I went to the DiaoYuTai several times in 2004, and then I never went there again. It is one of those places you goto for conferences, to admire the gardens, and finally to gasp at a bit of history.
The name, apparantly, means "Angling Platform", and it was the favourite fishing spot of the Emperor Zhang Jong of the Jin Dynasty. What is good, in a sense, is that the Chinese have taken a bit of history, and made it relevant in the modern world.
During the Cultural Revolution, this is where Chairman Mao's wife, Jiang Qing, lived. This does draw parallels to, among other things, the French Revolution. While the country burned, the Royalty did seem to enjoy their lives, until their heads were lopped off! The parallel? Well, Jiang Qing did, herself, come to an untimely end.
At the time that I used to visit the Diao Yu Tai, we were told, in hushed tones, that this was the site for the Six Nation Meetings, when the powers that be were fretting over North Korea's nuclear capability. I did follow the story at the time, but then lost track of it when the newspapers had newer titbits to report. This is a strange world in which we live. We seem to move from scandal to scandal, from noise byte to noise byte.
When the famous Marquis de Sade wrote about sadism, especially in "Juliette", he was, in a sense, writing about people who deemed themselves to be above the law, and who's tastes were so jaded that they resorted to more and more bizarre forms of torture and murder in order to satisfy their sexual tastes.
In a more mild form, we seem to need titillation all the time, and this is provided by the press, in part.
Well, so much for the Diao Yu Tai!
At the DiaoYuTai in BeiJing <------that's what i was looking for
Posted by: Argumentative Essays | May 05, 2011 at 07:13 PM