A Woman Soldier's Own Story

This new translation of the autobiography of Xie Bingying (1906-2000)—an important Chinese feminist, pioneering "girl soldier," and skilled writer—provides a fascinating portrayal of a woman fighting to free herself from the constraints of ancient Chinese tradition in the context of the dramatic changes that shook China during the 1920s, '30s, and '40s. Her personal struggle to define herself within the larger context of political change is a poignant testament of determination and a striking story of one woman's journey from Old China into the new world.

For the first time, a complete version of the autobiography of Xie Bingying (1906-2000) provides a fascinating portrayal of a woman fighting to free herself from the constraints of ancient Chinese tradition amid the dramatic changes that shook China during the 1920s, '30s, and '40s.

Xie's attempts to become educated, her struggles to escape from an arranged marriage, and her success in tricking her way into military school reveal her persevering and unconventional character and hint at the prominence she was later to attain as an important figure in China's political culture. Though she was tortured and imprisoned, she remained committed to her convictions. Her personal struggle to define herself within the larger context of political change in China early in the last century is a poignant testament of determination and a striking story of one woman's journey from Old China into the new world.

Lily Chia Brissman is Xie Bingying's daughter and an artist/instructor of piano at the Wausau Conservatory of Music.

Barry Brissman is a novelist. The Brissmans worked with Xie Bingying to translate and edit this work.

Vivid and emotionally charged.

Xie's decades of political engagement [were]... full of social and personal experiments, of individual stories worked out in the interstices of big and visible events, of people negotiating daily life without knowing how the political story would end. Xie's autobiography is a precious glimpse into that vanished world of revolutionary uncertainty.