Madame White, The Book of Change, and Eileen Chang: On a Poetics of Involution and Derivation
Madame White, The Book of Change, and Eileen Chang: On a Poetics of Involution and Derivation
This chapter discusses Chang's aesthetic of revision and bilingualism by examining her two English novels, The Fall of the Pagoda and The Book of Change, These two novels were written in the late fifties, when Chang had just settled in the Unites States. In many ways, they provide a missing link in Chang's (re)writing of her own life story, from English to Chinese and vice versa, from lecture to fiction and photo album, and from autobiographical “whispers” to dramatized exposé. The two novels, one referring to the Leifeng Pagoda of the White Snake legend, and the other the esoteric classic The Book of Change, suggest Chang's effort to integrate her writings into a broader cycle of Chinese poetics of involution and derivation.
Keywords: Involution, Derivativeness, Modernity, the I ching
Hong Kong Scholarship Online requires a subscription or purchase to access the full text of books within the service. Public users can however freely search the site and view the abstracts and keywords for each book and chapter.
Please, subscribe or login to access full text content.
If you think you should have access to this title, please contact your librarian.
To troubleshoot, please check our FAQs , and if you can't find the answer there, please contact us .
