Memo #48 (Video)
In this set of interviews, Dr. Wendy Larson (Oregon), Dr. Theodore Huters (UCLA), and Dr. Christopher Rea (UBC) talk about two of modern China’s most famous scholar-writers, Qian Zhongshu (錢鍾書) (1910-1998) and Yang Jiang (楊絳) (b. 1911). They discuss why this husband-wife pair and their writings are important to China today.
Together, Qian and Yang represent a cultural ideal of intellectual integrity, having maintained an extraordinary breadth of humanistic vision through trying circumstances. Like many modern Chinese intellectuals, they worked through war and political campaigns, but two qualities distinguish them from their peers. One was sheer talent, as manifested in Qian’s essays, fiction, and critical works, and in Yang’s stage plays, fiction, essays, translations, and memoirs. Another was their joint devotion to literature and family, which helped them maintain admirable psychological insulation from contemporary politics. Their literary vision was not just Chinese, but cosmopolitan.
Qian Zhongshu (錢鍾書) became recognized in China as a brilliant writer and critic, especially for his novel, Fortress Besieged (1947) and his work of criticism Limited Views (1979-80). Yang Jiang (楊絳) is unique in that she continued to write into her nineties (she is now 99), launching a new career as a memoirist after Qian’s death. As Dr. Larson mentions, Yang and Qian shared a close, egalitarian relationship while each developing a distinctive literary style.
Dr. Huters and Dr. Rea point out that Qian considered the Nobel Prize to be an overrated, even meaningless, cultural honour, and that he would be bemused, if unsurprised, by the official Chinese reaction to Liu Xiaobo winning the 2010 Nobel Peace Prize.
In December 2010, UBC Asian Studies hosted a conference to mark Qian Zhongshu (錢鍾書) and Yang Jiang’s (楊絳) centennial. A new translation of Qian’s Humans, Beasts, and Ghosts came out the same month.
Part 1 – Yang Jiang (楊絳), a unique writer in contemporary China
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wrqIIeX6XjM[/youtube]
Part 2 – The book, Six Chapters from My Life “Downunder”
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g_dazSBSCXY[/youtube]
Part 3 – The relationship between Yang Jiang (楊絳) and her husband, Qian Zhongshu (錢鍾書)
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3yuU6_sz_lU[/youtube]
Part 4 – The significance of Qian Zhongshu (錢鍾書)
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2hvr7fPo5gs[/youtube]
Part 5 – How would Qian Zhongshu (錢鍾書) respond to Liu Xiaobo (劉曉波) winning the Nobel Peace Prize?
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HjP3DXsT8A8[/youtube]
Part 6 – Translating Qian Zhongshu’s (錢鍾書) work
[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c8wawbJ-NjA[/youtube]
Links:
- ‘Life, it’s been said, is one big book…’: One hundred years of Qian Zhongshu, The China Beat, November 2010 (Dr. Rea on Qian Zhongshu)
- China’s Nobel Prize Complex, circa 1946, The Star, December 2010
Related Memos:
- The “Directed Public” of China’s Public Intellectuals by Timothy Cheek (Memo #13)
- China’s Directed Public Receives Nobel Peace Prize by Timothy Cheek (Memo #28)
- A Critical Introduction to Mao by Timothy Cheek (Memo #34 – Video)
- Interview with Dai Qing, the Environmentalist Activist, Investigative Journalist, and Writer by Alison Bailey (Memo #39 – Video)
- Our other Memos about China
- Our collection of Memos on Chinese Literature