Between The Ideology And The Utopia Of The Utopian

Robert Van Gulik is a professional diplomatist of Holand, and also a renowned sinologist, interpreter and novelist. His Judge Dee Mystery is a series of detective novels written in18years from1950to1967. It was popular among the western world since published, and was translated into more than ten foreign languages. Since Robert Van Gulik retained the ancient Chinese living style in this novel intactly, the novel became the primary source for westerners to get acquainted with china in the age of1950s to1960s, an age that the Chinese image was worst. However, in the novel, Robert Van Gulik displays china not in its true image as it is. Actually, the china image of this novel is not the duplicate of the reality, but an imagined vision of his reflection, selection and re-construction.My dissertation tries to offer an analysis of imagology to his Judge Dee Mystery, which mainly focuses on the following problems:what is the actual Chinese image modeled in this novel? What parts of the image are real and what parts are just imaginary? Why Robert Van Gulik would have this kind of imagination, and what are his principles to select materials in the novels? Are there some emotional, historical, political and ideological factors of his writing?The preface mainly focuses on reasons of my analysis of imagology on Judge Dee Mystery, and its vision problems and the present research situation.The first chapter introduces the author, Robert Van Gulik, his detective novels of Dee, and the relevant theory of image research in the field of Comparative Literature. Then draws a rough outline of the Chinese image in western world since13th century, and give a related background of image analysis on Judge Dee Mystery.The second chapter focuses on the research of three constructing elements:words, hierarchical relationships and the plot of story with the means of internal-text research.The third chapter focuses on the external research of the Chinese image of the novels by combining with a great deal of documents from Ming and Qing Dynasties. It sorts out Chinese image depicted in this novel in detail from three aspects:the Chinese administration of officials, the bisexual relationships and the folk beliefs. And then emphasizes on the real and unreal of the Chinese image moulded by the novels, and then analyzes sorts of hidden influencing factors.The epilogue illuminates the viewpoint of this dissertation:in the novels of Robert Van Gulik, China is neither a heaven on earth, nor a hell on earth. So the Chinese image of the novel is neither ideological nor utopian, but cleverly in a tension between the two. There are three reasons for Robert Van Gulik to deal as such:he is influenced by Marco Polo and Jesuit missionaries; his attitude towards China is kind, this is reflected in his respect and understanding of Chinese culture all the time; Robert Van Gulik throws his desires, dreams and fascination into text.