Wolf Totem: A Novel

by Jiang Rong

  They went back into the living room. “The families in our section still follow the old Mongolian ways,” Batu continued. “We raise more sheep when the grass is good, and fewer when the grass is bad. When raising our sheep, we follow Tengger and the grass, and avoid greedy people. But, of course, the outsiders know nothing about the old rules, so they often sneak their sheep over to eat our grass when they finish theirs. It’s very upsetting. Then there are the local Mongolian drunks. They trade all the sheep they were allocated by the government for liquor. Then when their wives run away and their children go astray, they live off the rent they collect from leasing the pasture, about ten or twenty thousand yuan a year.”

  “Who leases their pastures?”

  “Outsiders from farming-herding areas,” Batu said indignantly. “These people don’t give a damn about capacity, so they raise two or three thousand sheep on land that can only support five hundred. Their sheep graze the land for a few years and turn it into sand; then they get out of their lease, sell their sheep, and go back home to do business with the money they got here.”

  “I never imagined that the outsiders could actually get worse,” Yang said to Chen. “Sooner or later they’ll ruin the grassland completely.”

  Feeling more confident about Batu and Gasmai’s pasture and family enterprise, Chen said, “I’m so happy to see you’re doing well.”

  Gasmai shook her head. “The big grassland is gone, and our small one won’t last forever. The land is dry, and Tengger refuses to give us rain. Our pasture is getting worse by the year. I have to put four kids through school, then save some money so they can get married and build houses. There are also the medical expenses and the savings we need for hard times. Kids these days only care about today and want to buy whatever they lay their eyes on. They saw your fancy Jeep just now, and they’re already trying to get Bayar to buy one like yours. I’m afraid that once the old folks are gone, the youngsters will ignore the old rules and raise as many sheep as possible so they can own new cars, big houses, and nice clothes.”

  “Now I see why they pestered me about the price of the Jeep as soon as I got out,” Yang said.

  “Mongols should also practice birth control,” Gasmai continued. “The grassland can’t support too many children. The two boys will have to return to herd sheep if they can’t get into a college; then we’ll have to divide up the household and the sheep after they get married. Each flock will be smaller, which will likely make them want to raise more. But the size of the pasture doesn’t grow. The grass will be crushed if a few more houses are built on this tiny piece of land.”

  Bayar was slaughtering a sheep outside; after a while, his wife, an equally robust Mongol woman, came in with a basin brimming with meat. Chen and Yang brought out the cans and other vacuum-packed food. Even though it wasn’t completely dark yet, the lights were turned on in the living room.

  Chen said to Batu, “Hey, that’s bright. Now you herders no longer have to use sheep-oil lamps. Back then I often burned my hair when I tried to read by an oil lamp.”

  “How long does the electricity from the wind-powered generator last?” Yang asked.

  Batu laughed. “When it’s windy, the generator will churn all day and store the electricity in batteries that will last two hours. If that’s not enough, I also have a small diesel generator.”

  Soon car horns sounded outside; nearly everyone in Gasmai’s “tribe” arrived in cars and motorcycles, turning the spacious living room into a sardine can. The old grassland friends were particularly affectionate; friendly thumps from fists kept falling on Chen and Yang, who were then made to drink so much they began to sway and spew nonsense.

  Lamjav, Laasurung, Sanjai, and other old friends followed suit and asked to borrow the car from Yang, who, in a drunken stupor, said yes to them all. “No problem. No problem at all. And come to me when you need to file a lawsuit.” Then he tossed the keys to Lamjav.

  The others all burst out laughing, before breaking into song. The last song was one made popular by Mongolia’s most famous male singer, Tenggeer. The voices were high, old, and sad, with the resonance of wolf howls.

  The drinking and singing went on all night; the tears never stopped flowing.

  During the drinking feast, “orders” were placed for Chen Zhen and Yang Ke as if they were divorcés sent back from Beijing. There would be two feasts a day, each hosted by a different family with drinking, eating, and singing. The blue Cherokee was turned into a vehicle for the old herders for test drives and entertainment, and for transporting the liquor they bought. It was also used to bring over friends from other sections, turning Batu’s yard into a parking lot.

  By the following afternoon, nearly half the cars and motorcycles from the brigade were parked outside Batu’s house, but there were few horses. One of the herders said, “People would probably give up raising Mongolian horses if not for the difficulty of herding sheep on motorcycles during snowy winters. Only one of the Second Brigade’s four horse herds is left, and it’s only half its previous size.”

  “The wolves are gone and grass is getting sparse,” Batu said. “The horses are lazy and can’t run very fast. They’re smaller than before. No one wants our horses anymore.”

  Chen noticed that all the old men of Bilgee’s generation were gone. The grammar school students that Yang Ke had taught were now the main workforce.

  In three days, the two men drank so much that their blood pressure shot up and they suffered accelerated heartbeats. Luckily, the Han vegetable garden was well stocked, so they enjoyed a large salad at every meal; otherwise, even their cholesterol levels would have suffered. Half of the herding in the section was halted by the series of drinking parties, and the families had to rely on outside help. Chen was told by one of the hired hands that they were paid two hundred a month plus two adult sheep, room and board included. They also got year-end bonuses for a good job.

  Both friends spent that day and slept the night in the homes of their former hosts.

  On the fourth day of their visit, Chen chatted with Gasmai and her family well into the night.

  On the early morning of the fifth day, Chen Zhen and Yang Ke got into the Jeep Cherokee and headed toward Black Rock Mountain.

  The mountain gradually came into view as the Jeep crossed the border highway. Yang Ke slowed down on the grassland dirt path.

  Chen sighed and said, “The presence of wolves is the ecological index to the existence of the grassland. When the wolves are gone, the grassland loses its soul; life here has completely changed. I miss the lush green, primitive grassland.”

  Rubbing his temple with one finger, Yang said, “I’m nostalgic too. As soon as I got here, my head was filled with herding scenes. It may be thirty years, but it seems like yesterday.”

  The Jeep was now entering the pasture south of the highway, where the grass was so short it looked if it were hugging the topsoil, like a driver training ground. Yang drove off the dirt path and headed toward Black Rock Mountain.

  The reedy grove in the foothills was long gone, leaving behind dry, yellowing land of short, sparse grass through which the Jeep traveled up the gentle slope.

  Yang asked, “Do you think you can find Little Wolf’s den?”

  “How could a student forget the location of his teacher’s house?” Chen said forcefully. “I’ll stop at the foothills nearest to the old den, and we can walk the remaining distance. We have to walk.”

  As the Jeep neared the birthplace of the cub, Chen felt a sudden anxiety, like an old war criminal asking for forgiveness at a memorial, which, in this case, was the burial ground of the seven Mongolian wolf cubs he’d killed. Five hadn’t opened their eyes or been weaned, and the sixth had just learned to run. He had snipped off the canines of the seventh cub, stripping him of his freedom with a chain during his short life, and in the end crushing his head. Someone who loved freedom and was increasingly respectful of freedom had committed a vicious act of the kind perpetrated only by the most tyrannical, t
otalitarian people. He had trouble facing the bloody crimes he’d committed in his youth. Sometimes he even loathed the result of his own research, for it was precisely his curiosity and research interests that had taken away the happiness and freedom of seven wolf cubs. The manuscript he’d completed was written with their blood, animals in which the noble blood of the White Wolf King may have flowed. For over two decades, he’d been tormented by this blood debt. But he also understood why grasslanders who killed wolves would willingly give their own bodies to the wolves at the end of their lives. It was not simply so that their souls would rise up to Tengger, or as a consequence of their belief in “returning flesh after eating flesh.” They probably also felt a heavy burden of guilt and wanted to repay a debt to the grassland wolves they revered. There were no more sky-burial grounds on the grassland.

  Over the past two decades, the admirable, lovely, and pitiable Little Wolf had often appeared in Chen’s dreams and thoughts, but not once did the cub bite him or seek revenge. Little Wolf always ran to him joyfully, wrapping his legs around Chen’s, rubbing up against his knees, and licking his hands and chin. In his dreams, Chen would wake up on the grassland to see Little Wolf lying by his head, and he would instinctively cover his throat with his hand. But the cub saw him waking up and would simply roll on the grass to expose his belly for him to scratch. In the countless dreams over the past two decades, Little Wolf never showed resentment; instead, he was as affectionate as a loving child. What puzzled Chen was that not only did the cub not hate or snarl at him, but he always displayed the friendship and affection of a wolf. This sort of ancient, bleak, tender, and innocent affection could never be found in the human world.

  At the sight of the loose rocks and wild grass on the barren slope, Yang seemed to recall the cruel extermination of nearly thirty years ago; guilt feelings and self-reproach showed in his eyes.

  The Jeep stopped, and Chen pointed to a level area and said, "That was the cubs’ temporary hiding place. I was the one who dug them out; I was the culprit. The cave had collapsed when I left the Olonbulag and not a trace of it remains now. Let’s walk from here to the old den.” With Chen leading the way, with a backpack, they meandered their way toward the small hill.

  When they reached it, they saw that the dark spot originally hidden by tall brambles and grass stalks had turned into a barren slope. The green tent of reeds the wolves had used as a cover was also gone. Several yards ahead, the hundred-year-old cave came into view. Now completely exposed, it looked bigger than before, almost like an abandoned cave dwelling on a loess hill in northern Shaanxi. Holding his breath, Chen rushed up and, as he got closer, realized that the cave was the same size. It only looked bigger because it no longer had tall grass as a screen. The shape hadn’t changed much, owing to years of drought, but the ground was littered with pebbles and dirt. After walking up to kneel by the cave, Chen took a few seconds to calm himself before looking inside, which was half filled with tumbleweeds and bramble stalks. He took a flashlight from his backpack to shine into the opening and saw that the bend in the tunnel was nearly blocked by rocks, yellow sand, and weeds. Despondent, he sat down on the ground and stared blankly at the ancient cave.

  Yang shone his flashlight at the tunnel. “This is it,” he said. “This is the cave. You crawled inside from here. At the time, I was scared witless, afraid you’d run into the mother wolf and fearful that the wolves outside would attack me. I don’t know where we got our nerve back then.”

  Bending down, Yang yelled into the cave, “Little Wolf, Little Wolf, time to eat. Chen Zhen and I are here to see you.” He acted as if he were once again calling out to the cub at the new pastureland, where the young wolf had dug a cave of his own. But this time the cub would not leap out.

  Chen rose and brushed the dirt off, then squatted down to pull up the grass in front of the cave. Then he took out seven Beijing sausages. The biggest one was intended for the cub he had raised. After respectfully placing them on the ground, he took out seven sticks of incense, stuck them in the ground, and lit them. Finally, he took out the first page of his completed manuscript and burned it as an offering. With the flame licking at Chen’s name and the title, Wolf Totem, Chen hoped that the souls of the cub and the old man, Bilgee, would receive his promise and his deep sense of remorse. The fire did not die out until it reached his finger. Then he took out a bottle of the old man’s favorite liquor and sprinkled it on the sandy ground around the cave. He knew the old man had left his footprints by every old wolf den on the Olonbulag pastureland. He’d upset the old man by ignoring his objections to raising a cub, and that was something for which he’d never be able to atone.

  Chen and Yang stretched out their arms, palms up, and looked at Tengger, following the rising green smoke to search for the souls of the cub and the old man.

  Chen wanted to yell out, "Little Wolf, Little Wolf...Papa, Papa...I’m here to see you.” But he couldn’t bring himself to do it, for he didn’t deserve it. He didn’t dare disturb their souls, afraid that they’d open their eyes to see the yellow, dying “grassland” below.

  Facing the quiet wolf mountain, Chen Zhen did not know when he’d be back again.

  In the spring of 2002, Batu and Gasmai phoned Chen Zhen to say, "Eighty percent of the Olonbulag pastureland is now desert. In another year the whole area will change from settlement herding to raising cows and sheep, more or less like the animal pens in your farming villages. Every family will build rows of big houses.”

  Chen Zhen didn’t know what to say.

  A few days later, a yellow-dragon sandstorm rose up outside his window, blocking the sky and the sun. All of Beijing was shrouded in the fine, suffocating dust. China’s imperial city was turned into a hazy city of yellow sand.

  Standing alone by his window, Chen looked off to the north with a sense of desolation. The wolves had receded into legend, and the grassland was a distant memory. A nomadic herding society was now extinct; even the last trace left by the wolves on the Inner Mongolian grassland—the ancient cave of the wolf cub—would be buried in yellow sand.

  Glossary

  BANNER: An administrative unit roughly equivalent to a county in China proper.

  CAPITALIST-ROADERS : Party officials who implemented pragmatic economic policies in the countryside in response to the disastrous Great Leap Forward. The president, Liu Shaoqi was labeled the “Number one capitalist-roader in the party.” The term became the catchword for witch hunts during the Cultural Revolution.

  DEEL: A long belted robe, often made of animal skins.

  FOUR OLDS : Old ideas, old culture, old customs and old habits. “Destroy the four olds” was a campaign, launched in 1966, during which the Red Guards terrorized the countryside.

  HEILONG RIVER (JIANG) : The river (Black Dragon) after which China’s largest northeastern province is named.

  LEAGUE : An administrative unit roughly equivalent to a prefecture.

  LI : About one third of a U.S. mile.

  PRODUCTION BRIGADE: The largest labor unit in a commune.

  STUDY SESSIONS (GROUPS): Meetings, usually scheduled as punishment for political errors, for which reform was the goal, the works of Mao Zedong the tool.

  THREE DIFFICULT YEARS: Three years between 1959 and 1962, following the so-called "Great Leap Forward” (1958), during which upwards of twenty million people died of starvation.

  WORK POINTS: Computations of labor rewards in the countryside.

  YELLOW EMPEROR: The mythical founder of the Chinese race.

  YUAN: Chinese currency, valued at the time (the 1970s) at roughly four to the dollar.

  YURT: A round felt building. The preferred Mongol term is “ger.”

  About the Author

  Jiang Rong was born in Jiangsu in 1946. His father’s job saw the family move to Beijing in 1957, and Jiang entered the Central Academy of Fine Art in 1966.

  His education cut short by events in China, the twenty-one-year-old Jiang volunteered to work in Inner Mongolia’s East Ujimc
hin Banner in 1967, where he lived and labored with the native nomads until the age of thirty-three. He took with him two cases filled with Chinese translations of Western literary classics, and spent eleven years immersed in personal studies of Mongolian history, culture, and tradition. In particular, he developed a fascination for the mythologies surrounding the wolves of the grasslands, spending much of his leisure time learning the stories and raising an orphaned wolf cub.

  In 1978 he returned to Beijing, continuing his education at the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences one year later. Jiang worked as an academic until his retirement in 2006.

  Wolf Totem is a fictional account of life in the 1970s that draws on Jiang’s personal experience of the grasslands of China’s border region.