Liu Bannong

Liu Bannong (1891–1934), originally named Liu Fu, was a native of Jiangyin, Jiangsu, and a modern Chinese writer, linguist, and poet. A participant in the May Fourth New Culture Movement, he championed vernacular Chinese, took part in editing New Youth, later taught at Peking University, and established its phonetics laboratory. His scholarly works include A General Grammar of Chinese and Experimental Studies of the Four Tones. As a creative writer he worked in poetry, prose, and popular fiction; representative works include the poetry collections The Whip and Earthen Cauldron, the essay collection Bannong's Miscellanies, and the song lyric "How Could I Not Miss Her." He also translated and adapted Sherlock Holmes stories, collected in such volumes as Sherlock Holmes's Chinese Adventures and Sherlock Holmes's Great Failure. His writing combines scholarly rigor with literary flair and has influenced vernacular literature, folk-song collection, and the translation of detective fiction.