Chapter Eat to remember. Gastronomical reconfigurations of hunger and imprisonment in contemporary Chinese literature
During the famine that befell China following the disaster of the Great Leap Forward, hunger was a major affliction for the individuals undergoing reform in the labor camps. Food - in terms of procurement, consumption, or just discursive recollection - was a central issue in the prisoners' live...
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| Main Author: | |
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| Format: | Electronic Book Chapter |
| Language: | English |
| Published: |
Florence
Firenze University Press
2021
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| Series: | Studi e saggi
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| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | DOAB: download the publication DOAB: description of the publication |
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| Summary: | During the famine that befell China following the disaster of the Great Leap Forward, hunger was a major affliction for the individuals undergoing reform in the labor camps. Food - in terms of procurement, consumption, or just discursive recollection - was a central issue in the prisoners' lives and, as a consequence, descriptions of meals and eating practices are a recurring presence in modern Chinese literary texts that revolve around carceral experiences. This contribution investigates three literary works that reconstruct personal experiences of imprisonment by way of eating: Wang Ruowang's Hunger Trilogy (1980), Zhang Xianliang's Mimosa (1984), and Yang Xianhui's Chronicles of Jiabiangou (2003). In these texts, food becomes a privileged perspective through which look at how personal and collective memories are re-appropriated and re-elaborated, as well as to analyze how narratives of the past are consumed and produced. |
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| Physical Description: | 1 electronic resource (16 p.) |
| ISBN: | 978-88-5518-506-6.12 9788855185066 |
| Access: | Open Access |