“Eastern Literature” as Happenstance?

This essay examines how “Eastern literature” was perceived and presented in the making of world literature in 1980s China, an era of political and cultural opening-up, through the lens of Indian literature included in the magazine Shijie Wenxue. Although the magazine’s editors discursively championed the idea of geographic all-inclusiveness, the larger conjuncture brought “Western literature” to the forefront of attention. “Eastern” authors and texts, in contrast, were confined to a state of “happenstance,” due to the occasional manner of their presentation. However, by re-reading Shijie Wenxue on three levels, I argue that the magazine managed to produce a relatively eclectic and “thick” knowledge of Indian literature, which would have otherwise been neglected because of its tokenistic appearance and low visibility. Adopting a more creative and critical mode of reading, one can turn the seemingly Western-centric project of Shijie Wenxue into a useful archive for readers with a special interest in “Eastern literature.”