James Jiang

James Jiang is a critic and scholar who has worked as Assistant Editor at Griffith Review and Australian Book Review. Prior to becoming an editor, he taught in the English and Theatre Studies program at the University of Melbourne. He holds a PhD in modernist literature from the University of Cambridge and has written reviews and essays for a variety of publications in Australia (Sydney Review of Books, Australian Book Review, Cordite, LIMINAL Magazine) and abroad (Cambridge Quarterly, Ploughshares, Modernism/modernity). His interests range across poetry (contemporary and historical), the history and theory of criticism, diasporic writing, translation and sport.
All essays by James Jiang
Love and Desolation: Remembering Eileen Chang
‘Is the year 2020 a propitious time to be reading the untimely Eileen Chang? To some, Chang’s refusal of the moralism attaching to a more committed witnessing of history will always make her work appear trifling, “so much froth” riding atop the “vast oceanic swells” of modern history (to borrow from her own stock of images). And certainly at a time when Hong Kong has become a flashpoint for Chinese nationalism, stories such as “Love in a Fallen City” and “Lust, Caution” might seem a little jarring. By the same token, however, Chang’s translocalism – her work’s inability to accommodate the prevailing myths of and monuments to the nation – can only be salutary in light of the Chinese state’s recent push towards linguistic standardization and cultural homogenization. But it is perhaps with respect to our intimate lives that Chang’s work continues to resonate most strongly.’
So Far, So Left?: Literary Criticism: A Concise Political History by Joseph North
I think it would be a mistake to read Literary Criticism as simply another history of twentieth-century criticism. The tendentious and programmatic shaving down of local complexities allows North to sharpen his polemic into manifesto-like poignancy. One of the peculiarities of the manifesto is that it presumes the existence of something it is actually engaged in creating. This, I think, accounts for the odd yet telling choice to name a book after a practice that in its own account has been off the disciplinary map for at least the last few decades.