Yang-Min Lin (b.1955) is a Taiwan

Taiwan

Taiwan , also known, especially in the past, as Formosa , is the largest island of the same-named island group of East Asia in the western Pacific Ocean and located off the southeastern coast of mainland China. The island forms over 99% of the current territory of the Republic of China following...

ese author

Author

An author is broadly defined as "the person who originates or gives existence to anything" and that authorship determines responsibility for what is created. Narrowly defined, an author is the originator of any written work.-Legal significance:...

 and poet

Poet

A poet is a person who writes poetry. A poet's work can be literal, meaning that his work is derived from a specific event, or metaphorical, meaning that his work can take on many meanings and forms. Poets have existed since antiquity, in nearly all languages, and have produced works that vary...

. Lin's body of work totals over twenty published volumes of novels, short stories, poems, essays and criticism. His Rouge Tears, a poem of 110,000 words set in 9,000 lines, is the first epic poem to be written in Taiwanese. A number of his poems, including "Never Disregard Taiwan", have been set to music by Taiwanese composer Tyzen Hsiao

Tyzen Hsiao

Tyzen Hsiao is a Taiwanese composer of the neo-Romantic school. Many of his vocal works set poems written in Taiwanese, the mother tongue of the majority of the island's residents. His compositions stand as a musical manifestation of the Taiwanese literature movement that revitalized the island's...

. He is a recipient of numerous awards, including the United Daily News Prize for Literature and the Rong Hou Award for Taiwanese Poetry.

Lin, a native of Taibao in Chiayi

Chiayi

-Administration:-City attractions:*Chiayi Park*Sun Shooting Tower *Lantan *Historic Archives Building of Chiayi City*University of Chiayi*Chiayi Museum...

, studied at Chiayi Normal College and Fu Jen Catholic University

Fu Jen Catholic University

Fu Jen Catholic University is a co-educational Catholic university located in Xinzhuang District, New Taipei City, Republic of China...

. In 1983 he began writing works in Taiwanese. His interest in the creation and promotion of a distinctively Taiwanese literature accompanied a growing interest in democratic reform

Democracy

Democracy is generally defined as a form of government in which all adult citizens have an equal say in the decisions that affect their lives. Ideally, this includes equal participation in the proposal, development and passage of legislation into law...

 and Taiwanese national identity. His treatment of taboo subjects such as the White Terror

White Terror

White Terror is the violence carried out by reactionary groups as part of a counter-revolution. In particular, during the 20th century, in several countries the term White Terror was applied to acts of violence against real or suspected socialists and communists.-Historical origin: the French...

 under Chiang Kai-shek

Chiang Kai-shek

Chiang Kai-shek was a political and military leader of 20th century China. He is known as Jiǎng Jièshí or Jiǎng Zhōngzhèng in Mandarin....

 led to his works being officially banned by the Kuomintang

Kuomintang

The Kuomintang of China , sometimes romanized as Guomindang via the Pinyin transcription system or GMD for short, and translated as the Chinese Nationalist Party is a founding and ruling political party of the Republic of China . Its guiding ideology is the Three Principles of the People, espoused...

 government from 1987 to 1989. Today his works from the 1980s are considered landmarks in the Taiwanese literature movement

Taiwanese literature movement

The Taiwanese literature movement refers to the effort of authors, poets, dramatists, musicians, and publishers in Taiwan to establish recognition of a distinctly Taiwanese body of literature...

.

Lin now resides in Taoyuan.