Collective consciousnesses and individual identities in colonial Taiwan fiction

Situated at the confluence of twentieth century Chinese and Japanese languages and literatures as well as the intersection of literary criticism and colonial studies, this dissertation explicates fiction written by Taiwanese persons during the islands, Japanese colonization, in order to better our understanding of class, ethnicity, location, and gender in the colonial context. Though very brief biographical sketches for a number of authors are included in this study, I elucidate rather than polarize texts, and avoid conflating fiction with its author by adopting a text-centric approach. Chapter one defines colonial Taiwan fiction in terms of author, language, and subject matter before setting aside narratives by the colonizer. Chapter two delineates themes from theses and introduces the concept of proletarian or leftist fiction in Taiwan, in order to examine the texts of Yang Kui (Yô Ki), Yang Shouyu, Wang Shilang, and Zhu Dianren and illustrate how the texts reflect or engage the early twentieth century proletarian moment. Chapter three focuses on the native-intellectual and emigrant colonial; furthermore, I argue that Tokyo, and Taiwan identities should be understood as the center and periphery of Imperial Japan by examining texts written by Weng Nao (Ou Nyou), Wang Changxiong (Oo Shôyû), and Wu Zhuoliu. Chapter four examines the gendered roles of wife, bride, daughter, and mother in their relationship to the emerging female subject by reading texts authored by Zhang Bihua (Chô Hyakuka), Ye Tao (Yô Tô), Huang Baotao (Kô Hôdô), and Yang Qianhe (Yô Chizuru), in order to question the larger, more ambiguous relationship between colonialism and gender. More specifically, I argue that a gender identity that transcended the colonized and colonizing dichotomy existed at upper economic strata. Chapter five argues for a reassessment of post-colonial translation and criticism of colonial era fiction, in order to better understand orthodox Cold War and martial law fields of discourse in Japan and Taiwan. In summary, I employ literary criticism, postcolonial and otherwise, to discuss the technical, thematic, and stylistic merits, as well as shortcomings, of colonial Taiwan fiction, and at the same time shed light on colonial identity and the context of colonialism