The City of Ye in the Chinese Literary Landscape

In The City of Ye in the Chinese Literary Landscape, Joanne Tsao demonstrates how the city of Ye changed from an iconic space that represented Cao Cao’s heroic enterprise to a symbol of the fruitlessness of human endeavour, and then finally to a literary landmark, a synecdoche for the vicissitudes of human life caught in the predictable cycles of dynastic rise and decline. Through a close reading of literary works on Ye, she illustrates how the city transformed from a lived to imaginative space to become a symbol in the poetic lexicon.

Making use of literary and historical texts on Ye and its material remains through the Song and beyond she shows the potency of place as a generative force in literary production and in historical discourse.