英文摘要 |
The article aims to examine the metaphorical use of the past in Wu Mei-Cun's play ”Moling Chun”, and to investigate the nostalgic turn of the late Ming craze for antiques in the wake of dynastic turnover as represented in it. In line with early Qing playwrights' tendency of setting their works in the past eras that are perceived to parallel their contemporary history and politics, Wu chooses as his topic the lives of several Southern Tang loyalists. Through analyzing Wu Mei-Cun's careful selection, appropriation, and rearrangement of the Southern Tang imagery and its last ruler Li Yu's lyrics, the article sets out to discuss how Wu succeeds in invoking the Southern Tang as a key means of conveying his historical memory and reflection. Wu pays particular attention to the Southern Tang cultural artifacts. It exemplifies that such objects from the fallen dynasty not only evokes a strong sense of nostalgia, but also came to be the center of literary representations of the nostalgia for the fallen dynasty, thus making the conventional denunciation of indulgence in objects as sapping a person's will surprisingly irrelevant in the early Qing literature. |