[3] Dissatisfied with being a widow, Shen remarried but found her second husband, Xu Qingyu (徐庆誉), too much of a male chauvinist; the relationship ended in divorce in 1931.

[3][4] After her father's company filed for bankruptcy, Shen moved to Shanghai where she was recruited as assistant editor and Japanese translator for the Chinese-language current affairs journal Shishi leibian (时事类编) published by the Zhongshan Culture and Education Bureau.

[4] In Shanghai, while keenly following the May Fourth Movement, Shen acquainted herself with leftists and Chinese Communist Party (CCP) members alike; with their support, she became founding editor of the women's magazine Funü shenghuo (妇女生活) in 1935.

[3] In February 1942, as the Battle of Singapore was being fought, the couple, now married, fled to Indonesia together with Yu Dafu; Shen recorded her wartime experiences in a series of articles later compiled into a book entitled Exile on the Equator (流亡在赤道线上).

[6] After spending some four years in hiding, the couple returned to Singapore to establish the New South Seas Publishing Company (新南洋出版社), which catered to the overseas Chinese with publications as New Women (新妇女) and Below the Winds (风下).