Office: CLE C204
Hours:
Phone: 721-7478
Email: tclin@uvic.ca

I received a B.A. in Chinese Literature from Fu-Jen Catholic University in Taiwan, followed by an M.A. in Theoretical Linguistics at Indiana University, Bloomington. I took a Ph.D. in classical Chinese literature from the University of British Columbia, completing a dissertation on narrative forms, especially anachrony and non-temporal sequencing, in classical Chinese poetry. I spent a year (2006-2007) doing post-doctoral research, supported by the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS), at Kyoto University in Japan. In July 2008, I joined the Department of Pacific and Asian Studies at the University of Victoria after a year of teaching at the University of Alberta.

My principal area of research is classical Chinese poetry, particularly poetry of Late Imperial China, and narrative theories, including modern European narratology and traditional Chinese theory of fiction. My research in Chinese poetry is primarily concerned with narrative form and the tradition of the knight-errant. I am also interested in other narrative genres, especially vernacular novels of the 14th to 19th century China, fiction before the 11th century, and early Chinese historical narratives like Zuo Zhuan 左傳 (Zuo Tradition), Guoyu 國語 (Conversations of the States), Zhanguoce 戰國策 (Intrigues of the Warring States), and Shiji 史記 (Records of the Grand Historian).

I am currently working on a book project, titled The Classics and the Sword: The Knight-errant in Classical Chinese Poetry, which examines poetic works concerning knights-errant from the earliest stage of the tradition to Late Imperial China, i.e., from the 1st century to the 19th. It looks at how the tradition of the knight-errant in poetry distinguishes itself from that in other literary genres, primarily historical writings and novels, and discusses how the tradition of knight-errantry in poetry was fertilized by historical writings and vernacular fiction and how the tradition in other literary genres was in turn influenced by poetry.

In addition, the female knight-errant is an important subject of my book. Recent Chinese and Western scholarship on classical Chinese poetry has offered a number of valuable studies of gender to enrich the interpretation and appreciation of poetry. The aim of my research is to contribute to this work by giving further consideration to an exploration of the difference between male and female knights-errant in poetry. This will highlight the role of the female knight-errant, or ‘woman warrior’, which can be seen as important evidence for revising standardized gender roles but which has received very scant attention and examination hitherto.

Selected Articles

Lin, Tsung-Cheng 2008. "The Development of Catenation in Tang Narrative Verse: Defining the Achievement of Bai Juyi 白居易 in the Tradition of Chinese Narrative Poetry" (in Japanese). The Haku Kyoi Kenkyuu Nenpou 白居易研究年報 9 (The Annual of Bai Juyi Studies, Tokyo, Japan) (September, 2008), pp. 40-62.

Lin, Tsung-Cheng 2007. "The Development of Catenation in poetry from the Shijing to the Han and Six Dynasties" (in Japanese). Chūgoku bungakuhō 中国文学報 74 (The Journal of Chinese Literature, Kyoto University ) (October, 2007), pp. 1-28.

Lin, Tsung-Cheng 2005. "Yuan Mei's (1716-1798) Narrative Verse." Monumenta Serica 53 (2005), pp. 73-111.

Lin, Tsung-Cheng 2004. "Historical Narration Under Multiple Temporalities: A Study of Narrative Style in Wu Weiye's (1609-1672) Poetry." Asian Cultural Studies 30 (March 2004), pp. 127-43.

Literature / Culture Courses

Language courses