Jiang Qing (; also spelled as Chiang Ch'ing), born Li Yunhe, also known as Li Jin, and briefly known by her stage name Lan Ping in the 1930s Shanghai, was a Chinese revolutionary, actress, and political figure. The fourth wife of Mao Zedong, she played a major role in the Cultural Revolution and led the Gang of Four.
Born to an abusive father and a mother who worked as a domestic servant and sometimes a prostitute, Jiang joined the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) in 1933. She pursued an acting career in Shanghai before going to Yan'an, where she married Mao in 1938. After the founding of the People's Republic of China in 1949, she wielded considerable influence over the arts while engaging in party power struggles, orchestrating campaigns against the film The Life of Wu Xun and the Peking opera Hai Rui Dismissed from Office, and promoting revolutionary operas.
Jiang reached the height of her power in late 1960s. A Politburo member at the Ninth and Tenth Central Committees and de facto leader of the Cultural Revolution Group, she was arrested following Mao's death and expelled from the party. Blamed for the upheavals of the Cultural Revolution, she was sentenced to death with a two-year reprieve in a televised trial, before her sentence was commuted to life imprisonment. She committed suicide in May 1991.
Names
Chinese names Jiang was known by various names throughout her life, as well as Madam Mao. Before her birth, her father named the baby Li Jinnan, where Jinnan means the "coming boy." When she was born, her father changed the name to Li Jinhai, meaning the "coming child." Therefore, Jiang also called herself Li Jin. Several other sources indicate her birth name Li Shumeng, which means "pure and simple."
She adopted the name Li Yunhe during primary school. She told her biographer Roxane Witke that she liked the name because "Yunhe," meaning "crane in the cloud," sounded beautiful. In July 1933, during her first visit to Shanghai, she assumed the name Li He and worked as a teacher for local workers. On her second visit to Shanghai in June 1934, she used the alias Zhang Shuzhen. Later, when detained by the Nationalist government in October 1934, she identified herself as Li Yungu.
In 1935, when she entered the entertainment industry, she took on the stage name Lan Ping, which means "blue apple". Although the name had no particular meaning, its bluntness made it unique. However, Jiang did not favour this name due to its association with her scandals in Shanghai. She became known as Jiang upon arriving in Yan'an, where Jiang means river and Qing means azure or "better than blue".
In 1991, when she was hospitalised in Beijing, she used the name Li Runqing. When she died in Beijing, her body was labelled with the pseudonym Li Zi. In March 2002, she was buried in Beijing by her school name Li Yunhe.
English names In English, many contemporary articles used the Wade–Giles romanisation system to spell Chinese names. For this reason, some sources – especially older ones – spell her name "Chiang Ch'ing", while newer sources use Pinyin and spell her name "Jiang Qing". She was also known as Madame Mao. In accordance with Chinese customs in which women retain their maiden names after marriage, her surname remained unchanged in Chinese.
Early life Jiang was born in Zhucheng, Shandong, in March 1914. She deliberately kept her exact birth date private to avoid receiving any gifts. Her father was Li Dewen, a carpenter, and her mother, whose name is unknown, was Li's subsidiary wife, or concubine. Her father had his own carpentry and cabinet making workshop. Her parents were married after her father initially found his first wife unable to conceive.
As a child, Jiang was deeply traumatised by the domestic violence inflicted by her father, who verbally and physically abused her mother almost every day. One Lantern Festival, after her father broke her mother's finger during an attack, her mother fled with Jiang under the cover of darkness. Her mother found work as a domestic servant that often blurred the lines with prostitution, and her husband separated from her.
Jiang eventually moved with her mother to her grandparents' home in Jinan. However, they soon returned to Zhucheng, as her mother continued to seek inheritance rights, or financial support, from her husband's family, which proved extremely difficult. During this period, Jiang attended two primary schools with disruptions, where she was often mocked for wearing outdated, boyish clothing from her brothers. She became silent and not easy to open up.
Her mother, having fallen ill, eventually abandoned hope of obtaining further financial support from her husband. After selling some of her belongings, she purchased a train ticket, and together with Jiang, boarded a train from Jiaoxian to Jinan. There, Jiang was welcomed by her grandparents and resumed her primary education. In 1926–1927, her mother took her further north to Tianjin to stay with her half-sister. During this time, Jiang worked as a housekeeper in the household. She proposed taking a job rolling cigarettes, but the family disapproved. Later they returned to Jinan, where her mother died in 1928.
Entertainment career
Jinan At 14, Jiang, now an orphan, joined a local underground theatre troupe, seeking independence. Her striking looks drew attention, but she remained sensitive about her poor upbringing. Alarmed by her undisclosed departure, her grandparents paid the troupe's boss to bring her back. She enrolled in the Experimental Arts Academy, which became less picky about the social class of new entrants due to the May Fourth Movement. Despite her strong Shandong accent initially hindering her performances, she excelled during her year of training, in some traditional opera roles. When the academy closed in 1930, Jiang, though only half-trained, was chosen to join theatrical companies in Beijing. She returned to Jinan in May 1931 and married Pei Minglun, the wealthy son of a businessman, and soon divorced.
Qingdao Following her divorce, Jiang reached out to Zhao Taimou, the former director of the Arts Academy and dean of Qingdao University. With the assistance of Zhao's wife, Yu Shan, Jiang secured a position as a clerk in the university library. Yu Shan later introduced Jiang to her brother, Yu Qiwei, an upper-class youth who had embraced the Communist cause and was connected to underground Communist organisations as well as literary and performing arts circles.
The Mukden Incident in September ignited her patriotism, leading her to develop a dislike for the Kuomintang and its supporters. By the end of 1932, Jiang and Yu Qiwei fell in love and began living together, enabling Jiang to gain entry into the Communist Cultural Front. She became a member of the Seaside Drama Society, performing in plays such as Lay Down Your Whip, harnessing the influence of theatre to resist Japanese aggression. In February 1933, she officially joined the CCP.
The Communist activities at Qingdao University, which was later renamed Shandong University, attracted significant attention from the Kuomintang's secret police, who arrested Yu Qiwei in July, forcing Jiang to leave Qingdao.
Shanghai After the arrest of Yu Qiwei, Yu Shan arranged for Jiang to move to Shanghai. With a recommendation from Tian Han's younger brother, Tian Luan, she enrolled as a visiting student at the Great China University in Shanghai. In July, with endorsements from Tian Han and his associates, Jiang became a teacher at the Chengeng Workers' School, an institution organised by Tao Xingzhi. During this time, Yu Qiwei was released and visited her in Shanghai. In October, Jiang re-joined the Chinese Communist Youth League, became a member of the League of Left-Wing Educators, and resumed her career as a drama actress.
She performed in the Shanghai Work Study Troupe. Jiang was among the cast of a production of Roar, China! which British authorities banned from being performed in Shanghai's International Settlement.
In September 1934, Jiang was arrested and jailed for her political activities in Shanghai. During her arrest in Shanghai, Jiang was interrogated by a Zhongtong agent named Zhao Yaoshan. Jiang had once revealed to Zhao that Tan Xiaoqing was a CCP member, leading to Tan's arrest. She was released three months later, in December. She then traveled to Beijing where she reunited with Yu Qiwei, who had just been released following his prison sentence, and the two began living together again. She returned to Shanghai in March 1935, and entered Diantong Film Company. She became famous when featuring in Ibsen's play A Doll's House as Nora. She later became an actress in Goddess of Freedom and Scenes of City Life, during which she fell in love with Tang Na, her colleague at Diantong. The two began living together in September 1935. Jiang nevertheless left him for Tianjin to meet Yu Qiwei, telling Tang that her late mother "had fallen ill in Jinan." When Tang discovered the truth, he attempted suicide in Jinan but later reconciled with Jiang and returned with her to Shanghai in July 1935. Later they were married in a collective wedding ceremony at Liuhe Pagoda in Hangzhou in April 1936.In Shanghai, Jiang joined Lianhua Film Company, where she acted in Blood on Wolf Mountain and Lianhua Symphony. During this period, she began an affair with film director Zhang Min, appeared in his production The Storm. She also became an actress in Wang Laowu. However, during the second performance of The Storm in May 1937, Tang attempted suicide again. Following this incident, Jiang divorced Tang and started living with Zhang Min, but the relationship cost her career as she was dismissed by Lianhua Film Company.
Jiang's widely publicised affair with Tang Na tarnished her reputation, making it difficult for her to continue her acting career in Shanghai. Like many youths of her time, she was drawn to the progressive ideals associated with Yan'an. The Marco Polo Bridge Incident in July 1937, which marked the start of Japan's full-scale invasion of China, further galvanised young activists to advocate for a united front. Yan'an, promoted through Communist propaganda, emerged as a symbol of democracy, freedom, and hope. She left Shanghai for Yan'an in July, after which the Japanese invasion in Shanghai started on 13 August. +Selected films featuring Jiang in the 1930sYearEnglish titleOriginal titleRoleNotes1935Goddess of FreedomYu YueyingScenes of City LifeWang Junsheng's girlfriend1936Blood on Wolf MountainLiu Sansao1937Lianhua SymphonyRickshaw puller's wifeSegment 1: "Twenty Cents"1938Wang LaowuYoung Girl LiFilmed in 1937. Leading actress
Early political activities
Yan'an
Drama teacher Jiang went first to Xi'an, then to Yan'an. In November, she enrolled in the Counter-Japanese Military and Political University for study. The Lu Xun Academy of Arts was newly founded in Yan'an on 10 April 1938, and Jiang became a drama department instructor, teaching and performing in college plays and operas. The conditions in Yan'an were harsh, but Jiang was able to make it there and persist. Jiang was striking in appearance and had several talents; she could sing opera, write well, and her calligraphy was particularly impressive, especially in regular script. On one hand, she was relatively quiet and reserved—she didn't enjoy shooting, but liked playing poker, knitting, and was skilled at creating various patterns. She was also adept at tailoring and made her own clothes beautifully. On the other hand, she had a lively and bold side—Jiang enjoyed horseback riding, especially taming wild horses; the more ferocious the horse, the more she liked to ride it. This combination of traits allowed her to excel as both a homemaker and adapt to the tough, military lifestyle, earning the admiration of revolutionary leaders.
Secret marriage