ABSTRACT
After Mao's death in 1976, China started to rein in the excesses of the Cultural Revolution. As Sino-Soviet relations improved in the 80s, Soviet literature had a blooming in China. Several journals dedicated to Russian and Soviet literature sprang up. Articles discussing Soviet literature appeared in academic journals by the score. A great deal of such effort was devoted to updating Chinese readers with newer works of Soviet authors. Moving into the twenty-first century, the rising international importance of China and Russia has made their strategic partnership more critical. Growing up on Soviet culture, many of the Chinese acknowledge having a "Soviet complex". In the Soviet complex of many Chinese, the nucleus is the love of their imagined Soviet Union that encapsulates their youthful dreams. The strong Soviet complex in some Chinese often manifests itself as a compulsive preoccupation with the literature, films, and songs of the Soviet era, leading to a prejudice against contemporary Russian culture.
