Chimera Literary Salon| From The Picture of Dorian Gray to Du Lian Kui—Reading a Timeless Classic

‍Event Content

Wang Daizhi, the first generation of Taiwanese architect after the war, presented Wilde's classic novel “The Portrait of Gray” with ten years of light (The Picture of Dorian Gray) The scene is moved from Victorian London to Taipei in the 1970s and translated into Dulienqui, which belongs to his era. Through the transformation of time, Wang Daei not only allows us to see a common fable about humanity, but also buried its aesthetic thoughts and observations of Taipei in the plot of the novel. In 2021, a new production was produced by the Wen Shin Art Foundation, curated by the Wen Shin Art Foundation, in collaboration with the Wang Daishi Architectural Research and Preservation Society.

The series of lectures in the book opens with a conversation between Yang Jia-han (Associate Professor/Writer, Department of Chinese Literature, National Tsinghua University) and Zhan Wai-Hung (Cultural Sociologist). Analyzed from the perspective of literary observation by Teacher Yang Jia-han, introduces Du Lianqui to present-day Taiwan, and discusses reading classic works for modern reading The meaning of the author; at the same time, through the work of Mr. Wang Daei's thoughts on the times, and Mr. Zhan Wai Hung's personal experience with his interviews in the 1990s, brings everyone “closer to Wang Dai Yin” from a perspective beyond architecture.

From classical literature one can read into another world and reflect on the present through an understanding of what is in it. In Taiwan's society, where individualized feelings are valued, I hope that readers will be able to gain a different sense of life after reading Dulienqui, and learn to open up their senses and perceive the world with their bodies.