The finding of the children is a significant literary theme in contemporary Chinese literature as well as a significant means by which intellectuals in the Republic of China strive to construct a contemporary sense of national identity. The academic community in the fields of modern Chinese literature and cultural history has progressively begun to pay more attention to images of children and women, but the topic of how children and women were discovered and built by modern literature, with “girls” as the key thread, has not yet been completely explored. In order to better understand the survival and mental state of girls during the Republican era as demonstrated by the observation, reproduction, and creation of the girls’ image by writers during that era, this research will examine how girls are portrayed in novels written. By using close reading, literary theorist Susan Sniader Lanser’s female narrative perspective, historical context from the late Qing Dynasty and the early Republic of China, and literary theory, this study will examine how the girl image in literature reflects the social and cultural background of the Republic of China and how intellectuals can create a new nation by writing the girl image. The image-building of girls in the Republic of China is a crucial clue for reexamining the literature and social culture of that country. This study also will offer some valuable insights for future research on social change and escalating ideological trends.

As time goes by, native American writers learn about China and Chinese through various channels, and portray the images of China in their eyes into their literary works. Among them, some writers learn about China through others’ literature, mass media, etc., while others have had experiences in China, or gone to China in person to explore Chinese culture they long for, and put the images of China in their eyes into words in their works. Given the topic and length of writing, this thesis selects three native American writers who have had a long-term Chinese life experience and their masterpieces to research on: Pearl Buck, Bill Porter and Peter Hessler. In addition, imagologie in comparative literature is selected as the theoretical framework to study on the images of China in their literary works.

The essay aims to make contributions to the study on the theory and application of imagologie and its practical significance. Through the images of China in Pearl Buck, Bill Porter and Peter Hessler from the perspective of the American, on the one hand, it may be conducive for American readers to have reflection on the themselves and the US. On the other hand, reviewing the changes of the images, it may be helpful for Chinese to reflect on the past, take actions at present and look forward to the future.

Zhou Shoujuan (1895-1968) was a pre-eminent author of popular fiction in modern China. Being fluent in English, he was also a prominent and versatile translator of world literature into Chinese, classical and vernacular. Being proficient in English, Zhou facilitated the introduction of a diverse array of literary works to Chinese audiences from different literary traditions through the method of indirect translation. The present study aims to examine Zhou Shoujuan’s indirect translation of Italian fiction, focusing on the choice of works and themes and the rendering of the same popular appeal in the Chinese context. The corpus under scrutiny includes the translations of three short stories by Gabriele D’Annunzio (1919, 1922, 1924) and especially the juvenile novel written by Benito Mussolini (1941-2), which contains all the ingredients of the popular feuilleton. The methodology of this study will combine close and distant reading and will be derived from two fields of research: translation studies and a socio-historical analysis of the production, transplantation and reception of popular fiction from Italian to Chinese literature through English or American intermediate translations.