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Writing Oneself As a Writer: Intellectual Identity and Moral Agency in Contemporary Chinese Novels Fang-Yu Li Washington University in St

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Writing Oneself As a Writer: Intellectual Identity and Moral Agency in Contemporary Chinese Novels Fang-Yu Li Washington University in St Washington University in St. Louis Washington University Open Scholarship Arts & Sciences Electronic Theses and Dissertations Arts & Sciences Summer 8-15-2015 Writing Oneself as a Writer: Intellectual Identity and Moral Agency in Contemporary Chinese Novels Fang-yu Li Washington University in St. Louis Follow this and additional works at: https://openscholarship.wustl.edu/art_sci_etds Part of the East Asian Languages and Societies Commons Recommended Citation Li, Fang-yu, "Writing Oneself as a Writer: Intellectual Identity and Moral Agency in Contemporary Chinese Novels" (2015). Arts & Sciences Electronic Theses and Dissertations. 556. https://openscholarship.wustl.edu/art_sci_etds/556 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Arts & Sciences at Washington University Open Scholarship. It has been accepted for inclusion in Arts & Sciences Electronic Theses and Dissertations by an authorized administrator of Washington University Open Scholarship. For more information, please contact [email protected]. WASHINGTON UNIVERSITY IN ST. LOUIS Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures Program in Comparative Literature Dissertation Examination Committee: Lingchei Letty Chen, Chair Robert E. Hegel, Co-Chair J. Dillon Brown Rebecca Copeland Zhao Ma Marvin Howard Marcus Writing Oneself as a Writer: Intellectual Identity and Moral Agency in Contemporary Chinese Novels by Fang-yu Li A dissertation presented to the Graduate School of Arts & Sciences of Washington University in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy August 2015 St. Louis, Missouri © 2015, Fang-yu Li Table of Contents Acknowledgments.......................................................................................................................... iv ABSTRACT OF THE DISSERTATION ...................................................................................... vi Chapter 1: Writing Oneself as a Writer: Writer-Intellectuals and Narrative Identity..................... 1 1.1 Writers, Intellectuals, and the Writing of Intellectuals......................................................... 5 1.2 Writer-intellectuals in China, Taiwan, and Hong Kong after 1990s .................................. 11 1.3 Narrative Identity, Moral Agency, and the Writing of the self as a Writer........................ 25 Chapter 2: Failing as an Author: Qiu Huadong’s Confession at Noon and the Spiritual Crisis of Intellectuals................................................................................................................................... 41 2.1 Qiu Huadong and the “New Generation Writings” ............................................................ 42 2.2 Confession at Noon: Scandal and Criticism ....................................................................... 46 2.3 Failing as an Author: A Reading of Confession at Noon ................................................... 50 2.4 “Humanist Spirit” and the Value of Writing in the New Era ............................................. 71 Chapter 3: The Road to Redemption: Confession of an Intellectual in Yan Lianke’s Feng Ya Song............................................................................................................................................... 77 3.1 Realist Writings in the New Century and the Problem of the Writer................................. 79 3.2 Yan Lianke and Divine Realism......................................................................................... 84 3.3 Feng Ya Song: A Critique of Others or the Self? ............................................................... 90 3.4 Confessional Narratives and Feng Ya Song........................................................................ 98 Chapter 4: Rhizomatic Writing and Problematics of Taiwanese Identity in Wu He’s Thinking of Abang Kadresengan.................................................................................................................... 113 4.1 The Lone Writer of Taiwan .............................................................................................. 115 4.2 Thinking of Oneself as a Writer and Searching for “Taiwan” ......................................... 121 ii Chapter 5: Possible Worlds and Writer’s Autonomy in Dung Kai-cheung’s The Exploitation of the Works of Nature: Xuxu and Ruzhen...................................................................................... 145 5.1 A Book of the Self: Dung Kai-cheung and Self-Reflexive Writings ............................... 147 5.2 Two-Part Invention and the Dissolution of Binary Oppositions ...................................... 152 5.3 Possible Worlds and Multiple Selves: The Crisis of Being a Writer and the Power of Creation................................................................................................................................... 164 Conclusion: The Dilemma of Writer-intellectuals and the Function of Literature..................... 178 Bibliography ............................................................................................................................... 186 iii Acknowledgments I would like to express my deepest gratitude to my advisor, Dr. Lingchei Letty Chen, for her valuable comments and critiques on my research and her support and guidance throughout the years of graduate study. I would like to thank my mentor Dr. Robert Hegel, who patiently corrected my writing and provided me invaluable lessons as well as practical advice which I will continue to benefit in the future. I would also like to thank Dr. Marvin Marcus, Dr. Rebecca Copeland, and Dr. Zhao Ma for their intellectual support and useful suggestions that help me re-evaluate my project from various angles. Special thanks goes to Dr. Dillon Brown, who was willing to participate in my final defense committee at the last moment. I would like to thank my colleagues and friends Yunjing Xu and Kazue Harada, whose intellectual stimulation and constant encouragement helped me survive the last and most difficult stage of writing. Many thanks to Ke Nie, Yinghui Wu, Waiman Suen, Xia Liang, Wei Wang, Jue Lu, and other colleagues and friends in the Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures for giving offering me professional assistance and moral support when I needed them the most. I would also like to thank my parents, my elder brother, and my dear friend Yi-chun Liu. They were always supportive and encouraging me with their best wishes. Finally, I would like to thank my husband, Geng-yuan Jeng, who never fails to believe in me. He was always there to cheer me up and stood by me through the good times and bad. Fang-yu Li Washington University in St. Louis August 2015 iv Dedicated to my parents, Gong-way Lee and Bi-sha Hong v ABSTRACT OF THE DISSERTATION Writing Oneself as a Writer: Intellectual Identity and Moral Agency in Contemporary Chinese Novels by Fang-yu Li Doctor of Philosophy in Chinese and Comparative Literature Washington University in St. Louis, 2015 Professor Lingchei Letty Chen, Chair Professor Robert E. Hegel, Co-Chair The discussion of “identity” in current scholarship on modern Chinese literature is mostly centered on the political dynamics between national, cultural, and gender identity. Contemporary Chinese language novels from late 1990s to the present, however, seem to show a sense of confusion and disorientation towards one’s existence in the rapidly changing society. Among the works that address individual’s existential crisis, self-reflexive novels are particularly intriguing as they reveal a strong sense of self-doubt on part of the author, and in particular, towards one’s role as a writer in contemporary society. This dissertation investigates this sense of self-doubt by examining closely four self-reflexive novels written by writers from PRC, Taiwan, and Hong Kong: Qiu Huadong’s Confession at Noon (2000), Yan Lianke’s Feng Ya Song (2008), Wu He’s Thinking of Abang Kadresengan (1997), and Dung Kai-cheung’s Exploitations of the Works of Nature, Xuxu and Ruzhen (2005). In these novels, each author incorporates different narrative strategies to conduct a moral inquiry into both the meaning of writing and one’s function as a writer-intellectual in contemporary society. Despite having differing historical experience, these vi authors reveal a shared intellectual identity reminiscent of the traditional Chinese wenren or “literati,” who believe in the power of writing in guiding one towards a moral path. Such a shared intellectual identity indicates a common moral ground on which writers and intellectuals from the three Chinese-speaking regions can conduct a dialogue transcendent of political conflicts and cultural/historical barriers. vii Chapter 1: Writing Oneself as a Writer: Writer-Intellectuals and Narrative Identity "I think writers write for their consciences, they write for their own true audiences, for their souls."1--Mo Yan When the Swedish Academy in Stockholm announced Mo Yan as the winner of the Nobel Prize in Literature in 2012, it generated a debate among critics and scholars in Mainland China and overseas. While the Chinese government was quick to congratulate Mo Yan on his success and to appropriate his personal accomplishment as national glory, many voiced concerns on Mo Yan’s political stance and his affiliation to the CCP, especially regarding his role as Deputy President of the government sanctioned China Writer’s Association (Zhongguo zuojia xiehui), and his reluctance to speak against State censorship at the press
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