Ru Zhijuan
| Ru Zhijuan | |
|---|---|
| Native name | 茹志鹃 |
| Born |
September 13, 1925 Shanghai, China |
| Died |
October 7, 1998 (aged 73) Shanghai, China |
| Pen name |
|
| Language | Written Chinese |
| Citizenship | China |
| Spouse | Wang Xiaoping (王啸平) |
| Children | 3, including Wang Anyi |
| Ru Zhijuan | |||||||
| Traditional Chinese | 茹志鵑 | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Simplified Chinese | 茹志鹃 | ||||||
| |||||||
Ru Zhijuan (1925–1998) was a Chinese writer.[1] Her fictions have been translated to many languages.
Her second daughter Wang Anyi is also a famous writer.
Biography
Ru Zhijuan was born in Shanghai, the daughter of migrants from Hangzhou, Zhejiang province. While she was still young, her mother died and her father left; she and a brother were raised by a grandmother. She was educated in various schools including Christian missionary schools. She taught school for a short time in 1943 before joining the propaganda division of the New Fourth Army. In 1944, she married Wang Xiaoping, who was born in Singapore but arrived in China to fight the Japanese. In 1947, she joined the Communist Party of China. In 1955, she became the editor of the Monthly for Literature and Art,[2] retiring in 1960 to write full time.[3]
The 1958 short story "Lilies" was criticized by some for its "bourgeois sentimentality"[3] but became popular after it was praised by Minister of Culture and author Mao Dun. Many of her stories of this period were intended to show the popular support for the revolution and the communist party. She also dealt with the changes in Chinese society from traditional values. She did not publish any work from 1962 to 1965, because it was felt at the time that her work dealt with the worries of everyday people rather than more important issues.[2]
She regained favour when the values from the Cultural Revolution were being reconsidered. They are generally critical of earlier policies and promote the new social norms.[2]
She served as party secretary for the Shanghai Writer's Association. She died in Shanghai at the age of 73.[3]
Works available in English translations
The 1985 anthology Lilies and Other Stories (ISBN 9780835113328), contains the following short stories:
- "Lilies" (百合花)
- "On the Banks of the Cheng" (澄河边上)
- "Warmth of Spring" (春暖时节)
- "Badly Edited Story" (剪辑错了的故事)
- "Path Through the Grassland" (草原上的小路)
- "Comradeship" (同志之间)
- "Third Visit to Yanzhuang" (三走严庄)
- "Maternity Home" (静静的产院)
- "Between Two Seas"
- "Just a Happy-Go-Lucky Girl"
Other translated works include:
- "A Promise Is Kept", in Sowing the Clouds: A Collection of Chinese Short Stories (1961)
- "A Story Out of Sequence", in Prize Winning Stories from China, 1978-1979 (1981) — same story as "Badly Edited Story"
- "My Son, My Son" (儿女情), in The Rose Colored Dinner: New Works by Contemporary Chinese Women Writers (1988)
- "How I Came to Write 'Lilies on a Comforter'" (我写〈百合花〉的经过), in Furrows, Peasants, Intellectuals and the State: Stories and Histories from Modern China (1990)
- "The Warmth of Spring", in Writing Women in Modern China The Revolutionary Years, 1936-1976 (2005) — same story as "Warmth of Spring"
References
- ↑ Hong, Zicheng (2007). A History of Contemporary Chinese Literature. pp. 133–35. ISBN 9004157549.
- 1 2 3 Lee, Lily Xiao Hong (2003). Biographical Dictionary of Chinese Women: The Twentieth Century, 1912-2000. pp. 432–34. ISBN 0765607980.
- 1 2 3 Ying, Li-hua (2010). The A to Z of Modern Chinese Literature. pp. 161–62. ISBN 1461731879.