Qiu Miaojin

Chiu Miao-Chin (Qiu Miaojin)
Born	May 29, 1969 Changhua County, Taiwan
Died	June 25, 1995 (aged 26) Paris, France
Occupation	Novelist, short story writer
Language	Chinese
Nationality	Taiwan
Alma mater	Taipei First Girls' High School, National Taiwan University, University of Paris VIII
Period	1989–1995
Genre	Literary fiction, autobiography
Literary movement	Queer literature
Notable works	Notes of a Crocodile, Letters from Montmartre

Chiu Miao-Chin (Qiu Miaojin) (Chinese: 邱妙津; May 29, 1969 – June 25, 1995) was a Taiwanese novelist. Her unapologetically lesbian^[1] sensibility has had a profound and lasting influence on queer literature in Taiwan.

Biography

Originally from Changhua County in western Taiwan, she attended the prestigious Taipei First Girls' High School and National Taiwan University, where she graduated with a major in psychology. She worked as a counselor and later as a reporter at the weekly magazine The Journalist. In 1994 she moved to Paris, where she pursued graduate studies in clinical psychology and feminism at University of Paris VIII.

Her death was a suicide. Although there has been a great deal of speculation as to the exact cause of death, most accounts suggest that she stabbed herself with a kitchen knife.

Her best-known work is Notes of a Crocodile,^[2] for which she was awarded the China Times Literature Award in 1995. The novel has been widely described as "a cult classic,"^[3][4] along with her later "Last Words from Montmartre." ^[5]

Qiu has been recognized as a counterculture icon,^[6] and a two-volume set of her diaries was published posthumously in 2007.

Luo Yijun's book Forgetting Sorrow (遣悲懷) was written in her memory.

Bibliography

Novels

• Notes of a Crocodile (1994) - translated by Bonnie Huie (New York Review Books Classics, forthcoming in 2017)
• Last Words from Montmartre (1996) - translated by Ari Larissa Heinrich (New York Review Books Classics, 2014)
• Letters from Montmartre (1996) - excerpt translated by Howard Goldblatt. In J. Lau and H. Goldblatt (Ed. & Trans.), The Columbia Anthology of Modern Chinese Literature. New York: Columbia University Press, 2007, ISBN 978-0-8248-2652-9

Short stories

• "Platonic Hair" (1990) - translated by Fran Martin. In F. Martin (Ed. & Trans.), Angelwings: Contemporary Queer Fiction from Taiwan. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 2003, ISBN 978-0-231-13841-3

See also

• Écriture féminine
• Post-structural feminism
• Queer theory

References

1. Sang, Tze-Lan D (2003), The Emerging Lesbian: Female Same-Sex Desire in Modern China, University of Chicago Press, p. 159, ISBN 0-226-73480-3
2. "Qiu Miaojin's Survival Guide". The Millions. Retrieved October 10, 2012.
3. "PEN Translation Fund: Bonnie Huie, Excerpts from Qiu Miaojin's Notes of a Crocodile". PEN American Center. Retrieved January 3, 2013.
4. "'Cult Classic of Taiwanese Lesbian Literature' Now Excerpted In English, Available Online". Autostraddle. Retrieved October 10, 2012.
5. "'Last Words From Montmartre'". Retrieved February 5, 2016.
6. "PEN Translation Fund: Bonnie Huie on translating Qiu Miaojin". PEN American Center. Retrieved January 3, 2013.

Further reading

• "Afterword," by Ari Larissa Heinrich, in Last Words from Montmartre, by Qiu Miaojin, translated by Ari Larissa Heinrich. New York: New York Review Books, 2014. ISBN 978-1-59017-725-9
• "Begin Anywhere: Transgender and Transgenre Desire in Qiu Miaojin's Last Words from Montmartre," in Transgender China: Histories and Cultures, ed. Howard Chiang. New York: Palgrave MacMillan, 2012. ISBN 978-0-230-34062-6, http://www.worldcat.org/title/transgender-china/oclc/830163605&referer=brief_results
• "Stigmatic Bodies: The Corporeal Qiu Miaojin," in Embodied Modernities: Corporeality, Representation, and Chinese Cultures eds. Fran Martin and Larissa Heinrich. Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 2006. ISBN 978-0-8248-2963-6
• Martin, Fran. "Situating Sexualities: Queer Representation in Taiwanese Fiction, Film, and Public Culture," Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 2003. ISBN 978-962-209-619-6
• Sang, Tze-Lan D. The Emerging Lesbian: Female Same-Sex Desire in Modern China, Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2003. ISBN 0-226-73478-1

External links

• Excerpt from Last Words from Montmartre in Words Without Borders
• Excerpt from Last Words from Montmartre in Lonely Girl Phenomenology (magazine)
• Excerpt from Last Words from Montmartre in Guernica (magazine)
• Podcast reading and interview with the translator of Last Words from Montmartre
• "The Kids Are Too Straight: Translating Qiu Miaojin's Notes of a Crocodile" in Kyoto Journal
• First excerpt from Notes of a Crocodile in The Brooklyn Rail
• Second excerpt from Notes of a Crocodile in The Margins, published by Asian American Writers' Workshop
• Third excerpt from Notes of a Crocodile in Words Without Borders