Mu Qing (journalist)

Mu was born in Bengbu, Anhui in 1921. After attending secondary school in Henan he joined the Eighth Route Army, and in 1937, at the age of 16, he was responsible for a number of propaganda works. He joined the Communist Party of China in 1939 and entered the Lu Xun Academy of Art (鲁迅艺术学院) a year later.

Mu commenced his career in journalism as a war correspondent in Jiefang Daily in the year 1942. Early in his career, he engaged in covering news stories on war, including the Sino-Japanese War (1937–1945) and the Chinese Civil War. After Japan had surrendered in 1945, Mu was sent to the North-eastern China and established Dongfang Daily (东方日报).

After the founding of the People's Republic of China (PRC) in 1949, Mu was promoted to a senior level in the Xinhua News Agency. In 1951, Mu was given the title of Vice President for the Xinhua Headquarters in Beijing. Later in 1955, he moved from the Headquarters to the Xinhua News Agency main office in Shanghai, where he was President for the next three years.

In 1982, Mu became the Chief President of Xinhua until his retirement in 1992. On October 11, 2003 he died from lung cancer in Beijing.

Mu believed that investigative journalism is a journalist's responsibility to the readers. He thought that investigation is essential in ensuring that the facts reported are accurate. Journalists must be constantly alert and insist on investigation so that the news reported would be honest and truthful.

Mu believed that investigation is so important that it sustains the life of a journalist as a journalist. He also thought that without investigation, news would lose its energy, orientation and meaning. On the other hand, Mu resisted making reports with people and stories which were fictional.

Mu believed that in order to have accurate news reporting, journalists have to be constantly ready to challenge the information collected. Instead of merely reporting facts in a narrative way, journalists are to reveal to the readers the significance and meaning behind the news reports.

Mu thought that raising questions enable journalists to think more, investigate more, and discover more; only by doing these things, can journalists reach closer to the truth.

Mu believed that journalists should discover more up-to-date social problems instead of reporting old problems. This could draw people's attention and motivate them to search for solutions. These reports could eventually help remove the obstacles to social development.

Mu stated that journalists should actively report social issues and policies which aroused great public concern. Transparency in major social issues enabled the public to get hold of more information and hence could react correspondingly. Consensus between the people and the government could be easily reached if the public understood the rationale behind each policy implemented by the government.

Apart from news writing, Mu was also famous for his directorship of the Xinhua News Agency. He helped defend independence of journalism during a period when biased news reporting was prevalent. When the Anti-Rightist Movement started in 1957, the Shanghai Office of Xinhua, under the leadership of Mu, was the only branch that did not engage in criticising the rightists.

Although Mu was under severe criticism during the Cultural Revolution, he upheld the principles. In 1975, Mu reported to Mao Zedong about opposition of Jiang Qing, leader of Gang of Four, towards Zhou Enlai and Deng Xiaoping once he got hold of the information from his reporters, ignoring the potential consequences that might have caused him.

Mu claimed that the Xinhua News Agency was a tool for Communist Party of China's (CPC) propaganda. It represented the Party and the People's Republic of China (PRC), and was also a medium for the promotion of Marxism and the CPC's orientation, direction and policies. He required all journalists of the Xinhua News Agency to work in conformity with the principles of the Party and the Central Government.

Claiming to be at the side of the proletariat, Mu heavily criticized the appearance of capitalism in Chinese journalism. Mu believed that the thoughts of liberation advocated by capitalism would lead to a denial of the CPC leadership. He constantly reminded the journalists in Xinhua to maintain absolute obedience towards the CPC.

Mu's strong stance helped preserve the political orientation of the whole of Xinhua News Agency.

Mu's contribution to Xinhua's development had been widely recognized. He envisioned that for Xinhua would become an international news agency, it had to be more accurate and efficient in its news reporting, as well as to acquire a wider coverage on the news of developing countries.

Under the leadership of Mu, Xinhua endeavoured to give the world a Chinese voice, by developing its own perspective. Aiming at this goal, Mu introduced new strategies to the agency and improved on the standard of news reporting. He placed emphasis on the training of young reporters, and advocated the idea of searching for truth by reaching out to the lower class of society.

When Mu was young, he was more interested in becoming a writer than a journalist. While he was studying in Lu Xun Academy of Art, his writing skills were honed as he spent a lot of effort on them. He learned theories of literature from many famous writers of modern China, e.g. Mao Dun and Zhou Yang, president of the Academy at that time. This essentially led to his literary style of news writing in his later career.

Mu's greatest contribution was his news writing and literature. He disagreed with people at that time who did not regard literary reportage (报告文学) as a kind of literature and he insisted that literary reportage should be based on real people and real life situations, rather than fiction.

His work, particularly about people, had incorporated various techniques of literature into news writing and had profound impacts on the development of literary reportage in China. His article "For Premier Zhou's Exhortation" (为了周总理的嘱讬) was once selected as the Outstanding Literary Reportage in China and this proved the literary value of his journalistic works.

Mu had written many correspondences during the "war era", however he did not have the chance to take any photographs reflecting the real world he was writing about. In the 80s, with the advancement of technology, Mu started to take pictures during his journeys in different places.

Mu liked to present his stories through his camera in a realistic way. He resisted reporting with second hand information. His photographs went with this principle as well.

• An Unfinished News Report (一篇沒有寫完的報道)
• For Premier Zhou's Exhortation (為了周總理的囑託——記農民科學家吳吉昌)
• Jiao Yulu – A Good Example of the Secretaries of the County Committee of the Communist Party (縣委書記的榜樣——焦裕祿)
• Judgement of history (歷史的審判)
• Last Supper (最後的晚餐)
• Revolution has begun again!(革命又回來了！)
• Save Africa(救救非洲)
• Wang Jinxi the Iron Man(鐵人王進喜)
• Under the Leaning Tower (在斜塔下)

• Ding ci yishu (《定瓷藝術》) (2002)
• Xinwen san lun (《新聞散論》) (Talking about News) (1996)
• Jiao yu lu (《焦裕祿》) (1980)
• Mingdai minyao qinghua (《明代民窯青花》) (With Tang Weijian) (2000)
• Mu Qing sanwen xuan (《穆青散文選》) (1984)
• Shi ge gongchandangyuan (《十個共產黨員》) (10 Communists)
• Weiyena de xuanlü (《維也納的旋律》) (The Melody of Vienna) (1983)
• Xiang zhong de hongqi (《湘中的紅旗》)(1950)
• Xinwen gongzuo san lun (《新聞工作散論》) (1983)
• Zhongguo xin wenyi daxi, 1937–1949. Baogao wenxue ji (《中國新文藝大系, 1937–1949. 報告文學集》) (Edited by Mu Qing) (1996)
• Zhongguo xin wenyi daxi, 1949–1966. Baogao wenxue ji (《中國新文藝大系, 1949–1966. 報告文學集》) (Edited by Mu Qing) (1987)

• Selected photographic works of Mu Qing (穆青攝影選)

• Selected calligraphies of Mu Qing (穆青書法作品選)