Yao Wenyuan | |
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| Born | (1931-01-12)January 12, 1931 |
| Died | December 23, 2005(2005-12-23) (aged 74) |
| Occupation | Politician |
| Known for | Gang of Four |
| Political party | Chinese Communist Party |
| Yao Wenyuan | |||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Chinese | 姚文元 | ||||||||||
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Yao Wenyuan (January 12, 1931 – December 23, 2005) was a Chinese literary critic,politician, and member of theGang of Four during China'sCultural Revolution.
Yao Wenyuan was born inZhuji,Zhejiang, to an intellectual family. His father, Yao Pengzi (姚蓬子) was a writer, translator and art critic.[1]
He began his career inShanghai as a literary critic, where he became known for his sharp attacks against colleagues, such as in June 1957 against the newspaperWenhuibao. Since that time, he began to closely collaborate with leftist Shanghai politicians, including the head of the city's Propaganda Department,Zhang Chunqiao. His article "On the New Historical Beijing Opera 'Hai Rui Dismissed from Office'", published inWenhuibao on November 10, 1965, launched theCultural Revolution.[2]
The article was about a popular opera byWu Han, who was deputy mayor ofBeijing.Zhang Chunqiao andJiang Qing feared the play could be counter-revolutionary because parallels could be drawn between the characters in the play and officials in the communist government. In the play, Hai Rui, a government official, speaks for the peasants against the imperial government, criticizing officials for hypocritically oppressing the masses while pretending to be virtuous men. Hai Rui is dismissed because of this. Yao claimed it was a coded attack onMao for dismissing in 1959 then-minister of defensePeng Dehuai, a critic of Mao'sGreat Leap Forward.[citation needed]
Confused by this unexpected attack, Beijing's party leadership tried to protectWu Han, providing Mao the pretext for a full-scale "struggle" against them in the following year. Yao was soon promoted to the Cultural Revolution Group.[citation needed]
Yao Wenyuan was an ideal candidate for the criticism for such an opera because of his consistent socialist background. In April 1969 he joined the Politburo of theCentral Committee of the Chinese Communist Party, working on official propaganda. A member of "Proletarian writers for purity" he was the editor ofLiberation Daily, one of Shanghai's main newspapers. He joined the state's efforts to rid China's writers union of the famous writerHu Feng.[citation needed]
On October 6, 1976, he wasarrested for his participation in the Cultural Revolution and sentenced to 20 years imprisonment in 1981. He was released on October 5, 1996, and spent the remainder of his life writing a book and studying Chinese history. He lived inHuzhou andShanghai and became the last surviving member of the Gang of Four afterZhang Chunqiao died in April 2005. According to China's officialXinhua news agency, he died ofdiabetes on December 23, 2005, aged 74.[3][4]
