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Tag: Agnes Smedley

To Be A Radical

Does our heart speak a different language that we don’t understand?  What does it mean by “listen to your heart?”  The only time I really hear my heart is when in a crisis, it thumps in my ears.  Maybe we’re talking about a gut reaction—to act with our instincts instead of assessing the situation with what we know.  But I also think it is much more than that.  I think it is asking us to find the essence of our being and let its wisdom to be our guide.

A pure being is often compared to a fool because his/her actions are outrageous and inconsistent.  But the heart, when examined at a distance, is steadfast as a rock.  Such is the feeling I have after reading the book, Agnes Smedley, the Life and Times of an American Radical by Janice and Stephen R. MacKinnon.  Smedley’s passionate involvements in the Indian Independent movement and the Chinese civil war between the Communist and the Guomindang (1927-1950), her triumphs and defeats showed a heart that could neither be borrowed or bought.  Such was a human life in all its harshness.  Such was a heart that was true to its end.

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Bound Feet and Western Dress

Xu Zhimo and Indian poet Rabindranath Tagore

After reading about the Chinese poet Xu Zhimo on my blog, my friend Diana offered me two books:  Bound Feet and Western Dress by Pang-Mei Natasha Chang, and Agnes Smedley, The Life and Times of an American Radical by Janice and Stephen MacKinnon.  Bound Feet was the story of the poet’s first wife and Agnes Smedley was at one time the poet’s lover.  Apparently Pearl Buck also had an affair with him.  Xu Zhimo died in a plane crash in 1931.  He was 34 years old.

Xu Zhimo was the Chinese Shelley.  A proponent of  free love, a worshiper of beauty, he was way ahead of his times.  Bound Feet retold the struggles between ideology and tradition.  But it was also about love and how it triumphed above all the conflicts.  His family and friends, including his first wife, though hurt by his infidelity and irresponsibility, loved and respected him for who he was.

How modern are we, living in the 21st Century?  What progress in freedom and tolerance for the arts has China made since the times of Xu Zhimo?  In the news, a photo shows a parade of Chinese couples in tuxes and snow white bridal gowns.  But to me the bandages of bound feet are still visible and the dress remains an illusion.

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