\n#2<\/td>\n | Tao Li<\/td>\n | \n Spouse\n <\/td>\n | <\/td>\n | \n N\/A\n <\/td>\n | \n N\/A\n <\/td>\n | N\/A\n <\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\nDoes Liu Xiaobo Dead or Alive?<\/h2>\nAs per our current Database, Liu Xiaobo died on 13 July 2017(2017-07-13) (aged\u00a061) Shenyang, Liaoning, China.<\/p>\n <\/i> Physique<\/h2>\n\n \n\n\nHeight<\/th>\n | Weight<\/th>\n | Hair Colour<\/th>\n | Eye Colour<\/th>\n | Blood Type<\/th>\n | Tattoo(s)<\/th>\n<\/tr>\n<\/thead>\n | \n\n\n N\/A\n <\/td>\n | \n N\/A\n <\/td>\n | \n N\/A\n <\/td>\n | \n N\/A\n <\/td>\n | \n N\/A\n <\/td>\n | \n N\/A\n <\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n<\/i> Biography<\/h2>\n<\/i> Biography Timeline<\/h2>\n\n \n \n <\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n 1955<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n \n Liu was born on 28 December 1955 in Changchun, Jilin province, to a family of intellectuals. Liu’s father, Liu Ling (\u5218\u4f36), was born in 1931 in Huaide County, Jilin. A professor of Chinese at Northeast Normal University, he died of liver disease in September 2011. Liu’s mother, Zhang Suqin (\u5f20\u7d20\u52e4; \u5f35\u7d20\u52e4), worked in the Northeast Normal University Nursery School. Liu Xiaobo was the third-born in a family of five boys.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n \n <\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n 1969<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n \n In 1969, during the Down to the Countryside Movement, Liu’s father took him to Horqin Right Front Banner, Inner Mongolia. His father was a professor who remained loyal to the Communist Party. After finishing middle school in 1974, he was sent to the countryside to work on a farm in Jilin.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n \n <\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n 1977<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n \n In 1977, Liu was admitted to the Department of Chinese Literature at Jilin University, where he founded a poetry group known as “The Innocent Hearts” (\u8d64\u5b50\u5fc3\u8a69\u793e) with six schoolmates. In 1982, he graduated with a BA in literature before being admitted to the Department of Chinese Literature at Beijing Normal University as a research student, where he received an MA in literature in 1984, and started teaching as a lecturer thereafter. That year, he married Tao Li, with whom he had a son named Liu Tao in 1985.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n \n <\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n 1986<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n \n In 1986, Liu started his doctoral study program and published his literary critiques in various magazines. He became renowned as a “dark horse” for his radical opinions and scathing comments on the official doctrines and establishments. Opinions such as these shocked both literary and ideological circles, and his influence on Chinese intellectuals was dubbed the “Liu Xiaobo Shock” or the “Liu Xiaobo Phenomenon”. In 1987, his first book, Criticism of the Choice: Dialogs with Li Zehou, was published and subsequently became a nonfiction bestseller. It comprehensively criticized the Chinese tradition of Confucianism, and posed a frank challenge to Li Zehou, a rising ideological star who had a strong influence on contemporaneous young intellectuals in China.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n \n <\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n 1988<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n \n In June 1988, Liu received a PhD in literature. His doctoral thesis, Esthetic and Human Freedom, passed the examination unanimously and was subsequently published as his second book. That same year he became a lecturer at the same department. He soon became a visiting scholar at several universities, including Columbia University, the University of Oslo, and the University of Hawaii. During the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests, Liu was in the United States but he decided to return to China to join the movement. He was later named one of the “four junzis of Tiananmen Square” for persuading students to leave the square and thus saving hundreds of lives. That year also saw the publication of his third book, The Fog of Metaphysics, a comprehensive review of Western philosophies. Soon, all of his works were banned in China.<\/p>\n Evolving from his esthetic notion of “individual subjectivity” as opposed to Li Zehou’s theory of esthetic subjectivity which combined Marxist materialism and Kantian idealism, he upheld the notion of “esthetic freedom” which was based on the individualistic conception of freedom and esthetics. He also strongly criticized Chinese intellectuals’ “traditional attitude of searching for rationalism and harmony as a slave mentality” just as it was criticized by radical left-wing literary critic Lu Hs\u00fcn during the New Culture Movement. He also echoed the New Cultural Movement’s call for wholesale westernization and the rejection of Chinese traditional culture. In a 1988 interview with Hong Kong’s Liberation Monthly (now known as Open Magazine), he said “modernization means wholesale westernization, choosing a human life is choosing a Western way of life. The difference between the Western and the Chinese governing system is humane vs in-humane, there’s no middle ground … Westernization is not a choice of a nation, but a choice for the human race.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n \n <\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n 1989<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n \n On 27 April 1989, Liu returned to Beijing and immediately became an active supporter of the popular movement. When the army seemed ready to violently eject the students who persistently occupied Tiananmen Square in order to challenge the government and the army that was enforcing its declaration of martial law, he initiated a four-man three-day hunger strike on 2 June. Later referred to as the “Tiananmen Four Gentlemen Hunger Strike”, the action earned the trust of the students. He requested that both the government and the students abandon the ideology of class struggle and adopt a new political culture of dialogue and compromise. Although it was too late to prevent the massacre which started on the night of 3 June from occurring beyond the square, he and his colleagues successfully negotiated with the student leaders and the army commander so the several thousand students who remained in the square would all be allowed to peacefully withdraw from it, thus preventing a possibly much larger scale of bloodshed.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n \n <\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n 1991<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n \n In January 1991, 19 months after his arrest, Liu Xiaobo was convicted of “counter-revolutionary propaganda and incitement” but he was exempted from criminal punishment due to his “major meritorious action” for preventing what could have been a bloody confrontation in Tiananmen Square. After his release, he was divorced; both his ex-wife and son subsequently emigrated to the US. He resumed his writing, mostly on human rights and political issues, but was not allowed to publish them in Mainland China.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n \n <\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n 1992<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n \n In 1992, while in Taiwan, he published his first book after his imprisonment, The Monologues of a Doomsday’s Survivor, a controversial memoir which contains his confessions and his political criticism of the popular movement in 1989.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n \n <\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n 1993<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n \n In January 1993, Liu was invited to visit Australia and the United States for the interviews in the documentary film The Gate of Heavenly Peace. Although many of his friends suggested that he take refuge abroad, Liu returned to China in May 1993 and continued his freelance writing.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n \n <\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n 1995<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n \n On 18 May 1995, the Chinese police took Liu into custody for launching a petition campaign on the eve of the sixth anniversary of the Tienanmen protests calling on the government to reassess the event and initiate political reform. He was held under residential surveillance in the suburbs of Beijing for nine months. He was released in February 1996 but was arrested again on 8 October for writing an October Tenth Declaration, coauthored by him and another prominent dissident, Wang Xizhe, mainly on the Taiwan issue, that advocated a peaceful reunification in order to oppose the Chinese Communist Party’s forceful threats against the island. He was ordered to serve three years of reeducation through labor “for disturbing public order” for that statement.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n \n <\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n 1996<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n \n In 1996, while he was still imprisoned in the labor camp, Liu married Liu Xia, who herself not a prisoner. Because she was the only person from the outside allowed to visit him in prison, she was deemed his “most important link to the outside world.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n \n <\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n 1999<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n \n After his release on 7 October 1999, Liu Xiaobo resumed his freelance writing. However, it was reported that the government built a sentry station next to his home and his phone calls and internet connections were tapped.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n \n <\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n 2000<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n \n In his letter to his friend Liao Yiwu in 2000, he expressed his thoughts on the prospects of the democracy movement in China:<\/p>\n In 2000, while in Taiwan, Liu published the book A Nation That Lies to Conscience, a 400-page political criticism. Also published, in Hong Kong, was a Selection of Poems, a 450-page collection of the poems as correspondences between him and his wife during his imprisonment; it was coauthored by Liu and his wife. The last of three books which he published during the year was published in Mainland China, later titled “Selected Poems of Liu Xiaobo and Liu Xia” (\u5289\u66c9\u6ce2\u5289\u971e\u8a69\u9078), a 250-page collection of literary critiques coauthored by a popular young writer and himself under his unknown pen name of “Lao Xiao”. The same year, Liu participated in founding the “Independent Chinese PEN Center,” and was elected to both its board of directors and as its president in November 2003; he was reelected to both positions two years later. In 2007, he did not seek reelection as president but held his position as a board member until he was detained by the police in December 2008.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n \n <\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n 2002<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n \n In 2002, he reflected on his initial Maoist-flavored radical esthetic and political views in the 1980s:<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n \n <\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n 2003<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n \n In 2003, when Liu started writing a human rights report on China at his home, his computer, letters and documents were all confiscated by the government. He once said, “at Liu Xia’s [Liu’s wife] birthday, her best friend brought two bottles of wine to [my home] but was blocked by the police from coming in. I ordered a [birthday] cake and the police also rejected the man who delivered the cake to us. I quarreled with them and the police said, ‘it is for the sake of your security. It has happened many bomb attacks in these days.'” Those measures were loosened until 2007, prior to the 2008 Beijing Olympic Games.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n \n <\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n 2004<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n \n In his 2004 article titled “Victory to the Anglo-American Freedom Alliance”, he praised the U.S.-led post-Cold War conflicts as “best examples of how war should be conducted in a modern civilization.” He wrote “regardless of the savagery of the terrorists, and regardless of the instability of Iraq’s situation, and, what’s more, regardless of how patriotic youth might despise proponents of the United States such as myself, my support for the invasion of Iraq will not waver. Just as, from the beginning, I believed that the military intervention of Britain and the United States would be victorious, I am still full of belief in the final victory of the Freedom Alliance and the democratic future of Iraq, and even if the armed forces of Britain and the United States should encounter some obstacles such as those that they are currently facing, this belief of mine will not change.” He predicted “a free, democratic and peaceful Iraq will emerge.”<\/p>\n Liu’s human rights work received international recognition. In 2004, Reporters Without Borders awarded him the Fondation de France Prize as a defender of press freedom.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n \n <\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n 2005<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n \n In January 2005, following the death of former Chinese Premier Zhao Ziyang, who had shown sympathy towards the student demonstrations in 1989, Liu was immediately put under house arrest for two weeks before he learned about the death of Zhao. The same year, he published two more books in the US, The Future of Free China Exists in Civil Society, and Single-Blade Poisonous Sword: Criticism of Chinese Nationalism.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n \n <\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n<\/div>\n 2006<\/div>\n<\/div>\n \n <\/div>\n <\/div>\n \n \n Liu admitted in 2006 in another interview with Open Magazine (formerly known as Liberation Monthly) that his 1988 response of “300 years of colonialism” was extemporaneous, although he did not intend to retract it, because it represented “an extreme expression of his longheld belief”. The quote was nonetheless used against him. He has commented, “Even today [in 2006], radical patriotic ‘angry youth’ still frequently use these words to paint me with ‘treason’.”<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n | |