Title: The Sinicization and Globalization of Marxist Literary and Art Thought: Re-reading Mao Zedong’s “Yan’an Talks”

Abstract: Mao Zedong Thought is a “glocalized” or “Sinicized” Marxist theory initiated and developed by Mao and his comrades in arms and successors in China. The present essay attaches great importance to literature and art with Mao’s famous “Yan’an Talks” as one of his most representative works. The author argues that although Mao Zedong Thought is not a dogmatically “imported” Marxism from the West, it has indeed grasped some fundamental Marxist principles in combination with the concrete Chinese literary and critical practice. Thus a “glocalized” or “Sinicized” Marxist literary theory has contributed and will continue to contribute a great deal to the global Marxist literary and art theory, especially in the contemporary era. Even in today’s China, his “Yan’an Talks” and the essence of his literary and art theory is still influential functioning as the guiding principle in current China’s literary and art criticism and studies. The Beijing talk given by the current Chinese leader Xi Jinping has inherited Mao’s legacy in literature and art and pushed it forward to a new stage.

Keywords: Marism, sinicization, Mao Zedong Thought, “Yan’an Talks”, Mao’s legacy

Author: Ning Wang, Professor, University of Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, Beijing, China; Humanities and Social Sciences at Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai, China.