The Long March 1935: The Epic of Chinese Communism's Survival

by Dick Wilson

A British journalist reports on the extraordinary march begun in 1934 which helped forge the Chinese Communists into a powerful force

Genres: History, China, Nonfiction

380 pages, Paperback

First published February 24, 1972

Reviews

[Fred Dameron · Rating 4 out of 5]

Where does a country get it's self esteem from? For the U.S. it's Valley Forge and Trenton. Canada Vimy Ridge. France the Bastille and Russia The Great Patriotic War. For Modern China it's the Long March. With out a basic understanding of how the Long March affected China since 1936 any casual observer of Asiatic affairs is at a lose. China is the Major player in Asia. They want to be the main player in the Pacific. To understand why one must look at what actually happened during the Long March. Why Mao conceived the Cultural Revolution and the Great Leap Forward all go back to how he achieved singular leadership of the party during the Long March. The affects of those two purges have both crippled and strengthened China at the same time. Crippled by forcing intellectuals into the fields. Strengthened by committing ALL of China to one single minded goal. That single mindedness is now driving the economy. Forcing the elite into the fields has made every person aware that they are expendable. Even the biggest investment banker understands that "If I cheat the party or the country I will find myself pulling a plow." Wouldn't we all like to see Bernie Madoff in the traces? Or the CEO's of Enron picking tomatoes? In China it happens. Why, the leadership, even today, understands how the Party and Country will turn on you if you cheat and none of them want to go to the Gobi Desert and try to grow peppers or dig coal by hand. This discipline comes from the Long March and it's long shadow. Dick Wilsons book is a great primer on this most important event in Chinese 20th Century history. A history whose long shadow is casting into the 21st.

[Will · Rating 5 out of 5]

Teared up a few times, good way to understand the animating drive of Chinese politics. Super interesting to see how everyday political thought is formed

[Amy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I read this book a long time ago, when I was depressed over the troubling relationships going on in my life. It was a great book for that because it was interesting enough to keep my attention, but not happy enough to make me say screw it and just decide to end it all. It made me almost develop a grudging respect for Mao...almost. His trek was a feat, to be sure, but It's hard to like a guy who so is so self-centered that he kills less out of spite and more out of sheer ignorance. The book made Mao seem kind of formidable, capable of spite killing, particularly when the author talked about the treatment of the Communists by the minorities (the uyghurs, maybe? I don't recall now) and how he believed that certain warlords & minority groups fared worse because of how they were treated during their long march. That, and the section where they were in the long grass were the only two things that really stuck with me.

The depiction of Mao is not necessarily like the more modern ones based on accounts by people who were able to talk about him after he died. This book was published in 1971, and the author's name was Dick Wilson, and he writes about this political & military leader the way you think a guy named Dick Wilson might. Mao seemed strong, competent and unwavering. He doesn't come across that way in a later biographical stuff, so he is more of a archetype here, but he was a man who clearly knew how to keep the power.

Not to give anything away, but the trek is successful and the Communist revolution takes place, which means the Cultural Revolution takes place, which means you can almost hear a collective sigh from all those who aren't going to make it in the years that happen after the events in this book. You pretty much wish the grass had swallowed them up, or that they had fallen off a cliff, but we can't always have what we want out of a story.