The turn of the third century CE—known as the Jian’an era or Three Kingdoms period—holds double significance for the Chinese cultural tradition. Its writings laid the foundation of classical poetry and literary criticism. Its historical personages and events have also inspired works of poetry, fiction, drama, film, and art throughout Chinese history, including Internet fantasy literature today. There is a vast body of secondary literature on these two subjects individually, but very little on their interface.The image of the Jian’an era, with its feasting, drinking, heroism, and literary panache, as well as intense male friendship, was to return time and again in the romanticized narrative of the Three Kingdoms. How did Jian’an bifurcate into two distinct nostalgias, one of which was the first paradigmatic embodiment of wen (literary graces, cultural patterning), and the other of wu (heroic martial virtue)? How did these largely segregated nostalgias negotiate with one another? And how is the predominantly male world of the Three Kingdoms appropriated by young women in contemporary China? The Halberd at Red Cliff investigates how these associations were closely related in their complex origins and then came to be divergent in their later metamorphoses.
On the day of the wedding, not only did the bridal sedan chair of his beloved not arrive, it was instead carried into the palace to celebrate for the old emperor. The old emperor passed away, the one in love stepped on her to succeed the throne. As the Conspiracy Consort, her limbs and veins were all cut off by aphrodisiac, and she was buried in the Tomb of the Underground Emperor! In exchange for her death, all the chickens and dogs in the world would be raised to the heavens! When she woke up again, time had flowed back to three years ago. She was still a weak girl, her father was kind and her mother was kind, her sister was cute, and the person in her heart was still a modest gentleman. Huo Mingzhu sneered from the bottom of her heart. All of the peaceful love and camaraderie was just an illusion. She had already lost her life and would never believe their flowery words again.
Yan Zhitui (531–590s) was a courtier and cultural luminary who lived a colourful life during one of the most chaotic periods, known as the Northern and Southern Dynasties, in Chinese history. Beginning his career in the southern Liang court, he was taken captive to the north after the Liang capital fell, and served several northern dynasties. Today he remains one of the best-known medieval writers for his book-length “family instructions” (jiaxun), the earliest surviving and the most influential of its kind. Completed in his last years, the work resembles a long letter addressed to his sons, in which he discusses a wide range of topics from family relations and remarriage to religious faith, philology, cultural arts, and codes of conduct in public and private life. It is filled with vivid details of contemporary social life, and with the author’s keen observations of the mores of north and south China. This is a new, complete translation into English, with critical notes and introduction, and based on recent scholarship, of Yan Zhitui’s Family Instructions, and of all of his extant literary works, including his self-annotated poetic autobiography and a never-before-translated fragmentary rhapsody, as well as of his biographies in dynastic histories.
Ten years had passed, and she had lost her sight. She did not know that scum of a man was cruel and cruel, and did not know that scum of a woman was a fake snake or a scorpion! He had his hands and feet cut off, and his shoulder blades were gouged out. He had died a miserable death in the depths of the cold palace! Once she was reborn, she slashed through everything as she moved closer to Shangguan Hong. "Shangguan Hong, why would I, Murong Sheng, let you go?! Even if I die, I will bring you along with me on the path to the Yellow Springs!
The Liang dynasty (502-557) is one of the most brilliant and creative periods in Chinese history and one of the most underestimated and misunderstood. Under the Liang, literary activities, such as writing, editing, anthologizing, and cataloguing, were pursued on an unprecedented scale, yet the works of this era are often dismissed as "decadent" and no more than a shallow prelude to the glories of the Tang. This book is devoted to contextualizing the literary culture of this era--not only the literary works themselves but also the physical process of literary production such as the copying and transmitting of texts; activities such as book collecting, anthologizing, cataloguing, and various forms of literary scholarship; and the intricate interaction of religion, particularly Buddhism, and literature. Its aim is to explore the impact of social and political structure on the literary world.
Winner of the 2016 Choice Outstanding Academic Title Award This book is the first long-term study of the Sino-Tibetan borderland. It traces relationships and mutual influence among Tibetans, Chinese, Hui Muslims, Qiang and others over some 600 years, focusing on the old Chinese garrison city of Songpan and the nearby religious center of Huanglong, or Yellow Dragon. Combining historical research and fieldwork, Xiaofei Kang and Donald Sutton examine the cultural politics of northern Sichuan from early Ming through Communist revolution to the age of global tourism, bringing to light creative local adaptations in culture, ethnicity and religion as successive regimes in Beijing struggle to control and transform this distant frontier.
For more than five centuries the shamanistic fox cult has attracted large portions of the Chinese population and appealed to a wide range of social classes. Deemed illicit by imperial rulers and clerics and officially banned by republican and communist leaders, the fox cult has managed to survive and flourish in individual homes and community shrines throughout northern China. In this new work, the first to examine the fox cult as a vibrant popular religion, Xiaofei Kang explores the manifold meanings of the fox spirit in Chinese society. Kang describes various cult practices, activities of worship, and the exorcising of fox spirits to reveal how the Chinese people constructed their cultural and social values outside the gaze of offical power and morality.
Enchanted Revolution moves religion and gender to center stage in the Chinese Communist revolution, examining the mobilizational dynamics of anti-superstition propaganda in support of the Communist Party's rise from rural backwaters to national dominance. Xiaofei Kang argues that religion was not merely adversary for the revolutionaries-it also served as a model for the ways in which the Party mobilized support and constructed legitimacy. In this parallel and often paradoxical process, the Party attacked "superstitions" that had long supported the foundations of Chinese religious life. At the same time, Party propaganda co-opted these same religious resources for its own political ends. Kang demonstrates that the persuasive power of Party propaganda relied heavily on recasting the cosmic forces of yin and yang that sustained the traditional gender hierarchy and ritual order. Moreover, revolutionary art and literature revamped old narratives of female ghosts and ritual exorcism to inject the people with a new masculinist vision of the Party-state endowed with both scientific potency and the heavenly mandate. Gendered language and symbolism in Chinese religion thus remained central to inspiring pathos, ethos, and logos for the revolution. Enchanted Revolution sheds light on the contemporary significance of the Maoist legacy in China through a deft exploration of the complex interplay of religion, gender, and revolution.
Freezing and thawing of soils is a common phenomenon in the winter-cold zone. The thesis titled “Material Cycling of Wetland Soils Driven by Freeze-Thaw Effects” systematically explores the freeze-thaw effects on the accumulation and release processes of carbon and nitrogen in wetland soils, which is a good step toward the investigation of biogeochemical processes in wetlands in seasonal freeze-thaw areas. It is also developing strategies aimed at global warming effects on the accumulation and release of carbon and nitrogen in wetlands. Dr. Xiaofei Yu works at the Northeast Institute of Geography and Agroecology, Chinese Academy of Sciences, China.
On the day of the wedding, not only did the bridal sedan chair of his beloved not arrive, it was instead carried into the palace to celebrate for the old emperor. The old emperor passed away, the one in love stepped on her to succeed the throne. As the Conspiracy Consort, her limbs and veins were all cut off by aphrodisiac, and she was buried in the Tomb of the Underground Emperor! In exchange for her death, all the chickens and dogs in the world would be raised to the heavens!When she woke up again, time had flowed back to three years ago. She was still a weak girl, her father was kind and her mother was kind, her sister was cute, and the person in her heart was still a modest gentleman. Huo Mingzhu sneered from the bottom of her heart. All of the peaceful love and camaraderie was just an illusion. She had already lost her life and would never believe their flowery words again.
The Liang dynasty (502-557) is one of the most brilliant and creative periods in Chinese history and one of the most underestimated and misunderstood. Under the Liang, literary activities, such as writing, editing, anthologizing, and cataloguing, were pursued on an unprecedented scale, yet the works of this era are often dismissed as "decadent" and no more than a shallow prelude to the glories of the Tang. This book is devoted to contextualizing the literary culture of this era--not only the literary works themselves but also the physical process of literary production such as the copying and transmitting of texts; activities such as book collecting, anthologizing, cataloguing, and various forms of literary scholarship; and the intricate interaction of religion, particularly Buddhism, and literature. Its aim is to explore the impact of social and political structure on the literary world.
As medieval Chinese manuscripts were copied and recopied through the centuries, both mistakes and deliberate editorial changes were introduced. Xiaofei Tian shows how readers not only experience authors but "produce" them by shaping texts to their interpretation, focusing on the evolution over the centuries of the reclusive poet Tao Yuanming into a figure of epic stature.
Ten years of love in exchange for a heart-wrenching pain, she resolutely chose to flee. When she saw her again, there were two little bun by her side."Mr. Li, please behave yourself. The child has nothing to do with you.
Ten years had passed, and she had lost her sight. She did not know that scum of a man was cruel and cruel, and did not know that scum of a woman was a fake snake or a scorpion! He had his hands and feet cut off, and his shoulder blades were gouged out. He had died a miserable death in the depths of the cold palace! Once she was reborn, she slashed through everything as she moved closer to Shangguan Hong. "Shangguan Hong, why would I, Murong Sheng, let you go?! Even if I die, I will bring you along with me on the path to the Yellow Springs!
The turn of the third century CE—known as the Jian’an era or Three Kingdoms period—holds double significance for the Chinese cultural tradition. Its writings laid the foundation of classical poetry and literary criticism. Its historical personages and events have also inspired works of poetry, fiction, drama, film, and art throughout Chinese history, including Internet fantasy literature today. There is a vast body of secondary literature on these two subjects individually, but very little on their interface.The image of the Jian’an era, with its feasting, drinking, heroism, and literary panache, as well as intense male friendship, was to return time and again in the romanticized narrative of the Three Kingdoms. How did Jian’an bifurcate into two distinct nostalgias, one of which was the first paradigmatic embodiment of wen (literary graces, cultural patterning), and the other of wu (heroic martial virtue)? How did these largely segregated nostalgias negotiate with one another? And how is the predominantly male world of the Three Kingdoms appropriated by young women in contemporary China? The Halberd at Red Cliff investigates how these associations were closely related in their complex origins and then came to be divergent in their later metamorphoses.
For more than five centuries the shamanistic fox cult has attracted large portions of the Chinese population and appealed to a wide range of social classes. Deemed illicit by imperial rulers and clerics and officially banned by republican and communist leaders, the fox cult has managed to survive and flourish in individual homes and community shrines throughout northern China. In this new work, the first to examine the fox cult as a vibrant popular religion, Xiaofei Kang explores the manifold meanings of the fox spirit in Chinese society. Kang describes various cult practices, activities of worship, and the exorcising of fox spirits to reveal how the Chinese people constructed their cultural and social values outside the gaze of offical power and morality.
China’s past and present have been in a continuous dialogue throughout history, one that is heavily influenced by time and language: the temporal orientation and the linguistic apparatus used to express and solidify identity, ideas, and practices. Presenting a host of in-depth case studies, Time and Language: New Sinology and Chinese History argues for and demonstrates the significance of “New Sinology” by restoring the role of language/philology in the research and understanding of how modern China emerged. Reading the modern as a careful and ongoing conversation with the past renders the “new” in a different perspective. This volume is a significant step toward a new historical narrative of China’s modern history, one wherein “ruptures” can exist in tandem with continuities. The collection accentuates the deep connection between language and power—one that spans well across China’s long past—and hence the immense consequences of linguistic-related methodology to the comprehension of power structures and identity in China. Each of the essays in this volume tackles these issues, the methodological and the thematic, from a different angle but they all share the Sinological prism of analysis and the basic understanding that a much longer timeframe is required to make sense of Chinese modernity. The languages examined are diverse, including modern and classical Chinese, as well as Manchu and Japanese. Taken together they bring a spectrum of linguistic perspectives and hence a spectrum of power relations and identities to the forefront. While the essays focus on late Qing and early twentieth-century eras, they refer often to earlier periods, which are necessary to making real sense of later eras. The methodological and the thematic do not only converge, but also generate a plea for fostering and expanding this approach in current and future studies.
The structure, content, and imagery of The World of a Tiny Insect reveals a carefully crafted, fragmented narrative that skips in time and probes the relationships between trauma and memory, revealing both history and its psychic impact. Xiaofei Tian's annotated translation includes an introduction that situates The World of a Tiny Insect in Chinese history and literature and explores the relevance of the book to the workings of traumatic memory. Zhang Daye (b. 1854) is known only as the author of The World of a Tiny Insect. Xiaofei Tian is professor of Chinese literature at Harvard University. Among her recent publications is Visionary Journeys: Travel Writings from Early Medieval and Nineteenth-Century China."The author and narrator recounts his terrible experiences and miraculous survivals with a child's curiosity and in a vivid, straightforward way. But he also embeds what happened to him in a larger historical, philosophical, moral, and aesthetic context.
Enchanted Revolution moves religion and gender to center stage in the Chinese Communist revolution, examining the mobilizational dynamics of anti-superstition propaganda in support of the Communist Party's rise from rural backwaters to national dominance. Xiaofei Kang argues that religion was not merely adversary for the revolutionaries-it also served as a model for the ways in which the Party mobilized support and constructed legitimacy. In this parallel and often paradoxical process, the Party attacked "superstitions" that had long supported the foundations of Chinese religious life. At the same time, Party propaganda co-opted these same religious resources for its own political ends. Kang demonstrates that the persuasive power of Party propaganda relied heavily on recasting the cosmic forces of yin and yang that sustained the traditional gender hierarchy and ritual order. Moreover, revolutionary art and literature revamped old narratives of female ghosts and ritual exorcism to inject the people with a new masculinist vision of the Party-state endowed with both scientific potency and the heavenly mandate. Gendered language and symbolism in Chinese religion thus remained central to inspiring pathos, ethos, and logos for the revolution. Enchanted Revolution sheds light on the contemporary significance of the Maoist legacy in China through a deft exploration of the complex interplay of religion, gender, and revolution.
Winner of the 2016 Choice Outstanding Academic Title Award This book is the first long-term study of the Sino-Tibetan borderland. It traces relationships and mutual influence among Tibetans, Chinese, Hui Muslims, Qiang and others over some 600 years, focusing on the old Chinese garrison city of Songpan and the nearby religious center of Huanglong, or Yellow Dragon. Combining historical research and fieldwork, Xiaofei Kang and Donald Sutton examine the cultural politics of northern Sichuan from early Ming through Communist revolution to the age of global tourism, bringing to light creative local adaptations in culture, ethnicity and religion as successive regimes in Beijing struggle to control and transform this distant frontier.
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