Chen Ying-zhen: The Unificationist Literary Conscience from Zhunan to Beijing

30-Second Overview: Chen Ying-zhen (1937–2016), born Chen Yung-shan, was born in Zhunan Township, Miaoli County, and later grew up in Yingge, Taipei County. He rose to fame in 1959 with "Noodle Stall" and in 1964 with "The General Clan," a tragedy involving a mainland veteran "Triangle Face" and a young Taiwanese prostitute "Little Skinny Girl" in an entertainment troupe. In 1968, he was arrested due to the "Democratic Taiwan Alliance Case" and sentenced to 10 years; he was released early in 1975 following an amnesty after the death of Chiang Kai-shek. During the Nativist literature debates of 1977–78, he published essays such as "The Blind Spot of Nativist Literature" to rebut critics like Yu Kwang-chung. In 1985, he founded Human magazine, pioneering reportage literature in Taiwan. In 1988, he co-founded the China Unification Alliance with Hu Chiu-yuan and served as its first chairman. In 2006, at the invitation of Renmin University, he settled in Beijing, suffered a stroke that same year, and passed away in Beijing in 2016.

Chen Ying-zhen was one of the most controversial and influential leftist writers in Taiwan's post-war literary history. Born Chen Yung-shan in Zhunan, Miaoli County in 1937, he fled to Yingge with his uncle and father in 1944, a transition that spanned the end of the Japanese colonial period and the early post-war era. Through works such as "The General Clan," "Mountain Road," and the Washington Building series, he analyzed Taiwan's colonial psychology, class structures, and the historical predicament caused by the cross-Strait division. Chen was not only a novelist and a pioneer of the reportage literature movement but also a political intellectual who explicitly advocated for China unification. His stance led him to be categorized as a "unificationist" during Taiwan's localization process, placing him in significant divergence from the mainstream opinion in Taiwanese society. His works and ideas profoundly influenced the theoretical construction of the Nativist literature movement and provided a literary benchmark for subsequent pro-unification camps in Taiwan. ¹

Intellectual Enlightenment of Post-War Youth

Chen Ying-zhen grew up during a complex era in post-war Taiwan, a historical background that deeply shaped his worldview and creative direction. Born in Zhunan in 1937, his childhood coincided with the end of Japanese rule; he moved to Yingge for refuge in 1944 and subsequently experienced the political upheavals of post-war Taiwan, including the February 28 Incident and the White Terror. These historical events prompted the young Chen to contemplate questions of politics, society, and human nature.

His writing was influenced by socialist currents and Lu Xun, promoting realism within the Taiwanese literary scene.

In September 1958, Chen Ying-zhen enrolled in the Department of Foreign Languages at Tamkang Junior College of Arts and Sciences. ² During his college years, he not only excelled academically but also began forming his own political and social views. He encountered Marxist theory and began using class analysis to observe Taiwanese society. This leftist thought profoundly influenced his creative direction for decades and served as the ideological foundation for his later political stance of "China unification." ²

Literary Beginnings and Rise to Fame

In 1959, at age 22, Chen Ying-zhen published his debut work, "Noodle Stall," in Bi Hui magazine, officially beginning his literary career. This was prompted by an invitation from Wei Tian-ts'ung to submit work to the magazine.

In the early 1960s, Chen published a series of short stories, which were later collected in volumes such as My Brother Kang-hsiung (1959–1964) and Tang Chien's Comedy (1964–1967).

The 1964 publication of "The General Clan" was Chen's breakthrough work and a sign of his mature literary style. The novel depicts the tragic romance between two people from the bottom of society: "Triangle Face," a nearly forty-year-old bachelor retired from the National Revolutionary Army who earns a living playing the trumpet in an entertainment troupe; and "Little Skinny Girl," a fifteen or sixteen-year-old girl from a poor family in Taitung, sold into prostitution due to her family's circumstances. After escaping to Taipei, she joins the same troupe as a dancing clown. The two find solace in each other at the bottom of society; Triangle Face leaves his pension savings for her to buy her freedom, but the attempt fails, and she is sold again. They reunite five years later and commit suicide together in a sugarcane field the next day.

By writing about the plight of mainland veterans and young Taiwanese women, "The General Clan" used delicate prose to depict how two marginalized lives—who might otherwise have had nothing in common—were brought together on a path to death by the cross-Strait division, the Chinese Civil War, and the economic marginalization of Taiwan's social structure. In 1999, "The General Clan" was selected as one of the "Thirty Classics of Taiwan Literature" by the Council for Cultural Affairs. ³

Mountain Road: A Delayed Atonement for the White Terror

Written in 1983 and published in Wen Ji, "Mountain Road" is one of Chen's novels dealing with the White Terror, alongside "Bellflower." ⁴

The novel begins with an elderly woman, Tsai Chien-hui, suddenly losing her will to live and gradually wasting away. It traces back through her life of labor in the mountains of Yingge, finally revealing her past through a Japanese letter: her second brother betrayed two comrades—one was executed by firing squad, while the other was sentenced to life imprisonment on Green Island. She spent the rest of her life seeking atonement for this act. ⁴

The Washington Building: Critique of Transnational Capital and Compradorism

The Washington Building series is a significant body of work produced after Chen's second arrest in 1979, shifting focus toward the aggression of transnational corporations against the economy, culture, and psyche of the Third World. On October 3, 1979, he was taken to the Investigation Bureau by the Headquarters of Police Security; he was released approximately 36 hours later following a joint protest signed by figures such as Shih Ming-te, Chen Ku-ying, /en/people/pai-hsien-yung-literary-master/, and Cheng Chou-yu.

His novels and discourses during this period focused on Taiwan's position under transnational capital and dependent capitalism.

The 1968 Democratic Taiwan Alliance Case

On July 31, 1968, the Nationalist government arrested 36 people, including Chen Ying-zhen, Li Ch'eng-tsung, Wu Yao-chung, Chen Shu-kung, and Chiu Yen-liang, on charges of "organizing the reading of leftist books such as Marx and Lenin and spreading communist propaganda." This was the "Democratic Taiwan Alliance Case" (some documents refer to it as the Democratic Taiwan Union Case). At the time, Chen served as an editorial committee member for Literature Quarterly, and writers like /en/people/huang-chun-ming-taiwanese-literary-master/ and Wei Tian-ts'ung were also implicated, leading the incident to be known as the "Wen Ji Incident." ⁵

Note: The 1968 arrest was due to the "Democratic Taiwan Alliance Case," not the "China Unification Alliance" founded by Chen Ying-zhen in 1988. The latter was a political organization established 13 years after his release; while the names are similar, they were two entirely different events.

On December 31, 1968, Chen was sentenced to 10 years in prison and transferred successively to Taitung Taiyuan Prison and Green Island Mountain Villa (Green Island Correctional Institution). In prison, he did not cease thinking or writing; instead, he reflected more deeply on social issues and cross-Strait relations. He was released three years early in 1975 due to an amnesty following the death of Chiang Kai-shek.

This imprisonment experience further solidified Chen's leftist stance and his political advocacy for "China unification." He began to think more rigorously about Taiwan's position within the Cold War framework and the shared destiny of the Taiwanese people with oppressed nations in Asia, Africa, and Latin America. After his release in 1975, he returned to the literary world with more mature ideas and a sharper style. Works from this period, such as Mountain Road and the Washington Building series, embody his grasp of social reality and his concern for the fate of the people.

Theorist of the Nativist Literature Movement

In the 1970s, the Nativist literature movement emerged in Taiwan. In 1976, Chen Ying-zhen served as an editor for Summer Tide magazine. During the Nativist literature debates of 1977–78, he published essays such as "Establishing a Style for National Literature," "Literature Comes from Society and Reflects Society," and "The Blind Spot of Nativist Literature" to rebut criticisms by Yu Kwang-chung and others who argued that Nativist literature tended toward "worker-peasant-soldier" literature. Consequently, he was regarded as one of the primary representatives of the Nativist school. ⁶

"Xu Nan-cun" was one of his pseudonyms, used, for example, in "New Hope for Realist Art," published in the third issue of Poetry Tide in 1978. The aforementioned debate essays, however, were published under his real name.

In the 1980s, he continued to participate in the editorial work of Wen Ji and Summer Tide, and engaged in debates with the Taiwan localization faction—including opponents such as Chen Fang-ming—during the "China Knot" vs. "Taiwan Knot" controversies.

Magazine Editing and Cultural Promotion

Beyond his fiction, Chen Ying-zhen devoted himself to editorial work, striving to promote progressive culture. In 1985, he founded Human magazine, which used reportage literature to closely report on various social issues in Taiwan, including labor, environmental, and Indigenous issues.

The editorial philosophy of Human reflected Chen's consistent cultural advocacy: cultural workers should enter the grassroots, understand the suffering of the people, and use text and imagery to record real social life. Human was a monthly publication that ran from November 1985 to September 1989, totaling 47 issues, and is considered a pioneer of reportage literature in Taiwan.

Through Human, Chen nurtured a group of excellent cultural workers, including photographers, writers, and journalists. These individuals went on to practice Chen's cultural convictions in various roles within the Taiwanese cultural sphere. ⁷

Literary Achievement and Historical Status

Chen Ying-zhen holds a high status in Taiwan's literary history. Alongside /en/people/pai-hsien-yung-literary-master/, /en/people/huang-chun-ming-taiwanese-literary-master/, and Wang Zhen-he, he formed an essential part of modern Taiwanese literature. The distinction lies in their focus: if /en/people/pai-hsien-yung-literary-master/ focused on the spiritual world of urban intellectuals and /en/people/huang-chun-ming-taiwanese-literary-master/ described the charms of life for ordinary people, Chen Ying-zhen focused on the structural problems of society as a whole.

His works are imbued with tones of melancholy and anguish, yet carry a sense of humanitarian concern. In 2004, the Cloud Gate Dance Theatre adapted chapters from "The General Clan," "The Sun Shining by Itself," "Oh! Susanna," "Mountain Road," and "Cloud" into the dance drama Chen Ying-zhen: Landscapes. In 2018, the Fire Thief Theater adapted "Mountain Road" into the stage play On the Mountain Road.

Chairman of the Unification Alliance and Ten Years in Beijing

On April 4, 1988, the China Unification Alliance was founded in Taipei by China Magazine and the Summer Tide Federation. Chen Ying-zhen and Hu Chiu-yuan were among its founders, and he served as its first chairman. The organization, which opposes Taiwan independence and promotes cross-Strait unification, is considered a pro-unification group; in 2019, it registered as a political party named the "Unification Alliance Party." The founding of the China Unification Alliance marked a key turning point in Chen's transition from a man of letters to a political intellectual. He was no longer just a leftist writer of fiction; he chose to stand at the core of Taiwan's pro-unification camp.

In June 2006, at the invitation of Renmin University, Chen Ying-zhen settled in Beijing to serve as a visiting professor. On September 26 of that year, he was admitted to Beijing Chaoyang Hospital due to a stroke; on October 16, he suffered another stroke and fell into a deep coma. In June 2010, the China Writers Association approved his membership and appointed him Honorary Vice Chairman of the Seventh National Committee. He was the second non-mainland Chinese person to hold this honorary position after Jin Yong, and the first Taiwanese person to join the association.

Chen Ying-zhen passed away in Beijing on November 22, 2016, at the age of 79. On December 1, a farewell ceremony was held at the Babaoshan Funeral Hall in Beijing. More than sixty friends and relatives from Taiwan attended, and wreaths were presented by high-ranking officials including Yu Zheng-sheng (Chairman of the CPPCC), Liu Yan-dong (Vice Premier), and Sun Chun-lan (Head of the United Front Work Department). ⁸

Chen Ying-zhen's life trajectory—born in Zhunan, raised in Yingge, writing in Taipei, imprisoned on Green Island, founding Human in Taipei, and falling ill in Beijing—represents one of the most controversial personal choices among Taiwan's post-war leftist intellectuals. His political stance (China unification) diverged significantly from the mainstream opinion in Taiwanese society, leading to debates with figures like Chen Fang-ming. Following his death, Chen Fang-ming also publicly expressed his condolences.

Awards and Works

Chen Ying-zhen received several important recognitions for his literary achievements:

• 1979: Won the Fiction Prize at the 10th Wu Tu-liu Literary Award
• 2003: Won the 2nd Flower Trace World Chinese Literature Award

In 2001, Hung Fan Publishing collected his short and medium-length stories into six volumes titled The Collected Fiction of Chen Ying-zhen, which include My Brother Kang-hsiung, Tang Chien's Comedy, A Day in the Life of an Office Worker, The Emperor of All Merchants, Bellflower, and Zhongxiao Park. His critical essays were collected in volumes such as The Paranoia of the Intellectual. Researcher Zhao Gang authored Seeking: The Literary Path of Chen Ying-zhen. ⁹

References

Further Reading

• Museum of National Taiwan Literature — Chen Ying-zhen — Biography, chronology of works, and manuscript archives of Chen Ying-zhen.
• /en/people/pai-hsien-yung-literary-master/ — A prominent contemporary Taiwanese literary master, best known for Taipei People.