Fables for the Patriarchs: Gender Politics in Tang DiscourseExploring issues of gender in Tang-dynasty literature and culture, Jowen R.Tung draws on a comprehensive range of historical, literary, and social texts to unravel the complex mechanisms of one of the world's oldest patriarchal systems. The author reveals the profound damage inflicted by the masculine state ideology on its subjects by illuminating the problematics of male sexuality under the hovering phallus of the emperor, the construct of male and female psyches within the pseudo-monogamous household, the logic of the collective unconscious in the literati's writings, and a female tradition desperately trapped inside the law of the father. Tung poses urgent questions about a civilization that builds itself upon the sacrifice of human lives and arrives at a rather dark interpretation of the Tang_for many the epitome of the Chinese empire. As such, the book moves beyond the confines of gender studies to propose a heightened agenda for feminist studies, which the author argues now stand at a critical conjecture. |
Contents
III | 1 |
IV | 4 |
V | 10 |
VI | 13 |
VII | 14 |
VIII | 17 |
IX | 19 |
X | 25 |
XLI | 108 |
XLII | 113 |
XLIV | 114 |
XLV | 115 |
XLVI | 117 |
XLVII | 120 |
XLVIII | 125 |
XLIX | 132 |
XI | 26 |
XII | 30 |
XIII | 40 |
XIV | 42 |
XV | 45 |
XVI | 46 |
XVII | 47 |
XVIII | 49 |
XIX | 50 |
XX | 53 |
XXI | 57 |
XXII | 59 |
XXIII | 61 |
XXIV | 64 |
XXV | 67 |
XXVI | 69 |
XXVII | 73 |
XXIX | 76 |
XXX | 77 |
XXXI | 78 |
XXXII | 83 |
XXXIII | 86 |
XXXIV | 88 |
XXXV | 91 |
XXXVI | 94 |
XXXVII | 97 |
XXXVIII | 101 |
XXXIX | 103 |
XL | 106 |
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Common terms and phrases
amorous androgyny beauty biographies boudoir lament Buddhist Chang'an chastity Chen China Chinese Chu Suiliang clans codes concubine Confucian consciousness consorts court courtesans courtiers cultural daughters death discourse dreams Dunhuang elite empire entertainers erotic ethical exiled exposed expressions father female body female desires female jealousy Gaozong gaze gender goddess Heaven husband ideology imperial late Tang Li Shangyin Li's literati Liu Zongyuan lyrical male desires marriage masculine metaphor ministers mirror monarch moon moral mourning obsession official palace women patriarchal poems poetic poetry poets political presented princesses psychological Qu Yuan records scholars sense sexual Shangyin Six Dynasties social Song sorrow supernatural symbolic Taizong talents Tang History Tang narrative Tang women Taoist TDCS tion TNSR transformation Wang Wei Zheng Wen Tingyun wife wives woman emperor words writings Wu Zhao Wu's Xuanzong Xue Tao Xue's Yu Xuanji Yu's Yuan Zetian Zhang Zheng Zhongguo Zhonghua ZZTJ