Books by Li (Book Review Editor Yu

The Fragrant Companions is the most significant work of literature that portrays female same-sex love in the entire premodern Chinese tradition. It is at once an unconventional romantic comedy, a barbed satire, and a sympathetic portrayal of love between women.

A Couple of Soles is a classic comedic romance by the seventeenth-century playwright Li Yu. The first major comedy from late imperial China to appear in English translation, it provides an unparalleled view of the theater in seventeenth-century China.

Hanan has translated six of the twelve stories in the Sh'ier lou collection, which is the most famous individual collection of vernacular stories from pre-modern China. With Hanan's introduction and notes, and containing with Li Yu's emphasis marks, notes, and critiques, this volume will interest students of Chinese literature and general readers alike.