Research On The Revision Of Zhang Ailing's "Legend"

The first edition of Legend was published by Za Zhi Press in Augest15 1944,which includes ten fiction works in it.The book was extremely delicate in terms of it's inner content and outer design.The patternless peacock-blue cover was personally designed by Eileen Chang and only marked the title and the author of book.The second edition of Legend were published in September 25 of the same year.The cover was used the painting of Yanying and the whole cover was like dark clouds climbed to the ancient silks.In November 1946,the revised edition of Legend was published by Shanhe publisher in Shanghai.Based on the first edition,it was added five fiction works which include a large proportion of Eileen's masterpieces and Yanying was back on the cover design.Unlike her previous design work for Legend,the revised edition took the Portrait of Beauty Wearing Ancient Clothes in the Dianshizhai IIIustrated in Late Qing Dynasty as it's base graph,coupled with the disproportional modern figure,which showing a mysterious and ghostly observer scene to the reader.So far,Eileen's Legend has four editions,including the original version,first edition,second edition and revised edition.The research of edition is a vital step for the historical materials of modern Chinese literature.The variation of edition can not only demonstrate the changes in author's mindset,but can also illustrate a comprehensive interpretation for the content of grammatology,linguistics,sociology,rhetoric,psychology and aesthetics.Through the conflation,we can centralize the historical and literary information in the changing process of different editions in order to explore the creative ideas,aesthetic conception and mentality changes of author.