Mary Ann Farquhar

Chris Berry

In China on Screen, Chris Berry and Mary Farquhar, leaders in the field of Chinese film studies, explore more than one hundred years of Chinese cinema and nation. Providing new perspectives on key movements, themes, and filmmakers, Berry and Farquhar analyze the films of a variety of directors and actors, including Chen Kaige, Zhang Yimou, Hou Hsiao Hsien, Bruce Lee, Jackie Chan, Maggie Cheung, Gong Li, Wong Kar-wai, and Ang Lee. They argue for the abandonment of "national cinema" as an analytic tool and propose "cinema and the national" as a more productive framework. With this approach, they show how movies from China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and the Chinese diaspora construct and contest different ideas of Chinese nation -- as empire, republic, or ethnicity, and complicated by gender, class, style, transnationalism, and more. Among the issues and themes covered are the tension between operatic and realist modes, male and female star images, transnational production and circulation of Chinese films, the image of the good foreigner -- all related to different ways of imagining nation. Comprehensive and provocative, China on Screen is a crucial work of film analysis.

Cinema and Nation

China on Screen

Christopher J. Berry

In China on Screen, Chris Berry and Mary Farquhar, leaders in the field of Chinese film studies, explore more than one hundred years of Chinese cinema and nation. Providing new perspectives on key movements, themes, and filmmakers, Berry and Farquhar analyze the films of a variety of directors and actors, including Chen Kaige, Zhang Yimou, Hou Hsiao Hsien, Bruce Lee, Jackie Chan, Maggie Cheung, Gong Li, Wong Kar-wai, and Ang Lee. They argue for the abandonment of "national cinema" as an analytic tool and propose "cinema and the national" as a more productive framework. With this approach, they show how movies from China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, and the Chinese diaspora construct and contest different ideas of Chinese nation—as empire, republic, or ethnicity, and complicated by gender, class, style, transnationalism, and more. Among the issues and themes covered are the tension between operatic and realist modes, male and female star images, transnational production and circulation of Chinese films, the image of the good foreigner—all related to different ways of imagining nation. Comprehensive and provocative, China on Screen is a crucial work of film analysis.

Associate Professor of International Business and Asian Studies at Griffith University Mary Ann Farquhar, PH D

A history of children's literature in China, set in the framework of China's revolution and modernization. Lu Xun and his brother Zhou Zhuren were the founding fathers of the idea of the political importance of children and how that connected with literature tailored for them in the 20s and 30s.

From Lu Xun to Mao Zedong

Children's Literature in China

The first history of the vast, yet neglected, field of modern Chinese children's literature, this book introduces the major works and debates in children's literature within the framework of China's revolution and modernization. This literature was born out of the May Fourth period cultural renaissance in the early twentieth century; its rationale was the political importance of children as the nation's future at a time of war and revolutionary change. Lu Xun and his brother, Zhou Zhuren, were the founding fathers of this new literature which swept major urban centers in the twenties and thirties. It began as an anti-Confucian attack on tradition, using social Darwinism as the framework for national survival and its application to education. Darwinism gave way to Marxism in the post-war period and children's literature subsequently adopted revolutionary approaches first formulated by Mao Zedong. It became the subject of major debates and political campaigns, particularly around the nature of fairytales.

Christopher (Associate Professor of Film Studies Berry, Goldsmiths College)

Introduces major works and debates in children's literature within the framework of China's revolution and modernization. Discusses literature born out the May Fourth period cultural renaissance in the early 20th century, and looks at the work of Lu Xun and his brother Zhou Zhuren, founding fathers of this new literature which swept major urban centers in the 1920s and 1930s. Shows how this literature began as an anti-Confucian attack on tradition, using social Darwinism as the framework for national survival and its application to education, then chronciles how Darwinism gave way to Marxism in the post-war period. Farquhar teaches China studies and Asian law at Griffith University in Brisbane, Australia. Annotation copyrighted by Book News, Inc., Portland, OR.

This book introduces the major works and debates in Chinese children's literature within the framework of China's revolution and modernization. It demonstrates that the guiding rationale in children's literature was the political importance of children as the nation's future.

Mary Ann Farquhar

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