The 1950s and 1960s were a brutal, oppressive period in Chinese history. Mao Zedong's "Great Leap Forward"—a plan to rapidly transform China from an agricultural economy to one focused on heavy industry—led to widespread death and starvation.
Intellectuals were taken from their homes and sent to labor camps to be "re-educated." Chang fled to the United States. His poem Childhood""Garden of my childhood" describes China before the revolution as a peaceful, idyllic garden with a violent horde rapidly approaching. A vine, the wind, and the sea are each personified and beckons him to run.