, how that vehicle could work to talk about china as well as your family, or is that something that came to you as you were writing it? >> i saw part of it before i started. because when i started the book, i realized that i wanted to make a family book. and we have seen a lot of the books right now, for example, the writer wrote about the families, about the political drama during the cultural revolution. but her family and probably lots of others who had written about how the parents, they were persecuted during the cultural revolution, they represent only a small minority of the people who are directly impacted by the cultural revolution. but most of the people, like my

family, they were -- we were just ordinary families. we went to the meetings, and then we shouted the revolutionary slogans. but our families were not directly impacted. but i want to use this cultural revolution is always, the changes in china after mao and during the mao era to use as the background to talk about a universal theme of our relationship with our participants. because when i -- with our parents. during the past 20 years i've been here, i talk with lots of friends, we seem to face the same questions. you have the guilt about your mother, you know, i sometimes would tell stories about my mother, and people always laugh because they say, oh, it's just like my mother. and like my mother was here visiting, and then i got this house, i would show off my house, oh, mom, how do you like it? my mom went in and said, it's okay. you just need -- you know. people would say, your mother sounds like my jewish mother. [laughter] the relationship with a mother.

and then with my father i talk with people, you always have the tension when you were young, your father was just this horrible figure, and you reach a certain age, you just think your father is so old-fashioned, and you have the tension when i was kid, when i was growing up. and then you wonder how you resolve it when you reach a certain age. so i try to focus on this so i can get more of a universal feeling. but the political background is always there. the most important thing i want to use this book as a way to help people understand china. because the chinese not always a, the cultural revolution is not everybody's parent that got beaten up. because most ordinary people, you live the life, the ordinary things, and you do ordinary things. but then during this family tension, that's how you survive. no matter what the revolution is trying to do or what mao tried

to eradicate, the family or the traditions, they are always there. you can never eradicate it because people like my parents, they were at work shouting slogans and saying we were going to -- [inaudible] society, and turn around, and the kids, they just life continues as always. >> so that relationship with your father, there is, there are a couple of points in the book where you are that kind of mark twain experience where your father got a lot smarter between your ages of 17 and 21, right? >> right. >> and i think one of them is your father was cautioning that during the political changes when there was, there were glimpses of openness from the communist authorities, your father was cautioning you not to jump in. and i think the translation was something like the first bullet hits the head of the flock or something like that. >> right. >> so talk a little bit about that, how you changed your view of your father during the writing of the book. >> yes.

that, actually, when, during the writing of the book my views toward my father, including my grandmother and mother, changed dramatically. that's something i really didn't expect. it's like a therapy session. when you walk in there, you have one set of views, and by the time the book ended, i just totally saw things differently. like originally i saw, when i was trying to write the book, i just saw my father as a very tragic figure because he was a government official, very educated. a cultural official, and because he offended his boss, he was not connected with any political campaign, but the communist party officials, they asked people to say could you, please, propose some ways how could you improve my work, my dad just said the party official act like a dictator. and because of that one day my

grandma became sick, and he went back to take care of my grandmother, and then they immediately used the excuse that he placed the family above revolutionary work. that was big, considered a very sack ri lishes during the revolutionary years. and then he was fired. and then for three years he didn't have a job. and later on he had to start as laborer. by the time i was born, he was a warehouse manager. i always felt like he was so cautious. i tried to be -- i was little red guard, i was very progressive, i was a firm believer of communism, but, you know, he was a party member. i would assume he always supported me, but the time i tried to go to the extreme, he would always bring me back to say, no, don't go too much, you have to hard. politics always very frivolous, very fickle. and i never understood what he meant. and until years later when i started to know about his life, i just realized his whole

generation we call it spiritually castrated because those people, they were the ones who suffered so much because sometimes you just said something wrong, or you could end up in jail or just because there was a lot of stories about people that went to the bathroom, and then they accidentally use a newspaper to wipe their bottom, and then on the back of the newspaper was chairman mao's portrait. and then the neighbor found out, and the person end up in jail for a year. you know, you live in that constant vibe. that's why i could -- environment. that's why i could understand why my father was like that. for years it was a very contra contradicting, like, my father at work, he was a model communist party member. he said all the right things. and then at home he would teach me a different set of principles, very confusion. say you have to be faithful to your grandma, and you have to

work hard no matter what the political circumstances are. your knowledge will be always useful. so i always felt very torn. and i felt like he was such a weak and incompetent worker, or as a father. but during the writing process the more i started to read into it, i talked with a lot of people, went back to china, and i felt like lots of stuff he actually is guiding me. you know, as i grow older, sometimes the decision i make i actually thought, yeah, there is something about my father, he's always there. and then the stuff he said, i saw the understanding more better. so that's about my father. and also with my mother. i -- she was very, um, tough with me, harsh with me when i was a kid because i was raised by my grandmother. she was seldom home because she wanted to be a revolutionary. she went to work one month later after i was born, she went to work, and i was wholly in the

care of my grandmother. it was very bad the take care of their children rather than go to work. so she did that. and when i was 9 years old, she came back, moved back, and sometimes she would beat me up, corporate punishment. sometimes when i thought about the way she treated me, i felt very bitter about it. but in later years she tried to make up with me but it was very hard because the formative years she wasn't there. and i have this thing, and then the more i wrote about her and my views about my mother changed because i had realized that since my grandmother had such a stronghold over me and over my father, too, my father probably never -- she never had a proper relationship with her son. she tried very hard to get back, get back to me, but i couldn't -- i think there was the bitterness. and i felt like, you know, i start to understand my mother more and more. and the same with my grandmother. she raised me, and then she was my surrogate mother. but then you start examine the

relationship with my father, her relationship with my father and my mother, and you get a more complex picture. and i just realized my grandmother, she probably -- she lost her husband when she was young, and she raised my father single-handedly. emotionally, she controlled my father. my father probably was never able to love my mother as much because his mother had such a strong influence over him. and also imagine -- and then when i was born, and she had such control over me. and probably because she, her own need to protect herself and didn't give my mom too much to have. that was the -- so i was analyzing the those three things, and i started to have, at the end of the book i felt have a more different perception or different understanding of the three of these key characters in the book. >> and the kind of psychological

and emotional tensions among the characters in the book, you know, grandmother, father and mother, are plays outside not only in family, but in society. there's this underlying kind of tension between the old ways and the new ways, of course. but the degree to which superstition and old traditions kind of persist during that time i found to be remarkable. i think anybody who reads it, you know, we're talking here in the 1970s and some of the things that are still being accepted as truths in the village which are clearly folklore or superstition, and your grandmother and your mother were at odds in that area. so, um, kind of looking back on that where do you see that? you were fighting those superstitions yourself, but later you kind of sought refuge in them a little bit. >> right. you know, when we were kids,

probably most people who grow up in china, you will be one of the things that's very annoying but also very fascinating about china is with every weddings, with funerals, and there's all kinds of different rituals. there's a combination of buddhist practices, tooist practices. -- taoist practices. for example, during my father's funeral, and as the eldest son what you do is when -- you cannot cry too loud because you cannot allow the tears to fall on the body of the dead. because if they carry your tears, they'll be sad for the rest of their afterlife. and then the day of the funeral, so i have to go there, and they have a big vessel, and it contains all the ashes people pour in the fake paper money, and you have to smash it, smash it. when you smash the urn in this way, it means like his next life can be the body of this life

died or shattered, so he can be reincarnated into another cycle of life. so, and then when you're on your way to the funeral house, you have to keep spreading these paper, fake paper money because you are trying to describe the ghosts. so they don't -- they block your dad's way into heaven or the other world. sometimes they're kind of a reflection of the current world. everywhere in china now you have to bribe somebody. you have to bribe the ghosts so that they can have transitions very smoothly. [laughter] and even with weddings. and then the day and when the groom comes to pick up the bride, they have to bow to the parents, and then they have to bring gifts like five pounds of

pork, the meat, because you are taking the daughter away. it's like taking a piece of flesh from the mother, and you bring that. and you bring some cigarettes or liquor, even though my dad -- they never smoked cigarettes, but it shows you were willing to spend the money, and you are not cheap with the dollar. you know, all these different rituals. and then you have to go up there and hang up the red curtain meaning, like, your life will be for auspicious. and then the night before they sleep, you have to, you put a lot of peanuts and walnuts underneath the bed meaning like when you gave birth, and you won't just have boys or girls all the way through, you have a variety of boys and girls. all these different rituals and traditions i always find they're just so burdensome. [laughter] and during my dad's funeral, i actually acted very badly. it was just, it was so ridiculous because the night before we have to, i have to

wear this white linen and led a group of -- let a group of people in the neighborhood carry my dad's picture. and you have to howl and cry so loudly, people think that you really love your dad so much. imagine you're 20 years old, you great from a university, you think you can do anything, you are so full of yourself, and then you are carrying this way, walking around the neighborhood, everybody could see you. so that part i ri zest a -- resist a lot. oh, you go to china, everybody you ask about that it's very common. but then when i was doing years later and then you find out you reach the mellow aim, i started to -- age, i started to understand why we have those rituals. and sometimes it's actually not doing for the dead, but for the living. i found i guess because we're living we feel so helpless, and you just feel like if you do something, and it makes you feel better. like i wrote in the printers row

about my father when the book came out, and i felt very relieved, and be i said maybe this will be, do some justice to my father because for years i, during his -- those who have read the book, you probably know -- during his funeral, and then they asked me to say something about him, i just thought he had such a trivial life, i just didn't felt like there was anything worth saying. i just went there, and i just bowed and then left the stage. and for years my mother gave me such a hard time and just would never forget my shame. always say, oh, so and so, the person had never been to college, but he delivered such a great eulogy and made everybody cry. and somebody who never, never been to college, she sang a song that was her dad's favorite song. does that sound like all mothers? and it just killed me. but i felt, you know, the guilt my mother put in me, and then i after the book came out and i

decided to do something that probably i would never have done many years before. so i took the book to my, i went back to china and visit my parents, their tombs. and i went there, and i actually burn the book because, as a way to pay tribute to my dad. because my sister said, oh, if you burn the book because your father will be able to read it. for the details, you can read the printers row article, but i'm just giving you this idea. and then -- >> you have to subscribe though. [laughter] >> and, but for this ritual, when i finished that, i thought it was very -- sometimes i want to smile be. i felt very ridiculous. you would take a whole trip back just to burn the book and say something to my mother. but on the other hand, i found it very soothing. i felt, because there was nothing i could do to make up for what i didn't do, the guilt. and then you create these rituals, i guess i did it, i

felt like, oh, finally, i was able to pay my dad off and was able to do something. so that's whole transformation. i got a better understanding about why superstition, all these rituals. i'm sure is we have the same thing in this country when we do certain things. it's not for the dead, but also for our ourselves. -- for ourselves. >> but the extent to which during this time wen's writing about his childhood, the extent to which characters, the people in the village and the characters in the family feel that their lives are not in their control. so whether the fates, you know, whether it's the ancestors from the past who are controlling what happened -- [audio difficulty] of consistency about not being able to control your own destiny, and then your fate is in the hands of other people. when you went to the u.k., you talk about how difficult that was and how kind of alarming it

was. and all of a sudden there's all this opportunity and choice available to you. >> correct. >> so how difficult was that for a 20 -- were you 20 at the time? >> 20, yes. >> to make that transition? >> when i was 20 year old, china opened up because after mao died and china started to open up to the outside world -- because it was a very, how do i say it, very hard thing for us to suddenly you grow up in china in this isolated world and suddenly enter the u.k. which is wholly different from what you have imagined. for years and years when we were growing up, our per tsengs of the west -- perceptions of the west -- especially the united states and england -- went through two stages. the first thing i remember was a bulletin board in my dad's factory, there was all these black and white pictures. we thought it was present pictures. i remember there was one picture about the streets lining up on

the new york, in new york street people back, they were waiting for the food because they were unemployed. and another one, it was this capitalist dumping all this milk into the river to keep the price, but he wouldn't feed ordinary people. and then when we were growing up, i talked to some people many times that my mom would always say that when you have a penny, break it in half. you spend a half and save the other half for the poor people in america. [laughter] so i guess -- so that's what, and my first story, english story was i can memorize the whole story. it's called "john smith and his wife, mary, they work for the coal mine." but in the winter it's very cold, but they didn't have enough money to buy coal. so john is, there is a son. his son asks, daddy, why don't we have money to buy coal? he says because we produce too

much coal, and the capitalists have us out of a job. still a lot of the stories were written about the great depression. that's how we saw, you poor people in america were starving, and we have to go and save it. there were stories about how american delegation came to china, and then they -- we fed you very, fed the americans some beautiful peking duck. and then the mesh guests were so grateful -- american guests were so grateful, they gave us dark bread. dark bread in china, you don't -- you know, very poor people's food. and then the waiter thanks the american guests, and then he turned around the dumped the bread in the garbage can to show how wonderful it was to live in a socialist country. and then suddenly when china opened up to the outside world and we saw these great hollywood movies, i remember the first movie, it was "godfather." [laughter] you know, it's mafia society, but then there was also the glamour to it.

and then so it was, we've gone through two extremes. and then i went to the u.k. it was just, i finally realized, wow, there was so much green stuff in there, and people are really very decadent. and then i went to the morrisons, the big supermarket, and then my host family, they told me, they said, oh, these are the biscuits you can go through and you can buy be. i said -- i counted at least 30 different count of cookies. and i said, wow, those poor people, we have so many cookies n. china we have almond cookies, and i couldn't even get it all the time. [laughter] so that was an experience. another experience was complete cultural shock. but another thing that struck me, when we were growing up, we

always thought all western families were very loose, not like the chinese were close-knit family. so when the children grow up, no matter how far away you go, you always come back. it's a big family. we were told that american parents are very ruthless. they just raise their kids to 18 years old, they kick them out. they come back and charge them represent. you know, that's what everybody -- you know, i remember my mother would be saying, oh, think about how hard they would have to beat you up thinking you have to look at the western family, they just kick you out. so this was the impression. even i think a lot of people now in china, they think that american families much more -- chinese are the model families, we're very close. and the way we express ourselves more, the parent makes all kind of sacrifices. even though we said i love you. i never heard my mother throughout her whole life say i love you. but they do love you through other ways. we just feel like so faithful americans, they say, oh, i love

you so much, and when they're 18 years old, they kick them out. and when they come back, you know, we say that, oh, the participants of the children -- the parents of the children, they buy a house. they have to borrow money from the parents. so that's the impression i got. and when i was in the u.k., you suddenly realize i went to visit these families, there were these close-knit ties. the more i stayed there, all the propaganda things both in this country, americans i'm sure i've said the same thing about china, right? about not finishing of food and people are starving. and the longer i stayed, the longer you feel like there is the values are universal. and also in way i feel like maybe western participants, you have -- parents, you have more closer ties, and china sometimes with the family, with my dad and my grandmother, it's the ritualistic practice, the way you love your parents is not through -- you care about them, but you sacrifice for them.

your participants, probably your dad, will be working in a different city, will never see you for 20 years. and then suddenly because he was earning money to support the family. that's the sacrifice, it's considered a kind of love. but it's just different, you know, the different perceptions of families. that, to me, is once i stayed a year in the u.k. and i started to get a more of a realistic picture than most people in china. but on the other hand, it's after many years of brainwashing. you always say, oh, this is a decadent, capitalist society, and our socialist system -- you try to justify what china couldn't accomplish. it's either the gap between the rich and the poor. i say, well, at least in china we didn't have a lot of beggars. once we become more and more open, china's just like the west, the gap in the rich and

poor. even worse. and then it's acting more and more westernized. but in those years it was just the contradictions when you were taught in china, what you would see, and it's very eye-opening experience. >> let me take that opportunity then to talk about wen's next book. he's got a contract for a book that he's going to co-write about the current government in china and the difference there, the political scandals that are ongoing right now, and that's going to be coming out in the fall. >> in the fall. it's very punishing. >> so i have one last question, and it's about the humor in the book. and this book has so many parts that are laugh-out-loud funny, and they're written in a very, it's written in a very deadpan way. but the kind of observations that wen makes and the details that he brings to light are uproar crouse.

so kind of a, did you -- i don't want to say was that intended because i know it was, but do you recognize why that's, um, that would be so funny to a westerner, some of these things? or as you were telling these stories, were you surprised that your friends were saying, wow, that's really funny, you've got to write that down? >> i think initially we didn't think it was funny. you know, it was happening in china, when i came over here we had a lot of friends, and i started to tell stories. and there was some ridiculous aspects of china. but when we were there, you felt it was part of your life. i'm sure people here grew up in china, but certain things that when you were there, you just never saw anything funny. even like my grand ma's coffin be. for years and years people said, well, did you ever think you have a disfunctional family, or your family, you're live anything a room with a big coffin in there. [laughter] i never thought, i thought my

family was very normal. we just had a big piece of purposeture in there, and it covered up. [laughter] you just take it for granted until many years later. i depress -- i guess the way i could talk with some humor, after 20 years and then you are able to detach yourself and look at what the picture -- especially you are here for a long time -- enables me to go and stand back and then look at the whole, that period of life with a little bit of certain detachment. and you can make money of your, the family and also sometimes the sad things about my parents. and then i feel very much at home. i guess a lot of people if you talk about it with everybody will have certain dysfunctional aspects in our family. and, you know, our participants, about our grandparents and that we probably want to share with friends, or i guess i'm just now