Asia Today: Two Outlooks, Beatty Memorial Lectures (1969) is a compilation of three lectures that Han Su Yin gave in 1968 at McGill University.
The lectures are called the Beatty Memorial Lectures.
Her 1968 lectures generated extraordinary public interest, as China was closed to the outside world then, and the Great Leap Forward and Cultural Revolution were big, seminal events for which the public wanted an insider view.
The lectures were titled “Revolutionary Change in the 20th Century,” “The Cultural Revolution in China,” and “War and Peace.”
Having read these lectures, it is clear she is a proponent of Mao. In her view, these seminal events were necessary in Mao’s quest for rejuvenation and to get rid of the capitalists, even if some innocent people suffered wrongly.
It is well known that many did indeed suffer. Could Deng have embarked on his campaign to open and rejuvenate China if these events had not happened? Would he?.
An Indian lawyer once told me he wished India had a Mao instead of Gandhi, the Great Soul, who would have cleared the deck and dismantled the caste system, which still plagues India. On this, one should read the critique of the caste system by Arundhati Roy titled The Doctor and the Saint. Is she correct? Is the lawyer right?
LWH, Chinese New Year, 5th day. 21 Feb 2026.