Tian Han
田汉
1898–1968
- Playwright
- Lyricist
- Co-founder of the League of Left-Wing Dramatists
Biography
Founding Father of Modern Chinese Drama
Tian Han was born on 12 March 1898 in Changsha, Hunan Province, and became one of the most important founding figures of modern Chinese spoken drama. After studying in Japan, he returned to China and threw himself into the New Culture Movement, producing a large body of plays, operas, and film scripts in Shanghai. In 1930 he co-founded the League of Left-Wing Dramatists, combining theatrical art with social transformation and using the stage to awaken patriotic sentiment and class consciousness. His major works include The Death of a Famous Actor (名优之死) and Guan Hanqing (关汉卿), both of lasting importance in Chinese theatrical history.
March of the Volunteers and Anti-Japanese Cultural Work
In 1935 Tian Han wrote the screenplay for the patriotic film Children of Troubled Times; the song lyrics he contributed were set to music by Nie Er as the March of the Volunteers. According to accounts of the period, Tian Han wrote the lyrics on the back of a cigarette paper just before his arrest by the Nationalist government, smuggling them out of detention — an act that embodied the very spirit of the line "Advance, advance, advance under the enemy's fire." During the Second Sino-Japanese War he actively participated in the cultural resistance movement, organising theatrical performances to mobilise public support for the war effort.
Persecution During the Cultural Revolution
After 1949, Tian Han served as Chairman of the Chinese Dramatists Association and was a leading figure in the cultural establishment. When the Cultural Revolution erupted in 1966, he was persecuted as a "counter-revolutionary revisionist", subjected to struggle sessions, and imprisoned. He died in Qincheng Prison in Beijing on 10 December 1968, aged 70. His death, alongside the effective prohibition of the March of the Volunteers during the Cultural Revolution, constitutes one of the most striking historical paradoxes of the People's Republic: a regime that persecuted the lyricist of its own national anthem while continuing to treat the song as a national symbol. Tian Han was posthumously rehabilitated in 1979.