Women’s Poetry of Late Imperial China: Transforming the Inner Chambers

Acknowledgments

ac k now l e d g m e n t s The journey of the making of this book started at McGill University, where I met Professor Grace S. Fong and took her course “Ming-Qing Women’s Writings” in 1999. When she recommended this course to me, I can still remember blurting out, “Were there women writers in the Ming-Qing period?!” Before going to McGill, I graduated from the Department of Chinese Language and Literature at Peking University , one of the best universities in China, but I had learned about only a handful of women writers from earlier periods. Women writers of the Ming-Qing period? Unheard of. With an understanding smile, Professor Fong replied, “Well, you should come to my class then.” I did and have ever since been exploring this forgotten part of China’s literary past. The years of training I received at McGill were crucial to the making of this book. From basic research knowledge and skills to how to become a serious scholar, Professor Fong has been an unflagging guide. I am deeply grateful, not only for her scholarly inspiration, but also for her sustained support of my career. She opened up a brandnew world to me and played a fundamental role in helping me reestablish my career after I immigrated to Canada in 1998. I can never thank her enough. Adding to this good fortune, I am also blessed to have had Professor Robin S. Yates’s advice on the field of MingQing history. His insights as a historian have led me to always pursue further the historical and critical issues relevant to my study. My heartfelt thanks also go to Professor Thomas Lamarre, for comments on my thesis proposal that have remained helpful in refining the approach adopted in this study, and to Professors Kenneth Dean, Hajimei Nakatani, and K. M. Sibbald, for serving on my dissertation examination committee and making suggestions for revisions that have Acknowledgments x been incorporated into this book. I want to thank Professor Dean, in particular, for his assistance on many other academic occasions. It would have been impossible for me to come this far if not for their support. I wish also to acknowledge my fellow students and friends at McGill, James Bonk, Paola Carrozza, Alvin Chung, Jie Ding, Ping Fu, Qiaole Huang, Young Kwon, Fan Lin, Yonghua Liu, Diane Lemire, Sara Neswald, Margaret Ng, Sufeng Xu, and Yimin Zhang, who made my years of graduate study pleasant and unforgettable. All have been a precious source of inspiration and peer support. This scholarly undertaking is also indebted to a number of other institutions and individuals. First, I would like to acknowledge the Social Science and Humanities Research Council of Canada’s FourYear Doctoral Fellowship, 2000–2004, and the Chiang Ching-Kuo Doctoral Fellowship, 2005. During my doctoral studies, I also benefited from the 2004 Mellon Dissertation Workshop at Washington University in St. Louis hosted by Professor Robert Hegel. In 2005, I landed my first job at Swarthmore College, where I was able to move on to the next stage of my career. I want to thank Alan Berkowitz , Haili Kong, Carole Netter, and Kirsten Speidel for their friendship . In 2008, the University of California, Santa Barbara, offered me my current job, which I hope will be my last. I am deeply grateful for the generous support of the department and the university in the forms of course release and research funds, including the Career Development Fund, Individual Research Fund, and Hellman Fellowship . I have been especially blessed to have Professor Ron Egan, a real gentleman and scholar, as my mentor and friend. He has graciously read my work and offered valuable suggestions. Professors John Nathan , Yunte Huang, and Anthony Barbieri-Low have also helped in various ways. During the writing of this book, I belonged to a bookwriting group with ann-elise lewallen, Christina McMahon, Mhoze Chikowero, and Teresa Shewry. I benefited a great deal from their criticism and suggestions. Beyond the campuses with which I have been affiliated, I would like to thank Professor Wilt Idema, the external examiner of my Ph.D. dissertation, and Professor Ellen Widmer who read the dissertation and the introductory chapter of my book manuscript. Both gave me specific advice on how to expand on my subject. Liang Ying, the librarian at Shanghai Library, kindly assisted me many times in finding the materials I needed. I also want to acknowledge pioneering scholars in the field of late imperial...