ZHANG JUN-XIANG

Wade-Giles Chang Chn-hsiang born 1909, Chenchiang, Kiangsu province, China leading playwright and motion-picture director in Nationalist China and later in the People's Republic. Zhang was educated at Tsinghua University, Peking, and at Yale University and then studied film technique in Hollywood. Returning to China during the Sino-Japanese War (193745), he directed several successful plays in Chungking and rose to preeminence in the Chinese film industry. After the establishment of the communist regime in 1949, Zhang became a director of the governmental Central Motion Picture Company. His film Red Banner on the Emerald Ridge won acclaim throughout China. Zhang's first published play, Tales of a Small Town (1941), is a comedy about the psychological conflicts of a woman in love. Model Teacher of Myriad Generations, considered his best play, concerns a group of Chinese intellectuals from 1919 to 1937.