Nien Cheng
   HOME

TheInfoList



OR:

Nien Cheng or Zheng Nian (January 28, 1915 – November 2, 2009) is the pen name of Yao Nien-Yuan (). She was a Chinese author who recounted her harrowing experiences during the
Cultural Revolution The Cultural Revolution, formally known as the Great Proletarian Cultural Revolution, was a sociopolitical movement in the People's Republic of China (PRC) launched by Mao Zedong in 1966, and lasting until his death in 1976. Its stated goa ...
in her memoir ''
Life and Death in Shanghai ''Life and Death in Shanghai'' is an autobiography published in November 1987Published 1986-07-24, , by Yao Nien-Yuan under the pen name Nien Cheng. Written in exile in the United States, it tells the story of Cheng's arrest during the first day ...
''.


Biography

Cheng was born into a rich landowning family in
Beijing } Beijing ( ; ; ), alternatively romanized as Peking ( ), is the capital of the People's Republic of China. It is the center of power and development of the country. Beijing is the world's most populous national capital city, with over 21 ...
. She studied at Yenching University and later went to London to obtain a master's degree at the
London School of Economics The London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) is a public university, public research university located in London, England and a constituent college of the federal University of London. Founded in 1895 by Fabian Society members Sidn ...
. She returned to China after graduation. During her time in London, Cheng also met her husband Kang-chi Cheng and converted to Christianity. Upon their return to China, Kang-chi Cheng joined the Foreign Affairs ministry of the Nationalist government. The couple lived in Australia briefly, setting up an embassy there, and eventually moved to Shanghai. After the
Communist Party of China The Chinese Communist Party (CCP), officially the Communist Party of China (CPC), is the founding and sole ruling party of the People's Republic of China (PRC). Under the leadership of Mao Zedong, the CCP emerged victorious in the Chinese Civil ...
came to power in 1949, Kang-chi Cheng served at
Shell Shell may refer to: Architecture and design * Shell (structure), a thin structure ** Concrete shell, a thin shell of concrete, usually with no interior columns or exterior buttresses ** Thin-shell structure Science Biology * Seashell, a hard o ...
's office in Shanghai until his death from cancer in 1957. Nien Cheng then joined the company as an adviser.Nien Cheng
Telegraph.co.uk, 11 Nov 2009
The couple had one daughter named Meiping, but she died under uncertain circumstances when her mother was in prison. In 1966, Cheng was targeted by
Red Guards Red Guards () were a mass student-led paramilitary social movement mobilized and guided by Chairman Mao Zedong in 1966 through 1967, during the first phase of the Cultural Revolution, which he had instituted.Teiwes According to a Red Guard lead ...
and accused of being a British spy, as she was both Western-educated and the widow of the former manager of a foreign firm in
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 flowin ...
. Cheng's book documents her account of her subsequent confinement, which lasted for more than six years. According to her book, Cheng managed to endure the tortures and abuses inflicted by the interrogators and never made any false confessions or perjuries. Cheng used Chinese Communist Party founder Chairman Mao Zedong's teachings successfully against her interrogators, frequently turning the tide of the
struggle session Denunciation rallies, also called struggle sessions, were violent public spectacles in Maoist China where people accused of being "Five Black Categories, class enemies" were public humiliation, publicly humiliated, accused, beaten and tortured by ...
s against them. Although the living conditions at the detention house were inhumanly squalid, Cheng still tried to maintain her dignity and keep her appearance decent as much as possible. In 1973, when offered parole on the basis that her attitude had shown improvement, Cheng resisted leaving the detention house without first receiving official acknowledgment from her captors that she had been unjustly detained. Upon her release, Cheng was relocated from her spacious home to two bedrooms on the second floor of a two-story building. Cheng continued her life under constant surveillance, including spying by the family on the first floor. When released from jail, Cheng was told that her daughter Meiping Cheng () had committed suicide. After Cheng conducted a discreet investigation, she found that this scenario was impossible, and she came to believe that Meiping had been murdered by Maoists after she refused to denounce her mother. The alleged killer of Meiping, a rebel worker named Hu Yongnian, was arrested and given a suspended death sentence by Shanghai authorities in 1980, but he was eventually paroled in 1995. Cheng lived in China until 1980. Using funds that her husband had placed in overseas bank accounts, she first emigrated to Canada and later to Washington, D.C., where she wrote the autobiography. Cheng never returned to China. She stated that the main reason she remained in her self-imposed exile was that she could not bear the constant reminder of her dead daughter at the sight of other young Chinese women. Meanwhile, Cheng also suspected that she was still a constant target of surveillance by the Chinese government. In an interview conducted in 1998, Cheng said she would never return to China until the portrait of Chairman Mao was removed from the gate of
Tiananmen Square Tiananmen Square or Tian'anmen Square (; 天安门广场; Pinyin: ''Tiān'ānmén Guǎngchǎng''; Wade–Giles: ''Tʻien1-an1-mên2 Kuang3-chʻang3'') is a city square in the city center of Beijing, China, named after the eponymous Tiananmen ...
. Cheng was a longtime friend of U.S. Ambassador to China Nelson T. Johnson and his wife Jane Augusta Washington Thornton Beck Johnson. After moving to Washington, D.C., Cheng traveled extensively and was a frequent speaker on the lecture circuit. She was also a close friend of Baroness Van Aerssen ( Suzanne Hiltermann-Souloumiac), wife of the Dutch Consul General in Hong Kong. Nien and Suzanne exchanged several letters on ''Life and Death in Shanghai''.
Canadian Canadians (french: Canadiens) are people identified with the country of Canada. This connection may be residential, legal, historical or cultural. For most Canadians, many (or all) of these connections exist and are collectively the source of ...
singer Corey Hart recorded an instrumental song based on her memoir in his 1990 album '' Bang!'' Cheng died of
renal failure Kidney failure, also known as end-stage kidney disease, is a medical condition in which the kidneys can no longer adequately filter waste products from the blood, functioning at less than 15% of normal levels. Kidney failure is classified as eit ...
in
Washington, D.C. ) , image_skyline = , image_caption = Clockwise from top left: the Washington Monument and Lincoln Memorial on the National Mall, United States Capitol, Logan Circle, Jefferson Memorial, White House, Adams Morgan, ...
on November 2, 2009.


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Cheng, Nien 1915 births 2009 deaths Shell plc people American writers of Chinese descent Victims of human rights abuses Prisoners and detainees of the People's Republic of China Chinese prisoners and detainees Chinese emigrants to the United States Victims of the Cultural Revolution