Image credit: Yunfei Faye Dai
LANXIN SHI
Read the Faculty Introduction here.
“Men speak and always will speak of what fills their souls and no poetic,
whether it be that of Tolstoy or of Aristotle,
will be able to suppress the sufferings accumulated in them.”
(Shestov 88)
Introduction
In this essay, I will discuss Ibsenism as a phenomenon of the so-called “Weltliteratur” (i.e., World Literature) under the context of early 20th century China through a close analysis of the local reception towards it. I will argue that World Literature is no omnipotent medicine universal and adaptable for all cultures, but rather, a dynamic conversation joined by both the host culture and the source culture. That is to say, the ideal of World Literature is realized through the metamorphosis of the ideas embodied within the text. This metamorphosis is made possible not only by the text of origin alone, but also by the effort of the audience critically examining the foreign ideas. In the case of Ibsenism and its reception in China, as I will show with detail, the spirit of the original text has undergone a variety of challenges and reinterpretations in order to be able to adequately contribute to the dynamic social forum of early 20th century China.
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