Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung — Quotations from Chairman Mao Tse-tung

What kind of book is this

A quotation collection compiled by the General Political Department of the PLA and first issued in 1966. Thirty-three chapters, 411 entries, each carrying its source. In the second half of the twentieth century it was one of the most-printed books in the Chinese-speaking world, and it was translated into many languages.

The thirty-three chapters are not thirty-three essays. They are thirty-three topical drawers: the editors lifted sentences from thirty years of articles, speeches and documents and filed them by theme. So you can open the book at any chapter, or read just one.

This site does three things: it reproduces the original text and cites each entry; it restores every quotation to the time and occasion of its delivery (the 'background' panel on the right); and it offers the 1966 English translation for comparison. The rest of the judgement is left to the reader.

Base text: PLA General Political Dept., 1966 revised edition
Chapters: 33
Entries: 411 (each sourced)
English: Peking FLP, 1966 (422 entries)
Nature: Documentary edition — text as published, no comment

Most-quoted lines

click to read the original and its source

Chapter6

Imperialism and all reactionaries are paper tigers

Chapter 6 title, and the most widely circulated line in the book.

Chapter23

No investigation, no right to speak

Chapter 23. Stresses that conclusions must follow investigation.

Chapter17

Serve the people

Chapter 17 title, from the 8 Sept 1944 eulogy for Zhang Side.

Chapter1

Policy and tactics are the life of the Party

End of Chapter 1; execution-level policy cannot be sloppy.

Chapter1

A single spark can start a prairie fire

Describes how a small base area can grow into a large situation.

Chapter11

The masses are the true heroes

Chapter 11. The practitioner's knowledge precedes book knowledge.

Four ways to read

pick one to begin

First read

Chapters 3 (Socialism and communism), 17 (Serve the people) and 22 (Methods of thinking and work) - the three most often quoted.

For methodology

Chapters 22 and 23 are the longest and most re-quoted.

For the military

Chapters 5-9 run from the view of war to people's war.

For conduct

Chapters 17, 19, 20, 21 on service, heroism, thrift and self-reliance.

All thirty-three chapters

grouped by theme into five clusters

Stand & path

The first five chapters state the editors' theoretical stand: party, class, social system, handling contradiction, and the view of war.

01The Communist Party 02Classes and Class Struggle 03Socialism and Communism 04The Correct Handling of Contradictions Among the People 05War and Peace

5 chapters · 95 entries

Enemy & strategy

How to size up the enemy and how to fight. The paper-tiger judgement and the organization of people's war live here.

06Imperialism and All Reactionaries are Paper Tigers 07Dare To Struggle and Dare To Win 08People's War 09The People's Army

4 chapters · 38 entries

Building the army

Seven chapters on how an army is organized: party committees, the masses, political work, officers and soldiers, the three democracies, training.

10Leadership of Party Committees 11The Mass Line 12Political Work 13Relations Between Officers and Men 14Relations Between the Army and the People 15Democracy in the Three Main Fields 16Education and the Training of Troops

7 chapters · 84 entries

Character & style

Service, internationalism, heroism, thrift, self-reliance - the conduct the editors wanted readers to form.

17Serving the People 18Patriotism and Internationalism 19Revolutionary Heroism 20Building Our Country Through Diligence and Frugality 21Self-Reliance and Arduous Struggle

5 chapters · 44 entries

Method & cultivation

The largest group: epistemology, investigation, correcting errors, unity, discipline, criticism, and specific demands on Party members, cadres, youth and women.

22Methods of Thinking and Methods of Work 23Investigation and Study 24Correcting Mistaken Ideas 25Unity 26Discipline 27Criticism and Self-Criticism 28Communists 29Cadres 30Youth 31Women 32Culture and Art 33Study

12 chapters · 150 entries

Six themes

re-read the book across chapters

Where knowledge comes from - practice, investigation, judgement

Chapters 22 and 23

From the masses, to the masses - the mass line and methods of work

Chapters 10, 11, 12

Paper tigers and people's war - the book's view of war

Chapters 5-9

Serve the people - the conduct the book demands

Chapters 17-21

The machinery of error-correction - criticism, self-criticism, rectification

Chapters 24, 27, 28

Why the book ends on 'study'

Chapters 30-33

People who appear in the book

speaker, sources, models and opponents

Mao ZedongSpeaker of the book★★★★★Karl MarxIntellectual source★★★★☆Vladimir LeninIntellectual source★★★★☆Friedrich EngelsIntellectual source★★★☆☆Joseph StalinIntellectual source★★★☆☆Zhou EnlaiContemporary★★★★☆

All 13 people

Three decades behind the quotations

1927-1965

The book's 411 entries span about four decades (1927-1965). Below they are listed by period with the nodes directly related to the quotations' sources, each tagged with the chapter(s) to read alongside. Years come from the source dates the entries themselves cite - no guessing.

Agrarian revolutionary war 1927—1937
1927'Report on an investigation of the peasant movement in Hunan' written (March), a 32-day field study; source of Chapter 31's first entry and many in Chapter 23.
1929Gutian resolution 'On correcting mistaken ideas in the Party' (December), the main source of Chapter 24.
War of Resistance against Japan 1937—1945
1937'On Practice' (July), 'On Contradiction' (August), 'Combat liberalism' (September) - core sources of Chapters 22 and 24.
1938'Problems of strategy in guerrilla war against Japan' and 'On protracted war' (May), 'The role of the Chinese Communist Party in the national war' (October).
War of Liberation 1945—1949
1945'The situation and our policy after the victory in the war of resistance' (13 Aug), source of Chapter 21's first entry; 'On the Chongqing negotiations' (October).
1947'The present situation and our tasks' (December), source of many in Chapters 2 and 5.
Nation-building & socialist transformation 1949—1956
1954Opening address to the First National People's Congress (15 Sept), source of Chapter 1's first entry.
1955'On the question of agricultural co-operation' (July), editor's notes to 'The socialist upsurge in China's countryside'; source of many in Chapters 3 and 11.
The exploration period & the book's making 1957—1966
1957'On the correct handling of contradictions among the people' (February) and 'Speech at the national propaganda conference' (March); the direct source of Chapter 4.
1963'Where do correct ideas come from?' (May), on the two leaps of the cognitive process; an important source of Chapter 22.

See the full chronology