 Sanmao (March 26, 1943 - January 4, 1991),
literally "three hairs" though it is not considered to have a meaning, was the
pseudonym of the popular Taiwanese author Chen Ping. She adopted her pseudonym
from the acclaimed caricaturist Zhang Leping's most famous work "Sanmao", which
tells the story of a Shanghai street child named "Sanmao". In English she was
also known as Echo, the first name she used in western European languages, or
Echo Chan, based on the homonymous Greek nymph.
Sanmao was born in Chongqing, China, and the whole family moved to Taiwan later.
She was said to have read the Dream of the Red Chamber, a famous Chinese
classic, at the age of five and a half years old. In elementary school, she read
much literature. Throughout her education she had conflicts with her teachers,
including an incident in which she said she wanted to be a garbage collector
when she grew up, which her teacher said was unacceptable. During her second
year of high school, she shut herself up due to a traumatic incident, and
refused to go to school. Her father bought many books for her to read at home,
allowed her to take piano lessons, and practice painting.
From 1965 to 1969, she studied philosophy in Taiwan, and it was during this
period that she experienced her first love. Things didn't work out, so she
planned to go as far away as possible, and ended up in Spain.
Between 1967 and 1970 she studied in Spain, and then in Germany, and later found
work in a law library in the state of Illinois in the US. Eventually, she
returned back to Taiwan and began working as a teacher. Her fiance died, and it
was at this time that she again left Taiwan and returned to Spain.
In 1974 she went to the Sahara desert (in what is now Western Sahara) and
married a Spanish man named Jose Maria Quero Y Ruiz, whom she met in Madrid 7
years before when she was a student. She writes that when she first met Jose in
Spain she thought he was very handsome, but too young for her. Jose had been
waiting for her since she had returned to Taiwan, although they had not been
dating at the time.
In 1976 she published her first work, entitled The Stories of the Sahara in
1976. With its immense success, her early writings were collected in a second
book, published under the title Gone With the Rainy Season. Her writings
continued to be published from that point on, and her experiences in the Sahara
and the Canary Islands were published in several more books.
In 1979 her husband drowned while diving (there is still speculation that her
husband may not have died then). In 1980 she returned to Taiwan, and in November
of the same year, she traveled to Central and South America. These experiences
were recorded in subsequent writings. From 1981 to 1984, she taught and lectured
in a Taiwanese university. After this point, she decided to dedicate herself
fully to writing.
Near the end of her life, she became accuainted with an author named Wang Luobin,
and there has been speculation that she may have considered marrying him.
In 1991, at the age of 48, Sanmao died in a hospital in Taipei. Most people
believe that it was a suicide, though some, most notably Zhang Jingran, claimed
it was a murder. Her apparent suicide came as a shock to many of her readers.
Sanmao's books deal mainly with her own experiences studying and living abroad.
They were extremely well-received in both Taiwan and the Mainland China, and
they remain very popular. From 1976 to the time of her death in 1991, Sanmao
published more than 20 books. She had also translated the comic Mafalda from
Spanish to Chinese.
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