Taiwan Literature: English Translation Series, No. 45 ( Special Issue on New Generation Fiction Writers of Taiwan)

Kuo-ch'ing Tu and Terence Russell (eds.)

  • PublishedJanuary, 2020
  • Binding平裝 / 21*14 / 240pages / 單色(黑) / 英文
  • PublisherUS-Taiwan Literature Foundation & National Taiwan University Press
  • SeriesTaiwan Literature: English Translation Series 45
  • ISBN978-986-350-376-7
  • GPN1010900036
  • Price NT$450
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The New Generation of Taiwan writers, born after 1970, has unquestionably established a distinguished presence in today’s literary circles, and they continue to scale the creative peaks. This issue is entitled, “Special Issue on the New Generation Writers,” and is intended to locate these works within the context of the development of Taiwan literature so that we may observe the special qualities they have brought to literary modulation and generational change. We have also attempted to summarize in stages the imagination/composition that this new generation has projected on a period of history and on their generation.

【About the Editors】

Kuo-ch'ing Tu
, born in Taichung, Taiwan. His research interests include Chinese literature, Chinese poetics and literary theories, comparative literature East and West, and world literatures of Chinese (Shi-Hua wenxue). He is the author of numerous books of poetry in Chinese, as well as translator of English, Japanese, and French works into Chinese.

Terence Russell is Senior Scholar in the Asian Studies Center at the University of Manitoba. He has an interest in contemporary literature in Chinese, especially the literature of Taiwan's Indigenous people. Dr. Russell has been a regular contributor to Taiwan Literature: English Translation Series, and was the guest editor of Issue 24 on Taiwan Indigenous myths and oral literature.


【About the Translators】

John Balcom
 teaches at the Middlebury Institute of International Studies. His most recent translation is The All-Seeing Eye: Colleted Poems of Shang Qin, published by the National Museum of Taiwan Literature.

Howard Goldblatt has been translating Taiwanese literature for more than forty years. His work includes the translation of Pai Hsien-yung's novel Niezi [Crystal Boy] and the stories of Huang Chun-Ming.

Yingtsih Hwang is an independent scholar and translator based in Monterey.

Sylvia Li-chun Lin, a native of Tainan, Taiwan, was Associate Professor of Chinese at the Department of East Asian Languages and Cultures at the University of Notre Dame, where she taught modern and contemporary Chinese literature, film, and culture. Her book, Representing Atrocity in Taiwan: The 2/28 Incident and White Terror in Fiction and Film was published by Columbia University Press. In 2013, she resigned from Notre Dame to be a full time translator and writer. She has translated short stories and co-translated full-length novels from Taiwan and China, including Li Ang's The Lost Garden (Columbia UP, 2015).

Bert Scruggs is an Associate Professor of Taiwanese Literature in the Department of East Asian Studies at the University of California, Irvine. His most recent research on Taiwanese fiction, “It All Starts in Hualien: Pangcah Woman; Rose, Rose, I Love You; and The Man with the Compound Eyes" is contained in the anthology Positioning Taiwan in a Global Context: Being and Becoming (Routledge, 2019). He is also the author of a single volume on postcolonial discourse, identity, translation, and Taiwanese fiction and film: Translingual Narration (University of Hawaii Press, 2015).

Brian Skerratt is an assistant professor at the Graduate Institute of Taiwan Literature and International Cultural Studies at National Chung Hsing University, Taiwan. His research and teaching focus on modern and contemporary poetry in Chinese, comparative poetics, and ecopoetics. Before joining Chung Hsing, he taught at the Centre for China Studies at Chinese University of Hong Kong. He was a Fulbright Senior Scholar at National Chengchi University and a postdoctoral researcher at the Institute of Chinese Literature and Philosophy at Academia Sinica. He received his Ph.D. from Harvard University with a specialization in modern and contemporary poetry in Chinese. His publications include articles such as “Born Orphans of the Earth: Pastoral Utopia in Contemporary Taiwanese Poetry,”“Hsia Yu Buys a Computer” and “Zhu Guangqian and the Rhythm of New Poetry.”His translations of Macanese writer Un Sio San’s poetry, Naked Picnic, are published by CUHK Press.

Terence Russell is Senior Scholar in the Asian Studies Center at the University of Manitoba. His research interest is in contemporary literature in Chinese, especially the literature of Taiwan’s Indigenous people. His publications include studies of Adaw Palaf, Auvini Kadresengan, and Syaman Rapongan. Dr. Russell has a strong interest in translation and translation theory, and has been a regular contributor to Taiwan Literature: English Translation Series. He was the guest editor of Issue 24 on Taiwan Indigenous myths and oral literature, and now serves as co-editor for the journal. His literary translations include novels by award-winning Chinese author Zhang Wei: September’s Fable (2007) and Seven Kinds of Mushrooms (2009); and most recently, The Spirit of

Foreword to the Special Issue on New Generation Fiction Writers of Taiwan/Kuo-ch'ing Tu
「台灣新世代作家小說專輯」卷頭語/杜國清
Casting Light on the Imagination of an Age and a Generation−Introduction to the Special Issue on New Generation Fiction Writers of Taiwan/Chen Wei-lin
投射一個時代與世代的想像—「台灣新世代作家小說專輯」導論/陳惠齡

Short Stories
The Daughter’s Well 女兒井/Translated by Yingtsih Hwang
Tiger God 虎爺/Translated by Howard Goldblatt
Mystery Train 神祕列車/Translated by Bert Scruggs
Low Season淡季/Translated by John Balcom
Hiding迷藏/Translated by Terence Russell
My Late Grandpa王考/Translated by Sylvia Li-chun Lin
Turtle Jar龜甕/Translated by Brian Skerratt
Hua Jia花甲/Translated by Sylvia Li-chun Lin
Limestone Temple堊觀/Translated by Howard Goldblatt

About the Translators
About the Editors
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Foreword to the Special Issue on New Generation Fiction Writers of Taiwan
 
by Kuo-ch’ing Tu
 
T aiwan Literature: English Translation Series started its publication in 1996, and over the course of twenty-three years it has published forty-five issues. Each issue deals with a selected theme, and seeks to present various features of Taiwan literature with the intention of illuminating aspects of its historical development. The works to be translated are chosen with the aim of shedding light on the social background of the writers and their times, as well as on the special qualities of their works, and their historical position. For your reference, the themes that have been covered in previous issues can be found as an appendix at the end of this issue.
 
In looking back, we found that many of our themes in the past took the colonial period as a focus, including Lai Ho and his contemporaries who were writing in Chinese, Taiwanese writers who were writing in Japanese, the Imperial subject literature, and down through Wu Cho-liu and writers representing the transitional period from the Japanese to Chinese regime. The line extends to the postwar period, including February 28th fiction, regional literature, Modernist writers, the nativist view, and fin de siècle trends in the arts and literature. From these works we observe the source fountain of modern Taiwan literature and its developmental tendencies. After dealing with Modernist writers in several recent issues, our attention was directed to the new generation writers who appeared in the 1990s to become a conspicuous phenomenon in literary circles. Taking note of this new development, we resolved that in this special issue we would introduce the new voices of the younger generation writers of Taiwan, and the new directions in the development of Taiwan literature that they represent.
 
For this special issue, we invited Professor Chen Wei-lin of the Graduate Institute of Taiwan Literature, National Tsing Hua University, to serve as the guest editor. Professor Chen is an eminent scholar specializing in the modern fiction of Taiwan. We have availed ourselves of her expertise in the field for assistance in recommending important writers and their representative works. After careful consultation with Prof. Chen, and with the limited space available for each issue in mind, we could only select nine authors for inclusion in this issue. This means that many excellent and noteworthy works have been left out. In fact, a large number of talented young writers are constantly coming to the fore, and we hope to have an opportunity to come out with another issue on a similar theme in the future.
 
Regarding the definition and basic categorization of the new generation writers, and the characteristic styles found in their works, Professor Chen has provided a concise explanation in her introduction. This is especially so with regard to the characteristics of each of the nine selected authors. The introduction provides very helpful information for the readers, and there is no need to reiterate here. It is just unfortunate that our selection of works to be translated is limited to short stories. The characteristic themes employed by the new generation fiction writers, such as local subject matter, family stories, characters from marginalized social classes, folk rituals, chronicles of physical terrain, metaphorical rhetoric, etc. as well as their narrative modes and techniques of expression, are quite different from the writing styles of their predecessors. As pointed out in the introduction, “in their use of form and imaginative construction they already display transitional divergences and variations in writerly aesthetics.” In other words, in their modes of writing, “the New Generation and the previous generation differ vastly… in their sense of country, especially… in their use of ‘intellectual landscapes’ and ‘aesthetic strategies.’” These emerging writers have an encyclopedic knowledge, represented through their literary techniques. Thus, the new generation writers interpret and explain the contemporary realities of their imaginings and experience in their attempt to construct a modern form of Taiwan nativism.
 
However, from the perspective of translation into a foreign language, such characteristics can present special difficulties. Thus, we owe special admiration and appreciation to our translators for the challenges that they have faced, and their skill in overcoming those challenges. It is unavoidable that some passages may appear obscure and difficult to understand. All that we can say is that our translators and editors have tried their best to find creative compromises, and the reader’s understanding is much appreciated.
 
For this special issue, I am above all deeply grateful for the whole-hearted assistance of Professor Chen for discussing the theme, recommending the stories, providing the introduction, and contacting the authors about related information in detail. Her contributions to the conceptualization, editing and ultimate realization of this issue have been invaluable. The translators of this issue, in addition to their well respected reputations in the field, are long-time supporters of the journal. At the same time, we welcome Professor Brian Skerratt, National Chung Hsing University in Taiwan, who joined our translation team and instilled new vitality into the journal. Their effort and cooperation in the laborious, challenging work of translating these nine stories has resulted in an impressive achievement, and is deserving of my highest admiration and appreciation. As for the editing work, I am grateful that my co-editor, Terence Russell, and I share a like mind as we work together with the common cause of promoting the English translation of Taiwan literature.
 
In addition, with the sponsorship of the Graduate Students Study Abroad Program supported by the Ministry of Education in Taiwan, a Ph.D. candidate at the Graduate Institute of Taiwan Literature, National Taiwan University, Tu Shu Wei, has joined us to carry out further research. He also participated in the editing work of the manuscripts, as did our East Asian Language Studies student, Zachary Belgum. Zachary is a diligent student and worker, and he helped with the final proof-reading. The editorial assistance from the Center for Taiwan Studies, in particular the help of Angela Borda and Raelynn Moy, as well as the assistance from our long-time copy editor Fred Edwards, all have my sincere appreciation. Last but not the least, my thanks go to Yen Chiayun of the National Taiwan University Press for the professional assistance that she has rendered in the printing, cover design, and production of the issue. Her cooperation and efficiency were key factors in ensuring that this issue appeared as scheduled and as expected.