Study Of Nostalgic Sentiments In CHEN Dawei's Poems

In the global Chinese literature arena, Malayan Chinese literature had been sidelined for years. However in recent years, there has been a growing scholastic interest into Malayan Chinese literature. In general, those scholars involved in analyzing Malayan Chinese literature will focus a great deal on the works of new generation writers. CHEN Dawei, who born in the 60s, was one of the few prominent poets with great literary achievements, whose works are gradually gaining recognition in the global Chinese literary arena. Such literary achievements are bound to gain scholastic interests. However, most scholars who are involved in the analysis of CHEN Dawei's poems focused into his historical narrative poems and his style of narration. They either analyzed his poems through narrative angle or the relationship between history and poem. Few scholars look into his works using the angle of "nostalgic sentiments" to discuss the rich content of "hometown" in his poems. A look into four of his collections series, we discovered they are filled with transition of language styles and narrative topics, and the main sentiment noted across all four collection series is the theme "nostalgia". As such, this thesis will take a detailed read into Chen Dawei's works, analyzing his "nostalgic sentiments" style of writing through the three aspects of personal, family and culture. We will also point out how he depicts such sentiments and his method in constructing cultural identity and recognition.This thesis is divided into four segments: First, will look through his works from his personal perspective, analyzing his hometown of Malaysia and it picturesque; Second, analyze his description of his clan and its history; Third, we will analyze the imagination of cultural china in his poems. Segment four follows segment three to further the analysis that narration of hometown is in fact the construction and recognition of a poet's cultural identity. Lastly, the conclusion of this thesis is based on the analysis from the above four segments, and further identified the areas and direction for future analysis.