Professor Li Yining Discusses River Elegy

The famous columnist Liang Houfu once expressed the opinion that the primary reason for China's inability to bring itself out of a state of chronic disorder lies in its traditional passive and negative culture. His opinion is that it would be useless and meaningless to speak of politics before the problem of the cross of traditional culture is resolved. In his view, culture is the water, and politics is merely something that floats on top of the water. If the water's buoyancy is insufficient, then politics will simply sink in it. Many of China's problems originate from its culture. Since the broadcasting of the television program River Elegy, the purpose of which was to carry out a comprehensive rethinking of China's historical civilization, there has been very intense reverberation both at home and overseas. At the end of last year, when Professor Li Yining, one of the consultants for River Elegy, was lecturing in Guangzhou, he made the following response to the question of River Elegy's "tremendous impact" on its audience: Li Yining believed that "the theme of River EZegy is to explore why it is that this great nation of ours, which has created such a splendid and glorious culture in history, has been trapped in a chronic quandary in the last hundred years or so. Why is there such a stupendous gap in terms of economics and technology between our country and the most developed countries in the world? What is the force that stands in the way of our progress?" As for the intense debate that has emerged since the broadcasting of River Elegy, Li Yining felt that this is precisely a goal that the production intended to attain. He said: "If things were to remain calm and insipid after the broadcasting of River Elegy, it would mean that the production had not left much of an impression with its audience; then we would have to say that River Elegy was a failure. If there were nothing but acclamation and applause, we would still not be able to say that River Elegy had made a positive impact. It is not only a normal phenomenon for there to be debate; moreover, it helps to stimulate people's thinking and stir up their sense of trouble and suffering." Some people have been very angry and dis-satisfied with River Elegy and have announced that they would organize people to write critical essays about it. In response to that, Li Yining calmly said: "If such a situation should emerge, then we are bound to see River Elegy have an even greater impact on people. Even more people will begin to take down and publicize the adages and words of warning in River Elegy. If there were an unjust criticism of River Elegy, its stunning and eye-opening effect may well become a thousand times greater than that of River Elegy itself!"

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