Navigating the Scylla of “conventional autobiography” and the Charybdis of pure “textuality” (p. 2), Lingzhen Wang's study of “women's autobiographical practice” provides both a sweeping treatment of the subject, which spans the twentieth century, and an acute intervention into poststructural feminist discourse in the Western academy. Of profound import for both Chinese cultural studies and the larger realm of literary theory and women's studies, Personal Matters is intelligent, insightful, eloquent, and most of all, profound in its analysis of how women from Qiu Jin to Wang Anyi have articulated their specific historical situations through autobiographical writing. As such, it sits aside the works of Tani Barlow, Rey Chow, Wendy Larson, and Lydia Liu as the latest installment in an intellectual sea change in Chinese studies, placing women, both as the objects and the practitioners of study, at the forefront of the field. It is meticulously researched, sagacious in approach, and...

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