走在新旧中国之间——美国记者西蒙·托平及夫人奥黛丽·托平

Travelling between the Old and the New China: The Career of American Journalist Seymour Topping and Audrey Topping

98岁的托平和93岁的奥黛丽是在新旧中国之间旅行的历史记录者和现代中国历史转折点的见证者。这对结婚70年的新闻伴侣几乎走遍了世界每一个地区采访报道,但是,在他们的新闻生涯中,给人留下最深刻印象和最有意义的报道几乎都发生在中国。托平不仅是报道国共两党淮海大决战的唯一外国记者,还是第一个报道解放军占领南京的外国记者。托平预见并见证了新中国的诞生。奥黛丽的家族见证了从封建社会到新中国这场人类历史上最伟大的革命。在'文革'期间,奥黛丽是到中国进行采访报道的第一个和唯一的美国主流媒体记者,她的专题报道《红色中国之旅》和《回到变化中的中国》成为《时代》和《国家地理》封面文章。奥黛丽也是第一个向全世界报道西安兵马俑的记者。本文由过去20年间作者在中国、美国和非洲等地追随托平夫妇所做的十多次访谈笔记整理而成。

Seymour Topping and Audrey Topping are veteran reporters who travelled between the old and the new China,who witnessed historical turning points in modern Chinese history over the past seven decades.The couple,who have been married for 70 years,has traveled to nearly every corner of the world to report stories.In their journalism career,their most impressive and meaningful stories were all about China.Topping is not only the only non-Chinese journalist who reported the decisive Huaihai Campaign between the Kuomintang and the Chinese Communist Party,but he is also the first journalist who reported the occupation of Nanjing by the People’s Liberation Army in 1949.Topping foresaw and witnessed the birth of the new China.Audrey’s family witnessed the great revolution in human history of China transforming from a feudal society into the new China.During the Cultural Revolution,Audrey was also the only American mainstream journalist who traveled to China to conduct interviews and reports,her special reports'Report From Red China'and'Return to the Changing China'were on the cover papers of the'Time'magazine and the'National Geography'magazine.In addition,Audrey was also the first journalist who reported on the discovery of terracotta warriors in Xi’an.This article has been compiled from more than ten interview notes made by the authors in the past 20 years following Mr and Mrs Topping in China,the United States and Africa.