Narrative and Genre: Locating Tanci in Chinese Literature and World Literature

Document Type

Contribution to Book

Journal/Book Title/Conference

A Companion to World Literature

Editor

K. Seigneurie

Publisher

Wiley-Blackwell Publishing, Inc.

Publication Date

12-19-2019

First Page

1

Last Page

12

Abstract

This chapter provides an introduction to the origin and stylistic features of the genre of tanci, an exploration of the themes of women-authored tanci, a study of gender and nationhood in Zixuji (A tale of vacuity, 1883), and suggestions for future directions for study. The chapter investigates how tanci works as chantefable narratives expand current studies on the rise of the novel in non-Western vernacular traditions. Probing into representations of desire, disguises, and non-normative gendered relations, I propose that tanci allows women's temporary freedom and their negotiations between obedience and resistance under confining environments. A case study illustrates that tanci works portray women's enactment of nationalist passions and their political agency. The chapter concludes with discussions of further themes to study, including anonymous authorship as gendered and ideological responses, early modern women's homoeroticism, translation of early modern notions of the nation, and tanci works' representations of racialized femininity and interracial marriages.

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