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China Diary grew out of a random series of articles I wrote for the Morning Star, starting in 1988. The Morning Star was (and I believe stillis) the only daily newspaper in English in the world with a socialistperspective. The paper had a tradition of close coverage of the SovietUnion and the Eastern European countries, and it seemed a glaringomission that it contained scarcely a word about events in the biggestsocialist country in the world--China. At that time I had been working asa copy editor at Xinhua, China's main official news agency, since arrivingin Beijing from Hong Kong in 1984. On a visit to the Morning Star'soffices in London in mid-1988 I suggested that,I could contribute newsfrom China. The features editor accepted with alacrity, asking for onepiece per month--"Of course, we can't afford to　pay　you." Ah well, itdoes the soul good to do something for free ira a good cause, I thought. Italso occurred to me that if they were not paying they'd have to be verycareful about changing what I wrote even if they didn't like it--or I mightjust stop doing it. That made me feel very virtuous as compared to thehacks in the mainstream press, who write what they are told to write bythe people who hire them.