Comparative Encounters between Artaud, Michaux and the Zhuangzi
Rationality, Cosmology and Ethics

Xiaofan Amy Li

Cover of Comparative Encounters between Artaud, Michaux and the <i>Zhuangzi</i>

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Transcript 4

Legenda

1 July 2015  •  186pp

ISBN: 978-1-909662-67-4 (hardback)  •  RRP £80, $110, €95

ISBN: 978-1-351191-11-1 (Taylor & Francis ebook)

FrenchChinesePoetryPhilosophy

The encounter between different minds and perspectives across time and space has always haunted the literary and philosophical imagination. Just such an encounter is staged and played out in this comparative study, which connects the twentieth-century Francophone writers Antonin Artaud (1896-1948) and Henri Michaux (1899-1984) with the ancient Chinese text Zhuangzi (c. 4th-3rd century BCE). These disparate texts are bridged by questions that draw them into close dialogue: how can Artaud and Michaux, who read about and admired ancient Chinese literature and culture, be rethought through certain philosophical concerns that the Zhuangzi raises? If the points of conceptual intersection focus on rationality, cosmology and ethics, what can they tell us about these important issues? By imagining, constructing and developing this thought-encounter, Li re-envisages Artaud, Michaux and the Zhuangzi through the kaleidoscope of comparative interpretation, juxtaposing and recombining ideas and contexts to form new patterns and meanings.

Xiaofan Amy Li is Junior Research Fellow in Comparative literature and translation at St Anne's College, Oxford University.

Reviews:

  • ‘This intelligent book raises important issues about comparative literature at its most challenging... All three thinkers are concerned with expression and performativity rather than with self-justification. The justification of this three-part comparison is clearly in the fluidity of thinking and its non-limitation.’ — Mary Ann Caws, French Studies 70.2, April 2016, 278-79
  • ‘The philosophical, rather than literary approach undertaken here offers valuable and well-founded insights into enduring modes of thought and existence.’ — unsigned notice, Forum for Modern Language Studies 52.4, October 2016, 473-74

Bibliography entry:

Li, Xiaofan Amy, Comparative Encounters between Artaud, Michaux and the Zhuangzi: Rationality, Cosmology and Ethics, Transcript, 4 (Legenda, 2015)

First footnote reference: 35 Xiaofan Amy Li, Comparative Encounters between Artaud, Michaux and the Zhuangzi: Rationality, Cosmology and Ethics, Transcript, 4 (Legenda, 2015), p. 21.

Subsequent footnote reference: 37 Li, p. 47.

(To see how these citations were worked out, follow this link.)

Bibliography entry:

Li, Xiaofan Amy. 2015. Comparative Encounters between Artaud, Michaux and the Zhuangzi: Rationality, Cosmology and Ethics, Transcript, 4 (Legenda)

Example citation: ‘A quotation occurring on page 21 of this work’ (Li 2015: 21).

Example footnote reference: 35 Li 2015: 21.

(To see how these citations were worked out, follow this link.)

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