During the AntiJapanese War, the Xinjiang University Student Summer Delegation to Yili led by Du Chongyuan, the famous patriotic democratic figure and then president of Xinjiang University, was a great feat in the modern history of Xinjiang University and Xinjiang. It was also a glorious page written by the people of all ethnic groups in the border area in the history of China’s AntiJapanese War and cultural and educational history.As the event was associated with the murder of Du Chongyuan in Xinjiang, it had a wide impact on modern Chinese history.Written by Zhang Zhongshi in 1939, Travel in Yili completely and truly recorded the whole process of the delegation’s propaganda and social investigation activities in Yili during the AntiJapanese War, and vividly presented the unique historical geography, economic society, cultural and educational status quo and folk customs of the Yili region in the late 1930s.Based on the analysis of the book, it not only can comprehensively understand the colorful work, activities and the members’ spirit of caring for the motherland and actively engaging in the antiJapanese struggle, but also can see determination and confidence of the frontier people’s hard work in Xinjiang, the unity of all nationalities in the war, and the author’s unique writing features as a famous scholar’s.As the only text describing the activities of the delegation that year completed in time, the book is of precious historical literorly value, economic and social value, as well as unique literary value.Study on Travel in Yili is necessary to link it with the author’s academic work, literary writing, literary translation and literary publishing activities in the past 60 years.

Travel in Yili; Zhang Zhongshi; Du Chongyuan; Xinjiang University Student Summer Delegation; History of Xinjiang University; Xinjiang AntiJapanese War History