Course Proposal under 01:170 Chinese Studies
Course Title: 01:170:284: Chinese Philosophical Themes and Literary Writings
Course Description:
Exploration of the philosophical ideas of Confucianism, Daoism, Buddhism, and other
schools of thoughts as reflected in Chinese literary writings such as Chinese poetry, prose,
rhymed prose, informal essays, transformation texts, short stories, novels, and drama
from ancient times to modern China.
Rationale:
Confucianism, Daoism, and Buddhism all had a profound influence on the development
of Chinese literary writings and at one time or another harnessed the power of literature
to disseminate their ideas among the elite and masses alike. The rise of certain literary
genres such as landscape poetry (Daoism), Yuan drama (Daoism), or the full-length
vernacular novel (Buddhism) and the beginnings of Chinese literary criticism
(Confucianism), for example, are closely associated with one or the other of these
philosophical traditions. Furthermore, many works in the Chinese literary canon are
informed by core ideas and values derived from them. Rather than to consider these
ideas and values as “background” of the literary writings to be discussed, this course will
study the philosophical themes in individual works in their own right and consider them
as one of the forces shaping the larger intellectual discourse throughout Chinese literary
history.
Course Requirements:
 Attendance and participation
 Midterm Exam
 Term Paper (10-15 pages on assigned topics)
 Final Exam
 Assigned individual or group project (optional)
Course Schedule and Assigned Readings:
Week 1
Week 2
Man, Heaven, and Earth in Classical China as Reflected in the Yijing
(Book of Changes)
(1) The interplay of heaven, earth, and man
Wilhelm, Eight Lectures, Chapter 1, Concept of Change
Wilhelm, Heaven, Earth, and Man, Chapter 5
(2) The meanings of human events
Wilhelm, Heaven, Earth, and Man, Chapter 3
Wilhelm, Eight Lectures, Chapter 8
Confucian Ideas on Human Relationships and the Book of Poetry
(1) Ancestors, kings, and the people
Waley, Book of Songs, selections from Minor Odes, Major Odes and
Hymns
Yu, ed. Ways With Words, Chapter 1, Classic of Poetry Nr. 245, “Birth
Week 3
Week 4
Week 5
Week 6
Week 7
of the People”
(2) Courtship, marriage, and village life
Waley, Book of Songs, selections from the Airs of the States and Minor
Odes
Granet, Festivals and Songs of Ancient China, Part I, Chapters 1 & 3;
Part II, Chapters 1, 2, & 3
Confucian Emphasis on Moral Judgment and Independence as Seen in
Early Historical Writings (Chunqiu, Zhanguo ce, Shiji)
(1) Stories, historical exempla, and speeches in Chunqiu and Zhanguo
ce
Owen, Anthology, “Early Narrative,” pp. 77-81, 87-99
Ng and Wang, Mirroring the Past, Chapter 1
(2) The historian, the authorities, and historical judgment
Owen, Anthology, “Sima Qian,” 135-154
Ng and Wang, Mirroring the Past, Chapter 2
Prusek, “History and Epics”
Human Frailty and Suffering in Chinese Five-Word Poetry
(1) Warfare and separation in the Han yuefu (Music Bureau poems)
Owen, Anthology, “Yuefu,” pp. 227-243
Allen, In the Voice of Others, Chapters 2 & 3
(2) Reflections on the human condition in the Nineteen Old Poems
Owen, Anthology, “Beginnings of Classical Poetry,” pp. 253-262
Kao, “Nineteen Old Poems”
Harmony of Man and Nature in Chinese Landscape Poetry
(1) Pastoral Serenity
Owen, Anthology, “Tao Qian,” pp. 311-318
Kwong, “Farmstead Poetry”
(2) The poetic exegesis of the principle of silence
Owen, Anthology, “Wang Wei,” pp. 385-395
Yang, Chan Interpretations of Wang Wei, Chapter 4
Philosophical Foundations of Chinese Literary Criticism: The Influence
of Confucianism, Daoism, and Buddhism
(1) The Confucian views of literature
Confucius, Analects, selections
Owen, Readings in Chinese Literary Thought, Chapter 1
Holzman, "Confucius and Ancient Chinese Literary Criticism"
(2) The coalescence of the three schools in the Wenxin diaolong
Owen, Anthology, “Wen-xin diao-long,” pp. 343-359
Cai, “Making of a Critical System”
Impermanence and Transcendence in the Tang Tale
(1) Vulnerability of human nature
Owen, Anthology, “Ying-ying’s Story,” pp. 540-557
Owen, End of Chinese Middle Ages, “Conflicting Interpretations:
‘Yingying’s Story’,” pp. 149-176
Week 8
(2) The supernatural and fantastic
Owen, Anthology, “Huo Xiao-yu’s Story,” pp. 531-539
Owen, End of Chinese Middle Ages, “Romance,” pp. 130-148
Retribution (bao), Karma, and Causality in Vernacular Fiction from
Tang to Ming
(1) Karma: the bond between Mother and Son
Mair, Tun-huang Popular Narratives, “Maudgalyāyana”
Teiser, The Ghost Festival in Medieval China, Chapters 4 and 5
Week 9
(2) Retribution: the relation between husband and wife
Feng Menglong, “The Pearl Shirt Reencountered”
Hanan, Chinese Vernacular Story, Chapter 5
Individual Desire and Societal Norms in Yuan drama
(1) Happiness and romance
Wang Shifu, The Story of the Western Wing, selections
West, “Innocence and Allure”
Week 10
(2) Social convention versus individual freedom
Shen Fen, “Chung-li of Han Leads Lan Ts’ai-ho to Enlightenment”
Idema and West, Chinese Theater, pp. 299-311
Human Agency as Depicted in Traditional Chinese Fiction
(1) The code of conduct of the warrior in historical fiction
Luo Guanzhong. Three Kingdoms, selections
Plaks, Four Masterworks of the Ming Novel, Chapter 5, pp. 441-476
Week 11
(2) Desire, seduction, and vanity in the domestic novel
Roy, trans. The Plum in the Golden Vase, or Ching P’ing Mei,
selections`
Ding, Obscene Things, Chapters 5 and 6, pp. 143-194
Syncretism of Confucianism, Daoism, and Buddhism in Chinese fiction
(1) “Unification of the three teachings” (san jiao he yi)
Yu, trans. The Journey to the West, selections
Plaks, Four Masterworks of the Ming Novel, Chapter 3, pp. 224-242
(2) Immanence vs. Transcendence
Tang Xianzu. The Peony Pavilion, selections
Pu Songling. Strange Tales of Liaozhai, selections
Week 12
Reality and Illusion from Han Rhapsody to the Dream of Red Chamber
(1) Veiled remonstration through illusion
Song Yu. “Rhapsody on the Gaotang Shrine”; “Rhapsody on the
Goddess”
Li, Enchantment and Disenchantment, Chapter 1, pp. 3-46
Week 13
Week 14
(2) This World vs. Other World
Cao Xueqin. The Story of the Stone, selections
Li, Enchantment and Disenchantment, Chapter 4, pp. 152-201
Self, Nation, and National Survival
(1) Individual and Nationhood
Zeng Pu. A Flower in the Sea of Sins, selections
Huters, "Impossible Representations: Visions of China and the West in
Flower in a Sea of Retribution"
(2) Construction through Deconstruction
Lu Xun. “Diary of Madman”; “Confucius in Modern China”; “On the
Power of Mara Poetry”
Yu Dafu. “Sinking”
Tsu. Failure, Nationalism, and Literature, Chapter 1, pp. 1-31
Wang Ban. "Irony and Social Criticism in Lu Xun's Fiction," pp. 37-48
Conclusion, Review, and Genera; Discussion
Required Books:
Cai, Zongqi. A Chinese Literary Mind: Culture, Creativity, and Rhetoric in Wenxin
Diaolong. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2002.
Ding, Naifei. Obscene Things: Sexual Politics in Jin Ping Mei. Durham: Duke
University Press, 2002.
Frankel, Hans H. The Flowering Plum and the Palace Lady: Interpretations of Chinese
Poetry. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1976.
Granet, Marcel. Festivals and Songs of Ancient China. Trans. E.D. Edwards. New York:
Gordon Press, 1975.
Hanan, Patrick. The Chinese Vernacular Story. Cambridge: Harvard University Press,
1981.
Huters, Theodore. "Impossible Representations: Visions of China and the West in Flower
in a Sea of Retribution." In Huters, Bringing the World Home: Appropriating the
West in Late Qing and Early Republican China. Honolulu: University of Hawaii
Press, 2005: 173-200.
Hsia, Chih-tsing. C.T. Hsia on Chinese Literature. New York: Columbia University
Press, 2004.
———. The Classic Chinese Novel; a Critical Introduction. New York: Columbia
University Press, 1968.
Kao, Yu-kung. “The Nineteen Old Poems and the Aesthetics of Self-Reflection.” In
Willard Peterson, et al., ed. The Power of Culture: Studies in Chinese Cultural
History. Hong Kong: Chinese University Press, 1994.
Kwong, Charles. “The Rural World of Chinese "Farmstead Poetry" (Tianyuan Shi): How Far Is It
Pastoral?” Chinese Literature: Essays, Articles, Reviews (CLEAR), Vol. 15, (Dec., 1993):
57-84
Li Wai-yee. Enchantment and Disenchantment. Princeton: Princeton University Press, .
Liu, James. Chinese Theories of Literature. Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1975.
———. The Interlingual Critic: Interpreting Chinese Poetry. Bloomington: University
of Indiana University Press, 1982.
Lu Xun. "Confucius in Modern China" [Zai xiandai Zhongguo de Kongfuzi]. Trans.
David Pollard. In Pollard, ed., The Chinese Essay. New York: Columbia University
Press, 2000: 121-28.
———. "On the Power of Mara Poetry" (excerpts). Trans. Shu-ying Tsau and D. Holoch.
Modern Chinese Literary Thought. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1996: 96109.
———. “Diary of a Madman.” In Diary of a Madman and Other Stories. Trans. William
A. Lyell. Hawaii: University of Hawai’i Press, 1990.
Luo Guanzhong. Three Kingdoms. A Historical Novel. Trans. Moss Roberts. Berkeley:
University of California Press, 1999.
Owen, Stephen. Readings in Chinese Literary Thought. Cambridge, Mass: Council on
East Asian Studies, Harvard University, 1992.
———. The End of the Chinese ’Middle Ages’: Essays in Mid-Tang Literary Culture.
Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1996.
———. An Anthology of Chinese Literature. New York: Norton, 1996.
Plaks, Andrew H. The Four Masterworks of the Ming Novel = Ssu Ta ch‘i-Shu.
Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1987.
Prusek, Jaroslav. “History and Epics in China and the West.” In Chinese History and
Literature. Collection of Studies. Dordrecht: Reidel, 1970.
Roy, David T., trans. The Plum in the Golden Vase, or Ching P’ing Mei. Princeton:
Princeton University Press, 1993 (Vol. 1), 2001 (Vol. 2).
Shen Fen. “Chung-li of Han Leads Lan Ts’ai-ho to Enlightenment.” Trans. Wilt Idema
and Stephen West. Chinese Theater. 1100-1450. A Sourcebook. Wiesbaden: Franz
Steiner Verlag, 1982: 313-340.
Song Yu. “Rhapsody on the Gaotang Shrine”; “Rhapsody on the Goddess.” Trans. David
R. Knechtges. Wen Xuan or Selections of Refined Literature. Vol. 3. Princeton:
Princeton University Press, 1996: 325-349.
Tsu, Ching. Failure, Nationalism, and Literature: The Making of Modern Chinese
Identity, 1895-1937. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2005.
Waley, Arthur, trans. The Book of Songs. Edited with Additional Translations by Jospeh
R. Allen. New York: Grove Press, 1996.
Wang, Ban. The sublime figure of history: aesthetics and politics in twentieth-century
China. Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997.
———. "Irony and Social Criticism in Lu Xun's Fiction." In Narrative Perspective and
Irony in Selected Chinese and American Fiction. Lewiston, NY: Edwin Mellen,
2002.
Wang Shifu. The Story of the Western Wing. Trans. Wilt Idema and Stephen West.
Berkeley: University of California Press, 1995.
West, Stephen H. “Innocence and Allure: The Characterization of Oriole in Wang Shifu’s
Story of the Western Wing.” In The Paradox of Virtue in Traditional Chinese
Vernacular Literature. Ed. Eva Hong and Jospeh S.M. Lao. Hong Kong: Chinese
University of Hong Kong Press, 1994: 57-75.
Wilhelm, Helmut. Eight Lectures on the I Ching. Princeton: Princeton University Press,
1960
Yu, Anthony C. Rereading the Stone: Desire and the Making of Fiction in Dream of the
Red Chamber. Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1997.
_______, trans. The Journey to the West. 4 vols. Chicago: Chicago University Press,
1977-1983.
Yu, Dafu. "Sinking" (Chenlun). Trans. Joseph Lau and C.T. Hsia. In Joseph Lau and
Howard Goldblatt, eds. Columbia Anthology of Modern Chinese Literature. New
York: Columbia University Press, 1995: 44-69.
Yu, Pauline, ed. Ways with Words; Writing about Reading Texts from Early China.
Berkeley: University of California Press, 2000.
———. The Reading of Imagery in the Chinese Poetic Tradition. Princeton: Princeton
University Press, 1987.
Zeng Pu. “A Flower in a Sea of Sins.” Trans. Rate de Crespigny and Liu Ts'un-yan,
Chinese Middlebrow Fiction. Hong Kong: Renditions Books, 1984: 137-192.
Zhang, Longxi. Allegoresis: Reading Canonical Literature East and West. Ithaca:
Cornell University Press, 2005.