Jiang Qing

Jiang Qing (19 March 1914 – 14 May 1991), also known as Madame Mao, was a Chinese communist revolutionary, actress, and major political figure during the Cultural Revolution (1966–1976).

She was the fourth wife of Mao Zedong, the Chairman of the Communist Party and Paramount leader of China.

Jiang Qing was born in Zhucheng, Shandong province, on 19 March 1914.

Her birth name was Li Shumeng (李淑蒙).

Her father was Li Dewen (李德文), a carpenter, and her mother, whose name is unknown, was Li's subsidiary wife, or concubine.

Her father had his own carpentry and cabinet making workshop.

After Jiang's parents had a violent argument, her mother found work as a domestic servant (some accounts cite that Jiang's mother also worked as a prostitute) and her husband separated from her.

When Jiang enrolled in elementary school, she took the name Li Yunhe (李雲鶴), meaning "Crane in the Clouds", by which she was known for much of her early life.

Due to her socioeconomic status and the fact that she was an illegitimate child, she was looked down upon by her schoolmates and she and her mother moved in with her maternal grandparents when she started middle school.

In 1926, when she was 12 years old, her father died.

Her mother relocated them to Tianjin where Jiang worked as a child laborer in a cigarette factory for several months.

Two years later, Jiang and her mother settled in Jinan.

The following summer, she entered an experimental theater and drama school.

Her talent brought her to the attention of administrators who selected her to join a drama club in Beijing where she advanced her acting skills.

She returned to Jinan in May 1931 and married Pei Minglun, the wealthy son of a businessman.

From July 1931 to April 1933, Jiang attended National Qingdao University (renamed National Shandong University in 1932) in Qingdao.

She met Yu Qiwei, a physics student three years her senior, who was an underground member of the Communist Party Propaganda Department.

By 1932, they had fallen in love and were living together.

She joined the "Communist Cultural Front", a circle of artists, writers, and actors, and performed in Put Down Your Whip, a renowned popular play about a woman who escapes from Japanese-occupied north-eastern China and performs in the streets to survive.

In February 1933, Jiang took the oath of the Chinese Communist Party with Yu at her side, and she was appointed member of the Chinese Communist Party youth wing.

Yu was arrested in April the same year and Jiang was subsequently shunned by his family.

She fled to her parents' home and returned to the drama school in Jinan.

Through friendships she had previously established, she received an introduction to attend Shanghai University for the summer where she also taught some general literacy classes.

In October, she rejoined the Communist Youth League and, at the same time, began participating in an amateur drama troupe.

She used the stage name Lan Ping (藍蘋) during her acting career (which ended in 1938), and was known by many other names.

Jiang was best known for playing a major role in the Cultural Revolution and for forming the radical political alliance known as the Gang of Four.

Jiang married Mao in Yan'an in November 1938 and served as the inaugural "First Lady" of the People's Republic of China.

She served as Mao's personal secretary in the 1940s and was head of the Film Section of the Communist Party's Propaganda Department in the 1950s.

Jiang served as an important emissary for Mao in the early stages of the Cultural Revolution.

In 1966, she was appointed deputy director of the Central Cultural Revolution Group.

She collaborated with Lin Biao to advance Mao's view of Communist ideology as well as Mao's cult of personality.

At the height of the Cultural Revolution, Jiang held significant influence in the affairs of state, particularly in the realm of culture and the arts, and was idolized in propaganda posters as the "Great Flagbearer of the Proletarian Revolution".

In 1969, Jiang gained a seat on the Politburo.

Before Mao's death, the Gang of Four controlled many of China's political institutions, including the media and propaganda.

However, Jiang, deriving most of her political legitimacy from Mao, often found herself at odds with other top leaders.

Mao's death in 1976 dealt a significant blow to Jiang's political fortunes.

She was arrested in October 1976 by Hua Guofeng and his allies, and was subsequently condemned by party authorities.

Since then, Jiang has been officially branded as having been part of the "Lin Biao and Jiang Qing Counter-Revolutionary Cliques" (林彪江青反革命集团), to which most of the blame for the damage and devastation caused by the Cultural Revolution was assigned.

Though she was initially sentenced to death, her sentence was commuted to life imprisonment in 1983.

After being released for medical treatment, Jiang died by suicide in May 1991.