Misers, Shrews, and Polygamists

Misers, Shrews, and Polygamists
Author :
Publisher : Duke University Press
Total Pages : 400
Release :
ISBN-10 : 0822315661
ISBN-13 : 9780822315667
Rating : 4/5 (667 Downloads)

Book Synopsis Misers, Shrews, and Polygamists by : Keith McMahon

Download or read book Misers, Shrews, and Polygamists written by Keith McMahon and published by Duke University Press. This book was released on 1995 with total page 400 pages. Available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. Book excerpt: Having multiple wives was one of the mainstays of male privilege during the Ming and Qing dynasties of late imperial China. Based on a comprehensive reading of eighteenth-century Chinese novels and a theoretical approach grounded in poststructuralist, psychoanalytic, and feminist criticism, Misers, Shrews, and Polygamists examines how such privilege functions in these novels and provides the first full account of literary representations of sexuality and gender in pre-modern China. In many examples of rare erotic fiction, and in other works as well-known as Dream of the Red Chamber, Keith McMahon identifies a sexual economy defined by the figures of the "miser" and the "shrew"--caricatures of the retentive, self-containing man and the overflowing, male-enervating woman. Among these and other characters, the author explores the issues surrounding the practice of polygamy, the logic of its overvaluation of masculinity, and the nature of sexuality generally in Chinese society. How does the man with many wives manage and justify his sexual authority? Why and how might he escape or limit this presumed authority, sometimes to the point of portraying himself as abject before the shrewish woman? How do women accommodate or coddle the man, or else oppose, undermine, or remold him? And in what sense does the man place himself lower than the spiritually and morally superior woman? The most extensive English-language study of Chinese literature from the eighteenth century, this examination of polygamy will interest not only students of Chinese history, culture, and literature but also all those concerned with histories of gender and sexuality.


Misers, Shrews, and Polygamists Related Books

Misers, Shrews, and Polygamists
Language: en
Pages: 400
Authors: Keith McMahon
Categories: Family & Relationships
Type: BOOK - Published: 1995 - Publisher: Duke University Press

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Having multiple wives was one of the mainstays of male privilege during the Ming and Qing dynasties of late imperial China. Based on a comprehensive reading of
Polygamy and Sublime Passion
Language: en
Pages: 226
Authors: Keith McMahon
Categories: Social Science
Type: BOOK - Published: 2009-11-24 - Publisher: University of Hawaii Press

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

For centuries of Chinese history, polygamy and prostitution were closely linked practices that legitimized the 'polygynous male'. This title introduces a fresh
Untamed Shrews
Language: en
Pages: 307
Authors: Shu Yang
Categories: Social Science
Type: BOOK - Published: 2023-07-15 - Publisher: Cornell University Press

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

Untamed Shrews traces the evolution of unruly women in Chinese literature, from the reviled "shrew" to the celebrated "new woman." Notorious for her violence, j
Wanton Women in Late-Imperial Chinese Literature
Language: en
Pages: 228
Authors:
Categories: Social Science
Type: BOOK - Published: 2017-04-18 - Publisher: BRILL

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

The contributors to Wanton Women in Late-Imperial Chinese Literature: Models, Genres, Subversions and Traditions draw attention to ‘wanton woman’ themes acr
Misers
Language: en
Pages: 199
Authors: Timothy Alborn
Categories: History
Type: BOOK - Published: 2022-05-05 - Publisher: Routledge

DOWNLOAD EBOOK

This volume uses the extreme case of misers to examine interlocking categories that undergirded the emergence of modern British society, including new perspecti