Su Xuelin's Cultural Characters

Su Xuelin, one of the outstanding writers in modern Chinese literature history, is considered to be the evergreen tree in this field. During her 80 years of writing she has published about 50 works, and meanwhile, she also has devoted herself to the education for as long as 50years. Therefore, the unique experience formed the writing style of her own in literature. Su Xuelin was born in 1897 and died in 1999. The two centuries' experience and the ups and downs in life influenced her so much in shaping her complicated character.Actually, Su Xuelin is more than a writer. And one can easily find two contrary aspects in her character. One is that she shows great respects towards Confucian thoughts and moral principles. The other is that she shows great hatred towards the feudal society and feudal patriarchal domination as well as her pursuit to anti-traditional thoughts. She used sharp words to be against Lu Xun. And she has been supporting the KMT government in her life and migrated to Taiwan after China's liberation. Her attitudes towards marriage changed a lot---from rebelling to compromise, and finally giving up her own rights. Meanwhile, her convert to Christian also underwent intensely struggle in her mind. Su Xuelin adhered to the rationalism of the May 4^th Movement, however, she still criticized Lu Xun's work sharply. The essay in her early days reflects the gentleness of female and childlike innocence. But later her work shows more about her martialism.So, it is clear that Su Xuelin's principles of living are different from her contemporary female colleagues. The reasons for that include family influence, educational experience, social condition and her character itself, etc. Although she was born in RunAn, Zhejiang province of China, her growing experience still remained in the orthodox family in Hui Zhou, where influenced her strongly. And it was this experience that shaped her thoughts with Confucian culture in her mind deeply. On the other hand, after the May 4^th Movement in 1919, she went to Beiping to study, and experienced the new cultural movement by her own. Her works represent the attitudes of the intellectuals at that time--- that they were still attracted by and loved the traditional culture; and that they showed their great expectation towards the new culture, which has become the model in the process of cultural changing. All in all, we still can learn a lot from Su Xuelin's persistence in her career and spirit overwhelming the difficulties.