Quick Facts
Biography
Xie Bingying (simplified Chinese: 谢冰莹; traditional Chinese: 謝冰瑩; pinyin: Xiè Bīngyíng; Wade–Giles: Hsieh Ping-ying; September 5, 1906 – January 5, 2000) was a Chinese soldier and writer.
Life
She was born in Loudi, Hunan in 1906.
Xie was one of the first female soldiers in modern history, and participated in the Northern Expedition. Her literary reputation started with her military diaries and letters, some of which were translated into English by Lin Yutang and published first serially in 1927 and then in book form in 1930. Sometime after 1929 she was the person credited with naming the young actress Wang Ying.
She was arrested in Japan for resistance activities in 1935. In 1948 she moved to Taiwan to escape the coming communist rule, and became a professor at the National Taiwan Normal University. In 1974 she emigrated to the United States.
Main works
- Girl Rebel: the autobiography of Hsieh Pingying, with extracts from her new war diaries (Adet and Anor Lin), Da Capo Press, New York, 1940
- Autobiography of a Chinese Girl: a genuine autobiography (Tsui Chi), G. Allen & Unwin, London, 1943
- A Woman Soldier's Story: The Autobiography of Xie Bingying,translated by Lily Chia Brissman and Barry Brissman, Columbia University Press, New York, 2001.