Oriental Studies (Dec 2023)
Works of Nikolai V. Gogol in Chinese Reading Audience: A History of Translations and Features of China-Based Studies
Abstract
Introduction. The early twentieth century reforms in China gave rise to the issue of renovating fiction that profoundly influences collective consciousness. Chinese translators started actively addressing foreign fiction, including classic Russian literature. Goals. The study attempts an insight how Chinese reading audience’s interest in Russian classics — and particularly in the works of Nikolai V. Gogol — would take form and develop. Results. As for the reasons behind the Chinese translators’ appeal to Russian classical literature, the paper notes those are associated with the huge political and social changes in Russia after the October Revolution. The latter facilitated that Russian literature has firmly entered the cultural space of China, having yielded strong impacts on both readers and Chinese writers. The May Fourth Movement not only marked the beginning of a new era in the history of twentieth century China, but also served as an impetus for the development of new Chinese literature. The works of N. Gogol began to occupy a special place in this cultural space. Since 1920, when N. Gogol’s first work was published in a Chinese magazine, attention to his literary heritage has grown significantly. The translation activities of Qu Qiubai, Geng Jizhi, Ren Guangxuan, Bai Sihong, Bai Chunren and many other associates contributed to the widespread interest in N. Gogol’s works all across China. These efforts were paralleled by literary studies of the writer’s fiction techniques and style. The 1950s witnessed a ‘pause’. At the beginning of the Cultural Revolution, articles dedicated to N. Gogol disappeared from Chinese newspapers and magazines, but already in the 1970s publications about his works started reappearing. Since the 1990s, the research of Chinese specialists into N. Gogol’s narratives has become far more profound and diverse, and this work will continue, since Russian classical literature has had — and still does — a great influence on the development of contemporary Chinese literature.
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