Chapters in this book

1. Frontmatter i
2. Acknowledgments vii
3. Contents ix
4. Contributors xi
5. Introduction 1
6. Part I: Writing the Courtesan
7. 1 Ambiguous Images of Courtesan Culture in Late Imperial China 17
8. 2 The Late Ming Courtesan: Invention of a Cultural Ideal 46
9. 3 The Written Word and the Bound Foot: A History of the Courtesan's Aura 74
10. 4 Desire and Writing in the Late Ming Play Parrot Island 101
11. 5 Women in Feng Menglong's Mountain Songs 131
12. Part II: Norms and Selves
13. 6 Ming and Qing Anthologies of Women's Poetry and Their Selection Strategies 147
14. 7 Changing the Subject: Gender and Self-inscription in Authors' Prefaces and "Shi" Poetry 171
15. Part III: Poems in Context
16. 8 Writing Her Way Out of Trouble: Li Yuying in History and Fiction 221
17. 9 Embodying the Disembodied: Representations of Ghosts and the Feminine 242
18. 10 De/Constructing a Feminine Ideal in the Eighteenth Century: Random Records of West-Green and the Story of Shuangqing 264
19. Part IV: "Hong lou meng"
20. 11 Women's Writing Before and Within the Hong lou meng 285
21. 12 Beyond Stereotypes: The Twelve Beauties in Qing Court Art and the Dream of the Red Chamber 306
22. 13 Ming Loyalism and the Woman's Voice in Fiction After Hong lou meng 366
23. Postface: Chinese Women in a Comparative Perspective: A Response 397
24. Reference Matter
25. Notes 425
26. Works Cited 479
27. Character List 503
28. Index 519