Mao Dun
| Mao Dun | |
|---|---|
 |
|
| Minister of Culture of the PRC | |
|
In office 21 October 1949 – January 1965 |
|
| Premier | Zhou Enlai |
| Succeeded by | Lu Dingyi |
| Chairman of the China Writers Association | |
|
In office 23 July 1949 – 27 March 1981 |
|
| Succeeded by | Ba Jin |
| Personal details | |
| Born |
4 July 1896 Tongxiang, Jiaxing, Zhejiang |
| Died | 27 March 1981 (aged 84) Beijing |
| Spouse(s) | Kong Dezhi (孔德沚) |
| Relations | Shen Zemin (brother) |
| Alma mater | Beijing University |
| Mao Dun | |||||||||
| Chinese | 茅盾 | ||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
|
|||||||||
| Shen Dehong | |||||||||
| Traditional Chinese | 沈德鴻 | ||||||||
| Simplified Chinese | 沈德鸿 | ||||||||
|
|||||||||
| Shen Yanbing | |||||||||
| Chinese | 沈雁冰 | ||||||||
|
|||||||||
| Transcriptions | |
|---|---|
| Standard Mandarin | |
| Hanyu Pinyin | Máo Dùn |
| Wade–Giles | Mao Tun |
| Transcriptions | |
|---|---|
| Standard Mandarin | |
| Hanyu Pinyin | Shěn Déhóng |
| Wade–Giles | Shen Te-hung |
| Transcriptions | |
|---|---|
| Standard Mandarin | |
| Hanyu Pinyin | Shěn Yànbīng |
| Wade–Giles | Shen Yen-ping |
Mao Dun (4 July 1896 – 27 March 1981) was the pen name of Shen Dehong (Shen Yanbing), a 20th-century Chinese novelist, cultural critic, and the Minister of Culture of People's Republic of China (1949–65). He is one of the most celebrated left-wing realist novelists of modern China. His most famous works are Ziye, a novel depicting life in cosmopolitan Shanghai, and Spring Silkworms. He also wrote many short stories.
He adopted "Mao Dun" (Chinese: 矛盾), meaning "contradiction", as his pen name to express the tension in the conflicting revolutionary ideology in China in the unstable 1920s. His friend Ye Shengtao changed the first character from 矛 to 茅, which literally means "thatch".
His father, Shen Yongxi (Chinese: 沈永錫) taught and designed the curriculum for his son, but he died when Mao Dun was ten. Mao Dun's mother Chen Aizhu (Chinese: 陳愛珠) then became his teacher. He mentions in his memoirs that "my first instructor is my mother". Through learning from his parents, Mao Dun developed great interest in writing during his childhood.
Mao Dun had already started to develop his writing skills when he was still in primary school. In one examination the examiner commented on Mao Dun's script: '12 year old young child, can make this language, not says motherland nobody'. There were other similar comments which indicate that Mao Dun had been a brilliant writer since his youth.
While Mao Dun was studying in secondary school in Hangzhou, extensive reading and strict writing skills training filled his life. He read the Wen Xuan, Shishuo Xinyu, and a large number of classical novels, which influenced his writing style.
Mao Dun entered the three-year foundation school offered by Peking University in 1913, in which he studied Chinese and Western literature. Due to financial difficulties, he had to quit in the summer of 1916, before his graduation.
The trainings in Chinese and English as well as knowledge of Chinese and Western literature provided by the fifteen years of education Mao Dun received had prepared him to show up in the limelight of the Chinese journalistic and literary arena.
...
Wikipedia