Lu Xun Park
Lu Xun Park | |
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Hongkou Football Stadium Station |
Lu Xun Park | |
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Hanyu Pinyin | Hóngkǒu gōngyuán |
Wu | |
Shanghainese Romanization | Ghonkheu Konyoe |
Lu Xun Park, formerly Hongkou (Hongkew) Park, is a municipal park in
Lu Xun Park is just north of Duolun Road, a historic street that is now a car-free zone. It is also located near Lu Xun's former residence, a three-story Japanese-style home where the author lived from 1933 until his death in 1936.[1]
Features
Lu Xun Park contains the tomb of Lu Xun, with an inscription by
The park also contains a plum garden, a memorial hall dedicated to Yun Bong-gil, and a bust of the Hungarian revolutionary poet Sándor Petőfi, some of whose works Lu Xun translated into Chinese. The bust was unveiled by Hungarian Prime Minister Ferenc Gyurcsány in 2007 as part of the preparations for the Shanghai Expo.[5] Lu Xun Park is home to several hundred cherry trees, some of which are Yoshino trees transplanted from Ueno Park in Tokyo.[6]
History
In 1896, the Bureau of Construction of the
The Shanghai Municipal Band, the predecessor of the Shanghai Symphony Orchestra, performed summer concerts at Hongkou Park and the Public Garden (now Huangpu Park). These were attended by the foreign residents of the International Settlement, as Chinese residents were not permitted to enter either park.[10] Hongkou Park, along with the other parks administered by the Shanghai Municipal Council, was opened to Chinese visitors for the first time in 1928.[11]
The pre-1928 prohibition against Chinese visitors in foreign-administered Shanghai parks was the subject of much debate among Chinese intellectuals. The park regulations stated that the facilities were exclusively for the use of the foreign community, and also that dogs, horses, and bicycles were prohibited. Critics later paraphrased these regulations into various fictitious versions such as "Dogs and Chinese not admitted", juxtaposing the low status of Chinese citizens in their own country with that of dogs.
The second and fifth Far Eastern Championship Games were held at Hongkou Park in 1915[13] and 1921, respectively.[14] The 1915 games were a major priority for the Beiyang government under Yuan Shikai, as well as for Chinese media covering the event. Yuan had agreed to Japan's Twenty-One Demands just prior to the games, leaving the Chinese crowds in attendance eager for victory against their Japanese opponents on the field. The 1915 games were among the earliest international sporting competitions to be held in China. They attracted a large number of spectators to the new stadium built near the Hongkou shooting range.[15]
The 1921 games were notable for being the first to include female athletes, though their participation was limited to performing group calisthenics demonstrations with movements mimicking those of modern sports.[14] The closing ceremony was disrupted by six Hunanese anarchists who fired a gun outside Hongkou Park and distributed anti-capitalist pamphlets.[16]
Japanese occupation
Japanese settlement in Shanghai was predominantly concentrated in the Hongkou area. During the
Bombing incident
On April 29, 1932, the Japanese military held a celebration of the birthday of Emperor Hirohito in Hongkou Park. Among the attendees were General Yoshinori Shirakawa, commander in chief of the Shanghai Expeditionary Army; Kawabata Teiji , government chancellor of Japanese residents in Shanghai; Kenkichi Ueda, commander of the 9th Division of the Imperial Japanese Army; Vice Admiral Kichisaburō Nomura of the Imperial Japanese Navy; and Mamoru Shigemitsu, diplomat. Yun Bong-gil, a Korean independence activist opposed to Japanese rule over Korea, entered the park carrying two bombs hidden in a lunchbox and a water bottle. After the Japanese national anthem had finished playing, Yun threw the water bottle bomb at the dais where the Japanese officials were gathered, and detonated it.[19]
Shirakawa and Kawabata were killed in the explosion.[7] Nomura, who later served as ambassador to the United States at the time of the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor, was blinded in his right eye.[20] Mamoru lost a leg; in 1945, as Japan's Minister for Foreign Affairs, he signed the Japanese Instrument of Surrender that marked the end of World War II, walking on the deck of the USS Missouri with an artificial leg and cane. Yun Bong-gil was arrested at the scene, taken to Japan, and executed.[19]
In 2003, a two-story memorial hall dedicated to Yun Bong-gil was opened in the park with the support of the Chinese and South Korean governments. After a renovation, it was reopened in 2015 at a ceremony marking the 83rd anniversary of the bombing.[21] The incident is also commemorated on a stone tablet featuring a bilingual inscription in Chinese and Korean.
Dedication to Lu Xun
Lu Xun
After his death in 1936, Lu Xun was originally buried in the International Cemetery (Wanguo Cemetery).
The Lu Xun Memorial Hall (or Museum) was constructed inside Hongkou Park in 1951, and in 1956, Lu Xun's remains were reinterred in the park to mark the 20th anniversary of his death.
Transportation
The park can be reached by taking
Gallery
See also
Notes
31°16′22.21″N 121°28′42.33″E / 31.2728361°N 121.4784250°E
- ^ a b DK Eyewitness 2007, p. 138.
- ^ a b "General Survey". Shanghai Tong. Shanghai Municipal Government. Retrieved May 10, 2015.
- ^ a b Forbes 2007, pp. 144–145.
- ^ a b Harper & Dai 2015.
- ^ "Hungary catches Expo fever". Eastday. June 9, 2007. Retrieved May 11, 2015.
- ^ Shen, Chunchen. "Cherry Blossom Season in Lu Xun Park". Hongkou Shanghai. Shanghai Municipal Government. Retrieved May 12, 2015.
- ^ a b French 2010, p. 118.
- ^ Denison & Ren 2013.
- ^ Bickers & Wasserstrom 1995, p. 461.
- ^ Melvin & Cai 2004, p. 26.
- ^ Bickers & Wasserstrom 1995, p. 444.
- ^ a b Bickers & Wasserstrom 1995, p. 453.
- ^ Morris 2004, p. 25-30.
- ^ a b Morris 2004, p. 89.
- ^ Morris 2004, pp. 25–30.
- ^ Morris 2004, p. 97.
- ^ Ristaino 2003, p. 65.
- ^ Harmsen 2013, p. 49.
- ^ a b Morris-Suzuki et al. 2013, p. 169.
- ^ Polmar & Allen 2012, p. 584.
- ^ Oh, Grace (April 29, 2015). "S. Korea honors independence fighter against Japan's colonization". Retrieved May 10, 2015.
- ^ Pollard 2002, pp. 115–119.
- ^ Wong 1991, p. 59.
- ^ Pollard 2002, pp. 199–207.
References
- Bickers, Robert A.; S2CID 153322481.
- Denison, Edward; Ren, Guang Yu (2013). Building Shanghai: The Story of China's Gateway. ISBN 978-1-118-86754-9.
- DK Eyewitness Travel Guide: Beijing and Shanghai. ISBN 978-0-7566-4860-2.
- Forbes, Andrew (2007). "Shanghai". National Geographic Traveler. ISBN 978-1-4262-0148-6.
- ISBN 978-988-8028-89-4.
- Harmsen, Peter (2013). Shanghai 1937: Stalingrad on the Yangtze. ISBN 978-1-61200-167-8.
- Harper, Damian; Dai, Min (2015). Lonely Planet Shanghai. ISBN 978-1-74360-530-1.
- Melvin, Sheila; Cai, Jindong (2004). Rhapsody in Red: How Western Classical Music Became Chinese. Algora Publishing. ISBN 978-0-87586-186-9.
- Morris, Andrew D. (2004). Marrow of the Nation: A History of Sport and Physical Culture in Republican China. ISBN 978-0-520-24084-1.
- Morris-Suzuki, Tessa; Low, Morris; Petrov, Leonid; Tsu, Timothy Y. (2013). East Asia Beyond the History Wars: Confronting the Ghosts of Violence. ISBN 978-1-136-19226-5.
- Pollard, David E. (2002). The True Story of Lu Xun. ISBN 978-962-996-060-5.
- Polmar, Norman; Allen, Thomas B. (2012). World War II: the Encyclopedia of the War Years, 1941-1945. Courier Corporation. ISBN 978-0-486-47962-0.
- Ristaino, Marcia Reynders (2003). Port of Last Resort: The Diaspora Communities of Shanghai. ISBN 978-0-8047-5023-3.
- Wong, Wang-Chi (1991). Politics and Literature in Shanghai: The Chinese League of Left-Wing Writers, 1930-1936. ISBN 978-0-7190-2924-0.