Ai Weiwei's Blog, The Book

I stopped by the library the other day and they had this book just sitting out in the main arts section. It's only been out since April. I snapped it right up:


Image: MIT Press. Click here to purchase from MIT.

I'm only a slight way into the 2006 section right now, but the book is fascinating. For one thing it's dense. I get a very strong sense from the translation how challenging the act of making Chinese writing into English sentences must be. There's this flavor that you are only really hearing about one third of what you need to hear to truly comprehend, but that one third alone is really interesting. Ai's got this brain that's constantly firing and churning, full of ideas and critiques. Ai Weiwei's father was a famous poet, and that shines through as well- that lyric quality of poetry, the use of allusion and metaphor. His blog posts are almost long poems, or at least in English that's how they read.

Also Ai  has this immense ego/humility thing going for him which is charming and exasperating in equal measure. I don't know if that's because of the way the translation works, but the tone I get is this man who is so rock sure of what he's saying, so willing to lay down his gospel, so very much himself, that he's not overly concerned with the feeling or impression of other people. It's a funny thing because I think he's also willing to contradict himself as he goes along, and to make himself the butt of his jokes as well, which is what makes his confident superiority so charming. He's absolute, for only so long as he is absolute about that thing, and he can take a good joke.

So far much of what he's occupied with is architecture, but the political tone is already starting to seep in, and I think that is suppposed to pick up as it goes forward.  Chillingly, I came across one post from 2006 about how he's moved so many times in his life, how he's lived in everything from a pit in the ground that later was turned into a pigsty up to luxurious apartments and the house he built himself, that the only place he has yet to live is in prison.  (Foreshadowing!)  I don't have the book with me right now, but I'll come back to that quote when I do and transmit it more fully here.

Just the fact that he was allowed to blog for even 3 years is interesting, because China's internet civil war is such a serious thing. From the little I've read about it, China even has paid commenters who go around to articles posting pro China comments to help stifle critique. If you read  the Economist's review of the book, you'll see some commenters who might be those paid pro China folks.

Here's a sample:

"Talking about human rights, China has been trying really hard to increase the human rights and dignity of her citizen by increasing prosperity and lifting people out of poverty.

From that regard, Ai Weiwei is very selfish if he wants to stir any revolutions. Sure, he has his rights and aspirations. But, so do 1,300 million other people in China. One thousand and three hundred millions other Chinese. Any revolution that disrupts the momentum and progress of these people just for the sake of one's person aspiration is stupid - and should rightfully and quickly be controlled.
Ai Weiwei and other political activists need to learn to be patient. Rome wasn't built in a day. China is way bigger than Rome!"

Here's hoping Ai Weiwei gets his ticket to Berlin because I can't wait to see what he'll write when he's out of China and completely free to say what he wants.