Authorial responsibility

This chapter deals with censorship of literature during the Mao era (1949–1976). The first part of this chapter is a case study of a famous novella by Wang Meng from the time of the “Hundred Flowers Movement.” The debate about Wang’s novella shows a political push toward placing more responsibility (and heavier punishment) on authors, rather than on their editors or publishers. The case also shows the complex textual history of the novella, which was never published in its original form, even after Mao had died and Wang had been rehabilitated. The second part of this chapter deals with literature of the Cultural Revolution (1966–1976), a time when author-focused censorship and persecution were rife, while officially approved types of literary writing reached unprecedented audiences. This chapter also discusses the overt cutting and changing of Chinese literature from the Mao period by English translators and publishers, a form of censorship based on the assumption that Chinese literature from this period has no literary value.