Year

1972-1973

Text

Type

Publication

Mentioned People (1)

Subjects

Chronology Entries (12)

#	Year	Text	Linked Data
1	1909-1949	Oscar Wilde : Rezeption in China allgemein. Bonnie S. McDougall : In the debates which took place in the early stages of the new movement in China, Oscar Wilde's name did not commonly appear, nor did he provide the major inspiration to any group of young writers. He did have some influence : the Xin yue she (Crescent Moon Society) writers acknowledged his theories on art. Wilde's work had much to offer the creators and critics of China's new literature. On the social side, there is his defence of individualism and of feminism, his criticism of governments and politicians, his exposure of the moral poverty underlying conventional respectability and his contribution to libertarian socialism ; on the artistic side, apart from the actual example set by his own work, there is his stress on the importance of criticism in art, and on the importance of art in literature. If there were other aspects of his writing left unexplored or unappreciated, such as his ideas on abstract art, or his general theory of making an art of life, this is hardly to be wondered at, the violent prejudice which led most English and American critics to dismiss him as 'insincere' and 'frivolous', obscured Wilde's standing in his own country for many years. It is even possible that the initial enthusiasm for Wilde in China was dampened by the unfavourable remarks of these critics who had an undue influence among the intellectually impressionable young critics of the early twenties. Neither in China nor in England could censorious critics prevent the widespread popularity of Wilde's fairy-tales and plays. For Chinese readers, less dazzled by the brilliance of Wilde's wit and remembering his persecution in England, the satire of the plays was sharp and powerful. Again, less aware of the luxury and artificiality of his personal life, they were able to believe in the sincerity of the fairy-tales and prose-poems, which describe the beauty of humility and simplicity. Wilde's theories on art and literature were neglected in the early period of the new literary movement, though there is some evidence that the Crescent group took them up in the late twenties and early thirties. None of the critics seems to have said that he liked Wilde's plays simply because they were very funny. Zhou Xiaoyi : The first half of the twentieth century witnessed a 'Wilde-mania' throughout China. After his tragic death in Paris in 1900, the English aesthete was introduced into China as the figure head of England's aesthetic movement. Chinese responses to his works, which adumbrate the principle of art for art's sage, were enthusiastic. A large number of Chinese writers were attracted to aestheticism and produced voluminous works in the aesthetic style. Wilde was regarded as the symbol of an artistic lifestyle and the major representative of those Western writers who lived cloistered away from the ordinary world and devoted themselves entirely to pure art. Wilde was first introduced into China not simply as a writer of a Western literary genre entirely new to the Chinese, but mainly as an apostle of pure art or, to be more specific, a practitioner of a new way of life. The aesthetic ideas of Wilde that attracted modern Chinese writers were in many ways simplified. Wilde's earlier thinking, which developed in his first 'aesthetic' period during the 1880s, was much emphasized by his Chinese audience. In the Chinese account of Wilde, his various ideas from that period, such as art as religion, art for art's sake , and pure form as the ultimate value of artistic creation, subtle impressions and feelings, the flamboyantly aesthetic mode of being and the severe critique of the existing social order, were regarded as basic principles of aestheticism and key concepts of Wilde's thinking. But the moral radical side of Wilde and his most radical conceptions which are presented in The picture of Dorian Gray and Intentions and other essays on life and art are pointedly ignored. In 1920s and 1930s, Wilde was better known for his literary works than for his critical essays. The Chinese reception of Wilde's works was thus highly selective. If Wilde was not entirely misread, he was at least only partially received and interpreted. His aesthetic theory and literary practice were transfigured into the forms which conformed to the social realities and cultural dynamics of China at that time. He was regarded as an artistic symbol of the time surrounded by a mysterious aesthetic aura. His life and his thought on art were widely admired, and his arguments were frequently quoted as the most important sources for Chinese modernists defending their aesthetic approach to art. Wilde represented an idealized image that rebellious May Fourth writers could identify with. It is not the Wilde of wit and paradox that fascinated the Chinese aesthetes, it is the flamboyant Wilde, the extravagant and self-fashioning Wild, that impressed the Chinese minds questing for a new and alluring way of life. Linda Pui-ling Wong : The reception of Wilde in China in the 1920s and 1930s, new and modern modes from the West surfaced in various areas like fashion, general Westernized appearance, schools, establishment of different social and literary communities and journals. The Chinese intellectuals' new perception of their social and personal positions in relation to Chinese traditions, in which a different and modern mentality emerged. Such consciousness warred against the conservative Confucian mode of thinking and engendered new, or anti-traditional, visions of the concept of self. Wilde was widely known for his extravagant and eccentric clothes, which was a mark of his 'aesthetic dandyism'. Guo Moruo condemned such a movement which was entirely external and had nothing to do with inner problems. The Chinese writers, as seen in their commentaries and essays, praised Wilde for being a phenomenal literary figure of the nineteenth-century, especially for his leading position in the aesthetic movement. Their reviews and comments on Wilde's work basically were consistent with those of the Victorian readers. Readers of both cultures, regardless of the time and cultural lapses and gaps, understood ideas like social satire, hypocrisy, conservatism, social injustice, and class discrimination shown in his plays.	Document: Zhou, Xiaoyi. Oscar Wilde : an image of artistic self-fashioning in modern China, 1909-1949. In : Images of Westerners in Chinese and Japanese literature : proceedings of the XVth Congress of the International Comparative Literature Association‚ Literature as cultural memory, Leiden 1997. Ed. by Hua Meng, Sukehiro Hirakawa. (Amsterdam : Rodopi, 2000). (WilO4, Publication) Document: Wong, Linda Pui-ling. The initial reception of Oscar Wilde in modern China ; with special reference to Salome. In : Comparative literature & culture (Hong Kong), no 3 (1998). = The Oscholars Library : http://www.oscholars.com/TO/Appendix/Library/WONG.htm. (2012). (WilO5, Publication) Person: Wilde, Oscar
2	1909	Yu wai xiao shuo ji. Zhou Zuoren yi. [ID D12489]. Earliest translation of Oscar Wilde was The happy prince by Zhou Zuoren in classical Chinese. In his short introduction, Zhou argues that the key point of Wilde's aestheticism is to 'transform life into an art. He himself practiced it by wearing eccentric clothes of an extraordinary shape and walking down in the street with a sunflower in hand'. According to Zhou, Wilde was an artist with a will to transcend ordinary life and elevate himself to the higher level of the kingdom of art. Zhou Zuoren's efforts to promote Western humanist writing were unsuccessful at that time. A re-issue of these translations in 1921 was soon out of print, this time presumably because classical Chinese was now superseded by the vernacular.	Document: Zhou, Xiaoyi. Oscar Wilde : an image of artistic self-fashioning in modern China, 1909-1949. In : Images of Westerners in Chinese and Japanese literature : proceedings of the XVth Congress of the International Comparative Literature Association‚ Literature as cultural memory, Leiden 1997. Ed. by Hua Meng, Sukehiro Hirakawa. (Amsterdam : Rodopi, 2000). (WilO4, Publication) Person: Wilde, Oscar Person: Zhou, Zuoren
3	1915	[Wilde, Oscar]. Li xiang zhang fu [ID D27628]. Hu Shi criticized the Chinese translation of An ideal husband by Oscar Wilde for its lack of artistry and its irrelevance to the Chinese situation.	Person: Hu, Shi Person: Wilde, Oscar
4	1917	Chen, Duxiu. Wen xue ge ming lun [ID11258] : Chen schreibt : "Die europäische Kultur hat freilich viel der Politik und der Wissenschaft zu verdanken, doch auch nicht weniger der Literatur. Ich habe das Frankreich von Rousseau und Pasteur lieb, aber noch mehr das von Goethe und Hauptmann ; ich liebe das England von Bacon und Darwin, aber noch mehr das von Dickens und Wilde. Ist unter unseren heldenhaften Literaten jemand da, der den Mut hat, ein Hugo oder Zola, ein Goethe oder Hauptmann, ein Dickens oder Wilde zu werden ?" = "European culture has benefited considerably from the many contributions of political thinkers and scientists, but the contribution of writers has not been small either. I love the France of Hugo and Zola ; I love the Germany of Kant and Hegel, but I love especially the Germany of Goethe and Hauptmann ; I love the England of Bacon and Darwin, but I love especially the England of Dickens and Wilde. Is there some outstanding writer in our own national literature who will take on the role of China's Hugo, Zola, Goethe, Hauptmann, Dickens or Wilde ? Is there anyone bold enough to make a public challenge to the 'eighteen demons', ignoring the criticism of reactionary scholars ? If so, I am willing to drag out the cannon to from his vanguard." [Jean-Jacques Rousseau, Louis Pasteur, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, Gerhart Hauptmann, Francis Bacon, Charles Galton Darwin, Victor Hugo, Charles Dickens, Oscar Wilde, Emile Zola]. Bonnie S. McDougall : Chen meant no more than a literature in which the material world is shown to affect people's lives, and in which concern is shown particularly for the sufferings of the poor. The demand for 'freshness' should be taken in the context of 'stale classicism' ; Chen was not opposed to rich and elaborate descriptions of scenery or emotions as such, he only rejected the euphuistic and allusive language typical of a great deal of classical Chinese poetry and essays. His final aim, to create a simple and popular literature to replace obscure scholarly or eremitic literature, shows the most obvious reason for classing Wilde among the literary giants.	Document: Yang, Wuneng. Goethe in China (1889-1999). (Frankfurt a.M. : P. Lang, 2000). S. 29. (YanW1, Publication) Person: Bacon, Francis Person: Chen, Duxiu Person: Darwin, Charles Robert Person: Dickens, Charles Person: Goethe, Johann Wolfgang von Person: Hauptmann, Gerhart Person: Hugo, Victor Person: Pasteur, Louis Person: Rousseau, Jean-Jacques Person: Wilde, Oscar Person: Zola, Emile
5	1920	[Wilde, Oscar]. [Ye ying yu mei gui]. Hu Yuzhi yi. [ID D27629]. Hu Yuzhi argues that 'we have to study his poems and fairy tales if we want to know Wilde as an aesthete'. This is mainly because 'only in his poems and fairy tales, his vivid imagination of beauty, his rare gift in art, and his wonderful attractiveness are given full play'.	Document: Zhou, Xiaoyi. Oscar Wilde : an image of artistic self-fashioning in modern China, 1909-1949. In : Images of Westerners in Chinese and Japanese literature : proceedings of the XVth Congress of the International Comparative Literature Association‚ Literature as cultural memory, Leiden 1997. Ed. by Hua Meng, Sukehiro Hirakawa. (Amsterdam : Rodopi, 2000). (WilO4, Publication) Person: Hu, Yuzhi Person: Wilde, Oscar
6	1920	Tian Han had seen a Tokyo performance of Lady Windermere's fan by Oscar Wilde. On a meeting with Guo Moruo, he revealed his desire to introduce the work of Wilde to the Chinese public. In 1920 Tian Han thought of Wilde as primarily an aesthete.	Person: Tian, Han Person: Wilde, Oscar
7	1920-1922	Mao Dun as editor of Xiao shuo yue bao chose Oscar Wilde as the prime example of a writer whose works were of no use in the present situation. He denounced both Western and Chinese aesthetic and decadent schools, among whom such practices as smoking opium, debating homosexuality, wearing strange clothes, regarding murder as a game and dyeing one's hair green were considered highly romantic. Wilde dyed his carnation green but not his hair. If Mao Dun disliked this side of Wilde's personal behavior and writing, he still acknowledged Wilde's more serious works.	Person: Mao, Dun Person: Wilde, Oscar
8	1922	Zhou, Zuoren. Zi ji de yuan di [ID D27657]. Bonnie S. McDougall : By 1922 the new literary movement was undergoing its first internal debate, 'art for art's sake' versus 'art for life's sake'. Zhou Zuoren was among those who objected to the false distinction being made, although ultimately he had to declare himself on the side of life : “'Art for art's sake' will separate art from life and make life an appendage of art, or even make an art out of life as Oscar Wilde proposed – of course, this would not be very proper ; 'art for life's sake' will make art an appendage of life or make art into a tool for changing life and not an end in itself – surely this is separating life from art”. Despite this disapproving tone, Zhou strongly defended Wilde's dialogue The decay of lying, and even remonstrated with one of Wilde's translators for rendering 'lying' by the more innocuous Chinese word for 'fabrication' (jia kong). Zhou Zuoren regarded beauty of Language and a ready wit as the special qualities of Wilde's plays and essays, but his favourite pieces were The happy prince and The fisherman and his soul, the tales with a strong element of fantasy. Zhou noted the thread of social compassion which ran through the fairy-tales, but he also described them as 'unchildlike', 'a poet's poem', and their author as a 'decadent aesthete'. Zhous literary sensibilities enabled him to appreciate Wilde's literary work and attitudes, but his moral seriousness was offended by the dissipation in Wilde's personal life which he read about in Western criticism.	Person: Wilde, Oscar Person: Zhou, Zuoren
9	1922	[Wilde, Oscar]. Yu zhong ji. Zhang Wentian, Wang Fuquan yi. [ID D12194]. Zhou Xiaoyi : Lu Xun, after reading the Chinese translation of Gide's biography of Wilde, noted that "his way of life is most interesting". He also noted Wilde's style of dress. In a paragraph discussing Wilde's appearance, he states : "look at his pictures, in which Wilde wears a flower in his button hole, taking a cane inlaid with ivory ; how handsome he is, everybody would love him, not to speak of women". Lu Xun used the phrase 'aesthetic costume' to describe Wilde's dress. Lu Xun is critical of Wilde's way of life, because, as a writer with a social mission and ideals, he is hostile to aestheticism and art for art's sake as universal principles for literature. He emphasizes the essentially social function of art. Yet no matter how critical he was, he had a clear image of Wilde as an aesthetic figure.	Document: Zhou, Xiaoyi. Oscar Wilde : an image of artistic self-fashioning in modern China, 1909-1949. In : Images of Westerners in Chinese and Japanese literature : proceedings of the XVth Congress of the International Comparative Literature Association‚ Literature as cultural memory, Leiden 1997. Ed. by Hua Meng, Sukehiro Hirakawa. (Amsterdam : Rodopi, 2000). (WilO4, Publication) Person: Lu, Xun Person: Wang, Fuquan Person: Wilde, Oscar Person: Zhang, Wentian
10	1922	[Wilde, Oscar]. [The picture of Dorian Gray : Preface]. Yu Dafu yi. [ID D27658]. Seine Übersetzung des Buches wurde nie publiziert. Zhou Xiaoyi : Yu Dafu admired Wilde's work very much and cited him from time to time in his works, and treasured his aphorisms such as 'all art is quite useless, there is no such thing as moral or immoral art' and others. Yu's love of Wilde is fired in many ways as Wilde is also a social rebel and further, he is a rebel with some clear social and political ideas and artistic principles. He observes that 'the first rebellious spirit which is against the prevalent moralism and formalism in the Victorian age comes from aestheticism that Wilde proposed. Bonnie S. McDougall : The Preface is a very abbreviated version of Wilde's aesthetic principles, but gives a fair view of that theory of art which was first elaborated in English by Walter Pater, that art is the record of an artist's appreciation or impression of nature or of other works of art, and that the artistic experience is a proper end in itself. Yu Dafu's views on poetry and art are quite different from these : he regarded poetry as the expression of emotion clothed in beauty, and believed that poetry should be an instrument of social change. Only at one point do Wild and his translator meet : both insisted on the irrelevance of moral judgments in and about art. It was probably for this reason that Yu Dafu translated the preface ; like Wilde, he was labeled a decadent by his contemporaries for his obsession with sexual aberrations, and he wrote admiringly of the 'decadents' who contributed to The yellow book.	Document: Zhou, Xiaoyi. Oscar Wilde : an image of artistic self-fashioning in modern China, 1909-1949. In : Images of Westerners in Chinese and Japanese literature : proceedings of the XVth Congress of the International Comparative Literature Association‚ Literature as cultural memory, Leiden 1997. Ed. by Hua Meng, Sukehiro Hirakawa. (Amsterdam : Rodopi, 2000). (WilO4, Publication) Person: Wilde, Oscar Person: Yu, Dafu
11	1923	Hu, Yuzhi. Jin dai wen xue gai guan [ID D27215]. Bonnie S. McDougall : Hu Yuzhi described Oscar Wild as a major dramatist as well as a poet, novelist and writer of fairy-tales. He mentions that The picture of Dorian Gray had already been translated into Chinese, as well as some plays and many fine poems and fairy-tales. According to Hu Yuzhi, Wilde's main contribution to literature was in the theory and criticism, as the founder of the Aesthetic School and major advocate of the separation of art from life. Hu then went on to say that Wilde was a decadent writer who led a dissolute life and was sent to prison for committing an offence against the law. He avoids making explicit the nature of Wilde's offence, but it is unlikely that it would not be known to this group of professional writers. In the puritanical atmosphere of the May Fourth movement, Wilde's flamboyant homosexuality may have been a substantial factor in alienating the more serious-minded of the literary revolutionaries.	Person: Hu, Yuzhi Person: Wilde, Oscar
12	1925	Guo, Moruo. Sheng huo de yi shu hua. [The art of living]. In : Guo, Moruo. Moruo wen ji. (Beijing : Ren min wen xue chu ban she, 1959). 生活的艺术化 Bonnie S. McDougall : In this lecture, Guo Moruo begins with the disparaging remark, that Oscar Wilde's conception of making an art out of life was simply to stroll down the street wearing peculiar clothes and trying to attact people's attention. This is grossly unfair not only to Wilde's views on the proper influence of art on life, but even to his very sensible ideas on dress reform.	Person: Guo, Moruo Person: Wilde, Oscar

Sources (7)

#	Year	Bibliographical Data	Type / Abbreviation	Linked Data
1	1918	[Wilde, Oscar]. Shao nai nai di shan zi. In : Xin qing nian (1918). Übersetzung von Wilde, Oscar. Lady Windermere's fan. (London : Elkin Mathews and John Lane, 1893). (Kline/Roethke collection). [Erstaufführung 1892 St. James Theatre London]. 少奶奶的扇子	Publication / WilO76
2	1919	[Wilde, Oscar]. Shao nai nai di shan zi. In : Xin chao ; March (1919). Übersetzung von Wilde, Oscar. Lady Windermere's fan. (London : Elkin Mathews and John Lane, 1893). (Kline/Roethke collection). [Erstaufführung 1892 St. James Theatre London]. 少奶奶的扇子	Publication / WilO77
3	1921	[Wilde, Oscar]. [Bu yao jin de nü ren]. Geng Shizhi yi. In : Xiao shuo yue bao (1921). Übersetzung von Wilde, Oscar. A woman of no importance. (London : J. Lane, 1894). [Uraufführung Haymarket Theatre, London 1893]. 不要緊的女人	Publication / WilO13	Cited by: Worldcat/OCLC (WC, Web) Person: Geng, Shizhi Person: Wilde, Oscar
4	1921	[Wilde, Oscar]. [Zi si de ju ren]. Zhou Zuoren yi. In : Xin chao ; Sept. (1921). Übersetzung von Wilde, Oscar. The selfish giant. In : Wilde, Oscar. The happy prince, and other stories. Ill. By Walter Crane and Jacomb Hood. (London : D. Nutt, 1888). 自私的巨人	Publication / WilO102	Person: Wilde, Oscar Person: Zhou, Zuoren
5	1922	[Wilde, Oscar]. [Five prose poems]. Liu Fu yi. In : Xiao shuo yue bao (1922).	Publication / WilO14
6	1922	Zhou, Zuoren. Zi ji de yuan di. In : Chen bao fu kan ; Jan.-Oct. (1922). = (Beijing : Chen bao she chu ban bu, 1923). (Chen bao she cong shu ; 11). [One's own garden]. [Enthält Eintragungen über Oscar Wilde]. 自己的園地	Publication / ZhouZ10	Person: Wilde, Oscar Person: Zhou, Zuoren
7	1922	[Wilde, Oscar]. [Daolian Gelei de hua yiang : Preface]. Yu Dafu yi. In : Chuang zao ji kan ; no 1 (1922). 道连葛雷的画	Publication / WilO48	Cited by: Zhou, Xiaoyi. Oscar Wilde : an image of artistic self-fashioning in modern China, 1909-1949. In : Images of Westerners in Chinese and Japanese literature : proceedings of the XVth Congress of the International Comparative Literature Association‚ Literature as cultural memory, Leiden 1997. Ed. by Hua Meng, Sukehiro Hirakawa. (Amsterdam : Rodopi, 2000). (WilO4, Published) Person: Wilde, Oscar Person: Yu, Dafu

Cited by (1)

#	Year	Bibliographical Data	Type / Abbreviation	Linked Data
1	2000-	Asien-Orient-Institut Universität Zürich	Organisation / AOI	Cited by: Huppertz, Josefine ; Köster, Hermann. Kleine China-Beiträge. (St. Augustin : Selbstverlag, 1979). [Hermann Köster zum 75. Geburtstag]. [Enthält : Ostasieneise von Wilhelm Schmidt 1935 von Josefine Huppertz ; Konfuzianismus von Xunzi von Hermann Köster]. (Huppe1, Published)