Zou Taofen (1895-1944), real name Enrun, was born in Yong'an, Fujian Province. Profile picture
He was unusually naïve, barely aware of the deception and adultery of the world. As a result, from time to time he suffered great losses. However, he never changed his opinions and opinions by changing his views. He is clinging to it. He served the majority of the people, spoke for them, fought for them, and fought for them until he died. Like a giant, he stands like a mountain, clinging to the torch, and leading the people. He is most opposed to corruption and corruption; he does not hesitate to attack all that is unreasonable, even if it causes all kinds of evils. ——Zheng Zhenduo, "Mr. Yi Taofen"
In the early days, as a democratic youth, Zou Taofen took over as the editor-in-chief of "Life" Weekly, but he wanted to change the "Life" weekly, which guided vocational education, into a popular publication that "pays attention to life, arouses the national spirit, and promotes social change"; the style pursued is only "no restraint, avoid rigidity, and strive to be relaxed and vivid, concise and elegant, and interesting"; the target audience is set as intellectuals and cultural classes, and the intellectual class is expected to have more of the integrity of "the world rises and falls, and the people are responsible".
The change in Taofen's ideological concept began with the "918" incident in 1931. When the Japanese army invaded and occupied northeast China, he deeply felt the pain of national ruin and the humiliation of being bullied and insulted by foreign nationalities, and quickly shifted the content of the publication from the interests of the urban middle class to propaganda to resist Japan and save the country, from "rejoicing and happy in the air of laughter and laughter" to "making sincere criticisms or suggestions on the people's position on the government and society with its objective and unbiased attitude toward society, discussing people on the facts, and relying on justice."
Tao Fen regarded Life Weekly as a clarion call for mobilization to all walks of life in China, and each issue devoted a great deal of space to reporting the news of the courageous resistance of the Chinese military and people, exposing the bloody crimes of the Japanese aggressors, and sharply attacking the principles and policies of non-resistanceism.
After the "January 28" incident, Chiang Kai-shek issued a "Telegram to the Generals of the Whole Country," asking the officers and men of the whole army to "work hard and vigorously, and share the same hatred with the enemy" and "stand by and wait for the order to save the dying in danger," and said that he himself was "willing to swear to live and die with all the generals and fulfill my duty." "Life" weekly told the truth without mercy: the people of the whole country believed it to be true, and the result was blinded by Chiang Kai-shek. The articles published by life magazine and the organization of collecting military supplies and building hospitals for wounded soldiers were originally consistent with Chiang Kai-shek's generous remarks. As everyone knows, all of Chiang Kai-shek's measures were only temporarily made for the forces of various factions, and in his bones he had long ago determined the general political principle that "outside the country must first be at home."
"Life" weekly magazine attracted the attention of the vast number of readers, and gradually became the public opinion position of the national salvation movement.
Tao Fen's true ambition and establishment of faith was when he was first forced into exile abroad. In June 1933, Kuomintang agents killed Yang Xingfo, vice president and director general of the China Civil Rights Protection League. Tao Fen was also among the assassination lists circulating at the time, and he was forced to leave his family and go into exile. In Britain, Tao Fen read Marx's works and accepted Marxism; in the Soviet Union, he entered the Moscow Summer University and wrote more than 200,000 words of articles to publicize the achievements of socialist construction in the Soviet Union. He pondered the reality of China, clearly understood the essence of the Kuomintang's passive resistance to Japan and active anti-communism, and felt that only the Communist Party of China could save China. In New York, he expressed his desire to join the Chinese Communist Party to a Chinese Communist Who stayed in the United States.
In July 1935, Tao Fen saw in the American newspaper that the magazine "Xinsheng" had been banned and the editor-in-chief Du Chongyuan had been arrested and imprisoned, and he was so angry that he decided to return to China. After returning to China, he immediately founded the weekly magazine "Public Life", continued to hold high the banner of anti-Japanese resistance, and advocated and shouted for the anti-Japanese salvation.
The Kuomintang secret service watched Taofen's actions, and Chiang Kai-shek instructed Hu Zongnan to go to Shanghai to persuade Taofen to change his position and support the Kuomintang government. Tao Fen argued with him for four hours, and made it clear that no matter what day the "government" that only supports the anti-Japanese resistance, no matter what day it is, as long as the "government" openly resists Japan, we will certainly support it. Until the "government" did not openly resist Japan, we had no way to support it. Hu Zongnan returned in vain, and the weekly magazine "Life" in Jiangxi, Hubei, Henan and Anhui provinces was banned.
In January 1936, Taofen's classmate Xu Enzeng, the head of the Central Unification Secret Service, and Zhang Daofan and Liu Jianqun went to Shanghai again to persuade and threaten, and the two sides dispersed unhappily. Later, Du Yuesheng also wanted to "personally accompany" Tao Fen to Nanjing and "have a face-to-face talk" with Chiang Kai-shek, and Tao Fen directly stated that as an individual, he had nothing to do with Chiang Kai-shek; if he wanted to say that he could not represent the National Salvation Congress as an organization, he could not accompany him to Nanjing. Greatly annoyed, Chiang Kai-shek ordered the secret service to take action, and Tao Fen was in a very dangerous situation, so he had to go into exile in Hong Kong and venture back to Shanghai a few months later.
In order to change Taofen's political stance, Chiang Kai-shek also directly put pressure on the China Vocational Education Society, the organizer of the Life Bookstore. Tao Fen did not want to affect the vocational education society, and resolutely broke away from the management relationship with it and independently ran a magazine and a shop. The Life Bookstore did not flinch and published dozens of progressive books such as The Communist Manifesto, Wage Labor and Capital, Anti-Dühring, State and Revolution, and Dialectical Materialism and Historical Materialism.
In November 1936, Tao Fen, Shen Junru and other "seven gentlemen" were arrested and imprisoned by the Kuomintang government. They will never compromise and insist on saving the country without guilt. Until the Lugou Bridge Incident the following year, in the national solidarity, the Kuomintang government had no choice but to release them. After Tao Fen's release from prison, Shanghai fell, and he transferred the general management office of the Life Bookstore to Wuhan. Tao Fen actively moved closer to the Communist Party organization, and through Zhang Zhongshi's contact, he met Dong Biwu and Zhou Enlai successively. Zhou Enlai encouraged and supported him to set up bookstores in the Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia Border Region and behind enemy lines; in order to avoid suspicion, it was suggested that the name of the life bookstore should not be used, and that the Shaanxi-Gansu-Ningxia base area could be called the North China Bookstore, and the New Fourth Army base area should be called the Mass Bookstore. Tao Fen was very encouraged and solemnly submitted a request to Zhou Enlai to join the Chinese Communist Party. Zhou Enlai told him that the party needs you to stay outside the party. Tao Fen thanked the party for its trust in him and happily accepted Zhou Enlai's advice. He and Lin Boqu specifically discussed the plan to open a bookstore, and in September and October 1940, he opened a north China bookstore in the liberated area of southeastern Jin and Yan'an, and a popular bookstore in northern Jiangsu and central Jiangsu.
In 1939, Zou Taofen participated in an event in honor of Mr. Lu Xun in Chongqing. Profile picture
Later, the General Management Office of The Life Bookstore was transferred to Chongqing. In order to actively publicize the War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression and the Party's proposition of establishing a national united front, Tao Fen took turns to invite Zhou Enlai, Dong Biwu, Lin Boqu, Ye Jianying, and other CPC leaders to the Life Bookstore to make reports on the situation of the War of Resistance and actively propagate Mao Zedong's "On New Democracy."
In February 1941, Zhou Enlai personally deployed an operation to protect the relocation of prominent cultural figures to Hong Kong. Zhou Enlai met with Tao Fen, told him that it would be too dangerous to stay in Chongqing any longer, and asked him to go to Hong Kong as well.
Tao Fen and Chen Guofu live in the same courtyard, and the whole family leaving Chongqing at the same time will inevitably be exposed, and Tao Fen can only leave his family alone once again. With the help of Shen Junru, Tao Fen escaped from home like an underground worker.
In December 1941, the Japanese army occupied Kowloon, and Hong Kong was in danger. Zhou Enlai instructed Liao Chengzhi and Pan Hannian to help cultural figures in Hong Kong move to Nanyang and Guangzhou. Kuomintang agents tracked down Guangdong, and the party organization made meticulous arrangements to first transfer Taofen's wife and children to Guilin, and Taofen hid in Meixian County, Guangdong Province, with the Dongjiang guerrilla column for nearly half a year. Following Zhou Enlai's instructions, in September 1942, the Life Bookstore sent someone to Guangdong to accompany Taofen on a detour from Wuhan to Shanghai, planning to go to Yan'an via northern Jiangsu.
In the liberated areas of northern Jiangsu, Taofen witnessed a new scene of the new Fourth Army officers and men uniting in unison and the military and the people as one family. No matter where the team went, they always had to sweep the yard of the station clean, borrow the belongings of the fellow villagers, even if it was a broom, a bucket, and a spoon to return in person. Before the troops set out, all companies, platoons, and squads must conscientiously check whether they have returned the things borrowed from their fellow villagers, whether the water tanks are full, and whether there are any things that damage the homes of their fellow villagers. Assembling or setting off, the troops sang "Three Disciplines and Eight Notes". During the night talk in Jiangtou Village, Meixian County, he heard the local people say that five Kuomintang recruits escaped and were arrested and brutally killed, and the officials also dug out the hearts and livers of the soldiers, scaring the common people on the spot, and the two armies were very different.
Tao Fen threw himself passionately into the fiery life of the Liberated Areas, either marching with the troops or giving speeches everywhere. When he came to the Liberated Areas from the Kuomintang Area, he had too many things to say to the officers and men, and he wanted to talk about the life in the Kuomintang areas and the nature of the Kuomintang's fake anti-Japanese and anti-communism, and his feelings about the Communist Party and the New Fourth Army. In his speech, he shouted to all officers, men and the people: China's fate rests on the Communist Party of China, the Eighth Route Army, and the New Fourth Army!
Tao Fen's ear disease became more and more serious every day, and he endured earache to give a speech to the officers and soldiers. In the evening class, the ear hurt so much that I couldn't write, so I could only stop massaging and taking painkillers. He Luting found that Tao Fen's painkillers could not stop the pain, Huang Kecheng reported to his superiors, and Chen Yi instructed "Comrade Sui to escort Tao Fen back to Shanghai for treatment." Huang Kecheng and Su Yu also prepared travel expenses and medical expenses for him. Tao Fen truly felt the warmth of the party organization and said that after curing the disease, he would definitely come back.
Zou Taofen's "Aftermath of Suffering" manuscript information picture
The Kuomintang's wanted warrant forced Tao Fen to be hospitalized under a pseudonym, and agents tracked him down, forcing him to be transferred four times. Tao Fen's illness was already very serious, Zou Jialuo and Zou Jiali's two children were in middle school in Guilin, and his wife Shen Pujian could not leave, so he had to ask his 14-year-old son Zou Jiahua to return to Shanghai to take care of him. Zou Jiahua saw that his father was still writing despite the pain of illness, and advised him not to be too tired. Tao Fen patiently said to his son, "Dabao, Daddy's time is too precious. "The Aftermath of Suffering" has not yet been written, and I still want to write two books, "Observations and Feelings of Northern Jiangsu" and "History of Democracy and Politics in Various Countries.", I am afraid that I will not be able to finish it if I do not seize the time. Shen Pujian rushed to Shanghai with her daughter, and Zou Jiali could no longer recognize her father. Tao Fen's eyes were blind, still lying on the small table writing.
On June 1, 1944, Tao Fen's condition worsened. On June 2, Xu Xuehan came to visit on behalf of Chen Yi. As soon as they met, Tao Fen handed over the "Appeal to the People" he had just written to Xu Xuehan and asked him to take it back for publication. He asked Xu Xuehan to write an application for joining the party on his behalf, asked the Party Central Committee to review his life, and if he was worthy of the glorious title of Communist Party member, he was posthumously recognized as a member of the Communist Party of China. On July 24, Tao Fen died of illness in Shanghai at the age of 49.
On September 28, the Central Committee of the Communist Party of China sent a telegram to Taofen who died and posthumously recognized him as a member of the Communist Party of China. The Party Central Committee held a memorial service in Yan'an, and Mao Zedong, Zhu De, Liu Shaoqi, and Zhou Enlai all wrote inscriptions for Taofen. Zhou Enlai's inscription reads: "The road experienced by Comrade Zou Taofen is the road for Chinese intellectuals to move toward progress and revolution. (Author: Huang Guorong, Deputy Secretary-General of Taofen Foundation)