Literary Criticism : Asian

The most extensive account of Chinese literary history to date – spanning some 3,000 years – the Geschichte der chinesischen Literatur presents the historical development of each literary genre from the beginnings to the present day. Renowned scholars were involved in portraying the longest literary tradition alive. Seven volumes focus on individual genres and the complete work is rounded off by the Bibliographie zur chinesischen Literatur in deutscher Sprache (Bibliography of Chinese Literature in German), the Biographisches Handbuch chinesischer Schriftsteller (Biographical Handbook of Chinese Writers), and an index volume. The fifth volume follows the history of reflection on literature and art in China from the beginning of the first millennium BC up to China’s transition to the modern period (19th/20th century). The focus is on writings on the aesthetic aspects of poetry, the most important literary form in China. The topics range from the merging of scenery and feelings, the balance of content and form, harmony of the internal and external worlds, and natural creativity, to the “Regel der Nicht-Regel” (rule of no rule). Relations to painting and the art of writing as well as philosophical developments such as Confucianism, Daoism and Buddhism, are also demonstrated. The Geschichte der chinesischen Literatur provides the first comprehensive coverage of a formidable cultural achievement, stretching back over three millennia and embracing many forms and subjects. Upon completion, the entire work will amount to a rich fund for sinological research, whilst also forming a stimulating source for comparative studies with other philologies and cultural sciences. more...

Price: $207.00

On publication Arundhati Roy's first novel The God of Small Things (1997) rapidly became an international bestseller, winning the Booker Prize and creating a new space for Indian literature and culture within the arts, even as it courted controversy and divided critical opinion. This guide to Roy’s ground-breaking novel offers:.:.; an accessible introduction to the text and contexts of The God of Small Things.; a critical history, surveying the many interpretations of the text from publication to the present.; a selection of new essays and reprinted critical essays by Padmini Mongia, Aijaz Ahmad, Brinda Bose, Anna Clarke, Émilienne Baneth-Nouailhetas and Alex Tickell on The God of Small Things , providing a range of perspectives on the novel and extending the coverage of key critical approaches identified in the survey section.; cross-references between sections of the guide, in order to suggest links between texts, contexts and criticism.; suggestions for further reading. Part of the Routledge Guides to Literature series, this volume is essential reading for all those beginning detailed study of The God of Small Things and seeking not only a guide to the novel, but a way through the wealth of contextual and critical material that surrounds Roy's text. more...

Price: $28.95

This book explores one of the crucial themes in postwar Japanese fiction. Through an examination of the work of a number of prominent twentieth century Japanese writers, the book analyses the meaning of the body in postwar Japanese discourse. more...

Price: $190.00

This volume is a survey of modern Chinese literature in the second half of the 20th century. It has three goals: to introduce figures, works, movements, and debates that constitute the dynamics of Chinese literature from 1949 to the end of the century; to depict the enunciative endeavors, ranging from ideological treatises to avant-garde experiments, that inform the polyphonic discourse of Chinese cultural politics; and to observe the historical factors that enacted the interplay of literary (post)modernities across Chinese communities in the Mainland, Taiwan, Hong Kong, and overseas. more...

Price: $31.95

Cosmopolitan Publics focuses on China's "cosmopolitans"-Western-educated intellectuals who returned to Shanghai in the late 1920s to publish in English and who, ultimately, became both cultural translators and citizens of the wider world. Shuang Shen highlights their work in publications such as The China Critic and T'ien Hsia, providing readers with a broader understanding of the role and function of cultural mixing, translation, and multilingualism in China's cultural modernity. The influence of the cosmopolitans is neglected and the significance of cosmopolitan practice is underplayed due to narrowly defined notions of national culture in Chinese studies. Shen’s encompassing book revisits and presents the experience of Chinese modernity as far more heterogeneous, emergent, and transnational than it has been characterized until now. more...

Price: $36.00