China and the West

[Shakespeare, William]. Yadian ren Taiman. Yang Hui y [ID D23870].
Cao Weifeng : The preface of Timon of Athens by Yang Hui is the first and most important critical essay on Shakespeare's works from a Marxist-Leninist approach.
Murray J. Levith : This detailed study mentioned a number of times in the writings of Marx and Engels anticipates the critical slant that became 'de rigueur' for Chinese critics on the mainland after 1949. Yang first rehearses well-known facts about Shakespeare's life and times, reading the playwright's presumed biography into the critic's interpretation of Elizabeth's and James' reigns. He discusses the waning of feudalism and the initial optimism about the new social order replacing it, linkening the social chaos at the start of the 17th century to a 'corresponding situation in China : the old moral order was bankrupt and the new moral order had yet to be established'. Then Yang launches into his interpretation of Timon of Athens, suggesting that 'the play is Shakespeare's violent attack on his society, his roar of anger' at what happened in England after the death of Elizabeth. 'Timon of Athens is the tragedy of gold'. He states that Timon of Athens is 'Shakespeare's most important work. If we want to know Shakespeare, his era and society, we need to study the play'.