On the Concept of Taiwan Literature  

Oleh:

Xiaobing, Tang

Jenis: Article from Journal - ilmiah internasional
Dalam koleksi: Modern China vol. 25 no. 4 (Oct. 1999), page 379-422.
Topik: Taiwan Literature
Fulltext: 379MC254.pdf (131.56KB)

Isi artikel

Few debates about literary concepts, properties, and traditions in the contemporary Chinese-speaking world have generated as much passion and anxiety and given rise to as much intellectual provocation and reflection as the controversy over the notion of “Taiwan literature” that broke out in Taiwan in the early 1980s and kept its galvanizing force well into the 1990s. The number and variety of writings devoted to the debate are simply extraordinary, while the range as well as the depth of the topics examined goes well beyond academic literary studies or campaigns for stylistic innovations. At issue is apparently the definition and positioning of “Taiwan literature,” but in this sprawling debate, literary discourse largely serves as a contentious field through which a symbolic reconfiguration is carried out. Incidentally, the conventional English rendition of “Taiwan wenxue” into “Taiwan literature” brings to the fore the crux of the contention: 1 should it be understood as “Taiwanese literature” instead? What, then, would “Taiwanese literature” connote? And what would be the relationship between this body of literature and Chinese literature? More specifically, what if any relationship is there between literatures from Taiwan, Hong Kong, and mainland China? In offering their different, often emotionally charged answers to these questions, participants in the debate cannot help but address, either directly or implicitly, questions of origins, political legitimacy, hegemonic practices and institutions, and geopolitical implications on a local as much as global scale. Wishing to sort out Taiwan literature amounts to articulating one’s own position vis-à-vis or in terms of various overlapping structures of identity. Inevitably, literary discourse turns into a commentary on Taiwan’s past as much as its future, and the meaning of both categories is fraught with uncertainty in an age when all exclusionary claims of sovereignty over the island seem to be gravely contested.

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