Chinese Courses

1086 Love in Chinese and Western Literature

2101, Fall 2009, 37351, Yun Peng

TH 1–2:20

1.This course is a comparative study of the idea of “love” in Chinese and Western literature. We begin with an examination of various historical modes of love as they are expressed in literary works in both traditions. We approach love by questioning its relationship with other important aspects of culture and human existence. What does love have to do with social, political, and natural orders? How is desire conceived differently in different historical and cultural contexts? Is there an intrinsic relationship between love and what we consider to be essentially “literary” about literature? What does love have to do with being modern? We will ask these questions via close analyses of a variety of texts, including literary classics (e.g. Tang Xianzu’s The Peony Pavilion, chapters from Cao Xueqin’s The Story of the Stone, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe’s Elective Affinities, stories by Zhang Ailing), philosophical writings (e.g. excerpts from Denis de Rougemont’s Love in the Western World and Stephen Owen’s Mi-Lou), as well as cinematic texts (e.g. Yellow Earth).

3. No recitations.

4. Expected class size: 25.

5. This course is not offered regularly.