“He was so well-read and witty that all you wanted to do was sit with him all day long and listen,” she said.

Ying was on his deathbed between 2001 and 2003 when Conceison promised to tell his life story to the world. The result is her newest book, Voices Carry:Behind Bars and Backstage during China's Revolution and Reform (Rowmand & Littlefield Publishers, Inc.)

The book is an autobiographical memoir, for which Conceison transcribed and edited more than 100 hours of audio and video tape recorded with the dying actor from his hospital bed.

By then, Ying had long faded from the spotlight after a distinguished career as a stage and movie actor in films such as Little Buddha and The Last Emperor. Today's younger generation only know him as the father of Ying Da, the actor, director and celebrated TV talk show host.

Now that she has kept her promise by publishing the book in English, Conceison worries about the Chinese translation due out in June – particularly because of the emotional repercussions it may have on Ying's prominent family.

Ying confided to Conceison that for many years, he and his wife Wu Shiliang worked for the Chinese Communist Party in collecting information on others.

During their student days at Qinghua University, Ying and Wu were dedicated to the Party. For the rest of their lives they wrote lengthy reports on their foreign acquaintances, working for the same government that imprisoned Ying as a “reactionary” during the Cultural Revolution (1966-1976).


Claire Conceison’s book: Voices Carry.(Global Times Photo)

Conceison says Ying did this because he loved China. Nevertheless, the dying artist was still wrestling with his conscience on his deathbed and did not want to discuss his emotional dilemma, even to the “goddaughter” who adored him.

His autobiography attempts to explain his mentality as a young actor in New China. Ying seems to have had an actor's gift for turning even his bleak imprisonment into a theatrical drama, in which he played the part of a prisoner.

In his memoirs, he mockingly remembers a prisoner driven mad with hallucinations, believing he was a long-lost son of Mao Zedong and who screamed in the night, “Mother Jiang Qing! Come save me! They are torturing me!”

To Ying this was ideal material for a dark comedy skit.

Despite his dark past, Conceison prefers to gloss over the “spy scandal” in deference to her admiration for the cultural ambassador whose groundbreaking achievements included bringing legendary American playwright Arthur Miller to Beijing for a Chinese staging of Death of a Salesman.

Now a professor of theater and East Asian studies at Duke University, North Carolina, Conceison concludes Ying and Miller were kindred spirits in their respect and nostalgia for the common man, despite the former's privileged upbringing. As a child Ying spent much of his boyhood living in Prince Qing's Mansion.

“Someone warned me that you're really not going to mourn him until the book comes out,” she says, nibbling a vegetarian salad in the Bohemian Nanluoguxiang hutong in Beijing.

“At times, I painfully feel his absence. This is one of the hardest times for me,” she admits.

“I've been hearing his voice and sharing his words for seven years. At times, it's as if he's still here. But I can't ask him questions any more.

Source: Global Times

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