Nominated for the 2014 Taipei Book Fair Award
2014 Golden Tripod Award
This is a book telling the story of one of Taiwan’s most important independence activists and revolutionaries, known as the ‘Che Guevara of Taiwan.’ Born in Taipei in 1918, Su Beng’s pen name means ‘to know history clearly,’ a statement of intent that sums up a remarkable life.
While studying politics and economics at Waseda University in Tokyo, Japan, Su Beng became a Marxist. Upon graduation in 1942, he went to Shanghai to work as an undercover agent with the Chinese Communists. He quickly became disillusioned, however, and made his escape to Taiwan in 1949. Once home, Su and others began devising a plan to topple the Chiang Kai-Shek dictatorship that had taken power on the island after the Kuomintang’s defeat on the mainland. When Su’s plot to assassinate Chiang was discovered in 1952, he was forced to flee to Japan. There he continued to support Taiwan’s underground independence movement and wrote the first version of Taiwan’s 400 Year History.
Su Beng returned to Taiwan in 1993. He has been a frequent fixture at independence rallies and continues to be an enduring symbol of the fight for the rights of the Taiwanese people.