In 1912, PuYi resigned as Emperor and for the next decade the country was ruled mostly by powerful warlords, as no government established authority over the bulk of the country. In 1924, fighting erupted between the main warlord factions in Northern China. The grandmother in Wild Swans lived in a city that was in the centre of the fighting, and looting and raping during this time were commonplace.
Soon after this, however, the warlords and their system had collapsed, and the Kuomintang, or Nationalists, headed by Chiang Kai-shek, controlled most of China. At the same time, Japan was also steadily expanding its power in Northern China, and in 1932 launched a full-scale invasion of Manchuria. The Japanese took over the area and created a new state, ‘Manchukuo’, with the old emperor PuYi as the ‘head’, in fact simply a Japanese puppet. However, all of this did not really affect the grandmother in the story, who at this time was living by herself and had little contact with the outside world. In fact, at this time life was increasingly hard for most of the Chinese population. The government treated them cruelly, and democracy was non-existent.
At this point Wild Swans leaves gaps in showing the lifestyle of the Chinese people at the time in history, although it does shine light on the treatment of women at the time. The grandmother, as a concubine was treated with utter disdain by the wives and higher-ranking concubines of her ‘husband’. Furthermore, when her first husband dies and she is free to remarry, as an ex-concubine and divorcee is treated almost as a social outcast by her fiancée’s family. So much so do the family disapprove that the man’s eldest son kills himself to prove a point, and the newly wed couple are forced to move to a Japanese-occupied town in Manchukuo to escape the discerning family.
When the family arrive in Manchukuo, at a town called Jinzhou, they are extremely poor and their lifestyle at this point shows the extremes that the poorest Chinese were forced to live with. The houses were tiny mud huts, with self-made roofs of iron and stones. There were no real resources, such as electricity or running water and the toilet was simply a communal pit. The area, which was near the river, was constantly flooded and the people were on the edge of starvation, there diet consisting wholly of acorn meal. All of the other available food was exported to Japan or given to the rich and the Japanese troops that inhabited the city.
The family move to a better neighbourhood and start to feel the real effects of the tight Japanese rule. The young daughter begins school, and it is made clear the tight control the Japanese keep on the education. The language and teaching was in Japanese, and most of the teachers were Japanese. The pupils were taught to be obedient subjects of Manchukuo, and that it was a paradise on earth. However, this was not so for the locals, whose schools were nothing compared to those of the Japanese children. Locals were treated as inferior, and had to bow to Japanese people in the street.
Although many local people at first believed PuYi had no knowledge of the atrocities going on, they soon began to think otherwise. The grandmother’s family in Wild Swans begin thinking of PuYi as a ‘tyrant’ when they see how badly labourers are treated, and a man they meet is killed for eating anything other than the allotted acorn meal. Also, the grandmother’s husband’s son is branded a ‘thought criminal’ and killed when he, as a schoolteacher, forgets to bow to a portrait of PuYi one morning.
A relative of the grandmother’s works in a prison, and tells the family of the atrocities which are carried out towards the prisoners there, and how they were tortured and killed by garrotte. In fact, the family manage to save some prisoners from this fate with the help of some prison guards, although most prisoners suffered this same cruel death, and were then dumped in a huge pit with other bodies.
As labour shortages became a problem with the increased Japanese war effort, the daughter in Wild Swans is sent by the government to work in a dangerous textile factory at the age of eleven. She is treated far inferior to the Japanese girls also working at the factory, and many children were injured whilst at work.
Unlike at the beginning of the century, it was now acceptable for girls to receive high school educations, although they were taught to become good housewives rather than being taught the same subjects as the boys. Girls were also chosen as wives by Japanese officials, who had seen their photos, and by Japanese men abroad.
Wild Swans describes how it was difficult for those living in Manchukuo to find out what was going on in the rest of the world, and how Japan was doing in the war. However, the worsening food situation and other signs gave them a sense that the tide was turning, and Japan was in trouble.
At this point Italy, one of Japan’s allies, had surrendered, and the Japanese were becoming more and more edgy. One of the daughter’s school friends was executed in front of the whole school for reading a censored Chinese book and setting off the alarm in an arms depot.
Soon after the news spread that Germany had surrendered and two atom bombs had been dropped on Japan. Japan’s surrender came soon after. Over the whole city, Japanese people were being lynched or committing suicide, as the locals began taking their revenge for years of mistreatment. The city was in chaos for eight days, until the population was suddenly informed that the Soviet Red army was arriving.
In the few years after the war, Jung Chang describes the several armies that attempt to gain control of Jinzhou, and the affect this has on the grandmother and other families like hers. The Russians are at first looked up to and celebrated as those who defeated the Japanese. However, these attitudes soon changed when Russians began stealing things and raping local women. Wild Swans tells of how the grandmother’s daughter was chased after by Russian men with the intention of raping her.
The grandmother is witness to two other very important Chinese groups who joust over possession of the city. The shabby looking Chinese Communists are the first to enter Jinzhou, restoring some degree of order, improving the economy and bettering the food situation somewhat. However, lack of recruits meant their impact at this time was limited, and the Kuomintang, their stronger, American-backed rival, were soon to follow in marking Jinzhou as their own territory.
Wild Swans depicts how although the Kuomintang wore smart uniforms and had American weapons, and were at first polite as the Russians had been, they soon became condescending and threatening to the local people. Over the next few years the grandmother’s lifestyle changes significantly from the free state expected on the defeat of the Japanese. The Kuomintang was extremely harsh with the people of Jinzhou, limiting their freedom enormously, and often torturing and executing its opponents on the accusation that they are Communists.
The Jinzhou in which the grandmother’s family live is now a corrupt world where accusation and torture is an everyday occurrence. Soon after, civil war breaks out between the Kuomintang and the Communists. Wild Swans describes how the grandmother and her family are caught in the middle of shelling and open gunfire, and must hide in a makeshift air raid shelter. Many civilians, as well as Kuomintang soldiers, are killed amidst the chaos and fighting.
Eventually the Kuomintang is forced to surrender their hold on Jinzhou and retreat, leaving the Communists in charge. The grandmother during this whole time gives an accurate and vivid account of how ordinary citizens of Jinzhou were forced to live under these war conditions.
The rest of the story is mostly described as the mother’s life, as she becomes an active member of the Communist Party, and steers her life in the direction of a loyal Communist.
The grandmother’s story gives great insight in to the way a woman of her age, class and situation would live. However, one woman’s story is just that; it cannot really reflect on the life other people in China were treated or the situation they were in. Although at one point the grandmother is very poor, through most of her life she is luckier than many people in China at that time, and the fact that she lives in Manchuria means that her story only shows what it was like for those living under Japanese occupation. In other parts of China, the Kuomintang had taken over much earlier, and other countries saw Chaing Kai-shek as the leader of China from much earlier on. Also, there are periods of historical importance in which the grandmother is separated from society, and so cannot comment on the proceedings.
However, in terms of giving an insight in to the lives of those ordinary people around her, the grandmother’s story is invaluable in that it allows the reader to gain knowledge from a sensitive point of view, rather than having just a description of the historical proceedings. Another advantage of having the grandmother’s account is that she has quite an eventful and fluctuating life, and can also give the point of view of a the changing roles of women in society.
