Initially a prominent member of the Chinese Communist Party, he was accused of being a counter-revolutionary and he spent the last few decades of his life living under persecution.

As part of the Anti-Rightist Campaign which started in 1957, Feng was sentenced to re-education through labor,[2] although he was acquitted in 1961.

Having previously attempted to rewrite Death of Lu Dai in the early 1950s, he sought to write what would have been the only novel of his career for a third time.

After being advised not to write on a "revolutionary subject" like the Long March, however, Feng reportedly burnt the entire manuscript.

[4] Feng continued living under persecution in his final years and was again targeted by the government during the Cultural Revolution.