Young Xi Jinping

choi

Chinese politics | The Father and the Son; If you want to understand Xi Jinping, read a biography of his father. The Economist, May 31, 2025, at page 68
(book review on Joseph Torigian, The Party's Interests Come First; The life of Xi Zhongxun, father of Xi Jinping. Stanford University Press, 2025)

Note:
(a)
(i) 习近平 (1953- ; 父 习仲勋, 母 齐心 )
(ii) 习仲勋
https://zh.wikipedia.org/习仲勋
(1913-2002; section 3 家族: 第一任妻子 郝明珠 (marriage 1935-1944: 长女 习和平（文革中自杀); 第二任妻子 齐心 (marriage 1944-2002)
(iii) My post title was inspired by Young Frankenstein
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Young_Frankenstein
(a 1974 American comedy film)

(b) "garlic ribs [蒜香排骨 (pork rib cooked with garlic sauce)] * * * Every lunar new year, Mr Xi would perform the traditional kowtow ritual, prostrating himself before his parent [note the singular form: what about jinping's mother?  Is it an oversight by book author or reviewer, or Jinping was exempted from kowtowing to the mother?] in a display of reverence. * * * Then, in 1962, he [Zhongxun] was purged by Mao Zedong for supporting the publication of a novel Mao considered subversive. * * * One time, Mr Xi managed to escape and make his way home. He begged his mother for some food. Not only did she refuse, she also reported him to the authorities, fearful that she would be arrested otherwise. Crying, Mr Xi ran out into the rain."
(i) About the 1962 purge, see 反党小说《刘志丹》案
https://zh.wikipedia.org/zh-cn/反黨小說《劉志丹》案
(ii) 齐心
https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/齐心
(举报亲儿习近平: quoting 杨屏, 习近平13岁被打成反革命进少管所 习仲勋哭不止. Hong Kong: 成报, Aug 28, 2012)

(c) "What doesn't kill you * * * 'Even if you do not understand, you are forced to understand,' he later recalled of that time. 'It forces you to mature earlier.' * * * After Xi Zhongxun was rehabilitated under Deng Xiaoping in the late 1970s, he was put in charge of Guangdong province and began to liberalise the local economy.  [广东省委员会第一书记 (Dec 11, 1978 - Nov 9, 1980)] * * * 'Whoever throws away those things left behind by our ancestors is a traitor,' he told Ma Ying-jeou, a former president of Taiwan. [Try as I may, I simply can not find the Chinese original. Take notice that these two men only met twice.] * * * Mr Torigian suggests the answer may lie in 'What Is to Be Done?,' a novel of 1863 by Nikolai Chernyshevsky, a Russian journalist. In the story a young man named Rakhme sleeps on a bed of nails to strengthen his will. Mr Xi imagined that he was Rakhme as he endured those cold floors, lice, rainstorms and blizzards."
(i) The only sectional heading ("What doesn't kill you") is part of the English saying "what doesn't kill you makes you stronger," which came directly from German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche's 1888 writing "Aus der Kriegsschule des Lebens.—Was mich nicht umbringt, macht mich stärker."Aus der Kriegsschule des Lebens.—Was mich nicht umbringt, macht mich stärker."
https://www.dictionary.com/e/sla ... makes-you-stronger/
(ii) "Even if you do not understand, you are forced to understand. It makes you mature earlier."
(A) from the Web: "He [Jinping] also had to take part in 'struggle sessions' in which he had to denounce his father." Later in those words, he described the sessions to a Washington Post reporter "with a trace of bitterness" in a 1992 interview.
(B) The Washington Post report, not even a title, is too old to be found in the newspaper's website. And for the same reason, the quotation does not have Chinese original, nor is the quotation translated.
(iii) "Rakhme sleeps on a bed of nails * * * Mr Xi imagined that he was Rakhme"
(A) What Is to Be Done? (novel)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/What_Is_to_Be_Done%3F_(novel)
("The chief character is Viéra Pavlovna, a woman who escapes the control of her family and an arranged marriage to seek economic independence"/ section 4 Influence)
Surprisingly, section 2 Plot mentioned little about a man.
(B) Rakhmetov
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rakhmetov
("His only action in the story is to give the heroine, Vera Pavlovna, a note from her husband explaining that he [husband, not Rajhmetov] has faked his suicide. * * * Rakhmetov is descended from Rakhmet, a thirteenth-century Tatar chief. * * * His ultimate act of self punishment is sleeping on a bed of nails, which may have been based on certain Orthodox Saints. He explains this as a 'A trial. It was necessary to make it. Improbable, certainly, but at all events it was necessary to make it. I know now what I can do' ")  

East Slavic name
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/East_Slavic_name
(section 3 Family names: (romanization: -ov, -sky + "In the 19th and early 20th centuries, -off was a common transliteration of -ov for Russian family names in foreign languages such as French and German (like for the Smirnoff and the Davidoff brands)" )
(C) 高安西 and Sam Chetwin George, 一本成為習近平精神指南的俄羅斯小說  This Unreadable Russian Novel Is Xi Jinping's Spiritual Guide. Dec 16, 2024 (under the heading 觀點).
https://cn.nytimes.com/opinion/2 ... trump/zh-hant/dual/

The English version appeared in print edition with that title on Dec 20, 2024, at page A22.

(d) "Towards the end of his career, Xi Zhongxun was put in charge of unification with Taiwan. * * * 'The territory left by the ancestors must not shrink,' he [Jinping] said in 2012."
(i) As far as I can tell, Zhongxun  was not in charge of Taiwan unification. Never was.
(ii)
(A) 遥远 (a pen name, NOT owned by Xi Jinping), 老祖宗留下来的国土，寸土不能丢; 在 '坚决维护中国钓鱼诸岛主权' 研讨会上的发言之二. 新华网, July 18, 2012.
https://news.sohu.com/20120718/n348428222.shtml
(B) Xi Jinping regurgitated the above title. See
• My research shows that Jinping first said this in 2017: "在国家主权和领土完整遇到重大挑战时，我们必须针锋相对、寸土必争；在涉及国家核心利益的原则问题上，我们必须坚守底线、坚决斗争。老祖宗留下的国土，我们一寸也不能丢！"
, which appeared in news report 老祖宗留下的国土，一寸也不能丢. 解放军报, Aug 7, 2017
www.xinhuanet.com/politics/2017-08/07/c_1121441190.htm
("8月1日，在庆祝中国人民解放军建军90周年大会上，习主席" delivered a speech)
• 斯洋, 祖宗土地不能丢，习近平划红线，美中冲突风险增加？ VOA Chinese, 2018年6月29日
https://www.voachinese.com/a/mat ... 180628/4459089.html
("中国想把南中国海变成 '内湖' [whch was sectional heading]: 习近平6月27日会晤 [美国国防部长Jim Mattis] 马蒂斯时说：'在涉及中国主权和领土完整问题上，我们的态度是坚定明确的， 老祖宗留下的领土一寸也不能丢，别人的东西我们一分一毫也不要' ")


(e) "What is clear, though, is that his family's suffering has shaped Mr Xi's dark view of politics. 'For people who rarely encounter power and who are distant from it, they always see these things as very mysterious and fresh,' Mr Xi once said. 'But what I saw was more than the surface of things. I didn't just see the power, flowers, glory and applause. I also saw the cowsheds [where people were confined during the Cultural Revolution] and the fickleness of the world.' " )brackets and insertion original -- NOT by me)

"[说到我从政，很多人联系到我的家庭。坦白地说不能说没有关系，但是这种有关系决非像别人想象的那样。] 对权力接触少的、距离远的人，老把这些东西看得很神秘、很新鲜，而我看到的更多不只是面上的东西，不仅仅是权力、鲜花、荣耀和掌声，也看到了牛棚，看到了世态炎凉[，对政治的认识也有一层更深刻的东西。]"
《勤奋 真诚 坦然 尽责——与习近平聊做官与做人》. 《人民日报》主办的《时代潮》杂志2000年 文章.