沈从文
He was born Shen Yuehuan () on 28 December 1902 in the town of Fenghuang (then known as Zhen'gan) in west Hunan Province. In late adolescence he chose the name Shen Congwen. He was the fourth of nine children born to Shen Zongsi, a Han-Miao, and Huang Suying, a Tujia. His grandfather, Shen Hongfu, was a local hero who became a decorated general before being named acting commander-in-chief of Guizhou province at the age of 25. Due in large part to his grandfather's fame and fortune, Shen Congwen was born into a relatively well-off household. Following the founding of the Republic of China in 1912, his father hoped to become elected to the provincial assembly, but was instead forced to go into hiding in Inner Mongolia after joining a failed plot to assassinate President Yuan Shikai. The fact of Shen's mother's Tujia ethnicity and his paternal grandmother's Miao ethnicity, he keep secret until the 1980s.