Organized by the UCLA Department of English
Date: May 4, 2018
Time: 9:00 AM – 5:00 PM
Location: California Room, UCLA Faculty Center
The one-day Crescent Moon Symposium (May 4, 2018) explores the lives of philosopher Hu Shih 胡适 (1891-1962), poet Xu Zhimo 徐志摩 (1897-1931), scholar/Shakespearean Liang Shiqiu 梁实秋, writer/painter Ling Shuhua 凌淑华 (1900-1990), and their literary communities. The quartet of bilingual intellectuals epitomized the vibrant East-West exchanges in the wake of the May Fourth movement. All four were members of the Crescent Moon Society 新月社, established by Xu Zhimo and Hu Shi and designed as a counterpart of the Bloomsbury Group of England. Three also happened to be prolific epistolary writers. A cosmopolitan friendly with Katherine Mansfield, Roger Fry, and Rabindranath Tagore, Xu was most famous for his Chinese poetry and love letters. Hu Shi corresponded with Bertrand Russell, Arthur Waley, and a number of American literary luminaries. Ling Shuhua corresponded with Virginia Woolf, Vanessa Bell, and Julian Bell.
Two of the four keynote speakers are descendants of Xu Zhimo and Ling Shuhua, respectively: Tony S. Hsu 徐善曾, Xu Zhimo’s only grandson and author of Chasing the Modern《志在摩登》(2017); Sasha Su-Ling Welland 魏淑凌 (U of Washington), grandniece of Ling Shuhua and author of A Thousand Miles of Dreams: The Journeys of Two Chinese Sisters (2007). The other two keynoters are Susan Chan Egan 陈毓贤, co-author of A Pragmatist and His Free Spirit: The Half-Century Romance of Hu Shi and Edith Clifford Williams (2009), and Michelle Yeh (UC Davis), author of Modern Chinese Poetry: Theory and Practice since 1917 (1991). The symposium will also feature a round table discussion of the Crescent Moon Society (a literary society named after a volume of prose poems by Rabindranath Tagore) and its Bloomsbury connection, and a literary salon with bilingual readings, songs, slides, and documentaries about Xu, Hu, and Ling. Round table participants include the four keynoters, visiting scholar Liu Cong 刘聪 (Liang Shiqiu 梁实秋 scholar), and three UCLA faculty members (Michael Berry 白睿文, King-Kok Cheung 张敬珏, Louise Hornby). Admission is free and open to the community.
Speakers:
Susan Chan Egan 陈毓贤, retired securities analyst, author of A Latterday Confucian and A Pragmatist and His Free Spirit: The Half-Century Romance of Hu Shi and Edith Clifford Williams
Louise Hornby, Assistant Professor of English at UCLA; author of Still Modernism: Photography, Literature, Film
Liu Cong 刘聪, Visiting scholar at UCLA and Liang Shiqiu specialist
Tony S. Hsu徐善曾, physicist, entrepreneur turned writer; author of Chasing the Modern: The Twentieth-Century Life of Poet Xu Zhimo
Sasha Su-Ling Welland 魏淑凌, Associate Professor of Gender, Women, & Sexuality Studies, U of Washington; author of A Thousand Miles of Dreams: The Journeys of Two Chinese Sisters and Experimental Beijing: Gender and Globalization in Chinese Contemporary Art
Michelle Yeh, Distinguished Professor of East Asian Languages and Cultures, UC Davis and Director of the Confucius Institute at UC Davis; author of Modern Chinese Poetry: Theory and Practice since 1917
Co-sponsors:
Center for the Study of Women
Department of Asian American Studies
Asian American Studies Center
Department of Asian Languages and Cultures
Confucius Institute
Institute of International Exchange
