By: Ma Bo
This memoir of Ma Bo’s sent shock waves throughout China when it was published and was even first banned by the Communist Government. This passionate story paints a clear picture for what the Great Chinese Cultural Revolution was really like. Many Chinese living today can attest to similar if not identical ordeals as expressed in Ma Bo’s story. The toils of being a young Red Guard in inner China were experienced by many if not millions. The horrors and atrocities were wide spread throughout the country, not just in Inner Mongolia. The experiences illustrated in Blood Red Sunset uniquely belong to Ma Bo’s entire generation of mislead Chinese. As expressed in the books dedication the Cultural Revolution produced victims, people who suffered from unspeakable wrongs, not limited by any criteria but all segments of society. All parts of China were turned completely upside down. Along with the turmoil came more than just suffering, but pure tragedy. Even the strongest unit throughout all of China’s millennia’s of history, the tight knit family unit, was broken. Particularly profound is the exhibited brutality, victimizing, and sheer loss of humanity that the common people of China subjected each other to during this tumultuous period. This sad theme was seen over and over again throughout the memoir. The devastation Mao Zedong’s Cultural Revolution inflicted on China has the country still in recovery today. The oldest still standing civilization in history became lawless and un-secure for an entire decade. This resulted in millions of atrocities and injustices taking place throughout the country. Injustice ran rampant everywhere and humanity itself struggled to survive. It awakened the most malicious side of mankind ever seen on such a large scale. To truly appreciate the Communist China 1966-1976 national aberration known as the Great Cultural revolution it is necessary to read an account of a person who actually lived in