Written by Tsering Döndrup, one of modern Tibet’s foremost authors, The Red Wind Howls is a courageous and gripping piece of fiction. A work of incredible audacity and a vital piece of historical testimony, it spans some thirty years and all of Mao Zedong’s rule, covering the early encounters between Tibetans and Communist China, the Great Leap Forward, the Cultural Revolution, and events more taboo than any of these: the Amdo uprising of 1958 and the brutal suppression that followed. In this Q&A, the translator Christopher Peacock discusses the historical significance of this work, how it fits into the bigger picture of modern Tibetan literature, and Tsering Döndrup’s research methodology.

Q: Modern Tibetan authors are not widely known in the West. Can you contextualize what’s happening in Tibetan literature and where the author fits in?

Christopher Peacock: What we think of as “modern” literature in Tibet began in the 1980s in the post-Mao, post–Cultural Revolution era. This period saw the introduction of entirely new literary and intellectual topics and entirely new forms, including short- and long-form fiction. Tsering Döndrup began writing around this time, and he is something of a rarity in that he has been consistently active since. Today, he is one of Tibet’s most well-established authors. He is most interested in the changes that Chinese-driven modernity have brought to Tibetan nomadic life. His work is known for its irreverence and black humor, and for tackling serious social issues like religious corruption, addiction, language loss, and here—the brutal treatment that Tibetans have received at the hands of the Chinese state.

Q: What is the history that the novel relates, and why does it matter?

Peacock: In the West, people might be familiar with the events of 1959, when the Tibetan uprisings in Lhasa led to the Dalai Lama fleeing into exile in India. People will likely be less familiar with what happened in Tsering Döndrup’s home region of Amdo in 1958—in part because the Chinese state has so effectively repressed this history. In that year, Amdo Tibetans rose in armed revolt, fearing the imminent destruction of their traditional ways of life under Mao’s radical policies. The rebellion was brutally crushed by the People’s Liberation Army, and survivors were quickly rounded up and sent to labor camps, where many more met their end.

Q: Why did the author decide to tackle this subject, and how did he go about it?

Peacock: He took on this subject in part because this history has been so suppressed, and he feared it being completely lost. Discussion of these events is completely taboo inside China, where few have dared broach the subject, including in fiction, where it has only ever been referenced fleetingly. Even in the West, thorough academic studies of this period have only emerged recently (notably Benno Weiner’s The Chinese Revolution on the Tibetan Frontier). Tsering Döndrup’s approach was that of a researcher: he conducted oral histories with elders of his community and based the details of the novel on their accounts. This is what makes the book a valuable work of testimony beyond its technical label of fiction. As he told the literary scholar Lama Jabb, “there are no lies in it, and I was prepared to tell them [the Chinese authorities] that if they questioned the historical veracity of my novel.” 

Q: What other books would you compare The Red Wind Howls to?

Peacock: In the Chinese context, we might think of novels like Yu Hua’s To Live (about PRC history as a whole), Yan Lianke’s The Four Books (about the Great Leap Forward), or perhaps even histories like Yang Jisheng’s Tombstone (also about the Great Leap). In the Tibetan context, the closest text is Naktsang Nulo’s My Tibetan Childhood, a memoir that deals with the same period of history and is also available in English translation. Beyond China/Tibet, I would compare it to other memoirs and works of fiction that deal with great traumas of the twentieth century, particularly in places like Soviet Russia (the author is an admirer of Solzhenitsyn, for instance).

Q: There have been numerous memoirs and novels about China under Mao. What makes this one different?

Peacock: Readers well versed in Chinese history or literature will find some familiar ground here. But fundamentally, Tibetans experienced this history in a completely different way from their Han Chinese counterparts. For Tibetans, these catastrophes were imposed upon them by an alien regime that was indifferent to, and largely ignorant of, their culture, religion, history, and language. The novel constantly emphasizes the strangeness and the imposed nature of Maoist language and ideology, and its concern with the fate of a minoritized people—and their religion, language, and culture—sets this apart from many accounts of the Mao period that readers might have come across.

Q: How was the author able to publish a novel like this in China?

Peacock: In short—he wasn’t. In the more liberal atmosphere of the early 2000s, the author did initially have some hope that it could be published. He even toned down many of the novel’s violent extremities in the hope that it could be released, but its contents were simply too controversial. No publisher would risk taking it, leaving Tsering Döndrup with little choice but to print and distribute the novel by himself in 2006. It circulated widely and caused waves in Tibet, which quickly drew the authorities’ attention. On the pretext that the book did not have an International Standard Book Number (ISBN), the remaining copies in the author’s possession were confiscated and he was warned not to try to publish it again. Tsering Döndrup then was forced into early retirement, was no longer permitted to receive literary prizes, and had his passport revoked (he hasn’t been allowed to leave the country since). Given the unimaginably strict scrutiny and censorship that Tibetans face in contemporary China (far stricter than what is imposed on the Han majority), it is a miracle that this book exists at all.