Interracial relationships from the past

Yang Xianyi and Gladys Yang. Photo provided to China Daily

The author is most impressed by the love story of Yang Xianyi and Gladys Yang, the couple known for translating many Chinese classics into English, including A Dream of Red Mansions.

Born into a wealthy family in Tianjin in 1915, Yang met his future wife Gladys Tayler in 1936 at the Merton College, Oxford, where he was studying.

Gladys Yang spent her early childhood in China as the daughter of a missionary and later enrolled into Chinese studies at Oxford.

Despite opposition from her mother, the two got engaged, and returned to China in 1940 to get married, although they were aware that the Yang family had no money left and that the country was faced with wars and poverty.

They made a living as college teachers and translators, and were happy despite the odds.

When Chiang Kai-shek retreated to Taiwan in 1949, the Yangs also were given plane tickets to follow, but they stayed behind on the Chinese mainland, because they believed the Communist Party would be a better choice for the Chinese than the Kuo-mintang.

They became respected translators in New China, but as China was dragged into the madness of the "cultural revolution" (1966-76), the couple was imprisoned for their independent views as intellectuals.