Novelist Ba Jin dies at 101

Ba Jin with his relatives in Chengdu in 1941

Ba Jin (Li Yaotang), the Esperanto-speaking novelist whose pen name was taken from Russian anarchist Bakunin, has died. Ba Jin’s life spanned the 20th century and he wrote about and participated in some of the most important events of the last hundred years. He went to France to study in 1927, he wrote anti-Japanese propaganda during the war and he was persecuted during the Cultural Revolution.

Ba Jin’s writings include Miewang (Destruction), Nahan (Outcries), later renamed Fenghuo (Beacons) — written with Mao Dun, and Zaxiang Lu (Random Thoughts).