The International Center for Writing and Translation

presents

"In Search of My Homeland"
Reading, Art Exhibit, Book Sale and Signing

with
Er Tai Gao

Thursday, November 5, 2009
6:00 p.m.
Humanities Gateway 1030

In 1957 at the age of 22, Er Tai Gao wrote an essay stating that freedom was essential to the creation of beauty, and that beauty, in turn, was an expression of freedom. For that, Gao was labeled a "rightist" by the regime under Chairman Mao and sentenced to three years of hard labor in China's central desert. Ninety percent of the inmates died during the three years he was imprisoned. Over the next 30 years, Gao was sent to labor and reeducation camps several times because of his outspoken views. While relatively little is known in the West about the Chinese gulags or those who suffered in them, Gao's riveting memoir, IN SEARCH OF MY HOMELAND: A Memoir of a Chinese Labor Camp (Harper Collins, Oct 2009) chronicles the author's years of political persecution under China's Communist government and provides an insider's look at this hidden side of Chinese history.

Opening remarks from Perry Link, UC Riverside Chancellorial Chair for Innovative Teaching and introduction by Dr. Robert Dorsett, translator

Co-sponsored by the UCI School of Law, Department of History, and the UCI Bookstore. This event is free and open to the public. For more information: icwt@uci.edu or (949) 824-1948.