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Reading Colonial Dis-ease/Disease in Hong Kong Modernist Fiction

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Abstract

Hong Kong people’s dis-ease caused by British colonial rule and the unsettling colonial living environment is thematized as a disease in some of Hong Kong’s most prominent modernist fiction, such as Liu Yichang’s The Drunkard  (1963), Yasi’s Paper Cut-outs (1977), and Xi Xi’s Mourning My Breast (1992). By examining the medical themes of these novels, this chapter examines the promise and failure of Western modernity in colonial Hong Kong, especially in the form of a medical science that did not take into account the local practice of Traditional Chinese Medicine.

I would like to acknowledge that the research for this chapter was supported by the General Research Fund (GRF Project No.: 18400114) of the Research Grants Council of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region Government.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Literature and Culture Studies, The Education University of Hong Kong, 10 Lo Ping Road, Tai Po, Hong Kong, China

    C. T. Au

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  1. C. T. Au
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Correspondence to C. T. Au .

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Editors and Affiliations

  1. University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, USA

    Stephanie M. Hilger

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Au, C.T. (2017). Reading Colonial Dis-ease/Disease in Hong Kong Modernist Fiction. In: Hilger, S. (eds) New Directions in Literature and Medicine Studies. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-51988-7_15

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