A Girl Named Faithful Plum by Richard Bernstein Page B

Zhongmei. It was a name she had heard before, but she wasn’t sure where or when.
    “He’s only the greatest dancer in China,” Tianyuan said. “Now he’s the vice director of the Beijing Dance Academy, but even though he’s only the vice director, he’s really the person in charge. He’s the one who can have you accepted if he likes you. But I’ve already told you, if you don’t have
guanxi
, you don’t stand much of a chance.”
    Zhongmei remembered where she had heard the name Jia Zuoguang before. It had been during her week with the song and dance troupe of Jiamusi, when she had gone there with her teacher from Baoquanling. She remembered now that the members of the troupe had all watched a dance movie and Jia Zuoguang had been the lead male dancer in it. She remembered his strength as a dancer, the grace and height of his leaps. Somebody had said that he had even once been to Jiamusi when he had toured northern Heilongjiang Province a few years before.
    “But he can’t help you really,” Tianyuan was saying. “There’s already a list of names. My mother’s friend has seen the list, and my name is on it. It’s all the sons and daughters of important people like my father. No farmer’s daughter from Heilongjiang is going to get on that list.”
    Zhongmei watched as Jia Zuoguang disappeared through the main gate of the school, gently pushing his way through the crowd.
    “Is that all you need,
guanxi
?” Zhongmei said. She suddenlyhad a vision of important people who worked in offices and wore fine woolen tailored suits and were chauffeured around in big black Red Flag limousines. Once she had seen such a car in Baoquanling, as long as an ocean liner, carrying the governor of Heilongjiang Province in an inspection tour of the state farm. Of course these important people had children. Were they the ones already chosen?
    “You mean you don’t even have to be a good dancer?” Zhongmei asked. “You just have to have high-ranking parents?”
    “Oh, no, you have to be a good dancer too. I’m already very famous in Shanghai. I was the best dancer in the Shanghai Children’s Dance Troupe. Everybody knows me!”
    “Well, I was famous too,” Zhongmei said truthfully.
    “But you have no
guanxi
, being from … what was the name of that place again?”
    “Baoquanling,” Zhongmei reminded her.
    “What dance are you going to do today?” Tianyuan asked.
    “It’s from
The Red Detachment of Women
,” Zhongmei said. “What about you?”
    “Oh, I’m doing a solo from
Swan Lake
,” Tianyuan replied. “That’s real ballet.
The Red Detachment of Women
was really a Gang of Four ballet,” she said. “I don’t think the judges are going to like it.”
    The Gang of Four were a group of high officials in China who were close to Chairman Mao. One of them, the leading one, was Mao’s wife, Jiang Qing, who had created a few ballets and operas that for about ten years were just about all theChinese people were allowed to see or hear. The Gang of Four were the ones who had instigated a lot of the violence during the Cultural Revolution, and they were reviled for that all over China. A few months after Mao died, the new government arrested them, put them on trial, and sent them to jail. It’s true what Tianyuan said, that
The Red Detachment of Women
had been one of Jiang Qing’s favorites, and it was full of bombastic praise for Mao and the Communist Party. But even though Mao’s wife was now in prison, it was still performed a lot, especially in the countryside. Foreign ballets like
Swan Lake
had been banned in China during the Gang of Four time, but they were making a comeback now, especially in the big cities.
    “Well, it’s what I prepared,” Zhongmei said worriedly. “I don’t have time to switch to something else.”
    “Do you have the music? Can I see it?” Tianyuan asked, as if that would somehow help.
    “I don’t have any music. I didn’t bring any.”
    “You don’t have music? But