I also think that it's not just anyone who can achieve this level of emotional communication. Firstly, it needs to be based in mutual love; secondly, the couple have to be relatively well matched intellectually, educationally and culturally; and thirdly, and this is even more important, both have to share the same sublime aspirations, constantly exploring aspects of human life and constantly rising, through study, to ever higher realms of the soul. It is, I believe, only under such conditions that this kind of love can be firmly grounded and can gradually evolve towards a degree of perfection.
Perhaps because of my career as a teacher, I have always been willing to look for the answers to many questions in books. Since I became aware of these special emotions between us, I've been exploring and researching it a great deal, and have even read On Love by Vasilyev. This is a rather serious book, which I bought because many of my young friends were reading it, and I wanted to know what it was about so that I could set them some ideological tasks. I brought my own questions to it and read through the relevant chapters; but although I found the book inspiring, it didn't quite accord with our own reality. That's why I wrote above that somehow our feelings seemed in some way "original", still to be researched! I hope you're not going to laugh at me for being too bookish!
You asked me if I could go to Shanghai after I retired. In theory, yes, but it's a bit late now, as I have already been fixed up with a place at the Cadres' Retirement Institute. Actually I really do prefer Beijing. Wherever I am, it won't make any difference to us. The main thing is that we should be able to write unlimited letters to each other. I'll definitely come to Shanghai every year, so we can always see each other, and after I've moved to Beijing, you are welcome to take a trip up here whenever you have a chance. You can stay here, and I can take you to see other old army friends or we can go sightseeing in Beijing. I've rambled terribly in this letter, so I'll stop now. I hope you won't fret any more about not getting letters from me. Believe me, I will write to you sooner or later, so don't worry.
With best wishes,
Phoebe
24.
10 May 1992
Dearest Phoebe,
Let me throw restraint to the winds, and shout out my feelings vehemently! I got your letter of the 6th yesterday, and having my dear distant one's letter to read at the weekend was a great stroke of good luck for me. At dinner I like to drink a glass (about three fluid ounces) of locally brewed liquor, and so I warmed up my tipple, quickly sat down and gently tore open my love letter. As I read, I sipped the wine; only you can share these tender feelings! In the evening there was the weekend dance at my old workplace, and so I went out. I generally go dancing two or three times a month – it's free of charge. Too bad I'm such a country bumpkin from a foreign school that I don't dance very well. If only my valiant and gentle Phoebe were in Shanghai, my dancing prowess would no doubt soon attain postdoctoral level.
After the dance I came back home, and got your letter out to read it for the second time. I marked in red pen such memorable phrases as "Dear Lou" [in English], "In any case, you are already at the centre of my affections". I read and read, and marked and marked. My eyes were wet with tears, and my heart trembled. Such true joy! To be able to receive so much true, fervent and constant affection from you fills me both with excitement and contentment, and is even rather flattering, because I'm really a rather mediocre and superficial person, even though my love does run true and deep. But here too you have infected and inspired me. I rejoice that I can have your deep love for myself, I must do my best to reciprocate and, just as you do, irradiate and deepen life and everything around me!
Now it's eight o'clock on Sunday morning and I've finished my various chores. I have "shut myself up away upstairs to become one with you", as Lu Xun put it, and to perform my sacred task – writing a letter, to you. My daughter-in-law has taken my six-year-old grandson, whose name is Erjia (his baby name is "Jimmy") to see her parents, and my son is sleeping late. In such an atmosphere of warmth and gentleness, I open my heart to my dear, faraway one and make a reading of its rhythms. First I take out of the drawer all those much-treasured letters you have written to me, and read them again. In the forties, I saw the Hollywood film Review of Lovers' Dreams*17 and, although I've long forgotten what it was about, I remembered its name while I was doing this because, just as if I was watching the film, I replayed in my mind our love, from that early spring day in February to the fiery heat of May. How amazingly quickly time has passed, and how very logically things have progressed. Let me quickly sketch in how things have developed: the happiness of our deepening feelings as we met again – I, far below you, probing; you, from your high position, enlightening me; then re-establishing relations on the basis of "good friends" – "letters between the two of us" linking us together, bringing us the closeness and happiness of intimate friends – further reminiscences and further exchanges, filling the voids in each other's souls, and "feeling abundantly enriched by life" – having the pleasure of reading each other's letters, and "getting boundless satisfaction from our love" – quantitative changes bring with them qualitative changes, leading to "deep, deep love", which "is pure because it reveals trueness of heart; noble because it rises above this vulgar world; beautiful because it can excite the most beautiful feelings in the reader" – now we are increasingly "in love", a new form of love, full of originality, pure, noble, filled with poetry, we have become lovers, in a "diffuse" yet real sense. Let us sing of the spring of our love, of this rush of longing, we are each at the centre of each other's love, "we want to clear away all obstacles" – and make the future all roses! Let vulgar people mock at our passion – some great writer may one day immortalise this rarest of feelings in a work which will amaze the world!
Let me now revisit an old dream: just as you were fond of me in the past, so your loving image never once faded from my mind in forty years. Although you weren't constantly present, you were with me almost every night and morning. This is not something which I've just made up – I can prove it. Every time I thought back to when we joined the army together, your beautiful image came naturally to mind. When I looked at photos of that time, especially, I thought of you; there was that photo of me in an army helmet with a chin strap, taken when I got a new army uniform, and you laughed at it and said I didn't look anything like a PLA soldier, I looked more like an English one! So whenever I turned up that picture I thought of you, and seemed to hear your tinkling laugh again. Then, in the summer of 1956, I bumped into you and Xiaoda at the entrance to the Shanghai Park Hotel when I took my niece for a drink in their fourteenth-floor restaurant. I was not yet married, and seeing you brought so many feelings back, as if a multi-flavoured bottle of seasoning had upended and the flavours gushed out, predominantly unbearably bitter. I wrote recently to you that if I had not left the Foreign Languages Training Unit, then perhaps it would not have been our departed friend who had the good fortune to marry you. The instant I bumped into you both at the Park Hotel, that was the thought that occurred to me. Another example: on 26 December 1989 (I now know it was two days before your birthday) about a dozen of us from the office took a trip to Nantong, and stayed at the Youfei Hotel. The manager told us the hotel's name commemorated a group of eminent scholars of old, but – as if I had had an electric shock – I thought of you because the "Fei" was the same character as in your name. That night, what with thinking of you and being in a strange place, I hardly slept. In the autumn of 1978, I met our Director again in Shanghai, and in the following three or four years, until he retired and went back to Beijing, I paid frequent visits to his house. Every time he mentioned old friends from the Foreign Languages Training Unit, I would think especially of you, but I dared not ask him how you were because I harboured ulterior motives. Then a month before the Spring Festival this year, he came on a trip to Shanghai and I went to see him at the Yun Feng Hotel. He told me that you came to visit your brother in Shanghai every Spring Festival, and gave me his address, and that was what first spa
rked the beginning of our romance.
When you were good enough to advise me to look for a life companion to care for me, I couldn't be angry or take it the wrong way, because you really meant well. But I won't accept it. I'm sure it's easy to find someone to look after one, but a true lover is hard to find. I will not be so foolish as to desert my soulmate – my true lover! You say "We can dissociate ourselves from our feelings", and I respect your opinion. It wouldn't be the first time this has happened, especially outside China. But if we dissociate ourselves from our feelings, all that's left is carnal desire; I'm afraid even sexual love is not enough. I am also still me, my darling, so let our future be all roses . . .
I will stop now. I grasp your hand!
Louis
25.
13 May 1992
Dear Louis [in English],
The photo of you holding your grandson is lovely. I can see that you've completely recovered, you look about the same weight as when I saw you at the Spring Festival, and you look younger in spirit. Being in love keeps you young, that's true! Who would believe from that picture that you will soon be an old man of seventy! Your grandson looks adorable, what a good-looking boy! Those great big eyes are so appealing, and he's a sturdy little boy. I hope you'll give him a good upbringing; his parents' generation want to make life easy for their children because of the hardships they suffered as children themselves. But then, because they're the only child in the family, today's children end up spoilt rotten and that's actually harmful to their health. As a grandfather, you need to spend a bit of time on scientific child-rearing, which will turn him into the ideal, able young person, don't you think?
The depth of the love and affection in your letter made me read it over and over again, as if nothing less than this would enable me to assimilate your true love in its entirety. I didn't stop there – in spare moments, I read all the letters you have sent, from beginning to end, savouring them as I do so. Feelings of immense happiness wash over me – that's what's called being "madly in love". I always used to laugh at the "madness" of young people in love, and I certainly never imagined that I'd be "madly" in love myself in my old age. I think that we are really very fortunate to be able to enjoy being madly in love at our age. As soon as I've retired, as long as nothing bad happens, then we can really make this into a topic. We can write about it and the effects may be sensational! Of course, I just can't put things into words the way you can.
When you told me candidly in your letter how you had thought and felt about me during all those years, I felt very honoured to have made such a profound impression on you. I really had no idea; if it had not been for our chance meeting, all this would have been buried forever, which would have been a terrible pity. I find your love very pure and precious. As for me, Xiaoda and I were so very happy together that I didn't think about you much, even though I had been fond of you. But after Xiaoda had passed on, that fondness was the basis on which you kindled the flames of feelings which had been hidden deep in my heart, and new and intense emotions were born, miraculously, out of our feelings all those years ago. You never can tell how life will turn out. Maybe we're destined to be together! I think that staying "madly in love" as we are now is probably the best way to deal with things, as it's the only way to keep the flames of our love alive forever.
I think you are one male comrade who is really capable. I've always felt that the more capable one is, the better, and the less one depends on others, the happier one will be. I always make a point of impressing this on the younger generation, especially the girls. It's fashionable nowadays for young girls to think that if you're "helpless", you can "use men" and so "manage men". That's a complete lie! If I was a man, I would find it unbearable to spend my life with a girl who couldn't do anything for herself, depended on me for everything, and just chattered away, no matter how pretty she was. Beauty on the outside diminishes for everyone as the years roll by. But inner beauty is much more important. It's what really fascinates, and it's everlasting [in English]. Of course, I still approve of people dressing themselves up in suitable outfits when they're middle-aged or elderly. At the moment I wear a uniform every day and I've got a bit sloppy about my other clothes. When I've retired, I'm planning to come to Shanghai to get a tailor to run me up a few things that fit nicely. The last time we met at Zhu Nan's, from the way that everyone joked about you being just a municipal cadre but you couldn't tell by the way you dress, I realise you're a bit of a dandy!
The story you told me about your name was really interesting, typical of the feudal society of the old days. My name was different from yours, because it reflected Western influence in the old society. You know I was born in Columbus, Ohio, and was given the English name, Phoebe (pronounced fee-bee). Phoebe was the goddess of the sun, so my parents wanted me to spread joy and warmth like the sun. Perhaps the name achieved something of this, as my philosophy of life has always been to give people warmth and happiness. If you turn Phoebe into Chinese characters and pronounce it in Shanghai dialect, it sounds very like the English. Either way, both your name and mine bear the stigma of the old, semifeudal, semi-colonial society. People are creatures of society, so people's names most clearly reflect social changes.
I'm glad to hear that you have a busy life. Dancing is a great social activity, and I think you should keep it up. I do like dancing – we have weekend dances here too, and I sometimes go and dance – but I watch more television. When people get older, quick dance steps are just too hard, and I prefer slow dancing so that I can enjoy the music and chat at the same time. That's what I enjoy most.
I've thought and written a lot to this point, and maybe I haven't expressed myself clearly, but I really don't care, just so long as our hearts have communicated. I know you will understand, and will forgive the deficiencies in my letter.
With best wishes,
Phoebe
31.
30 May 1992
Dear Phoebe [in English],
I hope you are well. Your letter from Shanghai arrived in due course and I have read it. You have sent me another deeply loving and wonderfully philosophical love letter.
I accept and respect your analysis and reasoning. When I commented on the previous period of your letters to me, that is, on your attitude to the love between us, I used the word "appropriate", as heartfelt praise. Actually, after our conversation at dinner in the Hengshan Hotel, I passed beyond disappointment, became more aware and completely accepted your choice. I also broadly settled on the path my own life was to take, even if there was really no other way! Our letters flew back and forth, and elaborated more fervently our feelings, and these rapidly underwent a most gratifying development from their original basis in friendship. Nevertheless, I never forgot, and never tried to defy, your simple injunction, even though there were times when I cast restraint aside and showered you with tender regards. I believe that what exists between us is a real, yet also "diffuse" love, different from but surpassing a husband-and-wife relationship. I have suddenly remembered a line inscribed at the mountain gate of a monastery on top of Jade Emperor Mountain in Hangzhou: "Not in heaven, yet not of this world" – a realm which is not easy, yet not so very hard, to understand! I understand it like this: especially deep love is love which is deeper than normal love and also completely original, and I value and treasure it all the more for that. I feel and understand at the deepest level your very deep love for me, and offer you my deepest gratitude. To obtain one bosom friend in one's life is surely sufficient! To obtain a bosom friend who loves one so deeply is more than sufficient! I hope, I believe and I will strive to ensure that the especially deep love between us will continue to grow and will have the most wonderful outcome. It is also best to keep it a secret between us. Incidentally, the only person I have told of our special love, in sketchy terms, is my younger brother. He was delighted for me, and thinks this is a very good thing. I will obey your wishes and not let anyone else in on the secret – this I swear. Let me adapt, albeit inappropriately, a
line of poetry: In a vow are the words of two hearts, our love will last forever!
About first love [in English]. I have never actually enjoyed real first love. The first time I was in love dates back to the spring of 1947, at St John's. She was a fellow student, her name was Chen, and she was very keen on me, and we spent time together for a while, but it was limited to talking and walking around the campus, and we seemed closer than I was with other students. But soon I was told by another student, an underground Party member, that Chen was "essentially not of a very good person" (I clearly remember that phrase) and it was hinted that I should see less of her. So I didn't take it any further. Then in the autumn of 1951, after I had left the Foreign Languages Training Unit, and was recuperating from a lung infection in a convalescent unit in Pudong, Shanghai, I became the Party Secretary of the unit, and the Deputy Party Secretary was a young woman, also convalescing. She had been an underground Party member in Shanghai's Sanzhong area. We were eating, living and convalescing together, and working together too, and gradually we grew close, although we never got to the stage of being open about it. In early spring the next year, I left the convalescent unit and in the beginning we kept in contact, but we gradually stopped because of a certain amount of "pride and prejudice". To be strictly truthful, these were no "sweet first love" experiences, they were brief and painful. Then in 1954, while I was in the Labour Office, I met Ren Dacheng, my late wife, and love was kindled again. However, our courtship did not go smoothly, mainly because her family and fellow workers were putting a lot of negative pressure on her and she didn't want to risk giving rein to her feelings. We married in June 1958, just as the Leftist movement was in full swing, and we didn't dare have a warm and loving home life in case we got labelled "petty bourgeois lovey-doveys". At the same time, her family was just as short of cash as ever, and she and her older sister were the sole support for her five school-age brothers and the parents, so she had to carry on looking after them. In April 1959, when we hadn't been married a year and my wife was about six months pregnant with our son, I was ordered to go and "toughen up" with a year of labour in the countryside, so when the baby came, I wasn't with her. From 1962, she had to do two stints of farm labour and socialist education, one after the other. That was followed by the Cultural Revolution, and I was imprisoned for a year and then "exiled" to Nanjing for six years, which meant that our family life was even more fragmented. Things got much better after the 3rd Plenary Session of the CCP 11th National Congress, and we could get a bit of time to be a family together at home, but from 1979 onwards, she was suffering from cerebellar ataxia, which got progressively worse, and the whole family went around with long faces. We were powerless to help her and she died prematurely in middle age. All that took up more than half my life, so I never really got to enjoy a happy family time. My memories are mostly of pain in the midst of happiness, and affection which was beyond my reach. Luckily I'm quite a strong character. Although physically puny, I'm strong in spirit! I never let it get me down, or put the blame on anyone else, least of all my sick wife. After all, she suffered more than me, and never had a good life after she married me. Sometimes I found it difficult, especially when she wet and soiled herself, it was really unbearable to deal with, I felt like swearing at her, even hitting her, but I could never bring myself to be that cruel. Sometimes I thought how she could have been a wife to me, and I never got any of that love and affection; but then it wasn't her fault, and besides, I didn't give her anything more or better. So I pulled myself together and faced reality, and didn't let myself get downhearted. Anyway, that's enough of all that . . . you may take it or leave it!