Disguised Subjectivity in Two Chinese Fictional Dream Narratives of the Qing

This article is an attempt to explore the emergence of subjectivity in two Qing classical short stories: while using classical patterns, they also reveal elements about the dreamers’ psychological states. The analysis shows that far from being clear-cut, the emergence of subjectivity was a non-linear process—a “premodern” way of writing. This disguised way of expressing subjectivity conveyed a renewed creative investment at a time when classical literature almost reached the edge of modernity.