Book Review of Mao's Last Dancer

Book review of Mao’s Last Dancer by Li Cuinxin

Review by Marc Breault

I had never heard of Li Cuinxin. I have never attended a ballet in my life. Nevertheless, this book, about the life of a Chinese ballet dancer born under the rule of Chairman Mao, was fascinating in so many respects, it is difficult to know where to begin. Li describes his life under Chairman Mao, a life of abject poverty but also of family loyalty and closeness despite the grinding poverty in which they lived. Honestly, when I read the description of his childhood, I could almost believe Cuinxin was born in 1761 instead of 1961. I could not help compare his childhood to mine. I had good food to eat, good water to drink, flushing toilets, and so many things to take for granted such as TV, radio, a good car and an endless selection of toys from which to choose.

Brainwashing under Mao’s China started at an early age. It was fascinating to read that when Cuinxin was old enough to attend school, the first words he learned to read and write were “Long, long live Chairman Mao.” When I went to school, I learned such non political words as dog and cat. The book tells of how Cuinxin was forced into learning ballet and how this necessitated a long separation from his parents while still at a young age. Li tells of his first exposure to Beijing, China’s capital and what a culture shock it was for him. After enduring an amazingly hard training regime that would do any army’s boot camp proud, The teenage Cuinxin develops an appreciation for ballet and through a one in a million chance, is given the opportunity to travel to the great capitalist enemy country of the United States to study ballet for a few months. If Beijing was a culture shock, the United States was like another planet.

In addition to his physical journey from rural China to the United States, the book describes his spiritual journey from complete acceptance of Communism to a realization that things are not as he learned under Mao’s brainwashing.

There are over a billion Chinese and we Americans tend to sometimes look at China as a series of numbers and statistics. “There are too many people there,” we say. Or we might say: “China’s one child policy is the only way forward.” I suppose in one sense, we cannot help but look at China from a distance and with some level of detachment. Li’s book, however, shows an insignificant peasant family, the Li family, a family of no consequence in the eyes of their own government or in our eyes, and turns them into real living human beings, with hopes, dreams, aspirations, times of anguish, and with perceptions of the world and of the people in it. Li shatters our from-a-distance perspective and reminds us that but for an accident of birth, we could have been born in a village just like his, suffering poverty just like he did. The contrast between the average American of the 60’s and 70’s, and the average Chinese is so pronounced as to be almost beyond belief.

Mao’s Last Dancer is about a well know ballet star. But it is much more than that. This book shows the dance of life which exists between two different worlds and how neither world can live without the other. The United States and countries like it can offer material prosperity and a framework to achieve a decent life. The world of Li’s village teaches us the importance of family togetherness and the importance of helping and relying upon one another through hardships which we can barely even imagine. These spiritual values are just as essential to a good life as material comfort.

Mao’s Last Dancer is one of the most fascinating and insightful books I have read in a long time and it receives my highest recommendation.