Excerpt from the book The Heart Of The Dragon published in 1985 as a companion to the BBC series:

Datong on the mongolian border, makes steam engines and it also mines coal. In china both industries - railways and mining - are run by the state. The name 'Datong - literally 'Great Harmony' - evokes Utopia; it was the name of the ideal stage of society imagined by Confucian philosophers. But Datong has never in fact been noted for its harmony. In imperial times it was a frontier town between two cultures, Chinese and Mongolian. It lies just inside the 'Great Wall' , and beyond was the domain of the horseman who under Genghis Khan invaded the north and under Kublai Khan conquered the whole of China. Even today the closeness of central Asia is evident in the biting wind from the Russian steppes that blows for much of the winter, and in the citys one exotic sight, Bacterian camels slow-marching through the streets with panniers of coal on either side of their humps.

The Japanese lack coal. They conquered northern China in the late 1930's, and opened up the mines on a great scale. Today memories of the Japanese occupation are kept alive by the authorities: they help make people appreciate the present. Thus at the edge of a grim hole in the hills outside Datong, on a sunny day in May 1982, a rest day for miners[at the time most miners worked 6 days a week] , a group of them had been gathered round an older colleague to engage in what is called a 'speak bitterness' session. The old miner said:

" I am Wang Futain and I came from Yidu County, Shandong Province. Our whole family fled from the famine in 1939. We came here begging for food. Collaborators with sweet words captured us and forced us down the mines. We worked thirteen to sixteen hours a day. They whipped us every day. The Japanese imperialist did not treat the workers like human beings, but like animals. 'Exchange coal with Chinese peoples lives,' was their slogan. They used to say, 'There are so many Chinese. killing them is like killing chickens. When you kill one there are always more.'

The workers had to drink the stinking water at the bottom of the bottom of the pit. When people became seriously ill they tied their legs and arms, carried them away on a thick carrying pole and kicked them into this hole. No space was waisted in the hole; it was completely filled with bodies. Numerous dogs were waiting down there, biting and tearing the bodies to pieces. It was not long before the collaborators broke my fathers leg and threw him into the 'Ten Thousand Men's Hole' . My father was only thirty - six years old, but he died only a few days after he arrived here. When he died I was nine years old, and I was sent to work in the coal pit. I was always beaten by the Japanese, because i was a child and I couldn't do hard manual work. Once I was ill and became unconscious. They carried me to the hole and threw me in. Down there the dogs barked and howled and there were litters and litters of small dogs, I cried very loudly. There were so many people in there, crawling and grasping at one another. I was so frightened that I cried madly, shouting 'Mother!' 'Mother!'. It happened that a poor man was nearby. Hearing a child crying in the pit, he took me out. He asked me If I had any relations. I told him my mother was begging for food not far away. He took me to my mother in a desolate place. Both my mother and I held each other, crying. That is how I was brought back to life. "