ABSTRACT
This chapter investigates Hu Zhengzhi’s (1889–1949) first tenure with Dagong bao, arguably the most reputable non-partisan newspaper in Republican China, between 1916 and 1920. Despite its status as Anhui Clique warlords’ partisan newspaper in the mid- and late 1910s, Dagong bao underwent a reform under Hu’s leadership. By changing the newspaper’s layout, improving its printing technology, and putting emphasis on providing the readership with plausible political information, Hu harbored an intention to make Dagong bao an independent, money-making enterprise. An analysis of Dagong bao as both a commercial daily newspaper and a locus of publishing political commentaries thus allows for a reexamination of the rhetoric of wenren lunzheng or “literati cum political commentators,” which has been long hailed as a unique journalistic tradition in China. This chapter shows that “literati-cum-political commentators” was a particular practice created in a specific temporal (the first half of the twentieth century) and geographical (northern China) condition.
