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ABSTRACT
Xue Yiwei, the Montreal-based veteran Chinese novelist, completed “King Lear” and Nineteen Seventy-Nine in 2020, a year when a devastating plague radically transformed the world. This novel can be regarded as Chinese Ulysses for its family resemblance to the modernist monument, in terms of cognitive depth, stylistic vigor, and thematic profundity. Not only does such an analogy honor Xue’s latest charismatic achievement, but it also characterizes a new esthetic in contemporary Chinese literature.
Acknowledgments
This article was funded by 2020 Original Research Support Program at the College of Foreign Languages and Literatures at Fudan University, China.
Disclosure Statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Notes
1. As to Xue’s eventful publishing history, see CitationXue, “‘Bad Luck’ of ‘Good Literature,’”; CitationGrescoe, “A Chinese Novelist is Found in Translation.”
2. Leading Chinese literary journals such as Writer Magazine, Fiction Review, and Shanghai Culture published nine favorable reviews of the novel within eight months.
3. CitationMa, “A Feast of ‘Co-Text’,” 56–9.
4. Regarding the three daughters’ homecoming comments in the first three chapters, see CitationLu, “The Arrival of the Three Daughters,” 204–8.
5. CitationXue, “My ‘Rural Literature’,” 9–10.
6. CitationLin, “Xue Yiwei’s ‘King Lear’,” 199, 203.
7. CitationBirmingham, The Most Dangerous Book, 2.
8. Heffernan Lecture 1: The Story of a Modern Masterpiece.
9. CitationKiberd, “Introduction,” xxxii.
10. CitationXue, “‘King Lear’ and Nineteen Seventy-Nine: Part 1,” 208. The author of this article does all translations of the quotations from “King Lear” and Nineteen Seventy-Nine.
11. CitationXue. “‘King Lear’ and Nineteen Seventy-Nine: Part 3,” 176.
12. Xue, 176.
13. Shakespeare also favors the style of “anti-realism” and “anti-dogmatism.” For Xue’s discussion of fiction and reality, see CitationXue, “The Most Sacred Cause,” 100–1.
14. CitationJoyce, Ulysses: Annotated Students’ Edition, 432.
15. Joyce, 432.
16. Joyce, 432.
17. Joyce, 432.
18. CitationXue, “‘King Lear’ and Nineteen Seventy-Nine: Part 2,” 188.
19. Xue, 151.
20. CitationXue, “‘King Lear’ and Nineteen Seventy-Nine: Part 1,” 138.
21. Xue, 179. The translator made minor alterations to the text for the sake of smooth understanding.
22. CitationXue, “‘King Lear’ and Nineteen Seventy-Nine: Part 2,” 206.
24. CitationXue, “‘King Lear’ and Nineteen Seventy-Nine: Part 3,” 219. The translator made minor alterations to the text for the sake of smooth understanding.
25. Zhongshan Literary Award Winner Xue Yiwei.
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Miao Wei
Miao Wei is currently working at the College of Foreign Languages and Literatures at Fudan University in China. Her research interests include Chinese diaspora literature and film, and gender and cultural studies.