Wife Urged to Face Reality, ‘Look for New Love’ : Sexless Marriage Draws Advice From Chinese Readers

PEKING —  Chinese newspaper readers are urging a 39-year-old woman who refuses to grant her husband a divorce after 13 years of sexless, loveless marriage to face reality and “look for new love,” according to the newspaper China Daily.

Both the woman and her husband have threatened to commit suicide if they lose the divorce case, but the Chinese public has so far largely sided with the husband.

The case, which stirred a nationwide debate when it first was publicized late last year, involves technician “Zhou Jing” and her 50-year-old college lecturer husband, “Yang An,” residents of southern China’s Yunnan province. The couple’s real names have not been released.

Married after a two-month romance in 1972, the couple soon discovered that they were incompatible.

“The relationship deteriorated when the wife suffered from an illness which ended their sex life and shattered their hopes of having a child,” China Daily said.

The couple has lived together “without sex or mutual affection” for 13 years, the official New China News Agency has reported.

Yang finally filed for divorce in 1983, over his wife’s violent objection. She later said she would divorce him, but only if he paid her 30,000 yuan, or $9,000, a sum he could never afford, China Daily Said.

When the divorce court delayed its verdict, both Yang and Zhou threatened to commit suicide if they lost.

“It is inhumane to allow a loveless marriage to continue,” said China Daily, summarizing the opinions of a second batch of letters from Chinese readers on the case.

In one of the letters, Wu Changzhen, an official of Peking’s Women’s Federation, urged Zhou to “face reality, to try to break out of the tragedy and to look for new love,” the paper said.

In another letter, Shang Shaohua, an editor of the magazine Chinese Women, advised women who consider divorce shameful to “try to get rid of such ideas and grow in strength and self-respect.”

“Women should not give themselves up completely and place all their hopes on their husbands and children,” Shang said. When divorce looms, she said, women should “bravely take the challenge.”

Divorce is still rare in China, but has been on the upswing in recent years.

Official reports said a Yunnan province court has withheld judgment on the case.