It is mentioned in ancient poems: The temperament is as beautiful as an orchid, and the talent is as fragrant as immortals. This sentence means that a woman's temperament is as noble as an orchid, but a talented woman is like a fairy. Since ancient times, China has had no shortage of talented women, and people like Xie Daoyun and Li Qingzhao have attracted widespread attention. However, in the modern history of China, Eileen Chang is actually very popular, but when people mention Eileen Chang's early stories, they have to mention Eileen Chang's mother Huang Yifan.
Huang Yifan was born in a family of officials in the Qing Dynasty in 1896. Although Huang Yifan was a rare twin, Huang Yifan's childhood was also extremely tragic because she was born with a tragedy hat on her body. Because Huang Yifan's father participated in some movements to maintain the rule of the Qing Dynasty, he also lost his life during the turbulent years.
However, feudal ethics had not been completely replaced by new ideas at that time, so Huang Yifan's mother was just a concubine, so Huang Yifan's childhood was naturally not too happy. In fact, when Huang Yifan was born, his family named him Huang Suqiong, but later Huang Yifan changed his name. In 1916, when Huang Yifan was 22 years old, he was betrothed to Zhang Zhiyi, who was Li Hongzhang's grandson.
After the two got married, they always quarreled because their ideological concepts could not be integrated in all aspects. This kind of marital status also made Huang Yifan extremely distressed. He repeatedly wanted to follow the call of the new era to study abroad and go elsewhere to escape such a suffocating marriage.
In 1922, a series of negative news came out about Huang Yifan's husband. It was reported that the husband not only smoked opium, but also had other nasty hobbies, such as finding women. So Huang Yifan still chose to leave the family, packed his bags, and embarked on the road to the United States.
In 1923, Huang Yifan’s father’s first wife did not leave any heirs. Therefore, regarding the division of property after the death of the eldest lady, as one of the people in the family who could inherit the property, Huang Yifan naturally also received it. With his share of property and financial income, Huang Yifan also strengthened his determination to stay overseas. When his husband's family sent messages calling him to return to China many times, Huang Yifan refused.
But Huang Yifan, who left China at the time, was already 28 years old. He also left two children in this marriage with her husband, namely sister Zhang Ailing and brother Zhang Zijing. In order to become the first Nora in China to run away, Huang Yifan also sacrificed a lot and lost a lot at the same time. Among them is Zhang Ailing's sister and brother's resentment towards their mother.
Because Huang Yifan ran away, her father soon married a stepmother. However, Zhang Ailing’s subsequent literary works focused on portraying the vicious image of her stepmother. Therefore, many later readers silently speculated: is it true that there is a disagreement between the stepmother and Zhang Ailing's sister and brother, or is it that Zhang Ailing's sister and brother turned the pain of losing their mother into hatred to attack their father's second wife.
But since leaving the motherland in 1922, Huang Yifan has never found home no matter where he goes. Huang Yifan was only accompanied by a box. As for what was contained in this box, some people later speculated that it might be funds from the jewelry and antiques that Huang Yifan received when he inherited his father's inheritance.
Whenever Huang Yifan needs living expenses, he will liquidate part of the inheritance left by his ancestors in exchange for some cash to barely maintain his life. In August 1957, Huang Yifan, who was 61 years old at the time, died of illness. However, the two children who had no way to take care of them for the rest of their lives were also full of resentment towards Huang Yifan. Therefore, Huang Yifan was not forgiven by his relatives when he passed away, but the box remained with the runaway woman.