The Chinatown Narratives In Chinatown Ballads

Wallace Irwin(1875—1959)was a remarkable American popular writer in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries.He was one of the earliest poets who wrote the themes of Chinatown and published Chinatown Ballads in 1906 which told seven stories that took place in Chinatown.Through the study of the narrative themes and narrative techniques,this research reveals the historical cultural background and narrative purpose of shaping the stereotype of Chinese immigrants in Chinatown Ballads.The Chinatown narrative has been circulating and evolving constantly in the later kindred literature,and has triggered the corresponding rebellious writing from the Chinese American literature.This thesis consists of five parts: Chapter One serves as the introduction part,including a brief introduction of Wallace Irwin and Chinatown Ballads,literature review,motivation and significance,research methods and layout of the study.Chapter Two discusses the narrative themes of Chinatown Ballads.Based on the specific social and historical background,this paper discusses narrative theme of the “Yellow Peril”,Gothic narrative theme and narrative theme of the domestics.Chapter Three mainly explores the narrative techniques of Chinatown Ballads from the classical western narratology.The narrative time aims to make the ballads easy to understand by changing the order,duration and frequency.In addition,the author imitates Chinglish expressions to tell stories about Chinatown to enhance the authenticity.But the discrimination against the Chinese immigrants in the poem reflects that the implied author of this anthology is a racist.Chapter Four mainly analyzes the circulation and evolution of the Chinatown narrative in Chinatown Ballads.Firstly,“The Chamber of Tranquillity” is the evolution of Bluebeard story in Chinatown.Moreover,“Young Mr.Yan” not only has similar plots of The Flower Drum Song,but its subjects are handed down in later literature.Finally,the stereotype of Chinese in Chinatown Ballads forced several generations of Chinese American writers to make unremitting efforts to deconstruct and resist this prejudice.Chapter Five is the conclusion.Although it objectively has the historical value of recording Chinatown and the lifestyle of Chinese laborers at that time,Chinatown Ballads still has misunderstandings and prejudices against Chinese overseas.These prejudices also drive Chinese American writers to improve the image and status of Chinese in American society by rebellious writings.The formation and evolution of China’s image in the West has been going through a slow and long process.Nowadays,it is still necessary to strengthen the dialogue among different civilizations and enhance the soft power of culture under the Belt and Road Initiative.