Some people say that he was the first newspaper man of the Republic of China, and he is the only wordless monument of Chinese intellectuals in the 20th century.
In the summer of 1957, Chu Anping, as the editor-in-chief of Guangming Daily, ended his career as an intellectual, and his life and death were unknown.
The so-called "unknown life and death" has become an unsolved case in history.
There have always been different opinions about Chu Anping's whereabouts and the outcome of his life, and there is still no conclusion.
Even his family members can only express endless confusion and incomprehension when they recall him.
Although the state later sent a task force to look for clues, the mystery of Chu Anping's disappearance has not been solved.
The young man is unyielding in his suffering
Chu Anping, this name may not be well known among today's young generation.
However, for the slightly older predecessors, whenever they mention Lantian Normal College (the predecessor of today's Hunan Normal University) in Hunan during the Anti-Japanese War, the Shanghai "Observation" magazine after the victory of the Anti-Japanese War, and the Beijing "Guangming Daily" in the early days of the founding of New China, it is difficult for Chu Anping's figure not to appear in his mind.
Chu Anping's childhood can be described as tragic, his biological mother died early, his father was uninhibited, and his family was almost broken.
He lost the arms of his mother just six days after he was born, and his father was obsessed with all kinds of pleasures and had no sense of responsibility for the family.
Fortunately, he had a kind grandmother and a generous uncle.
His grandmother and father died one after another when Chu Anping was 14 years old, leaving him alone to face the turbulent sea of life.
At this time, his uncle reached out to help him continue his education and also provided a quiet learning environment.
Chu Anping completed his primary and junior high school studies in his hometown, and was later sent by his uncle to Zhengyi Middle School in Nanjing, and eventually transferred to the High School Affiliated to Guanghua University in Shanghai.
During these years of study, he was careful about his budgets, and he also used his spare time to submit manuscripts to earn manuscript fees to save funds for his university education.
Although he humbled himself that his works were full of ideas and emotions, and failed to touch the deeper philosophical meaning, his pen still flowed with an indomitable spirit.
In high school, he earned more than 200 yuan in manuscript fees through writing, which not only supported his studies, but also laid a solid foundation for his future college dreams.
In 1928, Chu Anping stepped onto the campus of Guanghua University in Shanghai, a former prestigious St. John's University with a strong educational tradition and a strong academic atmosphere.
At that time, during the heyday of Guanghua University, many famous teachers gathered in the university, such as Hu Shi, Xu Zhimo, Lu Qian, etc., and most of them were liberal "Crescent" literati and scholars.
In such an academic environment, Chu Anping received a profound liberal ideological influence.
Regarding Chu Anping's major at Guanghua University, there have always been different theories.
Some say it's journalism, some say it's politics, but according to his classmates, Chu Anping studied English.
During these four years of college career, Chu Anping studied diligently and developed a strong interest in literary creation.
In the spring of 1931, on a whim, he completed his first novel, Spring, and the following year wrote Century and Obligation.
During his four years at Guanghua University, he wrote a total of 123 novels, eight of which were later edited and published by his friend Zhao Jiabi at Shanghai Liangyou Book Company as a collection of novels, The Liar.
Chu Anping's literary road was not smooth sailing, and his feelings pulled Chu Anping close to literature, and reason told him to leave literature.
Between literature and politics, he has always maintained a complex emotion.
In October 1931, Chu Anping also compiled and compiled the "Views on the Sino-Japanese Question", which included articles by many well-known scholars and politicians, such as Chen Duxiu, Wang Jingwei, Zuo Shunsheng, etc., and he also wrote the preface and inscription on the title page of the book.
After graduating from Guanghua University in 1932, Chu Anping recuperated for a year due to illness.
During this period, he married Duanmu Xinmin, a female classmate who was two levels lower than him, and the two matched their appearance and became a couple.
Soon after his marriage, Chu Anping was invited by the "Central Daily" to be responsible for compiling literary supplements, with a good salary.
He used this income to rent a high-end house, build a sweet family with his wife, and life seemed to have entered a happy time.
Although Chu Anping's life has entered a stable life, his ambition has not stopped and he is eager to further his studies.
He was determined to study in the UK, so he did not hesitate to lower his standard of living, cut back on food and clothing, and budgeted every penny to save enough money to study abroad.
In this process, Chu Anping also briefly went to Peking to enter the research department of Yenching University for further study.
The opportunity to study abroad finally came in 1936.
That year, the 11th Olympic Games were held in Berlin, Germany, and the Chinese authorities struggled to send reporters to report on the scene due to financial constraints.
Chu Anping proposed to voluntarily take a special train for Chinese athletes to Europe free of charge, as a springboard to Europe, and at the same time complete the task of covering the Olympics.
At this time, he had already saved some of his own funds, plus his uncle Chu Nanqiang's successful application for 2,000 yuan in the Jiangsu Department of Education, which made his dream of studying abroad come true.
As a special correspondent of the Central Daily, Chu Anping successfully arrived in Berlin and completed the task of covering the Olympic Games.
After the end of the Olympic Games, he went directly to London, England, and was admitted to the School of Economics of the University of London.
With the Lugou Bridge Incident in 1937, the Japanese fascist aggression ignited China's full-scale war of resistance against Japan.
At this historical juncture when the nation was in peril, the Kuomintang and the Communist Party cooperated to overcome the national crisis, and 40,000 compatriots gathered into a mighty anti-Japanese torrent.
At this time, Chu Anping was only 28 years old and was studying at the University of London in the United Kingdom.
Just as his studies were entering a critical period, the crisis in his homeland made him face a difficult choice: should he continue to stay in the UK to complete his studies, or return to China to participate in the war of resistance?
In the end, Chu Anping had a strong sense of national responsibility, chose the latter, and ended his studies early in 1938 and returned to China without hesitation.
In the early days of the Anti-Japanese War, Nanjing fell, and the mainland's education system, especially higher education, suffered an unprecedented blow.
In the face of the increasingly severe war situation, in order to save and preserve educational resources, many colleges and universities have been forced to move to the relative safety of the southwestern mountainous areas.
The famous Tsinghua University, Peking University and Nankai University jointly formed the "National Southwest Associated University" in Kunming.
At the same time, the focus of national teacher education has shifted to Lantian in Hunan, where its relatively secluded location makes it an ideal choice for running schools.
Under the severe environment of wartime, Lantian Normal College rose rapidly, was known as "Little Nanjing", and became an important base for cultivating talents urgently needed during the war.
Soon after Chu Anping returned to China, his old acquaintance, Liao Shicheng, who had been the head of the education department at Guanghua University in Shanghai, warmly invited him to teach at Lantian Normal School.
In August 1940, Chu Anping accepted the invitation to travel from Chongqing to Lantian to serve as a professor in the Department of Civic Discipline.
His teaching career at Lam Tin Normal College lasted until 1944, during which time he was deeply loved by his students for his erudition and passionate teaching style.
Chu Anping often gave lectures with passion, dancing with his hands, not only the classroom was crowded with students listening to the lectures, but even the corridors were full, and warm applause frequently broke out.
The first newspaper person of the Republic of China
The period from 1946 to 1948 was a golden period of dedication to his ideals and brilliance during his career, during which he founded and presided over the weekly Observer, which left a lasting impression.
In 1946, with the good news of the victory of the Anti-Japanese War, Chu Anping was demobilized from Chongqing and returned to Shanghai, where he originally served as a professor in the Department of Political Science and the Department of Journalism at Fudan University, teaching many courses such as "Government and Politics", "Comparative Constitutional Law" and "News Commentary Exercise".
However, his true passion was soon drawn to another cause – running a journal.
At that time, Shanghai was under the rule of the Kuomintang, and society was in a critical stage of post-war recovery, and various progressive publications sprung up.
Founded on September 1, 1946, Chu Anping's Observation was unique in this wave, quickly establishing a reputation among readers for its distinctive personality and high-quality content.
The journal is a 16-page edition, each containing about 60,000 words, and strives to be different and innovative in both form and content.
The Observer's mission is clear and strong: "Democracy, Freedom, Progress, Rationality," and these eight words are prominently printed on the cover of each issue of the magazine, becoming a symbol of its spirit.
The name of "Observation" itself is profound, expressing an editorial philosophy that looks deeply and reveals the essence of things.
Chu Anping hopes that through such publications, he will not only stay at the superficial "view", but also go deep into the level of "observation", that is, in-depth analysis and study of the essence of the problem.
Under his leadership, Observation has become an avant-garde, critical and in-depth platform.
Chu Anping's editorial talent shaped the Observation magazine into one of the most influential political periodicals in China at the time, with a circulation of more than 100,000 copies, making it one of the best-selling periodicals in China.
The readership of the Observatory is extremely broad, including teachers, students, civil servants, literary and artistic workers, businessmen, freelancers, and generals and soldiers in the army.
As a purely privately-run fanzile publication, "Observation" takes a supra-partisan stance, imitates the characteristics of the "Times" in discussing politics in the opposition, and dares to express sharp views on major national affairs.
Chu Anping's style of writing for the "Observation" was fierce and sharp, and his rhetoric was sharp, and he bluntly criticized the corruption and failure of the Kuomintang government, and even made spicy comments saying that the Kuomintang "70 days was a small rot, and 20 years was a big rotten," and he showed no mercy to the policies of the United States and the Soviet Union.
This outspoken spirit and sharp criticism naturally touched the sensitive nerves of those in power.
On December 24, 1948, the Nationalist Government issued a permanent suspension order for the Observation on the grounds of "attacking the government, ridiculing state affairs, propagandizing for bandits, and disturbing people's minds."
The Observation lasted less than three years, from its inception on September 1, 1946, to its termination in December 1948.
For Chu Anping, "Observation" is not only a platform for political discourse, but also the embodiment of his idealistic spirit.
After 1949, no one else has been able to write such in-depth and incisive commentary in such a complex political and social context.
It's not that the latecomers don't have the corresponding knowledge, it's that they lack that kind of environment.
Bizarre disappearance, unsolved mystery
The founding of the People's Republic of China is a new chapter in history, and for Chu Anping, it is a turning point.
As a key figure who actively promoted the downfall of the reactionary Kuomintang regime, Chu Anping was highly respected in the early days of New China.
He was housed in the Beijing Hotel, where he received high-ranking democrats, and Premier Zhou personally came to his room and had a very pleasant conversation with him.
On September 21, 1949, he participated in an important meeting of the New Chinese People's Political Consultative Conference (CPPCC) as an alternate representative of the Preparatory Committee of the Chinese Journalists Association.
In that year, China's political landscape changed dramatically, and Mr. Chu seemed to have a premonition of his possible role under the new system.
On April 1, 1957, Chu Anping was appointed editor-in-chief of Guangming Daily.
At the beginning of his tenure, with the same enthusiasm and vigor as when he ran the "Observation", he was determined to make a big show in his new post, formulated many grand plans, and interviewed countless personalities, hoping to completely reform and improve the quality and influence of the newspaper.
Chu Anping only sat in the position of editor-in-chief for 70 days before he had to step down due to various external pressures and internal difficulties.
In early September 1966, it was a suffocating episode in Chu Anping's life story.
One day, he left the house alone, and he has not been seen since.
Neither family nor friends knew anything about his whereabouts.
It took the task force two years to find him, but by 1968, his whereabouts remained a mystery.
Until one day in June 1982, when Chu Anping's son Chu Wanghua was about to leave Beijing to study in Australia, a hurried person brought a notice from the United Front Work Department of the Central Committee, officially announcing Chu Anping's "death".
This news was confirmed after 16 long waits, and it brought a great shock to the Chu family.
Regarding Chu Anping's whereabouts, there are rumors.
There are rumors that he committed suicide by throwing himself into the sea in the Tanggu area of Tianjin, and there are also eyewitnesses who claim to have seen him in Mingling, a hidden place on the border between Yixing and Changxing, a hidden place with lush bamboo seas.
However, none of these rumors have been confirmed.
For Chu Anping's family, although these news without conclusive evidence brought a glimmer of hope, it was more of a repeated disappointment.
Decades have passed, and the name Chu Anping has gradually faded from people's memory, and his disappearance has become an unsolved mystery.