Zan Zen

Zan Zen (: ; Zān Zén), courtesy name Zan Zrsan (: ; Zān Zr̀sān), ODMS, MS & 2 Bars, FGS (2 Siwol 1910 – 19 Sawol 1967) was a Jiugong-Sansiaonese military officer, mountaineer, politician, and musician who fought in the Great Eulhae War. Partially blind, he became famous for his many exploits and eccentric style.

Childhood
Zan was born in the Loch Dremny district of the Meisaani dependency of Jiugong to father Zan Renmou (張仁谋), a Sansiaonese expatriate originally of Wȕlín prefecture, and mother Xie Younyin (謝柔寧), a Jiugonger of mixed Sansiaonese-Kinshunese descent. His father was a music teacher at the Jiugong Academy of Classical Arts. Zan was the youngest of four children.

Zan was born with. After an accident involving falling out of a tree at age seven, he lost sight in his left eye completely. He is known to have worn an eyepatch from at least age ten. However, he did not let this condition handicap him; one of his teachers in grade school remarked that he was “already ungovernably boisterous with just one eye… I fear what he would be like with the full use of two”.

Music was said to be the only thing that would comfort him as a child. Having studied the since the age of four under the tutelage of his father, Zan’s first career was as a virtuoso guzheng player. His father, Zan Renmou, bragged that he was able to distinguish beyond the standard. To prove this claim, Zan frequently performed pieces of his own composition on idiosyncratically-tuned guzhengs. Before the age of thirteen, he had already travelled to Sansiao several times to perform with the Second Xiayan Ensemble, one of the most prestigious classical music groups in the Sansiaonese world.

Education
At thirteen, Zan entered university in Quejin at the Grand Regional School of Quejin (now National Quejin University). The youngest student in his year, he nonetheless excelled academically and athletically. Beginning with the study of and, he supposedly learned twelve different languages by the time he graduated. He also continued to perform the guzheng on a regular touring schedule throughout Meisaan. In 1928, tired of the routine of university life, Zan decided to spend six months trekking the Daidei Mountains alone. This experience introduced him to and, which later became two of his primary interests. In February 1929, while continuing his studies in Quejin, he participated in the E Jiu Movement in that city. He was reportedly detained briefly by the Meisaani police for disorderly conduct and inciting violence during the protests.

Zan remained in Sansiao after completing university, traveling regularly between Quejin and Xiayan. He was appointed to the position of associate artistic director of the Quejin Capital Orchestra, still the youngest person ever to have held that role. In May 1931, he approached the Gaifan Society, one of the “coffeehouse communist” debate circles, claiming that he had become fascinated by Hokanese after a performance tour of the nation. He was initially rejected because of an article he had written two years prior calling for greater Meisaani state control of Sansiao. However, he was eventually accepted later that year after publishing several essays and articles in various newspapers promoting World Emancipation and praising the works of Cui Bohai. When the Sian Gong Bao rejected one of his monographs as too propagandistic, he even bought his own printing press on a joint venture with a friend and briefly established a paper that he named the Sinju Liberator. However, the operation was terminated within four months.

Immediately after acceptance into the Gaifan Society, Zan joined its paramilitary wing, the Vanguard of Sansiao (colloquially the Gaifan Vanguards), as an officer. He later wrote, “after all that I have done in association with the communists … I never truly cared what they believed in. It was the excitement of preparing for revolution and using a gun.” His peers saw him as an opportunist but nevertheless also realized that he was a skilled organizer and leader.

Military service
Zan received his first military training as a member of the Gaifan Vanguards. The Vanguards officially opposed taking any action which would assist the government of Meisaan. However, immediately after the Meisaani declaration of war against Nukigurun in Owol 1935, Zan left the organization and received a commission in the Imperial Meisaan Army. As a 25-year-old, he was assigned to the 3rd Sansiaonese Light Infantry.


 * When it was surrounded and destroyed, he and his battalion were able to narrowly escape through a mountain pass

Central Yeongju (1936–1941)

 * Operated on himself when wounded, despite being partially blind
 * Captured a total of 5 times over the course of the war
 * Escaped one time by charming the wife of one of the prison guards with his guzheng playing
 * Notorious for drinking heavily and taking long walks at night

Yahuimilco

 * Served as advisory to revolutionary communist Nochtlico
 * Advised them on an ill-fated agricultural program to grow [some ridiculous crop]

Sansiao Legislative Assembly

 * Briefly a MP in Sansiao after “retirement”
 * Self-published memoir

Mountaineering and death

 * In older age, finally took up his passion of mountain climbing
 * first to climb 雪珍峰 Siẻzēnhēn major peak
 * Died on 古希頂 Gùxīdìn mountain in Zhuigo

Legacy

 * Has been the subject of many films (obviously)