Department of Comparative Literature

Center for the Study of Globalization and Cultures

Classic Chinese Novels: Contemporary China, Transnational Media and Affective Network

Date: Wednesday, 28 April 2021
Time: 5 PM (GMT +8)
Speaker: Tsz-kit Yim, PhD Candidate, Department of East Asian Studies, Princeton University

Please register at https://forms.gle/R8AyFuLmZSjQruh68 for Zoom Meeting ID

Today, what C.T. Hsia called “the classic Chinese novels” remain largely alive and kicking as not only literary translations, but also transmedial and transnational adaptations. Compared to Western literary canons which have been subject to postcolonial, racial, and gender critiques, it remains ambiguous what one should do with the ongoing afterlives of Chinese canons in, for instance, a Japanese video game, a Hong Kong soft-porn, a South Korean travel-reality show, or an Asian-American graphic novel. Through a survey of the field and selected case studies, this seminar proposes “affective network” as a lens to read Chinese classics and their transnational afterlives.

About the Speaker

Tsz-kit Yim is currently a Ph.D. candidate in East Asian studies at Princeton University, with B.A. (Comparative Literature & English) and M.Phil. (Comparative Literature) degrees from the University of Hong Kong. He works on classic Chinese novels and adaptations, intersecting broader inquiries of affect theory, gender and genre, as well as translation and world literature.

Moderator: Fiona Law, Department of Comparative Literature, HKU

Please register at the link above. The Zoom link will be sent to you a day before the event.

For enquiries, please contact Christine Vicera at viceracn@hku.hk