As a famous writer in the history of modern Chinese literature, Zhang Ailing's life was full of controversies and twists and turns, and her works and characters have also become classics in the literary world.
However, like Zhang Ailing's life, there are many women in her pen who have experienced countless twists and turns and pains, but still bloom beautiful flowers.
But Zhang Ailing's later years did not have a happy ending, she lived an unusually miserable life, lived alone in the United States, moved countless times, and even found her body by the landlord only a week after her death.
What exactly did this talented woman go through?
On September 30, 1920, the Zhang family gave birth to a genius female writer: Zhang Ailing, her grandfather was a famous court minister in the last years of the Qing Dynasty.
After the Qing Dynasty was overthrown, the Zhang family still had outstanding wealth, which was enough for the clansmen to be pampered.
However, Zhang Ailing's father was a real son-in-law, and after the decline of the Zhang family, he had to go to Shanghai to find an errand, but he was contaminated with harmful opium.
Zhang's father spent almost all of the family's money on buying opium, so Zhang Ailing's mother chose to run away from home and went to Europe with her aunt.
During this period, Zhang Ailing has been taking care of her aunt, the lack of her parents made her extremely insecure and loved, when she was ten years old, her mother returned to China, I thought everything would change, but I didn't expect my mother to come back just to divorce her father.
After that, Zhang Ailing's father married a new lady and became her stepmother, but this stepmother was very bad to Zhang Ailing, perhaps the shadow of childhood, the divorce of her parents, made Zhang Ailing full of desire for love, but also attacked by fear, she felt very blank about the future.
Zhang Ailing, who has always received Western-style education, speaks fluent English, and can also play piano and painting, and wrote her first ** book when she was seven years old, which shows that she is full of artistic talent.
After graduating from secondary school, Eileen Chang was admitted to the University of London with excellent grades, and she thought she could escape from this painful place and start a new life.
However, at this time, the Sino-Japanese War in China was becoming more and more fierce, and she could not go to the UK to study as planned, so she finally had to go to the University of Hong Kong, where she studied Chinese.
In college, Zhang Ailing published her first work, writing about her unhappy childhood, and so far, the name Zhang Ailing has become a rising star in the literary world and became an instant hit.
Subsequently, she published a lot of works, created a lot of scripts, and many directors found her to cooperate with her, and Zhang Ailing completely became a well-known writer and screenwriter.
Despite the war at this time, Zhang Ailing still became an outstanding screenwriter behind the movie screen, with a lot of income and star-studded fame.
In 1944, Zhang Ailing, who was only twenty-four years old but had become a famous writer, published a book called "Blockade".
Because of this **, the traitor Hu Lancheng, who was spurned and criticized by the world, took the initiative to communicate with Zhang Ailing, and the two gradually became lovers.
At this time, Hu Lancheng's wife at that time was Ying Yingdi, and after being with Zhang Ailing, Hu Lancheng divorced her, which was Hu Lancheng's second divorce.
In this way, the thirty-eight-year-old Hu Lancheng and the twenty-four-year-old Zhang Ailing got engaged, and the two officially lived together, but this marriage also put Zhang Ailing on the cusp.
Zhang Ailing's friend said to her: "Hu Lancheng is a traitor, even if he has literary talent, he supports Wang Jingwei!" What's more, he has a wife in his family, and you can't be together! ”
But Zhang Ailing thinks: "We are in love, why should we care about the world's vision? ”
First of all, the outside world is puzzled by such a talented female writer marrying Hu Lancheng, who is so much older than herself, not to mention that Zhang Ailing is with Hu Lancheng as a third party.
Moreover, Hu Lancheng lingers in the flowers, has an ambiguous relationship with many women, and has long been a scumbag in terms of emotion, and the young Zhang Ailing is just playing with him.
Not only that, Hu Lan became Wang Jingwei's writer, a veritable traitor, spurned by the world, countless people, including readers and fans, advised Zhang Ailing to be cautious and not to be with Hu Lancheng, but Zhang Ailing insisted on pursuing the so-called love and resolutely married Hu Lancheng.
After marriage, Hu Lancheng did not change his scumbag nature, and continued to indulge in drunken dreams and death, which made Zhang Ailing very painful, while longing for her husband's love, she resented Hu Lancheng's cheating.
Finally, a year after marriage, Hu Lancheng returned home and said to Zhang Ailing, "I fell in love with Xiao Zhou from Hanyang County Hospital, let's divorce." ”
This marriage, which lasted only one year, finally broke down completely with Hu Lancheng's betrayal, but Zhang Ailing was unwilling to separate, and even begged bitterly: "Why do you want to abandon me?" We can get through all the difficulties together! I don't want a divorce! ”
But then Hu Lancheng left their residence in Shanghai and went to Chongqing, and their marriage ended completely.
In the same year, Japan surrendered, Hu Lancheng became a lost dog and hid everywhere, and during this period, Hu Lancheng, who was with ** Xiao Zhou, also wrote to Zhang Ailing many times, wanting to save their feelings.
This made Zhang Ailing fall into contradiction and pain again, and broke off the connection with Hu Lancheng for another three years, and during this period, Hu Lancheng separated from Xiao Zhou and married Fan Xiumei again.
Therefore, Zhang Ailing is in an embarrassing position, becoming a wife from a third party, and from a wife to a third party, and her deformed relationship with Hu Lancheng has made Zhang Ailing controversial.
It wasn't until 1947 that Zhang Ailing completely let go and wrote a letter to Hu Lancheng, saying that the two had completely severed their relationship and would no longer interact.
After living in Hong Kong for more than two years, Zhang Ailing eventually left China, went to the United States alone, and obtained a green card in the United States as a refugee talent.
In the second year after coming to the United States, 36-year-old Zhang Ailing met Hollywood playwright Lai Ya as a writer, and Lai Ya was 65 years old at this time.
Lai Ya used to be a freelance writer and a well-known writer in Hollywood, earning a lot of money, but Lai Ya, who is 65 years old, has suffered several strokes and is unable to write, in fact, she has no income at all.
But Zhang Ailing once again made a puzzling decision, that is, to marry this person who is older than her father.
After marrying Lai Ya, Zhang Ailing found out that she was pregnant, but Lai Ya said, "I don't want to raise a child, if you insist on giving birth to this child, then we don't want to be together." ”
In the end, in order to be able to live with Lai Ya, Zhang Ailing still killed the child in her belly, and she was already in her thirties, and the abortion gave her no chance to get pregnant.
And Lai Ya suffered several strokes during their eleven years of marriage, broke her leg and was confined to a wheelchair and bed, Lai Ya herself did not have any savings, and even had countless credit cards that had been maxed out to be repaid.
After marriage, Zhang Ailing had to write frantically to earn money and take care of the sick Lai Ya, but the manuscript was returned countless times, and only half of the English ** was published.
Unable to publish her work in the United States, Zhang Ailing had to fly back to Hong Kong and send her script manuscript to the film company, but there was no good response.
However, Lai Ya wrote many letters from the United States urging Zhang Ailing to return to the United States: "Send money back quickly, there is no living expenses!" You should also come back to the United States, I can't live alone! Zhang Ailing, who had no choice but to return to the United States, had a very poor life.
Eileen Chang's second marriage lasted eleven years, and she worked hard to earn money, teaching at a university, writing non-stop for a modest manuscript fee, paying off her debts and taking care of her husband, who was paralyzed in bed at this time.
Seventy-six-year-old Lai Ya died, and she finally felt the relief of life, but it didn't take long for Zhang Ailing to realize that she had just entered another hell from one hell.
At this time, 47-year-old Zhang Ailing no longer had any expectations for her feelings, but Lai Ya's death made her economy better, because she no longer had to bear Lai Ya's life and medical expenses.
She went to the University of California to teach and study the Chinese literature "Dream of the Red Chamber", which made her financially better and even began to save a little.
But because Zhang Ailing is too withdrawn and not good at interpersonal relationships, colleagues think that she is lonely and arrogant and has low emotional intelligence, Zhang Ailing has conflicts with many colleagues and leaders, and it is difficult to get along.
In the end, after only two years of working at the university, she was fired and expelled from the school.
Since then, Zhang Ailing has been completely isolated from the world, and has begun to live alone, relying on relief money and the little money she has in hand.
In the 23 years since Zhang Ailing's death, she has been living alone, and none of her new works have been published, but fortunately, some manuscripts from her youth are still being published, so that she can have some income to rent a house and eat.
Living alone and under financial pressure, Zhang Ailing had some nervous problems in her later years, and she always thought that there were countless lice and insects in the room, which disturbed her and made her unable to rest.
Some scholars believe that she actually just had a mental problem and had such hallucinations.
But in order to avoid these terrible lice, Zhang Ailing moved more than 180 times in the last three years of her old age, but she couldn't find a place where she could sleep peacefully, and she was tormented by hallucinations.
In 1995, 74-year-old Zhang Ailing died alone in a rental house, and a week after her death, the landlord smelled the smell in the room before breaking down the door and finding that she was dead.
Her house was messy, with manuscripts littered everywhere, even shabby clothes, a messy kitchen and bathroom, and a suicide note left by her bedside indicating that she had given her belongings to her friends and did not have to hold any funeral.
In this way, this talented woman who was once a smash hit in the Shanghai beach lights ended her life and said goodbye to the world in such a miserable and dirty way.