Winton Dong

    dht620@sina.com

    WHILE visiting other countries, it is a common practice for Chinese leaders to bring senior officials and important businesspeople as their entourage. However, I am happy to see more and more Chinese writers are now joining the ranks and going to the global stage.

    For example, during Premier Li Keqiang’s visit to South America in May 2015, three famous Chinese writers — Tie Ning, Mo Yan and Mai Jia — were at his side. Tie is the president of the China Writers Association. Mo Yan won the Nobel Prize in Literature for 2012. Mai Jia is well-known in the Spanish world and his books are best-sellers there.

    In my opinion, such a tendency can be called culture diplomacy and it will surely turn out to be a new normal in China. Along with its fruitful physical cooperation worldwide, China now wants to promote cooperation at the spiritual level. Chinese leaders have come to realize the roles of literature exchanges as a potent medium of heart-to-heart communication and an effective way to promote international relations and mutual understanding between different peoples.

    Frankly speaking, late Chinese Premier Zhou Enlai was the founder of the country’s culture diplomacy. While attending the Geneva Conference in 1954, Premier Zhou hoped to invite all attendees to watch a Chinese opera named “The Butterfly Lovers.” However, it was virtually impossible for interpreters to explain the tragic love story to foreigners with simple words. In the invitation letters, Zhou just wrote “Please enjoy a touching Chinese movie, it is the Chinese version of ‘Romeo and Juliet.’” The movie was later well-received and proved to be a diplomatic success at the international conference.

    President Xi Jinping is also himself an advocator of culture diplomacy. In October last year, while giving a speech in London, Xi recounted his exposure as a youth to famous British writer William Shakespeare, saying how he was attracted by the emotions in “A Midsummer Night Dream,” “The Merchant of Venice,” “Twelfth Night,” “Romeo and Juliet,” “Hamlet,” “Othello,” “King Lear,” “Macbeth” and so on. During his other state visits in the past four years, President Xi talked about Alexander Pushkin, Nikolai Gogol, Ivan Turgener and Anton Chekhov while visiting Russia; mentioned Walt Whitman, Mark Twain and Jack London while visiting the United States; cited Montesquieu, Rousseu, Sartre and Diderot while visiting France; showed respect to Goethe, Schiller and Heine while visiting Germany.

    Such a way of cultural diplomacy will generate common experience between peoples. Culture diplomacy has at least three advantages. Firstly, it will greatly enhance the soft power and smart power of China on the international stage. Secondly, it can help bring China and other countries closer. Thirdly, it will help to show the erudition and charisma of Chinese leaders.

    Besides literature, film, TV, music, dance, drama, sports, news, science, technology and other cultural activities can also be used as important carriers to promote culture diplomacy. In these aspects, we have a lot to learn from Western countries, especially the United States. As we all know, the national image of the U.S. is widely spread all over the world by Hollywood and its movies and TV series such as “Forrest Gump,” “Friends,” “Prison Break,” “Desperate Housewives,” “Sex and the City,” “Iron Man,” “Avatar” and “Transformers.”

    American people are good at not only promoting their own culture and ideology, but also taking advantage of the best elements from other cultures. For example, they borrowed from China to create “Kungfu Panda” and “Mulan;” shot a film named “Gladiator” based on ancient Roman history; adapted the stories of the Trojan War and 300 Spartans from Greece; told the story of the Little Mermaid from Denmark; touched the whole world through “The Lion King” with inspiration from Africa; impressed audiences with “Fantasia” from the Middle East and so on.

    In modern society, the influence of a country will rely not only on military power and economic strength, but more on cultural dialogue and mutual communication. Military power may keep a country on the cutting edge for 10 years. Economic strength may maintain prosperity for 100 years. But the nourishment of culture is boundless and will never cease.

    (The author is the editor-in-chief of the Shenzhen Daily and guest professor of Shenzhen University with a Ph.D. from the Journalism and Communication School of Wuhan University.)