Yu Youren - Revolutionary Beginnings

Revolutionary Beginnings

In 1900, at the age of 22, Yu Youren wrote a letter for the Pacification Commissioner of Shaanxi, Cen Chunxuan, imploring him to take the opportunity of assassinating the Empress Dowager Cixi who was fleeing to Xi'an during the Boxer Rebellion, which would provide the impetus for true reform of the government, but Yu was stopped from sending it by his classmate Wang Linsheng. Yu wrote many poems venting anger and frustration with the government. These were collected into a book entitled Poetry Drafts from the Hall of Tears and Mockery. His friend Meng Yimin helped Yu to have it published.

In 1903, he passed the civil service examinations to become a Provincial Graduate (juren), but due to the satiric contents of Poetry Drafts from the Hall of Tears and Mockery, the government branded him a revolutionary. Wanted by the Qing government, Yu fled and sought refuge in Shanghai. With help from Ma Xiangbo, he was able to enter the Aurora Academy (later Aurora University (Shanghai)) under the assumed named of Liu Xueyu. Along with Ye Zhongyu and others, Yu established the Fudan College (later Fudan University) in memory of his days at Aurora (using the same character dan in Zhendan, the Chinese name of Aurora, and adding the character fu, for "reviving" China). Ma Xiangbo was elected as school president.

In 1906, Yu fled to Japan and while there was able to meet Dr. Sun Yat-sen and the Tongmenghui through the introduction of Kang Xinfu and he thereafter officially joined the Tongmenghui. After returning to China in 1907, Yu started a newspaper called The National Herald (also known as the Shenzhou Daily), but its facilities were destroyed in a fire less than a year later. In the following year, Yu's father died. In March 1909, Yu established another newspaper called The People's Voice (Minzhu Bao) in Shanghai, strongly condemning the culture of corruption in government. Attracting the attention of officials, he was arrested and sent to jail, and the newspaper was closed in June 1909. Released from jail and still undaunted, he established another newspaper called The People's Sigh (Minxu Bao) but less than two months later it was shut down and he was thrown in jail again. In 1910, he established yet another newspaper called the Min Li Pai, the offices of which virtually served as the contact headquarters for the Chinese Revolutionary Alliance.