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Crime or Punishment? On the Forensic Discourse of Modern Chinese Literature

Der-wei Wang David

in Becoming Chinese: Passages to Modernity and Beyond

This chapter examines the scenes of crime and punishment in Chinese literary works from the late Qing period to the late 1940s. It addresses the issue of critical intellectual stances vis-à-vis the ... More

This chapter examines the scenes of crime and punishment in Chinese literary works from the late Qing period to the late 1940s. It addresses the issue of critical intellectual stances vis-à-vis the state and outlines a literary trajectory that progressed from a representation of violence to the transformation of literature into sites for violence. It argues that a major thrust in the writing of modern Chinese literature has been the compulsion to address social justice, a high-strung, contentious call for justice that turned the printed pages into veritable courtrooms of public appeal.Less

Crime or Punishment?

David Der-wei Wang

in The Monster That Is History: History, Violence, and Fictional Writing in Twentieth-Century China

This chapter examines the dialectic of justice in order to understand violence and its representation in Chinese literature. It describes how a forensic discourse has arisen and evolved in modern ... More

This chapter examines the dialectic of justice in order to understand violence and its representation in Chinese literature. It describes how a forensic discourse has arisen and evolved in modern Chinese literature drawing examples drawn from four historical moments. The chapter explains that at a time when the old political, judicial, and moral order had collapsed and new orders were yet to be established, literature provided a textual space in which legal cases were presented for debate and deliberation.Less

Invention and Intervention: The Making of a Female Tradition in Modern Chinese Literature

Lydia H. Liu

in Chinese Femininities/Chinese Masculinities: A Reader

By analyzing the female tradition in modern Chinese literature, this chapter brings to attention the number of interesting claims put forth by women critics in post-Mao China. To many of the women ... More

By analyzing the female tradition in modern Chinese literature, this chapter brings to attention the number of interesting claims put forth by women critics in post-Mao China. To many of the women critics, female literature is more or less a fait accompli, something that preexists the critical effort. Most critics of women's fiction agree that female writers tend to grapple with the problem of subjectivity in connection with gender and explore the relationship of the female subject to power, meaning, and the dominant ideology in which her gender is inscribed. The focus of this chapter is to bring the female tradition to light. It indicates that the female tradition did not come into its own until women scholars began to make significant interventions in literary criticism and historiography in the second half of the 1980s. The three women writers being discussed—Ding Ling, Zhang Jie, and Wang Anyi—figure prominently in contemporary literary criticism as architects of the female tradition.Less

Confucians' Fear of Chaos

Paul U. Unschuld

in What Is Medicine?: Western and Eastern Approaches to Healing

The idea that a body as an organism has self-interest and tries to heal its own wounds and overcome difficult crises on its own is based on the model image of the self-regulating, autonomous polis. ... More

The idea that a body as an organism has self-interest and tries to heal its own wounds and overcome difficult crises on its own is based on the model image of the self-regulating, autonomous polis. The polis had transformed itself from the monarchy and the rule of the noble families into a democratic structure that was optimal for the situation of the time, a democracy in which the citizens were the sovereigns of their own fates through their meetings. The polis was a social organism and it was entirely unavoidable that its structures lent the plausibility needed for the explanatory model of the self-healing powers to find general acceptance. The fact that sickness heals on its own is also described repeatedly in the ancient Chinese literature. The ancient Chinese literature does not contain descriptions of the course of a normally fatal illness taking an unanticipated and unexpected turn for the better. China has never known trust in the self-regulating powers of the pan-societal organism.Less

Psychology and Freudian Sexual Theory in Early 20th Century China

in From Ah Q to Lei Feng: Freud and Revolutionary Spirit in 20th Century China

Modern psychology first came into China through a context of educational reform. The work of Kubota Sadanori, Hattori Unokichi, Joseph Haven, Ruric Nevel Roark, and Harald Höffding provided the ... More

Modern psychology first came into China through a context of educational reform. The work of Kubota Sadanori, Hattori Unokichi, Joseph Haven, Ruric Nevel Roark, and Harald Höffding provided the framework for studying and understanding the mind. This chapter examines the introduction of modern psychology and Freudian psychoanalysis in China, focusing on the notions of the unconscious, sexual desire, theory of the mind, and subjectivity. It looks at the arguments of Gao Juefu (1896–1993), China's most famous psychological researcher, against the primacy of both sexual desire and the unconscious in Freud's theories. It also comments on the debate between Zhang Jingsheng (1889–1970), dubbed “Dr. Sex,” and Zhou Jianren (1888–1984) regarding sexual desire. Finally, the chapter discusses Freudian theory in relation to Chinese literature in the 1920s and 1930s and in post-Mao China.Less

The Self Loving the Self: Men and Connoisseurship in Modern Chinese Literature

Wendy Larson

in Chinese Femininities/Chinese Masculinities: A Reader

This chapter discusses the concept of men and connoisseurship in modern Chinese literature. The Chinese literary tradition is male. Chinese literary culture, evolving out of a male-only educational ... More

This chapter discusses the concept of men and connoisseurship in modern Chinese literature. The Chinese literary tradition is male. Chinese literary culture, evolving out of a male-only educational and civil service examination system is so strongly identified by men as it puts them in a position entirely different from that of women, who are still fighting to be recognized as equals. Male writers problematized their relationship to the literary tradition in a way that directly questioned its gendered elitism and the limitations it produced. One way they did this was by creating the fictional character of the connoisseur and investigating connoisseurship, particularly that which involved women. The connoisseur was almost always male, and thus connoisseurship, a broader category than obsession, is an important means through which to evaluate masculinity in modern Chinese society. The four writers being discussed in this chapter all are well-known twentieth-century male Chinese writers. They all have used the character of the connoisseur as a trope of cultural critique.Less

Invitation to a Beheading

David Der-wei Wang

in The Monster That Is History: History, Violence, and Fictional Writing in Twentieth-Century China

This chapter deals with the theme of beheading in twentieth-century Chinese literature, focusing on the writings on decapitation by Youhuan Yusheng, Lu Xun, and Shen Congwen. It deals with ... More

This chapter deals with the theme of beheading in twentieth-century Chinese literature, focusing on the writings on decapitation by Youhuan Yusheng, Lu Xun, and Shen Congwen. It deals with decapitation as the primal scene of the twentieth-century Chinese imagination of national, ethnic, and personal trauma, and describes the advent of Chinese literary modernity in tandem with the eruption of violence. The chapter suggests that the beheading syndrome is seen as a source of century-long debates on civility versus savagery and nationalism versus colonialism.Less

Accelerating Literary Time: Metropolitan Editors at Work

Paola Iovene

in Tales of Futures Past: Anticipation and the Ends of Literature in Contemporary China

Relying on letters between editors and writers, memoirs, and interviews, the chapter argues that the future is a crucial site of struggle in 1980s Chinese literature. Editors cultivated modes of ... More

Relying on letters between editors and writers, memoirs, and interviews, the chapter argues that the future is a crucial site of struggle in 1980s Chinese literature. Editors cultivated modes of writing that would testify to brisk literary change. Their practices illustrate a mode of anticipation concerned with how Chinese literature ought to move forward, which was not solely an aspect of discourse but was built into institutional arrangements and enacted in a variety of collaborative endeavors. This concern affected the timing of publication and the formation of literary trends, particularly of avant-garde fiction, and significantly shaped the professional lives of writers, editors, and critics. The chapter historicizes the emergence of Chinese avant-garde fiction in the mid-1980s, showing how it emerged in response to popular genres, and demonstrates that the experience of reading foreign literature provided editors and writers with a shared horizon of literary expectation.Less

Introduction

Michel Hockx

in Internet Literature in China

This introductory chapter begins with a description of the basic features of Internet literature in China—it is Chinese-language writing, either in established literary genres or in innovative ... More

This introductory chapter begins with a description of the basic features of Internet literature in China—it is Chinese-language writing, either in established literary genres or in innovative literary forms, written especially for publication in an interactive online context and meant to be read on-screen. The discussions then turn to the main debates in three areas of study that are directly relevant to the present volume: electronic literature, Chinese Internet studies, and postsocialism. The remainder of the chapter details the methodology used in the present study and sets out the book's main objectives: to describe the general phenomenon of Internet literature in China; to analyze examples of literary innovation taking place online; and to show how online publications push the boundaries of the state-regulated publishing system, especially the moral boundaries of what is ideologically considered to be healthy literature. An overview of the subsequent chapters is also presented.Less

Online Poetry in and Out of China, in Chinese, or with Chinese

Michel Hockx

in Internet Literature in China

This chapter examines online poetry. The first part deals with online Chinese poetry communities as they have developed both inside and outside China. The analysis consists of descriptive accounts of ... More

This chapter examines online poetry. The first part deals with online Chinese poetry communities as they have developed both inside and outside China. The analysis consists of descriptive accounts of two separate visits to the same site, the first in 2004 and the second in 2012–2013. It also compares the practices of Chinese communities with those typically encountered on similar English-language websites, emphasizing the different social functions that online poetry writing appears to have in different literary cultures. The second part focuses on the ways in which transgressive writing pushes the boundaries of what is or is not considered respectable or legal in the PRC context. Specifically, it compares the gradual canonization of the “Lower Body” (Xiabanshen) group of avant-garde poets, known for their direct engagement with sex in poetry, with the gradual expulsion from the realm of literature of the work of the online poet Datui (“Thigh”). Finally, the chapter returns to questions of formal innovativeness in Internet literature, focusing on online experiments with visual or concrete poetry involving the use of Chinese characters, as carried out by both Chinese and non-Chinese poets. Much of the discussion is devoted to the unique early experiments from the 1990s by the sinophone poet and sound artist Dajuin Yao (Yao Dajun), whose almost classic achievements in the genre no longer survive on the live web. Also considered are poetic works by John Cayley and Jonathan Stalling, as well as Chinese translations by Shuen-shing Lee (Li Shunxing) of work by the acclaimed online poet Jim Andrews.Less

Introduction: On Futures, Literature, and Anticipation

Paola Iovene

in Tales of Futures Past: Anticipation and the Ends of Literature in Contemporary China

The chapter offers an overview of the concepts of modern temporality in literary studies, philosophy of history, and postcolonial studies that have inspired its notion of “anticipation,” and it ... More

The chapter offers an overview of the concepts of modern temporality in literary studies, philosophy of history, and postcolonial studies that have inspired its notion of “anticipation,” and it explains its relevance to modern and contemporary Chinese literature. Anticipation encompasses the fears and aspirations that shape lives and narratives in their unfolding as well as the perception of the possibilities and limits that inform human actions and are often mediated by literary texts. The work of anticipation involves imagining a different literature as a means of envisioning a different world and is premised on intense negotiations about the “ends” of literature: ends understood as the boundaries between what is literature and what is not, as the aims it is supposed to serve, and as the limitations that might lead to its exhaustion. How these negotiations shape contemporary Chinese literature at different historical junctures is explored in the ensuing chapters.Less

Internet Literature In China: History, Technology, and Conventions

Michel Hockx

in Internet Literature in China

This chapter begins with an overview of the early history of Chinese Internet literature, making use of canonizing efforts already under way in China. It then looks at the Rongshu Xia (Under the ... More

This chapter begins with an overview of the early history of Chinese Internet literature, making use of canonizing efforts already under way in China. It then looks at the Rongshu Xia (Under the Banyan Tree) website, generally acknowledged to be China's first successful literary space, before focusing on a work that helped make the site famous: the online diary of the cancer patient Lu Youqing. Drawing on different versions of the text observed at different times online, as well as snapshots from earlier versions and a copy of a later printed edition, the chapter shows how both the author himself and the people supporting him carefully tried to maintain the serious literary nature of the publication, despite the media attention it created. Lu Youqing's writing was among the earliest work demonstrating the potential of the diary or chronicle form for online literary expression.Less

Invention of the Novel: From Stage Act and Temple Ritual to Literary Text

Mark R. E. Meulenbeld

in Demonic Warfare: Daoism, Territorial Networks, and the History of a Ming Novel

This chapter examines the invention of the academic discipline of Chinese literature in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. It challenges some of the predominant notions in the field ... More

This chapter examines the invention of the academic discipline of Chinese literature in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. It challenges some of the predominant notions in the field of literary studies, arguing that it was during these decades that the traditional term xiaoshuo came to be equated with a modern, secular understanding of literary fiction in general and of the novel in particular. It considers how this usage of xiaoshuo has divorced vernacular narratives of the late Ming dynasty from the environment where they have always been most tangibly present: temples, rituals, theater acts, and the gods they embodied. It also explains how the academic shift away from the sphere of religion has resulted in a narrow understanding of these narratives exclusively as (literary) texts instead of as the cultural nexus of legend, divinity, ritual, and community. The chapter concludes by discussing the attempt by Chinese reformist intellectuals to make the novel the battleground for modernity.Less

Linear Innovations: Chen Cun and Other Chroniclers

Michel Hockx

in Internet Literature in China

This chapter examines the online chronicles of three very different authors. The first is Chen Cun, whose long, meandering, never-ending online writings are clearly linked to his earlier avant-garde ... More

This chapter examines the online chronicles of three very different authors. The first is Chen Cun, whose long, meandering, never-ending online writings are clearly linked to his earlier avant-garde experiments from his pre-Internet days, when he was always striving to find ways to liberate himself from what he considered to be the stifling conventions of fiction, in favor of a more immediate manner of written expression. The second is Wen Huajian, the author of China's first microblog novel. His work is less serious than Chen Cun's but nicely thematizes the community aspect of social media while constantly blurring the lines between the contents of the novel and Wen's actual interactions on Weibo. Finally, the chapter looks at celebrity blogger Han Han. Although he does not publish literary work online, Han Han's early blog posts are important for their frontal attacks on the established publishing system. More recently, he has been engaged in several projects aimed at widening the space for independent literature publishing in China, both in print and online.Less

When Small is Big and Big is Small

Svend Erik Larsen

in Translating the Literatures of Small European Nations

The leading Danish comparative literature scholar, Svend Erik Larsen, responds to the findings of the volume. Writing from the perspective of a smaller European literature, but with a wealth of ... More

The leading Danish comparative literature scholar, Svend Erik Larsen, responds to the findings of the volume. Writing from the perspective of a smaller European literature, but with a wealth of experience and knowledge of world literature scholarship, his conclusion assesses how the volume confirms, challenges or changes prevailing theoretical views of the type of national literatures under discussion and highlights where the need for further research and theoretical conceptualization is most pressing.Less