Prologue

      AT 2:28 ON MAY 12, 2008, an 8.0 earthquake leveled western Sichuan province in China, displacing millions of people and killing tens of thousands of others. It was one of the deadliest earthquakes in human history. It became clear that a disproportionate number of schoolchildren were killed when their government-built schools collapsed on them. To conceal the corruption behind the faulty construction, the government prevented parents and citizens from finding out who died, how many, and why—often using brutal tactics. Despite this, artist and human rights activist Ai Weiwei created a team called Citizens’ Investigation, which gathered and published the names of the children. In total, this list includes 5,196 names, their age, gender, date of birth, and which school they attended.

      WHAT am I, after all, but a child, pleased with the

      sound of my own name? repeating it over and over,

      I cannot tell why it affects me so much, when I hear

      it from women’s voices, and from men’s voices,

      or from my own voice,

      I stand apart to hear—it never tires me.

      To you, your name also,

      Did you think there was nothing but two or three

      pronunciations in the sound of your name?

      —Walt Whitman, “Leaves of Grass,” 1860–61

      Those children have parents, dreams, and they

      could smile, they had a name that belonged to

      them. That name will belong to them three years

      from now, five years, eighteen or nineteen years

      later; it is everything about them which may be

      remembered, it is everything that might be evoked.

      —Ai Weiwei, March 20, 2009