Stars as Texts: Eileen Chang and Celebrity Culture

蹦蹦戲花旦:張愛玲的「女明星學」

分享嘉賓 Speaker: Ms. LI Qing 李青 (專欄作家)

主持人 Moderator: Prof. Nicole HUANG 黃心村教授 (Department of Comparative Literature, HKU)

日期時間 Date & Time: April 23, 2026 (Thu) 17:00-18:30pm (HKT)
語言 Language: 普通話 Putonghua
地點 Venue: CBA, G/F, Chow Yei Ching Building, Main Campus, HKU
講座模式 Delivery Mode: Face-to-face & Online (via Zoom)
報名 Registration: https://hku.au1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_ddv8GpkQyEH0yZo

摘要 Abstract:
在24歲,張愛玲寫下,「將來的荒原下,斷瓦頹垣裡,只有蹦蹦戲花旦這樣的女人,她能夠夷然地活下去,去任何時代,任何社會裏,到處是她的家」。恰似人生判詞,其後 50 載,她採不同身段、於不同時空「夷然地活下去」。她亦是少數去國後仍將寫作視為畢生志業的女性,早早具備「打造明星 IP」的先鋒意識,與李麗華、林黛等名伶花旦皆有點滴交集,從原鄉到異鄉,離散中,有人「夷然地活下去」,有人沒有。

講座圍繞張愛玲自我經營的「女明星學」,回溯她的粉墨登場與隱入塵煙,並嘗試以之為綫索,鉤沉「花旦們」歷史深處的容顏,也希望藉此度量她與她的時代,似近還遠「孜孜窺視」的距離。

At the age of twenty-four, Eileen Chang wrote what seemed a defining prophecy: “In the wasteland of the future, amid crumbling walls and debris, only a woman like a rustic ‘bengbeng’ opera starlet can survive with poise. She belongs to any age, any society; she is at home wherever she goes.” For the next fifty years, shifting her gesture to fit the changing times, she continued to “survive with poise”. She was a pioneer who possessed an early instinct for “star branding,” her life crossing paths with silver-screen divas like Li Lihua and Lin Dai. In an age of dispersal, some survived with poise; others vanished.

This lecture centers on Chang’s own practice of the “art of the diva”, tracing her grand entrance and her eventual final curtain. Using her as a guiding thread, we seek to unearth the faces of “divas” buried in history, measuring the distance between Eileen Chang and her era: a distance that is “so near, yet so far”—defined by a gaze of perpetual, longing scrutiny.


講者簡介 About the Speaker:
李青  筆名「一把青」,畢業於華東師範大學中文系及香港中文大學性別研究專業。任職財經媒體,業餘專欄評論,文章見諸《新京報書評周刊》、《南方人物周刊》、《文匯報》、《印刻文學生活誌》、香港 01、《香港經濟日報》 等。喜風花雪月與故人故事。

LI Qing  Writing under the pen name “Yi Ba Qing”. Graduated from the Department of Chinese Language and Literature at East China Normal University, and later completed a postgraduate programme in Gender Studies at The Chinese University of Hong Kong. She works in financial media and writes film criticism and columns as a personal pursuit, with contributions to Beijing News Book Review WeeklySouthern People WeeklyWen Wei PoINK Literary MonthlyHK01Hong Kong Economic Times and other publications. She has a fondness for vintage romance and good old days.

Notice:
1) The seminar will be conducted primarily in face-to-face mode. Those who cannot attend the seminar in-person can apply for online participation (via Zoom) with justification.
2) All those who would like to attend the seminar are required to register online (https://hku.au1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_ddv8GpkQyEH0yZo) on a first-come, first-served basis.
3) A confirmation email will be sent to the registrants’ email addresses and participants have to show the screenshot or print-out version of the email for entry to the seminar venue.
4) Walk-in or latecomers will not be given entry to the seminar venue unless situation allows.

This event is held as part of the New Directions in Eileen Chang Studies Lecture Series |
張愛玲研究新方向講座系列 
Co-hosted by School of Chinese and Department of Comparative Literature, HKU
Co-sponsored by Louis Cha Fund for Chinese studies & East/West studies in the Faculty
& Center for the Study of Globalization and Cultures (CSGC)

For updates on future events hosted by the Center for the Study of Globalization and Cultures, please visit https://www.csgc.hku.hk/

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Contact Philology

Speaker:
Tamara Chin, Associate Professor of Comparative Literature, Brown University

Moderator:
Daniel Elam, Assistant Professor, Department of Comparative Literature, HKU

Date: Thursday, March 26, 2026
Time: 4:00 pm Hong Kong Time
Venue: Faculty Lounge (Room 430), 4/F, Run Run Shaw Tower, HKU

The study of language contact lacked prestige in traditional Philology. In China and Europe, philologists partitioned the past into distinct national languages. This talk asks how historical interactions across languages became a recognized modern research object. It revisits the discovery in Dunhuang of a multilingual cave library of ancient texts, and examines the post-Opium War and Cold War politics through which linguistic experts made language contact meaningful.

Tamara Chin is an associate professor of comparative literature at Brown University and author of Savage Exchange: Han Imperialism, Chinese Literary Style, and the Economic Imagination (Harvard 2014; trans. 野蛮交换:汉帝国的扩张、文学风格与经济想象 forthcoming); and The Silk Road Idea: Ancient Contact in the Modern Human Sciences, 1870-1970 (forthcoming 2026).

For updates on future events hosted by the Center for the Study of Globalization and Cultures, please visit https://www.csgc.hku.hk/

Follow us on:
– Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/csgc.hku
– Instagram: @csgc.hku