Li Ao | |
|---|---|
李敖 | |
 Li Ao atFayuan Temple inBeijing in 2005 | |
| Member of theLegislative Yuan | |
| In office 1 February 2005 – 31 January 2008 | |
| Constituency | Taipei 2 |
| Personal details | |
| Born | (1935-04-25)25 April 1935 |
| Died | 18 March 2018(2018-03-18) (aged 82) |
| Spouses | |
| Children | Hedy Lee [zh] (1964, daughter) Li Kan [zh] (1992, son) Li Chen (1994, daughter) |
| Parent(s) | Li Dingyi Zhang Kuichen |
| Education | National Taiwan University (BA,MA) |
| Occupation |
|
| Known for | Civil rights movement,Activism,Chinese culture criticism |
| Courtesy name | Aozhi (敖之) (Pe̍h-ōe-jī:Ngô͘ Chi) |
Li Ao (Chinese:李敖;pinyin:Lǐ Áo;Pe̍h-ōe-jī:Lí Ngô͘; 25 April 1935 – 18 March 2018), also spelledLee Ao, was a Taiwanese writer, politician, andpublic intellectual.[1]
Li rose to prominence in the early 1960s through his articles inWen Hsing (1957–1988), an intellectual Taiwanese magazine where he defendedHu Shih, criticized traditional Chinese culture, and advocated for complete Westernization, igniting a cultural debate over Chinese and Western ideologies. During the 1970s, he became active in the pro-democracyTangwai movement, which resulted in two prison sentences as a political prisoner.
After martial law was lifted in Taiwan in 1987, Li frequently ran for public office. In 2000, he ran for the presidency of Taiwan as theNew Party candidate. From 2004 to 2008, he served as an independent legislator in theLegislative Yuan. After leaving office, Li focused on writing and teaching, and became a media personality hosting shows such asLi Ao Speaks His Mind (李敖有话说) andLi Ao's Wit and Humor (李敖语妙天下).
Over his career, Li espousedliberalism,Chinese nationalist ideals,anti-American andanti-Japanese sentiments. He was prominent critic of theChiang family and of theKuomintang's authoritarian rule in Taiwan. Following Taiwan's democratization in the late 1980s, he also criticized theDemocratic Progressive Party and theTaiwanese independence movement. In his later years, Li praised theChinese Communist Party for revitalizing China but also condemned its authoritarianism.[citation needed]
Li was born inHarbin,Manchukuo, toLi Dingyi [zh] (李鼎彝), a prominent professor of Chinese, and Zhang Kuichen (張桂貞).[1] His family had ancestry inWei County (modern-day Weifang),Shandong, andFuyu, Jilin. When Li was two years old, the family moved toBeijing, where Li's father worked in the government's opium suppression bureau.[2]
While the family lived in Beijing, Li's father was accused of being a traitor to the Kuomintang by his superiors.[2] Li then began feeling enmity towards the party.[2] The entire Li family, except for two children, moved to Taiwan at the end of theChinese Civil War in 1949.[1] Li earned his bachelor's degree in history fromNational Taiwan University (NTU) in 1959.[3] In 1963, he earned a master's degree in history from NTU.[4] As a graduate student, he was the executive editor of the magazineWen Hsing, a liberal literary magazine.[2]
Li participated in thedemocratic movement in Taiwan between the 1960s and 1980s. In the 1960s, he was the editor-in-chief of pro-democracy magazineWen Hsing (文星).[1] He was jailed by theKuomintang government from 1971 to 1976,[5] for helping a pro-Taiwan independence legal scholar,Peng Ming-min, escape to Japan in 1970;[6] even though Li himself had a long history of being an advocate ofreunification. Throughout the 1970s, Li received international attention for his imprisonment. He was highlighted byAmnesty International as one of the three most important political prisoners in Taiwan in 1974. From 1981 to 1982 Li was imprisoned over a dispute with a former employer.[7]
Li's novelMountaintop Love (上山．上山．愛), about a mother and a daughter who fall in love with the same man, though several years apart, established his status as a novelist, solidified byMartyrs' Shrine: The Story of the Reform Movement of 1898 in China (北京法源寺), a novel about theHundred Days' Reform. Ninety-six of his books were banned in Taiwan until 1991.[8] Popular in mainland China in the 1990s and 2000s, the majority of his books have been prohibited from republishing since 2012 amid China's tightenedcensorship underGeneral Secretary of the Chinese Communist PartyXi Jinping, except his two memoirs andMartyrs' Shrine.[9]
Li participated in Taiwan'spresidential election in 2000 as a candidate for theNew Party. Li usually played the role of a political gadfly, and his campaign was largely symbolic. He took the election as an opportunity to "educate" the people of Taiwan. Both Li[10] and his party[citation needed] publicly encouraged people to vote forJames Soong. During the presidential debates, Li even stated that he was not planning to vote for himself and that people should vote for Soong.
| 2000 Republic of China Presidential Election Result | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Political affiliation | Candidate | Votes | ||||
| President | Vice President | Total votes | Percentage | |||
 Democratic Progressive Party | Chen Shui-bian | Annette Lu | 4,977,737 | 39.3% |  | |
| Independent | James Soong | Chang Chau-hsiung | 4,664,932 | 36.8% |  | |
 Kuomintang | Lien Chan | Vincent Siew | 2,925,513 | 23.1% |  | |
| Independent | Hsu Hsin-liang | Josephine Chu | 79,429 | 0.63% |  | |
| New Party | Li Ao | Elmer Fung | 16,782 | 0.13% |  | |
| Total | 12,786,671 | 82.69% voter turnout | ||||
| Valid votes | 12,664,393 | |||||
| Invalid votes | 122,278 | |||||
Since the2000 Taiwanese presidential election, Li had bitterly spoken out against pro-independence Nobel laureateYuan T. Lee, who publicly supportedChen Shui-bian. He also accused former PresidentLee Teng-hui of corruption. In October 2004, Li ran in theDecember 11 legislative election as a non-partisan candidate of the SouthTaipei constituency, and was subsequently elected to be the last winning place. He took office as an independent legislator on 1 February 2005.
In February 2005, Li held a press conference, accusing the PFP leader,James Soong of having changed his opposition towards military weapons purchase from the United States under the influence of people of pro-American inclination, people withCIA backgrounds and arms traders who would receive kick-backs. Li threatened Soong that he would reveal the names of the people with CIA backgrounds, who were influencing Soong, to the general public unless Soong reverted to his previous opposition position.[11] PFP legislators dismissed the accusation and responded that Li Ao should reveal his evidence to support his story.[12]
Later that year, in June, Li claimed to the Taiwanese press that he had exclusive information from the CIA concerning the3-19 shooting incident.[citation needed] He alleged that the real motive of the killer was to assassinate the Vice-PresidentAnnette Lu in order to garner sympathy votes forChen Shui-bian, and that the killer had been condoned by the governing party for ulterior political reasons. After flashing several allegedly CIA-endorsed documents to reporters, he mailed them to Annette Lu, claiming that she needed to know the truth about the assassination attempt to the full extent.[citation needed]
On 19 September 2005, Li returned to Mainland China for the first time in 56 years.[citation needed] He was invited to give speeches atPeking University,Tsinghua University andFudan University where he was warmly received, and the trip was claimed to have had significant impact on observers ofCross-Strait relations.[13][14][15]
Li was a candidate for the2006 Taipei Mayoral election, and a candidate for the2012 Legislative Yuan elections, campaigning in Taipei City District 8 under thePeople First Party (PFP) banner. Li also satirized Mao Zedong'sLittle Red Book in his article.
| 2006 Taipei City Mayoral Election Result | ||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| No | Candidate | Party | Votes | % | ||
| 1 | Li Ao | Independent | 7,795 | 0.61% | ||
| 2 | Clara Chou[a] | Taiwan Solidarity Union | 3,372 | 0.26% | ||
| 3 | Frank Hsieh | Democratic Progressive Party | 525,869 | 40.89% | ||
| 4 | James Soong[b] | Independent | 53,281 | 4.14% | ||
| 5 | Hau Lung-pin | Kuomintang | 692,085 | 53.81% | ||
| 6 | Ke Tsi-hai | Independent | 3,687 | 0.29% | ||
On 24 October 2006, Li sprayedtear gas and wielded astun gun during a Legislative Yuan National Defense Committee meeting, forcing several members of the parliament to flee. He was attempting to stop debate on purchasing attack submarines andPatriot anti-aircraft missiles for $16 billion from the U.S.[18] He was also wearing theGuy Fawkes mask fromV for Vendetta.[19]
In the early 1960s, Li cohabited with Wang Shangqin, aNational Taiwan University student and the younger sister of the writer Wang Shangyi. In 1964, Wang went to the United States for study, only to discover that she was pregnant with Li’s child. She gave birth to their daughter, Hedy W. Lee, out of wedlock in Seattle. However, during Wang Shangqin’s pregnancy, Li Ao became romantically involved with another woman, Wu Haidi. In 1966, Wang brought their daughter to Taiwan and briefly reconciled with Li, but their relationship ultimately ended due to his involvement with multiple other women.[20] Wang has acrimonious relationships with both Li and their daughter Lee thereafter. After she returned to the US from Taiwan, she remarried Wen Naijian, an engineer. Lee, in a book published in 2004, accused Wen, her stepfather, of molesting her when she was 14, which Wang denied.[21]
On 6 May 1980, Li married Taiwanese actressTerry Hu.[22] The couple divorced on 28 August 1980.[23][24]
On 8 March 1992, Li married his second wife, Wang Zhihui (王志慧). They had one son and one daughter. Their son, Li Kan (李戡), graduated with aBA degree in history fromPeking University and with a PhD degree in Chinese Studies from theUniversity of Cambridge.[25][26][27][28]
Names in brackets indicate accompanying candidate for theVice Presidency. Winners shown inbold. |
| International | |
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| National | |
| Academics | |
| People | |
| Other | |
