Aung San Suu Kyi :The Lady and the Peacock

How did a North Oxford housewife, cycling in a longyi to Park Town, win a Nobel Prize and this week be feted by Hillary Clinton?  Do good this Xmas season and read the new book Aung San Suu Kyi : The Lady and the Peacock ( 2011 398pp).

Peter Popham has interviewed Aung San Suu Ki, been to Burma, and has met many people who knew her when she was young. The nbookim includes first-person accounts not available before,  and a good description of events after Suu Kyi returned to Burma. The stand-off at Danubyu in 1989 is vividly described, Suu Kyi was on a progress through rural Burma and forbidden to enter a town under martial law. So she calmly walked down the middle of the road. The military drew their guns but didn't shoot.  That tells us a lot about Suu Kyi but also about Burma. In many countries she'd have been disappeared, not held in long-term detention.


Suu Kuyi's father was Aung San, the father of Burmese Independence, who was assassinated with his cabinet in 1947. Because he was such a figurehead, Suu Kyi had moral force, even after the military downplayed the personality cult.  But Suu Kyi's achievements are her own, and those of the National League for Democracy, and the thousands of unknown, ordinary Burmese who stood up to the regime. Many died, or still languish in prison. It's still not certain what might happen if Suu Kyi wins the next election. The regime nullified the 1990 election win, and used the ludicrous troll trespass incident of 2009 to extend the term of her house arrest.  And government is different to dissent. So no complacency. You need to read this book for background.

Suu Kyi was typical of the educated, idealistic Asian and African elite who studied abroad  and went on to challenge traditional parameters. Think Sun Yat Sen, the Nehrus, even Barack Obama's father. Suu Kyi was international, living from the age of 15 for long periods in India, England, Japan, Bhutan and in New York during the Warhol years. Many of her friends, even her brother, did well at university and had glittering careers but Suu Kyi found her niche only in her 40's.  Yet the fact that she spent her youth raising a family makes her dedication even more admirable. Mandela and Solzhenitsyn didn't sacrifice in the same way. One of the principles of non-violence is that even the humblest individual can change things.

This book is best where the author has access to good sources, like Bertil Lintner's  account of the 1988 revolt and the diary Ma Thanegi kept for Michael Aris. Eventually perhaps, there'll be a more analytical study with more detail on underlying issues. The Burmese regime became "The Albania of South East Asia" for reasons that need to be understood.  Suu Kyi's maternal uncle was a leader of the Burmese Communist Party.  Similarly, more assessment of relations with Thailand and Japan, the only rwo nations in Asia that escaped colonialism.  Suu Kyi's mother's dismay at her marriage reflects fears of cultural dilution in a post-colonial situation. Indeed, the whole idea of colonialism needs to be confronted.  It's by no means an issue of the past. It lives on unconsciously in any west-centric account of non-western subjects.  The many different varieties of Buddhism, for example, don't need unification any more than the many forms of Judeo-Christian belief.

This is primarliy a book by a journalist, well written in an accessible, direct way. That's important because this book needs to reach general readers everywhere. Later, a more scholarly analysis will be possible, but not yet as the drama still unfolds. Yet Suu Kyi's story resonates with most of us. Inspirational reading for Xmas! Gift this book and make a difference yourself in a small way.  Buy it direct from the Burma Campaign UK so profits go towards the cause.  As Lord David Steel says it's "a reminder that we, in the comfortable outside, must not let her down.”

Lots more on Aung San Suu Kyi, Asia and non-violence on this site. Please explore. 

First and greatest Traviata of all - 蘇小小

Another heroic consumptive courtesan? Su Xiao Xiao (So Siu Siu, 蘇小小) was a real person though relatively little is known about her since she died aged only 19 around 501 AD.  But she inspired some of the greatest poets and artists in China, and helped shape fundamental Chinese values. She's a cultural icon, even after 1500 years. Yet she was born in poverty and sold to a brothel as a child.

Su lived on the banks of West Lake, near Hangzhou, an area celebrated for its beauty. Su became famous as a poet and musician: much more valuable than sex. Her legend, however, revolves on her moral integrity. After enjoying this week's La Traviata at the Royal Opera House, (read more here), I decided to watch the 1962 film 蘇小小 which ar the time was one of the most extravagant Cantonese movies made. Part of it was filmed on location on West Lake, showing  its temples, bridges and pavilions and Su's grave, a highly symbolic monument which was destroyed in the Cultural Revolution. The Red Guards thought she was bad because she represented Chinese tradition. In fact, her values would easily have fitted socialist ideals. 

Su overcame her circumstances by merit, not wealth or connections. The film develops her poem in which two people encounter each other under trees by Xilin bridge. One is in a carriage, the other on a horse. Xiao Xiao (actress 白茵, Pak Yan, not the same as Pak Yin!) is on her way to the temple in her carriage and she meets Yuen Yu (周驄 Chow Hung) who is on a mission for his father, The Prime Minister. They fall in love and marry. Yuen's kept his identity secret becauase he knows Xiao Xiao doesn't trust wealth and power. But when he tells her who he really is, she says "I love you for you, not your Dad". Eventually the Prime Minister arrives and drags the son away fromk the unsuitable match. When the son is married off to a General's daughter, he tries to escape but falls to his death. Xiao Xiao doesn't know but pines for him.

The wicked local governor wants to sleep with Xiao Xiao but she stands up to him. If she writes a good poem, he has to leave her alone. It's so good that he's stunned into submission for a while. Morality and art as weapons.

Xiao Xiao also meets a scholar called Pao Yen (wonderful performance by Cheung Wood-yau 張活游)who's a master at singing and playing the  guzheng (table lute). More importantly, he's upright and opposes tyranny and poverty. "Why don't you become an official so you can do something about it", asks Xiao Xiao, ever down to earth. He's too poor to travel to the imperial examinations which qualify men for officaldom, so she gives him the money. No strings attached. Later Xiao Xiao is forced to sing for the wicked governor to raise money to bail out a young prostitute who's in love with a nice young man. By now, she's dying of what seems to be TB, so her song is so sad, the governor can't rape her.

The scholar passes his exams and gets a good job at court. So he returns to thank Ziao Xiao, but confirms that her lover is dead. It's too much and she collapses. Her last wish is that Pao Yuen plays the guzheng once more and sings of the West Lake and Zilin Bridge.

Shaw Brothers Studios used to make historical extravaganzas like this, but 蘇小小 was made by a tiny Cantonese independent called Peacock Productions which soon folded. Yet it's ambitious, shot in colour and has Chinese and English subtitles. If you want to watch it, email me for a link.

You might also like reading about another heroic Chinese Traviata, Lin Dai, in Love Without End.
Tomorrow I will review The Lady and the Peacock : the Life of Aung San Suu Kyi (2011) Please come back.  You can see why anyone well versed in Chinese/Buddhist values can relate to Aung San Suu Kyi and the ideas she holds. It's part of a culture that goes back moe than a thousand years. 

Making a difference - Aids and other causes

I can remember AIDS even before it had a name. At first it was just rumours and then everyone started to die, even "respectable" homophobes. My Dad had an illness that looked like Karposi's syndrome (it wasn't) and people would run away in the library and in the supermarket. The hysteria! I'd forgotten it was World's Aids Day but never forgotten the people who suffered, those who cared for them and those they left behind. Perhaps Aids is contained in the west because it's high profile and Big Pharma saw money in it. But at least the world was galvanized into taking action, and it's made a difference. One thing Thatcher's government did right was the NHS Aids awareness campaign, so brutal that many objected. Part of the hate directed at Princess Diana was because she had compassion and cared about people whatever their status. But it worked. Sometimes it feels like activism gets  nowhere but Aids campaigns show that people can make a change. So many causes still to struggle for, poverty, war, social injustice as well as disease.

I've started to read Peter Popham's Aung San Suu Kyi : The Lady and the Peacock (2011). Very well written and focused.  At Christmas, people splash money around. Give this book instead and make a difference. Buy it direct from the Burma Campaign UK so profits get ploughed back to a good cause. (multiple copies to multiple friends, less hassle)

People have asked me what the photo on my logo is. It's a statue that used to stand in Haw Par Yuen, (Tiger Balm Gardens) the home of Au Boon Haw (胡文虎) whose father founded Tiger Balm, still one of the best panaceas for muscle aches, headaches etc  The photo above is one of their cars, preserved in Singapore. (photo : Dionisius Purba) The family were Hakka from Fujian, but settled in Burma in the 1860's. Au Boon Haw and his brother were devout Buddhists who used their wealth for philanthropy, in China, Hong Kong, Malaya, Singapore and Burma. But because they refused to support the British during the Second World War they were maligned. But why should they have supported a foreign colonial power? Their primary loyalty was to China. The British were mainly interested in white British POWs not the millions of displaced, destitute locals

Aw Boon Haw supported numerous different charities and funded schools, hospitals and orphanages. During the Japanese occupation of Hong Kong, Aw used his clout with the Burmese Chinese rice monopoly to make sure supplies were not completely cut off.  He also founded a newspaper empire, aimed at South East Asian Chinese. His flagship title was the Sing Tao Yat Po. After 1945, Aw founded "The Standard" an English language newspaper that wasn't a mouthpiece of the establishment. Someone should use the archives of Chinese charities and study the Aw brothers as Chinese patriots. Indeed, the history of the period would be rewritten if Chinese sources were used.

Radical déjeuner

Dissident Ai wei wei poses naked with women? Far more radical was this event in the late 1920's in Shanghai where a group of artists posed for (I think) a formal graduation photo and included their life class model. It's a reference to Manet's Le déjeuner sur l'herbe but in China, unlike the west, there's no tradition of classical nudity. These artists were changing values within the society they lived in.

This week, Aung San Suu Kyi  announced that she would run for parliament in Burma.  This is courageous  because she's reaffirming the idea of democracy as "the will of the people". Although the generals mistreated her and other Burmese, she doesn't choose violent overthrow but works to heal from within. How can bad systems really change? Again and again, violence perpetuates regression. Cheer the fall of Gaddafi,  but remember what happened after the fall of the Shah. On the other hand, the non-violent collapse of Communism in Europe which really seems to have brought a new, if less secure, era. What brings about fundamental, positive change? I'm wary of rent-a-mob protesters who think protest is cute stunts and don't analyse issue by issue. That's no different from following party lines or demagogue politics. No one country can solve this Economic Collapse, certainly no one person. Real change, I think, will only come through a mature rethink of the fundamentals of the system, not stunts, not violence.  

Dichterliebe - Aung San Suu Kyi

In March, 1999, Michael Aris passed away. He was the husband of Aung San Suu Kyi, the Burmese dissident, who is still under arrest in Myanmar on trumped-up charges.  Here they are in happier times, in Burma, in 1973.

Aris was an authority on Himalayan Buddhism at Oxford, so a memorial was held for him in the theatre at Wolfson College. His identical twin Anthony is also a Buddhist scholar, so it was uncanny to see him at the memorial, But in many ways, that's karma.

Karma too, in the form of the memorial, a performance of Dichterliebe, for it was Michael and Suu Kyi's favourite song cycle, and meant a great deal to them.  Schumann won Clara only after years of separation and struggle. Although Dichterliebe was written to celebrate their wedding, the cycle is infused with a sense of uncertainty, as if happiness might not last. Only a few years into their marriage, Schumann became ill and died. Michael and Suu Kyi at least enjoyed some years of happiness before destiny called..

So this Dichterliebe was very  special indeed, emotionally very powerful. Let no one say that extra-musical impressions don't count. They do. We would not be human if we responded to music without emotion. Even the most abstract sounds are processed by who we are. Not all emotion needs to be effusive, heart-on-sleeve, but it's there, because people are not machines.  Sometimes simplicity is all the more sincere.

Mark Padmore sang this Dichterliebe with Julius Drake at the piano. It was a wonderful performance. Previously I'd only heard him sing baroque, lute songs and  Henze's Six Songs From the Arabian (sorry, but it wasn't good) but this Dichterliebe had me almost in tears. It was an experience I'll never forget.

Oddly enough what sticks in my memory too is the strawberries we were served at the end of the meal. Incredibly ripe and fresh.  We ate that crop, but offshoots of the plants have been growing again, year after year. Suu Kyi won't taste strawberries again, in prison, far away in tropical Burma, and Michael is dead. But they must have enjoyed the first strawberries of summer in the past, just as they once enjoyed Dichterliebe. She has grown old, suffering for her people and her ideals. I don't know if she'll be vindicated in her lifetime, but her courage is a symbol, for Burma, and for people everywhere who stand up for what is good, against all odds. Please seemy other posts on Aung San Suu Kyi by following the labels below and support the Burma Campaign and spreade the word by giving the new boiography to your friends.    The book is REVIEWED HERE.