Contemporary Chinese Literature From the Cultural Revolution to the Future [Hardcover]

This book offers a case study of four of the most influential contemporary Chinese writers and 'cultural bastards' - Duoduo, an underground 'misty' poet; Wang Shuo, a 'hooligan' writer; Zhang Chengzhi, an old 'Red Guard' and new 'cultural heretic'; and Wang Xiaobo, a chronicler of Rabelaisian modern history.Rethinking the Legacy of the Cultural Revolution Duo Duo: An Impossible Farewell, or, Exile between Revolution and Modernism Wang Shuo: Playing for Thrills in the Era of Reform, or, A Genealogy of the Present Zhang Chengzhi: Striving for Alternative National Forms, or, Old Red Guard and New Cultural Heretic Wang Xiaobo: From Golden Age to Silver Age, or, Writing Against the Gravity of History Revising a Double-Faced Chinese Modernity

'Taking a close look at Chinese literature in the post Cultural Revolution period as well as the era of economic takeoff, Huang deploys a very ingenious and provocative trope, that of the orphan pairing up with the bastard. Highlighting the self-contradictory nature and crisis-ridden search in writers such as Duo Duo, Wang Shuo, Zhang Chengzhi, and Wang Xiaobo, Huang's work is a comprehensive study of culturally orphaned and politically rebellious generations in search of their voice and identity.' - Ban Wang, Stanford University

YIBING HUANG is Associate Professor of Chinese at Connecticut College, USA.