Inscription: Those who govern the history of rural reform must not fail to pay attention to Wu Xiang. To study the process of reform, if you have not read Wu Xiang's articles, you will definitely not be allowed to enter the door. In other words, if we want to seriously explore the history of reform, we must carefully read Wu Xiang's writings. ——Excerpt from the second preface of "The Great Journey - The Beginning of China's Rural Reform".
Wu Xiang's book "The Great Journey: A Record of the Beginning of China's Rural Reform"
In the exhibition room of Xiuning County Archives in Huangshan City, you can see a treasure of the town hall, a photo scroll of Shangshan, it takes the towering undulating ancient rock of Danshan as the background, takes the wide and winding blue water as the foreground, the mountains are surrounded by water, the houses of the whole Shangshan Village are lined up one after another, the villagers come and go among them, life and beauty are serene, the blue water crosses four wooden bridges, the middle two are not far apart, enter the village entrance, there are gatehouses, obviously this is the main passage of the whole village. When the staff introduced the picture, they pointed to the bridge on the left in the middle and said that Wu Xiang's home should be next to the drying field.
Wu Xiang was born here in 1922.
PART
01
When Wu Xiang came back at the end of 1979, he still walked on the wooden bridge, and the old house was still there at that time. He stood for a long time at the head of the bridge and in front of the house. The wooden bridge was replaced with a concrete bridge in the 80s of the last century, and his family's old house was divided between several families after liberation, and now they have all been built into new buildings. Villagers said that the section of the wall was built on the foundation of his old house with bricks from his old house.
Although we can no longer see the old house of Wu Xiang's family, in Shangshan Village, we can still see the place where Wu Xiang lived and lived, that is, the mansion surnamed Wang surnamed Wang that has now been built into the memorial hall of Sun Qimeng, former vice chairman of the Standing Committee of the National People's Congress.
What is the relationship between the two families? After the Sun family moved to Suzhou, they sold their house to Wang Jing'an. Wang Jing'an is Sun Qimeng's cousin and Wu Xiang's grandfather. The old people in the village said that when Wu Xiang was ten years old, his mother died of illness, his father was newly married, and several younger siblings were born. Therefore, this house can also be said to be Wu Xiang's home.
At this time, Sun Qimeng became a model for Wu Xiang to learn, and Sun Qimeng's pursuit of progress also had a crucial impact on Wu Xiang's life choices when he first entered his youth. The uncle and nephew formed a lifelong friendship.
Sun Qimeng and Wu Xiang (right) pose for a group photo
Wu Xiang's father, Wang Hetai, was working as a clerk in a bank in Shanghai at this time, and his grandfather, Wu Ziding, ran an ancestral clothing village in Suzhou. Wu Xiang left his hometown at the age of 7 to go to school in Suzhou. Wu Xiang recalled: "When I was a child, I was a favored child, and I was afraid of my grandfather alone. After arriving in Suzhou, I often felt uncomfortable with his control. He said to me, you see Sun Qimeng, who graduated from junior high school and did not go to high school, studied on his own for a while, and was admitted to Soochow University with the same academic ability, graduated from college at the age of 18, and officially published two monographs on Buddhism", "My grandfather told me that ordinary people are 'thirty and stand', and Sun Qimeng stood up before he was twenty." Obviously, my grandfather hoped that Wu Xiang would take Sun Qimeng as a model for learning.
The old house of Wu Xiang's family still has an old wall foundation
In 1935, Sun Qimeng got married. Grandfather took Wu Xiang to drink wine. Sun Qimeng was eleven years older than Wu Xiang. Wu Xiang recalled: "Uncle Meng's wedding was very simple and simple, only two tables of close relatives and friends were invited, and they could talk freely or a few people together, and the atmosphere was cordial and lively. At first glance, I was full of adults and old people, and I was the only child, and I couldn't interject in the conversation at all, and I seemed a little restrained and even embarrassed. Uncle Meng took the initiative to talk to me, and after saying a few words, he asked about reading extracurricular books, but fortunately, I had just read a few novels by Lu Xun, Yu Dafu, and Bingxin at that time, and I talked nonsense with him. It was the first time I had spoken directly with him, and the affinity of his conversation took away my uncomfortable feelings and soon brought me into the convivial atmosphere of the room. I saw that Uncle Meng was very good at coping, as if he was very knowledgeable, he could talk to anyone, and he made witty remarks from time to time, causing bursts of laughter. Since then, I have a good impression of Uncle Meng, a feeling of admiration, respect and yearning."
The place where Wu Xiang lived and lived is now the mansion surnamed Wang of the Sun Qimeng Memorial Hall
At this time, Sun Qi Meng was serving as the director of discipline and education of Jiangsu Provincial Women's Normal School. After the "September 18" incident, Japan's ambition to invade China was further inflated, occupying the three eastern provinces and encroaching on North China. Sun Qimeng insisted on instilling democratic ideas in the school and propagating anti-Japanese salvation. Because the Kuomintang authorities insisted on the policy of compromise and concession, when they saw Sun Qimeng doing this, they dismissed Sun Qimeng from his post and investigated him, and ordered the province's educational units to never continue to use them. However, Sun Qimeng was not discouraged, and soon at the invitation of Huang Yanpei, he went to Shanghai to teach at the China Vocational Education Society, and became an active member in the wave after wave of anti-Japanese salvation movements.
After Wu Xiang heard this, he first sympathized, then admired, and then turned into an incentive factor to go to Yan'an with him.
PART
2
After the outbreak of the Anti-Japanese War in Songhu on January 28, his grandfather sent Wu Xiang back to his hometown to study. In the summer of 1933, Wu Xiang graduated from high school and was admitted to Wan'an Provincial No. 2 High School, but his grandfather asked him to transfer to Suzhou because he was too naughty. When he went to his father in Shanghai from Suzhou in those years, he met Zhou Qifeng, who was also from Shangshan. In his later years, Wu Xiang recalled that he "came from a poor and talented family, was admitted to the China International Trade Company in Shanghai as a trainee before graduating from junior high school, read many books, wrote essays and essays very well, and was a member of a peripheral organization of the National Salvation Association." In the summer of those years, I went from Suzhou to Shanghai, and often visited him, and I began to read progressive books, which also began under his influence", he became Wu Xiang's "respected and trusted person", and also became the direct promoter of Wu Xiang's trip to Yan'an.
On December 19, 1946, Wu Xiang's "Shouting Hero Wen Zhenming" was published in the Jinchaji Daily
Wu Xiang, who returned to his hometown not long ago, although he was only 15 years old, resolutely went to Yan'an.
In August 1938, Wu Xiang arrived in Luochuan and was incorporated into the Sixth Brigade of the Fourth Phase of Kang Da. In November, under the leadership of He Changgong, he walked more than 2,000 miles and arrived in the southeast of Shanxi. In March 1939, Wu Xiang joined the Communist Party of China, and after graduating in the summer, he was assigned to the Eighth Route Army Headquarters Guard Regiment and the 129th Division 385 Brigade as a company cultural instructor. At the beginning of 1942, he was transferred back to the General Colonel of Kang University and served as a cultural teacher in the Army Middle School under the General School. Here he experienced the test of life and death in the Japanese army's sweep.
In May, the Japanese army began a sweep. They are implementing a thorough "three-light" policy. It was in this sweep that Comrade Zuo Quan died. Wu Xiang had a severe cold at the beginning of the sweep, "The march was transferred for a few days and had a high fever and turned into typhoid fever, unable to move with the team, and was placed in a cave near a small mountain villa in Shahe County, with Luo Wei, a female teacher who was close to giving birth, and a small correspondent took care of us." After seven or eight days, the food left behind was eaten up, I was seriously ill and comatose, unable to move, and the correspondent entrusted me to an old lady in a nearby cave, who accompanied Luo Wei to look for the team and food, and encountered the enemy to search the mountain and disappeared. I relied on the old lady to get a little sauerkraut soup, sour date noodles and wild apricots to survive", and later several students passing by here found him, and immediately took out the horse meat they had brought to the weakened Wu Xiang to eat, and then several people took turns carrying him on his back to support him, and then brought him back to the army.
This experience gave him a personal experience of the peasants' lives, and he also deeply felt that the Chinese revolution was achieved with the support of the people, especially the peasants, who made tremendous sacrifices, and that the victory of the revolution must be grateful to the peasants, and the peasants must first be allowed to live a good life as masters of their own affairs. After Japan's surrender, Wu Xiang successively worked in the Xinhua News Agency and the People's Daily.
On September 13, 1947, the Land Work Conference of the Communist Party of China was closed, and the Outline of China's Land Law was adopted. In order to effectively promote the solid progress of the land reform movement, on February 1, 1948, the Central Bureau of the Communist Party of China in Shanxi, Hebei, Shandong, and Henan decided to send task forces to various localities. Wu Xiang was selected to participate. On February 25, they arrived at Shilidian Village.
On the one hand, they visited the poor peasants in depth or organized the poor peasants to hold forums, and at the same time they convened party members, especially village cadres, to ask them to conduct introspection and examination; on this basis, they convened a villagers' meeting and invited village cadres to participate, so that the villagers could make a discussion in front of them, and finally deal with the party members and cadres according to the problems exposed by the evaluation, so as to organize peasant associations and reorganize village cadres. Wu Xiang meticulously participated in the whole movement. In 1948, international friends Crook and Isabeth came to Shilidian Village to follow up the work team for nearly two months, and finally wrote "Shilidian - A Mass Movement in a Village in China". There are a lot of records of Wu Xiang in the book. Because of his concise speech, Wu Xiang was elected as the main spokesman of the task force. On the first night of entering the village, Wu Xiang gave a lecture to the villagers on behalf of the team under the moonlight. He explained the purpose of the task force, the main elements of the land law, the benefits it could bring to the peasants, and the steps to be taken. Wu Xiang emphasized the "turnover", although he just came, he still cited many examples, and won the attention of the villagers. Wu Xiang actively encouraged the villagers to speak boldly and raise questions, so that the meeting was held enthusiastically and smoothly, and great results were achieved, and finally the villagers truly experienced the feeling of turning over spiritually for the first time, and further strengthened the cognition that the Communist Party was really their backer.
In the spring of 1948, Wu Xiang (second from left, wearing a military hat) participated in the land reform task force and talked with farmers
Participating in the land reform task force this time, he saw the peasants' sincere support for the Communist Party when they were allocated land, the changes brought about by the economic development of the rural areas that began to carry out mutual assistance and cooperation, the harm brought to the peasants by ultra-"leftist" practices such as "cutting the feudal tail" in the process of land reform, and the urgency of the vast number of peasants turning over spiritually to further develop and daring to safeguard their own rights and interests, the reality that party members and cadres acted willfully and gradually degenerated after grasping power, and the urgency of urgently guarding against cleaning up and correcting.
All these laid a historical foundation for him to think about the rural peasant issue in the new period.
PART
3
After the founding of the People's Republic of China, Wu Xiang was left in Shanxi to prepare for the establishment of the "Shanxi Daily", and then served as the editor-in-chief, as well as the director of the Political Research Office of the Shanxi Provincial Party Committee and the deputy secretary-general of the Provincial Party Committee. Because of his outstanding work, in early March 1957, he represented Shanxi to participate in the Central Propaganda Work Conference, during which he participated in a small symposium presided over by Mao Zedong on the afternoon of the 10th, and was received by Mao Zedong. Wu Xiang vividly remembers the exciting scene and the encouragement he received.
Family
Chairman Mao walked into the venue and shook hands with everyone one by one, and Lu Dingyi and Hu Qiaomu introduced him one by one. Chairman Mao's hands are very big and powerful, when he shakes hands, he looks at each other with a smile, and after hearing the name clearly, he also makes a little joke from time to time, and says to Wu Xiang: "Oh, Wu Xiang, the elephant of the elephant, but your nose is not long." Everyone laughed. Then he asked everyone to sit down nearby. As a result, Wu Xiang sat in front of Chairman Mao, and there was only one person in front of him, Mr. Lu Yi.
In his speech, Chairman Mao emphatically emphasized the importance of enhancing the cultivation of Marxism in running a socialist newspaper. Chairman Mao spoke standing up, smoking while talking, almost one after another, and his face and whole body were often habitually turned to the left, speaking unhurriedly one sentence at a time, and occasionally using gestures to accentuate his tone. Wu Xiang said that his seat was just on the left, "Chairman Mao had a smile on his face, his broad forehead was shining, and his deep eyes were looking at this and that, which made people feel a clear spring of wisdom and refreshed their hearts." I was right next to Chairman Mao, listening directly to his old man's speeches one after another in such a close place to him, immersed in happiness that I had never had, while taking quick notes with simplified characters that I had made that no one understood, and not giving up a minute to stare at Chairman Mao, intending to deeply engrave his every movement and posture into my memory."
Chairman Mao's speech on increasing the ideological nature of newspapers and periodicals recorded by Wu Xiang in shorthand is not only pertinent and inspiring for us on how to run newspapers and periodicals well today, but is also of great historical value; Chairman Mao's sentence "A thorough materialist is fearless" has since become a strong spiritual pillar for Wu Xiang to uphold the truth.
In the early 80s of the 20th century, he was at the grassroots level with Xinhua News Agency reporter Zhang Guangyou (left).
Chairman Mao said: "A socialist newspaper cannot be done without criticism. However, when criticizing in the newspapers, it is necessary to prepare stairs for the people, otherwise they will not be able to go downstairs when the masses surround them." "It is not suitable to resolve contradictions among the people and engage in great democracy; in my opinion, it is necessary to use small democracy, and adding the word 'small' to small democracy is a drizzle, and the effect may be better if it is kept going down"; "We should stress ideology in running a newspaper and emphasize that it conforms to the interests of the majority of the people." The newspaper article 'shorter, shorter, shorter' is right, 'softer, softer' should be considered. Don't be too hard, too hard people don't like to look at it, you can unify the two things of soft and hard. The article is written in a popular and cordial way, from small to large, from near to far, and fascinating, which is very good", "Someone asked, what will happen to Lu Xun if he is alive now? I see that Lu Xun is alive, and he dares not write it." Under the abnormal air, he will also not write, but more likely will write. As the saying goes: 'If you are willing to cut your body, you dare to pull the emperor off the horse.' Lu Xun was a true Marxist, a thorough materialist. A true Marxist, a thorough materialist, is fearless, so he will write". Speaking of this, Chairman Mao waved his right hand and emphasized the last sentence: "A thorough materialist is fearless." ”
In 2005, Wu Xiang (second from left) and Lu Zixiu (first from left) conducted research at Desheng Luban Woodworking School in Xiuning County, Anhui Province
Wu Xiang said that this sentence has been echoing in his ears since then, so that he has been "exploring the philosophical and revolutionary connotations of this sentence".
At this time, Dazhai Village, Xiyang County, Shanxi Province has become a model of hard work in agriculture and rural areas across the country, and Wu Xiang, who is in Shanxi, is very familiar with the development process of Dazhai, and has a personal reflection on the later "Agricultural Dazhai" movement.
In the 80s of the 20th century, while conducting research in rural Hebei, Wu Xiang (left) talked with the secretary of the Baiguan Village branch in Wu'an County
He said: At first, "Dazhai agricultural production was quite excellent, and it deserved to be a model of hard work to build mountainous areas", and "in 1965, Chairman Mao Zedong issued a call for 'agricultural Dazhai'. Later, the 'Gang of Four' took advantage of this slogan and artificially elevated Dazhai as a typical example of the so-called 'continuing revolution under the dictatorship of the proletariat,'" "The development of the rural economy on the mainland is extremely uneven, and the natural conditions and production conditions are very differentThe 'big pot of rice,' 'big hurrah,' and 'blind command' have been exhausted, and they have been further engulfed," and "along with the sky-high falsehoods, big words, and empty words, there is widespread poverty."
All these have provided a realistic basis for his firm support for agricultural and rural reform in the new period.
PART
4
After defeating the "Gang of Four", Wan Li served as secretary of the Anhui Provincial Party Committee. Wu Xiang was transferred to Beijing Daily in May 1966 as deputy editor-in-chief. Wan Li was very familiar with his ability, and at this time, despite the fact that Wu Xiang was still in the censorship stage, he transferred him from Shanxi (during the "Cultural Revolution" Wu Xiang was brought back from Beijing by Shanxi to criticize and detain) to Anhui to help him carry out the cleanup, rectification, reform and development of Anhui.
In 2004, Wu Xiang (6th from the right in the first row) took a group photo in Hefei to participate in the academic seminar on building a moderately prosperous society in an all-round way and China's agriculture, rural issues
In the summer and autumn of 1978, Anhui suffered from a severe drought that had never been experienced before, and most areas had not received a single rain for seven or eight consecutive months. In the face of this disaster, the Anhui Provincial Party Committee made a bold decision to allow various localities to "borrow land to survive the famine." Wan Li later recalled: This directly "induced enthusiasm for the delivery of goods to households." The masses of Shannan Commune in Feixi spontaneously carried out the contract production to the households".
The incident caused huge ripples across the country. There is an urgent need to elaborate on it theoretically and further standardize it in documents. Wu Xiang played his due role. The second preface of the book "The Great Journey" summarizes it as follows: "The rural reform is magnificent, and Wu Xiang's role is unique and important. In the summer of 1979, Wu Xiang was ordered by Wan Li to enter Anhui from Jin to take charge of the Policy Research Office of the Provincial Party Committee. As a result, almost all important reform documents in Anhui were written by Wu Xiang. In the spring of 1980, Wan Li was promoted to the central government, and Wu Xiang accompanied him to Beijing. In the eighties of the 20th century, the reform was in full swing, or high-level meetings, or going out to investigate, or drafting documents, there were thousands of miles, and there was Wu Xiang. Wu Xiang gave advice for thousands of miles, catching knives and ghostwriting, although the high-level think tank is like a cloud, but there is no one who is unsurpassed, which can be called Wanli Wengu. Pay attention to rural reform, and those who know a little about the situation at the top must write about Wu Xiang when they write about thousands of miles, and they must write about Wu Xiang for thousands of miles. ”
At the end of 1978, the Central Committee convened the Third Plenary Session of the 11 th CPC Central Committee, and although the focus of the whole party's work was shifted to socialist modernization, the shackles of "leftism" in all aspects still shackled the people's ideological world like shackles. This is the case with rural reform. In April 1980, Wan Li was transferred to the post of vice premier of the State Council, and in August he was concurrently appointed director of the State Agricultural Commission.
In the summer of 1983, Wu Xiang (center) accompanied Wan Li (left) on a special train to Yuanping County, Shanxi Province
It is necessary to comprehensively sort out and expound the necessity of rural reform and theoretically get to the root of the problem. Wu Xiang picked up the pen and wrote an article entitled "Yangguan Road and the Duplank Bridge," which was published on the second page of the People's Daily on November 5. The article is divided into four parts: the "origin" part, in which he believes that since the delivery of production to households has become a strong demand of the masses in some localities, it is impossible not to analyze it from the objective economic conditions; in the "pros and cons" part, he summed up the four advantages of guaranteeing production to households, which can effectively implement the principle of distribution according to work, can effectively resist blind commands, can effectively resist flat adjustment and eating more and occupying more, and can effectively promote economic development; and "nature" In part, he said passionately that the package production to households is not a single-plank bridge, it is the same as various forms of responsibility system, it is the Yangguan Avenue of the collective economy, if we must compare it to a single-plank bridge, then it can be said that living in a deep ravine, without taking the single-plank bridge, you cannot move forward, you cannot go to the flat and wide Yangguan Road, in this case, taking the single-plank bridge is to take the Yangguan Road; in the "prospects" part, he summed up that socialism can only be built on the basis of a high degree of development of socialized large-scale production. Wooden plank bridges, stone slab bridges, and iron chain bridges, as long as they can walk, we will all make use of them, transform them, and develop them, so that we can get out of the deep mountains crisscrossed by ravines, walk to the flat and vast fields, and advance along the golden Yangguan Avenue.
Wu Xiang's writings
As soon as this article came out, the controversy over the contract responsibility system of joint production began to cross the single-plank bridge and walk onto the flat and vast field. Writing this article, it should be said that Wu Xiang also wrote it with great courage to walk on a single-plank bridge.
After that, he wrote a large number of articles and treatises on rural reform to advocate for the development of agriculture, rural areas and rural areas. For example, "From Xiyang to Fengyang", "China's Rural Reform", "Where the Great Hope of the Mainland's Rural Areas" and "The Great Journey" are, some people say that reading them will not only make the epoch-making achievements of China's rural reform, but also have a deep understanding and experience of the implementation of the strategy from poverty alleviation to rural revitalization since the 18th National Congress of the Communist Party of China.
In his later years, Wu Xiang often talked about the spirit of "Hui Camel". If camels are the ships of the desert and elephants are the hardened trekkers of the rainforest, one thing in common is the courage to brave the odds. Wu Xiang's desk is filled with "elephant" souvenirs he has collected from all over the world, and he truly thinks of himself as an elephant that promotes China's rural reforms.
What gave him this spirit and conviction was the character of seeking truth that he had cultivated since childhood, and the motivation that Mao Zedong later taught that "a thorough materialist is fearless."
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Text: Xu Jing, Ma Qibing, Editor: Zhang Qianying
Proofreader: Liu Jun
Review: Sun Ting
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