Mobo Gao: Chinese leftist and academic. Born into a peasant family in a village in Jiangxi province. During the Cultural Revolution he worked for a time as a "barefoot teacher." He wrote The Battle for China's Past, an interesting book which deals mainly with the capitalist and imperialist smears of Mao as a blood-thirsty repressive fanatic. It disproves many of the baseless smears written and propagated against Mao and the Chinese communists during his time, as well as portraying the Cultural Revolution in a clear light, without exaggerations or smears. Also attacks the path that China took after the death of Mao, i.e. brutal capitalism with some elements of a welfare state. Dongping Han: Chinese academic who wrote The Unknown Cultural Revolution, which deals mainly with the effects of the Cultural Revolution on rural areas, and how much of the real progress made during the Cultural Revolution was unfortunately reversed after Mao's death and the restoration of brutal capitalism. The author himself grew up in a Chinese village during the Cultural Revolution and because of it was he able to study and eventually attend university.