The human condition (1933) Aid to play: Shanghai 1927 summary

Résumé du document

Shanghai has its unique position at the mouth of a waterway that drains the richest and most populated regions of China have attracted foreign economic interests. The Chinese authorities have given up their sovereignty over certain areas of the city under French administration or, which is the international concession, under the authority of Great Britain and the United States. In 1927, the foreign population of the city amounted to about forty thousand people(see the nationality of several characters from The Human Condition: May is German, French-Hungarian Clappique, Ferral and Valerie French, Russian Katov Chinese Chen, Hemmerlich Belgian...).

Booming economy in twenty years, Shanghai is a cosmopolitan metropolis, but also the bastion of the new Chinese bourgeoisie case, the westernized intelligentsia and the industrial proletariat - about 500,000 people -. As the city becomes a place of intense fermentation and political conflict.

What are the forces?

The Kuomintang, Democratic and nationalist party founded by Sun Yat-sen, is supported by the financial and commercial bourgeoisie that wants to take their foreign administrative and economic privileges. To wrest power from the military dictatorship(" Warlords") which holds the central government in Beijing, Sun obtained the support of some general South and can form a government in southern China, in Canton.

Extraits

[...] He believes intelligence, but it is above all for his possession of the means to force things or men. His desire to dominate him access to eroticism, but not to love. Grand tycoon, less interested in material success that the risk and the taste of triumph. At the end, it welcomes the failure with a grandeur that commands respect. In nature stir Machiavel, Don Juan, and Faust. Meaning of the human condition The central theme of the work is man and his destiny. «Destiny is not death. [...]

[...] The troops of General Chiang Kai-shek are about to enter Shanghai. Ferral, the President of the French Chamber of Commerce, studying with local Chinese authorities the chances of success of the insurrection. Eventually he persuaded the business community to support Chiang Kai-shek. Ferral will then join Valerie, his mistress. It suffers painfully humiliating erotic relationship that is imposed. The fights are very violent. The insurgency is victorious, but Chiang Kai- shek opposes revolutionary and prefers compromise with the moderate forces: it requires that the insurgents lay down their arms. [...]

[...] Japanese painter Kama said:»When I went to Europe, I saw museums. More painters are your apples, and even lines that do not represent things, the more they speak for themselves. (P. 57) In love East solutions derived from an old social organization: the traditional subjugation of women is a convenient way to maintain harmony between the sexes. Gisors like a Japanese because »the love in his eyes, was not a conflict but a confident contemplation beloved face.» True love that unites este Kyo and May. [...]

[...] That's when Shanghai became the issue of the conflict. Controlled in early 1927 by a Chinese general northerner, the city theater, February 19, a general strike and armed that Chiang Kai- Shek insurrection, remained grounded arms a hundred kilometers, left a prey to fierce repression. The left wing of the Kuomintang notes March Chiang Kai- Shek of its functions, but the decision remains a dead letter. On 21 March, the day on which the novel opens Malraux, a new insurrectionary strike this time succeeded in working class suburbs of the city, while the foreign concessions are not attacked. [...]

[...] Instructed by a Chinese pastor, he has a horror of the flesh and the passion of Christ until Gisors replace him political passion of religious passion. Its favorable traits are: friendship and affection for Kyo Gisors. He risks his life for the revolution. Deciding to kill Chiang Kai -shek, it awakens the death instincts that lay in him. He becomes possessed by his murder, he was fascinated by terrorism. He wants to turn terrorism exemplary act. True kamikaze before the time it is caught in the desire to kill, the sublime sacrifice greater than him cause. Clap pique Interesting and original character. [...]