Today I would like to introduce Li Ji from the Guangzhou group.
Li Ji, also known as Yuan Bo and Zhuo Zhi, zi mao you, xie meng, moving mountain lang, Hunan Pingjiang people. During the founding period of the Communist Party of China, he followed Chen Duxiu and successively participated in the early organization of the Communist Party in Shanghai and Guangzhou. After the defeat of the Great Revolution, he joined the "Left Opposition of the Communist Party of China" organized by Chen Duxiu and Peng Shuzhi. He has been immersed in translating overseas socialist treatises for more than 40 years, publishing more than 6 million words, and integrating marx's life in detail with a systematic introduction to Marxist theory, which is quite distinctive.
Li Ji was born in 1892 in Xiushui Village, Wushi Town, Pingjiang County, Hunan Province, to a family of scholars. From an early age, he was brilliant and recited the Four Books and Five Classics in a private school in the local area. Seeing that his memory was amazing, Mr. Private school found his father and said that this child was too smart for me to teach at all, and suggested that the Li family send Li Ji to an outside school to study. Therefore, his father sent Li Ji to Yuezhou Middle School. In 1912, Li Ji was admitted to the Hunan Provincial Higher Commercial School in Changsha, and transferred to the Hunan Higher Normal School after one semester. With the ambition of first learning a foreign language and then learning the way of "governing the country and the world", he went to the English Department to study. In the autumn of 1915, Li Ji, who had not yet graduated from the high school, was admitted to the English Department of Peking University and studied under Gu Hongming. At that time, during the First World War, When China was about to declare war on Germany, Gu Hongming published an English editorial in a foreign newspaper, "Is It Righteousness or Profit?" to denounce it. Gu Hongming let the third-year students of Peking University translate into Chinese, felt very good, and then took the newspaper to the sophomore Li Ji's class, asked who can do this job, Li Ji agreed to try it on the spot, and immediately sent it over after the translation, Gu Hongming was very satisfied after reading it, and said happily: "Where did you learn such a good Chinese?" It's a rarity! For a time, Li Ji became a news figure at Peking University. Since then, Li Ji has been deeply valued by Gu Hongming, and his English level has greatly improved, and by the time he graduated, Li Ji was already an english talent. In 1918, Li Ji graduated from Peking University and stayed on as an English teacher. After the outbreak of the May Fourth Movement in 1919, Li Ji was deeply influenced and tried to break free from the "small self" and instead "determine my tendency" from the fate of the country and the nation. At this time, Li Ji began to study sociology, when domestic books and periodicals could not satisfy his curiosity, so english expertise played a role, he directly read the original English works, read three or four months of new ideas of the book. He first started with history, and in order to find out the ins and outs of the international trend of socialist thought, he began to translate Kokap's History of Socialism. Everyone was skeptical that the new graduate had rushed to translate, but the 220,000-word translation was completed in just three months. Li Ji translated and published Kokapp's History of Socialism, outlining the history of the development of socialism and systematically expounding the theory of class struggle. Cai Yuanpei personally prefaced it, and it was one of three books that enlightened Mao Zedong on class struggle in 1920.
The translation of the book "History of Socialism" was successful in the first battle, which greatly increased Li Ji's self-confidence. But then something happened that prompted Li Ji to re-plan his life. Li Ji used to work as a first-grade English composition and culture teacher at Peking University, but was forced to resign due to the lack of standard spoken language and fluency, which led to the opposition of students. The frustration of undergraduate degrees to control the college preparatory students made Li Ji grumpy, and he decided to study abroad. Soon, Li Ji left the higher cram school, but the opportunity to go abroad for the official fee that he had hoped for was in vain. When he was struggling with his life, Zhongxing Coal Mining Company entrusted a professor at Peking University to hire an English secretary on his behalf, so Li Ji engaged in this work. At first, he was not dissatisfied with this job in Shandong, but later, because the coal mining company did not keep its promises, Li Ji negotiated unsuccessfully for three months, so he resigned and did not work. For another reason, he was ready to accept Chen Duxiu's offer to serve as editor-in-chief of the upcoming Communist Party magazine. In June 1920, Li Ji joined the "Socialist Research Society" organized by Chen Duxiu and others in Shanghai, and he was one of the 13 initiators. In December 1920, Li Ji went to Guangzhou with Chen Duxiu to work. In March 1921, after Chen Duxiu formed the early organization of the Guangzhou Communist Party in Guangzhou, Li Ji was introduced to the party by Chen Duxiu, and Li Ji was 29 years old. Chen Duxiu's proposed appointment as the principal of Guangzhou No. 1 Middle School or a provincial television school was rejected by Li Ji because he was buying and translating a book on socialist ideological trends and movements, and he especially hoped to study abroad. Later, Guangdong prepared to set up a compilation bureau, which set up a British-based editor, chen Duxiu asked Li Ji's opinion and asked him if he was willing to take up this position, and Li Ji happily accepted. He felt that this position would allow him to do both his favorite translation work, study in england, and have a salary. In early May 1921, Li Ji returned to his hometown before going to England, and on June 2, Li Ji, who was visiting his family at home, received a letter of apology from Chen Duxiu, and due to military influence, the proposed compilation bureau could not be opened for a while. However, Li Ji's determination to study abroad was already determined, and he sold the five book manuscripts translated in Guangzhou to the publishing bookstore, and used the manuscript fee as the cost of studying abroad. On August 13, 1921, Li Ji left Shanghai by sea and began a study abroad trip, arriving in France in August of the same year. In 1922, Li Ji went to germany to study at the Faculty of Economics of the University of Frankfurt, Germany, and in 1924 he transferred to the Eastern University of the Soviet Union. In 1925, Li Ji returned to China as a professor of economics and head of the Department of Sociology at Shanghai University. The Department of Sociology of Shanghai University has become a well-known talent training base throughout the country, and this department has become a department with the largest number of students, the largest number of Communist Party members and members of the Communist Youth League, and a department with many revolutionary talents. According to incomplete statistics, among the 40 "martyrs of Shanghai University" in the CCP, 28 students have served as professors and read books in the department of sociology.
In 1927, Li Ji became a professor of sociology at the Central Military and Political School in Wuhan. In July of the same year, Wang Jingwei opposed communism. For a time, the three towns of Wuhan were in a state of white terror, and Li Ji was forced to flee by train overnight to his hometown in Pingjiang for temporary shelter. In 1928, he returned to Shanghai and immersed himself in writing and translation. In 1929, Li Ji participated in the "Left Opposition of the Communist Party of China" organized by Chen Duxiu and Peng Shuzhi and published the monthly magazine "Proletarians". On December 15 of the same year, Li Ji was one of the 81 people who participated in the "Our Opinion Letter" published by Chen Duxiu and others. On December 20, 1929, the Jiangsu Provincial Committee of the Communist Party of China announced that it had approved the expulsion of Li Ji and others from the Communist Party of China by the branches of the Hudong, Huxi, Hunan, and Zhabei district committees in Shanghai. In 1934, Li Ji announced his withdrawal from the Trotskyists, and since then he has not participated in any political activities, but has immersed himself in translation and writings. After the founding of New China, he, like Liu Renjing, issued a statement admitting his mistake in the People's Daily on December 21, 1950. In his statement, he stated the reasons for joining the Trotskyists and repeatedly stated that now that the liberation of the whole country is nearing completion and the construction of new democracy is beginning, I am willing to sincerely stand at my post under the leadership of the Central People's Government and the Communist Party of China and work for the motherland with the greatest enthusiasm.
From 1918 to 1964, Li Ji was engaged in translation for more than 40 years, publishing more than 6 million words. In his early years, he translated the History of Socialism, which had a great influence on Mao Zedong's acceptance of Marxism. He also translated "The Road to Freedom", "Syndicalism", "Socialist Thought and Its Movement", "The Principles of Scientific Socialism", "Popular Capital" and other treatises. After the founding of New China, he served as a special translator of the State Publishing Administration, translated "Marx and Engels Correspondence Collection", "Modern Capitalism", etc., and authored "Marx Biography", "Carl Marx Poetry Biography", "Yanni Marx Poetry Biography", etc., detailing the life of Marx and systematically introducing Marxist theory, which is quite distinctive. In February 1967, Li Ji died in Shanghai at the age of 75.
