Love-Letters and Privacy in Modern China The Intimate Lives of Lu Xun and Xu Guangping

by McDougall, Bonnie S.

• ISBN13: 9780199256792
• ISBN10: 0199256799
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2002-12-26
• Publisher: Oxford University Press

Summary

This book opens up three new topics in modern Chinese literary history: the intimate lives of modern China's most famous literary couple, Lu Xun and Xu Guangping; real and imagined love-letters in modern Chinese literature; and the contents, functions, and values of privacy held by one couple in twentieth-century China as shown by a comparison between the edited and unedited versions of their letters.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgements	ix
Dramatis Personae	xi
Abbreviations	xiii
Introduction	1	(12)
Part I: Intimate Lives
Xu Guangping `in the Front Row': 1898--1925	13	(5)
Lu Xun's `Life without Love': 1881--1925	18	(10)
Courtship: March 1925--August 1926	28	(17)
Separation: September 1926--January 1927	45	(10)
Living Together: January 1927--June 1929	55	(9)
Birth and Death: 1929--68	64	(19)
Part II: Real and Imagined Letters
Traditional Chinese and Western Letters	83	(7)
Modern Chinese Letters and Epistolary Fiction	90	(4)
The Making of Letters between Two	94	(9)
Frequency, Appearance, and Terms of Address	103	(9)
Defining Identities, Testing Roles	112	(25)
Part III: Searching for Privacy
Mapping Personal Space	137	(4)
Sex and Sexual Relationships	141	(11)
Bodies, Bodily Functions and Activities, and Hygiene	152	(6)
Domestic Life and Habits	158	(2)
Family Matters	160	(5)
Friends and Enemies	165	(6)
Political Opinions, Observations, and Activities	171	(5)
Thoughts and Emotions	176	(6)
Rumour and Gossip	182	(5)
Secrecy, Seclusion, and Private/Selfish Interests	187	(8)
Personal Space as Privacy	195	(12)
Part IV: Conclusion
Revealing to Conceal: Letters between Two and the Original Correspondence	207	(3)
Notes	210	(69)
References	279	(20)
Index	299