2 - An Elite Writer's Popular Talks on Literature and Culture: Wang Xiaobo's Essays

Presentation Abstract
An expert in computer science and software developer, as well as a sociologist and a screenwriter, the Chinese writer and polymath Wang Xiaobo (1952-1997) first established his reputation within the literary field through his publications on middle and high-brows journals and reviews eventually published in two collections The Silent Majority (Chenmo de da duoshu) and My Spiritual Garden (Wo de jingshen jiayuan). By focusing on the language that he used in some of his articles and on the topics he chose to address, and contrasting them with how he developed his fictional discourse, it is argued that Wang's work embodies the tension between a postmodern stylistic orientation and a Enlightenment-inspired discourse that make of him an (often unacknowledged) model for some of today's influencers.