This work is a story about the life and work of a Chinese couple - Tibetan poet, writer, blogger and public figure Tsering Oser and Chinese writer, human rights activist and independent researcher Wang Lixiong. The materials for its writing were a personal interview taken by the author in July 2014 with the characters of the story, an analysis of the works of married writers and research data on their work by scientists from different countries. Tsering Oser and Wang Lixiong represent a special group of dissenters in China, where their works are banned and their literary and social activities are closely monitored by the authorities. At the same time, their works are very popular both within the country and abroad. Tsering Oser and Wang Lixiong are widely known both as commentators on the Tibetan and Uighur protest movement and as defenders of the rights of national minorities.

Keywords: Tsering Oser, Wang Lixiong, Tibet, China, Tibetan political protests, self-immolation.

THE FATES OF THE DISSIDENTS IN CHINA: TIBETAN POETESS TSERING WOESER AND CHINESE WRITER WANG LIXIONG

Irina GARRY

The article analyzes the biography and works of the famous Chinese couple - Tibetan poet, writer, blogger and social activist Tsering Woeser and Chinese writer, human rights activist and independent scholar Wang Lixiong. The paper is based on a personal interview by the author, writers' literary works and research publications. Tsering Woeser and Wang Lixiong represent a social category of dissidents in China, their works are prohibited, and their literary and social activities have been attracting the most attention from the authorities. Nevertheless, their works are very popular both inside and outside of China. They have received wide recognition as commentators of protest movement on the part of Tibetans and Uighurs and as defenders of the rights of China's ethnic minorities.

Keywords: Tsering Woeser, Wang Lixiong, Tibet, China, Tibetan protests, self-immolations.

Tsering Oser and Wang Lixiong are perhaps China's most famous literary dissident couple. They are considered the brightest and most insightful

This work was supported by the RGNF grant No. 13-01-00086 "Tradition and Innovation in Eastern Tibet".

GARRY Irina Regbievna-Doctor of Historical Sciences, Associate Professor, Leading Researcher at the Institute of Mongolian Studies, Buddhology and Tibetology of the Siberian Branch of the Russian Academy of Sciences. Ulan-Ude, irina-garri@gmail.com.

Irina GARRI - Doctor of Sciences (in History), reading Research Fellow, Institute of Mongolian. Buddhist, and Tibetan Studies. RAS. Ulan-Ude. irina.garri@gmail.com.

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researchers of modern Tibet. I have long followed with interest the vicissitudes of their lives and their activities. Zering Oser and I have been Facebook friends for several years now, and in the summer of 2014, we started working together. As a member of the Buryat expedition group, I was able to meet her and her husband personally. Tsering Oser is a pretty, smiling woman who dresses smartly and wears beautiful Tibetan jewelry. Wang Lixiong looks like a traditional Chinese intellectual. Tsering Auxerre is lively, cheerful, and speaks with a soft accent. Wang Lixiong is calm, polite, and speaks the purest Putonghua (standard Chinese). To date, this pair is under constant surveillance by the Chinese authorities. House arrests, searches, and detentions are an unpleasant routine in their lives. The works of both are banned in the PRC, their Internet blogs are blocked, Tsering Oser is not issued a foreign passport, and therefore she is not allowed to travel.

Tsering Oser was born in Lhasa in 1966, at the very beginning of the Cultural Revolution. Her mother is Tibetan, and her late father is a half-Chinese, half - Tibetan officer in the People's Liberation Army (PLA). Officially, he had a Chinese name, but in his heart he considered himself a Tibetan. Tsering Oser grew up in the atmosphere of the military garrisons of Eastern Tibet-the towns of Tau and Kandina, belonging to the Ganzi Tibetan Autonomous Region of Sichuan Province. The Tibetan language was used in their environment only in colloquial speech, and all classes at school were conducted in Chinese. According to her, at that time she did not feel like a Tibetan at all. In 1981, Tsering Oser won back her parents ' right to move to the big city of Chengdu. She entered the higher secondary school at the University of Nationalities. There, too, teaching was conducted only in Chinese textbooks, although she was included in the experimental group for the creation of national universities. It was from this time that ethnic self-consciousness began to awaken and grow stronger in it. Almost daily, students watched films about the heroic deeds of the CCP and the PLA, portrayed Tibetans as savage and backward, and presented the CCP as the savior of the Tibetan people from the terrible Tibetan feudal lords and serfs. The emotional Tsering Auxerre was moved to tears by these films. She completed her classical Chinese education while studying at the Southwest University of Nationalities in Chengdu, majoring in Chinese language and Literature [Interview..., 2014].

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During her university years, Tsering Auxerre began writing poetry, which made her famous among her fellow students. In your blog on http://woeser.middle-way.net she writes that at that time she loved to recite the poems of Ghanaian and Sung poets, but knew little about such famous Tibetan authors as the Dalai Lama VI. In a short autobiography [Ciren Weise ziliao] Tsering Auxerre divides its life into four stages. About her younger years, she writes: "At first I wrote poetry, with the help of poetry I tried to find my true ancestral roots, these soul journeys to the past were akin to the search for faith." The first poems written by her at the age of 18 show that by that time she had already fully decided on her national identity:

I'll never allow it again
Muddy waters of contempt
Pouring out of your young eyes.
Trail left
by the Smell of tsamba 1 with oil,
Imprinted in my heart 2.

Violet Lo, translator and editor of Voices from Tibet [Tsering Woeser, Wang Lixiong, 2014], writes that one of Tsering Oser's first poems written at university was already a "political act". She wrote it in protest, defending her place and the place of her people after an argument with fellow Han Chinese students:

Your life must be filled with an innate sense of superiority,
But I won't smile in agreement
The sun is shining on you just as it is on me,
On this blue planet, we are all equally equal!3

Tsering Oser's formative years coincided with dramatic changes in Tibet and China as a whole. Four years after the death of Mao Zedong (1976), full-scale reforms began in Tibet. The liberalization of the economy and social sphere, coupled with huge investments in the region, caused a rapid increase in incomes, the restoration of monasteries, and the revival of culture. At the same time, an unexpected result of liberalization for the authorities was the demonstration of Buddhist monks for independence in 1987, which led to numerous arrests, deaths and the introduction of martial law in Lhasa. In 1989, a wave of pro-democracy protests took place across China, culminating in the Tiananmen Square massacre. There is no doubt that the events of those years could not but affect Tsering Auxerre. In July 1989, in response to the shooting of students in Tiananmen Square, she wrote several poems filled with pain for the deaths of young boys and girls.

One of the poems is called "Dedication to those who committed suicide in a dream" 4. The poem is the dying words of a poet, probably a girl. It tells of a poet who, armed with a word, so accurately struck down the target that a hundred flowers bloomed. But the word-weapon struck the poet himself:

I was looking for a phrase or word,
Yes, accurately, so that not in the eyebrow, but in the eye, and a hundred flowers instantly bloomed.
As a result, death found itself from this weapon.

Tsamba 1 ground barley flour, the main diet of Tibetans. Tibetans call themselves, in contrast to the ethnic Chinese-Han, "eating tsamba".

2 Translated from English by I. R. Garry po: [Woeser..., 2014; cit. by: Barnett, 2014].

3 Translated from English by I. R. Garry po: [Woeser..., 2014; cit. by: Law, 2014].

4 Two poems by Tsering Oser dedicated to the events of June 4 were published in the collection "Poems of June 4 "(Taiwan, June 2014). [http://woeser.middle-way.net/2014/06/blog-post_4.html] (accessed 11.10.2014).

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Here is a visible allusion to a famous saying from Chinese classical literature: "Let a hundred flowers bloom, let a hundred schools compete", used by Mao Zedong in 1957 to suppress his political opponents. In 1989, Beijing students, believing in the policy of liberalization, began to speak freely about the situation in the country, but as a result they were subjected to a brutal massacre.

Robert Barnett, a well-known Tibetologist from Columbia University, notes that "the distinctive features of Tsering Oser's poetic work are impressionism, allegory, insight, and mysterious imagination" [Barnett, 2014]. It seems that Auxerre's early poetic work was influenced by traditional Chinese poetry and literature. In the future, she gradually moves away from poetry.

Wang Lixiong's development as a writer and thinker took place in a completely different atmosphere. He was born in 1953 in Changchun, Jilin Province, northeast China. His father, Wang Shaolin, committed suicide in prison in 1968 during the Cultural Revolution. Prior to that, he held a senior position at a machine - building factory, where future Chinese President Jiang Zemin is said to have been among his subordinates (some believe this is the reason that Wang Jr. and his wife are not subject to prolonged arrests, despite their dissent) [Barnett, 2009, p. 21]. Because of my father's "crimes" in 1969. Wang Lixiong was sent to the village for re-education by labor and was rehabilitated four years later for his exemplary work. He was allowed to enter Jilin Technical University as a student of worker-peasant-soldier origin (gongnongbingdaxuesheng), despite his real roots (Wang Lixiong's mother was a writer, worked at the Changchun Film Studio).

After graduating from the university from 1977 to 1980. Wang worked as a mechanic in engineering factories in Jilin and Wuhan. While still working as a correctional laborer in the village, he began writing poetry, and in his student years he began working on a project for a future alternative political system. In 1978, when he was a worker, he published his first story in the famous magazine "Today" ("Jintian"). Two years later, in the wake of the Chinese perestroika, he decided to leave the factory and become a writer. At first, like his mother, he was engaged in screenplays, and in 1983 he published the novella " Victim of the motor system "("Youngdongji huanzhe"). "Like all of his subsequent literary works, it was an allegorical, futuristic commentary on contemporary Chinese politics, describing one peasant's attempts to invent an incredible machine in order to lift his family out of poverty" [Barnett, 2014].

In the mid-1980s, a free creative atmosphere prevailed in Chinese literature and art, writers and artists were looking for new forms of self-expression, and works based on personal experience, experiences, search for roots, and their identity became popular. Wang Lixiong, like many creative people, went to the far outskirts of the country in search of life experience and impressions.

In 1984. Wang Lixiong made his first trip to Tibet. This was actually the "way to the source": he reached the upper reaches of the Yellow River, and then swam alone 1200 km down the river on a raft made of car tires. His journey formed the basis of the book "Swimming", published by him in 1988. Since that time, he has devoted serious attention to environmental issues, becoming in 1994 one of the organizers of the first Chinese NGO " Friends of Nature "("Ziran zhi you"). Thanks to the raft trip, he first encountered a completely different world, located outside of Chinese civilization, and looked into the mysterious space of Tibetan culture.

In the late 1980s. Wang Lixiong decided to move to Beijing because he wanted to live in the cultural and political center of the country. In 1988, he joined the Writers ' Union of the People's Republic of China and began writing his first novel, Yellow Trouble (Huanghuo).-

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celebrated it in Taiwan under the pseudonym Baomi (Keep it a Secret) [Baomi, 1991]. The novel was in three volumes and totaled 1060 pages.

"I wrote my manuscript with a pen, then spent 500 yuan-almost half of my annual income - on a computer set. The typed text was copied to floppy disks, and then distributed to all my friends, " recalls Wang Lixiong [Law]. The novel aroused overwhelming interest among the public. It became one of the 100 most influential novels of the 20th century, according to the Hong Kong magazine "Asia Weekly" ("Yazhou zhoukan"), and became a bestseller in Hong Kong and Taiwan. Banned in mainland China, it was distributed in numerous self-published copies throughout the country.

Wang Lixiong's imagination conjured up an apocalyptic picture of the horrific catastrophe that engulfed China due to the unprecedented flood of the Yellow River, which led to bankruptcy, political assassinations, and finally the collapse of the CCP and the collapse of the country. The hero of the novel, Shi Ge, an adviser to the top leadership of China, during the period of severe crisis caused by flooding, believes that it is necessary to move away from the ongoing course of continuous economic development, and suggests other ways. Following his advice, the CCP's general secretary has taken some measures to avert the crisis, including revising decisions on the Tiananmen Square events of 1989 and ceding Manchuria to Japan because of its huge debt. The party wing of the "hawks", led by the security forces, perceives the measures taken as a manifestation of the weakness of the leadership, organizes the assassination of the general secretary and forms the fascist authorities. Shi Ge, being in disgrace, deals with environmental issues. This is followed by the collapse of the state and the civil war, in which Taiwan stands on the side of the southern provinces. A global nuclear war begins.

In addition to the exciting plot, the image of the adviser is of great interest in the novel. Sinologist Remy Quesnel writes: "In the Chinese context, jinan 5to. Of course, it is perfectly acceptable to relate Wang Lixiong to the character of Shi Ge, who was both the conscience and the savior of humanity, ready to cooperate with all types of regime - the CCP, the fascist military, the administration formed by foreign powers - to save the people and humanism, which transcends temporary considerations of honor and morality" [Quesnel, 2003].

After the Yellow Disaster, Wang Lixiong began writing a book on political theory, which he worked on from 1991 to 1994. It was published in 1998 in Hong Kong under the title "Distribution of Power - a multi-level electoral system" [Wang Lixiong, 1998], and the author considers it his main work. The essence of the system is that it applies to the whole of China, in which all provinces, including Tibet, become independent self-governing units. The multi-level electoral system proposed by Wang Lixiong starts from the lowest level of the village community. The members of the community choose their own head, then the village heads choose their representative to the next level of administrative power, and so on up to the very top of state power (for more details, see [Garri, 2009, pp. 282-288]). The main thing, according to Wang Lixiong, is not to turn Chinese democracy into a large electoral arena in which parliamentarians are directly elected, which becomes a source of nationalism, given the many nationalities inhabiting the country. The system of multi-level elections proposed by him resembles, in his words, the system of governance in the empire of Genghis Khan, when centurions elected thousands, leaders of Tumen (ten thousand), etc. up to the circle of the khan's closest advisers [Interview..., 2014]. So, a large election arena is divided into many small ones, in each of which

Zhinan 5 is literally "the receptacle of wisdom", similar in meaning to the term Junzi "noble husband". These terms are traditionally used in relation to a sage who gives his knowledge to the ruler in the name of serving his country and its people.

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everyone is familiar with each other and can choose a truly worthy representative of their interests. As a result, each nationality elects its main representative, and the leaders of all nationalities, including Han, decide state issues on the basis of coordination, rather than narrow national interests.

In addition to writing and analytical work, Wang Lixiong actively promotes his ideas on the future democratic structure of China on the Chinese Internet. He runs a website specifically dedicated to multi-level democracy. It contains hundreds of articles by various authors, analyzes their positive and negative aspects, and has pages designed for forums and current events. Wang Lixiong's website was temporarily closed in 2002, but then reopened (Quesnel, 2006).

After graduating from the university in 1988, Tsering Oser began working as a correspondent and editor for the Ganzi Newspaper publishing House in Sichuan Province. Two years later, she was hired to work on the editorial board of the Tibetan Literature Magazine (Xizang wenxue) of the Tibetan Branch of the Chinese Writers ' Union in Lhasa. At that time, Tsering Auxerre was still far from social and political activity. Poetry filled all her thoughts. R. Barnett writes:

"Tibetans like Auxerre almost never came in contact with dissident people, most of whom were monks, nuns or merchants. At that time, few Tibetan students, intellectuals, artists, or civil servants could afford to have any connection with those who were captured during the Lhasa riots, and no one with a high position in the bureaucracy dared to talk about political issues" [Barnett, 2014].

Although political control remained tight, living conditions in Tibet became much better, which somehow brought Tibetans into line with reality. The efforts of the Tibetan intelligentsia at that time were aimed at reviving and developing Tibetan culture without touching on political issues. Since the mid-1980s, more and more educated Tibetans have become writers, poets, or artists.

Tsering Oser's return to her native Lhasa can be called her new birth. Not very religious and not having received a traditional Tibetan upbringing, it is here that she found her true place. When she first came to the Jokhang Temple and saw the main shrine of Tibetans - the precious statue of Shakyamuni Buddha, she burst into tears: "I'm home, I'm really home," she repeated to herself [Law].

Tsering Auxerre continued to write poetry. In her lyrics, poetic allusions to political events became noticeable. In the poem" December", she writes:

Listen to me! Big lies stain the sky.
Two sparrows will fall in the forest...
"Tibet," you will say, " everything is fine in Tibet, it is flourishing "6.

The title suggests that it refers to the events of December 1995, when the authorities elected a different Panchen Lama to oppose the boy approved by the Dalai Lama. Two sparrows are most likely these two children, who will both become victims of a political confrontation hidden behind the empty rhetoric of the authorities. Tsering Auxerre's colleagues, who read between the lines, warned her about the possible consequences, but it was for this collection of poetry that Tsering Auxerre received her first and last state prize.

"I felt that poetry was useless. It cannot fully express what is happening, " says Auxerre. The allegorical and metaphorical nature of her poetry is replaced by the simplicity and immediacy of her prose. Wang Lixiong, whom she has already met, encourages and supports her in her endeavor.

6 Translated from English by I. R. Garry po: [Law].

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About her mature years, which coincided with her return to Lhasa, Tsering Oser writes: "In middle age, she wrote novels and short stories, described the life of the Tibetan people, faced with numerous problems of reality that could not be avoided, gradually saw the greatness and suffering of Tibet" [Ciren Weise ziliao].

In Lhasa, Tsering Oser made friends with lamas, and for the first time heard stories from Tibetans about their suffering during the turbulent history of Tibet. So she had the desire to write down all these stories and make them public. In 2003. She completed a collection of short stories called "Tibetan Notes" (Ciren Weise, 2003). These were stories about ordinary Tibetans, their daily lives, feelings, and sufferings. A long search for a publisher began. It was found in southern China in Guangzhou, where there was no such censorship as in Tibet and Beijing, although the fact that the book was published at all was already a miracle. However, as soon as the news of her appearance reached Lhasa, the book was immediately banned, and Tsering Auxerre got into trouble. The Tibetan Autonomous Region Literature and Arts Association, of which Auxerre was a member, issued the following statement: "It exaggerates and embellishes the positive role of religion in social life. Stories about people betray faith and deep respect for the Dalai Lama. The content of some of her stories reveals her rigid views on nationalism and views that harm the unity and solidarity of our nation "[Wang Lixiong, Tsering Shakya, 2009, p. 117].

The book ban was followed by the dismissal of Auxerre from the editorial office of the journal "Tibetan Literature", although before that she was supposed to be deputy editor-in-chief. In addition to being criticized and scrutinized, she was pressured to formally denounce and reject the Dalai Lama. It was too much for her to do this, and realizing that she was powerless against the system, Tsering Oser decided to leave Tibet for Beijing, where she took refuge in Wang Lixiong's house. They were married a year later.

It is clear that Wang Lixiong's involvement in the life of Chinese national minorities and his acquaintance with Tsering Auxerre had a great influence on his work. After his first raft trip, he visited the Tibetan lands again and again for 15 years, living there for a total of more than two years. His work on Tibet and Xinjiang has earned him recognition as the most thoughtful and respected expert in the region, even among Chinese nationalists. In 1998, he published a book about Tibet called "Heavenly Burial: The Fate of Tibet" (600 pages) (Wang Lixiong, 1998). In it, the author argues that the modernization of Tibet failed because it was brought in from the outside, without the desire of the people and taking into account their culture, and the Tibetan economy did not become self-sufficient, since the only driving force for its development was the huge subsidies of the center. The result of this policy was a sharp polarization of Tibetan society. The Tibetan nomenklatura, which receives high salaries, has proved to be the main force benefiting from the center's policies, and therefore it is not interested in a positive solution to the Tibetan issue, is afraid of losing its privileges and does not want the Dalai Lama to return. This book, like Wang Lixiong's other works on Tibet, was enthusiastically received by the Chinese intelligentsia, especially the Chinese diaspora, who saw them as a way to solve the Tibetan problem and respond to Western criticism without harming China.

His book, as one of the few written by Han Chinese who truly reflects Tibetan reality, was highly appreciated by the Tibetan intelligentsia inside the PRC. It was also known in the Tibetan diaspora, so the Dalai Lama himself invited Wang Lixiong to Dharamasala. He could not go there, but met with His Holiness in the United States. As a result of the meeting, he wrote an article entitled "The Dalai Lama is the key to resolving the Tibetan issue", in which he expressed the opinion that reaching an agreement between the Chinese government and the Dalai Lama is a key basis for resolving the Tibetan issue [Wang Lixiong, 2008].

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Among the author's earliest works on the Tibetan question is the article "Reflections on Tibet" [Wang Lixiong, Tsering Shakya, 2009, p. 37-81], which caused a sharp controversy with the well-known scholar of Tibetan origin Tsering Shakya. In it, the author interprets the history of Tibet from a completely different, seemingly paradoxical point of view and raises the most painful issue for Tibetans, namely the active participation of Tibetans themselves in the destruction of their monasteries during the Cultural Revolution. This work drew sharp criticism from Tsering Shakya, who saw it as a sinocentric, essentially colonial approach to the Tibetan problem. It is possible that as a result of this criticism, and also because of his acquaintance with Tsering Auxerre, Wang Lixiong's views changed significantly in the next few years, although the accusation of "racial bias" against Wang Lixiong is hardly fair.

I think that Wang Lixiong is most interested in the issues of a reasonable and fair state structure of his country, in which all citizens, regardless of nationality, will enjoy the same rights and jointly decide state affairs. Sinologist R. Quesnel says that the political system proposed by Wang Lixiong is "utopia in the best sense of the word, since it is not feasible and is represented by an imaginary ideal government" (Quesnel, 2006).

It is difficult to agree with this statement. While Wang Lixiong's literary works fit well into the category of dystopias, his analytical works mark him out as "Wang the mechanic, who dispassionately examines the system and discovers parts that require radical dismantling "(Barnett, 2009, p. 22). Wang Lixiong is convinced that with the further development of China, ethnic problems will become the main challenge for it. In "Reflections on Tibet" (2002), as well as in the works on Xinjiang, which will be discussed later, the author predicts a serious aggravation of ethnic problems in Xinjiang and Tibet. While writing Reflections on Tibet, Wang Lixiong noted that "Tibet is flourishing like never before in history," but Tibetans are not becoming more loyal to the PRC, as the Dalai Lama lives in the heart of each of them. According to the author, it would be a mistake to consider this situation more stable than in 1987. Then there were only monks and young people there, but now the opposition is maturing among cadres, intellectuals, and civil servants. Currently, only the Dalai Lama carries the two banners of religion and nation for Tibetans, embodying the status of spiritual and national leader, and there is no opposition force that can compete with him. Concluding the article, the author states: "Historically and morally, reforms were absolutely necessary. But they did not solve the Tibetan issue to anyone's satisfaction, and today all parties to the conflict have every reason to fear the future. New ways of solving the problem should be found" [Wang Lixiong, 2009, p. 81].

The highest priority in resolving ethnic problems, according to Wang Lixiong, is to avoid war. The best solution, as he wrote in his early works, is a single state, since the path of independence is an unrealistic choice for China's national minorities, given the huge difference in the number of people, economic and military strength of the parties. In a single state, a system should be chosen in which the freedom and autonomy of each ethnic group will be fully ensured, as well as the unity of China will be guaranteed. Neither the existing system of China, nor the democratic system of the West, nor the Middle Way of the Dalai Lama are suitable systems. The democratic system, according to the author, encourages competitive struggle of elites, which is not suitable for the inexperienced Tibetan electorate. With the sudden democratization of Tibet, the hottest topic in the election campaign will be the suppression of the Tibetan people by Han China. Any position other than fighting China will look like weakness or cowardice, which will inevitably lead to an escalation of relations. The Dalai Lama's Middle Way is also the basics-

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It is based on a Western-style democratic foundation and does not guarantee the unity of China. His proposed system of multi-level elections could be a good solution, but Wang Lixiong does not consider it a panacea and is still looking for ways to best resolve the ethnic, read national, issue.

Speaking about Wang Lixiong's views on the national question in China, it is impossible not to dwell on his work on Xinjiang. Back in 1999, he spent one month in prison in Urumqi for attempting to informally investigate the situation in Xinjiang, where he tried to commit suicide because he felt that he had compromised himself during the interrogation. After his experiences in Xinjiang, he wrote a unique critical study, "Memories of Xinjiang" ("Xinjiang zhuiji"), which was published in Taiwan in 2001. In this work, he wrote:

"I was able to experience firsthand the feelings of national minorities, putting myself in their shoes, and therefore once and for all destroyed the last remnants of nationalism that still existed in me; I learned from my own experience the weakness of human nature... I hated autocratic tyranny much more than before. Having crossed the line between life and death, I can now adapt to any situation. The courage that I begged heaven to grant me entered my soul quietly, like rain watering the earth." according to: [Quesnel, 2003]).

Although his investigation failed because of his arrest, Wang Lixiong received an unexpected source of information in the form of interviews with Uighur prisoners with whom he had to share a cell. His 2001 book on Xinjiang is largely a reflection on his experiences with Uighur prisoners.

In 2007 Wang Lixiong has created a new book called "My Western China, Your Eastern Turkestan" ("Wode xiyu, nide Dongtu"). 7 years after the book was published, on March 1, 2014, the Kunming incident occurred, when several Uighur terrorists stabbed 33 people to death and wounded 140 others at the Kunming Railway Station. Wang Lixiong, when asked to comment on the reasons for the atrocity, said that he predicted all this in his book. Here are some excerpts from it:

"When the Uighurs start a jihad against Chinese rule, will other Muslim Caucasians, Afghans, or rich Arabs side with them? The separatists are very well aware that they cannot stand up to China alone, so they always see their problem from a broader global perspective. I heard them talk about Xinjiang's geopolitics, the world of Islam, and the international community, and I was struck by their broad vision. When the time comes, Xinjiang will spontaneously organize riots and unplanned bombings, prepared armed actions and improvised terrorist attacks. The Uighur diaspora will be involved, and international Islamists will also provide support. If all these conditions are combined, the conflict will inevitably escalate. It will be very difficult for the Han Chinese to take control of Xinjiang, and once the hatred is unleashed, there will be no end to it, the killings will be insane and inhumane." [http://woeser.middle-way.nct/search?updated-max=2014-03-10T17:04:00%2B08:00&max-r esults=30&start=16&by-date=false].

If earlier Wang Lixiong hoped that the solution of China's ethnic problems would be possible within the framework of a single Chinese state, now in the light of the new development of the situation in China, Russia and the world as a whole, he seems to be less sure. During our interview, Wang Lixiong said:

"It is obvious that China is now facing very big changes. From the outside, it seems that China is a very powerful and stable country, but it has the same problems as the Soviet Union before its collapse. Whether China will collapse in the same way as the USSR, I do not know. But it is quite obvious that he will have the same challenges, since an autocratic regime cannot exist forever. Therefore, I am interested in the form in which the national question will exist by this time, what will be the explosion and how to resolve it" [Interview..., 2014].

The biggest danger in the case of rapid democratization of China, in his opinion, is that the Chinese government may lose control of the process, resulting in high risks of uncontrolled transformation and general chaos.

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According to Wang Lixiong, the Russian experience of democratization, its achievements and mistakes are extremely important for China.

Returning to the biography of our heroes, let me remind you that after moving from Lhasa to Beijing in 2003 and marrying Wang Lixiong, Tsering Oser began to process the materials collected in Tibet. In her autobiography, she writes::

"After that, in the light of history and modernity, in order to record the people and events of the beloved Tibetan plain, I began to write non-fictional works. Old literary experiences have been replaced by a sense of history and duty "[Ciren Weise ziliao].

In 2004, the Chinese Tourism Publishing house published her illustrated notes on Tibet "Dark Red Map" (Ciren Weise, 2004), which were also banned by the authorities. Since that time, Tsering Oser's works have not been published in any other Chinese publishing houses, magazines, or media outlets.

In 2006, two of her books were published in Taiwan. The first one is called " Forbidden Memory "[Ciren Weise, 2006 (1)] (tib. Shartse) She devoted herself to the images of the Cultural Revolution in the history of Tibet and their analysis. The book is based on materials and photographs taken by Tsering Oser's father and colleagues in Lhasa during the Cultural Revolution. The second book, "Memories of Tibet" (Ciren Weise, 2006 (2)), is also an image of the Cultural Revolution, compiled from oral stories told by elderly Tibetans. All Tsering Oser books published abroad are banned in China, they are not allowed to be transported, and they are confiscated at customs. Her name is banned on the Chinese Internet and is deleted at the first appearance. Her blog on Sina.com deleted more than 10 times.

Another major change in Auxerre's life occurred in 2008.

"At that time, the widespread Tibetan protests led to a massacre, the Chinese government monopolized all information, tried to force the whole world to listen only to distorted information given to them by the stream in unthinkable quantities. I made my written works "evidence" of time. Since that time, I have made all my works, blogs, a special radio program, Twitter, Facebook, as well as everything expressed in the media, "One-man media", they began to say about me "the power of one person opposes the giant state propaganda machine" [Ciren Weise ziliao].

The Auxerre blog was opened in 2005, but was closed three times by a Chinese server. In 2007 she started using the Google server, but was also repeatedly attacked by hackers. Currently used blog "Invisible Tibet" (http://woeser.middle-way.net) is the fifth in a row on the Google server, created in June 2008, its passwords were periodically hacked by hackers. This site is blocked in China, and you can only visit it if you bypass the "great firewall" - the Chinese system for blocking unwanted sites. But even with these measures, the number of visitors to the Auxerre site reached more than 12 million. At the same time, Oser's blogs on various servers are constantly attacked, Skype and mail are hacked, and all this is organized and sanctioned, in her opinion, by the Chinese government.

Tsering Oser and Wang Lixiong's lives changed after a wave of large-scale Tibetan protests in 2008 before the opening of the Beijing Olympic Games. Auxerre became an unwitting spokesperson for the Tibetan people and a commentator on the Tibetan protest movement, while Wang Lixiong took on the responsibility of bringing Tibet and Xinjiang issues to the attention of the authorities and Han Chinese in general. Their work sparked a major intellectual debate in China about the situation in Tibet, so that when Wang Lixiong organized a public appeal to the government in March 2008 calling for a review of policy in Tibet, it was signed by more than 300 scholars and intellectuals in China. Since that time, warnings, interrogations, detentions, summons to prison, searches, and house arrests have become routine for both spouses.

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In 2011, Auxerre's role as a reporter on events in Tibet was expanded to include a new role as a commentator on the unprecedented self-immolation protest movement. Auxerre keeps a chronicle of self-immolations, records all cases, examines the circumstances of what happened, finds out the biographies of those who committed suicide in such a terrible way, studies their suicide messages, analyzes the reasons for this movement. Let's focus on one of her posts analyzing this movement [http://woeser.middle-way.net/2014_04_01_archive.html].

Since 2009, when the first self-immolation of a monk of the Kirti monastery in Ngaba district named Tapei took place, there have been 137 cases to date. Most self-immolations occurred in November and March 2012. March is the "sensitive month" of each year, as it was the month of the memorable 1959 Tibetan uprising, and it is in March that Tibetans organize the most numerous protests. According to Tsering Oser, " every year the authorities prepare for March, as for a meeting with their most important enemy." In November 2012, the 18th CPC National Congress was held, where a new generation of Chinese leaders was approved. Then there was a peak in the number of self-immolations - 28 people committed suicide. During the eight days that the meeting lasted, people burned themselves alive almost daily.

In her assessment of this terrible movement of Tibetans for their rights, Tsering Oser stated::

"After becoming a self-immolation commentator and giving interviews to numerous people from outside, I always emphasize that Tibetan self-immolations are not suicides, but self-sacrifice! These self-immolations cannot be measured by Buddhist precepts; they are the result of modern politics. This raging flame is lit by national oppression, this is the Tibetan torch that illuminates the darkness, this is the continuation of the protests of 2008, namely the most fearless and forced continuation, as the monks of Sera Monastery said :" We stand up! " And, finally, the Tibetan self-immolations are a very obvious political protest, and not a protest of any other nature"[ibid.].

Of course, such statements as Auxerre and Wang Lixiong make cause a negative reaction from the authorities. No matter how many applications Auxerre applied for, she was always denied a passport. She has received 12 international awards, but has never been able to receive them herself. In 2012, Brown University in the United States invited her as a guest writer for one year, but the police directly stated Auxerre: "The State Security Service of the People's Republic of China prohibits you from traveling abroad, cannot issue you a passport." In March 2013, Auxerre won the US State Department's International Women of Courage Awards. During the award ceremony, which was led by John Kerry and Michelle Obama. Auxerre was under house arrest in Beijing.

According to R. Barnett, " she is the only Tibetan in China who continues to challenge censorship and directly tell foreigners about political events in Tibet. It is a unique historical aberration in the last 60 years, a critical voice that continues to speak out from within the country in a world and at a time when all others have already fallen silent "[Barnett, 2014].

It so happened that on July 9, 2014, in Beijing, just before the departure of our group of Buryat researchers to China, John Kerry visited China and the 6th round of US-China strategic cooperation, which was supposed to "reset" relations between the parties. At the same time, I learned from the blog Tsering Oser that during the two days of John Kerry's visit, she and her husband were not allowed out of the house by people in civilian clothes who were located in their entrance. Later, during our meeting, Tsering Oser said that she received a call from the American embassy and was invited to lunch with the Secretary of State, so they simply stopped letting them out of the house to prevent contacts with the American side.

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Analyzing the life and work of Tsering Auxerre and Wang Lixiong, one might wonder: how do they manage to stay free, unlike many other political prisoners in the PRC? It seems that the reason lies in the combination of several circumstances. First, it should be recognized that although China is, according to Wang Lixiong, an autocratic state, it is no longer the totalitarian state that existed during the time of Mao Zedong. Despite ideological dictates and official censorship, the ubiquity of the Internet means that the Chinese government is no longer able to control the ideological space, as the Internet activity of Tsering Oser, Wang Lixiong and many other political activists eloquently demonstrates. Secondly, Tsering Oser and Wang Lixiong are not representatives of the systemic opposition (in fact, there is no such opposition in China). They are outside the system, categorically avoiding any "immoral" connections with it, which gives them greater freedom, since their independence reduces the possibility of pressure on them. Nevertheless, it is difficult to attribute them to the so-called non-system opposition. Their activities are purely intellectual and take place inside China. Despite their sharp criticism of the government's policies, they do not engage in opposition political activities, do not call for the overthrow of the government, for the introduction of Western democracy in the country, which, in fact, they do not consider suitable for the PRC. In the context of the concept of a "wise adviser to the ruler", they are quite inclined to compromise with the authorities if the latter listens to their advice. Third, they have acquired, despite all the prohibitions on their intellectual products, a relative reputation at home and abroad, which also creates some protective effect, especially in the context of China's great integration into the world economy and the international community. However, there is no doubt that their "freedom" is still a relative concept.

Finishing the description of the life and activities of our heroes, we recall the words of Deng Xiaoping, who said that you need to "cross the river, extracting stones from the bottom" and " evaluate a cat by its ability to catch mice, and not by its color." This means that policies should be implemented in accordance with the specific situation and adapt it to changes in society. This pragmatic stance has helped China reform its economy and become a world leader. It is possible that the same pragmatic position of the Chinese leadership, coupled with the selfless work of such outstanding personalities as Tsering Auxer, Wang Lixiong and others like them, will also allow China to gradually reform its political system without conflict and violence.

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Bao Mi. Huanghuo. Taipei, 1991.

Barnett R. Introduction // Tsering Woeser and Wang Lixiong. Voices from Tibet / Ed. and Transl. by Violet S. Law. Hong Kong, 2014 (eBook)

Barnett R. Introduction // Wang Lixiong & Tsering Shakya. The struggle for Tibet. London New York, 2009. P. 1-33.

Ciren Weise ziliao (Autobiography of Tsering Auxerre). Manuscript (from the author's archive).

Ciren Weise. Shape. Taiwan, 2006 (1).

Ciren Weise. Tuwen youji "Jianghongsede ditu". Zhongguo luyou chubanshe, 2004.

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Garri I.R. Buddizm i politika v Tibetskom raione KNR. Ulan-Ude: Izdatel'stvo BNTs, 2009. = Garry I. R. Buddhism and Politics in the Tibet region of the People's Republic of China Ulan-Ude: BSC Publishing House, 2009.

http://woeser.middle-way.net/2014/06/blog-post_4.html (last accessed on 11.10.2014).

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http://woeser.middle-way.net/search?updated-max=2014-03-10T17:04:00%2B08:00&max-re sults=30&start=16&by-date=false

Interview with Tsering Woeser and Wang Lixiong, July 2014 (field research by Irina Garri). = Interview with Tsering Oser and Wang Lixiong, July 2014 (author's field materials).

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Invisible Tibet // http://woeser.middle-way.net/2014/06/blog-posl_4.html.

Law S. Violet. Two's company: dissident literary couple Tsering Woeser and Wang Lixiong // Post Magazine. http://www.scmp.com/magazines/post-magazine/article/1406144/twos-company-dissiden t-literary-couple-tsering-woeser-and (Последнее посещение 11.10.2014).

Quesnel R. Wang Lixiong, an atypical intellectual // China Perspectives [Online], 50 [November december 2003; Online since 31 July 2006 (http://chinaperspectives.revues.org/776). Last request: 15.10.2014.

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Wang Lixiong. Reflections on Tibet // Wang Lixiong & Tsering Shakya. The struggle for Tibet. London New York, 2009. P. 37-81.

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Woeser. "Print Lor Certain Prejudices" / Tr. Fiona Sze-Lorrain. Cited in: Barnett R. Introduction // Tsering Woeser and Wang Lixiong. Voices from Tibet / Ed. and Transl. by Violet S. Law. Hong Kong, 2014 (eBook).

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