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FEATURE: Fight for freedom inspires
student
By Wu Wei-kung and Jake Chung / Staff reporter, with Staff writer
Hsu Hao-chun, a student at
National Chang Hua Senior High School and author of a novel featuring late
democracy activist Chen Wen-chen, poses in front of a photo of Chen in Changhua
County on Dec. 25 last year.
Photo: Wu Wei-kung, Taipei Times
A fantasy novel featuring late democracy
activists Chen Wen-chen (陳文成) and Deng Nan-jung (鄭南榕) as the main characters has
recently been praised by judges of a national high schools’ and vocational high
schools’ fantasy writing contest, who cited the broad-mindedness of the author.
Yen Huo (煙火), written by Hsu Hao-chun (許皓鈞), a second-year student at National
Chang Hua Senior High School, narrates how Chen discovered how to decipher the
thoughts of other people through incense smoke. In the story, the incense smoke
takes on a particular shape according to a person’s thoughts while praying.
Fearing his power, the Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) government orders Chen’s
termination.
Chen then passes on his powers to Deng.
As the Chinese characters for incense, hsiang (香), and the Chinese character for
fire, huo (火), usually signify posterity, the incense and fire in the novel
symbolize the passing of the baton to the next generation to continue resistance
against an autocratic government.
In reality, Chen was a Taiwanese academic who studied and worked in the US as an
assistant professor in the department of statistics at Carnegie Mellon
University in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania.
A sympathizer of Taiwan’s democracy movements, Chen was a known donor to Formosa
Magazine (美麗島雜誌).
After he took part in Taiwanese independence protests overseas, Chen was
detained by the Taiwan Garrison Command. He was found dead on the lawn of
National Taiwan University on July 2, 1981 — just one day after returning to
Taiwan to visit his family.
At the time, the then-KMT government said that Chen had committed suicide.
However, an autopsy performed by a US forensics expert disputed this conclusion.
The cause of Chen’s death remains unknown to this day.
Deng committed suicide 24 years ago in defense of the freedom of expression
On April 7, 1989, Deng, then editor-in-chief of Freedom Era Weekly (自由時代週刊), set
himself alight as armed police attempted to break into his office following 71
days of self-imposed isolation after he was charged with sedition over the
anti-government stance of his magazine after it published a draft “Taiwan
Republic Constitution” in 1988.
Hsu said that as his parents had passed away due to disease in recent years, he
had to rely on subsidies and scholarships to continue his education, adding that
he augmented his income by writing for publications.
“I wrote this novel because I was impressed with Chen and Deng’s spirit and
their willingness to do what was necessary for democracy,” Hsu said, adding that
it was due to their efforts that Taiwanese live in a democratic society today.
Hsu added that he hoped ideas of democracy would resonate through society and
hence incorporated such ideas in his novel.
Chen Wan-yi (陳萬益), one of the judges, praised the novel for its content and
depth of perception on democracy, adding that it was not often that high-school
students displayed such mental acumen.
Hsu said that he intends to use the NT$30,000 (US$1,025) prize money to pay for
living expenses and next semester’s tuition fees.
The winners were second-prize winners Chen Min-tao (陳旻道) from Greater Taichung’s
National Sha Lu Vocational School and Lee Min of Shu Guang Girls’ Senior High
School in Hsinchu City, and third-prize winners Lai Chin-yi (賴瑾伊) from Sha Lu
Vocational School, Jung Yu-ting (榮玉渟) from Chiayi County’s Concordia Senior High
School and Lee Yi-yao (李奕瑤) from Yilan County’s National Lo Tung Senior High
School.
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