Composite, Comparativist, and Comparative Literature : Remembering John J. Deeney as a Confucian Gentleman

John J. Deeney (1931–2022), best known as a founding father of the “Chinese School” of comparative literature, is remembered ambivalently in China today. He has been revered for astutely proposing and unremittingly promoting the “Chinese School,” which, however, is simultaneously honoured and criticized, often for reasons that Deeney is neither credited with nor guilty of. Deeney is always referred to when the “Chinese School” is discussed, particularly in Mainland China today, but the references are somehow brief and passing. For some, while a “Chinese School” needs recognition from international academics, its establishment by a foreigner seems to be somewhat inconvenient. A “Chinese School,” it is said, is a “necessary result of national cultural confidence” [民族文化自信的必然結果] (Li 159). Thus, Deeney’s “Chinese School,” perhaps, needs to be, or has already been, surpassed, if not totally discarded.