Rereading Du Liankui: Wang Dahong’s Transwriting of The Picture of Dorian Gray and His Identity as an Architect
Resource
中外文學, 41(3), 159-189
Journal
中外文學
Journal Volume
41
Journal Issue
3
Pages
159-189
Date Issued
2012-09
Date
2012-09
Author(s)
Abstract
Ever since Wang Dahong (1918- ), a famous architect of Taiwan, completed
Du Liankui (1977), the transwriting version of The Picture of Dorian
Gray (1890), literary scholars in Taiwan have put it into the context of
translation studies and focused on its intratextual elements as well as its
intertextual relationships with The Picture of Dorian Gray. Trying to distinguish
itself from prior assessments, the present article begins with Mikhail Bakhtin’s
concept of chronotope and argues that, as Du Liankui is completely deprived
of the aristocratic splendor of the fin-de-si?cle London in The Picture of Dorian
Gray, this transwritten work becomes a mouthpiece for Wang Dahong the
architect. Judging from his various criticisms of Taipei and New York in Du
Liankui, it turns out that his urban vision is essentially based on the pursuit of
beauty, for which “nature” is the highest criterion of judgment.
The article concludes by arguing that Pai Hsien-yung’s Crystal Boys
(1983), like Du Liankui, is also a novel with the chronotope of “the Taipei
in the 1970s.” Both of the two novels depict Taipei’s East District and West
District as going through a great temporal-spatial transformation: the more
prosperous and splendid the East District seems, the older the declining West
District looks. While, in Du Liankui, the upper class Taipei people in the East
District live a life of vanity, in Crystal Boys we witness the process of the East
District’s becoming over-commercialized from the investments of international
capital, and no room is left for Wang’s ideal of beauty in that part of Taipei.
Finally, Huang Fan’s and Chen Ying-zhen’s works of fiction about problems of
city life are also included in the discussions.
Subjects
《格雷的肖像》，《杜連魁》，譯寫，世紀末倫敦，臺北東區／西區，時空體
The Picture of Dorian Gray, Du Liankui, transwriting, fin-de-si?cle London,
the East District and West District of Taipei, chronotope
the East District and West District of Taipei, chronotope
Description
THCI 1 級
Type
journal article