The literary giant who vanished without trace

A bronze statue of Yu Dafu outside his home in Fuyang, Zhejiang province. [Photo provided to China Daily]

Exactly 70 years ago on Aug 29 the Chinese writer Yu Dafu disappeared from his home in what is now Indonesia－the day before his daughter Yu Meilan was born－never to be seen alive again.

Yu, who was my uncle, made a name for himself during China's early New Cultural Movement (1915-23).

He had many loyal readers in Japan, and it is thanks to them that the story of his mysterious disappearance and the solution to that riddle can now be told.

It begins as Japan invaded Singapore in 1942. Yu had worked there as literary editor for the Sin Chew Daily for four years, and after the invasion, when he was 45, fled to Sumatra in what was then the Dutch East Indies. There he could no longer write or work publicly and he was forced to hide his identity. He changed his name to Zhao Lian and took on the persona of a businessman. Yu had always been outspoken but, just as circumstances doused that flame, he was also forced to put on a friendly front for the Japanese invaders, whom he loathed and had earlier fiercely and fearlessly denounced.

Eventually the Japanese authorities discovered he was fluent in Japanese－he had studied economics at Tokyo Imperial University－and he was forced to become an interpreter.

At the time he ran a wine shop, an unfortunate calling for a man whose daily companion for decades had been alcohol. However, he then swore off the bottle, judging this the safest course in these dangerous times, when the most lucid thinking was called for. As he turned his back on his dissolute ways he endured humiliation and risked his life in order to save others and to protect his compatriots.

A fellow journalist who was also in exile, Zhang Chukun, has recounted a few of these tales.

One day in Medan, in what was then East Sumatra, a Japanese officer is said to have sent a Chinese agent and others to arrest Chen Jiageng, a leader of overseas Chinese in the area.

Zhao, in his role of interpreter, is said to have told the Japanese gendarmerie chief: "Chen Jiageng returned by boat to China ages ago. In asking you to catch him, these guys are just trying to cause you trouble."

The chief was furious and scolded the men, who scampered off. Zhao Lian then reprimanded them in Chinese: "Chinese men should have saved the bones of Chinese."