Sesame Street strolls down Chinese memory lane

In a word, Big Bird in China is authentic. We live in irony, and a book like this is as bracing as it is hopeful.

The story begins with Big Bird's desire to find a Chinese feathered friend, the fenghuang 鳳凰, or phoenix (frequently paired to the dragon, its mate in mythology). A somewhat contrived, but nevertheless charming Chinese hanging scroll provides four visual clues to aid Big Bird's search. Readers will recognize the first landmark, the Great Wall, but the others are less familiar icons: a sculpture from the spirit path to the Ming tombs, a steeply arched bridge of the type found among the canals in Suzhou, and a pavilion from the Liu Garden, also in Suzhou. (Clearly, Big Bird's itinerary has been carefully circumscribed, as was the rule for foreigners in China in the early 1980s.)

Still, Big Bird and his doggy sidekick Barkley travel with aplomb, introducing an American audience to Chinese places and people, especially children. The story is not complex, but suits the goal of creating a foundation for friendship. The photographs, while supporting the narrative, also function (with thirty years' hindsight) as testimony to breathtaking change.

Through Victor DiNapoli's lens the lovable giant bird is a yellow so bright that he seems a hallucination against the hazy skies (smog from over-dependence on coal?)  and dreary colors of China's city streets and countryside. Telltale signs, figurative and literal, tell of life under the Communist regime: Big Bird and Barkley pose in front of a framed political message to Beijing's citizens in their "struggle" to support four capital city objectives, including government stability and environmental beauty. But even readers who cannot read Chinese can easily see the dark monochrome clothing worn by nearly all as well as the more than occasional People's Liberation Army soldier among the civilians. Since then, the brightness that concentrated itself in Big Bird and his Chinese friend has spread throughout the nascent middle class.

Clearly there are aspects of this book that, were it published today, would undergo a thorough screening, whether political or aesthetic. I am so glad it was published thirty years ago. That is my vote for authenticity.

Big Bird in China
written by Jon Stone with photographs by Victor DiNapoli.
Random House, 1983

Question to readers: Can anyone identify the Chinese girl who befriends Big Bird?