A time line of Lu Xun's life

1881

Zhou Shuren was born in Shaoxing, Zhejiang province.

1898

Left home to study at Jiangnan Naval Academy in Nanjing, Jiangsu province.

1899

Transferred to the School of Mines and Railways in Nanjing.

1902

Graduated and left China for Japan on a government scholarship and began to study Japanese.

1904

Left Tokyo for medical school in rural Sendai.

1906

Abandoned medical studies and returned to Shaoxing for an arranged marriage, but soon returned to Tokyo with his brother Zhou Zuoren.

1909

Returned to China and began to teach physiology and chemistry in Hangzhou, Zhe-jiang province.

1911

Wrote his first short story, Nostalgia.

1912

Left Hangzhou to take up a job in the Ministry of Education in Nanjing, and then in Beijing, where he absorbed himself in antiquarian research.

1918

Published his first vernacular short story Diary of a Madman under the pseudonym Lu Xun.

1922

Completed his first short story collection Outcry

1925

Began a love affair with Xu Guangping, his former student.

1926

Left Beijing with Xu Guangping to take up teaching posts in Xiamen and Guangzhou respectively.

1927

Moved to Shanghai.

1929

Xu Guangping gave birth to their only son, Zhou Haiying.

1936

Died of tuberculosis in Shanghai.