Sun Yat-sen: The Patriot with Unfulfilled Ambitions

Author: [USA] Clarence M. Wilbur
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2006-09-01
Features: "Sun Yat-sen, the 'Father of the Nation,' is a highly controversial figure both in history and among historians. During his lifetime, some cursed him, others sneered at him, and others revered him. After his death, the 'deification' movement of the leader further complicated the assessment of Sun Yat-sen. Wilbur believed that Sun Yat-sen's own imagination and his ambition to transform China far exceeded the specific reality of the society he lived in and the forces he could mobilize. The contradiction between his subjective desires and the objective circumstances that repeatedly frustrated him gave rise to questions about the construction of his personality, and such construction drove Sun Yat-sen to pursue an unattainable goal. Sun Yat-sen was a transitional figure. He reflected the great transformation of the declining feudal empire tradition to an industrialized, nationalistic society in modern China. In this transformation, he played a political role, helping to bring about a democratic republic and preventing the restoration of monarchy. However, from a historical perspective, he was merely one of many figures swept away in the same tide.
Author Bio: Clarence M. Wilbur (1908-1997) was a renowned scholar in modern Chinese history. He held long-term positions at Columbia University in the United States and served as the director of its Institute of East Asian Studies. He also authored works such as Village Government in China (1934), Slavery in China during the Former Han Dynasty (1943), The Nationalist Revolution in China, 1923-1928 (1984), and China in My Life: An Historian's Own History (1996). Together with Julie Lien-ying How, he edited Documents on Communism, Nationalism, and Soviet Advisers in China, 1918-1927: Papers Seized in the 1927 Peking Raid (1956).