China - A Country of Cannibals? The Motif of Cannibalism in Lu Xun's 'A Madman's Diary'

Seminar paper from the year 2015 in the subject Literature - Asia, grade: 1.0, University of Heidelberg (Institut für Sinologie), course: PS Einführung in die Chinesische Literatur, language: English, abstract: In this essay the focus will be on the motif of cannibalism in 'A Madman's Diary' (Kuangren riji), which is the central image of this short-story. I will examine it in the socio-political context the story was written in and analyse possible readings. Furthermore since the meaning of the image of cannibalism in this text has been thoroughly discussed over the last century, I want to go on briefly exploring the choice of this motif itself. Why has Lu Xun chosen this very image of cannibalism and what could we learn from this about the author's view of (traditional) Chinese society? Lu Xun's story has already been interpreted many times and in different ways. However it is and remains a significant and complex literary piece that should be read and interpreted again and again. First of all because of its importance for the history of modern Chinese literature, generally being considered to be the first modern Chinese short-story (Hsia 33) and even more to mark the beginning of modern Chinese literature itself (Chou 1042). Despite this evident contribution to the genre of modern Chinese fiction, Lu Xun's story can also be viewed as a 'prototypical text of social protest and criticism in modern Chinese literature' (Tang).