World Literature Midterm (Exam 1) Dr. Utter OBU

arrives selling cooking oil, but stays to teach the villagers kung fu

Red lantern Chu

Reading foreign literature is disorienting enough as it is, so it helps to always check the date and that way give yourself as much context as possible. In what century was Cao Xueqin's novel, the Story of the Stone, written?

18c AD

According to the introduction in the Norton, the Daodejing is the most translated early Chinese text, and more than _________ commentaries have been written to attempt to explain its paradoxical wisdom.

700

The famed poet Tao Qian is best remembered as:

A poet whose elegantly simple meditations on the quiet pleasures of friendship, farm, and nature engage with large existential themes.

According to the Norton introduction, it is clear that the Daodejing was written as, among other things:

A refutation of Confucius and his followers, and an alternative to the Confucian vision of human morality.

To what poetry do the "literary gentlemen" who move about the garden with Jia Zhong and Baoyu respond with praise?

Anything that appears to please Jia Zheng (thus revealing that they are sycophants, more interested in staying in the favor of their patron than in pursuing what is best and most beautiful in art)

Protestants and Catholics aren't the only ones to have differed over the question of whether religious images and icons are idolatrous or a useful part of personal piety. Those unfamiliar with the new religion of _________ in China took to calling it "the teaching of images."

Buddhism

Little Bao is uncertain at first who the powerful, black-robed Chinese spirit is that he summons when performing the ritual, but learns from Mei-wen that it is, in fact:

Ch'in Shih-huang, the first emperor of China

One alternate title of Story of the Stone is:

Dream of the Red Chamber

We learn from the introduction that the author, Cao Xueqin, was ethnically _______ (the dominant Chinese ethnicity then and to this day), but that his ancestors had been captured and made to serve on behalf of the conquering Qing Dynasty, which actually resulted in substantial wealth for several generations of the Cao family.

Han

The speaker of the Daodejing identifies himself in the text as __________.

He doesn't identify himself at all, but speaks simply as an indefinite, nameless "I," who delivers words of wisdom as if addressing us from the cosmic void.

We learn all of the following about the poet Li Bo (or, as he is more accurately called, Li Bai) except what?

He wrote only a very few poems, and of those, not many have survived.

who wrote Confusious

Laozi

the tales opera-mad protagonist, from who's point of view the story is told

Little Bao

Isn't it delightful when our close and careful reading of one text is rewarded by an allusion or reference to it in another? In today's reading, we came across direct references to the Classic of Poetry, which we've discussed in class. Moreover, you hopefully recognized the names of a writer whose work we have read together, for the narrator of The Story of the Stone explains that what the "literary gentlemen" have in mind when they propose "Wuling Stream" and "Refuge of the Qins" as poetic names for various spots in the garden is, in fact:

Peach Blossom Spring by Tao Qian (aka Tao Yuanming)

It aids our understanding of the historical context when we learn, again from the Norton introduction, that the _______ dynasty, whose members were regarded by many ethnically Han Chinese as outsiders, did not arise from within China's borders, but instead invaded from the northeast in the seventeenth century. HINT: If you remember the song, this dynasty was China's LAST, and comes right before the brief Republic.

Qing

According to the Norton introduction, it became popular (and, it could be argued, remains a worthwhile story to read and discuss now) because:

The author's intent in telling it is so intriguingly ambiguous

In what is probably the most famous passage in all of Zhuangzi's writings, he dreams that he is ____:

a butterfly

ren, li, and xio are

a central tenets of Confucian thought meaning goodness, ritual, and filial respect

To demonstrate how "the sage harmonizes with both right and wrong," Zhuangzi tells a little parable about:

a monkey trainer

To whom does the character Zongzhen speak these words?"No, this won't do! I can't let you sacrifice your future! You're a fine person, with such a good education . . . I don't have much money, and don't want to ruin your life!"

a young english instructor

We learn that xing, which translates roughly to "evocative images," is among the primary devices (or techniques) in the poetry of (or at least attributed to) Confucius. Which of the following images does not appear in the poems presented in the Norton?

an aged coughing monkey

What does Joan feed to Four-Girl in the woods?

an old raccoon

And yet, in this story, in which the hope of redemption is a prominent theme, we find that by being mindful of Christ's admonition to "Be mindful of others, as I am mindful of you," she has helped to save someone. Who?

bao

Which of the following statements about Chinese religion during the Period of Disunion is most accurate?

both buddhism and daoism encouraged withdrawing from public life

We learn that a courtier of Emperor Wu who assisted in writing the first comprehensive history of China had the misfortune of angering the emperor over a minor matter. For this, he was punished by:

castration

Which of these is not one of Buddhism's "Four Noble Truths"?

charitable giving of 75% of one's income is the great path to Nirvana

To whom do the brother-disciples of the Society of the Righteous and Harmonious Fist refer as the "secondary devils"?

chinese converts to christianity

Technology, as it appears and is described in the story, might best be described as . . .

cold and alienating, adding to the rigid loneliness of the city

We learn that the Chinese word meaning "four" is a homonym for the word meaning ______________ (a fact which readers alert to symbolic significance should probably take note of)

death

Zhang Aling . . .

died in impoverished obscurity in the United States before her work was "discovered" posthumously by a Yale professor.

Vibiana (as she demands to be called) aspires to become all but WHICH of these over the course of today's reading?

empress of china

According to the Norton's Introduction to Confucius, Confucianism enjoyed uninterrupted popularity in China during the rise of Communism in the 20th century.

false

According to the riveting Norton introduction to Early Modern Chinese Vernacular Literature (pp. 165-170), the Mongols based their system of government during the Yuan Dynasty on Confucian principles, for which they had the utmost respect

false

T / F According to my lecture today in class, Gene Luen Yang is historically accurate in his depiction of Joan of Arc's celebrated blonde hair.

false

T/F Though Jia Baoyu and his father, Jia Zhen, are often in disagreement, they share a moment of warm agreement over the definition of which kind of landscape is more "natural."

false

The tremendous success of Buddhism in China owes a great deal to the work of zealous Buddhist missionaries, who imposed conversion on many Chinese people.

false

Zhuangzi's writings are preoccupied, above all, with how to gain and maintain political power.

false

this story takes place during WW1

false

Little Bao's strength is restored when he discovers his elemental source of power, which is:

fire

In chapter one, Shiyin caps off a night of drinking and poetic invention (inspired, notably, by the moon, which is something we've seen before, if you'll recall) with his friend Yucun by presenting the younger man with an impressive amount of silver and two sets of new clothes to help enable him to do do what?

go to the capital and sit for the civil service exam

the God of war, frequently depicted in chinese opera

guan yu

What do we learn about Four-Girl's father?

haunted by troubling memories, he hanged himself

Four-girl's (later Vibiana's) initial interest in Christianity could best be described as stemming from . . .

her traumatized sense of herself as an outsider even within her own family.

little bao's bravery, spiritual sensitivity, and leadership qualities appear to help compensate for the fact that he is

illiterate

Who does Four-Girl refer to as "the acupuncture victim"?

jesus

Laozi advises in the Daodejing, "Know the ________ But keep to the role of the _________."

male/female

In Book XIV, Confucius strikes a young man across the shin with his stick for disrespectfully doing what?

man-spreading (Spreading his legs apart wide)

What important Chinese holiday, occurring on the fifteenth day of the eight month, when the moon is supposedly at its brightest, is mentioned repeatedly in Ch. 1 of Story of the Stone?

mid-autumn festival

The brother-disciples unexpectedly encounter an intimidating battalion of Kansu Braves, the renowned _________soldiers of Southern China.

muslim

Those of you acquainted with the witty, epigrammatical style of ____________, the iconoclastic Irish playwright, probably weren't surprised to read in the Norton Introduction that he was a fan of Zhuangzi's writings.

oscar wilde

Attentive readers should have noticed the repetition of the same phrase by two different characters, which serves to show Four-Girl--and us as readers--that determining whose cause is the righteous one is not always easy.

our nation will be made whole again

According to the Norton introduction, because of Zhang Ailing's experimental use of language and narrative structure, and her thematic preoccupation with the illusory nature of modern narratives of human progress and national success, she might best be classified as a ___________ writer.

postmodern

Even though we have read too little of the novel to even begin to figure out who the main characters are, we recognize a lovers' spat when we see one. Daiyu reproaches Baoyu, through her tears, "You shouldn't blow hot and cold by turns. If you want to quarrel, let's quarrel properly and have nothing to do with each other!" Their fight erupted over a _______ that Daiyu nearly cuts into pieces with scissors.

purse

Confucius was fascinated with duty, order, and tradition, and the Analects give as one example of the efficiency of proper action the model of Emperor Shun, who induced spontaneous order throughout the land simply by ________.

seating himself on his throne, facing south in ritual tradition

Buddhism's emphasis on detachment from the impermanent world came into conflict with traditional Confucian values in a variety of ways. For example, from a Confucian point of view, a young man who decided to become a Buddhist monk betrayed his family and ancestors through the act of:

shaving his head

In classical Greek mythology, the sun god Helios's team of fiery horses pulls the sun across the sky (and sets fire to the earth when his son, Phaethon, foolishly tries to steer the chariot on his own!). But Li Bai, in one of the poems you read today, describes who or what moving the sun?

six dragons

What major commodity emerged during the Tang dynasty and was used by Chinese and other East Asian monks during their meditation and sutra recitation?

tea

In one charmingly comic scene, Vibiana reveals that what appeals to her about the role of a priest is . . .

the authority to confront sin and administer justice

ashamed and angered when reminded that he failed to pass the civil service exam

the constable

Even from the lamentably-brief excerpts we read of The Story of the Stone, we can see that it is informed by Daoist and Buddhist ideas about the illusory, unstable, and futile nature of existence. We get a taste of this from the words inscribed over a big stone archway leading from the realm of unborn souls to (presumably) the world of living beings as we know it. What is inscribed there?

the land of illusion

Dao can be roughly translated as:

the natural way, or the method

In Book XIII of the Analects, Confucius says, "Alas! These puny creatures are not even worth mentioning!" Of whom was he speaking?

the politicians of this day

According to the Norton's Introduction to Medieval Chinese Literature, the apex of China's literary achievement occurred during:

the tang song dynasties

What metaphorical image that we saw repeatedly in Tao Qian's poems occurs also in the poetry of Li Bai?

the world described rather disdainfully as a "ball of mud"

According to the Norton, poetry of the Tang dynasty was characterized by more formal poetic rules than had governed the Classic of Poetry back in the Han dynasty.

true

Cao Xuequin died before he could complete his novel

true

One way in which Buddhism and Daoism harmonized was in their promise of personal salvation (so to speak) from a corrupt world.

true

a village god

tu di gong

Tao Qian's "The Peach Blossom Spring" depicts rural life as:

utopic and pure

For Zhuangzi, the greatest sources of misunderstandings are ______________.

words

According to the introductory passage on Early Chinese Literature and Thought, the ever-shifting Chinese empire was not based, as Rome had been, on conquest, but was instead "tied to cultural values and the power of the __________."

written word