¹ Here the political novel is defined broadly as a novel which deals with political ideas, or which analyses political phenomena, or in which the political milieu is the dominant setting. It can be defined as a political novel if it introduces, as material, political or revolutionary events of the past in historical settings or current affairs, or a heroic figure who made a significant contribution to such events. In a narrow sense it must at the same time express a positive direction towards the improvement of the existing social and political milieu. The present article is concerned with the political novel which is defined in the narrow sense.Google Scholar

² Given the disparities in socio-political and cultural settings between Japan and China, what was adopted from China became in due course revised to suit the Japanese environment. Following the same process of importation various schools of Chinese Confucianism had undergone the process of absorption in Japan. Japanese Confucian scholars came to meld Confucian values into the Japanese value system. In this context Confucian thought which had been modified by Japanese Confucian scholars is termed in this study as Japanese revisionist interpretations.Google Scholar

³ Barry, Wm. Theodore de and Bloom, Irene (eds), Principle and Practicality (New York, Columbia University Press, 1979), p. 38.Google Scholar

⁴ Qichao, Liang, ‘Lun zongjiaojia yu zhexuejia zhi changduan deshi’ (On Merits and Faults of Priests and Confucians), no. 4, p. 45, Yinbingshi heji-wenji (Collected Writings from the Yinbing Studio) (henceforth YBSHJ-WJ) (Taipei, Zhonghua, 1960).Google Scholar

⁵ Liang, , ‘Lun xiaoshuo yu qunzhi zhi guanxi’, (On the Relationship between Fiction and Politics), YBSHJ-WJ, 4–10, pp. 6–10.Google Scholar

⁶ Schwartz, Benjamin, In Search of Wealth and Power, Yen Fu and the West (Cambridge and Massachusetts, The Belknap Press of Harvard Uni. Press, 1964), p. 106.Google Scholar

⁷ The concept of Keimō originated from the Western enlightenment of the late seventeenth centuries, combined with the nineteenth-century thought of Mill, Bentham, Guizot and Spencer, See, for example, Fukuzawa Yukichi, Nihon no Meicho (Japanese Masterpieces) (henceforth NM), vol. 33, 1969, edited by Michio, Nagai, pp. 147–232.Google Scholar

⁸ Liang, , ‘Xinminshuo’, Yinbingshi heji-zhuangji (henceforth YBSHJ-ZJ), no. 4, pp. 84–5Google Scholar

⁹ Ibid., p. 9.

¹⁰ Michio, Nagai (ed.), Fukuzawa Yukichi, NM, pp. 159–61. By 1898 Yan Fu had completed the translation of Huxley's work as Tianyan lun and exerted a strong influence on Chinese literati. Liang must have read the translation prior to his exile in Japan in 1898. However, his espousal of Social Darwinism became evident after his exile. Thus, he made frequent use of Japanese Social Darwinist terms in his essays. He also utilized such sources as Fukuzawa's works and the publication of Japanese books and Chinese translations of Japanese books on Social Darwinism and its critics published in the Bookshop for the Diffusion of Knowledge which he established in 1901. “Google Scholar

¹¹ Notehelfer, F. G., Kōtoku Shūsui: Portrait of a Japanese Radical (Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 1971), p. 23.Google Scholar

¹² Liang, , YBSHJ-ZJ, no. 4, pp. 25–6.Google Scholar

¹³ Ibid., p. 75

¹⁴ The article was originally written in French by Hugo, Victor and was first translated by Bunzō, Morita. Meiji Hon'yaku Bungakushu (A collection of Translated Literature in the Meiji Period), edited by Tsuyoshi, Kimura, Meiji Bungaku Zenshū (A Collection of Meiji Literature) (henceforth MBZ), vol. 7 (Tokyo, Chikuma Shobō, 78 vols. 1966–1976), p. 120.Google Scholar

¹⁵ Sohō, Tokutomi, ‘Shōrai no Nihon’ (A Future Japan), NM, vol. 40, pp. 115–22.Google Scholar

¹⁶ Liang, , YBSHJ-VVJ, no. 2, pp. 48–9.Google Scholar

¹⁷ Chang, Hao, Liang Ch'i-ch'ao and Intellectual Transition in China 1890–1907 (Cambridge, Massachusetts, Harvard University Press, 1971), p. 146.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

¹⁸ Keyang, An, ‘Tongzhi jiande jinshu yu Ding Richang’ (The Banning of Books in the Tongzhi Era and Ding Richang), in Chunqiu, no. 710, 1987. pp. 48–9.Google Scholar

¹⁹ Qichao, Liang, ‘Yiyin Zhengzhi Xiaoshuo xu’ (Preface to the Translation of a Political Novel), YBSHJ-WJ, vol. 2, pp. 34–5.Google Scholar

²⁰ Liang, , ‘Lun youxue’ (On the Education of the Young), YBSHJ-WJ, vol. 1, no. 1, pp. 44–60.Google Scholar

²¹ Liang, , ‘Bianfa tongyi’ (Discussion on Reforms), YBSHJ-WJ, vol. 2, pp. 56–7.Google Scholar

²² Emori, Ueki, for example, consciously adopted a simple, colloquial style for the purpose of educating the general public as to the ideas of the rights of freedom and popular rights.Google Scholar

²³ Keizō, Yamada, ‘Chūgoku Shōsetsu no Seiritsu —Sono Riron no Hikakuteki Kōsatsu’ (The Formation of Chinese Fiction—A Comparative Study on Theories), Bungaku Ronso, vol. 21, 1975, p. 20.Google Scholar

²⁴ Yamamoto had met Wang Zhao and Luo Shenru in China. He continued to have personal contacts with them in Japan. His close contact with Luo and Liang is indicated by activities such as his contribution of his work, ‘Lun Dong'a shigi’, to Liang's second issue of Qingyi bao. He also translated the work, Seiji Hanron, for Liang. See Tadayuki, Nakamura, ‘Shin Chūgoku Miraiki Kōsetsu’ (A Study of Xin Zhongguo weilaiji), Taidai Bungaku vol. 4, 06 1944, pp. 115–17. He championed the Jiyūtō's interpretation of the principle of the Restoration. He strongly argued that the Restoration's initial purpose was to achieve constitutional monarchy and the Popular Rights movement was its continuation.Google Scholar

²⁵ Nihon Rikken Seitō Shinbun was the party organ for the Rikkentō which belonged to the Jiyūtō. It is possible that the paper circulated among some Chinese intellectuals prior to Liang's exile to Japan. Liang's view of literary reform envisioned in his various essays such as ‘Bianfa tongyi’, ‘Menxuebao yanyibao hexu’ and ‘Yiyin zhengzhi xiaoshuoxu’ gives a strong indication that he was to a significant degree influenced by Japanese Jiyūtō members. Liang was certainly aware of other Jiyūtō journals such as Eiri Jiyū and Jiyūtō.Google Scholar

²⁶ The publishing date and the authorship of the work could not be traced. Nakamura Tadayuki suggests that it was probably written by Yamamoto Baigai around 1883. See Tadayuki, Nakamura, ‘Shin Chūgoku Miraiki Kōsetsu’, Tenri Daigaku Gakuho, 1, no. 1, pp. 78–9.Google Scholar

²⁷ Ibid.

²⁸ Qichao, Liang, ‘Lun xiaoshuo yu qunzhi zhi guanxi’, YBSHJ-WJ, vol. 4, no. 10, pp. 10.Google Scholar

²⁹ Liang, , ‘Chuanban wenming sanliqi’, YBSHJ- ZJ, vol. 2, no.,2, p. 41.Google Scholar

³⁰ It is not certain if, at the time the novel was written, Liang still maintained a hope to establish a united force between the revolutionaries and the reformers. Nevertheless, evidently, around the turn of the century Liang had approached the revolutionary groups of Sun Yat-sen and Zhang Binglin and sought some way of organizing the united front before irreversible hostility between the two groups was created.Google Scholar

³¹ Three major parties in Xin Zhongguo weilaiji, the Guoquan dang, the Aiguo zizhi dang and the Ziyou dang, were undoubtedly modelled on the three Japanese political parties, the Teiseitō, the Kaishintō and the Jiyūtō, which were formed before 1890. Liang's subsequent lengthy essay, ‘Riben yubei lixian shidai zhi renmin’ (The People in the Preparation Stage for the Constitutional Government) which was serialized in three parts in Xinmin congbao was indicative of the extent of his interest in advocating a political system modelled on that of the Japanese.Google Scholar

³² There is also a distinct affinity between chapter 3 of Xin Zhongguo weilaiji and Nakae Chomin's socratic Sansuijin Keirin Mondō.Google Scholar

³³ Huters, Theodore, ‘A New way of Writing—The Possibility for Literature in late Qing China, 1895–1908’, Modern China, vol. 14, no. 3, 08 1988, pp. 243–76.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

³⁴ Galik, Marian, Milestones in Sino-Western Literary Confrontation (1898–1979), p. 15.Google Scholar

³⁵ Keizō, Yamada, ‘Chūgoku Kindai Bungakuron Josetsu’ (An Introduction to Modern Chinese Literature), Bungaku Ronshū, vol. 2, no. 3, 1974, pp. 318–36.Google Scholar