HARVARD EAST ASIAN MONOGRAPHS
Cover: Young China: National Rejuvenation and the Bildungsroman, 1900–1959, from Harvard University PressCover: Young China in HARDCOVER

Harvard East Asian Monographs 385

Young China

National Rejuvenation and the Bildungsroman, 1900–1959

Product Details

HARDCOVER

$49.95 • £43.95 • €45.95

ISBN 9780674088399

Publication Date: 01/18/2016

Text

396 pages

6 x 9 inches

7 halftones

Harvard University Asia Center > Harvard East Asian Monographs

World

Add to Cart

Media Requests:

Related Subjects

The rise of youth is among the most dramatic stories of modern China. Since the last years of the Qing dynasty, youth has been made a new agent of history in Chinese intellectuals’ visions of national rejuvenation through such tremendously popular notions as “young China” and “new youth.” The characterization of a young protagonist with a developmental story has also shaped the modern Chinese novel. Young China takes youth as a central literary motif that was profoundly related to the ideas of nationhood and modernity in twentieth-century China. A synthesis of narrative theory and cultural history, it combines historical investigations of the origin and development of the modern Chinese youth discourse with close analyses of the novelistic construction of the Chinese Bildungsroman, which depicts the psychological growth of youth with a symbolic allusion to national rejuvenation. Negotiating between self and society, ideal and action, and form and reality, such a narrative manifests as well as complicates the various political and cultural symbolisms invested in youth through different periods of modern Chinese history. In this story of young China, the restless, elusive, and protean image of youth both perpetuates and problematizes the ideals of national rejuvenation.

From Our Blog

Jacket: Iron and Blood: A Military History of the German-Speaking Peoples since 1500, by Peter Wilson, from Harvard University Press

A Lesson in German Military History with Peter Wilson

In his landmark book Iron and Blood: A Military History of the German-Speaking Peoples since 1500, acclaimed historian Peter H. Wilson offers a masterful reappraisal of German militarism and warfighting over the last five centuries, leading to the rise of Prussia and the world wars. Below, Wilson answers our questions about this complex history,