Lin Yutang ( ; October 10, 1895 – March 26, 1976) was a Chinese inventor, linguist, novelist, philosopher, and translator. His informal but polished style in both Chinese and English made him one of the most influential writers of his generation, and his compilations and translations of classic Chinese texts into English were bestsellers in the West.

Youth

Lin was born in 1895 in the town of Banzai,

Pinghe Pinghe County () is a county of the prefecture-level city of Zhangzhou, in southern Fujian province, PRC, bordering Guangdong province to the west. Administrative Division The administrative centre or seat of Pinghe County is Xiaoxi (). Towns ...

Zhangzhou Zhangzhou (), alternately romanized as Changchow, is a prefecture-level city in Fujian Province, China. The prefecture around the city proper comprises the southeast corner of the province, facing the Taiwan Strait and surrounding the prefect ...

Fujian Fujian (; alternately romanized as Fukien or Hokkien) is a province on the southeastern coast of China. Fujian is bordered by Zhejiang to the north, Jiangxi to the west, Guangdong to the south, and the Taiwan Strait to the east. Its cap ...

. His father was a Christian minister. His journey of faith from

Christianity Christianity is an Abrahamic monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus of Nazareth. It is the world's largest and most widespread religion with roughly 2.38 billion followers representing one-third of the global pop ...

Taoism Taoism (, ) or Daoism () refers to either a school of Philosophy, philosophical thought (道家; ''daojia'') or to a religion (道教; ''daojiao''), both of which share ideas and concepts of China, Chinese origin and emphasize living in harmo ...

and

Buddhism Buddhism ( , ), also known as Buddha Dharma and Dharmavinaya (), is an Indian religion or philosophical tradition based on teachings attributed to the Buddha. It originated in northern India as a -movement in the 5th century BCE, and gra ...

, and back to Christianity in his later life was recorded in his book ''From Pagan to Christian'' (1959).

Academic career and Shanghai intellectual world

Lin studied for his bachelor's degree at

Saint John's University St John's University may refer to: *St. John's University (New York City) ** St. John's University School of Law **St. John's University (Italy) - Overseas Campus * College of Saint Benedict and Saint John's University, St. Joseph, Minnesota and C ...

Shanghai Shanghai (; , , Standard Mandarin pronunciation: ) is one of the four direct-administered municipalities of the People's Republic of China (PRC). The city is located on the southern estuary of the Yangtze River, with the Huangpu River flow ...

, then received a half-scholarship to continue study for a doctoral degree at

Harvard University Harvard University is a private Ivy League research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Founded in 1636 as Harvard College and named for its first benefactor, the Puritan clergyman John Harvard, it is the oldest institution of higher le ...

. He later wrote that in the

Widener Library The Harry Elkins Widener Memorial Library, housing some 3.5million books in its "vast and cavernous" stacks, is the centerpiece of the Harvard College Libraries (the libraries of Harvard's Faculty of Arts and Sciences) and, more broadly, of the ...

he first found himself and first came alive, but he never saw a Harvard–Yale game. In financial difficulty, he left Harvard early and moved to work with the

Chinese Labour Corps The Chinese Labour Corps (CLC; french: Corps de Travailleurs Chinois; ) was a force of workers recruited by the British government in the First World War to free troops for front line duty by performing support work and manual labour. The French ...

in France and eventually to Germany, where he completed his requirements for a doctoral degree in Chinese philology at the

University of Leipzig Leipzig University (german: Universität Leipzig), in Leipzig in Saxony, Germany, is one of the world's oldest universities and the second-oldest university (by consecutive years of existence) in Germany. The university was founded on 2 Decemb ...

. From 1923 to 1926, he taught English literature at Peking University. Enthusiastic about the success of the

Northern Expedition The Northern Expedition was a military campaign launched by the National Revolutionary Army (NRA) of the Kuomintang (KMT), also known as the "Chinese Nationalist Party", against the Beiyang government and other regional warlords in 1926. The ...

, he briefly served in the new Nationalist government, but soon turned to teaching and writing. He found himself in the wake of the New Culture Movement which criticized China's tradition as feudal and harmful. Instead of accepting this charge, however, Lin immersed himself in the Confucian texts and literary culture which his Christian upbringing and English language education had denied him. His humor magazine ''The Analects Fortnightly'' (''Lunyu Banyuekan'', 1932–40, 1945–49) featured essays by prominent writers such as

Hu Shih Hu Shih (; 17 December 1891 – 24 February 1962), also known as Hu Suh in early references, was a Chinese diplomat, essayist, literary scholar, philosopher, and politician. Hu is widely recognized today as a key contributor to Chinese libera ...

Lao She Shu Qingchun (3 February 189924 August 1966), known by his pen name Lao She, was a Chinese novelist and dramatist. He was one of the most significant figures of 20th-century Chinese literature, and is best known for his novel '' Rickshaw Boy'' ...

Lu Xun Zhou Shuren (25 September 1881 – 19 October 1936), better known by his pen name Lu Xun (or Lu Sun; ; Wade–Giles: Lu Hsün), was a Chinese writer, essayist, poet, and literary critic. He was a leading figure of modern Chinese literature. ...

, and

Zhou Zuoren Zhou Zuoren () (16 January 1885 – 6 May 1967) was a Chinese writer, primarily known as an essayist and a translator. He was the younger brother of Lu Xun (Zhou Shuren, 周树人), the second of three brothers. Biography Early life Born in S ...

and attracted a wide readership. He was a key figure in introducing the Western concept of humor, which he felt China had lacked. In 1924, Lin coined the term ''yōumò'' (), phono-semantic match with the English word ''humor'', and used the ''Analects'' to promote his conception of humor as the expression of a tolerant, cosmopolitan, understanding and civilized philosophy of life. In 1933, Lu Xun attacked the ''Analects'' for being apolitical and dismissed Lin's elegant ''xiǎopǐn wén'' (), or "small essays", as "bric a brac for the bourgeoisie". Lu Xun nevertheless maintained a cordial relationship with Lin and continued to contribute to his journal. Lin's writings in Chinese were critical of the Nationalist government to the point that he feared for his life. Many of his essays from this time were later collected in ''With Love and Irony'' (1940). In 1933, he met

Pearl Buck Pearl Sydenstricker Buck (June 26, 1892 – March 6, 1973) was an American writer and novelist. She is best known for ''The Good Earth'' a bestselling novel in the United States in 1931 and 1932 and won the Pulitzer Prize in 1932. In 1938, Buc ...

in Shanghai, who introduced him and his writings to her publisher and future husband, Richard Walsh, head of John Day publishers, who published Lin's works for many years. Lin's relation with Christianity changed over the years. His father was a second-generation Christian, but at Tsinghua, Lin asked himself what it meant to be a Christian in China. Being a Christian meant acceptance of Western science and progress, but Lin became angry that being a Christian also meant losing touch with China's culture and his own personal identity. On his return from study abroad, Lin renewed his respect for his father, yet he plunged into study of Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism and did not identify himself as Christian until the late 1950s.Stacey Bieler, "Lin Yutang"
''Biographical Dictionary of Christianity in China''

Career after leaving China, and death

After 1935, Lin lived mainly in the United States, where he became known as a "wise and witty" popularizer of Chinese philosophy and way of life. Lin's first best sellers were ''My Country and My People'' () (1935) and ''The Importance of Living'' () (1937), written in English in a charming style. Others include ''Between Tears and Laughter'' () (1943), ''The Importance of Understanding'' (1960, a book of translated Chinese literary passages and short pieces), ''The Chinese Theory of Art'' (1967). The novels ''

Moment in Peking ''Moment in Peking'' is a novel originally written in English by Chinese author Lin Yutang. The novel, Lin's first, covers the turbulent events in China from 1900 to 1938, including the Boxer Uprising, the Republican Revolution of 1911, the W ...

'' (1939), '' A Leaf in the Storm'' (1940), and ''The Vermilion Gate'' () (1953) were well received epics of China in turmoil while '' Chinatown Family'' (1948) presented the lives of Chinese Americans in New York. Partly to avoid controversial contemporary issues, Lin in 1947 published ''The Gay Genius: The Life and Times of Su Tungpo'', which presented the struggle between

Su Dongpo The asterisk ( ), from Late Latin , from Ancient Greek , ''asteriskos'', "little star", is a typographical symbol. It is so called because it resembles a conventional image of a heraldic star. Computer scientists and mathematicians often voc ...

and

Wang Anshi Wang Anshi ; ; December 8, 1021 – May 21, 1086), courtesy name Jiefu (), was a Chinese economist, philosopher, poet, and politician during the Song dynasty. He served as chancellor and attempted major and controversial socioeconomic reforms k ...

as parallel to the struggle between Chinese liberals and totalitarian communists. Lin's political writings in English sold fewer copies than his cultural works and were more controversial. ''Between Tears and Laughter'' (1943) broke with the genial tone of his earlier English writings to criticize Western racism and imperialism. After the

attack on Pearl Harbor The attack on Pearl HarborAlso known as the Battle of Pearl Harbor was a surprise military strike by the Imperial Japanese Navy Air Service upon the United States against the naval base at Pearl Harbor in Honolulu, Territory of Hawaii ...

, Lin traveled in China and wrote favorably of the war effort and Chiang Kai-shek in ''Vigil of a Nation'' (1944). American

China Hands The term ''China Hand'' originally referred to 19th-century merchants in the treaty ports of China, but came to be used for anyone with expert knowledge of the language, culture, and people of China. In 1940s America, the term ''China Hands'' came ...

such as

Edgar Snow Edgar Parks Snow (19 July 1905 – 15 February 1972) was an American journalist known for his books and articles on Communism in China and the Chinese Communist revolution. He was the first Western journalist to give an account of the history of t ...

criticized the works. Ming Kwai 1952 US 2613795 A

Lin was interested in mechanics. Since Chinese is a character-based rather than an alphabet-based language, with many thousands of separate characters, it was difficult to employ modern printing technologies. Lin, however, worked on this problem for decades and came up with a workable

Chinese typewriter A Chinese typewriter is a typewriter that can type Chinese script. Early European typewriters began appearing in the early 19th century. However, as the Chinese language uses a logographic writing system, fitting thousands of Chinese characters o ...

, brought to market in the middle of the war with Japan. The Mingkwai "Clear and Quick" Chinese-language typewriter played a pivotal role in the Cold War machine translation research. Lin also invented and patented several lesser inventions, such as a toothbrush that dispensed toothpaste. From 1954-55, Lin served briefly and unhappily as president (or Chancellor) of the

Nanyang University Nanyang University (, also known as Nantah (), was a university in Singapore between 1956 and 1980. During its existence, it was Singapore's only private university in the Chinese language. In 1980, Nanyang University was merged with the Univer ...

, which was newly established in

Singapore Singapore (), officially the Republic of Singapore, is a sovereign island country and city-state in maritime Southeast Asia. It lies about one degree of latitude () north of the equator, off the southern tip of the Malay Peninsula, borde ...

by Chinese business interests to provide tertiary education in Chinese studies in parallel with the English-medium

University of Singapore The National University of Singapore (NUS) is a national public research university in Singapore. Founded in 1905 as the Straits Settlements and Federated Malay States Government Medical School, NUS is the oldest autonomous university in the ...

. However, according to CIA agent, Joseph B. Smith, Lin clashed with founder

Tan Lark Sye Tan Lark Sye (; 1897–1972) was a prominent Chinese businessman and philanthropist based in Singapore. Early life Tan was born in a Hoklo peasant family of seven in Jimei of Tong An in Fujian, China. Born into of very limited means, and orph ...

and the board of trustees on the direction of the new university. Smith quoted Lin as complaining "They want to indoctrinate the students not only with a love of China ... but they also want to concentrate all teaching on a love of Mao Tse-tung." Further, the faculty resisted Lin's plans to demolish and rebuild the new school building (which though grand, was not "Western" enough), his demands to have sole control over finances, and a budget clearly beyond its means. Lin accepted a dismissal fee of $305,203, entirely contributed by

, to prevent depleting the university's funds. After he returned to New York in the late 1950s, Lin renewed his interest in Christianity. His wife was a devout believer, and Lin admired her serenity and humility. After attending services with her at the

Madison Avenue Presbyterian Church Madison Avenue Presbyterian Church is a member church of the Presbyterian Church (USA), located at 73rd Street and Madison Avenue on the Upper East Side of New York City. In 1927 George Arthur Buttrick succeeded Henry Sloane Coffin as minister. ...

for several months, he joined the church and announced his return to the faith. His 1959 book ''From Pagan to Christian'' explained this move, which many of his readers found surprising. With his facility for both Chinese and English idiom, Lin presided over the compilation of a Chinese-English dictionary, ''

Lin Yutang's Chinese-English Dictionary of Modern Usage ''Lin Yutang's Chinese-English Dictionary of Modern Usage'', compiled by the linguist and author Lin Yutang, contains over 8,100 character head entries and 110,000 words and phrases, including many neologisms. Lin's dictionary made two lexicograp ...

'' (1972), which contains a massive English index to definitions of Chinese terms. The work was undertaken at the newly founded

Chinese University of Hong Kong The Chinese University of Hong Kong (CUHK) is a public research university in Ma Liu Shui, Hong Kong, formally established in 1963 by a charter granted by the Legislative Council of Hong Kong. It is the territory's second-oldest university and ...

. His many works represent an attempt to bridge the cultural gap between the East and the West. He was nominated for the Nobel Prize in Literature in 1940 and 1950. He continued his work until his death in 1976. Lin was buried at his home in

Yangmingshan Yangmingshan National Park is one of the nine national parks in Taiwan, located in both Taipei and New Taipei City. The districts that are partially in the park include Taipei's Beitou and Shilin Districts; and New Taipei's Wanli, Jinshan ...

Taipei Taipei (), officially Taipei City, is the capital and a special municipality of the Republic of China (Taiwan). Located in Northern Taiwan, Taipei City is an enclave of the municipality of New Taipei City that sits about southwest of the n ...

Taiwan Taiwan, officially the Republic of China (ROC), is a country in East Asia, at the junction of the East and South China Seas in the northwestern Pacific Ocean, with the People's Republic of China (PRC) to the northwest, Japan to the nort ...

. His home has been turned into a museum, which is operated by Taipei-based Soochow University. The town of Lin's birth, Banzai, has also preserved the original Lin home and turned it into a museum.

Lin's reputation and scholarship on Lin

Although his major books have remained in print, Lin was a thinker whose place in modern Chinese intellectual history has been overlooked until recently. Lin themed conventions have been organized in Taiwan and Lin's native Fujian, and in December 2011, the International Conference on the Cross-cultural Legacy of Lin Yutang in China and America was held at City University of Hong Kong, with professional and private scholars from mainland China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Japan, Malaysia, the United States, Germany and Slovakia. The organizer of the conference was Dr. Qian Suoqiao, author of the book, ''Liberal Cosmopolitan: Lin Yutang and Middling Chinese Modernity'' (Leiden; Boston: Brill, 2010).International Conference on the Cross-cultural Legacy of Lin Yutang in China and America
/ref> The first full-length academic study of Lin in English is Diran John Sohigian's "The Life and Times of Lin Yutang" (Columbia University Ph.D. diss., 1991). Jing Tsu's Sound and Script in Chinese Diaspora (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2010) gives a detailed account of Lin Yutang's typewriter and its role in the context of late 19th century script reform, Chinese national language reform in the early twentieth century and the fascinating story of his typewriting keyboard and

machine translation Machine translation, sometimes referred to by the abbreviation MT (not to be confused with computer-aided translation, machine-aided human translation or interactive translation), is a sub-field of computational linguistics that investigates t ...

research during the

Cold War The Cold War is a term commonly used to refer to a period of geopolitical tension between the United States and the Soviet Union and their respective allies, the Western Bloc and the Eastern Bloc. The term '' cold war'' is used because the ...

Family

His wife, Liao Tsui-feng (), was an author, who, along with her daughter Lin Hsiang Ju, wrote three cookery books which popularized

Chinese cuisine Chinese cuisine encompasses the numerous cuisines originating from China, as well as overseas cuisines created by the Chinese diaspora. Because of the Chinese diaspora and historical power of the country, Chinese cuisine has influenced many o ...

in the English speaking world. Dr. Lin wrote introductions which explained the historical background and relevance for American life. His first daughter Adet Lin Feng-ju (; 1923–1971) was a Chinese-American author who used the pseudonym Tan Yun. His second daughter Lin Taiyi (; 1926–2003) was also known as Anor Lin in her earliest writing, and had the Chinese name Yu-ju (). She was an author and the editor-in-chief of Chinese edition of the ''Reader's Digest'' from 1965 until her retirement in 1988. She also wrote a biography of her father in Chinese (), which shows some signs of her father's literary flair. His third daughter Lin Hsiang-ju (; born 1931), was referred to as MeiMei in childhood. She was co-author of cookbooks with her mother, and was the head of the Department of Pathology, University of Hong Kong, Queen Mary Hospital Compound, in Hong Kong.

Works

Works by Lin Yutang free online at

Internet Archive The Internet Archive is an American digital library with the stated mission of "universal access to all knowledge". It provides free public access to collections of digitized materials, including websites, software applications/games, music, ...

br>HERE
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In Chinese

Works by Lin in Chinese or published in China to 1935 include: * (1928) ''Jian Fu Collection'' (Shanghai: Bei Hsin Book Company) * (1930) ''Letters of a Chinese Amazon and War-Time Essays'' (Shanghai: Kaiming) * (1930) ''Kaiming English Books'' (Three Volumes) (Shanghai: Kaiming) * (1930) ''English Literature Reader'' (Two Volumes) (Shanghai: Kaiming) * (1930) ''Kaiming English Grammar'' (Two Volumes) (Shanghai: Kaiming) * (1931) ''Reading in Modern Journalistic Prose'' (Shanghai: Oriental Book) * (1933) ''A Collection of Essays on Linguistics'' (Shanghai: Kaiming Book) * (1934) ''Da Huang Ji'' (Shanghai: Living) * (1934) ''My Words'' First Volume (Sing Su Ji) (Shanghai Times) * (1935) ''Kaiming English Materials'' (Three Volumes) co-written by Lin Yutang and Lin you-ho (Shanghai: Oriental Book Co.) * (1935) ''The Little Critic: Essays Satires and Sketches on China'' First Series: 1930-1932 (Shanghai: Oriental Book Co.) * (1935) ''The Little Critic: Essays Satires and Sketches on China'' Second Series: 1933-1935 (Shanghai: Oriental Book Co.) * (1935) ''Confucius Saw Nancy and Essays about Nothing'' (Shanghai: Oriental) * (1936) ''My Words'' Second Volume (Pi Jing Ji) (Shanghai Times) * (1966) ''Ping Xin Lun Gao e'' (Taiwan: Wenxing Bookstore) * (1974) ''A Collection of Wu Suo Bu Tan'' (Taiwan: Kai Ming Book Company)

Works in English

Works by Lin in English include: * (1935) '' My Country and My People'', Reynal & Hitchcock, Inc., (A John Day Book) * (1936) ''A History of the Press and Public Opinion in China'', Kelly and Walsh * (1937) ''The Importance of Living'', Reynal & Hitchcock, Inc., (A John Day Book) * (1939) ''The Wisdom of Confucius'', Random House, The Modern Library * (1939) ''

'', The John Day Book Company * (1940) ''With Love & Irony'', A John Day Book Company * (1941) '' A Leaf in the Storm'', A John Day Book Company * (1942) ''The Wisdom of China and India'', Random House * (1943) ''Between Tears & Laughter'', A John Day Book Company, a plea for the West to change its plans for the post world war order, ((1945), published in London by

Dorothy Crisp Dorothy Crisp (1906–1987) was a right-wing English political figure, writer and publisher. Biography Dorothy Crisp was born in Leeds, England on 17 May 1906. She was the only daughter of Albert Edward Crisp, an examiner, and Annie Beckwith ...

& Co Ltd.) * (1944) '' The Vigil of a Nation'', A John Day Book Compan

* (1947) ''The Gay Genius: The Life and Times of Su Tungpo'', A John Day Book Company * (1948) ''Chinatown Family'', A John Day Book Company * (1948) '' The Wisdom of Laotse'', Random House * (1948) '' Gay Genius: The Life and Times of Su Tungpo'', William Heinemann Limited * (1950) ''On the Wisdom of America'', A John Day Book Company * (1951) ''Widow, Nun and Courtesan: Three Novelettes From the Chinese Translated and Adapted by Lin Yutang'', A John Day Book Company * (1952) ''Famous Chinese Short Stories'', retold by Lin Yutang, The John Day Book Company, reprinted 1952, Washington Square Press * (1953) ''The Vermilion Gate'', A John Day Book Company * (1955) ''Looking Beyond'', Prentice Hall (Published in England as ''The Unexpected Island'', Heinemann) * (1958) ''The Secret Name'', Farrar, Straus and Cudahy * (1959) ''The Chinese Way of Life'', World Publishing Company * (1959) ''From Pagan to Christian'', World Publishing Company * (1960) ''Imperial Peking: Seven Centuries of China'', Crown Publishers * (1960) ''The Importance of Understanding'', World Publishing Company * (1961) ''The Red Peony'', World Publishing Company * (1962) ''The Pleasures of a Nonconformist'', World Publishing Company * (1963) ''Juniper Loa'', World Publishing Company * (1964) ''The Flight of Innocents'', Putnam's Publishing Company * (1964) ''Lady Wu'', Putnam's Publishing Company * (1967) ''The Chinese Theory of Art'', Putnam's Publishing Company * (1972) ''Chinese-English Dictionary of Modern Usage'', Chinese University of Hong Kong and McCraw * (1928-1973) ''Red Chamber Dream''

References

External links

*
List of Lin Yutang's publications

Lin Yutang's Chinese-English Dictionary of Modern Usage

Patent for Lin Yutang's Chinese typewriter

The Lin Yutang House (Taipei)

"History of a 'Scribal Machine'"
''The Harvard Gazette'' (April 2, 2009)

Portrait

Lin Yutang. A Portrait by Kong Kai Ming
at Portrait Gallery of Chinese Writers (Hong Kong Baptist University Library). {{DEFAULTSORT:Lin, Yutang 1895 births 1976 deaths 20th-century Taiwanese writers 20th-century Chinese translators Chinese Christians Taiwanese people from Fujian 20th-century Chinese inventors Chinese lexicographers Chinese male novelists Harvard University alumni Leipzig University alumni Peking University faculty People from Zhangzhou Philosophers from Fujian Republic of China novelists Republic of China philosophers Republic of China translators Simple living advocates St. John's University, Shanghai alumni Taiwanese Christians Taiwanese inventors Taiwanese lexicographers Taiwanese male novelists Taiwanese people of Hoklo descent Taiwanese philosophers Taiwanese translators Writers from Fujian 20th-century Chinese novelists Chinese people of World War I 20th-century lexicographers