Book focuses on Chinese-British cooperation during darkest days

The main stage of the China Pavilion at this year's London Book Fair was crowded on Wednesday morning as the Chinese edition of a biography about a young British man was launched.

Blades of Grass – The Story of George Aylwin Hogg, which was written in English by Hogg's nephew, Mark Aylwin Thomas, was translated by Li Linxi, a lecturer at Communication University of China in Beijing and published by Renmin Publishing House.

"The book title refers to his epitaph: Through his being and working, many blades of grass will grow where none grew before," Thomas explained.

According to Thomas, in February 1938, 23-year-old George Hogg arrived in Shanghai and found work as a journalist.

It was during the Chinese People's War of Resistance Against Japanese Aggression (1931-45) and Hogg traveled widely to cover the war.

In October 1939, he joined the Chinese Industrial Co-operatives, or CIC, as a PR man, in Baoji, Shaanxi province.

The idea of the CIC, which had New Zealand-born Rewi Alley as one of its major initiators, was to "create masses of small industry in the hinterland, as the major industrial regions on the coast had been totally wiped out by the Japanese armies", severely damaging the economy.

Hogg's stories, which were published in the Western media, recorded atrocities committed by the Japanese army, and the Chinese people's resistance against Japanese aggression, and they raised awareness and financial support for the CIC.

Later, Hogg became headmaster of the Bailie School, which was founded by Alley in Shuangshipu, Shaanxi province, to conduct technical training for young people.

The school was forced to move during the war and Hogg oversaw its relocation, and the passage of 60 students and 20 tons of essential machinery over 1,000 kilometers and through two mountain passes, to Shandan in Northwest China's Gansu province.

In the summer of 1945, Hogg injured his foot and contracted tetanus during a basketball match between students and workers at the school. He died on July 22 aged 30, shortly before Japan's surrender in September of that year, which marked the end of World War II.