A 'Revolution in Ink' : Sui Sin Far and Chinese Reform Discourse

Type of resource
Author/collaborator
Title
A 'Revolution in Ink' : Sui Sin Far and Chinese Reform Discourse
Abstract
Montreal Eurasian author Edith Maude Eaton (1865-1914), who wrote under the pen name Sui Sin Far, lived in the United States between 1900 and 1910 before eventually returning to Montreal. In her writings while in the United States, Sui Sin Far defended the North American Chinese immigrant community from xenophobic slander perpetrated in the United States (and Canada) by the harsh reality of Progressive Era American "yellow peril" nativism and its portrayal Chinese modernization, especially by suffragists. The author documents the ways in which Sui Sin Far’s works were inspired by transnational as well as American models of modernization, particularly the Chinese reform movement which led to the temporary enfranchisement of women in Guandong Province eight years before the ratification of the 19th Amendment in the US. The author argues that learning from both Chinese reformer journalists who advocated “a revolution in ink” and nativist suffragists’ own critical quotational strategies, Sui Sin Far’s fiction fashions a resistant minority female voice through aggressive literary/ stenographic transcription.
Publication
American Quarterly
Volume
Vol. 60
Issue
no 4
Pages
975-1001
Date
December 2008
Language
en
Citation
Chapman, Mary. “A ’Revolution in Ink’ : Sui Sin Far and Chinese Reform Discourse.” American Quarterly Vol. 60, no. no 4 (December 2008): 975–1001.
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