英文摘要 |
According to the writer Zhang Dachun, the novel enjoys the freedom to invent alternative knowledge and challenge the social norms that have been taken for granted. From this perspective, Postwar Taiwanese literature with its realistic impulse is deemed to be conservative. Nonetheless, the social norms of the past that realistic literature has recorded could turn out to be rather alternative and challenging to the readers at the present. In Hou Hsiao-hsian's film A Time to Die A Time to Live (1985), Wang Zhenhe's 'Sulan is Getting Married' (1985), and Yang Qingchu's 'A Male Virgin' (1969) prostitution is a legitimate social institution wherein prostitutes perform the ritual of sexual initiation for male virgins while the males often suffer sexual anxiety and problems in need of experienced women's help. This conception of prostitution thus challenges the stereotype of prostitutes as either powerless victims under the rule of patriarchy or unredeemable sexual deviants with the false consciousness of consumerism. Because of their commitment to realism, these three texts ironically provide alternative knowledge to our commonsense and challenge the mainstream discourse about prostitutes. |