Edgar Snow exemplary in journalism
(China Daily)
Updated: 2005-07-22 09:16

When Edgar Snow (July 19, 1905February 15, 1972) came to China in 1928, he did not expect his whole life would be closely tied to this ancient, vast and then, poor country.

Edgar Snow on a horse with the Red Army soldiers on his way to Yan'an in 1936. [China Daily]

But in the following years, he made history in journalism by becoming the first Western journalist to visit Yan'an, the then "red capital" of the Communist Party of China (CPC), in 1936. His interviews resulted in his masterpiece "Red Star Over China."

Snow was exemplary with his reporting of China, as the participants expounded during the two-day international conference "Understanding China: Centennial Commemoration of Edgar Snow's Birth" on Tuesday and Wednesday.

The forum, marking the centenary of the birth of Edgar Snow, was jointly hosted by the Peking University, the State Council Information Office and the University of Missouri.

Wu Tingjun, professor and dean at the School of Journalism and Communication of the Huazhong University of Science and Technology, said: "He just took an unbiased attitude and tried to reveal the accurate facts of what he thought to be a correct enterprise for China."

Yin Yungong, director of the Institute of Journalism and Communication under the Chinese Academy of Social Sciences, agreed. He quoted the facts that Snow had criticized China's Great Leap Forward (19581959) and the "cultural revolution" (19661976) during his talks with Mao Zedong.

Yin also cited the fact that Snow even reported an aborted family planning programme in 1956, which had been ignored by Chinese historians.

Gong Wenxiang, executive dean of the School of Journalism and Communication at the Peking University, said besides giving more accurate information to the outside world, competing interpretations on the same issues should be encouraged to allow readers to make decisions for themselves.

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