"To Read Too Many Books is Harmful" (Mao Zedong)
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3.
Zhu Peilin (朱沛霖)
1954, November
Daddy, this is how you write this character
Baba, zheige zi shi zheiyang xiede (爸爸, 这个字是这样写的)
Xin meishu chubanshe, Shanghai (新美术出版社), 2nd edition, print no. 5431
Call number: BG E13/710
This image is designed in a style reminiscent of the calendar posters that were so popular in the urban and rural areas from the 1920s onward. The poster contains many layers of meaning: the material wellbeing of the peasantry, the abundance of life in the countryside, the (successful) struggle against illiteracy, etc. Note how learning how to read and write is clearly linked to familiarizing the people with new policies, in this case the policy of mutual cooperation that was spread in the rural areas. 'Mutual cooperation' (huzhu hezuo) are the characters the father is writing in the soil.
