Ai Siqi


Ài Sīqí is the pen name of Li Shengxuan, a Yunnan Mongol Chinese philosopher and author. He was born in Tengchong, Yunnan, later traveling to Hong Kong, where he studied English and French at a Protestant school and was exposed to Sun Yat-sen’s Three Principles of the People and Marxism. He read a great deal of Marxism, including the Communist Manifesto, in Japanese translation. This reading is the root of Ai’s most important works, Dialectical Materialism and Historical Materialism and Philosophy for the Masses. He was a delegate to the 1st, 2nd and 3rd National People's Congress.
In the small tourist town of Heshun in Tengchong County, in western Yunnan Province, China, there is a small museum dedicated to Ai. It is based in his former house, where he lived for two years. It contains pictures, personal items and a statue of him in the yard of the compound.

Secondary literature