Rose and Lotus: Narrative of Desire in France and China.

• Author: Caiss, Victoria B.

Comparative critical studies on Chinese and Western literature are a rarity, as are studies of Chinese literature using the full arsenal of contemporary critical theories. Tonglin Lu has helped fill in both of these lacunae with her study of early prose narrative in China and France. She has selected for analysis four novels: Chin P'ing Mei; Hung lou meng; Julie, ou la nouvelle Heloise (of Jean-Jacques Rousseau); and Les Liaisons dangereuses (of Choderlos de Laclos). The overarching topic of Lu's project is the "narrative of desire," or the language, themes, and imagery of love in these four novels. Lu examines the range of definitions of love from "destructive and perverse desire," to "lofty love," from libertinism to romanticism. She ranges from controlled and detailed analysis of smaller passages to broader interpretation of structure and theme. Throughout she is guided by the works of contemporary theorists and critics such as Michel Foucault, Georg Lukacs, Jacques Derrida, Jacques Lacan, Georges Poulet, Harold Bloom, Tony Tanner, and a considerable list of scholars who work in narrative theory and in romanticism.

Since this sort of study is so rare, Lu deserves praise for the originality and daring of the project's concept. Her application of theory and her comparatist approach are of value to the field and necessary for continued innovation in fiction criticism. Her use of theory is essentially successful. She uses to good purpose, for example, the insights of Lukacs in her discussion of narrative techniques in Chin P'ing Mei. Her comparatist observations are also of interest. She notes, for example, that the characters of Hung lou meng and of Julie, ou la nouvelle Heloise make contrasting uses of literary texts. In Hung lou meng the reading of literary texts subverts the progress of love; in Julie . . . the citation of literary texts advances the affair.

Lu's most successful observations seem to me to be her close critical readings. Her analytical readings of the detailed linguistic features of passages are subtle, sensitive, and rigorous. Her discussions of Rousseau's Julie . . . are the most successful. Her treatment of the aestheticization of passion and the mystification of the notion of illusion, and the subsequent ambiguities inherent in the creation of a completely self-referential world of the characters is persuasive. Her arguments are well substantiated by the texts she cites and clearly argued. Her discussion of Julie...