Lu Xun and Uchiyama Kanzō: Friendship in a Time of War

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A talk by Joshua Fogel, Professor, Department of History, York University

In early fall of 1927 Lu Xun moved to Shanghai after an unsettling, peripatetic previous few years.  It also enabled him to live with his beloved Xu Guangping.  Several days after arriving he ventured to the Uchiyama Bookstore to buy some Japanese books, and on his second visit met the owner Uchiyama Kanzō.  The men soon became best of friends and remained so for the last nine years of Lu's life.  Lu purchased over 1000 books from Uchiyama in these years, and a special rattan chair was reserved for his virtually daily visits.  Uchiyama fostered an environment for free-flowing conversation between Chinese and Japanese intellectuals, which many remembered with great affection.  Why a Japanese bookstore?  What was the nature of Lu Xun's friendship with Uchiyama?  What was Lu's overall view of Japan and Japanese culture?  How did Uchiyama end up spending over 30 years in Shanghai?  And, what was his view of China and Chinese society?  And, how could all this good will transpire as China and Japan were headed into total war?   These are among the questions this talk hopes to penetrate.