Yang Zai'an: A pioneer of Marxist dissemination with the same name as Li Dazhao

Text/Figure Yangcheng Evening News all-media reporter Zheng Da

Beishan Village, Xiangzhou District, Zhuhai City, where the Yang Ancestral Hall is located. In 1896, Yang Zaian fell to the ground here.

Yang Zaian was one of the members of the founding period of the Communist Party of China, an outstanding theoretician and revolutionary activist in the early days of the Communist Party of China, and was known as "the first person to systematically spread Marxism in the Lingnan region". Together with Li Dazhao, he is known as the pioneer of the spread of Marxism in China, and has the reputation of "Northern Li Nanyang" in the history of the party. His short life has illuminated the way forward for countless people.

It was the first to propagate Marxism in Guangdong

In November 1896, Yang Zaian was born in Beishan Village, Nanping Township, Xiangshan County, Guangdong Province (now Beishan Village, Nanping Town, Xiangzhou District, Zhuhai City, Guangdong Province), and in his childhood, his father died of illness and relied on his mother's needlework to survive.

Although life was hard, her mother insisted on sending Yang Zaian to the academy to study. Yang Zai'an was admitted to the preparatory department of the Liangguang Higher School with excellent results to continue his studies, where he came into contact with various doctrines and ideas such as the Kang and Liang reformists and the Democratic Revolutionaries of Sun Yat-sen.

After graduating from middle school, Yang Zaian returned to his hometown to teach at the primary school, was framed for reporting corruption to the principal, was imprisoned, and saw the dark side of society. In 1915, Yang Zaian came to Japan and eagerly studied books on the new doctrines of various Western schools.

In the winter of 1916, Yang Zaian returned to China and served as a reporter for the Guangdong Zhonghua Xinbao while teaching. In 1919, under the influence of the "May Fourth" patriotic movement and the New Culture Movement, Yang Zai'an underwent great changes in his thinking and made great strides toward the Marxist proletarian world outlook.

In 1919, during the climax of the "May Fourth" patriotic movement in Guangzhou, Yang Zai'an wrote a 80,000-90,000-word article introducing the new cultural trend and Marxism for the Guangdong Zhonghua Xinbao. Among them, the longest and most far-reaching is the article "Marxism", which was published from November 11, 1919 to December 4, 1919, and was published for 19 days, which was the earliest systematic introduction to Marxism in South China.

This article provided ideological and theoretical weapons for the anti-imperialist and anti-feudal patriotic movement and the new cultural movement that were being carried out in depth at that time, and made ideological preparations for the birth of the Guangdong Communist Party organization. "Marxism" came out almost at the same time as Li Dazhao's "My View of Marxism" published in "New Youth", and the two articles were called "sister articles", from which people put forward the term "Northern Li Nanyang".

In 1921, at the age of 26, Yang Zaian was introduced to the Communist Party of China and became one of the early members of the Communist Party of Guangdong.

In 1922, the Guangdong Youth League founded the Youth Weekly, and Yang Zaian wrote the inaugural "Manifesto" to publicly declare to readers: "We are most obedient to Marxism" because it "can clarify the purely economic and purely mechanical process of the collapse of the capital system" and "show us the actual road to socialism." The most valuable thing is that this short "manifesto" has initially linked Marxism with China's national conditions.

In 1929, Yang Zaian compiled the lecture notes brought back by comrades from the Soviet Union into a 200,000-word "Essentials of Western History", which was the earliest Work of Western History written in China using the Marxist materialist concept of history.

"Death is OKAY, Apostasy is NOT"

In 1931, yang Zaian and 16 other people were arrested for betrayal by traitors.

Because Yang Zai'an had served as a member of the Central Committee Standing Committee within the Kuomintang and had a relatively large influence, Chiang Kai-shek sent people several times to persuade him to surrender, but he severely reprimanded him. Chiang Kai-shek wrote a handwritten letter to persuade him to surrender, and after Receiving the letter, Yang Zai'an directly tore it to pieces; Chiang Kai-shek personally came forward to persuade him to surrender, but Yang Zai'an was not moved; the enemy threatened with death, and Yang Zai'an replied categorically: "Since I joined the revolution, I have long put my life and death on the sidelines. Yang Zai'an's iron heart not only touched his prisoners, but even some of the Guards' Kuomintang soldiers praised him as an "iron man."

Soon, Yang Zaian was escorted to the Longhua Detention Center of the Songhu Police Headquarters. Knowing that he would soon die, he entrusted a letter to his family, saying that he would inevitably sacrifice for the revolution, warning his family not to accept any financial support from anyone he did not know, and if he really could not live, he would go back to his hometown, and specially instructed: Do not sell the sewing machine, that is the family's future life. In fact, Yang Zaian's hometown in Guangdong no longer has any property, but he did not mention anything in his suicide note to let his family go to the party organization, just because he was afraid of adding a burden to the organization.

The night before the uprising, Yang Zaian found that Luo Qiyuan, who had worked with him for many years, was mentally weak in prison, and when he was dejected, he wrote a poem "Show the Friends of The Refugees" and gave it to Luo Qiyuan and the fellow prisoners: "Generously board the car, and the whole period is complete." There is nothing to love, and the enemy is present. Knowing the poor Zhang Jian, chi xing smiled Chu Yuan. Parting ways from zi and looking at each other! ”

In August 1931, Yang Zaian was shot dead by Kuomintang reactionaries at the Longhua Police Headquarters in Shanghai at the age of 36.

Edit: Bao Kuo

Source: Golden Sheep Network