“Iron And Silk” Author Brings Experiences In China To High Country By Mike Shands Tai Chi and Wu Dang WuShu KungFu Master Aiping Cheng performs a demonstration with a broad sword. Photo AP One concert changed Mark Salzman’s life. An accomplished cellist, Salzman planned to major in the instrument at Yale University until a Yo-Yo Ma concert helped convince him that music wasn’t his primary calling. He changed his major to Chinese language and philosophy and eventually went to China after graduating from college in the early 1980s. One result of that trip was “Iron and Silk,” Salzman’s nonfiction account of his experiences living and working in China. The novel was a finalist for the Pulitzer Prize for nonfiction and received the Christopher Award. The book is Appalachian State University’s summer reading program selection, and Salzman will be ASU’s Convocation speaker this month. He will also appear at the Watauga County Public Library. Thursday, Sept. 8 Salzman will speak at the Holmes Convocation Center at 10 a.m. He will hold an open question-and-answer session and book signing at 1:30 p.m. on the ASU campus and a reading and book signing at 7:30 p.m. in the Student Union’s Blue Ridge Ballroom. He will hold a reading and question-and-answer session at the Watauga County Public Library Friday, Sept. 9 at 10 a.m. Salzman, whose mother was a concert pianist, grew up playing the cello and appeared destined to continue his education in classical music at Yale. But just a few days before entering college he attended a concert by world-renowned cellist Yo-Yo Ma. “Seeing how much he enjoyed himself and loved the cello, I realized there was something wrong with my whole approach,” Salzman said. “I approached it not as something I loved, but as a means of gaining an adult identity. Many children look at (music) as a way to please their parents.” The concert helped Salzman realize that there must be something he enjoyed more than music so he quickly changed his major. Because of his lifelong interest in Kung Fu and other martial arts he chose Chinese language and philosophy. After graduating from Yale Salzman traveled to China, where he spent two years teaching English at Hunan Medical College and studying traditional martial arts. That time in China formed the basis for Salzman’s first book. “It’s a fish-out-of-water story,” Salzman said. “When I got there, I felt very homesick because I had never traveled much. “The country didn’t resemble what I ‘d hoped it would. I had been studying classical China, but this was a China struggling to enter the modern age. “I wanted to learn martial arts, but all my students wanted to know about was Michael Jackson.” Living with a one-party dictatorship took some getting used to for Salzman. “It was at the height of the Cold War era. Everyone wore Mao suits. I wore a Mao suit,” he said. “At that time very few people had the opportunity to choose their own professions or where they would live. The government chose what you would study in college and assigned you a work location. Monks pose for photos in the cemetery of the Shaolin Monastery. Phot AP “There were tense moments for me when the government was encouraging anti-western movements, but I never felt afraid for my life or freedom. It was whether I would be permitted to continue to pursue my martial arts studies.” The Chinese government’s attitudes helped foster an atmosphere of difficulty for anyone seeking new ways of doing things or those wanting to expand their knowledge, Salzman said. “In China the bureaucrats are frightened,” he said. “They don’t want to approve anything unusual for fear that they will be held responsible if anything goes wrong. It’s safer to say no.” After decades of working toward society’s common good some Chinese citizens are finally starting to discover the freedom of being able to talk openly about owning their own home or earning money on the side. “When I was there that was not allowed,” Salzman said. “But they are moving inevitably in that direction. As they become more prosperous they have more time to think about issues beyond just survival. “The desire to have more of a say in their own life seems kind of inevitable. They are at the same time repelled and fascinated by Western culture. They want the same things we do – personal happiness and success.” Salzman said China is much more of a family oriented society than the United Sates. “Young people don’t just decide when they’re 18 years old to move out, go to college or get a job,” he said. “There are often three generations living in the same house or apartment. Your personal needs are not the top priority – it is the family’s needs.” The Chinese also hold their teachers in much greater respect than Americans do, he said. “When I would enter the classroom the students stood up out of respect, even though most of them were older than I was,” Salzman said. “They invited me to their homes to make me feel appreciated. “One of my students was a surgeon, and he invited me to watch him do operations.” During his stay in China Salzman enjoyed studying martial arts. “It was thrilling. The quality of the athletes there was amazing,” he said. Members of the NG Family Martial Arts Group and the Allied Kung Fu Association perform the traditional lion and dragon dance to ward off evil spirits. Photo AP “Their profession is decided for them so from the age of 6 or 7 they’re in full-time training. It’s like their job. They’re more matter-of-fact about it. They’re not as romantic about it. They don’t think of it as being mysterious. “Here in America it’s more like a hobby. People romanticize about it more over here.” Salzman wanted to study martial arts thinking it would make him a changed person, but found out something else. “What it’s really about is discovering who you really are – becoming yourself,” he said. “It’s a means of learning that you cannot become someone else. You have no choice but to become who you really are.” Salzman’s latest work is a novel set in 13th century Mongolia during the Genghis Khan conquests. It deals with preemptive, uninhibited warfare, divine authority and escape.