Banana Tree in the Snow: Exploring Key Concepts of Song Dynasty Aesthetic Thought

Professor Ron Egan of UC Santa Barbara will give a talk on Song Dynasty Aesthetic Thought.

Ronald Egan works on traditional Chinese poetry, aesthetics, and literati culture of the Tang and Song periods. His publications include studies of major writers of the period as well as topical studies on literature, literary criticism and the relation between poetry and the other arts (painting, calligraphy and music). He is also the translator of selected essays of Qian Zhongshu, one of twentieth-century China's foremost literary scholars.

His current project is a critical study of the life and works of Li Qingzhao, China’s most celebrated woman poet. This project challenges conventional images of Li Qingzhao by examining how her gender has affected the way she is read and represented. Attention is also given to the dramatic swings in critics’ opinions of Li Qingzhao through the centuries. His most recent book, The Problem of Beauty, concerns the problem of justifying interest in beauty and aesthetic pursuits in Song dynasty China in such diverse fields as poetics, horticulture, the collection of art objects and antiquities, and entertainment songs. Before coming to UCSB, he taught at Harvard University and Wellesley College. He has received grants from the American Council of Learned Societies and the National Endowment for the Humanities.