Spiritualism and modernism in the work of Kawabata Yasunari

Abstract

Kawabata Yasunari held a deep interest in the study of spiritualism from his very youth. He demonstrates his knowledge of the field in his writing in a variety of ways, particularly in the short stories he published during the prewar period. Thus far, scholarship has considered Kawabata's relationship with spiritualism primarily in terms of his biography: there has yet to be a satisfactorily rigorous study taking into account historical context and his use of spiritualism as novelistic technique. This article analyzes Kawabata and spiritualism with respect to modernism by looking at the short stories ‘The Full White Moon’, ‘Requiem’, and ‘Lyric Poem’. This analysis will also help illuminate the diversity of Kawabata's approaches to modernism.     

What is the Canon in American Politics? Analyses of Core Graduate Syllabi

Many core graduate-level seminars claim to expose students to their discipline’s “canon.” The contents of this canon, however, can and do differ across departments and instructors. This project employs a survey of core American politics PhD seminar syllabi at highly ranked universities to construct a systematic account of the American politics canon. Our results offer valuable insights into the topics and literature that political scientists consider important and on which future scholars base their work. Our article breaks down the literature into a comprehensive list of topics and subtopics, which allows us to identify both an overall field canon and one for each topic, to assess whether some topics receive more attention than others, and to identify which topics are most clearly defined. We explore the extent to which diverse perspectives and methods are (or are not) taught to young scholars, and, although we identify sets of frequently assigned readings and authors within each topic, we also find considerable variation between seminars.     

Akutagawa Ryūnosuke's uncanny travels in Republican-era China

This study focuses on Akutagawa Ryūnosuke's Shina yūki (Travels in China): an account of a four-month journey through eastern, central, and northern China in the spring and summer of 1921. Due to Akutagawa's reputation as a writer and the account's vantage point on a transitional period in Japan's expansion abroad, Travels in China has traditionally enjoyed a prominent place in the canon of twentieth-century Japanese travel writing. What has received less attention, however, is the relation of the work to the rest of Akutagawa's literary corpus. In this paper, I situate Travels in China within the larger context of Akutagawa's ongoing interest in Chinese fiction and drama. Rather than reading Travels in China as a work of journalism, as Akutagawa initially invited his readers to do, I argue that the work is an extended exploration not only of the relationship between ‘New China’ and Akutagawa's beloved traditional Chinese culture, but also of the boundaries separating journalism, fiction, and other literary genres. Ultimately, I connect Travels in China to Akutagawa's later work: texts that similarly interrogate and deconstruct the distinctions between genres and modes of narrating experience.     

新世纪两岸对台湾文学诠释权的争夺——以“反攻”大陆学者写的《台湾文学史》为例

某些台湾作家在新世纪对大陆学者撰写的《台湾文学史》或分类史所做的“反攻”,主要是出版《台湾新文学史》或类文学史的著作,对“台湾文学是中国文学一个组成部分”、“反共文学”是一种逝去的文学、“皇民文学”就是汉奸文学的观点作出反弹。他们从政治上和学理上清算大陆学者的台湾文学史观时,还把岛内的统派学者“捆绑”在一起．。代表人物有钟肇政、陈芳明、林瑞明、谢辉煌。     

‘Black letters’: problems and issues in the research,dissemination and reception of literature by Afro-Argentines and on Afro-Argentines

Afro-Argentines of colonial descent constitute one of the lesser known minority groups in the country. While scholarly research on this particular group is still scarce, recent studies account for the diversity of its past and current cultural practices. Aside from some exceptions, Afro-Argentine literature is virtually unknown to academia and, as it is usually the case regarding Minor Literatures, it has been excluded from the national literary canon. Towards the end of the twentieth century there was a resurgence not only of studies on Afro-Argentine literature, but also of the presence of Afro-Argentines themselves in fictional writing. This paper will chart the process of retrieval, analysis and dissemination of Afro-Argentine literature, examining some of the issues that arise both at the epistemic and editorial policy levels. We will account for the revival of a literature on Afro-Argentines, in order to explore whether they reproduce a ‘master narrative’ that, through the historical novel, relegates Afro-Argentines into oblivion and/or reduces the group to its stereotypes; or if, on the other hand, these voices can subvert Argentine historiography by positioning this group in a leading role that mirrors the vitality of their present-day social movements.     

论童年经验对孙犁与赵树理文学创作的影响

20世纪40年代出现在解放区的著名作家孙犁和赵树理，一直备受关注，因其童年经验的影响，其创作呈现出了两种截然不同的风格和创作风貌，为此在批评史上也经历了此起彼伏的升降变化。母亲的慈爱与善良对孙犁的滋润，使得孙犁对真善美有着独特的理解与感悟，并形成了他对美的执著追求与向往，进而形成了超越现实层面，追求美、书写美的浪漫主义理想情怀及书写范式。对赵树理而言，苦难的童年和周围人艰辛的现实生活使得他不可能无视现实处境的残酷和农民的生存苦难，无法避开复杂的农村社会矛盾和斗争，因而形成了直面现实的现实主义情怀及现实主义书写方式。     

论苏诗评点的文献价值

苏诗数量繁多，内容丰富，评者在其评点过程中，对苏诗加添注释，考辨文本，指摘失误，帮助读者更易于阅读和理解作品，发挥出了本事批评的功能。而从文本本身来说，也是一种文献校勘工作，从而也就使得评点具有了文献价值，为我们今天研究苏轼提供了许多重要的参考资料。     

“出草”：一个猎头习俗的文学社会学旅程

“出草”猎人头，是一种消逝了的先民习俗，并非台湾原住民独有，但对“出草”的书写，却是台湾近代以来活生生的文化载体。“出草”在战后台湾文学中被呈现的面容，或诉说了几百年间原住民族的生存、抗争历史；或寄托着知识者缘少数族群问题进行的社会批判与反省，甚而，对萎弱的现代人格之出路的想象；或在当代意识形态与文化消费的背景下，成为某些主流论述——譬如多元文化主义——的注脚。本文追寻“出草”的文学旅程，一以探求战后知识者响应其时代、探寻思想出路的多重样貌；一以理解台湾的文化生态与现实政治。     

《徒然草》的多重魅力说

本文结合《徒然草》文本,分析了它的多重人本魅力艺术价值。就空海真言宗对其的影响从几个方面进行了探讨;还把它与《方丈记》做一比较,探讨了这部作品积极进取的思想价值;以及广泛吸收中国古代文化典籍的创新之处。