As many historians who have studied the May Fourth have recognized, science was an important part of both the May Fourth, with Mr. Democracy and Mr. Science as its two banners, and its impact. Yet, besides valuable studies by Fan Hongye (樊洪业) and others on the close connections between the May Fourth and the Science Society of China and Charlotte Furth on the geologist Ding Wenjiang, little has been done on the relationship between Chinese scientists and the May Fourth, especially in the late twentieth century. In an attempt to explore this critical dimension of the May Fourth history, I have chosen to examine the lives and careers of two prominent practicing scientists and their connections with the May Fourth: the meteorologist Zhu Kezhen (竺可桢1890--1974) and the astrophysicist Fang Lizhi (方励之1936--2012). Both identified primarily as scientists even as they carried out administrative duties and political activism (in Fang’s case), their evolving and differentiated views of the May Fourth and its legacy indicated possibly generational and disciplinary dynamics at work.
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There are many challenges facing historians in studying the May Fourth in modern Chinese history, and a central one is its malleability. Does it stand for an event that took place on 4 May 1919, or a broader movement, or, similarly, a period that encompassed early Republican China (1911--1927)? If we take it to mean the latter two, as the popular phrases “the May Fourth Movement” or “May Fourth Era” imply, then one needs to be careful in distinguishing between what happened during the movement/period and what happened due to it. Adding to this complexity is the necessity to consider its legacy, or legacies, which differed not only across individuals and groups but also in subsequent time periods and in transnational contexts. While the Chinese Communist Party has fairly consistently defined it as an event of revolutionary patriotism (“anti-imperial, anti-feudal”), others have seen it as a literary revolution (“the New Culture”), or the heralding of liberal values such as science and democracy. There is the additional question of the May Fourth both as an actual historical phenomenon (as any of the above three) and as a symbol, a myth, a slogan, an abstract concept with nevertheless powerful impact. Indeed, its meaning has been under constant contestation partly because its living legacy has been part of its nature. Thus, even as its centennial was celebrated in 2019 and afterwards, we still feel like the blind people touching the proverbial elephant, except that we are not sure that such a solid, unitary animal actually exists except for the many shadows it has cast.
