港大中文學院

2024/25 School of Chinese Research Student Seminar

遊記作為方法：20世紀初關於東北的旅行文學

Travelogue as Method: Travel Literature about Dongbei in Early 20th Century China

Abstract:

從1902年梁啟超《新中國未來記》中大連灣之旅到1930年代前後“東北旅行”熱潮的興起，“旅行”與“考察”成了近代中國人觀看“東北”的一個重要窗口，而遊記也成爲現代性經驗、民族意識與帝國慾望交纏的文本場域。20世紀初的東北是沙俄與日本爭奪遠東霸權的角力場，而經歷了甲午中日戰爭、日俄戰爭的旅順，更是旅行者踏訪東北的重要一站。本研究將遊記視為一種連結文學，歷史學，地理學等的“方法”，試圖超越傳統遊記的文本屬性，在考察旅行背後的話語模式與權力政治的同時，思考東北遊記何以成為想像現代中國的意指實踐。報告將以遊記中的旅順為例，視其為跨文化接觸的第三空間，通過遊記中的情感標注，探究其背後反映出的泛亞主義、民族主義、帝國主義間的競爭、博弈與協商，進而說明現代東北旅行經驗如何被轉化並生成為一種「旅行與救國」互為表裡的動態話語場域。

From Liang Qichao’s depiction of the Dalian Bay in his novel The Future of New China (1902) to the surge of “Northeast China travel” in the 1930s, “travel” became a critical lens through which modern Chinese observers viewed the Northeast China. Travel writings emerged as textual sites where modernity, national consciousness, and imperialist desires intertwined. In the early 20th century, Northeast China served as a contested arena for Russian and Japanese rivalry over Far Eastern hegemony, with Port Arthur—scarred by the First Sino-Japanese War and the Russo-Japanese War—standing as a symbolic gateway for travelers. This study considers travelogue as method bridging literary studies, history, and geography, aiming to transcend traditional textual analysis of travelogues, and to interrogate the discursive patterns and power politics embedded in these travel practices while exploring how travelogues functioned as signifying practices for imagining modern China. It takes Port Arthur/Lüshunkou in travelogues as an example, regarding it as a “third space” of cross-cultural encounter. Through tracing motional annotations in these texts, this talk explores the competition, negotiation, and collusion among Pan-Asianism, nationalism, and imperialism. Ultimately, it demonstrates how modern Northeast China travel experiences were transformed into a dynamic discursive field where “travel” and “national salvation” became mutually constitutive.