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Anecdote, Network, Gossip, Performance is a study of the Shishuo
xinyu, the most important anecdotal collection of medieval
China—and arguably of the entire traditional era. In a set of
interconnected essays, Jack W. Chen offers new readings of the
Shishuo xinyu that draw upon social network analysis, performance
studies, theories of ritual and mourning, and concepts of gossip
and reputation to illuminate how the anecdotes of the collection
imagine and represent a political and cultural elite. Whereas most
accounts of the Shishuo have taken a historical approach, Chen
argues that the work should be understood in literary terms. At its
center, Anecdote, Network, Gossip, Performance is an extended
meditation on the very nature of the anecdote form, both what the
anecdote affords in terms of representing a social community and
how it provides a space for the rehearsal of certain longstanding
philosophical and cultural arguments. Although each of the chapters
may be read separately as an essay in its own right, when taken
together, they present a comprehensive account of the Shishuo in
all of its literary complexity.
Literary History in and beyond China: Reading Text and World
explores the idea of literary history across the long span of the
Chinese tradition. Although much scholarship on Chinese literature
may be characterized as doing the work of literary history, there
has been little theoretical engagement with received literary
historical categories and assumptions, with how literary historical
judgments are formed, and with what it means to do literary history
in the first place. The present collection of essays addresses
these questions from perspectives emerging both from within the
tradition and from without, examining the anthological histories
that shape the concept of a particular genre, the interpretive
positions that impel our aesthetic judgments, the conceptual
categories that determine how literary history is framed, and the
history of literary historiography itself. As such, the essays
collectively consider what it means to think through the framework
of literary history, what literary history affords or omits, and
what needs to be theorized in terms of literary history’s
constraints and possibilities.
"Information" has become a core concept across the disciplines, yet
it is still often seen as a unique feature of the Western world
that became central only in the digital age. In this book, leading
experts turn to China's textual tradition to show the significance
of information for reconceptualizing the work of literary history,
from its beginnings to the present moment. Contributors trace the
organization of literary information across China's three millennia
of history, examining the forms and practices of information
management that have evolved alongside the increasing scale and
complexity of textual production. They reimagine literary history
as information processing, detailing the many kinds of storage,
encoding, sorting, and transmission that constitute and feed back
into China's long and ever-growing cultural tradition. The volume
features state-of-the-field essays on all major forms of literary
information management, from graphs to internet literature, and
from commentaries to literary museums and archives. By shifting
focus from individual works and their authors to the informatic
schemata of literature, it identifies three scales of information
management-the word, the document, and the collection-and surveys
the forms that operate at each level, such as the dictionary, the
anthology, and the library. Literary Information in China is a
groundbreaking work that provides a systematic and innovative
reassessment of literary history with implications that extend
beyond the particular Chinese context, revealing how informatic
practices shape literary tradition.
Emperor Taizong (r. 626-49) of the Tang is remembered as an
exemplary ruler. This study addresses that aura of virtuous
sovereignty and Taizong's construction of a reputation for moral
rulership through his own literary writings-with particular
attention to his poetry. The author highlights the relationship
between historiography and the literary and rhetorical strategies
of sovereignty, contending that, for Taizong, and for the concept
of sovereignty in general, politics is inextricable from cultural
production. The work focuses on Taizong's literary writings that
speak directly to the relationship between cultural form and
sovereign power, as well as on the question of how the Tang
negotiated dynastic identity through literary stylistics. The
author maintains that Taizong's writings may have been self-serving
at times, representing strategic attempts to control his self-image
in the eyes of his court and empire, but that they also become the
ideal image to which his self was normatively bound. This is the
paradox at the heart of imperial authorship: Taizong was
simultaneously the author of his representation and was authored by
his representation; he was both subject and object of his writings.
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Idle Talk (Paperback)
Jack W Chen, David Schaberg
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R1,268
Discovery Miles 12 680
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Ships in 10 - 15 working days
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Gossip and anecdote may be "idle talk," but they also serve to knit
together individuals in society and to provide the materials
through which literary culture and historical memory are
constructed. This groundbreaking book provides a cultural history
of gossip and anecdote in traditional China, beginning with the Han
dynasty and ending with the Qing. The ten essays, along with the
introduction and postface, address the verification, transmission,
and interpretation of gossip and anecdote across literary and
historical genres. Contributors: Sarah M. Allen, Beverly J.
Bossler, Jack W. Chen, Ronald Egan, Dore J. Levy, Stephen Owen,
Graham Sanders, David Schaberg, Anna M. Shields, Richard E.
Strassberg, and, Xiaofei Tian.
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