Hong Ching-fu: The Early Fallen Literary Giant of Local Color Literature

30 Second Overview: Hong Ching-fu (1949–1982), whose birth name was Hong Ma-tsong, was born into a poor farming family in Beiping Village, Erlin, Changhua. He is one of the most important novelists of post-war Taiwanese local color literature. After graduating from Taichung Normal School, he taught at Danan Elementary School and Shekou Elementary School in Shengao. By day, he was a grassroots teacher enlightening rural students; by night, under the dim light of his humble dormitory, he meticulously documented the rapidly disintegrating traditional Taiwanese village. He successively won major literary awards for short stories such as Black-Faced Qingzai, Sanxi, and Wutu. His works, Sanxi and the essay Paper Boat Impression, were selected for national high school textbooks for many years. In 1982, on the night of Typhoon Andy, Hong Ching-fu died suddenly in a car accident while returning home at the age of thirty-two, leaving behind classics such as Black-Faced Qingzai, Urban Legends, and The Rural Family, becoming the most sincere literary spokesperson for Taiwan's farmers and working class.

Walking Through the Sugarcane Fields of Erlin Barefoot: The Literary Dream of a Poor Farmer’s Eldest Son, "Hong Ching-fu-ski"

On December 10, 1949, Hong Ching-fu was born into a poor farming family in Beiping Village, Erlin Township, Changhua County. ¹ His settlement was located about three kilometers outside the township, surrounded by dense sugarcane fields. The family had many children; Hong Ching-fu was the eldest, with seven younger brothers and three sisters, some of whom were sent out for adoption due to poverty in their youth. ² His father, Hong Laiyong, and all the uncles and elders were illiterate, spending their lives working hard in saline and arid climates, yet they always hoped that their descendants could study and escape poverty.

Since childhood, Hong Ching-fu ran barefoot between field ridges and sugarcane fields; he attended Erlin Elementary School. Due to the Hokkien homophone of his birth name, "Hong Ma-tsong," he was often nicknamed "Mao Mao Chong" or "Hongmao" by peers, a childhood nickname that led him to change his name to "Ching-fu." ¹³ In 1963, at the age of fourteen, he was admitted to Taichung Municipal No. 1 Junior High School (now Ju-Ren Junior High School), becoming the first in his family to study away from home. In autobiographical pieces such as Fourth Uncle, he recorded the bitterness of his fourth uncle personally carrying peanuts to visit him in Taichung, and the scorn shown by villagers when they stayed in cities, along with his fourth uncle's earnest expectation before leaving: "Study diligently; people look down on us rural folk, you must be spirited!" ²

After graduating from junior high school, due to the family’s poverty making it impossible to afford private high school and university tuition, Hong Ching-fu was admitted to Taiwan Provincial Normal College in Taichung (now National Taichung University of Education), which provided subsidized meals. At eighteen, during his second year at the normal college, he wrote tens of thousands of words for the novel Countercurrent, driven by an inability to forget the painful memories of severe cramming from his elementary school days. It was serialized in a supplement of the Taiwan Daily News and recommended by the editor, thus knocking on the door of the literary world. ⁴³²

In his youth, Hong Ching-fu experimented widely with styles. Influenced by existentialism and modernism, he published modernist poetry and stream-of-consciousness novels under various pen names such as Situ Men, Ma Cong, Luo Di, and Lin Bian. He formed the "Later Wave Poetry Society" with his peers, whose journal Later Wave Poetry Journal was later revised into Poet Quarterly; in 1970, he helped revive the defunct literary magazine This Generation with Mo Shangsang, Qiao Xingjia, and Huang Chaohu, and assisted in editing Taiwan Literature, which published a collection of short stories from Sixty-Four Years. ⁴⁵³ He jokingly told friends that he wanted to name himself "Hong Ching-fu-ski," taking the Russian writer Fyodor Dostoevsky as a spiritual idol, vowing to dissect the soul's suffering of ordinary people at the social bottom with an honest pen, just like Dostoevsky. ¹⁴

Upon graduating from the normal college, he officially settled on the pen name "Hong Ching-fu." "Ching-fu" carried a self-commitment to awaken the world and regard the lives of rural low-level beings. He gradually came to believe that his creative inspiration came from the soil of the Zhidong River alluvial plain in Erlin, Changhua; only by focusing on the farmers who sweated and shed tears in the wind could his writing truly take root.

📝 Curator's Note
Many readers approach Hong Ching-fu with a layer of melancholy due to his premature death. However, upon closely reading his early self-accounts and manuscripts, one finds that what sustained him in picking up the pen was a resilient spirit born from life's hardships. He emerged from a poor village but chose not to forget it; instead, he turned his writing into the hoe held by farmers, turning over the pain and warmth deep within the land inch by inch on the manuscript paper.

Teaching at Shekou by Day, Documenting by Night: Quiet Cultivation in the Local Color Wave

After graduating from the normal college, Hong Ching-fu was first assigned to teach at Danan Elementary School in Xinshe Township, Taichung County, and was later transferred to Shekou Elementary School in Shengao Township, where he spent over ten years as a grassroots teacher. ¹³ At school, he was "Teacher Hong," beloved by the students for his lively and innovative teaching style, who particularly cared for weak or disadvantaged pupils. Simultaneously, facing the conservative administrative habits of the bureaucracy, he was naturally frank and outspoken; during morning meetings, he publicly told the principal, "Dedicate more time to the school and the students, read more books to improve your knowledge, don't always run outside." ²

This critical consciousness toward institutional flaws was also transformed into pieces such as The Chair and the Gate (which questioned the superficiality of education through a fierce debate between students and the principal over rebuilding the school gate and replacing student desks), the essay From Rejecting College Entrance Exams to Becoming a Writer (reflecting on educational obsession and life direction), and Not an Earthworm (encouraging students to break free from rote memorization and dream in the library). ² By day, he moved between classrooms and playgrounds; by night, at his desk in the faculty dormitory in Shengao, he lit a lamp after class to diligently write on calendar paper and the back of manuscripts.

In the mid-to-late 1970s, Taiwan society experienced the "Local Color Literature Debate" that swept the literary world (see Post-war Taiwanese Literature). In response to criticisms that modernist styles were disconnected from social reality, various factions in the literary community engaged in heated debates. Hong Ching-fu, who was part of the local color writers' circle in Central Taiwan, maintained close contact with central writers such as Wu Sheng and Song Zelei. ⁶

However, amidst the massive wave of debate, Hong Ching-fu chose a highly self-aware writing stance. He stated in his autobiography that he was not concerned about this debate: "It's so noisy, it’s no longer a serious literary discussion"; from the moment he started practicing writing, he had been writing about the people of his hometown, and he didn't care if others called it local color or not. ²

With extreme self-discipline, he continuously submitted representative short stories such as Black-Faced Qingzai, Sanxi, and Wutu. He did not shout political slogans; instead, he let the tearing and struggle of rural life amidst industrial transformation speak directly to the readers through rich details of daily life and psychological portraits.

The Land Elegy of the Classic Trilogy: Black-Faced Qingzai, Urban Legends, and The Rural Family

Although Hong Ching-fu's life was short, the three collections of short stories he left behind constitute a towering peak in the history of post-war Taiwanese realistic literature. His brushstrokes moved from rural villages to urban alleys, and his perspective expanded from individual characters to an entire portrait of clans, demonstrating a broad social vision and precise artistic conception.

Sanxi: The Professional Dignity of Xiujie After the Wild Stage Closes

In 1977, Black-Faced Qingzai won an award in the Second United Daily News Novel Award; in 1978, Sanxi won a second prize in the Third United Daily News Novel Award, establishing his representative status in the literary world. ⁴⁷

The setting of Sanxi is an afternoon at a rural temple festival. The traditional folk opera troupe, "Yushan Opera Troupe," faces an acute existential crisis. The audience below is sparse, with only a few elderly people and running children; most villagers have been drawn to the loud popular songs, open-air color television, and electronic piano performances opposite the stage. Jinfa Bo, the troupe leader, knows that times have changed, and the golden age of guzai opera is gone. Before the final performance of Jingzhong Yue Fei, he announces to the troupe members that the Yushan Opera Troupe will officially disband, and everyone must seek their own livelihood.

The soul character of the novel is "Xiujie," the actress who plays Yue Fei. Xiujie sits behind the messy, dim stage, washing off her heavy makeup with a broken compact mirror while listening to her troupe sisters discuss their grim prospects: becoming factory workers, maids, or even singing popular songs in nightclubs. Before the final act, Jinfa Bo earnestly tells Xiujie that even if there is no audience below, as long as they are on stage in costume, they must perform diligently and properly; this is a duty to their ancestors and an assertion of their professional dignity.

Hong Ching-fu explained his creative intention: "I care about these people. We know that although people have distinctions of nobility, wealth, wisdom, or baseness, they are all human"; what he wanted to write was the life behind the stage, not the play itself. ² Sanxi profoundly captures the powerless exit of folk artists under the impact of modern entertainment; Xiujie's persistence and Jinfa Bo's melancholy vividly portray the professional dignity defended by ordinary laborers before the great wheel of time.

Black-Faced Qingzai and Wutu: Distorted Paternal Love and Fierce Defense of Farmland

In December 1978, Er Ya Publishing House released Hong Ching-fu’s first collection of novels, Black-Faced Qingzai, which contained several groundbreaking rural masterpieces. ³⁸ The short story of the same name depicts "Qingzai," a poor farmer from the lower strata of the village with a dark complexion and silent demeanor. Qingzai's daughter, Ali, who has mental disabilities, becomes pregnant after being seduced by local delinquents. In a traditional village where customs are closed and clan honor is paramount, Qingzai’s family faces scorn, contempt, and ridicule from neighbors.

Faced with the cruel human indifference, the taciturn Qingzai does not complain to heaven or earth, nor does he abandon his disabled daughter and innocent grandson. He chooses to work in the fields at dawn, carrying a full load of night soil, nurturing the children with his clumsy yet rock-solid paternal love, shielding his daughter from the cold moral judgment of the entire village. Hong Ching-fu penetrated the cruel shell of feudal customs to excavate the pure human brilliance of the lower-class farmers.

Another work, Wutu, which won a prize in the First China Times Literature Award, is a historical realistic masterpiece infused with deep family memory. The eldest son of the Ma family in the novel, Ma Shuisheng, is based on Hong Ching-fu's father, Hong Laiyong. The elderly couple suffering from serious illness and relying on morphine for pain relief are based on his grandparents. ² The story recounts how Old Man A-rong, the patriarch of the Ma family during the Japanese colonial period, secretly cultivated a "cow dung field" in Hehuan Forest despite the danger of being beaten by Japanese police. However, after the war, the two elderly people were bedridden due to illness. To afford expensive morphine injections, Shuisheng sold the last piece of land belonging to his family to Chen Shuilei while hiding it from his parents.

When the two elders learned that all the land upon which their dozens of descendants depended had been sold, they bitterly scolded Shuisheng: "The land is ours; we cultivated it, so you must cherish and care for it, do not fear hardship." ² That night, to avoid burdening their descendants, the two elderly people committed suicide by hanging in their room. Through Wutu, Hong Ching-fu recorded the flesh-and-blood relationship between farmers and land. Ye Shitao reviewed Wutu, saying that the plot progression corresponds to the historical changes in Taiwan's land system and fully realizes the truth of realistic literature. ⁴

Urban Legends and The Rural Family: The Portrayal of Erlin’s Community

In 1981, the Independent News Agency published Hong Ching-fu's second collection of novels, Urban Legends. ² This work showed his creative vision extending from the familiar rural village to the rapidly forming peripheral areas of cities. Hong Ching-fu keenly observed that many young villagers flocked to large cities like Taichung and Taipei for survival, becoming construction workers, street vendors, taxi drivers, and factory workers. In the preface to Urban Legends, Hong Ching-fu wrote about his deep longing for his parents on the night he got drunk on his thirty-first birthday: "They are frail and ill, yet they still work in the fields; they have never complained a lifetime, raising us siblings well and farming diligently without any fault toward people. I think this is also a serious way of life."

In 1982, The Rural Family, published by Er Ya Publishing House with hidden planning, was Hong Ching-fu's last collection of novels during his lifetime. In the book, he comprehensively sketched the community of his hometown, Erlin, using a serialized portrait structure: "Zhu Gewangzai," who survives by herding pigs; "Ban Suihuza," who guards a small grocery store despite being disabled; "Niu Gupo," who is extremely superstitious about ghosts and spirits; "Qingxi Abo," who manipulates paper-doll opera puppets; "Bozhaotianzhu," who dies from exhaustion while oxen are working; "Jinshu Bo," who accepts fate despite raising more than ten children; and "Ruixin Bo," who is worldly-wise. The language skillfully blends Hokkien slang with modern novel narrative rhythm, engraving the human warmth, mutual assistance, and societal impact of Taiwan's traditional rural communities into a colorful ukiyo-e print.

Reading The Rural Family, one finds that Hong Ching-fu no longer relied on dramatic tragic conflicts but could distill moving life philosophies from ordinary conversations in the fields and family chats. ⁹

Paper Boat Impression and Sanxi: Collective Memory Passed into Textbooks

In the language learning journey of several generations in Taiwan, "Hong Ching-fu" is an extremely familiar and intimate name. His famous essays, Paper Boat Impression, and short stories, Sanxi, were long selected for junior high and high school Chinese textbooks, becoming introductory chapters that allowed millions of young Taiwanese to recognize local literature and experience human emotion.

Paper Boat Impression, included in the essay collection Recollections of That Conch Sound, unfolds as a vivid scene on a rainy day. In the period of extreme material scarcity, whenever heavy rain poured down, the village dirt roads turned into canals. Mothers, busy with farm chores, would put down the heavy tasks and casually tear pages from old notebooks to crudely and skillfully fold small, exquisite paper boats. The children excitedly placed the paper boats into the surging muddy stream in front of the house, enjoying the most luxurious happiness of childhood as they watched the boats bobbing through the whirlpools.

These small paper boats floating in the rain embody the mother's deep affection. The article concludes by extending memory to inheritance: he hopes that he too can fold a boat for the next generation that is impervious to wind and rain. This simple, long-lasting emotion moved generations of Taiwanese students who went through college entrance exams.

In contrast to the lyrical warmth of Paper Boat Impression, Sanxi, which was selected for high school textbooks, delivered a powerful shock to countless high school students with its profound realistic force. Many young readers raised in the educational system experienced the loss of traditional culture for the first time through Xiujie washing off her makeup—a forced farewell by real people caught between eras. Xiujie's insistence on artistic rules also quietly planted seeds of maintaining one's original intentions and professional ethics in the hearts of many young people over the years.

The widespread selection into textbooks allowed Hong Ching-fu's literature to transcend the scope of his contemporary literary circle, deeply integrating into the collective cultural memory of Taiwanese society.

The Sound That Stopped at Thirty-Two: Sudden Passing on Typhoon Andy Night

In the summer of 1982, Hong Ching-fu was in his prime, with abundant creative energy. He had received recognition in short fiction and was ambitiously determined to continue cultivating this land for at least another thirty years. ⁴

However, fate played a cruel joke on this talented young writer. Late on July 31, 1982, the powerful Typhoon Andy swept over Taiwan's mainland, bringing heavy rain and strong winds across the island. On that day, Hong Ching-fu and his friend Li Jinxiang took a taxi from Taipei back to Taichung in the rain. While passing through Tansi Township, Taichung County, the car overturned due to severe waterlogging on the road. The taxi driver escaped unharmed; Li Jinxiang was seriously injured; Hong Ching-fu suffered massive internal bleeding from liver rupture and was rushed to Fengyuan Hospital for emergency treatment, but he died in the early morning of the next day (August 1) from his injuries at the age of thirty-two (most literature records him as thirty-three based on the lunar calendar). ¹⁶¹⁰

The news shocked and deeply saddened the Taiwanese literary world. A rural novelist, who was at the peak of his creative period, bid farewell to the world on a night of wind and rain. Hong Ching-fu left behind his wife Lin Biyun and two young sons. ¹

At the funeral on August 9, the organizing committee included Zhou Yinglong as chairman, with Yang Kui and Chen Guimiao as vice-chairmen; there were sixty-nine organizers in total. ⁴ The Rural Family, which he had compiled during his life, was published by Er Ya in September of that year, and the essay collection Recollections of That Conch Sound was also published posthumously. In 2001, the Changhua County Cultural Bureau published the nine volumes of Complete Works of Hong Ching-fu, edited by Huang Wuzhong and Ruan Meihui, ensuring the complete transmission of this son of Erlin's writings. ¹²⁹

His close friend Wu Sheng later wrote the poem Sending You Two Trees to mourn him, and years later, the Hong Ching-fu Memorial Park in Erlin was established. ¹¹

Historical Evaluation and Literary Milestones: Rural Realism Without Slogans

Within the century-long context of Taiwanese literature development, Hong Ching-fu established his own distinct position.

The placement in literary history is clear: alongside Song Zelei, he is considered a representative figure of the third wave climax of local color literature in Taiwan during the 1970s, following Huang Chunming, Wang Zhenhe, Yang Qingchu, and Wang Tuo. His writing lacks flashy rhetorical displays or condescending political sermons; instead, it depicts the will to live of ordinary people amidst historical difficulties with profound human concern. ⁴

When placing Hong Ching-fu among his contemporaries in local color literature, his aesthetic characteristics become clearer. Unlike the self-deprecating and satirical comedy found in the works of Huang Chunming, or Wang Zhenhe's sharp dissection of local superstition and human cunning, Hong Ching-fu always maintained a compassionate attitude of "pity without harsh judgment." In the worlds of Black-Faced Qingzai and The Rural Family, even when characters possess flaws such as feudal ignorance, blind procreation, or timid conservatism, he never easily imposes severe moral judgments. He understood that these blind spots in ordinary folk stemmed from long-term constraints of poverty and environment.

Hong Ching-fu wrote a rural realism without slogans. He neither idealized the countryside into an idyllic paradise nor reduced farmers to thin political symbols. He faithfully recorded the desolation, illness, and decline of the countryside, yet he always managed to illuminate the dignity and warmth that refused to bow down to fate, even in the deepest mud at the lowest level.

Hong Ching-fu's brief thirty-two years were like a brilliant meteor streaking across the sky of Taiwanese literature. However, as long as someone on this island is bending over in the fields to cultivate, as long as someone is diligently performing according to tradition under the wild stage, and as long as someone remembers the paper boats folded by their mother when the wind and rain come, the sincere and simple world depicted by Hong Ching-fu will continue to accompany generations of Taiwanese people.

Further Reading

• Post-war Taiwanese Literature: The historical context of post-war social change, the local color literature debate, and realistic thought
• History of Taiwanese Literature: A complete genealogy of the evolution of Taiwanese literature from the Japanese colonial period to the contemporary era
• Huang Chunming: The tragedies and comedies of ordinary people on the Lanyang Plain; a classic counterpart in contemporary local fiction

References and Documents