Away from Here: Chinese Poets Outside the PRC

This dissertation examines how Chinese poets who left the People's Republic of China have positioned themselves in relation to a literary space shaped by a home country that is both absent and continually present. It addresses two gaps in existing scholarship: attention has concentrated on a small number of internationally famous poets, and the way poets abroad are discussed has depended heavily on who is speaking and from where, whether in Euro-Anglo-American public discourse or in officially sanctioned criticism within the PRC. The study is organised in two parts. Part I sets out the broader context. It outlines the development of the reform-era poetry scene and the relationship between poetry and nation, surveys how PRC academic criticism has treated poets who relocated abroad, and presents the theoretical and methodological framework. This section reviews the terminology available for such poets, including exile, diaspora, Sinophone and displacement, and adopts the notion of "away from here" together with the concept of self-fashioning drawn from New Historicism. Part II consists of four case studies, on Yan Li, Meng Lang, Zhang Zao and Chun Shu, poets who began writing at different times, left China under different circumstances, and have received limited scholarly attention. Each chapter combines biographical research, based on the poets' own statements and existing scholarship, with close readings of selected poems. Each is organised around three levels: the poets' textual practice, their self-presentation outside poetry, and their activity within the literary field, including publishing, editing and networking. A concluding section draws the case studies together, considers what they share and where they diverge, and identifies directions for further research. By approaching these poets individually rather than through fixed categories, the dissertation offers a wider and more varied account of Chinese poetry written outside the PRC.