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ibsen might have found it hard to imagine that his play a doll's house, written in 1879, would have such a strong and far-reaching impact on the modern destiny of an ancient country in the east. as ancient china encountered the west in the late 19th century, it was invaded and humiliated, which led to the hope of self-reliance through self-strengthening and self-reliance, so as to get rid of the fate of being colonized. therefore, the priority of the wise men at that time was to "learn from the barbarians to control the barbarians" to save the nation. against this background, various types of western knowledge flowed in, and china made flexible or helpless choices based on its own needs. although different groups of knowledge had different understandings of china's reform direction at that time and the image of china in the future, they had one thing in common, that is, by establishing a modern (western) nation-state, on the one hand, they hoped to get rid of the backward traditional feudal dynasty system and enter the world; on the other hand, they hoped to get rid of the situation of being invaded by a strong nation-state and thus move towards modernity and civilization.

"nora" in china: the creation and evolution of the new female image 1900-1930s

to a large extent, this core goal almost enveloped the entire period from the late 19th century to the first half of the 20th century. the discourse of saving the nation from extinction, strengthening the country and preserving the race, and resisting aggression permeated almost all relevant discussions and anxieties. naturally, the issue of modern chinese women is also difficult to escape from this overall background, which has also shaped its special and bumpy fate of liberation. xu huiqi's "nora in china: the shaping and evolution of the new female image 1900-1930s" (hereinafter referred to as "nora in china", only page numbers are marked in the following text) [①] focuses on the liberation of chinese women and the many problems they encountered during this special period of historical transformation. compared with the first edition of the doctoral thesis published by the department of history of national chengchi university in 2003, xu huiqi called the mainland version of the 2024 version, which has been heavily revised, "nora in china 2.0" (a more evolved version) (page ii). by comparing the two versions of the catalog, we can find the differences between them, especially the 2.0 version of the catalog, which has become clearer after revision. that is, the changes of the classic image of "nora" in different periods and situations during the period from 1900 to 1930 show the historical burden carried by the discourse of "new women" in modern china. the core conclusions are two: first, the image of "nora" in modern china is actually "a symbol of the 'new woman' in modern china summoned by the anti-traditional thinking of the may fourth movement", so its prototype is actually "new human nature", and "new women" is just its derivative (page 5); second, because the "new woman" is just a derivative of "nora", the discussion and discourse about it "does not serve the needs of women themselves, but aims to promote the characteristics and performance of new women that conform to various grand narratives" (page 5). xu huiqi pointed out that the evolution of the image of "nora" in modern china "rather than showing the development and ups and downs of the 'women's movement', it is better to say that it presents the staged imagination of anti-traditional intellectuals on chinese modernity and the ever-changing performance of the ideal new woman" (page 276). precisely because there is a gap between "nora" and the "new woman", it is actually a flexible signifier, and in this signified that seems to be related to the "new woman", it actually has another purpose. it is precisely this almost fundamental misalignment that has led to the liberation of women in modern china dancing in shackles almost from the very beginning.

different from the 2003 edition, the 2.0 mainland edition can clearly show the author's thinking logic from the table of contents, which is to use different "nora" images in different periods to show the complex changes in modern china, as well as the functions of the "new woman" signifier that is constantly imagined and shaped. in his book “feminist discourse in modern china: nation, translation and gender politics”, liu renpeng called the subjects who constructed “women”, advocated and promoted women’s liberation in modern china “male feminist pioneers”. that is, as xu huiqi pointed out in “nora in china”, many discourses and narrative subjects in modern china “are all male-centered” (page 6). whether it was western missionaries in the late qing dynasty, liang qichao and jin tianhe in china, or the advocates of retro ideas during the beiyang warlord period, women’s liberation during the may fourth new culture movement, and the new life movement or left-wing feminist movement in the 1920s and 1930s, their subjects were mostly men. therefore, xu huiqi called it a male-centered view, that is, “using male-dominated authority, mechanisms and organizations to carry out political, economic, social and cultural activities and establish gender relations... in principle, gender discourse that maintains the existing division of labor order is male-centered” (page 6), and it is precisely the many grand narrative practices constructed by men that constitute an important driving force for the changes in the image of the “new woman” in modern china.

xu huiqi borrows lyotard’s concept of “grand narrative” (i.e., “every era has a dominant system of ideas or beliefs” (page 5)) to present the image of the modern “new woman” and the specific historical background and situation of her liberation, thereby exposing the instrumentality of the image of “nora” itself and the separation between it and women’s liberation. this is because from the very beginning, it was not women who dominated the signifier “nora”, but a kind of grand narrative that could be called male-centered, which constantly shaped and disciplined its connotation. the problem that arises from this is that the real and specific needs of women are constantly ignored, criticized or swallowed up by the male-centered grand narrative, and are replaced by a purposeful exploitation, which is to maintain men’s own privileges in this rapidly changing era - especially knowledge (discourse) power on the one hand, and on the other hand, it concerns the construction of family (western nuclear family), society and nation-state. these organizations are often based on their interests and needs, which is why susan mann wonders: why, from the late imperial period to modern china, even though gender has become a new concept and new category that is completely different from the traditional one, and has influenced changes in many fields and the reshaping of the relevant social order, why has the form and norms of "heterosexuality" continued? for example, the heterosexual structure of men/women and husbands/wives remains stable, and the family system built around the father/husband system remains intact. [②] here, xu huiqi's so-called male-centered view may explain this problem, that is, although male feminist pioneers constantly emphasize the importance of women's rights, autonomy and liberation, they have always forgotten (?) their own gender privileges. they criticize traditional family, marriage and political systems, but ignore the invisible gender system. in modern china, the traditional gender system has been restructured through a subtle and perfect transformation. although the form seems different, its patriarchal ideological nature has not been questioned. when this concept continues to penetrate or combine with the construction of modern families, societies and nation-states, a whole set of male-centered systems will re-emerge, and the women's liberation movement regarding women's needs, experiences, desires and rights will inevitably produce new conflicts with it. the experience of the "new woman" image derived from "nora" in modern china just exposes the limitations and oppression of the male-centered grand narrative.

from the may fourth new culture movement in the early 20th century to the 1930s, xu huiqi divided the image of "nora" into three categories, corresponding to the issues that the male-centered grand narratives of different periods were concerned about. they were "self-help nora" in the enlightenment and awakening grand narrative of the new culture movement, "anti-marriage nora" in the free marriage and love grand narrative of the 1920s, and "career-oriented nora" in the equal rights and liberation grand narrative of the 1930s. from the individualism of the may fourth movement that emphasized individual awakening to the autonomy issue that was emphasized in the face of marriage and love issues and the traditional "parents' orders and matchmaker's words", to the 1930s when "society" began to become the focus of attention [③], the image and fate of "nora" also underwent different changes accordingly, and the overall trend was as yang nianqun pointed out in "the other side of may fourth: the formation of the concept of "society" and the birth of new organizations", that individuals and their rights and interests gradually began to be replaced by collective "social" issues. in "nora in china", we can also clearly perceive this change. the image of "self-help nora" who emphasizes self-help as a human being is based on liberal ideology. its core purpose is to create a "new humanity" for women who have been neglected in traditional china, that is, "women are also human beings" - a universal natural human nature becomes the basis of individual existence and rights. "women are human beings" means that they naturally have the same natural rights as men, from the right to own their own bodies, property rights to the right to education and political rights, etc. here, natural gender differences are ignored, and what is important is a shared human nature. therefore, xu huiqi emphasizes that the essence of the "nora" image during the "may fourth" period is actually a "new humanity" that is imagined and constructed. it is "promoted as the ideal of a new person" (page 62), so there is no gender distinction. but this does not mean that it is neutral. in xu huiqi's view, it is actually male-oriented, that is, the template or model of the "man" of the "new man" is "man". the new cultural intellectuals seem to have created a universal image of "man", but in fact it is derived from their own image. therefore, the "self-help nora" of the may fourth movement is desexualized (page 62). whether it is hu shi or lu xun, what they see in nora is the individual's "self-liberation, pursuit of independence and freedom" (page 71), rather than the gender power oppression encountered by specific women in marriage relationships. and it is precisely the desexualization of "nora" that makes this image a common role model for young men and women in modern china at the same time, and young women may see more in "nora" than young men, but this more will eventually be exposed when they encounter marriage and family.

in the discourse of free love, free marriage and free divorce in modern china, the image of nora in ibsen's a doll's house has undergone an interesting change. in the image of "anti-marriage nora", she is mostly equated with an unmarried woman who leaves home to resist marriage, which is in sharp contrast to nora in ibsen's original work as a married woman who runs away from her husband's house; furthermore, these "nora" often appear in a "plural, collective" image, resulting in the female voices in them being mostly standardized. (page 157) therefore, rather than saying that "anti-marriage nora" focuses on the persecution of marriage and gender systems such as nora encountered in ibsen's works, it is better to say that male intellectuals use this image to express their resistance to traditional family, marriage and social systems, and to lay the foundation for the rationality of new marriage and family systems. in the early 20th century, in many discussions about the relationship between husband and wife, housework and work in the modern nuclear family - ideally, a small family formed by free marriage based on free love - male intellectuals either lacked the corresponding sensitivity or criticized or wishfully imagined the situation of women in the modern family from their own perspective - men and husbands. for example, in the "women's magazine" in 1925, two women (chen jianchen and huang yazhong) wrote to the "advocacy and criticism" column, hoping to promote the "homosexualism" they practiced. in their view, for women who hope to "take social career as a lifelong thing", the issue of marriage is "extremely negative" because "after marriage, housework, childbirth, etc. will hinder our careers", while homosexual relationships can not only maintain mutual independence but also help each other, thus solving the double pressure between family and career that women encounter after entering marriage.

the letters from chen and huang were severely criticized by the male intellectual kaishi. he first accused "homosexuality" of being "unnatural sexuality...sexual inversion", which was closely related to the medical discourse surrounding "homosexuality" in the 1920s, especially the discourse of sexual psychological inversion. at the same time, kaishi's view on lesbianism was also very typical, that is, he believed that it was nothing more than a momentary passion or dependence caused by fragility between immature female students, and therefore a little twist in the process of sexual psychological development. [④] therefore, kaishi criticized chen and huang for treating "homosexuality" as an ideology, and did not recognize that it could replace marriage and provide new possibilities for women's liberation. when dealing with the situation of women after marriage that chen and huang were worried about, kaishi distinguished between traditional marriage and family and "new-style small family" to emphasize that in the latter "family and career are not fundamentally in conflict", thus warning women who want to focus on their careers not to abandon their responsibilities to their families. [⑤] for male intellectuals like kaishi, the new-style small family and women’s careers did not conflict. however, from the numerous letters from female readers at the time, the novels of female writers, or he xiao’s subsequent research [⑥], we can find that the new-style small family ultimately not only failed to reduce women’s housework, but instead made them take on two “jobs” at home and outside the home at the same time, eventually becoming overwhelmed.

at the same time, nora's misfortune constantly reminds those women who are fully committed to marriage and family that if the dependent situation of wives is still not resolved, they will eventually become playthings of their husbands, and thus those "young men and women who have defected from the old family and are unwilling to get into the 'besieged city' of the new family" will eventually have nowhere to go. especially for those new women who resisted marriage during the "may fourth" movement, where they should go not only became lu xun's unsolvable dilemma for a while, but also became the most important issue concerning the liberation of women in modern china. it was precisely at this dead end that the image of "nora" that emphasized self-help, self-reliance and being a good person during the "may fourth" period began to be doubted and encountered two forces at the same time. first, the liberal "nora" had no solution after leaving, which forced it to find another way. second, with the changes in the national situation, such as the overall rule of the kuomintang, the occurrence of the "may 30th massacre" and the acceleration of japan's invasion of china, "social liberation and national revolution" gradually became the focus of people's attention. in particular, many intellectuals gradually realized that individual problems could not be solved by individuals alone. only by placing them in larger social, economic and political issues could they be completely solved. with the spread of socialism and marxism in the late 1920s, "social" issues became the focus of people's attention and reform. [⑦]

in the image of "zhiye nora" produced in the 1930s, we can not only see more clearly that the image of "nora" is subject to both male-centeredness and the needs of the modern nation-state, but also that the interests of the two sometimes conflict and sometimes merge. for example, under the new life movement and the economic crisis in the 1930s, the state called on women to assume their responsibilities as wives and mothers, so there emerged a retro trend of "women returning home", and behind it actually involved the dual interests of men and the state; at the same time, some intellectuals still emphasized women's resistance and struggle in the public sphere, but due to the national situation, the image of the "new woman" created by "nora" at this time was different from the image of the "new culture" period. the most typical change was that she turned from resisting for self-salvation to struggling and dedicating for the greater self - such as society, nation and country. "nora's image did not disappear with the consciousness of the small self, but was transformed and strengthened into an image of running away for the greater self of society" (page 234). the "nora" of the "new culture movement" period who was obsessed with her own needs is no longer appropriate. today's male intellectuals and the society and nation they represent need a "new nora" who "dedicates herself to the masses, the public good, or the great cause of the country." today's "nora" is a transcendent "new woman," and we will find that behind her value judgment is still a strong traditional concept, namely the opposition between "public" and "private." [⑧]

during the "new culture movement", the liberal concept of emphasizing individual needs and autonomy was almost influenced by the traditional epistemology of "private" from the very beginning, which made it always doubted. with the approaching national crisis, collective images and organizations such as the greater self, group, society and the country will also gain strong legitimacy with the help of the traditional "public" image. nora, who once ran away to save herself, eventually encountered the (male) society and country and could only fall or return home. the limited individual power led to the lives and spirits of women in the works of female writers such as ding ling being full of melancholy, pain and helplessness. with the birth of "society", the new women found a third way to run away, that is, to integrate into the greater self by sublimating the small self (from liang qichao to hu shi, there has always been a tension between the "small self" and the "great self"). as for nora, who represents the "new humanity" in the "new culture movement", she will still pay the price of "de-feminization" in the greater self. she will participate in the construction of society, nation and country like (men). so, "women" disappear again.

the "homosexuality" practiced by ms. chen and ms. huang discussed above is precisely a new form of life and work that they have practiced according to their own needs, but it is incompatible with the mainstream male-centered narrative, so it is bound to be criticized and stigmatized. xu huiqi also saw this pattern in her criticism of the flappers in the 1930s, that is, under the narrative that emphasizes the interests of the "greater self" over the needs of the "small self", the flappers not only overemphasized their "female" identity, but also indulged in pleasure and did not take the overall situation of the country seriously. therefore, they were gradually stigmatized as petty bourgeois women who lacked responsibility and were degenerate. in this "collectivization era", women must go to the crowd, and the various exploitation and oppression problems they encountered began to be integrated into larger social problems. therefore, the task of "zhiye nora" now becomes "liberating herself by liberating society" (pp. 240, 260). therefore, the women's liberation movement began to lose its independent value and turned into a "social", economic and class issue (page 261), and gradually became an appendage of the greater social or national liberation. therefore, the new women could only completely solve the problems they encountered by dedicating themselves to the latter.

at this point, lu xun's question has been answered in a new way: "what will happen after nora runs away?" "nora will go to the masses, social revolution, and national and state construction!" then what about the needs and desires of nora, who is a "female" and special? they will eventually either merge into the group or castrate themselves, because their ultimate goal is to become a "person" like men, only in this way can they share rights and shoulder responsibilities together. the premise for achieving this "equality" is that "women at that time could not really be themselves" (page 256), because "women" have now become the main obstacle to the women's liberation movement. therefore, xu huiqi finally concluded that in modern times, "chinese women's discourse, rather than shifting from focusing on gender awakening to emphasizing class consciousness as harris said, is better to say that it has never really focused on "female" characteristics or needs... women's gender subject consciousness has not enjoyed the status and initiative it deserves", and the "new woman" has always been "not a new subject that acts according to her own will, but an object of knowledge that needs constant "control, supervision, and punishment" (page 267).

however, the most important issue is that under these various grand narratives with male-centered views as the core, all the neglect, rejection and pain of women's needs and desires will eventually pass through the body and consciousness of every woman, and they are bearing it concretely and truly. their voices have not completely disappeared in modern china, but have constantly appeared in various discourse fields, whether it is the flourishing magazine and newspaper discussions, novel creation or social and political movements, etc., women's figures and voices have never been absent. in "nora" in china, although the author pays attention to the voices of these women, it is very limited, such as the letters of chen and huang discussed above, or the women's articles in the journals "women's magazine", "new culture" and "new women", as well as the views of many female authors who participated in the tao sijin case in the 1930s and the letters from many female students in "linglong". through these voices, we may be able to more truly understand the views of different women under various male/nationalist grand narratives. there is limited discussion of this in "nora in china", so we may refer to works such as "emerging from the historical surface" (1989) co-authored by meng yue and dai jinhua, "emerging lesbians: lesbian desire in modern china" (2014) by sang zilan, and "the created disease: the transformation of lesbian discourse in modern china (1920s-1940s)" (2023) by xu weian, to supplement the voices of women in women's liberation under the male-centered narrative of modern china emphasized by xu huiqi, their cognition of themselves, and how to deal with the contradictions, conflicts and negotiations between their own "sex/gender" and the modern patriarchal system.

"the biggest problem facing the new women in modern china is that they are walking a path provided and guided by men, while at the same time facing all kinds of unfair criticisms from male-centered public opinion" (pages 278-279). on the issue of women's liberation in modern china, the men who were the forerunners, main participants and leaders forgot their own gender - "the male group has never been the target of criticism or accusation in the women's liberation movement in modern china" (page 279). in understanding ibsen's "nora", a married woman, male intellectuals in modern china almost "unconsciously" forgot her most typical and superficial feature - being a woman, which made the light dark. regardless of whether it is the path of women's liberation of liberals like hu shi who emphasized universal human nature, or the marxist-style women's liberation that later emphasized class, economy and social system, their common feature is that they ignored the most natural sex/gender differences. as zhang nian pointed out in his "gender wounds and existential pain: from hegel to psychoanalysis", enlightenment thought (liberalism and marxism) ignored gender differences, which ultimately led to women either forgetting "female-ness" because they wanted to become "human beings", or being placed at the bottom of nature and civilization in order to become "female", and being regarded as a defective product of men and reason.

as for the root cause of the dilemma faced by “nora” in modern china, xu huiqi believes that “it is not capitalism or socialism, but the male-centered system and thinking” (page 283). it is precisely the invisible and inaudible gender system that has been forgotten or deliberately hidden again and again in the process of women’s liberation. therefore, making sex/gender differences (lucy irigaray emphasizes that this difference is both natural and ontological [⑨]) visible may be the foundation and the first step of women’s liberation, and it is also the most important revelation that “nora”, who has traveled through china for nearly a hundred years, brings us.