Abstract
This chapter analyses Dung Kai-cheung’s Celestial Creations and the Works of Man and contends that Dung presents an alternative narrative of Hong Kong modernity by tracing his family’s involvement with modern technological objects. It explores the novel’s crystallization of temporalities within the technological objects and its development of a narrative rhizome that emphasizes connectivity and transversality to challenge the existing grand narratives of Hong Kong history. By engaging the history of objects in conversation with discourses of Chinese modernity, it argues that Dung’s novel creates a distinct coming-of-age story of Hong Kong from the perspective of individuals enmeshed in the history of objects, stimulating a re-examination of Hong Kong modernity in response to Chinese modernity since the early twentieth century.
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Title of host publication | Coming of Age in Chinese Literature and Cinema : Sinophone Variations of the Bildungsroman |
| Editors | Andrea RIEMENSCHNITTER, Kiu-wai CHU, Mung Ting CHUNG |
| Publisher | Amsterdam University Press |
| Chapter | 5 |
| Pages | 127-146 |
| Number of pages | 20 |
| ISBN (Electronic) | 9789048557134 |
| ISBN (Print) | 9789463720793 |
| DOIs | |
| Publication status | Published - 17 Jun 2025 |
Keywords
- Hong Kong modernity
- literary historiography
- family saga
- Xi Xi
- world of objects
- temporality
