Today, the capital, Beijing, has become the best platform for young people to show their ambitions, and many people want to stay in Beijing to live. However, our Chairman Mao had a "helpless" experience of "drifting north", and the place where he worked was peking university.
During his time at Peking University, the unknown Chairman Mao became acquainted with the initiators of the new cultural movement, such as Chen Duxiu and Li Dazhao, who had already become famous. It was even at Peking University that the young Chairman Mao learned about Marx's thought and established his identity as a "great Marxist."
Chairman Mao was with the people
So was Chairman Mao really smooth sailing at Peking University when he was young? Why did he get the cold eyes of the former "guide" Hu Shi? Or even public denigration? Is our great Chairman Mao really unable to pass peking university, as Hu Shi said?
In 1919, the 24-year-old Mao Zedong graduated from the Hunan First Normal School, and at a time when there was no clear plan for the future, Hunan set off a wave of study abroad. For the sake of the state and other Hunan students who were willing to do the same, Mao Zedong took on the task of organizing students to go to Beijing to learn French.
▲Group photo of French work-study personnel
In fact, before Mao Zedong, the Xinmin Society sent Cai Hesen to Beijing to explore the way, and found Yang Changji, a former teacher of hunan first normal school working at Peking University, to talk for a long time, just to ask Yang Changji to try to keep Mao Zedong in Beijing.
▲Yang Changji
Cai Hesen wrote in a letter sent back to Hunan: "I want two or three people to operate at home, and I want some people to go around looking for supplies." The implication is that studying abroad to save the country is of course necessary, but it also needs someone to be the cornerstone at home. In a letter to Mao Zedong, he even proposed that "my generation must have someone stationed here, and it is best for my brother to be here." "It is hoped that Mao Zedong will establish a firm foundation in Beijing in order to create space for the development of the Xinmin Society or the Xiang people."
▲ Cai and Sen
It is precisely for this reason that in August of the same year, after Mao Zedong persuaded Luo Xuezhan, he reached a consensus with Cai hesen that it was necessary to disperse and not to study abroad, thus starting a life in Beijing. So what kind of experience did Chairman Mao have at the Northern Congress?
Mao Zedong, who had just arrived in Beijing, was almost penniless, and like Cai and Sen, who had come before him, he lived in a guest room south of Yang Changji's house. Not long after Yang Changji's introduction, he and Li Dazhao had their first meeting. Although Li Dazhao had learned from Yang Changji that Mao Zedong was a very capable student, he asked him what work he wanted to do. Mao Zedong only replied: "Any rough work can be done, and you can pay both a salary and listen to lectures in your spare time." ”
▲Chairman Mao when he was young
Li Dazhao saw the simple characteristics of the young teenager in front of him, left the words "big materials and small uses" and introduced him to President Cai Yuanpei of Peking University and then left on loan.
Cai Yuanpei did not have a little headmaster's shelf, and while letting Mao Zedong introduce his situation, he brewed tea for him. When he learned the reason why Mao Zedong gave up studying abroad and chose to stay in Beijing, Cai Yuanpei remembered this tall young man dressed in simple clothes, and then entrusted Li Dazhao to arrange the work of library secretary for him. Although the monthly salary is only eight yuan, it gives him the opportunity to work and study half-time.
▲ Cai Yuanpei
So how did Chairman Mao relate to Hu Shi, who later said he could not pass Peking University?
During his work, the studious Mao Zedong participated in a lecture held by Hu Shi and the library. When Mao Zedong asked him questions, Hu Shi sneered at him for his "crappy" Hunan accent. But that didn't stop Mao, who was vengeful, and whenever celebrities came to the library to borrow books, he would seize the opportunity to ask for advice.
▲ Hu Shi
It is precisely because Mao Zedong is so humble and studious that many people have a deep impression of him, and even Hu Shi has changed from "cold" to "warm". Frequent academic discussions have also made the two friends like friends, so the relationship between teachers and friends is a good story. Even after Mao Zedong left Beijing and returned to Hunan, he praised his published articles.
Not only that, during his part-time work and half-study in the Peking University Library, under the influence of his "superior" Mr. Li Dazhao, Mao Zedong came into contact with and chose Marxism and was deeply interested in it. Just as Chairman Mao said in his recollection in Xibaipo, without the guidance of Comrade Li Dazhao, he would definitely not have become a Marxist.
▲ Young Chairman Mao and Mr. Li Dazhao in film and television dramas
Chen Duxiu, who is also known as the "Two Giants of the Red Chamber of Peking University" with Li Dazhao, read Mao Zedong's "Research on Sports" on top of "New Youth" as early as 1917, and was deeply impressed and admired by it.
▲ New Youth Magazine
Peking University also became a place where the two men's relationship was further developed, and the studious and humble Mao Zedong often asked Chen Duxiu about academic questions and discussed the future of the country with him. It was also the sentiment cultivated during this period that created many meetings in Shanghai and the founding of the party in Hunan.
▲Mr. Chen Duxiu
So how did such a good story of being a teacher and a friend become the later Hu Shi's "tit-for-tat confrontation" with Chairman Mao?
In fact, the relationship between Mao Zedong and Hu Shi was very good, and the teacher and friend were not just talking, but after Li Dazhao and Mr. Chen Duxiu launched the May Fourth Movement the following year, a rift arose between the two. Although both believe that democracy and science are the focus of the future development of the country, the two are completely different in their ideas of realization, and Hu Shi, who has studied abroad, is even more scornful of Mao Zedong's positive Marxist ideas.
In the era when people saved the country, it was common for there to be differences in thinking, and even because of differences, there would be progress, but then the two people's evaluations of each other were completely different.
Before and after the founding of the People's Republic of China, Hu Shi left the mainland and traveled from the United States to Taiwan. When Hu Shi was interviewed in the 1950s, he did not remember his old feelings, and even flatly erased the feelings of teachers and students between the two in public, and said that mao Zedong's level would certainly not be able to pass Peking University.
▲ Peking University in the last century
So is the truth really as Hu Shi said, is our chairman really unable to pass the Peking University?
In fact, Chairman Mao did not choose Peking University in terms of volunteerism, but this was not a lack of ability.
First of all, there are institutional reasons. Chairman Mao's normal school was a 5-year normal school, and Chairman Mao had just graduated in 1918. At that time, the Ministry of Education of the Republic of China stipulated that secondary normal students must have work experience to re-apply for universities.
Secondly, it is the reason for family circumstances. Cai Hesen and Xiao Zisheng, who went to Beijing with Chairman Mao, all became students of Peking University because of their study abroad, and Chairman Mao, who won the top spot among hunan students by writing alone, must be above them. But studying at Peking University also requires tuition fees, and even chairman Mao borrowed money to go to Beijing will certainly not be able to pay for this high tuition fee.
▲Chairman Mao's humble former residence
Finally, there is the reason for subjective will. When Chairman Mao, who had just arrived in Beijing, had a library job to make ends meet, he found that Peking University's curriculum was very old and old, and most of his time was a waste of time for him to save the country. Instead of wasting time in class, it is better to follow behind predecessors such as Li Dazhao and Chen Duxiu and learn by themselves according to the advantages of the library.
▲Today's Peking University Library
The success of the great man was not accidental, and it was not easy for Chairman Mao to maintain a high degree of self-discipline in a place like the library, and eventually during the "North Drift" period, he quickly developed his thinking along the direction of Marxism and finally achieved a great cause.
Although Hu Shi's remarks on Chairman Mao were very sharp, Chairman Mao still did not take it to heart and sent people to do Hu Shi's ideological work many times, hoping that he would join our party and contribute to the development of the country. Even the president himself greeting him as a student could not change his political estrangement. Many years later, the chairman finally responded to him, saying that he regretted that Hu Shizhi could not come back, and if he returned, he would be the only one who could be the director of the Peking University Library.
Facts have proved that the wheel of history cannot be stopped by individuals, and Chairman Mao's far-sighted vision has also created the prosperity of our country today.