Selected Essays of Xu Zhimo

Author: Xu Zhimo
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2004-08-01
Features: Xu Zhimo (1896—1931), whose given name was Zhang Xu, initially used the courtesy name You'en and later changed it to Zhi-mo. He was born in Xianshi Town, Haining County, Zhejiang Province. He came from a wealthy bourgeois family with strong feudal influences. In 1900, he entered the family's private school, and in 1907, he attended Kaishi Kaizhi School. In 1910, he enrolled in Hangzhou Prefecture Middle School. In the autumn of 1915, he entered Shanghai Jiajiang University, and by the end of the year, he transferred to Tianjin Beiyang University. In the autumn of 1916, he joined Peking University. In the summer of 1918, he went to the United States to study banking and sociology at Clark University and later enrolled in Columbia University to study politics. In 1920, he obtained a master's degree from Columbia University. That same year, he crossed the Atlantic to study politics at Cambridge University in the UK, where his interests gradually shifted toward literature, and he began writing poetry. In March 1922, he divorced his wife, Zhang Youyi, who was studying in Germany. In October of the same year, he returned to China. He taught at Peking University, Tsinghua University, and the People's University. He later joined the "New Moon Society" and the "Modern Review" group, becoming a key member of these organizations. During this period, he published essays and poems in various Beijing and Shanghai publications, including the "Supplement to the Morning News," "Monthly Novel," "Literary Weekly," "Effort Weekly," "Modern Review," and "Xuedeng," which had a significant impact. He served as the editor of the "Supplement to the Morning News" and "Poetry Magazine" in Beijing. In the autumn of 1926, after marrying Lu Xiaoman, he moved to Shanghai and taught at Guanghua University, Da Xia University, and Nanjing Central University. In the spring of 1927, he co-founded "New Moon Books" with Hu Shi and others. The following spring, he helped establish the "New Moon" monthly magazine and served as its editor-in-chief. He later edited "Poetry Magazine." Between 1924 and 1928, he traveled to Japan and various European countries, including the UK, Germany, Italy, as well as Singapore and India. On November 19, 1931, he boarded a plane from Nanjing to Beijing but crashed into a mountain near Dangjiazhuang in Jinan due to fog, resulting in the deaths of all aboard. He was 36 years old. Xu Zhimo's works include poetry collections such as "Poems of Xu Zhi-mo," "A Night in," "The Tiger Collection," and "Cloud Wanderings"; prose collections such as "Fallen Leaves," "Self-Analysis," "Fragments of Paris," and "Autumn"; letters and diaries like "Notes on Mei Mei" and "Xu Zhi-mo's Diary"; a short story collection titled "The Wheel"; and plays such as "Bian Kun Gang" (co-authored with Lu Xiaoman). His translated works include "The Child of the Vortex," "Short Stories of Mabel," "Mary Mary" (co-translated with Shen Xingren), and "Goutte-de-de." Additionally, there are poems and various forms of prose that were not included in collections and appeared in various publications.