1.

Record Nr.

UNINA9910735397303321

Autore

Bevan Paul L. T.

Titolo

The Adventures of Ma Suzhen : 'An Heroic Woman Takes Revenge in Shanghai' / / by Paul Bevan

Pubbl/distr/stampa

Cham : , : Springer International Publishing : , : Imprint : Palgrave Macmillan, , 2021

ISBN

9783030890353

9783030890346

Edizione

[1st ed. 2021.]

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (144 pages)

Collana

East Asian Popular Culture, , 2634-5943

Disciplina

895.1351

Soggetti

Ethnology - Asia

Culture

Oriental literature

Asian Culture

Asian Literature

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references.

Nota di contenuto

Chapter 1. Translator's Introduction -- Chapter 2. The Adventures of Ma Suzhen: Cast of Characters -- Chapter 3. The Adventures of Ma Suzhen: An Heroic Woman Takes Revenge in Shanghai -- Chapter 4. A Hero of the Women's Realm, Ma Suzhen, an Essay.

Sommario/riassunto

If you love wuxia ("knight-errant" tales), this book is an absolute must-read. Charming and delightfully humorous, it follows the adventures and bloodstained justice of the effervescent heroine, Ma Suzhen. Bevan's superb writing style and helpful introduction make this a wonderful initiation into Chinese Republican popular fiction and the world of wuxia. Dr Amy Matthewson, author of Cartooning China: 'Punch', Power, and Politics in the Victorian Era. Part newspaper shocker, part fact, part invention and many miles from The Dream of the Red Chamber, this is the sort of story people loved to read in early-twentieth-century China - an exciting and amusing example of truly popular Chinese fiction. Dr Frances Wood, retired curator of the Chinese Collections in the British Library and author of many books, including Great Books of China(2017). The comic novel, TheAdventures



of Ma Suzhen, was written during a highpoint in the popularity of xia "knight-errant" fiction. It is an action-packed tale of a young woman who takes revenge for her brother, Ma Yongzhen, a gangster and performing strongman, who has been murdered by a rival gang in China's most cosmopolitan city, Shanghai. After publication of the book in 1923, the character of Ma Suzhen appeared on stage, and subsequently in a film made by the Mingxing Film Company. The book version translated here, displays a delightful combination of the xia and popular"Mandarin Ducks and Butterflies" genres, with additional elements of Gong'an "court case" fiction. The translation is followed by an essay that explores the background to the legend of Ma Suzhen - a fictional figure, whose exhilarating escapades reflect some of the new possibilities and freedoms available to women following the founding of the Chinese Republic. Dr Paul Bevan is Departmental Lecturer in Modern Chinese Literature and Culture at the University of Oxford. His current research addresses a variety of themes concerning popular fiction and the visual arts as they appeared in periodicals and magazines published in Shanghai during the first decades of the twentieth century.