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= Lin_Yutang =
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Introduction
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{{family name hatnote|Lin ()|lang=Chinese}}
Lin Yutang (10 October 1895 - 26 March 1976) was a Chinese inventor,
linguist, novelist, philosopher, and translator. One scholar commented
that Lin's "particular blend of sophistication and casualness found a
wide audience, and he became a major humorous and critical presence",
and he made compilations and translations of the Chinese classics into
English. His 'My Country and My People' (1935) reached the top of the
'New York Times' bestseller list. Some of his writings criticized the
racism and imperialism of the West.
Early life
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Lin was born in 1895 in the town of Banzai, Fujian. His father was a
Christian minister. His journey of faith from Christianity to Taoism
and Buddhism, and back to Christianity in his later life was recorded
in his book 'From Pagan to Christian' (1959).
Academia
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Lin studied for his bachelor's degree at St. John's University, a
Christian university in Shanghai. Then he received a half-scholarship
to continue study for a doctoral degree at Harvard University. He
later wrote that in the Widener Library he first found himself and
first came alive, but he never saw a Harvard-Yale game.
In financial difficulty, he left Harvard early and moved to work with
the Chinese Labour Corps in France and eventually to Germany, where he
completed his requirements for a doctoral degree in Chinese philology
at the University of Leipzig. From 1923 to 1926, he taught English
literature at Peking University.
Enthusiastic about the success of the Northern Expedition, he briefly
served in the new Nationalist government, but soon turned to teaching
and writing. He found himself in the wake of the New Culture Movement
which criticized certain ancient traditions as feudal and harmful.
Instead of accepting this charge, Lin immersed himself in the
Confucian texts and literary culture which his Christian upbringing
and English language education had denied him.
His humor magazine 'The Analects Fortnightly' ('Lunyu Banyuekan',
1932-1940, 1945-1949) featured essays by writers such as Hu Shih, Lao
She, Lu Xun, and Zhou Zuoren. He was one of the figures who introduced
the Western concept of humor. In 1924, the term 'youmo' () was
invented, a phono-semantic match with the English word 'humor.' Lin
used the 'Analects' to promote his conception of humor as the
expression of a tolerant, cosmopolitan, understanding and civilized
philosophy of life.
In 1933, Lu Xun attacked the 'Analects' for being apolitical and
dismissed Lin's 'small essays' () as "bric a brac for the
bourgeoisie". Lu Xun nevertheless continued to write for the magazine.
Lin's writings in Chinese were critical of the Nationalist government
to the point that he feared for his life. Many of his essays from this
time were later collected in 'With Love and Irony' (1940). In 1933, he
met Pearl Buck in Shanghai, who introduced him and his writings to her
publisher and future husband, Richard Walsh, head of the John Day
Company.
Lin's relation with Christianity changed over the years. His father
was a second-generation Christian, but at Tsinghua, Lin asked himself
what it meant to be a Christian in China. Being a Christian meant
acceptance of Western science and progress, but Lin became angry that
being a Christian also meant losing touch with China's culture and his
own personal identity.
On his return from study abroad, Lin renewed his respect for his
father, yet he plunged into study of Confucianism, Taoism, and
Buddhism and did not identify himself as Christian until the late
1950s.
Career outside China
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After 1935, Lin lived mainly in the United States, where he was a
writer of Chinese philosophy and way of life. Lin wrote 'My Country
and My People' () (1935) and 'The Importance of Living' () (1937) in
English. Others include 'Between Tears and Laughter' () (1943), 'The
Importance of Understanding' (1960, a book of translated Chinese
literary passages and short pieces), 'The Chinese Theory of Art'
(1967). The novels 'Moment in Peking' (1939), 'A Leaf in the Storm'
(1940), and 'The Vermilion Gate' () (1953) described China in turmoil
while 'Chinatown Family' (1948) presented the lives of Chinese
Americans in New York. Partly to avoid controversial contemporary
issues, Lin in 1947 published 'The Gay Genius: The Life and Times of
Su Tungpo', which presented the struggle between two Song dynasty
figures, Su Shi and Wang Anshi, as parallel to the struggle between
Chinese liberals and totalitarian communists.
Lin's political writings in English sold fewer copies than his
cultural works and were more controversial. 'Between Tears and
Laughter' (1943) broke with the genial tone of his earlier English
writings to criticize Western racism and imperialism, going against
the advice of his Western patrons and publisher. He vehemently
criticised Churchill for refusing to extend the right to
self-determination to Britain's colonies under the Atlantic Charter
and also quipped that 'all you need to do to make an Englishman a
gentleman again is to ship him back west of the Suez Canal'.
Following the attack on Pearl Harbor, Lin traveled in China and wrote
favorably of the war effort and Chiang Kai-shek in 'Vigil of a Nation'
(1944). American China Hands such as Edgar Snow criticized the works.
Lin was interested in mechanics. Since Chinese is a character-based
rather than an alphabet-based language, with many thousands of
separate characters, it was difficult to employ modern printing
technologies. However, Lin worked on this problem for decades using a
workable Chinese typewriter, brought to market in the middle of the
war with Japan.
The Ming Kwai ('clear and quick') Chinese typewriter played a pivotal
role in the Cold War machine translation research.
From 1954 to 1955, Lin served briefly and unhappily as president of
Nanyang University, which was newly established in Singapore by
Chinese business interests to provide tertiary education in Chinese
studies in parallel with the English-medium University of Singapore.
However, according to CIA agent, Joseph B. Smith, Lin clashed with
founder Tan Lark Sye and the board of trustees on the direction of the
new university. Smith quoted Lin as saying "They want to indoctrinate
the students not only with a love of China."
The faculty rejected Lin's plans to demolish and rebuild the new
school building (which though grand, was not "Western" enough), his
demands to have sole control over finances, and a budget clearly
beyond its means. Lin accepted a dismissal fee of $305,203, entirely
contributed by Tan Lark Sye, to prevent depleting the university's
funds.
After he returned to New York in the late 1950s, Lin renewed his
interest in Christianity. His wife was a devout believer, and Lin
admired her serenity and humility. After attending services with her
at Madison Avenue Presbyterian Church for several months, he joined
the church and announced his return to the faith.
Lin presided over the compilation of a Chinese-English dictionary,
'Lin Yutang's Chinese-English Dictionary of Modern Usage' (1972),
which contains an English index to definitions of Chinese terms. The
work was undertaken at the newly founded Chinese University of Hong
Kong.
He continued his work until his death in 1976. Lin was buried at his
home in Yangmingshan, Taipei. His home has been turned into a museum,
which is operated by Taipei-based Soochow University. The town of
Lin's birth, Banzai, has also preserved the original Lin home and
turned it into a museum.
Legacy
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Although his major books have remained in print, Lin was a thinker
whose place in modern Chinese intellectual history has been
overlooked. Lin themed conventions have been organized in Taiwan and
Lin's native Fujian, and in December 2011, the International
Conference on the Cross-cultural Legacy of Lin Yutang in China and
America was held at City University of Hong Kong, with professional
and private scholars from mainland China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, Japan,
Malaysia, the United States, Germany and Slovakia. The organizer of
the conference was Dr. Qian Suoqiao, author of the book, 'Liberal
Cosmopolitan: Lin Yutang and Middling Chinese Modernity' (Leiden;
Boston: Brill, 2010).
The first full-length academic study of Lin in English is Diran John
Sohigian's "The Life and Times of Lin Yutang" (Columbia University
Ph.D. diss., 1991). Jing Tsu, 'Sound and Script in Chinese Diaspora'
(Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2010) and Thomas S.
Mullaney, 'The Chinese Typewriter: A History' (Cambridge, MA: The MIT
Press, 2017)
give a detailed accounts of Lin Yutang in the context of late 19th
century script reform, Chinese national language reform in the early
twentieth century and machine translation research during the Cold
War.
Family
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His wife, Lin Tsuifeng (née Liao)(), was an author, who, along with
her daughter Lin Hsiang Ju, wrote three cook books which popularized
Chinese cuisine in the English speaking world. Lin wrote
introductions.
His first daughter Adet Lin (1923-1971) was a Chinese-American author
who used the pseudonym Tan Yun. Adet Lin later committed suicide by
hanging herself.
His second daughter Lin Tai-yi (1926-2003) was also known as Anor Lin
in her earliest writing and had the Chinese name Yu-ju (). She was an
author and the editor-in-chief of Chinese edition of the 'Reader's
Digest' from 1965 until her retirement in 1988. She also wrote a
biography of her father in Chinese ().
His third daughter Lin Hsiang-ju (林相如; born 1930), was referred to as
Meimei in childhood. She graduated with a Doctor of Science (DSc) in
Biochemistry from Harvard University and later co-authored Chinese
cookbooks with her Mother including 'Chinese Gastronomy' for which her
father wrote the foreword. Working as a biochemist, she became the
Department Head of Pathology at the University of Hong Kong(HKU) and
later as a medical researcher at the Baylor College of Medicine in
Houston, Texas.
In Chinese
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Works by Lin in Chinese or published in China to 1935 include:
* (1928) 'Jian Fu Collection' (Shanghai: Bei Hsin Book Company)
* (1930) 'Letters of a Chinese Amazon and War-Time Essays' (Shanghai:
Kaiming)
* (1930) 'Kaiming English Books' (Three Volumes) (Shanghai: Kaiming)
* (1930) 'English Literature Reader' (Two Volumes) (Shanghai: Kaiming)
* (1930) 'Kaiming English Grammar' (Two Volumes) (Shanghai: Kaiming)
* (1931) 'Readings in Modern Journalistic Prose' (Shanghai: Oriental
Book)
* (1933) 'A Collection of Essays on Linguistics' (Shanghai: Kaiming
Book)
* (1934) 'Da Huang Ji' (Shanghai: Living)
* (1934) 'My Words' First Volume (Sing Su Ji) (Shanghai Times)
* (1935) 'Kaiming English Materials' (Three Volumes) co-written by Lin
Yutang and Lin you-ho (Shanghai: Oriental Book Co.)
* (1935) 'The Little Critic: Essays Satires and Sketches on China'
First Series: 1930-1932 (Shanghai: Oriental Book Co.)
* (1935) 'The Little Critic: Essays Satires and Sketches on China'
Second Series: 1933-1935 (Shanghai: Oriental Book Co.)
* (1935) 'Confucius Saw Nancy and Essays about Nothing' (Shanghai:
Oriental)
* (1936) 'My Words' Second Volume (Pi Jing Ji) (Shanghai Times)
* (1966) 'Ping Xin Lun Gao e' (Taiwan: Wenxing Bookstore)
* (1974) 'A Collection of Wu Suo Bu Tan' (Taiwan: Kai Ming Book
Company)
Works in English
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Works by Lin in English include:
* (1935) 'My Country and My People', Reynal & Hitchcock
* (1936) 'A Nun of Taishan and Other Translations', Commercial Press,
Shanghai
* (1936) 'A History of the Press and Public Opinion in China', Kelly
and Walsh
* (1937) 'The Importance of Living', Reynal & Hitchcock
* (1939) 'The Wisdom of Confucius', Random House, The Modern Library
* (1939) 'Moment in Peking', John Day Company
* (1940) 'With Love & Irony', John Day Company
* (1941) 'A Leaf in the Storm', John Day Company
* (1942) 'The Wisdom of China and India', Random House
* (1943) 'Between Tears & Laughter', John Day Company, ((1945),
published in London by Dorothy Crisp & Co.)
* (1944) 'The Vigil of a Nation', John Day Company
[
https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.46414/]
* (1947) 'The Gay Genius: The Life and Times of Su Tungpo', John Day
Company
* (1948) 'Chinatown Family', A John Day Book Company
* (1948) 'The Wisdom of Laotse', Random House
* (1948) 'Gay Genius: The Life and Times of Su Tungpo', William
Heinemann Ltd.
* (1950) 'On the Wisdom of America', John Day Company
* (1950) 'Miss Tu', William Heinemann Limited
* (1951) 'Widow, Nun and Courtesan: Three Novelettes From the Chinese
Translated and Adapted by Lin Yutang', A John Day Book Company
* (1952) 'Famous Chinese Short Stories', retold by Lin Yutang, John
Day Company, reprinted 1952, Washington Square Press
* (1952) 'Widow Chuan', William Heinemann Limited
* (1953) 'The Vermilion Gate', A John Day Book Company
* (1955) 'Looking Beyond', Prentice Hall (Published in England as 'The
Unexpected Island', Heinemann)
* (1958) 'The Secret Name', Farrar, Straus and Cudahy
* (1959) 'The Chinese Way of Life', World Publishing Company
* (1959) 'From Pagan to Christian', World Publishing Company
* (1960) 'Imperial Peking: Seven Centuries of China', Crown Publishers
* (1960) 'The Importance of Understanding', World Publishing Company
* (1961) 'The Red Peony', World Publishing Company
* (1962) 'The Pleasures of a Nonconformist', World Publishing Company
* (1963) 'Juniper Loa', World Publishing Company
* (1964) 'The Flight of Innocents', Putnam's Publishing Company
* (1964) 'Lady Wu', Putnam's Publishing Company
* (1967) 'The Chinese Theory of Art', Putnam's Publishing Company
* (1972) 'Chinese-English Dictionary of Modern Usage', Chinese
University of Hong Kong and McCraw
* (1928-1973) 'Red Chamber Dream'
See also
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*Gwoyeu Romatzyh
Further reading
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* Ebeling, Richard M.
[
https://www.aier.org/article/lin-yutang-a-classical-liberal-voice-for-a-free-china/
"Lin Yutang, a Classical Liberal Voice for a Free China,"] American
Institute for Economic Research, March 9, 2021
* Jianming He, "Dialogue between Christianity and Taoism," in
Ruokanen, Miikka, and Paulos Zhanzhu Huang, eds. 'Christianity and
Chinese Culture' (Grand Rapids, MI: W.B. Eerdmans, 2010), pp. 138-143.
*
* Rain Yang Liu, "Lin Yutang: Astride the Cultures of East and West,"
in Carol Hamrin and Stacey Bieler, eds, 'Salt and Light: More Lives of
Faith That Shaped Modern China' (Eugene, OR: Pickwick Publications,
2011), 158-175.
*
*
* Suoqiao Qian. 'Lin Yutang and China's Search for Modern Rebirth'.
Palgrave Macmillan, 2017.
*
* Diran John Sohigian, "The Life and Times of Lin Yutang." Columbia
University Ph.D. dissertation, 1991.
*
*
External links
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*
[
https://www.khanacademy.org/computer-programming/lin-yu-tang-sp-willardfun-and-clean-big-house/6587272384659456
two corner method at minecraft]
*
*
[
https://web.archive.org/web/20120314014021/http://www.linyutang.org.tw/user-en/aboutlinyutang_3.asp
List of Lin Yutang's publications]
* [
http://www.amoymagic.com/linyutang.htm Lin Yutang Biography &
Photograph Collection]
* [
http://humanum.arts.cuhk.edu.hk/Lexis/Lindict/ Lin Yutang's
Chinese-English Dictionary of Modern Usage]
* [
https://patents.google.com/patent/US2613795 Patent for Lin Yutang's
Chinese typewriter]
* [
http://www.linyutang.org.tw/english/index.asp The Lin Yutang House
(Taipei)]
*
[
http://news.harvard.edu/gazette/story/2009/04/history-of-a-%E2%80%98scribal-machine%E2%80%99/
"History of a 'Scribal Machine'"], 'The Harvard Gazette' (April 2,
2009)
Portrait
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* [
https://lib-linux2.hkbu.edu.hk/scadb/pgcw/purl.php?&did=pgcw017
Lin Yutang. A Portrait by Kong Kai Ming] at Portrait Gallery of
Chinese Writers (Hong Kong Baptist University Library).
License
=========
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Original Article:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Lin_Yutang
