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Afterword. Notes on Rereading and Re-enacting “China”

  • Giovanni Tarantino

In Europe, the historical representation and narration of China and the Orient more in general from an outsider’s point of view has conjured up an exotic and a-historical image of a poetical, mystical and refined civilization. In Walpole’s Britain, for example, “the argument from the Chinese”—namely, the admiration for a prosperous and densely populated kingdom which did not belong to a single faith—was frequently used in religious disputes when claiming a wider or more coherent policy of tolerance or seeking to cut down the prerogatives of the clerical hierarchies. This chapter explores further Western uses of "the argument from the Chinese" in modern times and through different media (Antonioni; Yanne; Martin).

  • Keywords:
  • Orientalism,
  • China,
  • Travellers,
  • Antonioni,
  • Jean Yanne,
  • Ballet des Porcelaines,
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Giovanni Tarantino

University of Florence, Italy - ORCID: 0000-0001-7007-0168

  1. Abbattista, Guido. 2022. “European Perspectives On China: A Prescriptive Turn.” Diciottesimo Secolo.
  2. Antonioni, Michelangelo. 1972. Chung Kuo, Cina. Color film, 3:28. <https://www.raiplay.it/video/2017/06/Chung-Kuo-Cina-Puntata-1-14d1bc52-02fa-4981-ad2a-ea444a0f5b4b.html>.
  3. Clark, Catherine E. 2019. “When Paris Was ‘À l’heure Chinoise’ Or Georges Pompidou in China and Jean Yanne’s (1974) Les Chinois À Paris.” French Politics, Culture & Society 37, 2: 56–86. DOI: 10.3167/fpcs.2019.370203
  4. De Giorgi, Laura. 2010. “In the Shadow of Marco Polo: Writing about China in Fascist Italy.” Journal of Modern Italian Studies 15, 4: 573–89. DOI: 10.1080/1354571X.2010.501977
  5. Eco, Umberto and Leefeldt, Christine. 1977. ‘De Interpretatione, Or The Difficulty of Being Marco Polo.” Film Quarterly 30, 4: 8–12. DOI: 10.2307/1211577
  6. Frothingham, Alice Wilson. 1955. Capodimonte and Buen Retiro Porcelains: Period of Charles III. New York: Hispanic Society of America.
  7. Liu, Xin. 2014. “China’s Reception of Michelangelo Antonioni’s Chung Kuo.” Journal of Italian Cinema & Media Studies 2, 1: 23–40. DOI: 10.1386/jicms.2.1.23_1
  8. Ma, Nan. 2020. “Les Chinois à Paris : Le Détachement féminin rouge et le maoïsme français du milieu des années 1970.” Perspectives Chinoises 1: 45–56. <http://journals.openedition.org/perspectiveschinoises/10953>.
  9. Martin, Meredith, ed. 2022. Reimagining the Ballet des Porcelaines: A Tale of Magic, Desire, and Exotic Entanglement. Turnhout: Brepols Publishers.
  10. Rai Cultura. n.d. “Chung Kuo, Cina” (1972). Introduction to the film Chung Kuo, Cina by director Michelangelo Antonioni. Trans. from the Chinese Paola Voci. Accessed April 20, 2022. <https://www.raicultura.it/raicultura/articoli/2020/03/Chung-Kuo-Cina-1972-bff01d20-6672-4f15-b0ca-3baaeaf11835.html>.
  11. Tarantino, Giovanni. 2012. Republicanism, Sinophilia and Historical Writing: Thomas Gordon (c.1691-1750) and his History of England. Turnhout: Brepols Publishers.
  12. Yu, Nan. 2009. “After Antonioni is gone.” News Magazine 10: 84–87.
  13. Zanardi, Tara. 2018, “Kingly Performance and Artful Innovation: Porcelain, Politics, and Identity at Charles III’s Aranjuez.” West 86th: A Journal of Decorative Arts, Design History, and Material Culture 25, 1: 31–51. DOI: 10.1086/699497
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  • Publication Year: 2022
  • Pages: 211-220
  • Content License: CC BY 4.0
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  • Publication Year: 2022
  • Content License: CC BY 4.0
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Chapter Information

Chapter Title

Afterword. Notes on Rereading and Re-enacting “China”

Authors

Giovanni Tarantino

Language

English

DOI

10.36253/978-88-5518-579-0.12

Peer Reviewed

Publication Year

2022

Copyright Information

© 2022 Author(s)

Content License

CC BY 4.0

Metadata License

CC0 1.0

Bibliographic Information

Book Title

Rereading Travellers to the East

Book Subtitle

Shaping Identities and Building the Nation in Post-unification Italy

Editors

Beatrice Falcucci, Emanuele Giusti, Davide Trentacoste

Peer Reviewed

Number of Pages

232

Publication Year

2022

Copyright Information

© 2022 Author(s)

Content License

CC BY 4.0

Metadata License

CC0 1.0

Publisher Name

Firenze University Press

DOI

10.36253/978-88-5518-579-0

ISBN Print

978-88-5518-578-3

eISBN (pdf)

978-88-5518-579-0

eISBN (epub)

978-88-5518-580-6

Series Title

Connessioni. Studies in Transcultural History

Series ISSN

2975-0393

Series E-ISSN

2975-0261

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