Charles Apple

Three national days of mourning began Monday in China, in memory of last week’s tragic earthquake that left a stunning 34,000 people dead.

My good friend and former intern Ji Qi — now of The Associated Press — tipped me off about an online roundup of Monday’s front pages of Chinese newspapers, commemorating the start of the days of mourning.

I looked over the pages — none of which I could read, naturally — and picked out a few that really spoke to me. Ji was kind enough to share background information and to do a little headline translation.

Here’s a look at just a few:

—
Xin Jing Bao
English name: Beijing News

Website: http://news.thebeijingnews.com

This one was just stunning. Naturally, very few papers in the U.S. would dare to run a photo of what appears to be a deceased victim. I remember the outrage some readers expressed following the Oklahoma City bombing, when some papers ran a picture of a fireman cradling a child who later died.

But you can’t deny: That’s a powerful, powerful photograph.

Ji says:

The photo caption reads: “A student was holding a pen tightly when the body was moved out from the rubble at Dongqi Middle school, Hanwang Township, Mianzhu, Sichuan province on the night of May 16. Xinhua Photo.”

The headline reads: “The nation mourns for 3 days.”

This is one of the most popular tabloids in Beijing (Circulation: 576,000).

—

Jinghua Shibao
English name: Beijing Times

Website: www.beijingtimes.com.cn

This one reminded me a lot of the commemorative pages some U.S. papers produced for various 9/11 anniversaries. Very powerful; very emotional. The distinctive shape the text creates — I wondered if that was a landmark building or something.

No, Ji says:

The big three characters under the candle read “Mourning Day.” 32,476 is the number of fatalities.

According to the paper’s Web site, the newspaper was launched in 2001 and had a circulation of more than 1.6 million by 2007. (Although Beijing has a huge population and Chinese love reading newspapers, I still doubt this circulation number.) It’s a tabloid.

—

Beijing Chenbao
English name: (Beijing) Morning Post

Website: www.morningpost.com.cn

This was another one that struck me as being very simple and moving. This kind of page is a stark contrast to the pages these papers normally produce.

Ji says:

The hed reads: “(The People’s) Republic (of China) is crying.”

The small characters below are too small to read.

I thought the overall effect was diminished, slightly, by what appears to be an ad across the bottom. I asked Ji about it:

The big two characters on the bottom left are the nameplate of the newspaper. The rest, though I cannot read it (low-res), should be some editorial copy.

So they stuffed the nameplate into the lower left in order to make their visual point uppage! Wow! Sounds like something our designers here at The Virginian-Pilot would do!

—

Xiandai Kuaibao
English name: Modern Express News

Based in Beijing
Website: www.kuaibao.net

Another stark, black, quiet page. I recognize the big word as being just that: One Chinese character that would basically mean one word or thought.

Ji translated for us but found she liked the next day’s page better:

The only character in the hed reads “Mourning.”

I found that paper’s Tuesday front page. It’s really touching, because the photo shows a young man in tears, waving a Chinese flag:

The four characters read “China, don’t cry.”

More of its pdf pages are available here.

—

Xiaoxiang Chenbao
English name: Xiaoxiang Morning News

Website: www.xxcb.com.cn

This one used a touch of understated color that appealed to me. I also like how the ribbon popped into the stick of copy on the left. This is a very serious treatment of a very somber story, yet apparently no editor told the designer that cutting out the ribbon was “too featurey” for this page.

Ji says:

The headline reads “Mourning.”

Xiaoxiang is another name of Changsha, the capital of Hunan province, east of Sichuan province where the earthquake hit.

I wondered if there was any significance to the gold ribbon — as opposed to, say, red, which is considered a lucky color in China. Ji replies:

I guess the gold ribbon matches the candle.

People in China launched a green ribbon campaign for the dead victims, though. I don’t know why they choose green. (Just like people here in the U.S. use a pink ribbon for cancer, right?)

—

And I found this one English-language front at the Newseum:

South China Morning Post
Based in Hong Kong

The photo shows two parents burning incense and grieving near the remains of a school dormitory where their daughter was killed.

—

First, I was struck by the quality of the design I’m seeing here. The folks in China can sure put out some powerful, gorgeous work.

I was also struck by the number of black-and-white pages I found at the site. Do Chinese papers normally print black-and- white? What’s the deal with that, I wondered.

Ji answers:

They used black-and-white for effect, because they usually print their front pages in color.

The main portal gates in China all changed to black and white to show mourning. Here are the most popular news Websites:

http://news.sina.com.cn/

http://www.sohu.com/

http://cn.yahoo.com/

And also baidu.com, China’s Google.

Though you cannot read it, I’m sure you can feel it.

—

While she was answering my questions, Ji brought up something that interested her:

The [Cleveland] Plain Dealer newspaper published an editorial cartoon on May 14, related to the earthquake in China, that offended Chinese. The paper apologized [Tuesday].

Here is the cartoon, by The Plain Dealer’s Jeff Darcy:

Yeeks! I normally have a pretty high tolerance for editorial cartoons — I was one myself for several years — but I, too, find this one a little over the line. Perhaps it’s because I have so many close Chinese friends.

But as much as I dislike what the Chinese government is doing in Tibet — and they way they handled the protests at the torch run in Europe and in the U.S. — the Chinese government did not cause the earthquake, nor has it been negligent in its emergency response.

Boo, hiss, Mr. Darcy!

Zhiqiang Gao, president of the Chinese Professionals and Entrepreneurs Association in Cleveland, responded with a letter to the editor:

The cartoon demonstrates a degree of insensitivity toward human suffering that is beyond our comprehension. Does it have no shame in politicizing human tragedy?

We understand that cartoonist Jeff Darcy played on the fact that this is the year of rat in the Chinese zodiac. But when Jeff wrote “CHINA” across the body of the big, ugly, menacing rat he drew, it is no wonder that his cartoon is taken by many as smearing of an entire nation. He should offer an apology.

And, in fact, the Plain Dealer did just that: Apologize. On Tuesday:

Can’t read it? Here’s the text:

Earthquake cartoon

The Plain Dealer apologizes to our readers who were offended by the May 14 editorial cartoon relating to the earthquake in China. Although it was not the cartoonist’s intent to diminish the gravity of this catastrophe, we take seriously the reaction of our readers. The cartoon, which many viewed as offensive, has also been removed from Cleveland.com, the newspaper’s Web site.

—

Thanks a ton, Ji, for helping us understand these pages and for tipping us off about that cartoon. I’m so glad your mom and dad are safe.

And my congratulations to the Chinese visual journalists out there. In this time of great tragedy, they’re standing tall with fabulous work for their readers.

Find the roundup of front pages here.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, May 21st, 2008 at 7:46 am and is filed under News design, Newspapers, VizEds Blog. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.