Ai Ching

(pseudonym of Chiang Hai-ch’eng). Born 1910. Chinese poet; studied in France.

In 1936 Ai Ch’ing published Tayenhe, a collection of poems about the country. During the Sino-Japanese War he wrote books of patriotic verse and longer poems, including Sunward (1938), The North (1939), He Died the Second Time (1939), The Torch (1940), Zoia (1942), and News of the Sunrise (1943). After the victory of the revolution in 1949, he wrote about socialist construction, the struggle for peace, and friendship with the Soviet Union in On the Road to Victory (1950), The Happy Call (1953), Ruby Stars (1953), Selected Poems (1955), and Spring (1956). His books On Poetry (1940) and New Literature: A Collection of Articles (1951) are concerned with problems of literary theory. The works of Ai Ch’ing, who has made substantial contributions to the theory and writing of free verse, have been influenced by E. Verhaeren, W. Whitman, and V. V. Mayakovsky. During the so-called Cultural Revolution, Ai Ch’ing was subjected to attacks and discreditation by the Hungwaiping press.