Paulo Fernandes Fernandes itibaren Estrela D'Oeste - SP, Brazylia
The Great Chinese Cultural Revolution began in 1966, when People's China was virtually incommunicado with the United States of America. I first read about it in a pamphlet published by the Students for a Democratic Society which represented it as a popular movement originating with Shanghai students frustrated by time-servers in academe and the party bureaucracy. The movement, while informed by Marx, was more idealistic and volunteeristic than materialist in these intial stages. I, similarly, while informed by Marxism, found the appeal to moral perfectionism compelling as did many of my peers, including, of course, the author of the original SDS publication. We, after all, were mostly middle class white kids, wanna-be revolutionaries against our own class. The sense of solidarity with the students of Shanghai, with students on the streets of, later, Paris and Prague was strong. The Chinese press published these three essays as part of the effort of the Party and its Chairman to contain and ultimately control the upsurge of radical idealism in People's China. When I read them in 1968, however, the excesses of the Cultural Revolution were unknown to us and the sentiments within them were inspiring.
One of my many medical novels, recommended by a friend while I was applying for medical school. This is a neurologist's collection of his patient's stories. Always sympathetic, it tells their stories in a very human, non-medical way. I plan to re-read this book before I start my residency.