通俗讀物編刊社與戰時歷史書寫(1933-1940)

Abstract

The Popular Reading Publishing Company was established in July 1934 after the Mukden Incident as an anti-Japanese academic society. Its predecessor was the Association of Anti-Japanese Chinese faculty of Yenching University. The original goal of the publishing company was to promote anti-Japanese sentiment with popular publications such as transcripts of folksongs, operas, and drum singing. The Popular Reading Publishing Company even established its own distributor, the Three Clans Bookstore. The publishing company later disassociated from Yenching University under the pressure of the Japanese and Nationalist Chinese governments, due to its anti-Japanese nature. The company then developed its own appreciation of how to market for the popular audience and a strategy for its publications, namely ＜||＞new wine in old bottles.＜||＞ The company published many periodicals, book series, pictorials, and readers for citizens during the war. With its extensive publications and far-reaching influence, the Popular Reading Publishing Company distinguished itself as an important association popularizing reading materials during the 1930s. Previous studies of the Popular Reading Publishing Company mostly focused on its famous director, Gu Jiegang, or approached it from a cultural history perspective. This article, on the other hand, attempts to analyze the marketing strategy of ＜||＞new wine in old bottles＜||＞ by examining the recently published Diary of Gu Jiegang, memoirs of its other members, and less examined popular publications put out by the company itself. The article then discusses how its revamped style of history writing shaped modern consciousness of history and national modernity. It also addresses the frustrations the company faced in this effort.