对于一本严肃的书来说，《中国的红鲟》中的戏剧性内容也许有点多。在某些地方，人们觉得自己在阅读小说。但作者为了获得他的故事，冒了很大的风险，这势必会给他的故事增添色彩，甚至让琐碎的事情变得突出。不过，气氛并不重要。重要的是主旨的完整性；关于这一点，不能有任何怀疑。
Walter H. Mallory
BOOKS
Red Star Over China
By Walter H. Mallory
MAY 1938 ISSUE
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by Edgar Snow
[Random House, $3.00]
OCCASIONALLY an alien is privileged to witness events of historic importance in some far country, and to carry back to his own people his explanation of them. Once in a great while such a man has the wisdom to appreciate the significance of those events, and the ability accurately to describe them and to give them meaning. It is in such circumstances that interesting and important books on foreign questions are born. Such a book is Red Star over China. Edgar Snow was the first correspondent to penetrate into the heart of Communist China and to return to tell the tale. His book, planned and executed with meticulous care, is the most superb piece of reporting that I have ever read. It is the authentic, inside story of the Chinese Communists and of their relation to the SinoJapanese War, The Communists and the war are more intimately connected than most people suppose.
Mr. Snow starts his book with a description of his journey into the forbidden Red territory of China’s Northwest. He paints many scenes which are familiar to your reviewer, and calls up many memories. The bright sun in one’s eyes, the dust in one’s throat, the tiredness of one’s legs, come back. One returns to America almost with a start, weary even from the remembrances, and glad of a comfortable bed, cool drinking water, and a clean undershirt.
From the historical point of view, Red Star over China is important for its account of the vicissitudes of Communism in China during the past ten years in which the Central Government has been endeavoring to stamp it out; for the description of life in the Red area; and for the biographical material concerning the Communist leaders who are so little known in the West. These leaders are not presented either as paragons or as villains. They are just ordinary Sons of Han to whom fate has given a rôle of unusual significance and danger. Because of the danger, and the price which Nanking had put on their heads, the author could not avoid a romantic touch. But he does not treat even Mao Tse-tung, the Chairman of the Chinese Soviet Government, as a man of destiny. He feels that whatever extraordinary qualities he has are due to the degree to which he synthesizes and expresses the urgent demands of millions of the Chinese people, not to his own inherent capacities.
The section of the book dealing with the SinoJapanese War — which, incidentally, was prepared before the outbreak of hostilities — is of particular interest. Mr. Snow has shown the influence of the Reds on the decision of China to resist Japan. Also, he reports Mao Tse-tung’s ideas of the nature and strategy of the conflict. The Japanese high command will eagerly read and study Mr. Mao’s prognostications.
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Life in Red China is carefully described. It seems very much like life in any interior Chinese area, though Mr. Snow gives the impression that it is somehow different. Your reviewer does not sense this difference. The author may not have lived before in rural China and may have mistaken what he saw for something new, when in fact it was only new to him.
Perhaps there is a little too much drama in Red Stur over China for a serious book. One feels in some places that he is reading fiction. But the author took great risks to get his story, and that was bound to lend color and give prominence even to trivialities. The atmosphere, however, does not much matter. It is the integrity of the main theme which counts; and about that there cannot be any doubt.
WALTER H. MALLORY
