It is five years since we announced the launching of China Heritage at the end of a speech titled Living with Xi Dada’s China — Making Choices and Cutting Deals and published A Monkey King’s Journey to the East, the inaugural article in our online journal. It is also ten years since the irresistible rise of Xi Jinping.
We mark this occasion, and the beginning of the end of Xi Jinping’s first decennary as head of China’s party-state-army, with Xi Jinping’s Empire of Tedium, a series written and published online in the Wairarapa, on the southern tip of Te Ika-a-Māui, the North Island of Aotearoa New Zealand.
Xi Jinping’s Empire of Tedium is the theme of China Heritage Annual 2022.
— Geremie R. Barmé, Editor, China Heritage
Distinguished Fellow, The Asia Society
1 January 2022
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Background Reading
- Prelude to a Restoration: Xi Jinping, Deng Xiaoping, Chen Yun & the Spectre of Mao Zedong, China Heritage, 20 September 2021
- China Story Yearbook 2012: Red Rising, Red Eclipse
- Under One Heaven, introduction to Shared Destiny: China Story Yearbook 2014
- Living with Xi Dada’s China — Making Choices and Cutting Deals, 16 December 2016
- Mendacious, Hyperbolic & Fatuous — an ill wind from People’s Daily, China Heritage, 10 July 2018
- Lee Yee 李怡, et al, Deathwatch for a Chairman, China Heritage, 17 July 2018
- Xu Zhangrun 許章潤, ‘Imminent Fears, Immediate Hopes’ — a Beijing Jeremiad 我們當下的恐懼與期待, China Heritage, 1 August 2018
- Ruling The Rivers & Mountains, China Heritage, 8 August 2018
- The Party Empire, China Heritage, 17 August 2018
- Homo Xinensis, China Heritage, 31 August 2018
- Peak Xi Jinping?, ChinaFile, 4 September 2018
- Homo Xinensis Ascendant, China Heritage, 16 September 2018
- Homo Xinensis Militant, China Heritage, 1 October 2018
Xi Jinping’s Empire of Tedium
Geremie R. Barmé
For Xu Zhangrun 許章潤
Contents
- Prologue 真面目 — The True Face of Mount Lu, 1 January 2022
- An Illustrated Proem 鴟 — A Winking Owl, a Volant Dragon & the Tiger’s Arse, 10 January 2022
- A New Year’s Card — Greeting the Year of the Tiger 壬寅虎年, 31 January 2022
- Introduction 瞽 — You Should Look Back, 1 February 2022
- A Tally 單 — The Threnody of Tedium, 18 February 2022
- Chapter One 比 — We Need to Talk About Totalitarianism, Again, 31 March 2022
- Chapter Two 旋 — The Lugubrious Merry-go-round
- Chapter Three 迴 — Turn, Turn, Turn
- Chapter Four 變 — From Reform to Revival
- Chapter Five 蔭 — Shadows of 1644
- Chapter Six 彪 — The Tyger’s Red Genes
- Chapter Seven 甦 — The Xi Jinping Restoration
- Chapter Eight 曲 — The History Men
- Chapter Nine 讕 — The Factory of Lies
- Chapter Ten 兲 — Horses Don’t Exist
- Chapter Eleven 伎 — The Theatre of Politics
- Chapter Twelve 緘 — A State of Cultural Boredom
- Chapter Thirteen 刁 — Thick Skin, Black Heart
- Chapter Fourteen 喬 — Professional Chinamen
- Chapter Fifteen 丕 — A Century of Cancellation
- Chapter Sixteen 膜 — Taiwan, ROC (The Republic of Comedy)
- Chapter Seventeen 熬 — Enduring
- Chapter Eighteen 祗 — The Miraculous Chairman Xi
- Conclusion 憬 — An Irrealis Mood & China Hopium
Appendices
- Appendix I 捌 — A Beijing Winter after the Summer Olympics, 4 February 2022
- Appendix II 忌 — Beijing’s Coldest Spring — The 2022 Winter Olympics, Li Wenliang & Xu Zhangrun, 4 February 2022
- Appendix III 霸— Requiem for an Autocrat — Fang Zhou on Xi Jinping’s End of Days, 10 February 2022
- Appendix IV 闔 — A Valentine for M on the Bund, 14 February 2022
- Appendix V 朝 — Nixon in China, 21-28 February 2022 (this appendix consists of eight sections: 蒞 — Nixon’s Press Corps; 迓 — ‘Welcome to China, Mr. President!’; 撼 — A Week That Changed The World; 鞭 — The President & The Chairman in Retrospect; 迥 — Dissing Dissent; 見 — A storied Handshake, an excised Interpreter & a muted Anthem; …)
- Appendix VI 直 — Eileen Gu— Hu Xijin on Skis, 25 February 2022
- Appendix VII 懼 — The Pandemic of Fear & the Angel of Dread, 6 March 2022
- Appendix VIII 愬 — Wang Jixian: A Voice from The Other China, but in Odessa, 12 March 2022; I’ve Forgotten How to Kneel in Front of You, 21 March 2022
- Appendix IX 蛻 — Who Goes Nazi Now? Russia, China, America …, 12 April 2022
- Appendix X 敘 — A Decade of Telling Chinese Stories, 1 May 2022
- Appendix XI 屈 — The Double Fifth Festival and the 35th of May 2022, 3 June 2022
- Appendix XII 治 — Hong Kong — twenty-five years after the fall, 1 July 2022
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Previous Issues of China Heritage Annual:
- 2021: Spectres & Souls
- 2020: Viral Alarm
- 2019: Translatio Imperii Sinici
- 2018: Watching China Watching
- 2017: Nanking
Extended Background Reading for China Heritage Annual 2022
- Linda Jaivin, Yawning Heights: Chan Koon-chung’s Harmonious China, China Heritage Quarterly, no.22 (June 2010)
- China’s Prosperous Age (Shengshi 盛世), China Heritage Quarterly, no.26 (June 2011)
- Geremie R. Barmé, The Children of Yan’an: New Words of Warning to a Prosperous Age 盛世新危言, China Heritage Quarterly, June 2011
- Timothy Cheek, Shengshi, Chinese Values and Han Yu 韓愈, China Heritage Quarterly, June 2011
- Geremie R. Barmé, ed., China Story Yearbook 2012: Red Rising, Red Eclipse
- Geremie R. Barmé, Under One Heaven, introduction to China Story Yearbook 2014: Shared Destiny
- Hong Kong Apostasy, China Heritage (1 July 2017-)
- Geremie R. Barmé, Living with Xi Dada’s China — Making Choices and Cutting Deals (16 December 2016), published in China Heritage, 20 July 2017
- Readings in New Sinology, China Heritage (1 January 2017-)
- The Ayes Have It, China Heritage, 18 October 2017
- Lee Yee 李怡, What’s New About Such Thinking?, China Heritage, 5 November 2017
- Lee Yee, Who’s on First — China’s Successive Failures, China Heritage, 20 November 2017
- Lee Yee, China Bound — meeting and eating, China Heritage, 15 December 2017
- Lee Yee, The Real Man of the Year of the Dog, China Heritage, 2 March 2018
- Lee Yee, A Landscape Desolate and Bare, China Heritage, 12 March 2018
- The Editor, Mendacious, Hyperbolic & Fatuous — an ill wind from People’s Daily, China Heritage, 10 July 2018
- The Editor and Lee Yee , Deathwatch for a Chairman, China Heritage, 17 July 2018
- Xu Zhangrun 許章潤, ‘Imminent Fears, Immediate Hopes’ — a Beijing Jeremiad 我們當下的恐懼與期待, China Heritage, 1 August 2018
- Xu Zhangrun Archive (1 August 2018-)
- The Editor and Others, Drop Your Pants! Ruling The Rivers & Mountains, China Heritage, 8 August 2018
- The Editor and Others, The Party Empire, China Heritage, 17 August 2018
- The Editor and Others, Homo Xinensis, China Heritage, 31 August 2018
- Geremie R. Barmé, A People’s Banana Republic, China Heritage, 5 September 2018, also published as Peak Xi Jinping?, ChinaFile, 4 September 2018
- The Editor and Others, Homo Xinensis Ascendant, China Heritage, 16 September 2018
- The Editor and Others, Homo Xinensis Militant, China Heritage, 1 October 2018
- The Editor and Others, Homo Xinensis Militant, China Heritage, 1 October 2018
- Robert Conquest, The Kremlin Then, Zhongnanhai Now — Watching China Watching (XXXV), China Heritage, 18 December 2018
- Translatio imperii sinici — China Heritage Annual 2019
- The Editor, Introducing Translatio Imperii Sinici, China Heritage, 14 January 2019
- Xu Zhangrun 許章潤, ‘China’s Red Empire — To Be or Not To Be?’, China Heritage, 16 January 2019
- Liu Xiaobo 劉曉波, ‘Bellicose and Thuggish — China Yesterday, Today and Tomorrow’, China Heritage, 24 January 2019
- Geremie R. Barmé, The Pirouette of Time — Introduction to ‘After the Future in China’, China Heritage, 28 January 2019
- Chan Koonchung 陳冠中, ‘Sic transit gloria mundi — Ten Years of a Prosperous Age’, trans. Geremie R. Barmé, China Heritage, 14 February 2019
- Du Mu 杜牧, ‘The Great Palace of Ch’in — a Rhapsody’ 阿房宮賦, China Heritage, 25 February 2019
- Leung Ping-kwan 梁秉鈞, ‘Terracotta Warriors on the Rhine’ 萊茵河旁的兵馬俑, China Heritage, 18 April 2019
- Xu Zhangrun 許章潤, ‘Viral Alarm — When Fury Overcomes Fear’, ChinaFile, 10 February 2020
- Xu Zhiyong 許志永, ‘Dear Chairman Xi, It’s Time for You to Go’, ChinaFile, 26 February 2020
- Viral Alarm — China Heritage Annual 2020
- Isaiah Berlin, et al, ‘Xi Jinping’s China & Stalin’s Artificial Dialectic’, China Heritage, 10 June 2021
- Jianying Zha 查建英, ‘China’s Heart of Darkness — Prince Han Fei & Chairman Xi Jinping’, China Heritage, 14-22 July 2022
- Geremie R. Barmé, ‘Red Allure & The Crimson Blindfold’, China Heritage, 13 July 2021
- Geremie R. Barmé, ‘The Fog of Words: Kabul 2021, Beijing 1949’, SupChina, 24 August 2021
- Geremie R. Barmé, ‘Prelude to a Restoration: Xi Jinping, Deng Xiaoping, Chen Yun & the Spectre of Mao Zedong’, China Heritage, 20 September 2021
- Namewee 黃明志 et al, ‘The Right to Know & the Need to Lampoon’, China Heritage, 18 October 2021
- Václav Havel, ‘History as Boredom — Another Plenum, Another Resolution, Beijing, 11 November 2021’, China Heritage, 14 November 2021
- W.H. Auden & Su Shi 蘇軾, ‘Streams Descending Turn to Trees that Climb’ — five years of China Heritage, 16 December 2021