The year is 1969 and Chairman Mao's Cultural Revolution is sweeping through China --- the government is in turmoil, the entire educational system is disrupted, and violence is the order of the day. You're either a revolutionary or you're a low-down reactionary, and in this world, you don't really have a choice --- you are what they say you are. "They" usually being the Red Guard, a semi military unit made up of young people who consider it their sole duty to ferret out counterrevolutionaries and beat the "reactionary dust" from their bodies and minds.
Maple, the novel's 14-year-old narrator, dreams of the day she will be old enough to join the People's Liberation Army and die fighting China's enemies, thus proving her loyalty to Mao. But in the meantime, it is her classmates she must fight off, particularly school bully and head of the local division of the Red Guard, Hot Pepper, who insists Maple is an anti-Maoist reactionary because she is not from a "three-generation-of-labor family." Maple endures these horrifically brutal attacks daily and has in fact become almost used to the routine, until the day a strange and beautiful new girl joins the July 1st Elementary school and changes everything.
Her name is Wild Ginger and she is immediately singled out for persecution by Hot Pepper and the other revolutionaries for her "foreign-colored eyes" and fearless attitude. Unlike Maple, Wild Ginger defends herself against Hot Pepper's accusations and even fights back when Hot Pepper's gang attempts to beat her into submission. Incensed that the newcomer refuses to reveal her background, Hot Pepper steals Wild Ginger's dossier and gleefully reports to the entire school that Wild Ginger's father was a Frenchman and her mother a whore. Wild Ginger does not deny these new accusations and is beaten severely.
Bonded by their outsider status, Wild Ginger and Maple become close friends and allies --- they still suffer the stinging blows and jabs of the Red Guard's bayonet-like umbrellas and sticks, but at least they are not alone in their suffering. Although Maple learns that Wild Ginger's deceased father was only half-French and her mother was once an opera singer not a whore, Wild Ginger confides to Maple that she is nevertheless deeply ashamed of her parents and is more than willing to do anything she can to distance herself from them so she can one day become a "Maoist star" in the Communist party. Maple humors her friend but knows that Wild Ginger has about as much of a chance of being accepted into the Communist party as she herself does.
After her mother commits suicide amidst accusations that she is a spy, Wild Ginger is left to fend for herself as an orphan. She begins working in the fish market as a preparer, a grueling and demeaning job that pays little. She spends any extra time she has memorizing Chairman Mao's words and speeches, hoping to enter and win the Mao Quotation-Reciting contest. She eventually loses the competition (even though it is obvious to all that she was the clear winner) but in the process is befriended by contest champion Evergreen, who admires Wild Ginger's determination to gain acceptance among the revolutionaries. Evergreen is an ardent Mao activist and head of the Red Guard at his middle school. The two develop intense feelings for each other but cannot act on them because to do so would go against the Chairman's teachings --- love is seen as human weakness and there is no place for weakness in Mao's army.
When Wild Ginger uncovers some unsavory and decidedly anti-Maoist activity on the docks where she works, she sets off a series of events that will immediately grant her the life she's always wished for. Her heroism on the docks thrusts her into the national spotlight where she is labeled a Maoist hero and invited to meet Mao himself. As a result of that meeting, Wild Ginger is accepted as the youngest member of the Communist party, pronounced the commander-in-chief of the Red Guard and held up as a shining example to China's youth. She has everything she's ever wanted, but in exchange must live up to the nearly impossible burden of being the perfect Maoist citizen --- one false step and she's back to where she started from --- or worse. Still, Wild Ginger cannot stay away from Evergreen…
Anchee Min has created an immensely satisfying tale of love, lust, and revenge set against a backdrop of political upheaval. At once a coming-of-age novel and a fascinating historical account of a frightening and confusing period in China's past, WILD GINGER is Min's best work to date and should earn this talented author many new fans.
--- Reviewed by Melissa Morgan (morgan9800@yahoo.com)
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