East Asian History NUMBER 19 . JUNE 2000 Institute of Advanced St udies Aust ralian Na ti onal Un ive rsit y Edi tor Ge remie R. Ba rm e Assi st a nt Edito r He le n Lo Edito ria l Bo ard Ma rk El vin(C o nvenor) Jo hnCla rk Andrew Fraser He le n Ha rd ac re Co inl Je ffco tt W. ]. F.Je nne r Lo Hui -mi n Ga vanMcCo rmack Da vid Ma rr Te ssa Mo rri s-Su zuki Michae l Unde rd ow n De sig n and Produc tio n Heen l Lo Bu si ne ss Ma na ge r Ma rion Week s Printed by Goa nna Print, Fy shwick, ACT Th isis the ni ne tee nt h issu e of East Asian History inthe se ri espr e vi ou sl y entit edl Papers on Far EasternHistory. Th e jo urna l ispu bli sh ed tw ice a yea r Co ntributio ns to Th e Ed ito r, East Asian History Di vi si o nof Paci fic and Asia nHi sto ry Re se arch Schoo l ofPacifi c and Asia n Studie s Au stralia n Natio nalUniv e rsity Ca nbe rra AC T 0200, Au st ra li a Pho ne +6 1 2 6249 3140 Fa x +6 1 26249 5525 emai l ge re mie @coom bs.a nu .edu .a u Sub scrip tion Enqui ries to Sub scriptio ns, East Asian History, at the abo ve add ress Annu alSub scriptio n Au st ralia A$45 Over seas US $45 (fo r two issu es) iii CONTENTS 1 Lu Xu n's Disturbing Greatness W. j. F.Jenner 27 Th e Ear ly -Qing Disco ur se on Loyalty Wing-ming Chan 53 Th e Da ri ya n ya, the State of the Ur iyangqai of the Altai, the Qa sa y and the Qa mni yan Ceveng (c. Z. Zamcarano) -translated by 1. de Rachewiltz and j. R. Krueger 87 Edwardian Th eatre and the Lost Shape of Asia: Some Re marks on Beha lf of a Cindere lla Subject Timothy Barrett 103 Crossed Legs in 19 30s Shanghai: Ho w 'Modern' the Modern Woman? Francesca Dal Lago 145 San Mao Makes Hi story Miriam Lang iv Cover ca ll grai phy Yan Zh enqing M�Y��, Tang calligra pher and statesman Cover illustrati on Maga zine advertisement for the med cii ne Bush iming EDWARDIAN THEATRE AND THE LOST SHAPE OF ASIA: SOME REMARKS ON BEHALF OF A CINDERELLA SUBJECT' � T H. Barrett As the ancie nt Chi nese phi losopher Me ncius fou nd out , those who have • This 60th George Ernest Morrison Lecture come a lo ng way to speak are pres umed to have somethi ng wor thwhile to in Ethnology was delivered by Dr Tim say for themse ves.l I shou ld th erefore at the outset disclaim all inte nt io ns Barrett of the School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, on 9 August other tha n to take up your time as agreeab ly as circumsta nces allo w. Eve n 1999 at the Australian National University, so , those circumsta nces do re qu ire that I sa y somethi ng inharmo ny with the Canberra. First published by the University estab ishedl traditio ns of this disti nguished series of le ctures , and somethi ng in that same year, it is reproduced here with the addition of illustrations supplied by the idea lly also in th e spirit of the grea t intercu tural l commu ni cator inwhose author. ho nour the series was first instituted. Comi ng as I do from Lo ndo n, my first thought was therefore to say somethi ng about the Ta ng dy nasty , for the obvious reaso nthat ever si nce the ear ly days of Arthur Wa ey'sl firsttra ns la tio ns Grea t Britai n has bee n know n amo ng Si no lo gists as a bastio nof Ta ng studies. Wa ley's firstefforts appeared almost simu lt aneous ly with the formatio n of the Schoo l of Orie nt a l and Africa n Studies inthe University of Lo ndo n, where I teach , si nce whe n Lo ndon has see n no t only A. C. Graham's work onTa ng poetry but also the entire career of E. D. Edwards and the initia l pub icatiol ns of J. K. Rideout , a former le cturer inthis series who was one of the fou nd ers of Ta ng studies inthis cou ntry. My ow nin troductio nto Chi nese studies , however , took place at Cambridge , where for ne ar ly ha lf a ce ntury the Chair of Chi nese has bee n occupied exc usivel ly by scho lars with stro ng interests inthe Ta ng: fir st E. G. Pu lleyb anl k, the n D. C. Twitchett , fo llowed by GlenDu dbridge and, si nce Professor Du dbridge's retur nto Oxford , D. L. McMu llen . De ni s Twitchett and Da vid McMu llenwere both teachi ng there whe nI was anun dergraduate , and I am much indebted to both of them no t simp ly for my initia l educatio n in Chi nese but for their co ntinued guida nce , just as I am to my doctora l supervisor at Ya e,l Professor Sta nley Wei nstei n, author of Buddhism Under 87 88 T. H. BARRETI ] The former technology and its relationship the Tang. I have found much to ad mire, too, in the schol arship of Professor with religion I am beginning to explore Pulley blank an d his one time student Professor Dud bridge, as would re ad ily myself, for example in "Images of printing be come ap parent were I to ad dress you tod ay on some topic rel ated to Tang in seventh century Chinese religious liter­ ature," Chinese Science 15 (998): 81-93; I culture. hope to consider religion and gunpowder at Th is, however, I do not propose to do, even though in terms of my own some future point. abilities I can cl aim little more th an a cert ain famili arity with the history of 2 Marco Ceresa, La scopertadell 'acqua calda the Tang al one, an d only the history of religion an d thought, at th at. Th e (Milan: Leonardo, 1993), provides an re ason is th at despite al l the eminent schol ar s I have named, it would be excellent summary, with translated texts, of this momentous innovation. wrong for me to pretend th at Tang studies have an y gener al prestige within 3 See, for a volume uniting both forms of Brit ai n itself. Indeed, as the only occup ant of ach air of East Asi an History in Buddhism mentioned, L. Lancaster and W. the British Isles, a ch air formerly occupied by experts on the exp ansion of Lai, Early Ch'an in China and Tibet (Berk­ Europe in East Asi a an d on the modern history of Jap an , I am obliged to report eley, Calif.: Asian Humanities Press, 1983). th at whenever I confess to fellow histori an s my preoccup ation with the religious thought of Chin a more th an a millennium ag o, I perceive if not an immedi ate gl azi ng over of the eyes in utter bo redom then a cert ain politely suppressed dis appointment th at aunique an d hitherto valu able post should be thrown aw ay on such fripperies. Wh at , af ter al l, to echo the Menci an experience once ag ai n, does it profit the wor ld to know an ything about the Tang, who for al l their long rule from the early seventh to the st ar t of the tenth century ar e as remote from us as ar e the Anglo-S axons of Ki ng Alfred's times ? Th e ag e th at we live in must surely owe very little to a time an d pl ace so remote . We should except, of course, one or two technologic alinnov ations, such as the printing of bo oks an d the discovery of gunpowder, bu t since Jo seph Needh am (another Cambridge fig ure) has now convinced al l of us th at the world owes much of its premodern technic al an d scienti fic knowledge to Chin a, this hardly calls for comment. Wh at , in an y case, does the history of religion have to do with printing an d gunpowder, ap ar t from the fact th at the earliest references to such things ar e al l in religious documents?] If we turn inste ad to matters of culture, then we can hardly see much in our contempor ary way of life th at can be tr aced back to Tang times, other th an perh ap s te adrinking, or wh at has from a slightly different an gle be en wryly termed the 'discovery of bo iling water', something which is such acommon fe at ure of our daily lives th at ag ai n it surely does not merit discussion. 2 And even if we look at the most novel an d exotic ad mixtures now to be found in the culture of English-spe aking countries, such as an interest in Buddhism, there is hardly an ything even there which provides a link with the Tang, unless perh ap s one includes the Tang connections of Ti be tan an d Ze n Buddhism- and the latter, though no dou bt first patented in Chin a, has al ways be en much more successfully marketed from Jap an .3 But the be st me asure of the irrelev ance of the Tang is surely to be found in its lack of an y contri bution to world liter ature.