Zhou Zuoren | |
|---|---|
 | |
| Born | Zhou Kuishou (周櫆壽) (1885-01-16)16 January 1885 Shaoxing, Zhejiang,Qing Empire |
| Died | 6 May 1967(1967-05-06) (aged 82) Beijing, People's Republic of China |
| Occupation(s) | Translator, Essayist |
| Partner | Zhou Xinzi (original name: Nobuko Habuto) |
| Children | Zhou Fengyi Zhou Jingzi Zhou Ruozi |
| Parents |
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| Relatives | Zhou Shuren (elder brother) Zhou Jianren (younger brother) |
Zhou Zuoren (Chinese:周作人;pinyin:Zhōu Zuòrén;Wade–Giles:Chou Tso-jen) (16 January 1885 – 6 May 1967) was a Chinese writer, primarily known as an essayist and a translator. He was the younger brother ofLu Xun (Zhou Shuren, 周树人), the second of three brothers.
Born inShaoxing,Zhejiang, Zhou Zuoren was educated at the Jiangnan Naval Academy as a teenager before moving to Japan in 1906, following his brother's footsteps. During his stint in Japan, he began studyingAncient Greek, with the aim of translating theGospels intoClassical Chinese, and attended lectures on Chinesephilology by scholar-revolutionaryZhang Binglin atRikkyo University, although he was supposed to study civil engineering there. He returned to China in 1911, with his Japanese wife, and began to teach in different institutions.
Writing essays invernacular Chinese for the magazineLa Jeunesse, Zhou was a figure in theMay Fourth Movement as well as theNew Culture Movement. He was an advocate of literary reform.[1] In 1918, Zhou Zuoren, then a literature professor at Peking University, published an article titled "Human Literature", insisting on mutual understanding and sympathy between each other, and required a "recognition of the existence of the same kind".[2] In the article, he attacked specifically such thematics in literature as children sacrificing themselves for the sake of their parents and wives being buried alive to accompany dead husbands. Meanwhile, Zhou made a distinction between "democratic" and "popular" literature by identifying the former as literature that studies human life rather than written for the common people to read.[3] Zhou condemned elite traditional performances like theBeijing opera. He called it "disgusting," "nauseating," "pretentious" and referred to the singing as "a weird inhuman sound."[4]
During theSecond Sino-Japanese War, Zhou was seen as acollaborator with the Japanese occupation, and has been regarded by some Japanese as one of the three Chinese in modern times who "truly understands Japan".[5] In 1945, Zhou was arrested for treason by the Nationalist government ofChiang Kai-shek, stemming from his alleged collaboration with theWang Jingwei government during the Japanese occupation of north China. He was sentenced to 10 years' imprisonment in 1947. In January 1949, the Nationalist government under acting president Li Zongren released Zhou Zuoren on bail, and he returned to Beijing.[1]
Over the next 17 years, Zhou continued to translate Japanese and classical Greek literature into Chinese. However, during the Cultural Revolution, the People's Literature Publishing House stopped paying Zhou his royalties, which were his sole source of income. On May 6, 1967, Zhou died of a sudden relapse of illness.[1] During the first decades of the People's Republic of China, Zhou Zuoren's writings were not widely available to readers due to his alleged treason. Only during the relatively liberal 1980s did his works become available again. The Chinese scholar Qian Liqun (錢理群) in 2001 published an extensive biography of Zhou Zuoren entitled "Biography of Zhou Zuoren" (周作人传).
He called his studies "miscellanies" and penned an essay titled "My Miscellaneous Studies" (我的雜學). In Tokyo, Zhou developed interests in mythology, anthropology, and what he called ertongxue (兒童學; the study of children development).[6] He later became a translator, producing translations of classical Greek and classicalJapanese literatures, including a collection of Greek mimes,Sappho's lyrics,Euripides' tragedies,Kojiki,Shikitei Sanba'sUkiyoburo,Sei Shōnagon'sMakura no Sōshi and a collection ofKyogen. He considered his translation ofLucian'sDialogues, which he finished late in his life, as his greatest literary achievement. He was also translated (from English) the storyAli Baba into Chinese (known asXianü Nu 俠女奴). During the 1930s he was also a regular contributor toLin Yutang's humor magazineThe Analects Fortnightly and wrote extensively about China's traditions ofhumor,satire,parody, andjoking, even compiling a collection ofJokes from the Bitter Tea Studio (Kucha'an xiaohua ji).[7] He became chancellor ofBeijing University in 1939.
In his early work, Zhou Zuoren denied the legitimacy of violence as a force for modernizing China, but rather sought social change and intellectual engagement through nonviolence.[8] Before the 1920s, his literary and philosophical views agreed with the essential aspects of Romanticism,[9] which impulses set him apart from other major literary and intellectual figures as his motives in participating in the New Culture Movement had much less or little to do with any apocalyptic vision or transcendental aspiration.[6] During the May Fourth era, he continued commitment to what he called "individualist humanism",[5] but eventually abandoned this ideology after witnessing increasingly violent tendencies that were out of the idealism of the May Fourth movement.[8] As he wrote in 1926, "class struggle was not a Marxist invention but true as the Darwinian idea of competition for survival".[10] After the May Fourth Movement, Zhou sought to retreat from the nation-building project into individual and ordinary life.
Between 1940 and 1943, Zhou used Confucianism as a guise to argue that the Chinese never had any "thought problem," as the Japanese so claimed. By comparing the Confucianism development in China to a tree, he asserted that "the tree can grow up again if there was no outside interference through either restraint or artificial cultivation."[5] However, after the war, his profuse textual language and artistic attitude were also seen to align with the spirit of Daoism thoughts.[11] In 1944, he explained: "According to my own observations and experience, I have an opinion that is incompatible with the time, which is my two not-to-be-isms. First, I don't want to be a follower; second, I don't want to be a leader. Although I labeled myself a Confucian, this attitude actually belongs to Daoism. However, since I cannot retreat fully, I still have no way to avoid conflicts".[12]
A great number of books about Zhou Zuoren are published in Chinese every year. For basic information about his life and works, see:
A character portrait by a contemporary colleague at Peking University:
For Western language studies, see:
Comprehensive editions of his works and translations include:
Some of his essays are available in English:
