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The River Fans Out

Literature and its Theories in China

  • Book
  • © 2020

Overview

Authors:
  1. Yiheng Zhao

    1. College of Literature and Journalism, Sichuan University, Chengdu, China

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  • Provides a comprehensive and unique cultural and historical approach to Chinese literature
  • Presents an in-depth empirical study of the development and characteristics of Chinese literature
  • Introduces Chinese literature to the world

Part of the book series: China Academic Library (CHINALIBR)

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Table of contents (19 chapters)

  1. Front Matter

    Pages i-vii
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  3. Traditional Chinese Literature

    1. Front Matter

      Pages 51-51
      Download chapter PDF

    2. Subculture as Moral Paradox: A Study of the Texts of the White Rabbit Play

      • Yiheng Zhao
      Pages 53-80

    3. Historiography and Fiction in Chinese Culture

      • Yiheng Zhao
      Pages 81-105

    4. Chinese Fiction and Its Narrator

      • Yiheng Zhao
      Pages 107-145

    5. The Cultural Status of Chinese Fiction

      • Yiheng Zhao
      Pages 147-164

    6. The Second Tide: Chinese Influence on American Poetry Today

      • Yiheng Zhao
      Pages 165-176
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Keywords

About this book

This book presents 18 highly influential essays on Chinese literature and semiotics by Professor Zhao Yiheng, including his analysis and discussions of the development of Chinese literature and its characteristics from traditional to modern times. It is divided into three parts: traditional Chinese literature, contemporary Chinese literature, and semiotics. In the first part, Professor Zhao summarizes the core elements of narrative cultural relations, ethical dilemmas, and narrative features. He also provides a comprehensive description of the formal structures in Chinese traditional literature. Taking the traditional Chinese play White Rabbit as a case, he discusses the connections between the narrative structure and the characteristics of Chinese novels and stratification of Chinese culture. 

Authors and Affiliations

  • College of Literature and Journalism, Sichuan University, Chengdu, China

    Yiheng Zhao

About the author

Yiheng Zhao (1943-), Professor of Semiotics and Narratology at the College of Literature & Journalism, Sichuan University, Chengdu, China, is currently the Director of ISMS (the Institute of Semiotics & Media Studies), Chairman of the Academic Committee of ACCS (The Association of Chinese Communication and Semiotic Studies), and member of the Collegium of IASS (The International Association of Semiotic Studies).  


He graduated from Nanjing University (B.A. 1968), the Graduate School of the Academy of Social Sciences (M.A. 1982), and the University of California, Berkeley (Ph.D. 1987). He taught at the School of Oriental & African Studies, University of London, for almost 20 years before resettling in China.  


He specializes in formal studies of art, literature, and culture. Since the late 1970s, he wrote two dozens of books and around 250 essays on those topics. His major works include The Uneasy Narrator (1994), Toward a Modern Zen Theatre (2001) in English, The Muse from Cathay (1983), Semiotics of Literature (1984), Comparative Narratology (1994), The Lure of the Other Bank (2003), Semiotics: Principles and Problems (2011), A General Narratology (2013), and Philosophical Semiotics (2017) in Chinese. Some of his works were republished in his 8-volume Selected Works (2013), and 12-volume Collected Works (2019). 

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