A Study On English Sinologist Alexander Wylie's Notes On Chinese Literature

Compiled by Alexander Wylie,the British Sinologist,in Shanghai in 1867,Notes on Chinese Literature is a catalogue of ancient Chinese literature.The book aims to help the western scholars who were engaged in studying ancient Chinese literature.In this book,the author collects more than 2000 ancient Chinese books and offers annotation for most of them.For western scholars,the book serves as an important reference for studying Chinese literature.Due to the lack of case studies on Notes on Chinese Literature in academia,this thesis takes it as its research target,and its major research method is detailed analysis of texts.The thesis also applies literature research,historical research,and comparative research methods to the research of Notes on Chinese Literature.The very thesis consists of five parts:The first chapter introduces the research on Alexander Wylie and his Notes on Chinese Literature,and conducts further researches on the basis of present researches.The second chapter is a brief introduction to A-Wylie's life.First of all,it explores the historical context concerning A-Wylie's visit to China in general and his compilation of Notes on Chinese Literature in particular.The chapter then briefly reviews the academic life of A-Wylie which mainly includes life,major works.academic life before visiting China,academic life after visiting China.At the same time,the very chapter also summarizes comments on A-Wylie and his Notes on Chinese Literature by other Sinologists.As for the research on A-Wylie,the author of the paper has tried his best to use those less frequently quoted English literature so as to supplement the current research on A-Wylie and to present a more comprehensive image of A-Wylie.The third chapter is a general introduction to Notes on Chinese Literature.This chapter mainly deals with its survey,major editions,writing background,writing purpose,and its major references in details for a the panorama of the book.The fourth chapter is the most important part of this thesis,which focuses on the analysis of the texts of Notes on Chinese Literature.It reveals the content and importance of the book through comprehensive and systematic analysis of Notes on Chinese Literature.This chapter mainly divides Notes on Chinese Literature into two parts.First of all,by using the method of comparative research,the thesis compared book structure and the classification of Notes on Chinese Literature with the Annotated Catalog of the Complete Library of the Four Branches so as to find the similarities and differences,and the connections between the two books.The second part is a detailed analysis on Notes on Chinese Literature.First of all,the main contents of the four major categories are summarized and refined respectively,and some of them are translated into Chinese to make up for the scarcity of the Chinese translation.Secondly,one or two representative bibliographies in each category is selected for detailed analysis to present the basic content of the document,and uses historical research methods to put it to the historical context so as to judge whether the author's narrative of the document is consistent with historical facts.Then the accuracy and authenticity of author's narrative can be confirmed.The fifth chapter is the conclusion.On the basis of the evaluation of Notes on Chinese Literature by academia,the chapter connects its advantages and disadvantages with An Annotated Bibliography of Selected Chinese Reference Works so as to establish an objective position for Notes on Chinese Literature in academic history.