Instantiations of Jiantao: Yang Mo’s Diaries (1945-1982)

This paper examines articulations of self-criticism (jiantao) in the diaries of the writer Yang Mo (1915-1995). Jiantao refers to the Communist practice of self-analysis that consisted in identifying one’s ideological and/or behavioral shortcomings. People from diverse social backgrounds produced jiantao, oral and written, in response to accusations of rightism or other mistakes. As a technique of political re-education, jiantao became a popular phenomenon in China from the early 1940s. This paper argues that Yang Mo’s diaries can be read as a manifestation of jiantao. This reading will invite a new reflection on what jiantao, merely known as a Communist technique of thought reform, accomplished beyond strictly defined contexts of punishment and re-education. Yang Mo’s diary spans from 1945 to 1982 and constitutes a compelling document to inquire into what self-criticism achieved during and after the socialist period. By exploring Yang Mo’s diary from the perspective of self-criticism, this paper asks: what qualifies Yang’s diary as an instantiation of jiantao? What is the content of jiantao and what is its form? How did jiantao shape Yang’s diary and what did it offer to Yang Mo as a creative writer? My close reading of Yang Mo’s diary entries will show how self-criticism became entangled with her preoccupation with writing as a mission and a means to construct her identity as a writer. The questions of how to write, how to communicate with readers, and how to shape one’s artistic persona demand, in Yang’s diary, a constant labor of self-interrogation and self-criticism. The striking ways in which jiantao became enmeshed with issues of artistic creation suggest new possibilities of understanding jiantao and its relation to literature in twentieth-century China.