Overview
This mammoth study is a major contribution to the study of Chinese literature, making available to scholars a genuine storyteller’s script from China’s Yangzhou oral tradition, dated to the late Qing period (1880-1910). This rare script is published in its complete form, both in facsimile and transcription, with an English translation also made. Its publication is of high importance not only to preserve knowledge about one of the famous oral traditions of China, but also as a unique documentation of the interplay between orality and literacy in Chinese storytelling. The book is also the first translation into a European language of the popular ‘Western Han’ narrative, one of a corpus of Chinese semi-historical romances brought to life in recent decades after the discovery in 1974 of the terracotta army commemorating the life and achievements of the first Chinese emperor. Moreover, this storyteller’s version is unique and entertaining. The work is an ideal classroom book for students studying Chinese history, literature, oral literature, storytelling, etc.
Full Product Details
Author: Vibeke Børdahl ,
Liangyan Ge
Publisher: NIAS Press
Imprint: NIAS Press
Volume: 139
Dimensions:
Width: 19.30cm
, Height: 4.30cm
, Length: 27.60cm
Weight: 0.825kg
ISBN: 9788776942144
ISBN 10: 8776942147
Pages: 720
Publication Date: 30 June 2017
Audience:
Professional and scholarly
,
Professional & Vocational
Format: Hardback
Publisher's Status: Active
Availability: Temporarily unavailable
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Reviews
This discovery of a genuine storyteller's script has huge implications for scholars of traditional Chinese literature, since the novel was modeled on oral storytelling and the exact relationship between them has been a subject of ongoing debate. Publishing the full script will allow scholars to use this rare find to investigate many vital questions in Chinese popular culture (Margaret Wan). [A]n excellent collaborative effort between two of the most accomplished scholars in the study of Chinese oral literature (Mark Bender).
Author Information
Vibeke Bordahl is a senior research fellow at the Nordic Institute of Asian Studies, Copenhagen University. Regarded as the world authority on Yangzhou storytelling, she has published widely and contributed greatly to the study of the more general field of traditional Chinese storytelling and related written texts. Liangyan Ge is Professor of East Asian Languages and Cultures at the University of Notre Dame. Seen as being at the forefront of current research on Chinese storytelling, his research interests include premodern Chinese vernacular fiction and the interplay between the oral and the written in Chinese popular culture and literature.
