Wolf Totem is narrated by protagonist Chen Zhen, a young man in his 20s who left his native Beijing to work in Inner Mongolia during the Cultural Revolution. Through descriptions of folk traditions, rituals, and life on the steppe, Wolf Totem compares the culture of the ethnic Mongolian nomads and the Han Chinese farmers who settle in their territory. The book appreciates the "freedom, independence, respect, unyielding before hardship, teamwork and competition" of the Mongolian nomads and criticizes the "autocratic, sheeplike" nature of the Han. The book condemns the agricultural collectivization imposed on the nomads by the settlers, and the ecological disasters it caused. It is a master work which passionately argues about the complex interrelationship between nature and culture, animal and human beings, nomads and settlers.
The author was inspired to write Wolf Totem by an accident. He ignored the advice of the clan chief of the group of nomads with whom he was staying, and accidentally stumbled across a pack of wolves. Terrified, he watched as the wolves chased a herd of sheep off a cliff, then dragged their corpses into a cave. From then on, fascinated by the wolves, he began to study them and their relationship with the nomads more closely, and even attempted to domesticate one, which would never be atoned by the clan chief. It was his precisely curiosity and research interests that had taken away the happiness, freedom and even life of the Little Wolf. As the author stated in the book: “Someone who loved freedom and was increasingly respectful of freedom had committed a vicious act of the kind perpetrated only by the most tyrannical, totalitarian people.” The book “was written with their blood.” He had been tormented by this bloody crime for over two decades. However, he also understood why grasslanders who killed wolves would willingly have heaven-burial, giving their own bodies to the wolves at the end of their lives. They probably feel a heavy burden of guilt and want to repay a debt to grassland wolves, which they worship spiritually but fight physically.
The sad story ends up with death of Little Wolf, extermination of grassland animals, extinction of nomadic herding society and desertification of the green pastureland. When the author stands alone by his window watching the yellow, suffocating sandstorm twenty years later, the wolf and grassland have become legend and distant memories.
Note: Most information was excerpted from Wikipedia and book reviews.
