Opium and Addiction in a Cross-Cultural Context: De Quincey's ‘Confessions’ (1821) and the Chinese Novel, Romantic Illusions of the Fool of Yangzhou (Fengyue meng) (c. 1848)
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引用次数: 0
Abstract
This essay examines De Quincey's representation of opium ‘addiction’ in the cross-cultural context of Britain and China in the light of recent revisionist medical discussions of addiction and dependence, and revisionist historical writing about opium use in nineteenth-century China. De Quincey's representation of the opium user is compared to that of China's first ‘city novel’, Courtesans and Opium: Romantic Illusions of the Fool of Yangzhou believed to have been written in 1848 (trans 2009). In this complex fiction, opium smoking is presented as a largely pleasurable and common pastime which has the potential for danger if abused by the unwary. It is not connected with dreams and nightmares, or figured as a stimulus of, or analogy for, the creative imagination. It offers a fascinating view of the leisure world of nineteenth-century China, where recreational opium smoking is common and not problematic when undertaken moderately.
期刊介绍:
The most distinguished scholarly journal of its kind edited and published in Britain, Romanticism offers a forum for the flourishing diversity of Romantic studies today. Focusing on the period 1750-1850, it publishes critical, historical, textual and bibliographical essays prepared to the highest scholarly standards, reflecting the full range of current methodological and theoretical debate. With an extensive reviews section, Romanticism constitutes a vital international arena for scholarly debate in this liveliest field of literary studies.