Answer all 12 questions. Length is not the top priority, but 10 points questions should be longer and more detailed than 5 points questions.
1) Which longer text is “Winter Night” a part of? Who is the author? What group of people who live in Taiwan is the author considered to be a part of? Why can the title of the book be seen as ironic? 5 points
2) What is “one of life’s greatest ironies” discussed in “Winter Nights”? Explain how it is ironic and its significance. 5 points
3) Which longer text is “Winter Night” a part of? Who is the author? What group of people who live in Taiwan is the author considered to be a part of? Why can the title of the book be seen as ironic? 7 points
4) The May 4th movement was a major event in the New Culture Movement that began in the 1910s and carried on into the 1920s in China. What were some of the major concerns of the New Culture Movement? How did this affect writing itself, such as syntax and form? 5 points
5)What is the relationship between the Chinese Cultural Revolution and contemporary China according to Yu Hua? How have social relations and the economy changed? What do you think is Yu Hua’s vision of Utopia? 10 points
6) In what ways does Xu Zhimo’s essay “Art and Life” flip the idea that China was spiritually superior to the West? How is this problematic but also poignant? 10 points
7) Yu Dafu writes, “Art is life, and life is art, and nothing is served by making them antagonistic!”; Ye Shengtao believes, “literature is the expression and the critique of life”; and Zhu Guangqian writes, “To capture the fresh image and appeal of the moment and give it a permanent expression, that is the art of literature”. Please compare and contrast these three views. Which do you subscribe to? Or do you subscribe to none of them? If so, explain why and present your own position. 12 points
8) How does Yu Hua seem to define “revolution”, what examples does he give? 5 points
9) When will there be genuine love of humanity according to Mao? 2 points
10) Does Mao believe there is human nature in the abstract or concrete? Explain the importance of this idea and how it relates to Maoism. 4 points
11) What is the lumpen-proletariat? What is the proletariat? How are they different? With which class are they both in an antagonist relationship? How is their contradiction the motor of history? Which theory identifies and describes this? 7 points
12) What is the relationship between fiction and governing the people according to Liang Qichao? Do you agree with him? Why or why not? 5 points
