 Background Information  About “The Little Red Book”  Famous Quotations  “The Little Red Book” and Li Cunxin  Bibliography

 Mao Zedong launched the Cultural Revolution in the 1960’s  The stated purpose was to revitalize the values of Communism  It was meant to eliminate remnants of past culture, customs, ideas and habits (“Four Olds”)

 Mao encouraged young people to attack the framework of Chinese politics and society  The Red Guards saw themselves as an army building a new China  It was a mass campaign which was savage and destructive  Red Guards humiliated their victims at the mass meetings

 Formally called “Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung”.  Consisted of 400 excerpts from Mao’s writings and sayings  First published in China in 1964  More than 900 million copies have been printed and distributed throughout the country  Most printed book in the 20 th century

 Vice-Chairman, Lin Biao made every soldier in the PLA (People’s Liberation Army) to study the Little Red Book  The Red Guards who wore green military uniforms with red armbands carry the Little Red Book everywhere they go

 Service the people  Letting a hundred flowers blossom  You young people, full of vigour and vitality, are in the bloom of life. Our hope is placed on you. The world belongs to you.  Force at the core leading our cause forward is the Chinese Communist Party

 Kathlyn Gay, Mao Zedong’s China Dictatorships, Minneapolis, 2008  Andrew Langley, The Cultural Revolution Years of Chaos in China, Minneapolis, 2008  Louise Chipley Slavicek, Mao Zedong, Great Military Leaders of the 20 th Century, USA, 2004