Study Of Late Qing Newspapers And Novels

Late Qing Dynasty was an era characterized by its strenuous turbulence in both Chinese society and Chinese culture. As far as the late Qing literature was concerned, it differentiated from that of the past in almost every respect, namely, the literary patterns, literary concepts, contents and structures of literary creation as well as the literary dissemination paradigms. In terms of literary creation of that era, the flourishing of novelle was so marvelous that "it was a world of eight-part essays a decade ago, but a new one of novelle at present", as Yin Bansheng exclaimed in 1906. In a word, the late Qing novelle were so prosperous that it changed the historical fate of novelle creation in China, see, from the previous "a small lane" to "the succinctness" of Chinese literary creation; it brought up a surging revolution initiated by Liang Qichao in the field of Chinese novelle; and it aroused the infinite enthusiasm and interest of many a researcher and achieved a great success, take for example, Lu Xun's A Short History Of Chinese Novelle, A Ying's History Of The Late Qing Novelle.The dominant feature that made the late Qing novelle different from those of the past was that they were published in newspapers and periodicals, with no exception of a great number of novels. At the time novelle were published not only in literary periodicals (the professional ones for novelle in particular) but in many newspapers as well. Therefore, no scholar in the field should brush aside the internal relationship between novelle themselves and the press of that era. So far, A New And Enlarged Novelle Catalogue From Late Qing To Early Min Guo, accomplished by the distinguished Japanese scholar Zunbenzhaoxiong, has been regarded as the most detailed book concerning late Qing novelle.yet it still has lots, of regrettable imperfections, as the author Zunbenzhaoxiong himself admitted, on the one hand, it was based on the second-hand materials, on the other, many novelle published in the daily newspapers were excluded. So, to a certain degree, it is its incompletion that stimulates me to decide on the topic of my present doctoral dissertation. Frankly, I began my study on late Qing novelle 5 years ago when I was engaged in writing my postgraduate dissertation with my supervisor's help. I initiated my research with collecting the first-hand materials which took me almost three years. Ultimately, there were approximately 1065 novelle taken from 106 periodicals (from 1872 to 1911) and 1456 novelle published in 47 newspapers issued before 1912 stored in Shanghai Library. Those first-hand materials have been applied to my two theses, respectively, Catalogue Of Late Qing Novelle Published In Periodicals and Catalogue Of Late Qing Novelle Published In Newspapers. Objectively, compared with A New And Enlarged Novelle Catalogue From Late Qing To Early Min Guo, those two theses have supplemented with more than 1000 new items.Altogether, the doctoral dissertation has 8 chapters, excluding Preface and Conclusion. Preface deals with a brief recall of the study on late Qing novelle in the previous century both at home and abroad, a short introduction to the determination and importance of the subject of my dissertation and an explanation to the main idea and features of the dissertation. Chapter One focuses on the exploration of the reasons why novelle became so flourishing. The following two chapters revolve around the press novelle in late Qing-the former concerns with the novellepublished in periodicals while the latter in newspapers, particularly in ShiBao (Times), Shenzhou Ribao (Shenzhou Daily) and ShenBao (Shanghai Daily). Chapter Four is on the novelle in Pictorials. How the late Qing novelle could have been spread so widely, in other words, the dissemination paradigm (the press media in particular) is the central idea discussed in Chapter Five. The next chapter is on the categorizations of the late Qing novelle and their corresponding contents. Chapter Seven is an analytical study on those novelle through the angle of craftsm...