Supplementing History: Xiyou bu as a 17th-Century Meta-Xiaoshuo

Abstract

Xiaoshuo has long been considered supplementary to official historiography in the Chinese literary tradition. In this paper, I will rethink the supplementary nature of xiaoshuo as a conceptual issue. Specifically, I focus on the 17th-century novel Xiyou bu as a unique case in which the protagonist can be interpreted as a literary figuration of the creative agency of xiaoshuo. My close reading, in turn, takes into account that conventional discourses on xiaoshuo consider xiaoshuo a genre that is intended for supplementing, expanding, and explicating official historical sources.