Literature and Modern China

Disturbing Reality and Narratives of Hope

Ailin Li — 2025-09-17

This paper explores late Qing and early Republican Chinese intellectuals’ construction of the youth in utopian literature and thought. Utopianism, as a literary genre, was introduced to China at the end of the nineteenth century and spread among revolutionary elites as a way to reflect on the undesirable present and project their hope for an imaginary optimistic future. The younger generation, burdened with the cultural symbolism of possibility and progress in narratives of hope, became crucial in the utopian envisioning of a perfect China in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. From the perspective of cultural history, this paper uses utopian novels and writings from the 1890s to the 1910s to argue that early modern China’s utopian dreams transformed the nation’s youth from those under protection in traditional crisis heterotopias to hopeful agents in the wishful project of reshaping China to perfection. Chinese intellectuals associated the youth with utopian power in saving the nation, culturally reconstructing the responsibility of youth as reordering China, cultivating new citizens, and regaining the nation’s historical fame. Traditional Chinese descriptions of youth utopia in the Confucian worldview were recast with modernized meanings, though gendered connotations of the Confucianist youth-society relationship still existed in early modern Chinese intellectuals’ design of a perfect world. Western influences also shaped the Chinese utopian dream of overseas students and female youths in sci-tec improvements and ideological enlightenment, bringing a transcultural perspective to textual analysis of early modern Chinese youth in utopias.

Visions of Utopia and Dystopia in Modern Chinese Literature and Culture

Hang Tu — 2025-09-17

N/A

From Provincializing Tianxia to Constructing National Imperialism

Chengxin Peng — 2025-09-17

This article examines the transformation of China’s global positioning from the late-Qing dynasty through a “Global South” perspective, focusing on its evolving relationship with the Nanyang (South Seas) region. It challenges dominant narratives of China’s modern history as a linear transition from Tianxia (All Under Heaven) to the nation-state, revealing instead a shift from “Provincializing Tianxia”to “Constructing National Imperialism.” The study critically enganges with intellectual discourses from key figures such as Wei Yuan, Liang Qichao, Yang Yunshi, and Yi Benxi, illustrating how early-Qing thinkers sought to integrate Nanyang into a strategic anti-colonial alliance, while later reformists and revolutionaries conceptualized it as China’s “natural colony.” By analyzing these shifting imaginaries, this article highlights the paradoxical coexistence of anti-colonialism and imperial aspirations in modern Chinese thought, contributing to a more nuanced understanding of China’s role in Global history.

Otherworldly Travels

Song Abel Han — 2025-09-17

Mediating between the normal and the strange, zhiguai stories are always understood as ways of border crossing, utopian imaginary, and self-expression of the literati. Yet one question is seldom asked: how does the imaginary evolve, particularly when the “strange” narratives became conventional and predictable in modern times? Scrutinizing a recurring trope of “otherworldly travels,” I argue that late Qing zhiguai turns the fantastic journeys into a secular dimension, featuring international journeys, realistic concerns, and new technologies. The utopian travels thus are infused with realistic concerns and real foreign places when the world has been brought to China. In the era of lithography, the desire for approachability becomes a newfangled visual experience that needs to be engaged and (dis)enchanted. The plotted fictionality of zhiguai, moreover, became a writing formula to cope with the speeding publication. I treat the modern experiences -- ocean liner, chemistry, photography -- as the “substance” of the fantasy, examining how they inscribe and exceed the predecessors as in material history. With a focus on fiction by Wang Tao 王韜 (1828-1897) and Zou Tao 鄒弢 (1850-1931), this paper aims to explore how late Qing writing imagines the utopia in the face of maritime discovery and mechanical reproduction, instead of what has been represented or done.

Utopia, Tongzhi, The Membranes

Yufan Chen — 2025-09-17

This article explores the intersection of queer utopianism, cyborgian embodiment, and literary critiquein Chi Ta-wei’s The Membranes. Drawing from queer theory, affect studies, and utopian studies, itexamines how the novel engages with speculative futures, gender fluidity, and technological mediation. The text destabilizes convential binaries–body/machine, inside/outside, real/simulated–through the protagonist Momo’s disembodied yet hyper-sensory experience in a cybernetic dystopia. The discussion contextualizes the novel within broader Sinophone queer studies, interrogating the shifting meanings of tongzhi (comrade) and ku’er (queer) in relation to transnational discourses. By critically engaging with Muñoz’s reparative utopianism and Baudrillard’s hyperreality, the article argues that The Membranes stages a paradoxical queer futurity, where identity, embodiment, and reality are perpetually deferred. This reading underscores the novel’s significance in challenging normative epistemologies of gender and sexuality, while exposing the fragility of utopian aspirations in hyperreal landscapes.

She-SF

Xinran wang — 2025-09-17

This essay examines the contested landscape of contemporary Chinese She-SF as a queer utopia—an intricate blend of literary genre, highly gendered imaginings, and socio-cultural blueprints. The first section explores and defines She-SF in its socio-historical context, providing a brief introduction of the She-SF panorama. The second part introduces two crucial concepts: China’s “new women” and “queer utopia.” The term “new women” is derived from Tani Barlow’s analysis of the historical catachresis nüxing 女性 and the intricate historical context surrounding this concept in modern China and the concept of “queer utopia” builds on the queerness found in Virginia Woolf’s endorsement of “androgyny.” I connect these two concepts to situate She-SF within the realm of Chinese feminist development and Western queer theory, complicating our understanding of Chinese new women.

The Romantic Reconstruction of Su Shi

Xiaojun Tan — 2025-09-17

This study delves into the profound impact of mobile game literature on the romantic reconstruction of Chinese historical figures and traditional culture. Focusing on the image of Su Shi (蘇軾，1037-1101) within the mobile game Mo Hun (Ink Spirits 墨魂), I investigate how the game narratives challenge prevailing stereotypes while crafting a modern and relatable image of Su Shi. The distinct nature of game narratives, diverging from traditional media, coupled with the dynamic player community, fosters a collective sense of historical nostalgia among young Chinese people. This narrative transformation not only meets contemporary yearnings for a romantic historical imagination but also underscores the potent role of literature in reshaping the reception of historical figures.