A Study of Literary Trends in China Since the 1980s

A Study of Literary Trends in China Since the 1980s
Author: Teresa Chi-Ching Sun
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
Total Pages: 87
Release: 2019-03-27
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 0761871098

This book intends to trace the revival of traditional literary works since the 1980s in China as it is revealed on the revitalized College Entrance Examination (CEE). In order to show how these changes reflect China’s altering ideology after the fall of Communism, selections from the CEE’s literary portion will be examined. Taking advantage of the resurrection of the powerful CEE, test creators have composed the literary portion as an education tool to shape public opinion in the post-Communist era. Literature in China have never been an independent art but had shared the responsibility for transmitting China’s intellectual and ethical traditions. The introduction of Communism to China silenced these traditions and made literature the servant of political ideology. This book traces the chronological process of restoring modern vernacular literature from the pre-Communist era and the ways in which traditional literature is being used for modern purposes. For many Chinese intellectuals, the gradual withdrawal of literature for serving political causes and the reinstatement of classical literature and early vernacular works to on the CEE bring to light the recovery of the aesthetic literary tradition and a return to normalcy. When students take the CEE, they not only mentally scrutinize literature that they first read during their secondary education, but also experience an assertive presentation of current Chinese cultural values and outlooks on life. This study argues that in the post-1980s CEE literary selections, students experience a variety of texts that summon up China’s pre-Communist literary tradition in order to serve as an intellectual guiding light for future social development. For those interested in comparative higher education, a particular area of interest may be the book’s singular consideration of the science and technology passages in connection with the restructuring of higher education in China as a remedy of China’s cultural tradition.

Chinese Literature for the 1980s

Chinese Literature for the 1980s
Author: Howard Goldblatt
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 189
Release: 2015-12-22
Genre: Literary Collections
ISBN: 1317284836

Editor Howard Goldblatt explains that while most societies analyse and revere their literary trends in retrospect, post-Liberation China’s literary trends tend to be announced beforehand allowing for critics to judge how close or far from the prescribed norms a piece of art is. In this volume, a collection of speeches and reports from the Fourth Congress of Writers and Artists, well-known Chinese writers (novels, poets, and dramatists alike) debate the future direction of Chinese literature for the 1980s. Originally published in 1982, the book lends a contemporary view into the state of art and literature in China during a critical era of transformation. This title is suitable for students of Literature and East Asian Studies.

Girls on the Line

Girls on the Line
Author: Jennie Liu
Publisher: Carolrhoda Lab& 8482
Total Pages: 236
Release: 2018
Genre: Juvenile Fiction
ISBN: 1512459380

Told in two voices, Luli and Yun, raised in an orphanage to age sixteen, work together in a factory until Yun, pregnant, disappears and Luli must confront the dangers of the outside world to find her. Includes facts about China's One-Child Policy and its effects.

Never Turn Back

Never Turn Back
Author: Julian Gewirtz
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Total Pages: 433
Release: 2022
Genre: China
ISBN: 0674241843

The 1980s saw spirited debate in China, as officials and the public pressed for economic and political liberalization. But after Tiananmen, the Communist Party erased the reform debate from memory. Julian Gewirtz shows how the leadership expunged alternative visions of China's future and set the stage for the policing of history under Xi Jinping.

A History of Contemporary Chinese Literature

A History of Contemporary Chinese Literature
Author: Zicheng Hong
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 657
Release: 2007
Genre: Literary Collections
ISBN: 9004157549

"A thorough overview and analysis of the literary scene in China during the 1949-1999 period, focusing primarily on fiction, poetry, drama, and prose writing"--Provided by publisher.

Masculinity Besieged?

Masculinity Besieged?
Author: Xueping Zhong
Publisher: Duke University Press
Total Pages: 228
Release: 2000
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 9780822324423

A feminist psychoanalytic account of changing conceptions of men and masculinity as seen in recent Chinese literature.

Personal Voices

Personal Voices
Author: Emily Honig
Publisher: Stanford, Calif. : Stanford University Press
Total Pages: 387
Release: 1988
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 9780804714167

Dramatic and far-reaching changes have occurred in the lives of Chinese women in the years since the death of Mao and the fall of the Gang of Four During the decade of the Cultural Revolution, attention to personal life was regarded as 'bourgeois'; in the post-Mao decade, abrupt turns in public policy made discussion of personal life imperative, and nowhere has this been more evident than in the debate about the role of women in Chinese society. This book is based on extensive personal viewing of urban women and study of contemporary literature and articles in the periodical press that touched on the problems of rural women. It is not only about the changes in women's lives but also about the excitement, confusion, and anxieties that Chinese women express as they contemplate the future of their society and their own place in it. Each chapter is devoted to one aspect of women's Lives: girlhood, adornment and sexuality, courtship, marriage, family relations, divorce, work, violence against women, and gender inequality. Giving a personal dimension to the issues discussed, the chapters close with a rich sampling of excerpts from the newly thriving women's press and other contemporary publications. Although many women in China still suffer discrimination in working life and mistreatment in the family, they can now raise questions that would have been unthinkable even ten years ago. Most notably, they can and do use the press to voice complaints, expose injustices, seek advice, and support or deplore the social changes of the 1980's.

Decadence in Modern Chinese Literature and Culture

Decadence in Modern Chinese Literature and Culture
Author: Hongjian Wang
Publisher:
Total Pages:
Release: 2020-10
Genre:
ISBN: 9781621965435

"European Decadence, a controversial artistic movement that flourished mainly in late-nineteenth-century France and Britain, has inspired several generations of Chinese writers and literary scholars since it was introduced to China in the early 1920s. Translated into Chinese as tuifei, which has strong hedonistic and pessimistic connotations, the concept of Decadence has proven instrumental in multiple waves of cultural rebellion, but has also become susceptible to moralistic criticism. This is the first comprehensive study of decadence in Chinese literature since the early twentieth century. Standing at the intersection of comparative literature and cultural history, it transcends the framework of tuifei by locating European Decadence in its sociocultural context and uses it as a critical lens to examine Chinese Decadent literature and Chinese society. Its in-depth analysis reveals that some Chinese writers and literary scholars creatively appropriated the concept of Decadence for enlightenment purposes or to bid farewell to revolution. This study is also the first to offer a holistic understanding of European Decadence, uncovering both its internal logic and external circumstances, hence excavating its distinct explanatory power. It also sheds fresh light on modern Chinese literature and culture. By examining the careers of seven prominent writers-Yu Dafu, Shao Xunmei, Yu Hua, Su Tong, Wang Shuo, Wang Xiaobo, and Yin Lichuan-this study disentangles apparent contradictions in their writing and reveals the nuances in the changing status of China's modern cultural elite. Last but not least, the book significantly expands the scope of comparative literary studies beyond influence studies and cultural translation by effectively adopting a literary-historical approach-a literary phenomenon is seen at once as a product and an indicator of certain sociocultural conditions, so similar literary phenomena can illuminate comparable contexts"--

Adapted for the Screen

Adapted for the Screen
Author: Hsiu-Chuang Deppman
Publisher: University of Hawaii Press
Total Pages: 258
Release: 2010-04-30
Genre: Performing Arts
ISBN: 0824833732

Hsiu-Chang Deppman puts landmark contemporary Chinese films in the context of their literary origins & explores how the best Chinese directors adapt fictional narratives & styles for film.

The Chinese Novel at the Turn of the Century

The Chinese Novel at the Turn of the Century
Author: Milena Dolezelova-Velingerova
Publisher: University of Toronto Press
Total Pages: 250
Release: 1980-12-15
Genre: Literary Criticism
ISBN: 1442638338

This collection of essays reveals the dynamic role of the late Qing novel in the process of modernization of Chinese fiction. Substantial changes in various aspects of the Chinese novel at the turn of the century, demonstrated by structural analyses of several representative novels, suggest that the evolution of modern Chinese fiction was a more complex process than a simple imitation of Western literatures. The results challenge the scholarly consensus that modern Chinese fiction resulted from a radical change brought about by the May Fourth Movement in 1919. It is demonstrated rather that the transformation had already begun in the first decade of the twentieth century and that the conspicuous changes in Chinese fiction of the 1920s represent a culmination rather than a beginning of the modern evolutionary process. The book consists of nine studies which analyse the late Qing novel in its general and specific aspects. The introduction and first essay explain how social changes conditioned cultural and literary changes during the period and how the resultant new theory of fiction generated new concepts of a politically engaged novel. The two following studies develop a general statement of narrative structures and devices, derived from structural analyses of seven outstanding late Qing novels. The last six articles examine particular novels in detail, focusing on the specific fictional techniques which predominate in each. This is the first volume in a new series, Modern East Asian Studies.