ch, the present essay observes China’s Ibsen studies in a broad context of modernity and East-West cross-cultural communication and interaction. To the author, the early reception of
Ibsen in China indeed promoted the process of China’s cultural modernity, but it should also be responsible for the misunderstanding
and misconstruction of the image of Ibsen as a revolutionary thinker rather than
an artist. In current international Ibsen scholarship, return to Ibsen as an artist
represents the forefront research of Ibsen and his dramatic works. Under the
revelation of Marxian aesthetic construction of Shakespeareanization and Said’s conception of traveling theory, the author for the first time creatively puts
forward his theoretical construction of Ibsenization, on the basis of which he is
carrying on equal dialogue with international Ibsen scholarship.
Key words: modernity, Ibsenism, Ibsenization, fin de siecle, aesthetic turn, reception
Wang Ning(1955- ), one of China’s leading scholars in modernity and postmodernity studies as well as Ibsen studies,
is Professor of English and Comparative Literature and Director of the Center for
Comparative Literature and Cultural Studies. He is the author of ten books and
numerous articles both in Chinese and in English, among which 15 published in
English are listed in the prestigious Arts and Humanities Citation Index(A&HCI).