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kmichaelwilson.bsky.social
Kevin
@kmichaelwilson.bsky.social
970 followers 850 following 2.5K posts
Historical Chinese literature, poetry, and philosophy. Co-host Rereading the Stone podcast https://bsky.app/profile/rereadingstone.bsky.social book reviews & discussion of Ming-Qing literature, science fiction, etc. https://www.patreon.com/kmichaelwilson
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kmichaelwilson.bsky.social
Kevin @kmichaelwilson.bsky.social · 7m
quantity was always algorithmic (derog.)
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kmichaelwilson.bsky.social
Kevin @kmichaelwilson.bsky.social · 7m
a "prolific" academic was already a red flag, even before AI
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Reposted by Kevin
eric.sadbutbuildingworlds.blog
E.M. White, load-bearing grad student @eric.sadbutbuildingworlds.blog · 1h
On this topic, a quick thread of other good reads about this whole sex-in-literature thing 🧵
eric.sadbutbuildingworlds.blog
E.M. White, load-bearing grad student @eric.sadbutbuildingworlds.blog · 18h
I probably first linked to this essay during some accursed past discourse, but this is a marvelous piece by @clclark.bsky.social on sexuality, sexual tension, and what recent literature broadly lacks due to neglecting these:
Everyone’s in Love, but Nobody’s Horny - Reactor
C.L. Clark discusses writing sex, desire, and queerness in Nicola Griffith's Ammonite
reactormag.com
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kmichaelwilson.bsky.social
Kevin @kmichaelwilson.bsky.social · 12h
"My mom is better than your mom!" Suddenly, remembering it's the late Ming Dynasty, "Under Heaven!"
kmichaelwilson.bsky.social
Kevin @kmichaelwilson.bsky.social · 12h
spousal arguments in A Marriage Fate to Awaken the Ages 醒世姻緣傳 (17th C.) so bad, you can feel their reality

"if you can't afford to clothe your wife, I'll walk around naked to shame your worthless *$#%& mother, who sells her body to eat!"

"How dare you, daughter of a silversmith, say such things?"
寄姐把那不賢惠臭臉一放放將下來，氣的象豬肝顏色一樣，罵道：「臭賊！不長進的忘八！你沒本事掙件衣服給老婆穿，就不消攬下老婆！你既攬下老婆，不叫穿件衣裳，難道光著屁股走麼？你是那混賬不值錢的老婆生的，不害羞；我是好人家兒女，知道羞恥，要穿件衣裳，要戴點子首飾！你既不肯教老婆打扮，我光著屁股走就是了，羞你娘的臭臉！」一面口裏村捲，一面將那做的衣裳扯的粉碎，把那玉簪玉花都敲成爛醬往河裡亂撩，罵道：「咱大家不得！沒見食面淫婦生的！」 狄希陳雖是被薛素姐打罵慣的，到了寄姐這個田地，未免也有些血性上來，說道：「你毀壞我這許多禮物，都小事，你開口只罵我的娘，我的娘又沒惹你，你又沒見他的面，你只管罵他怎的！你家裏沒放著娘麼？」寄姐道：「俺母是好人家兒子，骨頭尊重，生的好兒好女，不似你娘生你這們杭杭子！合我媽使天平兑兑，比你娘沉重多著哩！」 醒世姻緣傳 -> 第八十七回童寄姐撒潑投河　權奶奶爭風吃醋 book cover, spiral flaming beacon thing
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kmichaelwilson.bsky.social
Kevin @kmichaelwilson.bsky.social · 16h
I am
not using
the profanity
that you left here
Millennial
For the love of God
Keep that
shit
Out of your poetry
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kmichaelwilson.bsky.social
Kevin @kmichaelwilson.bsky.social · 22h
I know it's common for the field, but it's time to phase it out

it doesn't serve any clear function, it sounds racist, and it feeds the worst kinds of jealousies and suspicions
kmichaelwilson.bsky.social
Kevin @kmichaelwilson.bsky.social · 22h
I don't know, lol. It just seems that a great way to make everyone (ESL scholars, CSL scholars, anyone in between) equally anxious
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kmichaelwilson.bsky.social
Kevin @kmichaelwilson.bsky.social · 23h
is this a specifically Chinese thing?

is an orientalism being done? or are all the languages similarly measured in terms of... nativity?
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kmichaelwilson.bsky.social
Kevin @kmichaelwilson.bsky.social · 23h
it's 2025 and applications to university positions are still asking if you have "native" and "near-native" language proficiency 💀
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kmichaelwilson.bsky.social
Kevin @kmichaelwilson.bsky.social · 23h
@edwardw2.bsky.social I remember you recommending this one, back in the day

I cannot believe Ming-Qing literature just has "in its back pocket" what might be the best queer novel of the 19th C.

just, like, on the shelf, collecting dust, "nothing to see here"
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Reposted by Kevin
jdnicoll.bsky.social
James Davis Nicoll @jdnicoll.bsky.social · 1d
Or perhaps not.
Back cover blurb of St. Clair's Sign of the Labrys. WOMEN ARE WRITING SCIENCE-FICTION! ORIGINAL! BRILLIANT!! DAZZLING!! Women are closer to the primitive than men. They are conscious of the moon-pulls, the earth-tides. They possess a buried memory of humankind’s obscure and ancient past which can emerge to uniquely color and flavor a novel. Such a woman is Margaret St. Clair, author of this novel. Such a novel is this. SIGN OF THE LABRYS, the story of a doomed world of the future, saved by recourse to the ageless, immemorial rites... FRESH! IMAGINATIVE!! INVENTIVE!!!
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kmichaelwilson.bsky.social
Kevin @kmichaelwilson.bsky.social · 1d
a recent example from my stuff: there must be least a hundred articles speculating on whether Pu Songling is also the author of A Marriage Fate to Awaken the Ages 醒世姻緣傳 (17th C.)?

millions of words, and the only connection is that they both use some Shandong local dialectic... 🫤
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kmichaelwilson.bsky.social
Kevin @kmichaelwilson.bsky.social · 1d
99% of all secondary literature in all subfields is tedious claptrap that causes its reader legitimate brain damage

doesn't mean you shouldn't read it, though
rachelfeder.bsky.social
Rachel Feder @rachelfeder.bsky.social · 2d
Tell me your most unhinged literary opinion, as a little treat
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kmichaelwilson.bsky.social
Kevin @kmichaelwilson.bsky.social · 1d
Ibis (1985) is good, actually

www.typebarmagazine.com/2024/08/29/s...
kmichaelwilson.bsky.social
Kevin @kmichaelwilson.bsky.social · 1d
if your theory of history reduces all destruction to production ("the linen was destroyed to produce the shirt"), and you're witnessing billionaires buy up all the newspapers just to destroy them, maybe you need a new theory of history
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kmichaelwilson.bsky.social
Kevin @kmichaelwilson.bsky.social · 1d
it's very clear the OP isn't advocating for anything other than masking when it's convenient in public

don't feed the trolls, jamelle
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kmichaelwilson.bsky.social
Kevin @kmichaelwilson.bsky.social · 1d
anyway, it's not a coincidence that I might notice this

basically, the same dialectic occurs with Buddhist monks in Ming-Qing literature

every single text is like, "Damn, curious how this man who has dedicated his life to the disavowal of desire himself now resembles a large phallus? Significant?
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kmichaelwilson.bsky.social
Kevin @kmichaelwilson.bsky.social · 1d
there is a monkey's paw logic to how the "pursuit of masculinity" and the use of weird supplements has resulted in so many men who now themselves physically resemble phalluses
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kmichaelwilson.bsky.social
Kevin @kmichaelwilson.bsky.social · 1d
("canon" in the broadest possible sense... novels from this period that are extant and widely available)
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kmichaelwilson.bsky.social
Kevin @kmichaelwilson.bsky.social · 1d
(obscurely) I think you could read through most of the Ming-Qing canon of xiaoshuo novels in about 3000 hours
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Reposted by Kevin
kmichaelwilson.bsky.social
Kevin @kmichaelwilson.bsky.social · 2d
don't retweet if you've never let loose (morally) (風流過) in Chongqing
你在重庆风流过, asks Zhan-zhang from Qianfu (2008)
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kmichaelwilson.bsky.social
Kevin @kmichaelwilson.bsky.social · 2d
don't retweet if you've never let loose (morally) (風流過) in Chongqing
你在重庆风流过, asks Zhan-zhang from Qianfu (2008)
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kmichaelwilson.bsky.social
Kevin @kmichaelwilson.bsky.social · 2d
Infinite Jest (1996)
minor subplot to Dream of the Red Chamber, Jia Rui clowning with the so-called mirror for romantics 風月寶鑑
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Reposted by Kevin
kmichaelwilson.bsky.social
Kevin @kmichaelwilson.bsky.social · 5d
icymi 🌸🌺✨🪞
kmichaelwilson.bsky.social
Kevin @kmichaelwilson.bsky.social · 8d
though Flower Bouquet in the Polished Mirror 品花寶鑑 (1849) is not, as is sometimes claimed, an "ancient gay encyclopedia," it is one of the greatest queer novels of the nineteenth century, and it still does not have an English-language wikipedia entry

www.patreon.com/posts/reflec...
Reflections on Flower Bouquet in the Polished Mirror 品花寶鑑 (1849) | kmichaelwilson
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