China and the West

David L. Rolston ist Mitglied der Association for Asian Studies, der Conference on Chinese Oral and Performing Literature, der Association for Asian Performance.

Henry Rosemont ist Visiting Professor of Religious Studies, Department of Religious Studies, Brown University, Providence, R.I.

Don Rimmington erhält den B.A. in Oriental Studies (Chinese) des Queens' College Cambridge.

Don Rimmington erhält den M.A. in Oriental Studies (Chinese) des Queens' College, Cambridge.

Morris Rossabi ist Mitglied der American Historical Society, American Oriental Society, Association for Asian Studies, Middle East Studies Association, Mongolia Society, Sung Studies Society, Ming Studies Society.

Gilbert Rozman ist Mitglied der Association for Asian Studies, der American Association for the Advancement of Slavic Studies und der American Sociological Association.

Gilbert Rozman ist Mitglied des Editorial Board des Journal of East Asian studies.

Henry Rosemont ist Mitglied des Editorial Board von Contemporary Chinese thought.

Henry Rosemont ist Mitglied des Editorial Board von Modern China.

Maurizio Scarpari is Mitglied des Advisory board der Università Ca'Foscari di Venezia.

Klaas Ruitenbeek ist Direktor des Museums für Asiatische Kunst der Staatlichen Museen zu Berlin.

Daniel P. Chugg is Consellor der britischen Botschaft in Beijing.

Kenneth Dean ist Academic Advisory Committee Member der Chinese University of Hong Kong.

Kwong-loi Shun ist Mitglied des Advisory Board von Comparative philosophy.

Ding, Wenlei. Youth's guardian angel : Chinese readers mourn the death of American writer J.D. Salinger who captured the angst of growing up nearly perfectly : [on the impact of The Catcher in the Rye to Chinese readers]. In : Beijing review ; vol. 53, no 4 (March 4 2010).
J.D. Salinger is regarded as a guardian angel by young readers worldwide (CFP)
The death of author Jerome David Salinger has heralded nostalgia not only for his works but also for the moments those works represent in their readers' lives.
The reclusive author, best known for his book, The Catcher in the Rye, will live on in the memories of his loyal fans worldwide as long as there are misunderstood adolescents like Holden Caulfield, the anti-hero teenage protagonist he created in the novel.
The Catcher in the Rye appeared in 1951, a time of Cold War social conformity and conservatism and the dawn of modern adolescence.
Contemporary critics rated the book as the best of contemporary youth novels, because teenagers all over the world identified with the novel's themes of alienation, innocence and fantasy; and identified themselves with its antagonistic protagonist, the twisted and rebellious Holden Caulfield, although Salinger was primarily writing for adults.
More than 60 million copies of this book have been sold worldwide, and its impact was incalculable. Decades after publication, the novel remains the defining expression of rebellious teenagers' dreams: to never grow up.
The book has numerous fans in China as well. The Nanjing-based Yilin Press, one of the few professional publishers of translations in China, officially published the Chinese version of the book in 1983—along with a new translated edition in 2007.
"We sell around 100,000 copies of the book every year. It's undoubtedly a bestseller and has a great influence on young readers," said Ge Lin, Director of the press' Marketing Department.
But Salinger shunned fame. He moved to Cornish in New Hampshire in 1952 and lived there for decades in self-imposed isolation in a small, remote house where he died at 91 on January 27.
Salinger's other books didn't have quite the same impact, influence or sales as The Catcher in the Rye. They were the collection Nine Stories published in 1953, the fiction work Franny and Zooey in 1961, the 1963 book of two novellas Raise High the Roof Beam, Carpenters and Seymour-An Introduction and his last story Hapworth 16, 1928, published in 1965.
The Catcher in the Rye is viewed as a must-read book for teenagers to smoothen their spiritual growth (XINHUA)
The official publication of The Catcher in the Rye was regarded as one of the most unforgettable additions to Chinese readers' bookshelves in the 1980s by many critics.
Sun Zhongxu, translator of the most recent Chinese edition, said he would never forget how he was touched when he read the English version 16 years ago as a sophomore. "I was lucky that I could read the book at 19," he said. "I felt so closely connected to Holden: his rage was my rage, his perplexity my perplexity and his joy my joy."
In retrospect, Sun said the book's biggest contribution was to help rebellious teenagers to understand themselves—as well as the complexity of the adult world around them. "Holden made me feel lonely no longer. I came to realize it's no big deal to have all these doubts, queries and perplexities about the adult world during adolescence."
Salinger's fans shared their grief on Douban.com, a Chinese online community providing users' reviews and recommendations of movies, books, and music. They will forever respect Salinger because he created a companion for their lonely or troublesome adolescence.
"We have only one Salinger," Sun said. "He represented the world as an ever-so-unfair struggle between the relative innocence of young people and the corruption of elders, and at the same time created a mentor, Mr. Antolini, as a symbol of catching children as they fall over the cliff."
Lu Chuan, young Chinese director of the movie Nanking! Nanking! (2009), said Salinger was one of his favoriate writers. Only one English version was circulated among boys during his military school years. Lu and his roommates finished reading it with the help of electric torches when the electricity of their dormitory was shut off during night.
"The words Mr. Antolini quoted as his advice to Holden—'The mark of an immature man is that he wants to die nobly for a cause, while the mark of a mature man is that he wants to live humbly for one,'—still encourage me to pursue my goals today," Lu said.
"Salinger is an author the world will remember forever," said literary critic Lei Da. "The Catcher in the Rye cares about the spiritual growth of adolescents and will influence future generations, the young people aged between 16 and 20 in particular. "
The introduction of the book to China, Lei said, helped to nourish a group of satirical writers such as Wang Shuo,Wang Xiaobo and Han Han. The former, the most popular and famous writer in the 1990s in China, wrote about rebellious and the ganglike behavior of youth and was regarded as a Chinese counterpart of Salinger. His novel Wild Beast, about a group of teenagers running wild one summer, was adapted into the 1994 movie In the Heat of the Sun.
Chinese writer and painter A. Cheng, who had been in the United States for eight years, once said the Chinese translation of The Catcher in the Rye could have been closer to the original text if the translator imitated Wang Shuo's style of writing.
Zhang Yiwu, professor of Chinese at Peking University, explained Salinger's influence on Chinese readers and writers by pointing out similarities between Chinese society in the 1980s and the American society in the 1950s.
"The book didn't reach a wider audience or find a louder echo in China until the 1980s, though the first Chinese version was published two decades earlier," Zhang said.
This happened because Chinese society in the 1980s, after the introduction of the reform and opening-up policy, resembled post-war America in the 1950s, in terms of a developing economy and the contradictions between material abundance and spiritual deficiencies that sometimes led youth into depression and anxiety, he said.
"Holden found an echo among young readers and reading the book helped release them from their negative feelings," he said.
Zhang said the book probably enjoyed a smaller influence on today's teenagers, largely because the social situation changes.

Morris Rossabi erhält ein Distinguished Research Appointment des National Museum of Ethnology in Osaka. (Mai-Juni).

Alastair W.J. Morgan ist Generalkonsul des britischen Generalkonsulats in Guangzhou (Guangdong).

Wolfgang Röhr ist Generalkonsul des deutschen Generalkonsulats in Shanghai.

Leys, Simon. Barthes et la Chine. In : La croix ; 17. Sept. 2010
http://www.la-croix.com/livres/article.jsp?docId=2364309&rubId=43500
En avril-mai 1974, Roland Barthes a effectué un voyage en Chine avec un petit groupe de ses amis de Tel Quel. Cette visite avait coïncidé avec une purge colossale et sanglante, déclenchée à l'échelle du pays entier par le régime maoïste – la sinistrement fameuse «campagne de dénonciation de Lin Biao et Confucius» (pi Lin pi Kong).
À son retour, Barthes publia dans Le Monde un article qui donnait une vision curieusement joviale de cette violence totalitaire : «Son nom même, en chinois Pilin-Pikong, tinte comme un grelot joyeux, et la campagne se divise en jeux inventés : une caricature, un poème, un sketch d'enfants au cours duquel, tout à coup, une petite fille fardée pourfend entre deux ballets le fantôme de Lin Biao : le Texte politique (mais lui seul) engendre ces mêmes happenings.»
À l'époque cette lecture me remit aussitôt en mémoire un passage de Lu Xun – le plus génial pamphlétaire chinois du XXe siècle : «Notre civilisation chinoise tant vantée n'est qu’un festin de chair humaine apprêté pour les riches et les puissants, et ce qu'on appelle la Chine n'est que la cuisine où se concocte ce ragoût. Ceux qui nous louent ne sont excusables que dans la mesure où ils ne savent pas de quoi ils parlent, ainsi ces étrangers que leur haute position et leur existence douillette ont rendus complètement aveugles et obtus.»
Deux ans plus tard, l'article de Barthes fut réédité en plaquette de luxe à l'usage des bibliophiles – augmenté d'une Postface, qui m'inspira la note suivante : «(…) M. Barthes nous y explique en quoi résidait la contribution originale de son témoignage (que de grossiers fanatiques avaient si mal compris à l'époque ) : il s'agissait, nous dit-il, d'explorer un nouveau mode de commentaire, “le commentaire sur le ton no comment” qui soit une façon de “suspendre son énonciation sans pour autant l'abolir”. M. Barthes, qui avait déjà de nombreux titres à la considération des lettrés, vient peut-être de s'en acquérir un qui lui vaudra l'immortalité, en se faisant l'inventeur de cette catégorie inouïe : le “discours ni assertif, ni négateur, ni neutre”, “l'envie de silence en forme de discours spécial”.
Par cette découverte dont toute la portée ne se révèle pas d'emblée, il vient en fait – vous en rendez-vous compte ? – d'investir d'une dignité entièrement neuve, la vieille activité, si injustement décriée, du parler-pour-ne-rien-dire. Au nom des légions de vieilles dames qui, tous les jours de cinq à six, papotent dans les salons de thé, on veut lui dire un vibrant merci. Enfin, ce dont beaucoup sans doute devront lui être le plus reconnaissants, dans cette même postface, M. Barthes définit avec audace ce que devrait être la vraie place de l'intellectuel dans le monde contemporain, sa vraie fonction, son honneur et sa dignité : il s'agit, paraît-il, de maintenir bravement, envers et contre “la sempiternelle parade du Phallus” de gens engagés et autres vilains tenants du “sens brutal”, ce suintement exquis d'un tout petit robinet d'eau tiède.»
Voici maintenant que ce même éditeur nous livre le texte des carnets dans lesquels Barthes avait consigné au jour le jour les divers événements et expériences de ce fameux voyage. Cette lecture pourrait-elle nous amener à réviser notre opinion ?
Dans ces carnets, Barthes note à la queue-leu-leu, très scrupuleusement, tous les interminables laïus de propagande qu'on lui sert lors de ses visites de communes agricoles, d'usines, d'écoles, de jardins zoologiques, d'hôpitaux, etc. : «Légumes : année dernière, 230 millions livres + pommes, poires, raisin, riz, maïs, blé; 22 000 porcs + canards. (…) Travaux d'irrigation. 550 pompages électriques; mécanisation : tracteurs + 140 monoculteurs. (...) Transports : 110 camions, 770 attelages; 11 000 familles = 47 000 personnes (...) = 21 brigades de production, 146 équipes de production»… Ces précieuses informations remplissent 200 pages.
Elles sont entrecoupées de brèves notations personnelles, très elliptiques : «Déjeuner : tiens, des frites ! – Oublié de me laver les oreilles – Pissotières – Ce qui me manque : pas de café, pas de salade, pas de flirt – Migraines – Nausées.» La fatigue, la grisaille, l'ennui de plus en plus accablant ne sont traversés que par de trop rares rayons de soleil – ainsi une tendre et longue pression de main que lui accorde un «joli ouvrier».
Le spectacle de cet immense pays terrorisé et crétinisé par la rhinocérite maoïste a-t-il entièrement anesthésié sa capacité d'indignation ? Non, mais il réserve celle-ci à la dénonciation de la détestable cuisine qu'Air France lui sert dans l'avion du retour : «Le déjeuner Air France est si infect (petits pains comme des poires, poulet avachi en sauce graillon, salade colorée, chou à la fécule chocolatée – et plus de champagne !) que je suis sur le point d'écrire une lettre de réclamation.» (C'est moi qui souligne.) [...]

Lu, Xinyu. Deconstruction, justice of the 'other', and enlightenment spirit : notes from reading Derrida [ID D24729].
The internal theoretical threads linking postmodern theory and today's Chinese intellectual world merit further research and reflection. Today, due to the popularity of classical Western political philosophy promoted and fostered by intellectual leaders of the 1980s, the issue of how, from the perspective of political philosophy, to understand deconstruction's challenge to classical Western philosophy has become an important topic of discussion. From the New Enlightenment to today, we must bid farewell to 1980s China, yet a mere parting goodbye is not enough. Rather, we must revisit the 1980s in order to say goodbye. The fundamental question here is how should we, in contemporary China, recognize and re-understand the significance of enlightenment ? Particularly, how should we recognize and re-understand this significance in the current climate of escalating cultural conservatism ?
Today, perhaps the time for re-understanding deconstruction has already arrived. After all, to the Chinese and Asian intellectual world, which seeks to reflect on, conduct dialogue with, and resist Western-centrism, what is the significance of Derrida's deconstruction of Western-centrism ? What kind of significance does it hold for us in an imagined 'rising great nation' as we consider how to re-understand the nation-state, how to reestablish Asian and 'third-world' intellectual fields and cultural heritages, how to once again confront and consider the phenomenon of contemporary imperialism, and how to confront humanity's shared problems of ethics and responsibility ? These are the questions we keep in mind when reading Derrida today.
The 'post' of the postmodern in Derridas thought manifests itself in his thorough reflection on the Western-centrism of Western Enlightenment thought and his response to the social crises brought about by globalization. This is a powerful extension of the spirit of reflection in Western Enlightenment thought. This led him to trace from Heidegger to Husserl's phenomenology, to Nietzsche and ancient Greece—this path is actually the same as that traced by the Chinese intellectual and academic world in the 1980s, and this is why Derrida is especially significant to our review of the 1980s. This significance manifests particularly in that our reason for tracing this thought was precisely opposite to Derrida’s reason: the entire 1980s New Enlightenment movement wanted to return to the main narrative of Western-centrism, which was considered the main current of world civilization. This is why, when Derrida's thought was introduced to China in the 1990s, it was disassociated from his reflection on Enlightenment and lost the critical response of this reflection toward the Chinese problem. Thus, deconstruction to a great extent was relegated to frothy discourse within the academic knowledge-production system. To us, this was a huge loss of a thought resource. Moreover, it should not become a reason to slander deconstruction, as deconstruction was, from the beginning, absent from the Chinese intellectual world.
In their general introduction to the Sources of Western Learning (Xixue Yuanliu) series, 'Re-reading the West', Gan Yang and Liu Xiaofeng write: "Chinese people with healthy reading of the West laugh harmlessly at the bravado of the so-called 'anti-Western-centrism' heard within Western institutions. Because the healthy reader knows that although the original motive behind it is pure, it nevertheless often leads to even narrower Western-centrism—there is nothing new under the sun." This conclusion is quite forceful, and later scholars such as myself cannot help but have some doubts. In the last hundred years, Western learning has gradually seeped into China, and whether what we read is 'healthy' is not at all clear, yet it is intertwined with various Western centrisms and anti-centrisms, and these together shape our thought. In the last few years, classical Western political philosophy and Chinese cultural conservatism have entered the stage hand-in-hand, responding to China's rise to a powerful country. This is a new historical situation that also appeals to new heated cultural arguments.
This is almost an echo of the 1980s cultural craze, but the problem consciousness is related, yet different. How do we, from the perspective of reflection, deal with the domestic and foreign problems of China's new democracy today ? What does Western 'anti-Western-centrism' mean to us ? With projections of nationalism and statism lurking in the background, what kind of self-identification and national consciousness should we establish as a 'great country' ? This is a concern shared by all. Under the historical conditions of today, are the national liberation and nationalist consciousness that we once justified for the third world still useful in China, Asia, and the world ? These are the real, persistent problems that we face today.