Mao outlawed arranged marriages and concubines, and established a woman’s right to divorce, but the system left little room for desire. Dating that did not lead to the altar was “hooliganism,” and sex was so stigmatized in the Maoist period that doctors met couples who struggled to conceive because they lacked a firm grasp of the mechanics. When the magazine Popular Films ran a photo of Cinderella kissing a prince, readers wrote in to denounce it.
