Author of The True Story of Ah Q, father of modern Chinese literature who carried May Fourth’s critical spirit into the left-wing league
Born in Shaoxing, Zhejiang, he abandoned medical studies in Japan to “cure the spirit” of his people through literature. “Diary of a Madman”, published in New Youth in 1918, was the first vernacular short story; “The True Story of Ah Q” anatomised the spiritual servitude of the old society. After 1927 he translated Marxist literary theory in Shanghai and in 1930 became the guiding figure of the League of Left-Wing Writers, though never a party member. He died of tuberculosis in 1936; Mao later called him the “chief commander of China’s cultural revolution”.
Career Timeline
- 1920–1926Lecturer at Peking University
- 1930–1936Leading figure of the League of Left-Wing Writers