Zhou Yang (politician)

Zhou Yang
Traditional Chinese	周揚
Simplified Chinese	周扬
Transcriptions Standard Mandarin Hanyu Pinyin Zhōu Yáng Wade–Giles Chou Yang

In this Chinese name, the family name is Zhou.

Zhou Yang or Chou Yang (November 7, 1908 – July 31, 1989), courtesy name Qiying (起应), was a Chinese literary theorist, translator and Marxist thinker, active from the founding of the League of the Left-Wing Writers in 1930. In the 1930s he was notable for his sharp disagreements with other leftist writers, including Lu Xun, concerning leftist literary theory. Zhou also translated the works of Leo Tolstoy and other Russian writers into Chinese.

History

Zhou also translated the works of Leo Tolstoy and other Russian writers into Chinese. Shortly before the Yan'an Forum in 1942, he translated Nikolai Chernyshevsky's The Aesthetic Relations of Art to Reality into Chinese. Zhou described himself as being a "loyal follower" of Chernyshevsky, stating that Chernyshevsky's "famous formula of 'beauty is life' carries a fundamental truth." Zhou praised Soviet writers, such Alexander Fadeyev and his novel The Young Guard, for presenting "totally new characters of a kind unprecedented in human history, a kind of character possessed of the highest communist spirit and moral qualities. In their work in creating typical images of positive characters according to the conditions of actual life, beloved Soviet writers have completed their most glorious task of serving as 'engineers of the human soul.'"

Zhou's 1941 essay A Casual Discussion on Art and Life addressed the relationship between art and life through the idea of cultural practice. It examined the dialectical relationship between art and life in what Zhou referred to as "the practice of life" and "the practice of creation".

Zhou's view was that writers must learn from the masses, rather than position themselves as attempting to reform the masses from above.

After the People's Republic of China was declared in 1949, Zhou became one of Mao Zedong's most-supported literary theorists.

In August 1956, Ding Ling was accused during the Sufan Movement of forming an anti-party clique. As part of her response to the allegations, she criticized Zhou for his extramarital affair. Ding's criticism of Zhou was widely circulated among Communist Party Officials. In response, Zhou alleged that Ding was unchaste and not loyal to the Communist Party. Although in 1957 Zhou apologized for going too far in his allegations, he remained a lifelong political opponent and critic of Ding.

Beginning in the middle of 1958, the new folk song movement sought to compile folk songs and poetry. Among the major compendiums of these folk works was Red Flag Ballads, compiled by Zhou and Guo Moruo, which presented the works of amateur poets anonymously as part of an effort to develop the figure of the mass writer in communist art and literature.

Zhou's report, On the Military Tasks of Philosophy and Social Science Workers, delivered to Mao in 1963, was one of the catalysts for the Cultural Revolution. However, during the late stage of the Cultural Revolution Zhou was himself imprisoned after falling out of favor due to differing view points on the importance of art in politics.

After the Cultural Revolution ended, he was rehabilitated and given new political offices. At that time he apologized to victims of past campaigns. He also advocated the humanist aspects of Marxism within the Communist Party near the end of his life, and was criticized again for such views.