Zhuang Zedong (simplified Chinese: 庄则栋; traditional Chinese: 莊則棟; Pinyin: Zhuāng Zédòng; Wade-Giles: Chuang Tsetung) (born 1942) is a Chinese table tennis player, three-time world men's singles champion and champion at numerous other table tennis events, a well-known political personality during the tumult of the Cultural Revolution. His chance meeting with the US table tennis player, Glenn Cowan, during the 31st World Table Tennis Championship, later referred to as Ping Pong Diplomacy, was considered in China to have triggered the thawing of the ice in Sino-American relations since 1949. Zhuang was once married to the pianist Bao Huiqiao, and his second wife is the Chinese-born Japanese Sasaki Atsuko (佐々木敦子).
Read more about Zhuang Zedong: Early Life, Unique Style Among Penholders, Actor of The Ping Pong Diplomacy, Cultural Revolution and Consequences, New Life in Beijing, Marriage With Sasaki Atsuko
Famous quotes containing the word zedong:
“Apart from their other characteristics, the outstanding thing about China’s 600 million people is that they are “poor and blank.” This may seem a bad thing, but in reality it is a good thing. Poverty gives rise to the desire for change, the desire for action and the desire for revolution. On a blank sheet of paper free from any mark, the freshest and most beautiful pictures can be painted.”
—Mao Zedong (1893–1976)