On my last trip back to China in late December 2009, I managed to squeeze in three days to try to visit some of the women whom I interviewed for my book back in Chongqing.  I wanted to share the finished product with them and more importantly, show them how their stories had become written words, part of the permanent record of China’s Resistance War against Japan. 

As I arrived in Chongqing without previous arrangements with the women, I decided to try my luck calling their residences. After my first few phone calls failed to reach anyone on the other end, I finally reached a family member of Wang Shu, the underground CCP member.  I was saddened to learn that Wang had passed away.  I offered my condolences and informed her relative about the publication of the book.

I was, however, able to visit Gong Xue, the tailor’s wife.  At the age of 93, Gong had remained healthy and independent, still living on her own in the same small apartment she had kept for the past 45 years.  She was very happy to see me and the new book that featured her own picture and story in it.  She told me that she still dearly missed her husband, who died during the war, even after so many years had gone by.  We chatted more about the war and her life during and after it.  Although she had lived through all of China’s political upheavals as a widow since the war, she hardly complained about the hardships she had endured.  Instead, she told me how grateful she was for being able to live a long and healthy life.

I had gone to her apartment to thank her for sharing her stories with me. Yet she thanked me instead for visiting her. Watching her tiny figure and listening to her gentle and contented voice, I could not help being in awe again of the grace and fortitude of her spirit. This was the very spirit I had sought to capture in my book—the resilience shared by all of the seemingly “ordinary” women I had met.

*****

Danke Li is an associate professor of history and codirector of the women’s studies program at Fairfield University in Fairfield, Connecticut.  She is the author of Echoes of Chongqing: Women in Wartime China.