Butterfly Lovers

Illuminates how one folktale serves as a living record of the evolving cultures and relationships of China and Korea

The late-imperial legend of Liang Shanbo and Zhu Yingtai, the Butterfly Lovers--a story as central to Chinese culture as Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet is to Western culture--also relates a tale of two lovers help apart by social strictures. To audiences of the many Chinese ballads, plays, and films based on the story, the tragic ending offers proof that equality and happiness can only be achieved in a China freed from the traditional family system. This volume offers translations of the earliest versions of the popular ballad along with later literary reinventions of the tale; a variety of related documents reveal the historical and cultural origins of the legend. In his Introduction, Wilt L. Idema provides essential contextual information and discusses how the story of the Butterfly Lovers fits into modern Chinese concepts of gender roles and sexual freedom.

Based on a Chinese folk tale, this romantic tragedy portrays Romeo and Juliet from a distinctly Chinese angle, with its two star-crossed lovers facing the obstacle of a class-based arranged marriage.

Butterfly Lovers

Even though Keith Richardson and his wife, Francesca, own a shop that specializes in angels, and Keith has written the definitive books on America's best-known angel artist, Andy Lakey, Richardson was beyond surprised and to say the least skeptical when, during a guided meditation, a fully formed spirit guide appeared to him and began to speak. The story unfolds. The spirit guide called himself Chang (a Chinese title for "Emperor," as it turns out.) Chang is currently spirit guide to seventeen people, several of whom make an appearance in this book--most notably, James Van Praagh. As Richardson is guided by Chang, he learns many important life lessons and receives information about the past lives he and his wife share along with several of their current acquaintances. Richardson's quest eventually brings him to the Qing Tombs outside Beijing where Chang offers him a life-changing message that leads him and Francesca to recognize the meaning of true love and forgiveness. This moving and inspiring story has chapters on reincarnation and how it works, plus information on karma and universal laws, i.e. abundance, forgiveness, attraction. A fast and fascinating read! This is a book in the tradition of best-selling New Age titles such as The Celestine Prophecy or Mutant Message Down Under, or Shirley MacLaine's groundbreaking Out on a Limb. * A true story of love and reincarnation, forgiveness and karma, with wide mass appeal.

Love stories formed a major part of the classical short story genre in China from as early as the eighth century, when men of letters began to write about romantic encounters. In later centuries, such stories provided inspiration for several new literary genres. While much scholarly attention has been focused on the short story of both the medieval and late imperial eras, comparatively little work has been attempted on the interim stage, the Song and Yuan dynasties, which spanned some five hundred years from the tenth to the fourteenth centuries. Yet this was a crucial developmental period for many forms of narrative literature—so much so that any understanding of late imperial narrative should be informed by the earlier tradition. The first study of its kind in English, The Chinese Love Story from the Tenth to the Fourteenth Century traces the development of the love story throughout this important yet overlooked era. Using Tang dynasty stories as a point of comparison, Alister D. Inglis examines and appraises key new themes, paying special attention to period hallmarks, gender portrayal, and textuality. Inglis demonstrates that, contrary to received scholarly wisdom, this was a highly innovative period during which writers and storytellers laid a fertile foundation for the literature of late imperial China.

This book provides a more rational and systematic explanation for the origin and evolution of the Chinese narrative tradition, based on studies of Chinese literary classics, local culture and items such as bronze wares and porcelain vessels with “portrayed stories.” By doing so, it uncovers forgotten interconnections and reestablishes obscured or unacknowledged lines of descent. Furthermore, it makes an initial study of acoustic narrative. Going beyond the field of literature, it employs tools and materials from diverse fields such as anthropology, religious studies, mythology, linguistics, semiotics, folklore and local culture. The book also offers an archeological inquiry into the knowledge found in various narrative texts, objects with “portrayed stories” and perceptions with “relevant plots.” Providing a wealth of insights, inspiring investigative methods and practical tools that can be applied in narrative studies, the book is an essential resource for researchers and students in the fields of comparative literature, narratology and ancient Chinese literature.