The New Yorker:

In Ha Jin’s “Looking for Tank Man,” uncovering the past doesn’t guarantee making peace with the present.

By Han Zhang

In the beginning of Ha Jin’s new novel, “Looking for Tank Man,” a sophomore at Harvard seems to be on the verge of throwing her life away. Pei Lulu is the pride of her divorced parents. Her life in Boston is supported by her mother’s salary from a job at Tsinghua University and her father’s business of sculpting Buddhas and dragons for overseas clients. That Lulu has managed to study abroad—at Harvard, no less—is already an achievement. But she’s also particularly dedicated, even among her extraordinary peers. When her wealthy friend Rachel vacations in Newport or goes skiing in Vermont, Lulu is content to stay on campus, reading books in the library. There’s just one problem: she is a history major. All governments have their preferred versions of the past, but some are more totalizing than others. For a young Chinese person, interest in the wrong subject can seriously screw things up.

The year is 2008. Many Chinese people, including those pursuing an education abroad, still carry the self-image of an earnest underdog with much to learn and much to prove. (Lulu couldn’t have conceived that a Presidential decree might one day threaten her spot at Harvard, or question her eligibility for a student visa.) But has there ever been a simple time to be Chinese? A pivotal moment for Lulu arrives when she decides to join a crowd welcoming the visiting Chinese Premier. She feels an obligation to do so “because the delegates, even though we disliked them as officials, were from our motherland.” The mood is jubilant, with hundreds of miniature red flags and smiling young faces, except for one slender middle-aged woman. She is unaccompanied, but she holds a sign suggesting that she isn’t alone: “We Won’t Forget the Tiananmen Square Massacre!” The crowd is repulsed by her presence. A group of students disavow her message (“Nobody believes you!”), question her motive (“Why help Americans demonize our country like this?”), and call her names (“Bitch!” “Cunt!” “Loser!”). Lulu doesn’t participate and worries for the woman’s safety. Still, she uses the first-person plural in describing the crowd’s reaction. We intervene, she narrates, in the same way that we feel obligated to welcome the delegates from the motherland. The little flags, at first a sign of confidence in national identity, now seem to have turned into something else.

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