20201228 trans

Cao Runxin 曹润鑫

Zhu Ziqing

A third example, where an author shows another face in his essays is Zhu Ziqing. He is known as the author of the most often reprinted story-like Chinese essay "Back View" (Beiying), a standard school text. The success of this essay lies in the fact, that it applies to filial pity. From the reported fare-well scene with his father at the train station, he learned that his father loved him and that he had grown-up too now.

Chang Huiyue 常慧月

This self-reflective essay helped Zhu to find himself through the observation of the other (here his father). The 2nd often printed essay is also from Zhu. Parallelistic and repetitive structures are the driving factor in the atmospherical nebulous lyrical landscape desription "The Moonlit Lotus Pond", whose style easily may seem mannerist to the Western reader.

Zhu Ziqing supposedly opposed all political engagement and, wrote about unspectacular things. In Taiwan he became a type of substitute for the categorically refused state writer of the People’s Republic, Lu Xun, mainly because of Zhu’s supposed political independence.

Chen Han 陈涵

I would like to show with three examples that Zhu had absolutely clear political ideas: He had taken part in the demonstration March 18, 1926, which ended in a massacre. Zhu described this in "Report On the Massacre of the Government"[ (Zhizhengfu da tusha ji).].

Shots were still being fired, and the entrance of the east gate was packed with people. [...] Pushing and shoving, we climbed over them with great effort. We must have lost our senses then, not seeing, to our shame, the grotesqueness of our action.

Chen Hui 陈惠

[...]I was still walking on top of the people. No one dared to miss a single step, filing through the gate that divided safety from danger, one that would give us life or take our lives away. [...] My efforts finally brought me down to the ground, sealing my fate as I rolled down from the human pile. [...] I learned later that some of the people by the gate were dead, killed by the pistol squad firing from the other side of the gate. When I recall stepping over dead bodies, I cannot help but tremble with fear. [...]

Chen Jiangning 陈江宁

From this experience, Zhu addresses directly the repsonsible political leaders:

Duan Qirui, you must think about it! [...] How could we explain this to the world? [...] Granted, Duan Qirui and others could commit such atrocities without a thought; but how could we, the people of China, face the world with such a shameless government? [...] We, [...], must ask, „So many were killed—what should we do?“

Chen Jiaxin 陈佳欣

In contrast, Lu Xun has portrayed the same massacre with sighing undertone and Zhou Zuoren bitter-humorously in his "Ways to die"[ (Si fa).] - in which he finds "to be shot" the best method to die. The supposedly less politically engaged Zhu shows here more engagement.

The essay "Facing the New China"[ (Xin Zhongguo zai wang zhong).] is Zhu's political manifest: He asks for democracy, enlightenment and an increase of the education level.

Chen Jingjing 陈静静

China has to be born again through democratization. [...] The people should express their own will, concentrate on their own strength. Every level of administration should build up on the expressed will and strength of the people and struggle for the majority and its greatest happiness. This means that the people govern, the people own, the people enjoy.

A few weeks before his death, he demanded in the speech "Today's duty of the Intellectuals"[ (Zhishifenzi jintian de renwu).] the participation of the intellectual in the struggle for a better society.

Chen Sha 陈莎

With only a handful of essays I have demonstrated, that the picture of these three authors changes substantially, if we read carefully also their less known essayistic work. Imagine now how the picture of 20th century Chinese literature might change, if the literary histories and anthologies would not only tell the history of drama, fiction and poetry, but would also grant the essay its proper place. The following part of my paper are results of my monograph on the 20th century Chinese essay.

Chen Sunfu 谌孙福

The essay boom as a mirror reflecting growing individuality, participation in the public sphere, and the giddy-paced character of modern Chinese society

Acquiring an overview of the essay and assessing its essence has required extensive research in bookstores and libraries, in the People's Republic of China, Taiwan, Hong Kong and the United States for available resources in the form of essay book collections as well as secondary literature dealing with the essay.

Chen Yongxiang 陈永相

I built a database for a statistical analysis to rank more than 5000 essays and 1400 essayists. It turned out that out of the top 60 most famous Chinese essays only 14 had been translated into English so far. The forthcoming collection of Tam King-fai adds 4 and my own one the remaining 42.

Analysis reveals a general increase in essay publication after 1979 with two peaks immediately after the 'Cultural Revolution'. The publications apparently reaching a new height in 1990. The first increase came about in the 1920s and 1930s, after which the essay's role was eclipsed by the genre of the report[ (baogao wenxue) (Klaschka 1998).].

Cheng Yusi 成于思

The flourishing of essay publication in the 1920/30s and 1980/90s was helped in part by the appearance of new magazines that existed chiefly as vehicles for contemporary essayists, and numerous essay bookseries[ sanwen congshu 散文叢書.].

The reason for the increase in essay production, which we can date right after the clear-cutting of the ‘Cultural Revolution’ has been the backlog of demand, which is reflected in 1 million copies of essay collections being printed between 1980 and 1982 - only counting the collections contained in the sampling of 130 ‘representative’ books I was able to collect for the survey. There are three reasons for the increase in Chinese essay production and popularity in the mid-1990s:

Deng Jinxia 邓锦霞

1, The giddy-paced nature of current Chinese society with its demands for diverting and short texts, as Hall has put it: “[...] we live in an age of exposition”[ (Hall 1984:xiii).].

2, The increasing consciousness of individuality for which the essay is the most direct form of subjective expression, even more direct than the poem with its metrical and formal demands.

3, A revival of interest in discussing socio-political issues through the medium of the essay, as was the case in the 1920s/30s.

Ding Daifeng 丁代凤

If we look carefully at essay collections not only published in the United States, but also in Hong Kong, Taiwan and the People’s Republic, we find the following three reasons for the under- and overestimation of single essayists or essays which correspond to regional differences:

1, EXOTIC In the United States, essays are often chosen according to Western taste and totally unknown authors are given as much space as established ones.

Fang Jieling 方洁玲

2, SOCIO-POLITICAL In Taiwan, Lu Xun has been banned for a long time, but today, as the mentioned survey proofs, he ranks 12th among modern authors there. Wang Meng has been overestimated in the People’s Republic of China due to his political post.

3, PERSONAL Hong Kong literature on Yu Guangzhong has been censored by his disciple Huang Weiliang in favor for Yu.[ (see Lin Yaode 1989:50).]

Having named reasons for the essay boom and for the support for and the suppression of different actors in the cultural field of the essay, I would like to finish my paper by naming a few trends of the essay as they appear at the eve of the century.

Gan Fengyu 甘奉玉

The topical development of political essays sees a shift from the enlightenment-educational essay, which emerged in 1907, to the daily-political essays in the 1920-30s, further to anti-Japanese propaganda in the 1940s and ideological propaganda in the 1950s and 1960s. Whilst the 1980s saw a revival of political issues in terms of discussion on the best system of society, (also in literature in general and in film) to a mere unpolitical and again more philosophical-moral theme spectrum in the 1990s, where essayists define their role, first of all to counterpart the consumer-orientation of the masses. The essay seems to be the only genre in China which has kept its educational claim with the exception of essays which claim to be "art pourt l'art".

Gao Mingzhu 高明珠

The topical development of the unpolitical essay starts with the everyday-topics of Zhu Ziqing ("On dreams"[ "Shuo meng 說夢" On dreams in: Zhu Ziqing 1928.]) and Zhou Zuoren from 1917 ("My own garden"[ 9.1923.], "The Fly"[ 1924.], "Reading on the Toilet"[ 1936.]), with a caesura 1927, when the political essays became the main stream, until the late 1930s, when the unpolitical essay was eliminated totally by the anti-Japanese movement. It didn't recover until the 1970s, when life turned back to normality and normal things became topics of interest because of their long absence. Again in the 1990s, the unpolitical essay boomed also due to less interest in political issues and the need for a new orientation in the newly encountered world of mass consumerism.

Gong Yumian 龚钰冕

In the end of this century not the governmentally demanded affirmative texts stand at the forefront, but unpolitical essays, mostly dating from the Republican era, especially from the years 1923 to 1928. This observation is supported by the results of the mentioned statistical analysis. Among the upper list places of the political essay after 1949 there are critical essays. For the most often selected essays in the People’s Republic, Taiwan and Hong Kong, moral and aesthetic criteria seem to have underlain.

Gu Dongfang 顾东方

A sign for the increasing independence of the editors of essay anthologies from governmental or ideological handicaps, and for the increasing commercialization of the publishing houses with an orientation for customers (former: "readers"). Following the emotional essays of Zhu Ziqing who rank 1st and 2nd, nostalgia is the element of emotional identification in "Wild vegetables of my home region" by Zhou Zuoren, which ranks 3rd[ In Jia Pingwa's "Moon traces", which ranks 11, and in Ba Jin's "Paradise for Birds", which ranks 19]. Therefore one can state, that moving essays form the top.

Guan Qinqing 管钦清

In 1927, Chinese literature took the form of 'engaged literature'. In the 1980/90s, the discussion of politics in daily interest form a smaller part than in the 1920/30s. In the 1980s all genres including poems and essays were used for the critic against the master narrative of Communism or the Maoist understanding of art as serving ideology. In the later half of the 1990s, the master narrator himself seems to be lost within the subjectivity of individuals and everyday's profaneity and banality of a more and more formally organized but substantially empty citylife.

Gui Yizhi 桂一枝

In the 1990s, the essayistic culture of political criticism of the 1980s has vanished, the only remiscent element left is the patriotism.[ Trends like the use of ordinary language, which one finds in novels since 1993 (Jia Pingwa, Feidu; Gu Cheng, Yingger) and New Borderlessness since 1995, cannot be proven in the essaywriting.The reason that we do not find post-modernist essays in the sense of post-modernist fiction lies in the directness of the essay: The essay as a genre is a chat between author and reader and not an object d'art which wants to give cause for different interpretations or which would depend on exceptional form or contents or even quotations of pre-modern characteristics in order to make it an distinguishable object d'art.]

References [partly mentioned with German translation] （不用翻）

Vera Schwarcz 1996, Vera Schwarcz, "The pain of sorrow: public uses of personal grief in modern China", in Daedalus: Journal of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences (Winter 1996)

Ba Jin 1982, Ba Jin: "Yi feng huixin 一封回信" (Ein Antwortbrief (26.10.1982)), in: Bing zhong ji 病中集 (Auf dem Krankenlager), Hongkong 香港 1984(?) (Series Suixiang lu 隨想錄 (Thoughts) Bd 4), 147 pp.

Ba Jin 1982a, Ba Jin: "Yi pian xuwen 一篇序文" (Ein Vorwort) [dated 1982.9/10], in: Ba Jin: Auf dem Krankenlager 1984

Ba Jin 1956, Ba Jin 巴金: "Duli sikao 獨立思考" (Unabhängig denken), in: Li Jisheng 李濟生, Li Xiaolin 李小林 (Hgg.): Ba Jin liushi nian wenxuan (1927 - 1986), Suixiang lu, zagan, sanwen, xuba, yanjiang, shuxin 巴金六十年文選（１９２７－１９８６）隨想錄·雜感·散文·序跋· 演講·書信 (Ba Jin. Werkauswahl aus 60 Jahren (1927 - 1986), Gedanken, vermischte Gefühle, Essays, Vor- und Nachworte, Reden, Briefe), Shanghai 上海: Shanghai wenyi chubanshe 上海文藝出版社 (Literatur- und Kunstverlag Shanghai), 1986.12, S. 461 - 462 [Datiert auf 1956.]

Ba Jin 1962, "Zuojia de yongqi yu zerenxin 作家的勇氣與責任心" (Mut und Verantwortungsbewußtsein der Schrifsteller) 1962; der Essay von Zhou Zuoren 周作人: "Wenxue tan 文學談" (Über Literatur), in: Tan long ji 談龍集 (Über Drachen. Sammlung), Shanghai 上海: Kaiming shudian 開明書店 (Kaiming Buchladen) 1927.12, Nachdruck: Hongkong 香港: Shiyong shuju 使用書局 (Praxisverlag) 1972.1, 310 S., S. 165 - 167

Zhou Zuoren 1919, Zhou Zuoren, "Zuxian chongbai 1919 (Ancestor Worship)," in Early Essays, op.cit., pp. 78

Zhou Zuoren 1920: Zhou Zuoren 周作人, Xin wenxue de yaoqiu 新文學的要求" (The demand of the New Literature) [lecture], in Beiping shaonian xuehui 北平少年學會 (Beiping youth conference) 1920.1.6, in: Zhang Ruoying 長若英: Xin wenxue yundong shi ziliao 新文學運動史資料 (Material on the history of the New Literature movement), Shanghai 上海: Guangming shuju 光明書局 (Guangming bookstore) (1934.9) ²1936.9, 291-296

Zhou Zuoren 1923, Zhou Zuoren: Yanzhicao ba (Preface to Yu Pingbo's Yanzhicao), in: Yongri ji (Book of Eternal Day), Shanghai: Beixin shuju 1929, 180-181

Zhou Zuoren 1929, Zhou Zuoren: Ertong de shu (The books of children), in: Chenbao fukan (1923.8.17)

Zhou Zuoren yuanliu, Zhou Zuoren: Zhongguo xin wenxue de yuanliu (Sources of New Chinese Literature), p 71

Zhou Zuoren 1932, Zhou Zuoren: Lun baguwen 1932, in: Kanyun ji p. 148

Source: NEAAS annual meeting 10/09/1999 New Haven (Yale University)

Guo Lu 郭露

Modern Chinese Literature and the Essay Genre: A New Perspective

Martin Woesler

In this paper, I will not recount the contents and propose interpretations of any essays, nor will I outline the main topics or styles of essaywriting in China, but I would like to take the opportunity to reflect a little bit on the phenomenon of the genre itself and discuss some conclusions and hypotheses with the attentive and critical audience which can be found at only a few places on earth, EALC at Harvard definitely being one of them.

《中国现代文学与散文体裁：以新视角》

吴漠汀

在本文中,我将不再赘述任何文章的内容和提出的观点,我也不会列出其主要主题或风格,但是我想借此机会,反映一些现象本身的类型，并与包括哈佛大学学生在内的观众对一些结论和假设进行探讨。--Guo Lu (talk) 02:16, 25 December 2020 (UTC)

Han Haiyang 韩海洋

1. The unknown genre

The literary-historical narrative told by anthologies and collections of the 20th century has drawn an incomplete picture of Chinese literature: The genre of the essay was lacking. In my paper I will ask, if the picture of literature can remain unchanged, if we take into consideration also the essay. The genre has been neglected for a long time as a genre of merit (Margouliès 1949, Schmidt-Glintzer 1990) or overlooked (McNaughton 1974, Leiden 1988-90, McDougall 1998);

Han Wanzhen 韩宛真

whereas its elder brother, fiction, has been prized ever since the valuing of fictional literature and the vernacularisation of writing in early Republican China, which followed from the master narrative established by the May 4th movement. Modern anthologies would have the reader believe that a triumvirate of poetry, fiction and drama forms the backbone of modern Chinese literary output.

He Changqi 何长琦

Excursion: Defining the essay as a non-fictional subjective representation in a free form

Similar to international literature, the basic subdivision of literature in China in general is one in three types: epic (with xiaoshuo (fiction), sanwen (non-fictional prose)), lyrics (shige) and drama (xiqu). Though there is no pure epic form, fiction and prose are often jointly addressed with the Chinese term "wu yunwen" which corresponds to the term "epic" in the West. The types may be distinguished roughly by their nature in the following way: In the epic, bygone events are retold, a broad, filled story dominates the foreground.

Hu Baihui 胡百辉

In the lyrics, the reader is encouraged to feel the current sensations and often confessionlike feelings of the poet. The drama recalls a self-contained action directly in monologue or dialogue and in this way unburdens the re-creative imagination of the readers/spectators through it. The essay as a genre of the epic is a detached non-fictional subjective representation in a free form.

Hu Huifang 胡慧芳

"Essay", Chinese mostly sanwen, is a genre term for shorter, self-contained non-fictional prose texts, in which the author tries to mediate individual experiences on an object or a question out of subjective I-perspective. This it tries associatively and from different sides, not as a text for daily use, but with artistic or educationally demanding means of language, nevertheless in an accessible form. The resource is mastered by the essayist sovereignly and the topic is seen in a larger context and can even be presented humorously. Freedom in form and content is essential for the essay.

Hu Jin 胡瑾

Different perspectives range in the international genre of the essay: Genres are primarily divisions of literature through the scholarship of literature for specialized contemplation and in order to be able to compare similar texts more easily. On the other hand, a subcategorization in numerous small entities, like Zheng Mingli does with the essay, questions the sense of such subdivisioning in reference to hermeneutic findings. One must also stay aware of the changing nature of literature itself and the relativity of the scientific perspective, which is still a timely one, even if its accepted internationally.

Ji Tiantian 纪甜甜

Regional deviations seem less important for the essay than for established genres like short stories, novels etc., and far less important than for poems. All these other genres are seen as international genres. My hypothesis, that the Chinese and the Western essay also belong to the same international genre maybe proved by the crosscultural mutualities both in form and content.

Jiang Fengyi 蒋凤仪

In the 21st century, the world is growing together and culture is mainly determined by the grade of modernization. The Chinese essay, as we find it in newspapers today, has taken on the form and content of the Western essay and is aimed at a target group comparable to that of the Western essay. This is a second hint that the modern Chinese essay belongs to the international genre of the essay.

Jiang Hao 姜好

Even though the translation of duanpian xiaoshuo with short stories is commonly accepted, both are less closely related than the Western essay and its Chinese counterpart. The definition, which I developed out of a sample of more than 5000 modern Chinese essays, fits also the special international understanding of the essay (following Bolz 1992 13:269-272 on the development of the western essay; Butrym 1989 on the theory of the western essay).

Jiang Qiwei 蒋淇玮

Besides the trend towards a globalized society, first expressed in Zhou Zuoren's call to adopt the English essay style, there are special local characteristics of the Chinese essay. How is the Chinese essay to determine culturally, what makes it "Chinese"? In the occidental essay the form seems to be a more important criterion of differentiation than in its Chinese counterpart. In China even those texts are included, which have only a similar content, but cross the borders of the formal generical framework.

除了首先由周作人表达出来的社会全球化趋势，号召采用英语散文风格，中文散文有独特本土的特征。中文散文如何形成其特有文化，其中文性又由何组成？和中文散文相比，西方散文的文章形式似乎是更重要的分类标准。在中国，甚至有些文章内容相似，但形式和类别大相径庭。--Jiang Qiwei (talk) 02:06, 25 December 2020 (UTC)

除了最初由周作人表达出来的社会全球化趋势，号召采用英语散文风格，中文散文具有独特的本土特色。中文散文如何形成其特有文化，其中文性又由何组成？与中文散文相比，西方散文的形式分类标准似乎更重要。在中国，有些文章甚至是内容相似，但形式和类别大相径庭。--Guo Lu (talk) 02:18, 25 December 2020 (UTC)

Kang Haoyu 康浩宇

This can be shown with Zheng Mingli, who subcategorises the "unfinished diary" or the "unfinished letter". Those texts belong - within the Western context - to texts of personal use and therefor to the non-fictional prose works. Only after they have been altered into essays (Zheng Mingli: "essay in diary form" and "essay in letter form"), they are accepted as essays.

Kang Lingfeng 康灵凤

The Chinese understanding of the genre is tendencially broader

This tendencial broader understanding of the essay in China can be traced back directly to the connotation, that the term sanwen possesses in Chinese: wú yùnwén "non-rhythmic prose", which originally meant all non-fictional prose. In this broader meaning, also texts for personal or everyday use are included. However I deal only with sanwen in the narrower meaning "short literary essay pieces".

Further differences are that Chinese essays often have ideological contents and show stylistic characteristics like repetitions and the usage of sayings.

Kong Xianghui 孔祥慧

The Chinese essay is booming again in the 1980s and 1990s

Analysis reveals a general increase in essay publication after 1979 with two peaks immediately after the 'Cultural Revolution'. The publications apparently reaching a new height in 1990. The first increase came about in the 1920s and 1930s, after which the essay's role was eclipsed by the genre of the report (baogao wenxue).[ Klaschka 1998.] The flourishing of essay publication in the 1920/30s and 1980/90s was helped in part by the appearance of new magazines that existed chiefly as vehicles for contemporary essayists, and numerous sanwen congshu 散文叢書 (essay bookseries).

Kong Yanan 孔亚楠

The increase in essay production right after the clear-cutting of the ‘Cultural Revolution’ has been the backlog of demand, which is reflected in 1 million copies of essay collections being printed between 1980 and 1982 - only counting the collections contained in a sampling of 130 ‘representative’ books I was able to collect for a survey.

Thanks to the work of some major Chinese editors, the whole essay culture was compiled from magazines and newspapers and was published in a flood of anthologies since the 1970s. This boom is comparable to the cultural fever of undigging xiangtu literature, which rose in Taiwan in front of the background of the movement of self-identification and independance.

Lei Fangyuan 雷方圆

2. Why is the essay as abundant as fiction?

Let me name a few reasons, why the essay in fact is as abundant as its prose brother, fiction, and its lyrical sister, poetry, and why it must be valued as highly:

- The essay had a direct impact on Chinese society throughout history (the reform ideas from the end of the Qing dynasty through the May Fourth period with the literary theorethical pieces and the daily political zawen of Lu Xun, until today are mostly presented in essay form). The impact on literary reflection and theory is shown in the collection "Modern Chinese Literary Thought" 1996. The effect of the essay genre with its direct language, its connection to life (e.g. its role in the coming to terms with the cultural revolution), and its direct access to the individual reader through newspapers. This impact is larger than the indirect one of fiction or poetry. The poem is the genre of retreat from social life, from political issues and time references.

Lei Kuangxi 雷旷溪

Hu Shi argues, that poetry is most important in the process of modernity, since poetry rises emotions. But it relies also on images and on linguistic rhythm. Liang Qichao stresses the role of novel and opera in the changing society. But sanwen is able to name things, it reflects life, caleidoscopic. Modern subjectivity is constructed with the tool of sanwen.

- The essay also reflects trends in the society better than poetry and fiction: Individualism is expressed in the essay more directly than in the poem with its limitation in content and form. Ephemerality is reflected in the short form of the essay, which may be read in the subway on the way to work, where poems may not be so spontaneously enjoyed.

Li Haiquan 李海泉

- The essay reaches a larger part of the population than poetry, the amount of time spended on reading novels goes back, too. The essay itself a genre of high actuality, if not simply the genre of today.

- The essay tells us more about an author and his time than fiction or poetry, because in this genre, we encounter the author himself without metrical restrictions. We look trough authentic eyes on his contemporary society. Many authors turned to essay writing in the later periods of their lifes, like Lu Xun, Ba Jin, and Wang Meng.

Li Lili 李丽丽

- The volume of essay production exceeds the volume of xiaoshuo production: Chinese newspapers since the 1870s on[ Shenbao, Shibao etc. Liang Qichao sees the role of the newspaper both as liberal and authoritative: He understands the press as an institution to control the government, on the other hand he favors censorship.] and as a mass media from the early 20th century presented only one or two fictional stories in a serialized form, but invented essay columns like zagan (from which Lu Xun developed his zawen), suibi or suixiang (from which famous collections like Ba Jin's Suixiang lu derived).

Li Lingyue 李凌月

3. Let us assign the essay its proper place The consequence which must be driven from the above presented contrast between value and valuing of the essay is: Let us assign the essay its proper place! I will describe the beginnings of the discovery of the essay. Despite the increase in essay writing from 1979 on, it took a decade for the first theoretical reflections on this phenomenon to appear. It took another decade before the international scholarship of Chinese Studies became aware of the phenomenon of the essay.

Li Liqin 李丽琴

In the 1980s, Chinese scholarship made a first major approach to reflect on essay literature by writing essay histories and collecting papers, which concentrated first on the essayistic work of single authors like Lu Xun. Also two essay conferences in the 1990s showed no move towards international scholarship. Not before 1995 did international scholarship started to use common philological methods to explore single essayists (on Gaylord Leung [Liang Xihua] 梁錫華 Kubin 1995, on Wang Meng 王蒙 Woesler 1995, on Liu Zaifu 劉再復 Mansberg 1995 [unpublished]) or essays of groups (on 'Xīnyùe pài 新月派' Wagner 1996).

Li Luyi 李璐伊

Not before the second half of the 1990s, did a history of the Chinese essay using the means of Western philology appear (Woesler 1998) and for the first time, the essay was included in Western anthologies of literature as a genre equal to fiction and poetry (The Columbia Anthology of Modern Chinese Literature 1995, Modern Chinese Literary Thought 1996).

Regarding the valuing of essays in China, Taiwan and the West, there are regional differences: In the States, essays are often chosen according to Western taste and totally unknown authors are given as much space as established ones.

Li Meng 李梦

In Taiwan, Lu Xun has been banned for a long time, but today, in my survey, which Chinese essayists are printed the most in the 1990s, he ranks 16th. If one only take modern authors into account, he even ranks 12th. Hong Kong literature on Yu Guangzhong has been censored by Huang Weiliang in favor for the first (see Lin Yaode 1989:50), and Wang Meng has been overestimated in the People’s Republic of China due to his political post.

Still it remains a desideratum to get the most important Chinese essays in Western translation.

Li Yongshan 李泳珊

Currently at least three essay collections in English translation are in the reviewing process (Tam King-Fai, Woesler) or already published (Pollard 1999). Pollard's selection is a highly subjective and eclective choice of essays, covering even the premodern essay. This year, scholars will meet on a first international conference on the essay (Achern, Germany August 25-26). In the years to come, a new Bonn History of Chinese Literature will grant the essay its proper place with two to three volumes only dedicated to the biji, youji and other essays.

Li Yu 李玉

4. Taking into consideration the essay will rewrite the history of Chinese literature

I will give a few hints, what the essay can contribute to the picture of Chinese Literature, which so far is overshadowed by fiction through the narrative of C.T. Hsia, Prusek and Anderson.

We are used to established narratives, like the emergence and success of the May-Fourth literature. But this view neglects the role, that for example the yuanyang hudie pai played in the choir of different voices in the awoken intellectual debate in the beginning of this century.

Lin Min 林敏

The May-Fourth group at that time was one voice among many and only succeeded because of its agitation and polemic in the public sphere, so we have to use new means to assign the Chinese essay its proper place. We learn from simplifiying narratives, that it is absolutely necessary to differentiate, and to reconstruct the complex time background. Having understood Chinese literature as determined by the development of fiction and poetry only, a broader understanding will change the whole appearance of Chinese literature. A scholarly endeavour is the use of modern literary theories in the approach to this genre.

Lin Xin 林鑫

In the following, I will name three aspects (chronologically sorted by past, modern and contemporary time) to hold the argument, that the taking into consideration of the essay will rewrite the history of Chinese literature and change our current understanding of it.

5. The classical and premodern essay documents Chinese philosophy, early subjectivity and still, a native Chinese tradition is questioned

How is the Chinese essay to be positioned historically, how did it emerge, what is its generic background? Generically, the ancestors of the essay are both in China and the West notes written on the margins of books, they are letters and travel notes.

Ling Zijin 凌子瑾

These notes differed from the canonized literature through its informal style, its expression of individuality und subjectivity, a much earlier document for subjectivity than the first autobiographical Chinese novel, The Dream of the Red Chamber.

From the very beginning, the essay was valued lower than poetry: the oldest reference this far for the term sanwen that I found is Luo Dajing's 羅大經 (? - after 1248) statement from 1240: “Shī sāomiào tiānxià, ér sǎnwén pōjué suǒsuì júcù.

Liu Bo 刘博

詩騷妙天下，而散文頗覺瑣碎局促。” (Poetry is moving mankind in a wonderful way, prose inquires into incoherent bagatels, is limited.) (Helin yulu). Another reproach Luo Dajing mentions, is a formal one: In comparison to the highly artistic and century-long tradition of poetic writing, the direct and often vernacular langage of the essay in his eyes had less value.

In the West, a real 'art of the essaywriting' came up in the late 16th century as a medium for the newly reorganized knowledge.

Liu Jinxingqi 刘金惺琦

The reorganization originated from the observations of Kopernikus, which destroyed the whole conception of the world of the Middle Age.

In China, particularly the debates on Buddhism in the 4th and 5th century A.D. saw the origination of a tradition of letters. The Chinese tradition of the sanwen 散文 (essay) however, in the understanding of sǎn 散 as (to dispel, leisure, loose, relaxed, irregular, independant style, free prose, can be seen not before the detachment from the dialogue - or aphorism, which is still visible in the philosophical Lunyu.

Liu Liu 刘柳

Xunzi delivered the prototype of the later essay with his philosophical treatises. They are an early form of philosophical didactical essays, in which general theorems are derived not only from quotations of the canonized classical works, but for the first time also from his own individual experience. The individuality is still a main characteristic of the essay today.

During the dynasties the essay manifested itself further in certain subcategories: From reading-notes written at the paper margins originated the biji µ§°O (occasional notes), flourishing in the Ming Dynasty.

荀子的哲学论著是后世散文的雏形，它们是哲学教学论文的早期形式。其中的一般定理不仅来自于经典著作的引用，而且第一次从他的个人经验中得出。个性仍是现今散文的主要特点。

历朝历代，散文在某些子类中进一步得以表现，如从写在纸边的读书笔记产生了明朝盛行的偶记。--Liu Liu (talk) 02:25, 25 December 2020 (UTC)

Liu Ou 刘欧

The marginalism is a link between Western and Chinese tradition of early essays. Occasional notes could contain private historical notes, anecdotes, communications and contemplations. However, the consciousness of the essay as a genre of its own originated in China not before the Qing ²M dynastie, when numerous essay anthologies were compiled.

Taking into consideration the social-historical background draws a different picture of the old society than short stories and novels: Essays are much closer to real life, since they express individual problems and experiences.

Liu Yangnuo 刘洋诺

Until now, the Chinese pre-Hongloumeng individual literature spoke only through the indirect language of poems to us. Rediscovering the essays, we have a splendid source of opinions, social-historical pictures etc.

Premodern essay literature consists of much more than its most well-known example, the formally restrictive baguwen. Lu Xun himself wrote some of his essays in baguwen style, but on the other hand took it as a synonym for the ancient society. Zhou Zuoren saw the rhythm of the language of the "Eight legged essay" as as appealing and intoxicating as the "pleasure of doing opium. (Zhou 1932:148).

Liu Yi 刘艺

But he considered it also as a prevalent genre implicit in the modern writings as yang bagu (westernized bagu) and dang bagu (party-line bagu) (borrowing from Wu Zhihui, Zhou Yuanliu:71).

Neo-Confucianism stressed wen (prose) as the most important tool to transmit the dao (way): Wenyi zai dao (Literature as the carrier of the way). If we reinterprete this diction in the perspective of genre, we can say, that the essay then has been regarded as an important tool to express truth, subjectivity and Self.

Liu Yiyu 刘怡瑜

Liang Qichao developed a xīn wéntǐ 新文體 (new prose style), which was influenced by Western languages, but the essay became popular not before the newspapers became mass media, and the language changed into baihua.

6. The essay as the medium of modernity, the questioning of the genuiness of the Chinese essay

To solve first of all the dispute on whether the Chinese essay grew out of a native tradition or was influenced by Western translations, one finds both traditions relevant: The occidental essay was introduced to the writers of the literature reform movement from 1907 on by translations in Chinese (Lin Shu: Irving 1907, Addison 1911).

Liu Zhiwei 刘智伟

The current form of the genre is mostly based on the influence of Western essay translations. First developed a Chinese essay tradition, which consciously leaned upon the Western model in language, form and terminology, its own proponents succumbed soon to the temptation to derive a tradition of the Chinese essay from Chinese history only. A seemingly unbroken Chinese tradition of the native Chinese wenyan sanwen is presented in Chinese textbooks (Yu Zaichun 1978-82, Li Xishang 1985).

This is older than the ones referred to in the Large Chinese Dictionary of Morohashi (Morohashi undated) and in the Encyclopaedic Dictionary of the Chinese Language 1966.

Lou Cancan 娄灿灿

Still, the value of the native tradition of essay writing and the role of the Western influence upon it is discussed controversially among the scholars. Some admit that Western impact played a key role in what we understand as Chinese essays nowadays: Wang Bin 1992, Fan Peisong 1993; for Western impact in general see Průšek 1964, Gálik 1966, McDougall 1971. Other scholars think that Western influence is overestimated - Denton 1996 showed that the theoretical background was missing for understanding Western theories of literature in China, - and recommended that we understand the essay first by its national tradition.

Luo Weijia 罗维嘉

How far personal opinion may influence the narrative of historical facts can be seen by the example of the legendary authors of the May Fourth movement. All of them considered the English essay as the father of the Chinese essay: Zhou Zuoren 1921, Lu Xun 1933, the anarchist and later member of the Guomindang Wu Zhihui [1934]. Later, some of these authors changed their minds to support their own theories on the essay by looking for proof of a native Chinese essay tradition:

Luo Yuqing 罗雨晴

for example, Lu Xun with his theory "'Zhǎnkāi' shuō yǔ 'méngyá' lùn “展開”說與“萌芽”論"" (Theory of "Starting" and "Blossoming") came to see the fighting and critical character of the essay of the Jin dynasty (265 - 420) as the 'father' of the Chinese essay, and Zhou Zuoren first the English essay (1921) and later the biji (occasional notes) of the Ming, although he still tried to integrate the English essay in his "Gonganpài yu Yīngguo xiaopin 'hecheng' lun 公安派與英國小品“合成”論" (Theory of the Synthesis of the Gongan School and the English Essay).

Ma Juan 马娟

Wang Zengqi regrets that the national Chinese tradition of the essay at the time of the 'May Fourth Movement' has not been taken up again and has not continued in contemporary essays (Wang Zengqi 1993). The Chinese essay is an accommodating object of study, because one may look to it to prove any theory of the essay. One can find examples for each topic in almost every period, simply because the essay has a wide range of subjects.

Ma Shuya 马淑雅

When Zhou Zuoren showed that only seven months after the incident at Marco Polo bridge it was again possible to write about a candy seller (1924), he was critizised as "paralyzing" (Lu Xun 1934, Zhu Zhaoluo 1943). When he wrote a piece on the "Fly", he was reproached with dealing with subjects of minor importance. Reproaches like this lie in the very nature of the genre, since marginalism is substantial to the essay. The mentioned formal reproach of Luo Dajing can be found again in the 1990s, Hong Kong students critisized the literary style as it appears in Ba Jins "Thoughts" (Suixiang lu) as too direct and too less artful. But this perspective does not recognize the very nature of the essay, which is a very individual expression of an author's thoughts and not bound to tradition, and therefore much more free also in content.

Ma Zhixing 马智星

The essay - from its very nature free and independant - almost disappeared in the time of the Cultural Revolution and - except for the ideologically influenced essays - had a hard struggle between Yan'an and the loss of moral legitimacy by the leadership in 1989.

The essay was the genre of the modernizing society of the early 20th century. Many writers had to define and often redefine their position and self-understanding in reaction to war and warlordism and later in the modernizing society, often burying their own ideals, in the larger perspective for the seeming "needs" of society, which also claimed the author to be one of its products.

Meng Ying 孟莹

But from its very nature, the essay set new boundaries in form and content, and therefore not only survived the ideological restrictions, but also established its own critical subculture within. The essay was not only a medium of discussion and a documentation of the social-political background for us today, but also a documentation of the personal struggle of the writers finding a position in a changing environment, since the essay is "a genre of self-reflection". Some essays even deconstructed master narratives like the one of leftist ideology, often simply by confronting it with subjective experience, reality or art.

I want to mention another position on literature, which stresses the impact of literature on life, especially on the eve of revolutions - following this view, all literature is political (Jameson).

Mo Ling 莫玲

Not only the understanding of literature as a whole changes if we take into consideration the essay, also the view of single authors shifts, if we see not only their novels or poems, but also their essays. I mention only Zhou Zuoren. His ideas connected him spiritually to his contemporary collegues in Europe, Japan and America, but these where ideas for which China turned out to be not yet ready. At that time, China had taken a road which led away from progress, wealth, freedom and spiritual enlightenment. The consequences have yet to be overcome.

Mo Nan 莫南

In 1927, Chinese literature has taken the form of 'engaged literature'. The topical development of political essays sees a shift from the enlightenment-educational essay, which emerged in 1907, to the daily-political essays in the 1920-30s, further to anti-Japanese propaganda in the 1940s and ideological propaganda in the 1950s and 1960s. In the 1980/90s, the discussion of politics of daily interest form a smaller part than in the 1920/30s. In the 1980s all genres including poems and essays were used for the critic against the master narrative of Communism or the Maoist understanding of art as serving ideology.

Nie Xiaolou 聂晓楼

Whilst the 1980s saw a revival of political issues in terms of discussion on the best system of society, (also in literature in general and in film) to a mere unpolitical and again more philosophical-moral theme spectrum in the 1990s, where essayists define their role, first of all to counterpart the consume-orientation of the masses. The essay seems to be the only genre in China which has kept its educational claim with the exception of essays which claim to be "art pourt l'art".

Ou Rong 欧蓉

The topical development of the unpolitical essay starts with the everyday-topics of Zhu Ziqing ("Shuo meng 說夢" On dreams in: Zhu Ziqing 1928) and Zhou Zuoren from 1917 (My own garden 9.1923, "The Fly" 1924, "Reading on the Toilet" 1936), with a caesura 1927, when the political essays became the main stream, until the late 1930s, when the unpolitical essay was eliminated totally by the anti-Japanese movement. It didn't recover until the 1970s, when life turned back to normality and normal things became topics of interest because of their long absence. Again in the 1990s, the unpolitical essay boomed also due to less interest in political issues and the need for a new orientation in the new found world of mass consumerism.

Ouyang Jinglan 欧阳静兰

I mentioned the lack of translations in Western languages. One of the reasons might be the impression of some scholars that many of the Chinese essays were just propaganda. This might be true for the 1940s and even the 1950s, but nowadays this has changed, as the overwhelming majority of publications prove. This demands a closer look: Since 1949, politically affirmative literature has been encouraged by the government, resulting in a statistical paradox: not the affirmative authors and their texts form the majority of the essayists read in the 1990s, but the critical essayists, whose texts oppose the order to serve politics through their apolitical, sometimes even defiant character.

Ouyang Ling 欧阳玲

In the 1990s, the texts of 1920s/1930s Republican China are still as often reprinted as their contemporary counterparts. Obviously we can conclude that the politically affirmative essay of the 1950s only survived in special political essay collections and is no longer written by famous contemporary authors nor read by the Chinese audience in the beginning of the 21st century.

Taking into account of a genre shifts the whole perspective on literature, taking into account the essayistic works of an author shifts also the view of the author. I will name only one author as an example for a modern essayist: Zhou Zuoren.

Peng Dan 彭丹

Zhou Zuoren

I mentioned already his theoretical contribution to the Chinese essayism, but still, his essays have been neglected until the 1980s. The reason does not lie in literary quality, but in political valuing. The master narrative of the offical literary history of the People's Republic on Zhou Zuoren is, that the theoretical May Fourth genius "degenerated" and later became a "traitor". Publishing in the Japanese sponsored magazines Reminiscences,* and Chinese Literature, he was blamed together with Zhu Pu and Yuan Xi of collaboration. An unanswered question is, why another author, who published there, Zhang Ailing, was never reproached with collaboratorship. The difference between all of them is that Zhang Ailing tried to avoid political committments, whereas Zhou felt guilty, Zhu justified it and Yuan simply accepted it.

Peng Juan 彭娟

The 'mainstream' writers took an affirmative approach in their writing, whereas the other writers formed a minority. The individual authors did not necessarily belong to either one of these groups throughout their life, but may have moved between them. Since the essay is a medium which enables the individual to express thoughts directly, the writers chosen for this paper can be classified according to their position.

Yu Guangzhong's essay "The wolves are coming" shows that the ideological perspective did not only harm mainland essaywriting.

Peng Ruihong 彭锐宏

In his small literary pieces, Zhou tried to aesthetizise the little things of the everyday life out of the subjective experience of his private space. The major contribution of Zhou Zuoren is, that he set the turning point in Chinese essay writing with his call for writing short literary pieces (Meiwen 1921).

In foreign literature there is the so-called lunwen 論文 (treatise), which is roughly divided into two groups: the reflecting ones, piping 批評 (critical), are scientific articles. The others are jishu 記述 (descriptive) and yishuxing 藝術性 (artistic), they are also called meiwen 美文 (aesthetic essay). Within these texts, one can distinguish between xushi 敘事 (narrative) and shuqing 抒情 (lyric). But there are also mixed texts. [...] I hope that the aesthetical essay is encouraged to come back, and will open up a new field for the New Literature. Wouldn’t that be wonderful?

Peng Xiaoling 彭小玲

With these words from the essay "The aesthetic essay" this new vernacular form was defined. This starting point founded a whole new tradition of essay writing in China. Contemporary writers called this piece the "king of essays".

In order to bring this new form to his compatriots, he tried to find similiarities with the xiaopinwen of the Ming dynasty. He further discussed these thoughts in his essay theory. In his own essays, he profited a lot from ancient suibi. Later he further developed his literary theory towards an up and down of two trends. In the modernizing society, he advocated the liberation of women and asked to "treat children as full subjects with their own external and internal lives" and to "make children the essence of children's literature" (Zhou 1923). He promoted the baguwen and the independance of literature from politics and effected the literary scene and the development towards a modern Chinese society especially between 1917 and 1938.

Peng Yongliang 彭永亮

With this theoretical foundation and his own vo'luÉminous essayistic work, Zhou Zuoren through the example of his own form of short literary pieces within this genre, fought at that stage of the development of his literary theory like Benjamin Henri Constant de Rebecque 130 years ago in France for the idea "l'art pour l'art" , for individuality and independance of the writer, for disinterested literature. The jugdment, that Zhou was an apolitical author cannot be proved with his essays. Instead, he wanted his abstinence of political statement to be understood as a political statement by itself. For him, literature was a mean not for revolution, but for resistance (Zhou 1929:180-181).

Peng Yuzhi 彭育志

In fact he saw himself as ‘patriotic underground fighter’ and looked at the collaboration with the Japanese puppet regime as a forced one, following his attempted assasination, through which his driver had lost his life. His own concept of essay writing served less the needs of the building of a nation-state and comes closer to the ideal of the individual.

"I don't really know why, but I am feeling as if I am born into a dark age. I admit, that our forests are not inhabited by dragons, tigers and wolves, but shapeless "monsters" and "goblins" are still creeping around and try to swallow our souls. [...] What alarms me most, is the absence of freedom in this prison, into which we writers have been thrown."

Qi Kai 漆凯

Confronting tradition and progress in the essay "Ancestor Worship", he is in favor of the latter, since past could only become present through changes (Zhou 1919:7-8).

Benjamin Henri Constant de Rebecque (1767 - 1830) war französischer Romanschriftsteller und liberaler Politiker, der neben der Freiheit der Kunst nach der Französischen Revolution die Einführung der konstitutionellen Monarchie nach englischem Vorbild forderte.

Qu Miao 瞿淼

Siehe Journal (10.2.1804). Die "Kunst um der Kunst willen" propagierte die Zweckfreiheit der Kunst. Im Gegensatz dazu versteht sich die engagierte Literatur. Die Parallele zwischen Zhou Zuorens Literaturverständnis und dem Konzept "Kunst um der Kunst willen" zieht auch Wolff: Chou Tso-jen 1971, S. 84.

Siehe Zhou Zuoren: Der Ursprung der neuen chinesischen Literatur 1934, S. 95 - 98; vgl. auch Chen Zizhan: Vorträge zur chinesischen Literaturgeschichte 1937, Bd 3, pp. 416 - 422, besonders S. 422. Hinweis in: H. Martin: "Liang Qichao on Poetry Reform" 1996, Bd 1, S. 213.

Quan Meixin 全美欣

Regarding Zhou Zuoren, I want to correct the official assessment of the People’s Republic, that his work would have experienced a caesura in 1938. In order to explain his opposition of the propaganda to build up national heroes about 1937 and his collaboration from 1939, it has been said officially, that his thoughts had "duoluo 墮落" (degenerated) at that time (Zhu Jinshun 1990:59). In fact, this caesura, namely the change in the style and subject in his essays on literature, art etc. to zhengjing 正經 (serious, intentional essays), and xianshi 閑適 (essays for one’s own enjoyment) is located not before his outlawing through Mao Zedong (1942), and his arrest through the Guomindang (1945).

Sagara Seydou

Therefore not the Japanese suppressors are responsible for the retreat of this great writer, but his Chinese compatriots'.

On the basis of the stigma of the 'traitor', he has been undervalued until now. That his work in the 1990s is almost as often published as Lu Xun's and Zhu Ziqing's shows that his texts finally experience a more positive literaric evaluation through the audience, which now must be registered also by scholars.

Shi Diwen 石迪文

Another example of a misread Zhou Zuoren is his short essay on "The Fly", where he describes his changing attitude towards flies, which he had played with as child but later disgusted when he learned about their danger of passing on diseases. ”The fly” shows Zhou Zuoren’s strength to describe details and make them a real topic by recalling memories on them or describing a change of perspective on them. Zhou summarized the philosophical wisdom he learnt from this, that people did not judge on things objectively, but were likely to praise or damn things.

Shi Haiyao 石海瑶

The official reading re¬proaches Zhou that he "saw only the fly and not the cosmos" , a quotation of the young Zhou about a position he himself clearly opposed.

His ability to chat about the more pleasent things in life is displayed in his essay ”Birds’ twitter”. In ”Peking cakes and sweet-meat” and in ”Wild vegetable of my home region”, Zhou Zuoren shows his ability to make the reader feel at home at a region, where he feels at home himself, by describing the customs and special regional food.

Siehe Zhou Zuoren: "Cangying 蒼蠅" (Die Stubenfliege), in: Chenbao fujuan 晨报副镌 (Beilage zur Morgenpost) (1924.7.13). Eine Zu¬sammenfassung des Inhalts findet sich in: Yu Daxiang (Hg.): Auswahllexikon chinesischer Essays mit Inhaltsangaben und Analysen 1993.

Siehe Vollständige chinesische Anthologie der Wissenschaften - Bd Chinesische Literatur 1988, Bd 2, S. 1300. Dies spielt auf den Essay "Cangying 蒼蠅" (Die Stubenfliege), in: Zhou Zuoren: Zhi Tang. Sammlung 1933 an.（文献无需翻译）

Si Yu 司妤

His piece ”Bitter rain” shows the atmosphere, for what his essays had been labelled ”bitter tea”: There remains a taste in one’s mouth after reading. If you compare Lu Xun’s ”On tea drinking” (Yang/Yang 1961 3:325-326) with Zhou Zuoren’s essay with the same title, you see the difference of ”short and to the point” and ”eloquent and well-read”. ”First love” is more hilarious. The essay ”Three different ways to die” shows that Zhou Zuoren can compete with his elder brother in sarcasm. Lu Xun's essay on the same subject, the massacre on March 18, 1926, was a sight.

Song Jianru 宋建茹

Zhou asks for the ”best” way to die and favors the short and painless one. In ”On alcohol” and ”The awning bunk boat” Zhou Zuoren continues the tradition of late Ming biji.

7. The essay as a snapshot of contemporary thoughts

What is the state of contemporary essay writing in China? Its position should be brought into its proper relationship to recent approaches, perspectives and terms of categorization, like post-modernist elements, post-colonial thinking, deconstructivism etc.

Su Lin 苏琳

The increase of the essay production after the ‘Cultural Revolution’ might be explained with the ability of the essay, to express personal experiences much more authentically than other genres because of its immanent claim of historical truth. But the essay is not a guarantee for objective truth: In the same time it is subjective, the essayist mediates his image consciously. This restricts the reported truth to a subjective one and bears the risk of a consciously “corrected” truth.

Tan Xingyue 谭星越

The individualism of the Republican era has been based on the common feeling to stand at a historical turning point and directed towards common targets like the creation of a New Literature and a new Chinese society. In the 1980s and especially in the 1990s, individualism asks for a critical reflection on the satisfaction of personal consumption needs and tries to give personal orientation, essayists plead for moral virtues (Wang Meng: "Anxiang 安详" (Serene) 1992, "Zuohao ni ziji de shi 做好你自己的事" (First make your own things in a good way) 1994).

Tan Xinjie 谭鑫洁

These essays, mainly published in newspapers and magazines, are widely read by people in the rapidly changing, anonymous, alienating and consume-oriented mass cultural society.

Other essays in the 1980s and 1990s are in a kind of new subjectivism targeted away from contemporary contradictions but apply to the feelings of the audience by creating an either positive ("Shanxi opera", Jia Pingwa 1984) or negative world ("The nightmare", Si Yu 1995).

From the essay, we can see contemporary trends of literature, which are also reasons for the increase in volume of this genre in the 1990s:

Tan Yuanyuan 谭媛媛

- The giddy-paced nature of current Chinese society with its demands for diverting and short texts: “[...] we live in an age of exposition” (Hall 1984:xiii);

- The increasing consciousness of indivi¬duality for which the essay is the most direct form of subjecti¬ve expression, even more direct than the poem with its metrical and formal demands;

- A revival of interest in discussing social-political issues through the medium of the essay, as was the case in the 1920s/30s.

- The banality of everyday life becomes conscious through becoming a literary topic, most commonly in the genre of everyday life, the essay.

Tang Bei 汤蓓

- The De-ideologization of Chinese society. Today not the governmentally demanded affirmative texts stand at the forefront, but unpolitical essays, mostly dating from the Republican era, especially from the years 1923 to 1928. This observation is supported by the results of the mentioned statistical analysis. The mostly read political essays after 1949 are critical essays.

- Regarding the compiling of essay collections: For the most often selected essays in the People’s Republic, Taiwan and Hong Kong, moral and aesthetic criteria seem to have underlain.

Tang Ming 唐铭

This is a sign of the increasing independence of the editors of essay anthologies from governmental or ideological handicaps, and for the increasing commercialization of the publis¬hing houses with an orientation toward customers (former: "readers").

- The criteria for essay best sellers in the P.R. of China are the following: In the most often printed essay "The Back View", filial piety is the driving factor, parallelistic and repetitive structures in the atmospherical nebulous "The Moonlit Lotus Pond", both written by Zhu Ziqing, whose style easily may seem mannerist to the Western reader.

Tang Yiran 汤伊然

Nostalgic home feelings are the emotional identification element in "Wild vegetables of my home region" by Wang Zengqi. Therefore one can state, that moving es¬says form the top.

- In the latter half of the 1990s, the master narrator himself seems to be lost within the subjectivity of in¬dividuals and everyday's profaneity and banality of a more and more formally organized but substantially empty citylife. Time loses worth, since more and more of the daily acctivities are filled with mechanical and autistic actions.

Tao Ye 陶冶

In the 1990s, the essayistic culture of political criticism of the 1980s has vanished, the only political replique is the patriotism, for example expressed in the 1996 published monograph China can say no! – Possibilities for politics and emotions in the period after the cold war (No! 1996).

- The reason that we do not find post-modernist essays in the sense of post-modernist fiction lies in the directness of the essay: The essay as a genre is a chat between author and reader and not an object d'art which wants to give cause for different interpretations or which would depend on exceptional form or contents or even quotations of pre-modern characteristics in order to make it an distinguishable object d'art.

Wang Meiling 王美玲

Also trends like the use of ordinary language, which one finds in novels since 1993 (Jia Pingwa, Feidu; Gu Cheng, Yingger) and New Borderlessness since 1995, cannot be pro-ven in the essaywriting.

- Also the fictional realism David Der-Wei Wang sees in Lao She, Mao Dun and Shen Congwen, proves helpful for the understanding of some essays, one being "The Small Dog Baodi", written by Ba Jin 1981, in which the author turns into a narrator who recounts the memories of the 'Cultural Revolution' in allegoric instead of in descriptive truth as before ("In memoriam of Xiao Shan II", Ba Jin 1984).

Wang Xuan 王轩

Similar is the concept of imaginery nostalgia, as Wang calls the fictional truth in Shen Congwen's work (David Der-Wei Wang 1992), helpful for the reading of Wang Zengqi's "Rain in Kunming" as well as for Jia Pingwa's "Shanxi opera".

- The Schwarcz' concept of personal grief expressed in a metaphorical discourse helps us to understand how Ba Jin was able to overcome the truth of being he was known for, only to reach a more convincing fictional truth through the metaphor of his dog Baodi.

Xin zhuangtai xiaoshuo 新狀態小說 new borderless fiction, represented by Chen Dong 韓東, Lu Yang 魯羊, Zhu Wen 朱文, Lin Bai 林白, Chen Liang 陳梁, Zhang Mei 張梅.（文献无需翻译）

Post-colonialist thinking (Williams et al. 1994), which is to be seen as part of the social-political discourse, appears in essays, especially in the less critical political, but patriotic essays of the 1990s. Kafkaism helps us understand the essay "The nightmare", where Si Yu appears as a de-constructionist, the I-narrator even is drawn near to suicide.（文献无需翻译）

And maybe for Xie Bingxins* reflections on her experience as one of the chosen voluntaries of the Wuhan military academy: She insisted to remain a lifelong "woman soldier" .（文献无需翻译）

Wang Yu 王煜

8. Discussion: Is the genre of the essay the form of literary expression in 21st century China?

Regarding the future of the Chinese literature, we can only speculate. But out the risk of being wild and provocative, I would like to suggest some questions for considering the place of the essay in the field of Chinese literature and literary studies.

- People have less time for actions like reading, and get used to reduced visualized information through the Internet. Will the brevity of the essay make it the ideal medium?

Wang Yuan 王源

- If the Chinese people are rediscovering their individuality, will the essay allow them to express individual thoughts more directly?

- Modern societies are characterized by TV culture, mass consumption, and the loss of consciousness of one's own tradition, often partly due to the American impact on national cultures. Is the essay less bound to the restrictions of tradition, especially compared to the poem and thus more adaptable to the modern phenomenon of mass consumption?

Wei Honglang 韦洪朗

- The alienation and the anonymity of citylife worldwide, in China is combined with a loss of traditional values like ideology, family, solidarity etc. in favor of the concept of profit for oneself, - if this has produced a longing for new orientation, will it possibly be filled by morally guiding essays or nationalistic thinking?

《红楼梦》与其他世界文学作品的相似性——推荐《红楼梦》列入世界记忆遗产名录

Commonness between the Red Chamber Dreams and other World Literature Novels – Proposing the Red Chamber Dreams to the World Documentary Heritage List（修改）

吴漠汀，湖南师范大学 Martin Woesler, Hunan Normal University

Source: Lecture at Harvard University, Cambridge, MA USA, 14.3.2000（文献无需翻译）

Wei Yafei 魏亚菲

Abstract

In every culture, readers associate the literature they know with new literature they read. So literature is always cumulative, it grows out of existing literature and can refer back to it. When Western readers read the Red Chamber Dreams, they foremost associate novels and other pieces of literature of their own cultural tradition with the Dreams. This has also influenced the first full translation into German.

Cao Xueqin and even more his protagonist Jia Baoyu both are early humanists, universalists and world citizens. The Red Chamber Dreams function worldwide.

摘要

在每一种文化中，读者都会把他们读到的新文学与已知文学联系起来，所以文学总是积累的，它从现有的文学中生长出来，并以已有文学为参考。西方读者在阅读《红楼梦》时，首先会把《红楼梦》与自身文化传统中的小说和其他文学作品联系起来，这也影响了首次德语全译本。

曹雪芹，尤其是他的主人公贾宝玉，都是早期的人文主义者，普世主义者和世界公民。《红楼梦》具有普世价值。（修改）

Wen Sixing 文偲荇

The Dream is a complex showroom of diverse aspects of Chinese cultures and is the embodiment and essence of Chinese cultures, but it has also a global impact, therefore it should be honoured as “World Documentary Heritage”.

红楼梦》综合展示了中国的多元文化，是中国文化的集中体现和精华，同时在全球范围内产生影响，理应列入世界记忆遗产名录。（修改）

多元一体

Key words

Western culture, reception tradition, German translation, Embodiment of Chinese cultures, global compatibility, World Documentary Heritage

Wen Xiaoyi 文晓艺

1. Chinese Ethics

To help the poor and disadvantaged belongs to the traditional core values of Chinese culture.

When we sit in the Beijing Subway today, the loudspeaker announcement reminds us, that it is Chinese traditional ethics to give seats to the disadvantaged (老弱病残孕让座是中国传统道德). We know of Cao Xueqin, that he supported the poor and disadvantaged, and that he made kites for children.

However, when we look closer at these “Chinese Ethics”, we discover, that they are claimed also in Indian Buddhism “karuna” and in the Christian tradition of “caritas” and in almost every civilization. Therefore, we might call these values “human ethics”.

Wu Kai 吴恺

2. Compatibility Why do the Red Chamber Dreams function worldwide and have achieved world literature status even in their translations?

First of all, the Red Chamber Dreams are, like novels worldwide, a piece of entertainment literature. In comparison to the drama, in which every element is compulsory and plays its part in the overall structure, in the novel the line of action itself is simpler and not so important, most of the scenes or episodes are loosely put together and fit in the broader theme of the novel.

Wu Qi 吴琪

However, the lose arrangement of episodes of the Dreams comes from the tradition of almost unconnected episodes like in the Shuihuzhuan and is a step towards the greater coherence of the episodes, the aligning into a story line and the greater concentration on fewer protagonists. Therefore, the Dreams show clearly a step towards the Western tradition of novels, maybe because of growing Western influence in Qing dynasty.

3. Impact of translator’s native culture on the translation process

There are intercultural parallels between the Red Chamber Dreams and Western works of literature.

Wu Qiong 吴琼

These parallels are fundamental for the translation and were explicitly and implicitly fundamental for the German translator Martin Woesler during his translation and editorial work on the first full German translation. In the following, I will mention some of the Western novels and pieces of literature, which the Western reader of the Dreams will immediately think of.

4. The novel as embodiment of “Zeitgeist”

According to Georg Lukács’ Theory of the Novel, while the Epos (like Homer’s Ilias, which like the Dream reasons the stories in the divine realm) displayed a holistic world experience, a complete, self-contained culture, the novel displays, that the modern world has become infinitely large and has lost its homely quality.

Wu Xiang 邬香

The novel as a genre is no longer documenting just one culture, but represents, with the words of Walter Benjamin, the Organon of History. So the understanding of the novel changed with Lukacs to historical-philosophically. A novel is understood as typical for its historical era, the novel embodies the spirit of the epoch (Zeitgeist).

The Red Chamber Dreams are written in front of the background of the Manchu minority having taken over the power in formerly Han-shaped Ming-China (which was a multi-ethnic and crosscultural society) and families suffering the changing favor of changing emperors, with the Cao family being fostered by Kangxi and being persecuted by Yongzheng.

Wu Yilu 吴一露

While the author in his time could not criticize the system and power of emperors, in the novel he came to terms with this life by seeking the guilt for the persecution in the growing decadence of the family (engaging in Daoism, leisure, poetry-writing, arts and music instead of learning for being able to earn a living) and in himself not fulfilling the expectations as the family heir. This description of decadence of a declining family reminds us of the novels of Tschechov (and e.g. in the Buddenbrooks by Mann, including the turn to arts and music).

Wu Zijia 吴子佳

Moreover, with the detailed description of life on all social levels in early Qing Dynasty, the Dream appears as a documentary historical novel very much like Günter Grass’ The Tin Drum 1959.

5. Coming-of-age and Alienation

Abandoning the paradise-like garden in the Red Chamber Dreams is a symbol for leaving the protected childhood and arriving in the complex world of adults. With George Lukács theory of the novel, the protagonist starts to problematize the sense of his life, in the novel, the protagonist’s self permanently struggles with his environment.

Xiao Shuangling 肖双玲

However, Cao Xueqin’s message is not simply the one of “Paradise Lost”, instead he himself made the best out of his life. Although being less wealthy than when his family still enjoyed the favour of the emperor, there was a payroll system and a social net intact in Early Qing China, where he received enough income to be independent from his rich relatives, to be selective on accepting jobs, to live a relaxed life in a small house in the nature, spending time with his family and friends, follow his own interests, like reading, writing and drinking wine, making kites for the children and thinking of the disadvantaged.

Xiao Ting 肖婷

Cao Xueqin was fully aware of his time and China’s cultural achievements, he was familiar with the different levels of society, he was a detailed observer and skilful narrator. He may have conceptualized the ending of the novel as a discussion about the different personalities of the characters in the novel and therefore displaying his reflection about life and his psychological understanding of the diversity of human nature. He was able to grasp the “spirit of time” (Zeitgeist) and with his autobiographical experience create an eternal coming-of-age novel not just for his family, for the Qing-Chinese, for Chinese people, but for mankind.

Xiao Xi 肖茜

This tradition of Coming-of-age novels is also a European one, like enlightenment philosopher Voltaire’s novel Candide or Optimism《老实人》shows at the very same time (1759) in Europe. Also Voltaire’s Candide has to leave the luxurious paradise of his childhood and strives for true love, but his main learning is more pessimistic, since Voltaire wrote the novel in opposition to Leibniz, who optimistically looked to China as “the best of all worlds”. Recent research findings show that China had a much larger influence on European enlightenment philosophers and we can be sure, that also Cao Xueqin was aware of some European literary traditions.

Xiao Yining 肖伊宁

Also the German readership is familiar with the chronological following of the life of the protagonist and his development, the fate of a family over generations, the German readership knows this type of novel as the “Education novel” or “Coming-of-age-novel”. In Germany, the genre of the coming-of-age novel has a long tradition and it is shaped more by single characters, who appear as teachers (Goethe: Wilhelm Meister’s Apprenticeship威廉·麦斯特的学徒岁月 1795-96, Novalis 诺瓦利斯: Heinrich von Ofterdingen《海因利·封·歐福特丁根》1802).

Xie Fan 解帆

Wilhelm Meister, parallely to Jia Baoyu, is struggling with the traditional education, in Wilhelm Meister this is represented with the classics revived in Shakespeare’s dramas. Tradition can give orientation, but the personality of the protagonist needs to develop through emancipation is a wisdom, we can learn from all mentioned novels including the Dreams.

6. Pornography and True Love, female rivals

Sexuality is a basic human need and has developed into different shapes in all cultures. The German audience is familiar with erotic topics from the Middle Ages, in which sexuality was stylized. In the “Schwänke” of the 15th century (Wittenwielers Ring), erotic scenes are described sexually explicit.

Xie Ziyi 谢子熠

In the barock literature of the 17th century even the physical act is described extensively.

According to „cumulativity“, every human being is a product of history and literature is based on previous literature, therefore the author of this pager thinks that this background has to be taken into account while translating.

The best study on qing passion in the Dreams is the one by Anthony Yu, who understood it as desire and as the central motif of the Dreams. „The centrality of qing in shaping virtually every aspect of The Story of the Stone’s structure and meaning cannot be denied [...].“ (Anthony Yu 2001, 54).

Xu Jia 徐佳

In the framework story of the Dreams, the narrator consciously takes a stand against low-action and stereotypical pornographic literature as well as against the widespread romance novels (with the classic roles of the beautiful, talented woman and the poor scholar who finally achieves a respected position and prosperity by passing a civil service exam).

In chapter 1 he says: ”of the true feelings of young people [...] nobody has reported about so far.”

Erotic scenes are described in a decent and associative way (“Game of clouds and rain”), while displaying another quality in its openness e.g. towards bisexuality.

Xu Jing 许晶

The Dreams narrate the story of unfortunate lovers. Unfortunate lovers also in the West have a literary tradition, they constitute an archetype, such as Hero and Leander, Pyramus and Thisbe, Tristan and Isolde, Flore and Blanscheflur as well as Troilus and Cressida, the latter being considered the model for Arthur Brookes, who wrote Romeo and Juliet in 1562 and thus directly influenced Shakespeare.

While Marián Galik saw as the central topic of both, the Dream and Faust, the eternal feminine, which draws us on high, Gu Cheng called it the “eternal virgine”.

Xu Jing 许静

In Goethe’s coming-of-age novel Wilhelm Meisters Wanderjahre, we find a similar motif of female rivals, in the Keller 凯勒 The Green Henry 《绿衣亨利》1855, the hero turns away from an emphatically sexually designed figure and turns to the 'real' woman. In Jane Austen’s Pride and Prejudice 1813 Elizabeth and Lin Daiyu are similar, e.g. they both strive for real love (Zhuang 2011).