Sidney Rittenberg


Sidney Rittenberg was an American journalist, scholar, and Chinese linguist who lived in China from 1944 to 1980. He worked closely with Mao Zedong, Zhu De, Zhou Enlai, and other leaders of the Chinese Communist Party during the Chinese Communist Revolution, and was with these central Communist leaders at Yan'an. He witnessed first-hand much of what occurred at upper levels of the CCP and knew many of its leaders personally, approving of the crackdown on dissidents. Later, he was imprisoned in solitary confinement, twice. He was the first American citizen to join the CCP.

Early life

Rittenberg was born into a Jewish family in Charleston, South Carolina and he lived there until his college studies. He was the son of Muriel and Sidney Rittenberg, who was president of the Charleston City Council. After attending Porter Military Academy, he turned down a full scholarship to Princeton University and instead attended the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where he majored in philosophy. While attending Chapel Hill, he became a member of the Dialectic Society and the US Communist Party. When he arrived in China, he was sent to bring a $26 check to the family of a girl who was killed by a drunken US soldier. Despite the family's devastation, they gave Rittenberg $6 for his help. It was at that point that "something inside Sidney Rittenberg shifted."

Interpreting for Mao

Rittenberg worked for the Xinhua News Agency and Radio Peking.

First imprisonment

In 1949, immediately before the formal surrender of Beijing to the Communists, Rittenberg said he was summoned to the capital and he went, expecting to play a role in promoting the Communist takeover to the rest of the world. In fact Rittenberg was arrested as a spy and placed in solitary confinement, reportedly because the Soviet Union had denounced him as a US agent. Rittenberg attributes his survival in solitary confinement to a poem by Edwin Markham:

Cultural Revolution

On his release in 1957 Rittenberg remained a strong supporter of Mao and actively and enthusiastically supported the Great Leap Forward. Later he was a supporter of the Cultural Revolution and briefly associated with Made Mao's inner circle - leading a group of rebels to take over the state broadcasting institution. On April 8, 1967, the People's Daily published a long article written by him.
Rittenberg said, though, that after he objected to the excesses of the period he was arrested and placed back in solitary confinement, from 1967 to 1977. On his release he emigrated to the United States.

General sources

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