Hu Feng

Hu Feng (, November 2, 1902 – June 8, 1985) was a Chinese Marxist writer, poet and literary theorist. He was a prominent member of the League of Left-Wing Writers. After the founding of the People's Republic of China, Hu Feng became a member of the First National People's Congress of China, but was then heavily persecuted as the chief of the Hu Feng Counter-revolutionary Clique . The persecution became a massive political purge. He was first rehabilitated in 1980 and fully rehabilitated, posthumously, in 1988.

Life

Early life Hu Feng was born in Qichun, Hubei on November 2, 1902, as a son of a toufu artisan. He started school in his village in 1913 and entered middle school in Wuchang, capital of Hubei, in 1920. He transferred to the High School Affiliated to the National Southeastern University (, now High School Affiliated to Nanjing Normal University), which was also the school of writer Ba Jin. He joined Socialist Youth League of China there.

Education In 1925, Hu Feng participated in the May Thirtieth Movement, and entered Peking University later in the year. In 1926, he transferred to study western literature at Tsinghua University.

Literary activism Hu Feng returned to Shanghai in 1933 and became both the head of publicity and the executive secretary of the League of Left-Wing Writers. He became closely acquainted with Lu Xun. In 1934, he married Mei Zhi. In 1935, he secretly edited the journal Mu Xie Wen Cong (, literally "The Sawdust Journal"), which was published with the help of Kanzō Uchiyama. In 1936, he co-founded and co-edited the journal The Petrel with others, which published the works of Lu Xun and other authors including Nie Gannu, Xiao Jun, and Wu Xiru . Due to the war, Hu Feng moved the publication of July to Wuhan in October 1937, and to Chongqing in September 1938. Hu Feng stayed for a year in Guilin from March 1942 to March 1943, and returned to Chongqing after then. In 1945, Hu Feng became the chief-editor of the magazine Hope .

In 1951, some wrote to Wen Yi Bao, requesting that it critique Hu Feng's literary theory again. In early 1952, Wen Yi Bao publicized these letters.

In July 1954, Hu Feng delivered a 300,000-word report, titled "Report on the Real Situation in Literature and Art Since Liberation", to the Politburo of the Chinese Communist Party. In January 1955, the Publicity Department of the Chinese Communist Party submitted a report to the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party (CCCPC) requesting that it criticize Hu Feng. On May 17, Hu Feng was then arrested. He was detained at Qincheng Prison specified for political criminals, and in 1965 he was sentenced to 14 years in prison. Chinese authority claims that about 2,100 people were persecuted, 92 were arrested, and 72 were detained concerning Hu. Among them, 78 were confirmed as a member or accomplice of the "Hu Feng Counter-revolutionary Clique", and 23 were regarded as key members.

During the following Cultural Revolution, Hu Feng and his wife were sent to Lushan, Sichuan for labor re-education. Hu Feng was again arrested in November 1967. In January 1970, Hu Feng was accused of desecrating the portrait of Mao and was sentenced for life.

Rehabilitation and death In 1979, Hu Feng was released from prison. He was then made a standing member of the Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference and restored as a member of the China Federation of Literary and Art Circles and a member of the China Writers Association.