ABSTRACT
Chinese newspapers have been under strict control since the Chinese communist party gained power in 1949. It appeared that censorship, exercised by veteran editors like Tan, had once again prevailed. But when the newspapers arrived in mail boxes around Beijing the next morning, there was a surprise. The Keji ribao, a state controlled newspaper that usually limited its coverage to nonpolitical news, had published a factual account of the scene in the Square alongside a large photograph showing students, some with clenched fists, packed around a huge banner that proclaimed "The Soul of China." Inside newspaper offices, reporters including those at the People's Daily whose initial attempt to cover the movement had been frustrated by their cautious editor—petitioned their superiors to begin reporting accurately. Everyone followed suit, and by mid-May, the dike of censorship itself seemed to have been washed away.
