Xiaobin Xu - Crystal Wedding

30,000 yuan was a huge sum for a media work in mainland China in the mid-nineties. When Tianyi actually had the money in her hands, and counted, she was half-aware of a smile on Tong’s face. She suddenly felt that it was an immensely sunny smile. It warmed her to think of it for many years afterwards. It had emerged like the sun from behind clouds, and brightened the gloomy innermost recesses of her heart.

The year that followed was full of sunlight. In 1995, the Fourth World Conference on Women chose Beijing for its venue and instantly China’s women, especially the intellectuals, came to life. A leading scholar brought out a collection of women’s writing, and a piece by Tianyi was included. The concept of ‘Women’s writing’ made its debut in the literary world and, more interesting still for Tianyi, she gained critical recognition as a representative of the genre. This was partly due to her old publication, The Tree of Knowledge, and even more because of Drowning.

Drowning caused an unimaginable commotion. It was as if this was the first time since the founding of New China, indeed since ancient times, that women’s sexual needs, their deep inner suffering, and their ways of dealing with it, had been laid before the reader so clearly, so determinedly, so boldly, so painfully. Up until then, women’s eternal diffidence (‘Hiding half her face behind the pipa ’ in the words of the Bai Juyi poem) had caused people to misunderstand their sexual desires. It was as if Chinese women did not need sex, and were only passive partners, coerced into it by men. Chinese women’s sexuality had always been an absolutely taboo topic. Only a fool would have tried to rip away the veil that covered it. And that fool was Yang Tianyi, and she was a fool through and through.

Not unexpectedly, retribution was swift. Although Drowning was chosen unanimously for a literary prize soon afterwards, it was subsequently dropped. The reason was an anonymous letter whose author did a thorough job of demolishing Drowning, and in the voice of sweet reason and moderation, too. The writer had even saved the authorities the trouble of reading the book, by meticulously going to the trouble of cutting and pasting sections of it into the letter, like a good, considerate Party comrade. The letter made its way right up to the Literary Censorship Bureau, where the cut and pasted excerpts stirred up a hornet’s nest amongst its top brass.

Many years later, Tianyi found out to her amazement that the culprit had been Xi, Tong’s second wife. She was divorced now, and a writer, having started first with flattering articles about her rock star boyfriend, Meng. With her passable English, she had then worked her way into the Foreign Languages Research Institute. Most recently, she had started writing novels.

Xi was generally a very mixed-up young woman, in and out of relationships like a yoyo. However, her relationship with Meng helped boost her career because he was convinced she had talent and encouraged her to write fiction. He was a bit of a connoisseur of good literature and well-connected too, being on back-slapping terms with all the most important people in the literary world. Meng’s efforts were not wasted: Xi’s success was a credit to him But as soon as he read Tianyi’s Drowning , Meng began to have sleepless nights.

Meng had always felt that Xi was extremely talented, surely able to beat any of the newly fashionable women writers hands down. That is, until he gave Drowning a careful read and realized with alarm that this Yang Tianyi, whom he’d never heard of, posed a real threat to his lover. Of course, he could tell from her photograph that she was not a patch on Xi to look at, but in her style and depth of knowledge, she was far superior. There was scarcely anything in her writing that you could find fault with.

Over breakfast one day, Meng warned Xi: ‘You better watch out for that Tianyi!’ Xi was sceptical at first. After all, that silly woman hadn’t written a word for years, why would she be a threat? But age and experience count for a lot and before long, Meng had convinced Xi that Tianyi was having a very bad effect on Meng’s entire strategy for Xi. So Xi sat down in their bedroom and wrote that anonymous letter on Meng’s instructions. Meng photocopied Drowning for her himself, tracked down all the bits that referred to the body, cut them out and pasted them into the letter.

Tianyi never in her wildest dreams suspected Xi. After all, the girl had always been so smilingly unstinting in her admiration. Around then, Tianyi was delighted to receive an invitation, together with another woman writer, to a literary get-together on ‘Writing in the new age’, to be held in a well-known hotel on the outskirts of Beijing. It was Xi who sent the invitation letter and called her to reassure her cheerfully that she did not need to prepare anything. They would just enjoy themselves.

Xi had appeared on the literary scene at a quiet time. Not to put too fine a point on it, she was not a very good writer yet; her writing was limited mainly to impassioned outbursts which expressed ‘her reality’. Her language was full of the sort of malice endemic in an age of intellectual sterility. It just so happened that the Foreign Languages Institute was holding a get-together, and she took the opportunity to invite Tianyi and her fellow writer to go and ‘enjoy themselves’.

And when evening came, Tianyi did enjoy herself. She may have been a good bit older than the others, but she was young at heart. She seized the mike and sang karaoke with gusto. In fact, she would have gone on all night if the karaoke hall had not shut its doors. But the instant she got home, the phone rang. It was the other woman writer, sounding gloomy: ‘Tianyi, you’re such a fool. Why are you letting yourself be Xi’s doormat?’ Tianyi was taken aback. Then the woman went on: ‘Can’t you see she’s just using us as a prop for her literary career? She just wants someone to hold up her smelly feet for her! Didn’t you see how she told us not to prepare anything, but she prepared very well and that certainly made her look good!’ Tianyi could not believe her ears. This woman was just being bitchy, surely! She fobbed her off with a few words, then hung up. A few days later, Xi called: a well-reputed magazine from somewhere in China had asked for an article about her, and Xi would like Tianyi to write it. Tianyi did not raise any objections.

It was only when she came to write it that she began to worry: this was a really difficult article to write. They had just had a good time together. Good feelings could not be put into words. She was in a quandary.

As she racked her brains, she took a look at what one critic had written about Xi’s writing. Normally, he did not pull his punches, but for some reason, he had treated Xi with kid gloves, in fact had heaped praise on her. As the months went by, she realized that all the critics, even the ones who savaged writers’ work, behaved like pussycats where Xi was concerned. She certainly was a superb manipulator — she did not use money or sex, it was just that every time she opened her mouth, out came a barbed comment. And just one comment would do it, no matter how astute and savvy the intended victim was. Not a few seasoned authors, no matter how much of life they had seen and lived, fell right into the palm of Xi’s little hand in this way. It all goes to show that sometimes it is someone quite mediocre who most easily makes people drop their guard.

Tianyi was a conscientious woman. In those days, there was no internet so she went to the library to look things up. She spent a whole three or four days there, even skipping meals, and finally found something to write for Xi’s article. She mailed it to her. Xi was delighted with the article, and called simply to say: ‘Tianyi, you’re a darling!’ To herself, she thought, but did not say: ‘Tianyi, you’re a fool!’