Pu Shunqing

Pu Shunqing (; 1902 – ?) was a Chinese screenwriter, playwright, assistant director, and actress. A feminist writer and champion of women's liberation, she is considered the first female screenwriter in China. Her husband Hou Yao was also a Chinese film pioneer and advocate for gender equality, She wrote the well-known three-act play, Paradise on Earth, which adds a female character named "Wisdom" to the plot of the Book of Genesis. Wisdom prods Eve to eat the apple and build a paradise on earth. Pu called for women's liberation through the mouth of Wisdom, who declares that "if you don't believe in God, he will disappear." and Pu likely had an influence on her husband's advocacy of women's rights. She would write the scripts for Cai Gongshi and Mulan Joins the Army before the China Sun Motion Picture Company would go bankrupt. She also wrote the screenplays Hibiscus Tears and Her New Life, but they were never made into films.

In the late 1930s, she became a lawyer based in Tianjin and had her own legal advice column in the newspaper Shen Bao. After World War II she ran for congress but did not win. He was killed by the Japanese in Singapore, during the Sook Ching massacre of 1942.

Filmography

as Screenwriter and Assistant Director Way Down West (1927)

as Screenwriter Cupid's Puppets (1925) Hibiscus Tears (1926) Her New Life (1927) Divorcee Comedies (1927) Cai Gongshi (1928) Mulan Joins the Army (1928)

as Actress The World Against Her (1924)

Theatrical works The Plaything of the Goddess of Love Paradise on Earth (1928)