In the grand narrative of modern Chinese literature, we often tend to focus on the "tale of two cities"—Beijing and Shanghai—while overlooking the richer and more diverse literary landscape. The ravages of war not only brought trauma but also unexpectedly facilitated the migration and fusion of cultural contexts.
In this video, Assistant Professor Liu Dong from the Department of Chinese and History at City University of Hong Kong will guide us in breaking free from conventional imaginations of literary history. He will reveal how, during the War of Resistance against Japan, the collision between coastal cities in southeastern China, particularly Hong Kong, and foreign cultures gave rise to multiple origins and contexts for modern Chinese literature. Through the stories of writers such as Xiao Hong, Mao Dun, Eileen Chang, and Xiao Qian, we will see how Hong Kong transformed from a "safe harbor" into a critical "hub" for information, people, and literary forms. It connected isolated Shanghai, the wartime capital Chongqing, and even the red capital Yan'an, becoming a unique space where different ideologies and literary experiments converged.
This is not just a history of literature but also a story of courage. In an era engulfed by war, how did these writers persevere in writing, using their pens as swords to transform trauma into immortal words? What inspiration can their persistence and exploration offer us today?
(Reporter: Liu Yu | Cameraman: Felicia Li, Ian Lau | Video editor: Felicia Li, Ian Lau | Editor: Felicia Li, Liu Yu)
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