The play itself focused on a loyal Ming Dynasty minister named Hai Rui, who was portrayed as a savior to passive peasants for whom he reversed unjust land confiscations.
Wu then wrote a play for Beijing Opera titled "Hai Rui Dismissed from Office," which he revised several times before the final version of 1961.
[5] Academic Alessandro Russo writes that Wu's rare opera attendance may have been because in the 1950s and early 1960s, cultured Chinese did not see it as a "commendable spectacle" but better suited for popular enjoyment.
Politically aware Chinese readily understood the emperor as Mao, Hai Rui as Peng Dehuai, and the unjust land verdicts as comparable to the policies of the Great Leap Forward.
Yao's article argued that Wu Han had distorted the historical record and that the aspect of reversing unjust land verdicts provided a focal point for "bourgeois opposition" who wanted "to demolish the people's communes and to restore the criminal rule of the landlords and rich peasants.
[15] Ultimately, Yao's article was published in Wenhui Bao, an important Shanghai newspaper which was both widely read for its cultural content and political review, because it was not officially an organ of the party and was not subject to prior restraints.
[14] Peng Zhen, who headed a top-level political bureau in charge of cultural policies called the Group of Five, prevented other newspapers from republishing Yao's article for three weeks.
[17] In contrast, those critical of the play argued that by embellishing Hai Rui as a hero of the people, Wu had violated "the principle of historical materialism, which holds that it is the masses who make history.
"[21] Wu's article began with a chronology intended to implicitly distance his play and other writings on Hai Rui from the controversy at the Lushan Conference, but the effect backfired.
"[15] Although he did not discuss Yao's article at length, Mao noted that it had not gotten to the core political issue raised by the matter of Hai Rui, namely the dismissal.
[27] Early in January 1966, he conveyed a meeting of the Shanghai Party Committee, maintained that Wu was left-wing, and that the debate over Hai Rui Dismissed from Office should "remain within academic limits.
[29] The Group of Five began investigation who in Shanghai was responsible for the initial publication of Yao's critical article without having asked approval from the Central Department of Propaganda.
"[31] Using a literary comparison which became famous after the incident, Mao told Peng Zhen, "The Central Department of Propaganda is the King of Hell's Palace.
"[32] A series of top-level party meetings from mid-March to mid-May 1966 addressed the controversy following the February Outline and Mao Zedong's response to it.
[27] The Chinese government's view today, however, is that Peng Zhen's motive for issuing the February Outline was responding to a wave of public revulsion over the criticisms of Wu.
[43] The historical record is not clear regarding why Mao ultimately gave his full support to the controversy created by Yao's article criticizing Hai Rui Dismissed from Office.
[44] Theories include that Wu was a suitable polemical target because he was not sufficiently ranking in the cultural apparatus to prompt a strong institutional defense.
[44] Academic Alessandro Russo writes that, to the contrary, the top levels of the party's cultural apparatus including Peng Zhen vigorously defended Wu for months, that the criticism of Wu came from the grassroots intellectual level where most of the participants in the controversy were history teachers, and that the initial targets were high ranking in the party cultural apparatus.
[45] Academic Frederick Teiwes argues that as the controversy regarding Hai Rui Dismissed from Office unfolded, Mao had been plotting against his rival Chinese President Liu Shaoqi for months.
[46] Although modern Chinese narratives often focus on the personal leadership power of Mao throughout the dispute, the early phase of the controversy and his inability to stop the promulgation of the "February Outline" demonstrate that he faced open and effective political resistance within the party.