The Doctor Who Was Followed by Ghosts

By (author): Li Qunying, Louis Han

According to Chinese folklore, when his favourite daughter falls ill, Yanwang, the ruler of the underworld, sends his servants to look for a doctor who has as few ghosts as possible following him. This means that he is a better doctor than others, because when a patient dies, the ghost follows and haunts the doctor.

Li Qunying, a Communist doctor of great dedication, undoubtedly had fewer ghosts behind her. Yet her life was in many ways ill fated, as she struggled through the Anti-Japanese War, the Civil War, the Korean War, the great famine of the early ’60s and numerous political movements, including the notorious Cultural Revolution. The Great Leap Forward Movement tragically took away her son Bingbing’s life, and the persecution of her husband during the Cultural Revolution took a serious toll on his health, and consequently led to his early death. Besides enduring personal misfortune, she also witnessed the suffering of the peasants, who were the majority of the population at the grass-roots level and whose sorrowful stories have rarely been told.

This haunting memoir traces all of the major events of brutal twentieth-century China, interweaving eyewitness history, folklore, superstition, and Dr. Li’s own first-hand accounts.

AUTHOR

Li Qunying

Dr. Li Qunying was born in Chifeng, Inner Mongolia, China in 1926. A devoted follower of Mao Zedong, she joined the Communist army and served in both the Civil and the Korean Wars as a medic. Until her retirement, she worked as a doctor in various hospitals throughout the Shandong province, after which she served in a private clinic. She lives in Jinan in the Shandong province of China. Louis Han, the youngest son of Dr. Li Qunying, was born in the Shandong province and grew up in China during the Cultural Revolution. He lives in Vancouver, British Columbia.


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According to Chinese folklore, when his favourite daughter falls ill, Yanwang, the ruler of the underworld, sends his servants to look for a doctor who has as few ghosts as possible following him. This means that he is a better doctor than others, because when a patient dies, the ghost follows and haunts the doctor.

Li Qunying, a Communist doctor of great dedication, undoubtedly had fewer ghosts behind her. Yet her life was in many ways ill fated, as she struggled through the Anti-Japanese War, the Civil War, the Korean War, the great famine of the early ’60s and numerous political movements, including the notorious Cultural Revolution. The Great Leap Forward Movement tragically took away her son Bingbing’s life, and the persecution of her husband during the Cultural Revolution took a serious toll on his health, and consequently led to his early death. Besides enduring personal misfortune, she also witnessed the suffering of the peasants, who were the majority of the population at the grass-roots level and whose sorrowful stories have rarely been told.

This haunting memoir traces all of the major events of brutal twentieth-century China, interweaving eyewitness history, folklore, superstition, and Dr. Li’s own first-hand accounts.

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Details

Dimensions:

296 Pages
9in * 6in * 0.906in
1.283lb

Published:

November 01, 2007

City of Publication:

Toronto

Country of Publication:

CA

Publisher:

ECW Press

ISBN:

9781550227819

9781554907816 – PDF

Book Subjects:

BIOGRAPHY & AUTOBIOGRAPHY / Medical

Language:

eng

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