Ding Ling

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Ding Ling, 1930s.

Ding Ling ( Chinese  丁玲 , Pinyin Dīng Líng ; actually Jiang Bingzhi ( Chinese  蔣 冰 之 , Pinyin Jiǎng Bīngzhī ); * October 12, 1904 in Linli , Hunan Province , Chinese Empire ; † March 4, 1986 in Beijing , People's Republic of China ) was a Chinese Writer and one of the most important representatives of literature in the Chinese Republic (1911–1949). She was also politically active.

Life

youth

Ding Ling was born on October 12, 1904, to a wealthy, large landowning family in Hunan Province . Thanks to her progressive mother, she began to be interested in politics and socially involved at a young age.

She did not complete her studies in Changsha and Shanghai , but got to know some young writers in the meantime. From 1923 she lived in Beijing with her lover Hu Yepin and in 1927 published her first story, Mèng Kē (《梦 珂》). The success of this story led her to publish another work a year later, Diary of Sophia (《莎菲 女士 的 日記》, Shāfēi Nüshì de Rìjì; ISBN 3-518-01670-9 ), which is one of her most important. It is about a desperate, sick, young woman who cannot cope with her desires and passions in a partly conservative, partly capitalist environment and who gradually becomes selfish and cruel. This extensive story also enjoyed rapid recognition and brought the name Ding Lings to prominence in literary circles.

Life in Shanghai

Ding Ling moved back to Shanghai with Hu Yepin and the young writer Shen Congwen , where she wrote three volumes of short stories in the years that followed . In these texts, Ding mainly dealt with the topic of women and exercised social criticism . In 1928 she made an unsuccessful attempt with Hu and Shen to set up their own publishing house, Rot und Schwarz .

In 1930, Ding Ling and Hu Yepin had a son. That same year, Hu was arrested by the Guomindang for his communist activities and later executed. This and a pronounced political awareness prompted the writer to join the Chinese Communist Party in 1932 . She began her great novel Mother (《母親》 Mǔqīn) and was able to finish the first part before she was arrested by the Guomindang in 1933. Three years later, she managed to escape to Yan'an , an area that was controlled by the communists after the " Long March ".

Yan'an period

Ding Ling.

It was there that Ding Mao Zedong met and began again to be politically and intellectually active. Ding later experienced the dark side of the communist order and wrote some critical stories, including a. In the hospital . A movement of Yan'an writers was formed around them, who were also very concerned about the widening gap between Marxist ideals and reality. The CCP leaders' hypocrisy and occasional cruelty, in particular , received massive criticism. The leaders responded with a rectification campaign, and Mao managed to shake Ding's position. She was exiled to the country. After two years she returned and continued her work. She now lived with Chen Meng.

Career peak

In 1948, shortly before the CCP came to power across the country, she finished her novel Sun over the Sanggan River (太陽 照 在 桑乾河 上 Tàiyáng zhào zài Sānggānhé shàng), for which she received the Stalin Prize . With this, her career as a communist activist developed rapidly, she traveled around the world, participated in congresses and celebrations and was appointed editor of the Literaturanzeiger , the central cultural newspaper of China. She massively criticized “bourgeois” writers, including former friends, helped arrest them, and tried fanatically to stay true to the party line.

Life in custody

But even this loyalty to the party did not save them. In 1955 she was branded a traitor and in 1957, after a brief period of rest, was sentenced to work on a farm in the far north. From 1960 to 1964 she still enjoyed relative freedom, from 1964 onwards one again cracked down on her with great severity. During the Cultural Revolution , she suffered mental and physical torture and did heavy labor. The manuscripts of her unpublished works were destroyed. In 1970 she was arrested and detained in poor conditions for six years. After Mao's death and the breaking up of the Gang of Four , Ding Ling was released from prison in 1979 and rehabilitated. In the years that followed she criticized the Communist Party, albeit in a rather distant manner. In 1986, the year of her death, she was elected an honorary foreign member of the American Academy of Arts and Letters .

Works (selection)

  • 《梦 珂》 Mèng Kē
  • 《莎菲 女士 的 日記》 Suōfēi Nǚshì de Rìjì (The Diary of Sofia)
  • 《在 黑暗 中》 Zài Hēi'ànzhōng (In the dark)
  • 《水》 Shuǐ (water)
  • 《夜》 Yè (night)
  • 《母親》 Mǔqīn (mother)
  • 《自殺 日記》 Zìshā Rìjì (suicide diary)

Works in German

  • Sophia's diary . - Verlag Suhrkamp, ​​1986. - ISBN 978-3518016701
  • Sun over the Sanggan . Novel. - Dietz publishing house, 1952.
  • Millet grain in the blue sea. Narratives . - Verlag Reclam, 1987. - ISBN 978-3379001472
  • A woman's seasons . - Verlag Herder, 1994. - ISBN 978-3451221576

literature

Web links

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Honorary Members: Ding Ling. American Academy of Arts and Letters, accessed March 9, 2019 .
Note: This article places the family name before the person's first name. This is the usual order in Chinese. Ding is the family name here, Ling is the first name.
personal data
SURNAME Ding Ling
ALTERNATIVE NAMES Jiang Weiwen
BRIEF DESCRIPTION chinese writer
DATE OF BIRTH October 12, 1904
PLACE OF BIRTH Province Hunan
DATE OF DEATH March 4th 1986
Place of death Beijing