Reflections | She divorced China’s last emperor and died a pauper: the story of Wenxiu, unloved wife who became a teacher and an editor

The 1987 film The Last Emperor sees Wenxiu, Aisin Gioro Puyi’s secondary wife, walk off into the rain, never to be seen again. What happened to her after that?

The scorned consort of the last representative of Chinese royalty became a teacher, sold cigarettes on the street, died and was buried in a pauper’s grave

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Erdet Wenxiu was chosen as Aisin Gioro Puyi’s secondary wife just before she turned 13. After years of trials and tribulations – including serving China’s last emperor divorce papers – she was buried in a pauper’s grave.

Wee Kek Koon

Published: 7:45am, 23 Nov 2023Updated: 11:41am, 26 Nov 2023

Watching The Last Emperor again was an uncomfortable experience. This confection of a film about China’s last hereditary ruler is served in grand, Hollywood style, with an overwhelming attention to ahistorical detail, fistfuls of exotic, orientalist spice and a generous helping of stomach-churning white saviour complex.

The 1987 movie, which won nine Oscars, including best picture and best director for Bernardo Bertolucci, was, for me personally, a 163-minute onslaught of multiple cringe attacks when I recalled how much I had loved the film when it first came out. But I was only an impressionable teen in 1987, I had to tell myself. I couldn’t have known any better.

The life of Aisin Gioro Puyi, China’s last emperor, is fascinating, but this time round, I found myself drawn towards the secondary character of Wenxiu, his “No. 2 wife”, played by Vivian Wu Junmei. She was last seen walking into the rain, two-thirds into the movie, and out of Puyi’s life forever.

Whatever happened to her after that? Who was she really? I asked myself as I watched, in between bouts of embarrassment (I had even bought the movie soundtrack on cassette tape!)

Vivian Wu Junmei as Wenxiu (left), Joan Chen as Empress Wanjong and John Lone as Puyi in a still from “The Last Emperor”. Photo: Columbia Pictures

Erdet Wenxiu (1909-1953) was born into an illustrious Mongol family whose fortunes were in decline. She was a fine student at school, but she was chosen as Puyi’s secondary wife just before she turned 13, and conferred the title Pure Consort (shufei), ranked just below Puyi’s principal wife, Empress Gobulo Wanrong.

Despite the imperial pretensions, such designations as “Pure Consort”, “Empress” and even “Emperor” were only courtesy titles, valueless trinkets that mattered only to people who clung on to them. When Wenxiu and Wanrong married Puyi, China had been a republic for almost a decade.