Canadian surgeon who joined the Communist forces in northern China in 1938 as a battlefield doctor and died there of blood poisoning. Mao's essay 纪念白求恩 made him one of the best-known foreigners in China.
Mao Zedong wrote the essay 'In Memory of Norman Bethune'.
Tips
usage
His Chinese name echoes Bethune but also reads like a native one, with the common surname 白 and a given name meaning 'seek grace'. The standard spelling for the surname Bethune is 贝休恩; 白求恩 is kept for him alone.
culture
Mao's 《纪念白求恩》, written in December 1939, became one of the 老三篇, the 'three old essays' with 《为人民服务》 and 《愚公移山》 that everyone had to memorize during the Cultural Revolution.
