Studies on Sun Yat-sen have been abundant and contentious. Perhaps this is why there are so many differing viewpoints and opinions on Sun’s political career; hence, it is often difficult to interpret the exact value of his contribution to the creation of the Chinese Republic. In particular, biographical work on Sun seems to fall into three categories. Earlier monographs tend to portray Sun in a hagiographic manner, depicting him in almost a mythical role. Yet, research done on Sun after the 1960s brusquely deconstructs Sun’s career and instead assert that not only was Sun merely a marginal figure in Chinese politics, he was an intellectual charlatan who lacked ideal and integrity. Recent revisionist studies on Sun’s life tend to disagree with such an extreme stance; instead, they argue that Sun was shrewd politician whose peculiar ideas and actions were purposefully designed as part of his political platform. This essay will not attempt to add any more confusion this subjective dilemma; rather, it will a sample of these differing opinions of scholarship on Sun’s career.

Paul Linebarger and Lyon Sharman are two biographers who prefer to highlight Sun’s accomplishments while downplaying his weaknesses. Yet, Linebarger was not an historian, but an American attorney who joined Sun’s clique in 1913 and performed propaganda work for the Guomindang. Unabashedly professing himself as a “partisan of Sun Yat-sen,” his opinions in Sun Yat-sen and the Chinese Republic are quite subjective.[1] Created in conjunction with Sun shortly before his death in 1925, much of the biography is based on a series of interviews between Linebarger and Sun.

Far from being historical, Linebarger’s book lacks chronological analysis, for it skips important events of Sun’s life. Preferring to examine Sun’s personality as well as his personal life, Linebarger attempts to psychoanalytically explore the influences that moulded Sun’s character. Yet, his examination is flawed because he suggests that Sun’s character remained static throughout his life; in fact, Linebarger insinuates that Sun’s sense of righteousness and heroism was inbred. Hence, Sun is portrayed as being destined at the time of his birth to become the revolutionary saviour of China. Linebarger veneration is so blatant that he frequently refers to Sun as the “Great Leader.”

Hence, without any impartial sources to support Sun reminiscences, Linebarger’s study is plagued with biases and historical inaccuracies. His study begins with a mythical reconstruction of Sun’s childhood, portraying Sun as a young boy imbued with constant rebelliousness and relentless questioning of the traditional Chinese order. Linebarger insists Sun’s revolutionary career had begun long before his departure for Honolulu; the first act of reform occurred when he attempted to rescue his sister from footbinding when he was only five years old. In fact, Sun’s plans for overthrowing the Manchus had already formed during his childhood, for his experiences with the injustices of slavery, lawlessness, and tax evasion in “Choy Hung” (Xiangshan) ultimately forced him to look elsewhere for inspiration in changing China. This revelation, contends Linebarger, eventually came from American and European civilization.

Even though Linebarger contends that Sun’s benevolence was his main weakness, he goes to great lengths in justifying his relinquishment of the presidency to Yuan in1912. Sun tendered his resignation because he considered his duty fulfilled; as a result, he wanted to move on and devote his entire effort into the economic modernization, particularly its railways. Linebarger claims that Sun recommended Yuan as his successor because he thought they shared similar ideals.[2] Hence Sun was “tricked out of his presidency” because of his gullibility; yet Linebarger venerates this aspect of Sun’s weakness, justifying that it was Sun’s nature to trust. Because Yuan betrayed him, he is branded as Linebarger’s “Judas of Sun.”[3]

Fixated on Sun’s personality, Linebarger consequently overlooks looking at Chinese history in a larger context. The Three People’s Principles (Sanmin zhuyi), the primary foundations in Sun legacy, is not mentioned. Other important aspects of Sun’s career, such as his 1895 petition to Li Hongzhang, the 1896 London Kidnapping, and the creation of the Revolutionary Alliance Party are only briefly examined. More significantly, Linebarger omits discussing Sun’s role in the 1911 Revolution. Although this question would become the crux of future Sun Yat-sen studies, Linebarger refuses to delve into the issue; instead, he simply attributes the fall of the Manchus to Sun’s “shear fearlessness.”[4]

Sharman’s Sun Yat-sen is similarly riddled with the many biases that plagues Linebarger’s work. Her background as a professional historian is almost as obscure as Linebarger’s, for she was not a serious researcher. Her only other published works included a book of poetry and a short play. Her name was so anonymous that when her book was published, reviewers mistakenly identified her as a male author.[5] Like Linebarger’s main weakness, Sun Yat-sen has a narrow range of sources. Because Sharman did not read Chinese, her research is based entirely on English language sources. Sharman relies a great deal on the few Sun Yat-sen English biographies that were available to her up to 1934, particularly James Cantlie’s Sun Yat Sen and the Awakening of China, who was Sun’s intimate friend, Linebarger’s Sun Yat-sen, as well as Sun Yat-sen’s autobiography, Tzu Chuan. Such books can hardly be considered an objective approach in examining Sun. Even Sharman seems to recognize such limitations, for she acknowledges materials about Sun had multiple “deflections of representation due to partisan feeling.”[6] Yet she chooses to neglect sorting through the discrepancies, for doing so would only “cumber the book with the mechanism of scholarship.”[7]

Although Sharman and Linebarger share similar admiration for Sun’s character, Sharman has a much more thorough analysis of Sun’s political career. From her standpoint, Sun played a vital role in the downfall of the Qing. Although it would have been “saner” to follow Kang Youwei’s reformers, Sun’s humble populist strategies persevered and thus successfully gathered enough support from the overseas Chinese as well as the Triads to finance the revolution.[8] When the 1911 Revolution did occur, Sun performed an even greater function, for he secured the necessary foreign neutrality needed for a smooth transition to the republic. But later scholars such as Harold Schiffrin, who argue that Sun’s role was only an exaggeration, would overturn Sharman’s glowing breakdown of Sun’s career.

Sharman’s study also differs from Linebarger’s, for she argues that Sun was not a great thinker. In fact, she realizes that much of his Sanmin zhuyi was a confusion of Western and Chinese ideas. But refusing to admit this as Sun’s mistake, she awkwardly deflects his faults to the “Sun Yat-sen cult,” particularly the Guomindang government, whom she believes inflated his legacy for their own purposes. Thus, it not only twisted Sun’s words to its own end, it ultimately used Sun’s legacy to dictatorially command respect and authority.[9]

However, nonpartisan scholars of Sun Yat-sen are less forgiving than the earlier hagiographers. Such historians as Harold Schiffrin, Martin Wilbur, and Marie-Claire Bergere deconstruct Sun’s legacy. Arguing that Sun was merely one among the many who participated in the downfall of the Qing Dynasty, these authors particularly emphasize the flaws in Sun’s personality, his ideology, as well as his political actions.

Harold Schiffrin’s 1968 Sun Yat-sen and the Origins of the Chinese Rovlution and his 1980 Sun Yat-sen: Reluctant Revolutionary are similar to Paul Linebarger’s examination, for both offer an intimate and personal look into Sun’s psychological profile. The main difference is that Schiffrin is fixated on Sun’s irrationalities, while Linebarger is obsessed with Sun’s morality. In particularly scrutinizing Sun’s peasant background, Schiffrin argues that Sun’s constant feeling of inferiority ultimately shaped and hindered his political career.

Schiffrin’s 1968 biography examines the first half of Sun’s career, the period leading up to the 1911 Revolution. In contrast to Linebarger’s viewpoint, Sun’s revolutionary career started later in his life, initiated by Li Hongzhang’s rejection in 1895. Hence, he downplays Sun’s foreign experiences in Hawaii, Hong Kong, and Japan as possible influences on his revolutionary career. Schiffrin reasons that Sun wanted to join the gentry reformers and become a part of Li’s exclusive clique because he was ashamed of his peasant background. Because a lack of classical education was a barrier to his social status, Sun realized that the only way to achieve influence was through Li.

To support his argument, something Linebarger omits to do, Schiffrin proceeds with a careful analysis of Sun’s actual manuscript to Li. He asserts that Sun’s document did not reveal any trace of revolutionary ideas. In fact, its proposals were similar to the reforms proposed by other gentry officials such as Feng Kuei-fan, mainly ideas that advocated maximizing on human talent rather than material progress. In reality, the petition was Sun’s curriculum vitae in which the main objective was to sell himself and not his program.[10] But the rejection proved to be such a humiliation that he ultimately parted ways with the reformers. Schiffrin suggests this as an explanation for Sun’s unremitting mistrust of intellectual reformers such as Kang Youwei for the rest of his career. Yet, Sun had a strange attraction to the world of the intellectuals. The classics both awed and mystified the peasant Sun, who frequently felt mediocre due to his lack of a Chinese education. Thus, although he led a political revolution, he never supported a cultural revolution such as the May 4^th Movement, which not only sought to replace literary Chinese with the vernacular (which Sun preferred), but also attempted to alter Chinese tradition.[11]

When Sun finally decided to topple the Manchu regime, Schiffrin argues that he was only a half-hearted revolutionary who lacked ideal and integrity. Schiffrin particularly scrutinizes Sun’s London kidnapping in 1896 to exemplify Sun’s personality as well as appreciating “his talent for dissimulation.”[12] Schiffrin reveals that Sun’s mastery of manipulation was his main political skill. Sun not only bribed his guard George Cole, he also lied being a fellow socialist in order to earn Cole’s sympathy while securing his release. Moreover, he “diligently” attended church and sent thank-you letters to newpapers to cultivate his image as refined Christian gentleman. He then used his new fame to rebuke his enemies and shift public attention to his anti-Manchu movement. Schiffrin contends that Sun’s personality also changed, for his self-confidence soared, so much so that he believed that a “supreme being” had preserved him some high purpose.[13] Schiffrin suggests that Sun’s sense of recklessness began as a result of his London experience.

Schiffrin’s Sun Yat-sen: Reluctant Revolutionary insists that Sun spent his life yearning for recognition. Hence, his abdication to Yuan was cunningly coordinated. Not only did he realize that his peasant background would always hold back his political status among the revolutionaries, he recognized that he held only provisional powers.[14] By deferring power to Yuan, Sun in reality conspired to enhance his appearance among the public as true statesmen sacrificing for the good of the nation.[15] Subsequently, Sun reveled in his new fame, where he felt he was finally appreciated for his oratory public lectures.

In contrast to Schiffrin’s psychological profiling, Martin Wilbur’s Sun Yat-sen: Frustrated Patriot offers a less intimate analysis into Sun personality; rather, it evaluates Sun’s political career. Yet Wilbur is as unforgiving as Schiffrin, for he interprets Sun’s career as a disappointment. In his view, Sun was only a transitional figure in China’s modernization and thus played a politically trivial role. What makes Wilbur’s research stand out is his use of primary documents. Because he had access to newly discovered French archives and American archives, Wilbur offers a more comprehensive and exclusive view into the political relations between Sun and foreign diplomats.[16]

Contrary to the benevolent image that is inflated by Linebarger and Sharman, Wilbur does not see Sun as a humble populist who visited the overseas Chinese in search of contributions to finance his revolution. Instead, Sun was a political vagabond, ceaselessly in search for allies to further his personal authority. His prime weapon in dealing with foreign governments was his audacious lying.[17] Even though in no position of power to offering any concessions, Sun often made lavish promises to foreigners that would compromise China’s sovereignty in order to secure personal authority. In particular, Sun offered France, Britain, and the US railway and mining concessions in large parts of China in return for neutrality during the 1911 Wuchang Uprising. Despite his compromises, Wilbur asserts that not one foreign government supported him prior to 1912, for all had recognized his use of deception.[18]

Yet, Sun continued selling China’s sovereignty for short-term aid even after the establishment of the Chinese Republic. He often negotiated simultaneously with two or three countries in order to strike the most lucrative deal. Wilbur reveals that even while cooperating with the Soviet Russians after the Sun-Joffe agreement, Sun continued to secretly negotiate with the British for a possible alliance.

While Marie-Claire Bergere asserts that there has been no new exposure in the Western historiography of Sun Yat-sen, her research does little to solve this quandary. In fact, much of the content in Sun Yat-sen regurgitates what Schiffrin and Wilbur has already published. [19] What seems to differentiate her work from theirs is her focus on Sun’s ideological makeup in which she traces the development of Sun’s Sanmin zhuyi.

Unlike Sharman and Schiffren, who attributed Sun’s incoherent ideas as a product of his incomplete understanding of Western and Chinese culture, Bergere argues that Sun was well aware of his actions. She views him as a devious politician who carefully and deliberately crafted his speeches to suit the tastes of his audiences. For example, he would discuss Lincolnsonianism with Westerners, but would recite Mencius solely for his Chinese audiences. In Bergere’s mind, Sun had no definite set of principles; he believed in whatever would garner the most support. In contrast to Schiffrin’s psychoanalystical outline or Wilbur’s political evaluation, Bergere offers an ideological profile of Sun’s career.

Bergere derides Sun’s Three People’s Principles simply as a work of “propaganda designed to win followers rather than to instill conviction, an appeal to action rather than thought.”[20] Contrary to Linebarger’s claims that Sun’s revolutionary beliefs originated in the libraries of London, Bergere asserts that Sun’s earlier published texts reveal his thinking was still quite reformist prior to 1905. Two 1897 manuscripts written in London, which Sun excluded in his collective writings, reveal that Sun had only aspired for a less corrupt government and a European-style government; nothing was mentioned about overthrowing the Qing establishment.[21]

In the midst of a struggle with Kang Youwei for supporters, Sun adopted “anti-Manuchuism” as his main platform. By 1900 Sun had lost most of his supporters from his Revive China Society after the failed Huizhou uprising.[22] Kang not only took support away from Sun, the British and Japanese governments had also lost interest in his cause. Sun realized that the only way to regain recognition and legitimacy was to exploit the Anti-Manchu nationalist sentiment that was brewing among the revolutionary societies and intellectuals. Hence, he took hold of “anti-Manchuism,” something Kang and his reformers refused to do, and tied it to his political program in order to fuse the different groups under his guidance.[23] This fusion in 1905 became the Revolutionary Alliance.

Yet Sun’s ideology took another drastic change by 1920, for Bergere contends that Sun became nostalgic for the past. He had come full circle, for he began his career as a reformer, later became a radical, only to return to being a reformist in the end. Bergere sees in his later writings that Sun had turned to Confucianism –something he vehemently opposed in his past – for inspiration. In fusing anti-Manchuism and anti-Westernism together with his Principle of Nationalism (minzuzhuyi), Sun based his movement on the appeal of race, but in a starkly Confucian posture. Arguing that the fate of China belonged to the Han race, Sun advanced that nationalism was not the goal, but merely a stage in which the end was to restore the glory of the ancient past as well as pacifying the world, but not take part in imperialism.[24] Likewise, departing from his earlier views of democracy in Hawaii, Sun’s later writings reveal that he was an elitist who no longer supporter individual liberty. His rendering of emancipation implied increasing the power of the state, but not its citizens.[25]

In contrast to the nonpartisan authors, some recent scholarship has attempted to reinterpret Sun’s career. While they do not disagree that Sun’s career was flawless, revisionists such as David Strand and J.Y Wong dispute that in order to better understand his legacy, we must first comprehend his political constraints in early twentieth century China. Hence, these scholars return to the questions posed by Schiffren, Wilbur and Bergere, and reinvestigate the validity of their claims, but in doing so, they only rehash past assertions without actually offering much new information.

Strand’s “Community, Society, and History in Sun Yat-sen’s Sanmin zhuyi” reinterprets Sun’s incoherent ideology as a deliberate strategy to rationalize and thus “sinicize” Western concepts for a Chinese audience.[26] In response to those such as Schiffrin, who contend that Sun’s ideology was but a incoherent assortment of half-Western and Chinese ideas, Strand disputes that Sun could not afford to alienate his hard-earned supporters, particularly in the precarious political climate of early twentieth century China. As a symbol of China’s modernism, Sun had to adroitly appear Western “yet not overly Western and condescending to Chinese culture.”[27]

Furthermore, Sun was a realist, who believed in governmental efficiency rather than “political boisterousness.”[28] Hence, Sun’s ideology has little coherence if interpreted as pure doctrinal theory. Rather, Sun was more concerned with practical ideas than formal principles. In contrast to Bergere’s assertion that Sun had turned nostalgic for the past and thus becoming an authoritarian Confucianist, Strand points out that Sun had simply found a more useful model for structuring government. Sun’s opposition to pluralism and free speech did not mean that he had turned into an anti-democratic tyrant. Rather, Sun wanted to revive particular traditional principles such as family unity and Han racialism in order to create a sense of cultural unity that would help solidify a demoralized and divided country.[29]

J.Y. Wong’s The Origins of an Heroic Image focuses exclusively on Sun’s 1896 London Kidnapping. Disputing claims that Sun was an opportunist who lacked intellectual abilities, Wong argues that not enough attention has been paid to Sun’s stay in London to realize how great of an influence it actually had on his development of the Sanmin zhuyi. Although Wong builds on prior research done by Schiffrin, Luo Jianlun and Wu Xiangxiang, he surpasses them in detail because Wong engages in field work, using records from the London detective who shadowed Sun, diaries from James Cantlie’s wife, school records of Sun’s associates, as well as archives from the Chinese embassy in London that were not available to historians.[30]

Wong argues that James Cantlie and Edward Collins, a mysterious figure who coauthored with Sun’s first political writings, particularly influenced Sun. Collins was a British Israeliste who inspired Sun’s views of racial purity, namely his anti-Manchuism in relations to race and nationalism.[31] Wong contends that Sun’s time in the Library of the British Museum had also influenced Sun’s later thought. Since it is impossible to capture what exact books Sun read, Wong suggests a more practical method in discerning possible influences would be to locate the people Sun met. Based on a combination of diaries (recovered by Wong), oral interviews, as well as surviving records from Henry Slater (the detective who trailed Sun), Wong surmises that Sun’s meetings with Japanese and Russian exiles in the library later inspired the Pan-Asianism and Marxist ideals that Sun would associate with further into his career.[32] Moreover, Wong disputes Wilbur and Schiffrin’s claim that was a Sun horsetrader who compromised China’s sovereignty to which ever country would aid his personal success, Wong contends that Sun’s plea to Britain for aid during the 1911 Revolution was not a short-term “desperate bluff” to secure assistance. Rather, Sun truly believed that China’s survival depended on her successful diplomatic relations with Great Britain, for Sun’s stay during the peak of London’s power remained a strong influence to him throughout his life.[33]

In contrast to Wilbur and Schiffren’s challenge that Sun sensationalized his kidnapping in order to further his cause, Wong vindicates that Sun had no part in the twisting or exploitation of the incident. Analyzing British newspapers between 1896 and 1897, particularly the Daily Chronicle, Wong reveals that Sun reacted in embarrassment to the questions reporters asked him as he left the legation. On several other occasions Sun made no sensational stories of his kidnapping when interviewed.[34] Rather, Wong argues that it was public sympathy that helped spawn Sun’s fame. At a time when most Britons associated civilization with anything British, and barbarism with most things Chinese, Wong argues that Sun’s English appearance generated a feeling of British nationalism and patriarchalism, so much so that most British felt an obligation to protect the helpless Chinese from the “oriental despots.”[35]

However, whether for or against Sun Yat-sen, there remains the question that is inadequately unanswered by his biographers: What was his main motivation in overthrowing the Qing order? Sun’s biographers seem to evade this issue, for they focus mainly on his role (or non-role) in the creation of the Chinese republic. Sharman and Linebarger assert that Sun’s role was essential for the revolution while Schiffren, Wilbur and Bergere agree that Sun’s role was marginal; yet, both sides never quite explain what potential factors led to his unmitigated perseverance –ten failed revolutions in total— in ending the Qing? Instead they tend to redirect the issue to Sun’s nature, arguing that he was either a selfless individual or a crafty politician with an insatiable appetite for authority and recognition. Revisionists in fact add only more confusion, for they seem to only spin new interpretations of past discussions while not directly contributing a great deal to the fray. Hence, although Sun is a popular topic in Chinese history, there seems to be a great deal yet to be researched on this enigmatic politician.

Preliminary Bibliography: History 560

Bergere, Marie-Claire. Sun Yat-sen. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1994.

Linebarger, Paul. Sun Yat-sen and the Chinese Republic. New York: The Century

Company, 1925.

Sharman, Lyon. Sun Yat-sen: His Life and Its Meaning. Stanford: Stanford University

Press, 1934.

Schiffrin, Harold Z. Sun Yat-sen and the Origins of the Chinese Revolution. Berkeley:

University of California Press, 1968.

Schiffrin, Harold Z. Sun Yat-sen: Reluctant Revolutionary. Toronto: Little, Brown and

Company, 1980.

Strand, David. “Community, Society, and History in Sun Yat-sen’s Sanmin zhuyi.”

Culture and State in Chinese History. Ed. Theodore Huters, R. Bin Wong, and Pauline Yu. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997.

Wilbur, C. Martin. Sun Yat-sen: Frustrated Patriot. New York: Columbia University

Press, 1976.

Wong, J. Y. The Origins of an Heroic Image. New York: Oxford University Press,

1986.

[1] Linebarger, Paul. Sun Yat-sen and the Chinese Republic. New York: The Century Company: 1925, p. viii.

[2] Yet, this is a false assumption, for later biographies reveal that Yuan was already the most powerful man in China at the time of Sun’s resignation. Hence, Sun played very little in Yuan’s eventual ascension to power.

[4] Linebarger, Paul. Sun Yat-sen and the Chinese Republic. New York: The Century Company: 1925, p.217.

[5] Sharman, Lyon. Sun Yat-sen: His Life and Its Meaning. Stanford: Stanford University Press: 1934, p. vii-viii.

[6] Sharman, Lyon. Sun Yat-sen: His Life and Its Meaning. Stanford: Stanford University Press: 1934, p.390.

[11] Schiffrin, Harold Z. Sun Yat-sen: Reluctant Revolutionary. Toronto: Little, Brown and Company: 1980, 209-211.

[13] Schiffrin, Harold Z. Sun Yat-sen and the Origins of the Chinese Revolution. Berkeley: University of California Press: 1968, p.129-130.

[14] In reality, power was held by Li Yuanhong and Huang Xing. Because of a power struggle, Sun was selected as the temporary President until the deadlock would be resolved later.

[15]Schiffrin, Harold Z. Sun Yat-sen: Reluctant Revolutionary. Toronto: Little, Brown and Company: 1980, p.164-166.

[16] Wilbur, C. Martin. Sun Yat-sen: Frustrated Patriot. New York: Columbia University Press: 1976, p.60-67.

[17] (Particularly, these foreign governments comprised of France, Britain, the United States, Germany, and Japan).

Ibid.,p.74-75.

[19] (In fact, Bergere openly admits to drawing much of her content from Schiffren and Wilbur). Bergere, Marie-Claire. Sun Yat-sen. Stanford: Stanford University Press: 1994, p. 4.

[22] Ibid., p. 95. Sun had lost most of his lieutenants such as Yang Quyun and Zheng Shiliang, who were believed to have been assassinated by the Chinese imperial secret agents.

[26] Strand, David. “Community, Society, and History in Sun Yat-sen’s Sanmin zhuyi.” Culture and State in Chinese History. Ed. Theodore Huters, R. Bin Wong, and Pauline Yu. Stanford: Stanford University Press: 1997, p.327.

[30] Wong, J. Y. The Origins of an Heroic Image. New York: Oxford University Press: 1986, p.xii.

[31] (British Israelites believed that the British were the descendents of Israel. Hence, they believed that they were “God’s Chosen race” and thus destined to civilize the world. Hence, the eccentric logic which Sun subsequently used to argue that the Chinese people were a pure race, parituclarly that the Han overwhelmingly outnumbered the Mongols, Manchus, Tibetans, etc, is reminiscent of Collins’ views.) Wong, J. Y. The Origins of an Heroic Image. New York: Oxford University Press: 1986, p.227-229.

[32] (Interestingly, this assertion corresponds with Linebarger’s claim in 1925). Ibid., p.281-285.

[33] (Wong explains that the Queen’s Jubilee Processions had a particularly intense influence on Sun, and etched in him a strong desire to model China after this great superpower). Ibid., p.251.

[34] (One of the newspapers in London at the time). Wong, J. Y. The Origins of an Heroic Image. New York: Oxford University Press: 1986, p.169-172.

[35] Wong, J. Y. The Origins of an Heroic Image. New York: Oxford University Press: 1986, 175-177.