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About Li Cunxin
Li Cunxin is Mao's Last Dancer. Born into bitter poverty in the Chinese coastal city of Qingdao, Li Cunxin (pronounced Lee Schwinsin), was the sixth of seven sons in a poor rural family.
Li's peasant life during Chairman Mao's communist China changed dramatically when, at the age of eleven, he was chosen by Madame Mao's cultural advisers to become a student at the Beijing Dance Academy. At the time there were only two dance schools in China, and only forty-four children were selected to attend.
Against the odds, Li was one of two students chosen by Ben Stevenson to attend a summer school at the Houston Ballet Academy. Aged eighteen, Li was overwhelmed by everything in America, from Coca Cola to the wanton waste associated with mass consumerism. But his most disturbing realisation was that Americans, whom he had long regarded as the enemy, were warm and welcoming.
At the end of the summer Li returned to China briefly, before accepting a one-year internship with Houston Ballet in America. The day before Li was scheduled to depart America he chose to defect from China. This decision caused a massive uproar. Li was offered a soloist contract with the Houston Ballet and continued to dance.
Li went on to become one of the best male dancers in the world. Li now and works as a stock broker in Melbourne. His autobiography, Mao's Last Dancer won the Book of the Year Award in Australia. It is in the 25th printing and published and sold in over 20 countries.
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