Great Classical Novels Research Articles

A Comparative Study of the Clan Relationship and Clan Governance System in the Chinese and Western Aristocratic Families—Take A Dream of Red Mansions and The Age of Innocence as Examples

A Dream of Red Mansions, one of the Four Great Classical Novels of Chinese literature, and The Age of Innocence by American author Edith Wharton both depict the love stories of three noble youths in feudal aristocratic families against the backdrop of significant social changes. This paper seeks to compare the clan relationships and governance systems portrayed in both works, highlighting the similarities and differences between Chinese and Western aristocratic families. By doing so, this study aims to contribute to the broader field of cultural comparison between Chinese and American literature.

Research on the Deletion and Restoration of Literature Works in Film and Television Drama

Film and television adaptation of literature has become the mainstream of current film and television works, but literature and film and television, as two different art forms, the adaptation process is very complicated. This paper deeply discusses the various forms of adaptation of original works and the reasons behind them through case studies and qualitative analysis. At the same time, the article points out that there are significant differences between the original literature and the adaptation of film and television, and analyzes the reasons and techniques of adaptation. Meanwhile, taking the film and television adaptations of the Four Great Classical Novels and Sherlock as examples, it specifically analyzes the content and plot changes presented after the adaptation, and points out that the purpose of film and television adaptation is to improve the viewing quality and satisfy the needs of modern audiences.

A study on the translation strategies of ancient Chinese cultural classics from the perspective of hypotaxis and parataxis--taking the A Dream of Red Mansions as an example

Translation serves as a bridge for telling Chinese stories and promotes the exchange of Chinese and foreign civilizations. By translating Chinese classics into foreign languages, it facilitates the international dissemination of Chinese culture and deepens the exchange and mutual learning of civilizations. As the first of China's four great classical novels, A Dream of Red Mansions is widely recognized for its literary value and achievements by scholars worldwide. From the early 19th century to the present, there have been over 100 translations into more than 30 languages. A Dream of Red Mansions represents the pinnacle of classical Chinese literature, involving complex terminology from various fields. In addition to translating ancient titles and food in the text, there are also extensive translations of ancient poems, all of which pose focal points and challenges in translation. By comparing various translations, this paper takes Hawkes' translation as an example to analyze the differences between English and Chinese in the translation of A Dream of Red Mansions from the perspectives of hypotaxis and parataxis, and expound the translation strategies in this type of translation.

Research on Translation in Publicity in Cross-cultural Communication-Take Journey to The West as an Example

Journey to the West is one of the four great classical novels in China. It has a fascinating plot and a magic form to represent the struggle between hearts, which has high literary and artistic value. As an excellent traditional cultural masterpiece, Journey to the West can respond to the Sixth Plenary session of the 19th Central Committee to enhance people's cultural confidence, for the new era to create a new situation for the cause of the Party and the country to provide strong spiritual strength. Especially in the context of Chinese culture going out, this masterpiece is of great significance to the external communication of Chinese traditional culture. Based on the names and appellations in different versions of Journey to the West and the translation of poems, this paper analyzes the foreignization and domestication strategies used in different versions of Journey to the West from the perspective of domestication and foreignization, and explores what the translator wants to achieve by using this translation strategy, so as to promote the spread of Journey to the West abroad.

Strike the Zither by Joan He

Reviewed by: Strike the Zither by Joan He April Spisak He, Joan Strike the Zither; illus. by Tida Kietsungden. Roaring Brook, 2022 [368p] (Kingdom of Three) Trade ed. ISBN 9781250258588 $18.99 E-book ed. ISBN 9781250258595 $10.99 Reviewed from digital galleys R Gr. 9-12 This retelling of one of China’s four great classical novels, Three Kingdoms, sets the story in 414 during the Xin Dynasty as three warrior women each seek to oust a puppet empress and claim power. The focus here is on Zephyr, an incredible strategist who makes a noble choice to leave her clan and its leader Xin Ren to infiltrate an [End Page 87] enemy camp in the hopes of protecting Xin Ren’s innocent followers and perhaps maneuver an alliance. There, Zephyr is reunited with her sister, who she has been mourning as dead for years, and encounters Crow, a brilliant strategist in his own right, who is intriguing enough to move Zephyr past seeing him only as an enemy. Author He has attempted a bold and complex endeavor, and this series starter is an immersive, lengthy read that requires patience, perhaps some external research, and a willingness to dive into a work that unfolds slowly but offers many rewards. The first-person narration of Zephyr, who is passionate, clever, and impulsive, offers an immediate welcome point of connection in an intricately built world. While some of the political detailing leaves plot points underexplored, it also helps to establish a layered and tangible setting, and the steady but compelling pace allows readers to sink into a fascinating place and time with complex characters that interrogate notions of loyalty, power, and sacrifice. Copyright © 2022 The Board of Trustees of the University of Illinois

Tower of Myriad Mirrors: The first BL ‘quick transmigration’ novel?

Journey to the West is adulated as one of the Four Great Classical Novels in China, which has inspired a veritable cornucopia of sequels and adaptations. Tower of Myriad Mirrors (aka A Supplement to Journey to the West) composed during late Ming (1368-1644) is one of the three most illustrious sequels in pre-modern literature, in that it is characterised by vivid imagination and creativity, Buddhist ethos and philosophical thoughts, as well as biting satire on political reversals and societal predicaments in the 17th century. More significantly, Tower of Myriad Mirrors manifests psychological insights and features enigmatic dreams, which might have inspired a subgenre dubbed as ‘Quick Transmigration’ in China’s online literature. To be more specific, Tower of Myriad Mirrors is parallel to web-based BL (Boys Love) fiction under the category of Quick Transmigration, in terms of their analogous settings, storylines and characters. In this sense, Tower of Myriad Mirrors can be regarded as a prototypical BL novel concerning ‘quick transmigration’.

THE CHARACTER ZHU BAJIE IN “JOURNEY TO THE WEST” BY WU CHENGEN

“Journey to the West”, one of the Four Great Classical Novels of Chinese literature, was adapted for cinematographic, theatrical and television production, amongst others and spread beyond China’s border, making it familiar to millions of readers and audience in many parts of the world, including Vietnam. On the journey to retrieve original Buddhist scriptures for China, the character Pigsy or Zhu Bajie is portrayed as a half-man, half-pig monster with both good and bad personalities which are represented by the animal part and human part. In the article, the analytical and synthetic methods are used to clarify the meaning and significance of the image of Pigsy or Zhu Bajie in “Journey to the West” by Wu Chengen, and this contributes to teaching ancient Chinese literature to Vietnamese students.

Viaje al Oeste vs. viaje a la diversión: estrategias de traducción de los elementos culturales de Peregrinación al Oeste

Journey to the West, one of the Four Great Classical Novels of Chinese Literature, was published in the mid-16th century during the Ming Dynasty. The first Spanish version of the novel was published in 1992. Later, in 2004, this edition was revised and republished in one volume by Siruela Publishing. In addition to Siruela’s edition, another Spanish translation is available as part of the Library of Chinese Classics in 2010. The most recent Spanish version of Journeyto the West was a 187-page book published by the ChinaZhong publishing of Argentina in 2011. This article discusses translators’ strategies in dealing with cultural differences. It compares the contents length, chapter arrangement of the original work and its translations as well as the translation strategies for cultural elements.

Analysis of the Buddhist Conversion of Great Sage

AbstractAs one of the four great classical novels of Chinese literature,The Journey to the Westnarrates a legendary Buddhist pilgrimage. Until now, the religious conversion in the novel remains much less explored by academia. We propose an innovative approach to addressing this shortfall by conducting a corpus-based investigation into the characterization of the protagonist “Great Sage.” We use the corpus tools BFSU PowerConc 1.0 and LancsBox v.2.0.1 to calculate and visualize the collocation networks of Great Sage: for one thing, to contextualize the complex interactions between him and the external environment; for another, to define and compare different phases of the character’s evolution. The collocational networks are derived by means of a quantitative approach, i.e. a mutual information (MI) score with collocation cutoff values. This lays an objective foundation for a subsequent qualitative interpretation of how the protagonist’s identity is forged in his conversion. Further, some associated literary and theological scholarships are woven into our text-based analysis.

The Water Margin, Moral Criticism, and Cultural Confrontation

The Water Margin (Shuihu Zhuan 水滸傳) is one of the four great classical novels of China. It describes how people from different walks of life were driven to become outlaws as a result of poor governance and widespread corruption. These outlaws have been regarded by some commentators as heroes, despite the fact that they perform wanton killing, over retribution, and cannibalism. Liu Zaifu 劉再復 argues that the novel has contributed to the moral downfall of the Chinese people. In this essay, I put forward various arguments in objection to Liu. I think Liu’s argument is unsound, partly because he fails to address the nature of the cultural confrontation between modern readers and The Water Margin. By conducting an evaluation of Liu, I also consider a range of issues concerning how we may understand The Water Margin, and how the novel may morally relate to us in modern society.

MULTIPLE AUTHORS DETECTION: A QUANTITATIVE ANALYSIS OF DREAM OF THE RED CHAMBER

Inspired by the authorship controversy of Dream of the Red Chamber and the application of machine learning in the study of literary stylometry, we develop a rigorous new method for the mathematical analysis of authorship by testing for a so-called chrono-divide in writing styles. Our method incorporates some of the latest advances in the study of authorship attribution, particularly techniques from support vector machines. By introducing the notion of relative frequency as a feature ranking metric, our method proves to be highly effective and robust. Applying our method to the Cheng–Gao version of Dream of the Red Chamber has led to convincing if not irrefutable evidence that the first 80 chapters and the last 40 chapters of the book were written by two different authors. Furthermore, our analysis has unexpectedly provided strong support to the hypothesis that Chapter 67 was not the work of Cao Xueqin either. We have also tested our method to the other three Great Classical Novels in Chinese. As expected no chrono-divides have been found. This provides further evidence of the robustness of our method.

Wu Cheng'en: Viaje al Oeste o Las aventuras del Rey mono, uno de los mayores clásicos de la literatura china

Journey to the West (西遊記), also known as Monkey or The Pilgrim Monkey, is one of the four great classical novels of Chinese literature. The plot is apparently simple: the pilgrimage of a Buddhist monk called Hiuan Tsang (mostly known as Tripitaka) from China to India in order to get the Holy Scriptures, the Great Vehicle of Buddhism. Tripitaka won't be alone in his pilgrimage, as he will be accompanied by the Monkey King (probably the protagonist of the tale, whose birth and early life is accurately told), and also by a dragon and a pig. In this novel we can find a unique mix of beauty and absurdity. Folklore, allegory, religion, history, satyr against burocracy... all these can be found in this novel.