When Li Cunxin was writing the first draft of Mao’s Last Dancer, he questioned whether there would be much interest in his autobiography. Now, with the international bestseller in its 25th reprint in Australia and recently published in a condensed Young Readers’ Edition, he has his answer.
Li now works in a Melbourne stockbroking office. The plush reception area, and the meeting room where we chat, is not the place one would expect to find a man whose life began humbly in rural China. But there have been so many dramatic moments, so many unexpected transitions in Li’s remarkable life.
When we first meet Li in Mao’s Last Dancer, he is a peasant boy, born into a family rich in love, pride and dignity, but struggling to meet their meagre material needs.
Born a peasant, die a peasant—that may well be the lesson to be drawn from one of the fables he is taught as a child. But this is not to be Li’s destiny.
A visit to his school by a team of Madam Mao’s cultural delegates will change the 11-year-old’s life. They are looking for children with particular physiques and high levels of flexibility to take to the city, to train to become the best artists and dancers in China. Naturally, in this process they will learn to become loyal servants of Mao.
Li is chosen.
In Beijing, at Madam Mao’s Dance Academy, he undergoes extreme difficulties, but he also experiences a world no peasant child could ever imagine: eating fresh fruit twice a week and meat almost daily, becoming a student of ballet and, through years of rigorous, highly disciplined training, acquiring an understanding of the nature and essence of ballet, of movement and music, and the joy of performing for an audience.
Ballet becomes his obsession. He sets his course. He will become one of the best. And there are
mentors and teachers at the dance academy who see that he has what it takes, who guide him, who recognise how to bring out the best in him, who believe in him.
When Li first sees a video of Baryshnikov dancing, it dawns on him that there is so much more to be achieved through his art form.
Li is soon offered coveted solo roles. He becomes known. With each taste of success he becomes more determined. Obstacles will not deter him.
Ballet continues to open