Bo Yang

Not to be confused with Laozi.

Guo Dingsheng 郭定生
Born	Guo Dingsheng (1920-03-07)7 March 1920 Kaifeng, Henan, Republic of China
Died	29 April 2008(2008-04-29) (aged 88) Xindian City, Taipei County (now Xindian District of New Taipei City), Taiwan
Pen name	Boyang
Occupation	Historian, writer, philosopher
Language	Chinese
Nationality	Republic of China
Citizenship	Republic of China
Alma mater	Northeastern University
Period	1950–2008

Bo Yang (simplified Chinese: 柏杨; traditional Chinese: 柏楊; pinyin: Bóyáng; 7 March 1920 – 29 April 2008), also sometimes called Bai Yang, was a Chinese language writer based in Taiwan. His pen name is found in most sources as "Bo Yang" or "Bai Yang", but there is an argument that as Bo Yang was a pen name, it should be written as "Boyang" insead. According to his own memoir, the exact date of his birthday was unknown even to himself. He later adopted the date of his imprisonment in 1968 (7 March) as his birthday.

Biography

Bo Yang was born as Guō Dìngshēng (郭定生) in Kaifeng, Henan Province, China, with family origins in Hui County (輝縣), now part of Xinxiang, Henan. Bo Yang's father changed his son's name to Guō Lìbāng (郭立邦) to facilitate a transfer of schools. Bo Yang later changed his name to Guo Yìdòng (郭衣洞). In high school, Bo Yang participated in youth organisations of the Kuomintang, the then-ruling party of the Republic of China, and joined the Kuomintang itself in 1938. He graduated from the National Northeastern University, and moved to Taiwan after Kuomintang lost in the civil war in 1949.

In 1950, he was imprisoned for six months for listening to Communist Chinese radio broadcasts. He worked various jobs, including as a teacher. During this time, he began to write novels. In 1960, he began using the penname Bo Yang, which he derived from a place name in the mountains of Taiwan because he liked the sound of it, to write a political commentary column in the Independent Evening News. In 1961, he achieved acclaim with his novel The Alien Realm (異域 Yìyù), which told the story of a Kuomintang force which fought on in the borderlands of southwestern China long after the government had retreated to Taiwan.

Bo Yang was arrested in 1967, and from 1969 was imprisoned as a political prisoner (for "being a Communist agent and attacking national leaders") on Green Island for nine years, because of his unwitting criticism of Taiwan's dictator Chiang Kai-shek and in particular a translation of a comic strip of Popeye. In the strip, Popeye and Swee'Pea have just landed on an uninhabited island. Popeye says: "You can be crown prince," to which Swee'Pea responds, "I want to be president." In the next panel, Popeye says, "Why, you little..." In the final panel, Popeye's words are too faint to be made out. Chiang was displeased because he saw this as a parody of his installing his son Chiang Ching-kuo as heir apparent. Bo Yang translated the word "fellows" as "my fellow soldiers and countrymen," a phrase used by Chiang Kai-shek. (Towards the end of his life Bo Yang wrote in his memoirs that he did not have the slightest intention to insult Chiang Kai-shek in with this translation.) The original 12-year sentence was commuted to eight years after the death of Chiang Kai-shek in 1975. However, the government refused to release Bo Yang after his sentence expired, until it gave in to pressure from international organisations such as Amnesty International. After his release, Bo Yang continued to campaign for human rights and democracy in Taiwan.

Works

Aside of his Golden Triangle novel Yiyu, (異域, 1961), Bo Yang is best known for his non-fiction works on Chinese history (collated from ancient materials in the prison library Green Island) and The Ugly Chinaman (醜陋的中國人 Chǒulòu de Zhōngguórén, 1985; English translation, with the subtitle ... and the Crisis of Chinese Culture, 1992).

Later Years

He lived in Taipei in his later years. He became the founding president of the Taiwan chapter of Amnesty International. Also in 1994, Bo Yang underwent heart surgery, and his health never fully recovered. He carried the honorary title of national policy advisor to the administration of President Chen Shui-bian. In 2006, Bo Yang retired from writing, and donated the bulk of his manuscripts to the Chinese Modern Literature Museum in Beijing. He was awarded an honourary doctorate by the National Tainan University, to which he also donated much memorabilia and some manuscripts.

Bo Yang died of pneumonia in a hospital near his Xindian residence on 29 April 2008. He was married five times, and is survived by his last wife, Chang Hsiang-hua, and five children born by his former wives. On 17 May 2008, his ashes were scattered along the seashore of Green Island, where he was once imprisoned.

External links

• Biosketch at the Taiwanese American Foundation website
• Hsieh Wen-hua. "Bo Yang classic reaches out to today’s youth." Taipei Times. 5 April 2008. p. 3.