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Academic Journal of Humanities & Social Sciences, 2022, 5(3); doi: 10.25236/AJHSS.2022.050318.

A Gift from Mediation-Optimistic-Tragic Endings in Chinese Literature

Author(s)

Jie Xu

Corresponding Author:
Jie Xu
Affiliation(s)

The Department of East Asian Studies, University of California, Irvine, CA, USA

Abstract

This paper analyzed how Confucian’s mediation roots in modern Chinese female writers leading them to expose their life lessons in the works of optimistic-tragic endings as a concrete form of the term mediation as the first step. To answer this question, the author compared the achievements of three Chinese female writers, Lin Hai-yin (1918-2001), Hsiao Hung (1911-1942) and Eileen Chang (1920-1995) and observed Confucian’s mediation influence on their optimistic-tragic stories’ endings. The analysis of the critical plots in those women’s works showed mediation is a gift for writers to confess to their real life, and an enlightenment for them to create the endings of their works regardless of their lives are pleasure and amenity or misfortune and hardship. These three modern female writers all make one point that meditation plays an important role in their works. However, they create optimistic-tragic endings not because of their study is limited by traditional Chinese culture. Instead, they take the initiative to use optimistically tragic endings to call back their childhood memories.

Keywords

Mediation, Optimistic-tragedy, Lin Hai-yin, Hsiao Hung, Eileen Chang

Cite This Paper

Jie Xu. A Gift from Mediation-Optimistic-Tragic Endings in Chinese Literature. Academic Journal of Humanities & Social Sciences (2022) Vol. 5, Issue 3: 96-104. https://doi.org/10.25236/AJHSS.2022.050318.

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