Taiwan's 400 year history

by Su Beng

This anniversary edition of Taiwan's 400 Year History is our present to Su Beng in celebration of his 100th year birthday.

The work, which we present here, is based on the 1986 English version of Taiwan's 400 Year History - the Origins and Continuing Development of the Taiwanese Society and People.

We have maintained the Romanization of the Chinese names as in the original text, but we have added their Chinese characters for greater clarity.

The main purpose of the 1986, 1st English edition was to promote a better understanding of Taiwan's history to the West.

However, as time has passed, most of the world has come to realize the complicated context of Taiwan's history and position so that this work has taken on a second mission, namely to provide a greater understanding of Su Beng and his philosophy.

Genres: History

183 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1962

About the author

Su Beng was born November 9, 1918 in the Shilin district of Taipei, Taiwan. After graduating from Waseda University in Tokyo, Japan with a degree in political science and economics in 1942, he left for China where he worked undercover with the Chinese Communists (1942–1949). For years, he averted the Chinese Communists’ bids for him to join the party. Finally he escaped from Qingdao, China to Taiwan, just as the Chinese Nationalist Kuomintang soldiers were retreating to Taiwan.

Having returned to Taiwan for about a year, he established the Taiwan Independence Armed Corps in 1950 which plotted for the assassination of Generalissimo Chiang Kai Shek. When the Taiwan Independence Armed Corps’ stash of weapons were discovered hidden on land owned by Su Beng’s grandmother in 1951, Su Beng was forced to go into hiding.

After several months on the run, he finally fled to Japan in May 1952 by stowing away in boat exporting bananas. He served four months of detention for attempting to illegally enter the country, but when the Kuomintang reported him missing and wanted for his involvement in the plot to assassinate Chiang Kai Shek, the Japanese government granted him political asylum. Later on in 1954, Su Beng opened up a noodle shop restaurant named 新珍味 (Hoklo (Taiwanese): sin-tin-bi, Mandarin: xīn zhēn wei), which translates as New Gourmet, in Ikebukuro, Japan. Su Beng used the restaurant/residence as a base to continue his work with the underground Taiwan Independence movement. It was also here that he trained burgeoning Taiwan Independence activists and began writing Taiwan’s 400 Year History. The Japanese version of Taiwan’s 400 Year History was first published in 1962, the Chinese-language version was published in 1980 and an abridged English version was published in 1986.

In 1993 Su Beng returned to reside in Taipei, Taiwan. The following year, April 1994, he began the Taiwan Independence Action motorcade, which he conceived as a way to raise the Taiwanese people’s consciousness. The motorcade makes its rounds from Taipei county to Taipei city, every Saturday and Sunday afternoon, delivering messages calling for Taiwan’s independence and the normalization of Taiwan as a country.

Labeled a radical, violent militant, and communist, he has been dubbed the “Che Guevara of Taiwan”; there have been several tall tales about Su Beng’s controversial life decisions, one of which includes electing to have a vasectomy when he was in his twenties while working undercover for the Communists in China.

Reviews

[A · Rating 4 out of 5]

Oof. This one took me longer than expected due to various reasons but definitely learned a lot through reading this book. I have been struggling to find a history of Taiwan through a leftist critical lens. Beng does have pitfalls in his book, namely not acknowledging the settler colonialism of the Han "pioneers" that he constantly refers to. He begins equating them with the indigenous people even though they only started coming in the 1600s. This felt hypocritical and offputting throughout the book.

Although this was published in 1962, Taiwan's vision of independence that Beng and many others put forth is still in jeopardy and continually shaped by the histories of colonization that he talks about. This book was very informative for me as I did not know a lot about the histories prior, but I imagine would be less useful for someone who is more familiar already.

[Sharon Chang · Rating 3 out of 5]

Seminal work on Taiwanese independence. VERY important contribution to English-language canon on Taiwanese history, of which there still isn’t much. However, translation is clunky and publication is sloppy (e.g. three different romanizations of the same word on the same page). Would also liked to have seen more radical voices in the intros/epilogues for this 2017 anniversary edition. Womxn, queer folks, Indigenous peoples, etc. Those most impacted by colonialism/imperialism/militarism, and who we are increasingly recognizing as the needed visionaries of our modern era. Especially since Su Beng was such a revolutionary himself in his own time.

[Alan Tsuei · Rating 1 out of 5]

1.第一、史明並不是歷史學家，也沒有經過歷史學的專業訓練，這本書充其量只是他個人政治傾向下的產物…

2.史明所謂的“台灣人”是根據日本人所創出來的名詞加以發揮的，日本在二戰侵華前為了不讓台灣漢人在背後對其反抗，而創造出“台灣人”不是“中國人”的觀念，並灌輸給台澎兩地的百姓（在此之前日本人都以土人、台灣島人、台灣籍民甚至支那人來稱呼在台漢人），這個觀念到現在仍被台獨勢力與台獨史觀給借用…

3.台灣不是有原住民？難道原住民的歷史只有四百年？當然不只，只是在日本人眼裡，原住民只是牲畜，連人都不算（日本警察有便宜處分權），自然不包含在“台灣人”裡，而史明就用原住民沒有“信史”來對他台灣人四百年的論述加以辯解，對原住民族的過往一概不論，想想看，這是寫歷史應該有的態度嗎？當然不是，如果真要如此，那歷史上許多民族也不用寫進歷史裡了，反正沒有文字、沒有信史嘛…

4.為了建立其台獨史觀，只好大量藉用日本殖民者的角度來篆寫本書，這樣的方式自然會無法合理解釋二戰、盟軍與中國近代史的部分，這只要拿近代世界史加以比較就可看出其中無法自圓其說的部分，當然要騙騙沒有世界觀的人們也許還有點用，但真要上了台面只會漏洞百出不攻自破…

5.隔行如隔山，如果基本功不夠扎實，是無法輕易著書立說的，更何況作者還自帶有色眼鏡來寫歷史，只能說這是歷史學上的大忌，這本書能在台灣有市場不過是獨派勢力這幾年的抬頭，利用其作為“政治”目的罷了，當然就我們喜歡歷史的人來說，也不能說完全沒有用處，至少不失為一個負面教材，將來寫台獨史的時候可以當成很好的案例…

[Jeff Mann · Rating 3 out of 5]

I am not surprised that Beng, who attempted to assassinate Chiang Kai Shek, doesn't write much about history in a book titled "Taiwan's 400 Year History." 2/3rds of this book is the indictment of the Chiang family and name dropping random Taiwanese activists in bullet points. Still had some good information that helped me with my essay in Development Policies in the Asia-Pacific Region (926032011).

[Ross · Rating 3 out of 5]

Historically important work by one of Taiwan’s leading nativist leaders. The book is full of facts and interesting threads for further research. But the book lacks the rigor necessary for such an important topic. The editing was also very inconsistent - pinyin and use of Chinese characters.

Still very important for anyone interested in Taiwans history.

[Daniel · Rating 2 out of 5]

Not so much a history of Taiwan but rather a history of foreign oppression and the struggle for Taiwanese independence, from a Marxist-Leninist perspective. Not what I was looking for as an historical work on Taiwan, but it did contain a lot on the 228 incident.