SOURCE: "Stolen Kisses," in Vogue, Vol. 184, No. 3, March, 1994, pp. 278, 281-82.

[Schell is an American journalist, nonfiction writer, and critic who has written extensively on modern China. In the following review, based in part on a conversation with Min, he discusses Red Azalea and how Min came to write it.]

"Falling in love is so powerful that it makes you forget about almost everything else, even making revolution. Instead of wanting to struggle and destroy things, you want to find peace and to celebrate living. Because the Party knows that people in love are no longer completely under its control, its leaders have always been deeply fearful of love."

                  —Anchee Min, Chicago, 1993

Anchee Min learned about the politically subversive power of love in the People's Republic of China during the Cultural Revolution in a place where neither she nor the Party expected her to find it, with another woman...