Reconsidering the World History of Literature as an Entanglement of Cross-cultural and Intermedial Transmissions

While the previous studies of the world history of literature are mostly concerned with the cross-cultural dissemination of literature, this article intends to analyse the intermediality of world literature in light of intermedial studies. It argues that the cross-cultural transmissions of literature are often entangled with and empowered by the intermedial interactions between literature and different forms of art. Under the theoretical framework of cross-cultural and intermedial studies, two representative Chinese literary works are discussed at length, namely Mulan ci (The Ballad of Mulan, sixth century) and Hong gaoliang (Red Sorghum, 1987). In addition to a careful analysis of their respective history of overseas transmissions, a comparative study of the two, an ancient poem and a modern novel, is carried out to show how the evolution of media has contributed to the cross-cultural transmissions of literature.