s
“I am a Chinese. I love China.”
The applause, at the final scene of the drama “Xie Xide” accompanied by the song “To Motherland” inside Fudan’s Xianghui Theater, seemed to last forever.
This year marks the centenary birthday of Xie Xide, the late former president of Fudan University. An original drama entitled “Xie Xide”, based on the story of Xie, debuted on March 14. It tells the original aspiration of Xie who devoted herself to China’s development as a physicist and first female president of a Chinese university.
As a renowned scholar in surface physics and semiconductor physics, Xie made great contributions to China’s physics research and higher education through pushing forward the establishment of research institutes for physics and international scientific cooperation. China’s academia also has great reverence for her moral excellence as a scholar and educator.
The drama unfolds how Xie grew up as a hardworking student, how she spared no efforts to research and teaching after returning from MIT and how she strove to serve the country as the president of Fudan University.
After graduating from Xiamen University, Xie obtained a master’s degree in physics from Smith College and a PhD. in physics from MIT. She gradually became renowned in the physics circle worldwide merely within her five years abroad. However, Xie and her husband Cao Tianqin gave up the good working and living conditions abroad and came back to China at a time when it was in urgent need of advanced science and technology, dedicating themselves to the development of newly-founded People’s Republic of China.
In the first act, she says affectionately: “Wind howling and trees shriveling, I feel like a wild goose, forced to leave my homeland in the bitter winter. Now as spring warms the earth, I want to fly back to my motherland, to work and to fight.” The poetic expression shows Xie’s resolution of returning to China against all the odds to serve her homeland.
On October 1, 1952, Xie and her husband arrived in Shanghai where she began her teaching and research career at the Department of Physics in Fudan. While teaching basic courses and compiling textbooks, Xie mentored numerous students, many of whom have later become scientists and academicians of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, the country’s top scientific think tank. In Fudan, Xie devoted herself to the research of semiconductor physics and the establishment of the Institute of Modern Physics at Fudan University.
In 1983, Xie became the president of Fudan University. She made outstanding contributions to Fudan’s development by expanding academic departments and majors, improving academic environment and fostering international cooperation.
When Xie was seriously ill in hospital in 1999, she still kept working. With a phone, fax machine and computer in the ward, she seized every minute to work for the country and society. The fusion of historical events and Xie’s daily life presents an amiable and respectable image of Xie and creates enough space for the audience to discover and relate to Xie to the greatest extent.
In this special year to mark Xie’s 100th birthday, the drama was recreated and polished by the cast. The cast collected a large number of first-hand materials, involving more than 400 pictures, 4 videos and more than 600,000 words of text materials, and constantly improved the script through interviews, discussions and field investigations in order to depict Xie Xide in an objective light based on historical facts.
As in previous years, the teachers and students of Fudan university participated in this drama with great enthusiasm. This year, there were more diverse participators, including experienced performers, undergraduates who were attracted by the show after watching it in the freshman year, tutors at Fudan College, student counselors and young teachers dedicated to education.
The drama also gathered a professional team with roles including director, producer, stage designer, lighting technician, sound technician and makeup artist. The team integrated chorus and dance into the drama, presenting a fresh experience different from traditional theater dramas.
