My main research interests lie in the rich literature and culture of early and medieval China. My first book in English, Letter Writing & Epistolary Culture in Early Medieval China, was published by Washington University Press in 2013. The edited volume History of Chinese Epistolary Culture (Brill, 2015) collects twenty-five articles about a variety of topics throughout Chinese history. The prevalence of health reports and inquiries in Chinese personal letters sparked my research interest in illness narratives across genres in medieval China. In my recent book Health & the Art of Living: Illness Narratives in Early Medieval Chinese Literature, I show how health and illness are represented in literary criticism, autobiography, correspondence, historical accounts, poetry, and religious scriptures to find out what role these representations play in larger narrative contexts and what they tell us about the medieval Chinese understanding of health and illness. For a second, related project I also look across genres—this time not so much because I am interested in a particular theme, but rather because I am exploring the role of the imagination in Chinese medieval literature and literary thought.
keywords
pre-modern Chinese literature and thought, early and early medieval Chinese literature and culture, poetics, criticism, medical and illness narratives, medical culture, correspondence & epistolary culture, notions of nature and wilderness, sleep and dreams, early fiction, Buddhist literature, animal studies, nonhuman narration, Chinese art and material culture, manuscript culture & popular print culture
