Jaroslav Průšek (1906–1980) was a

Czech Czech may refer to: * Anything from or related to the Czech Republic, a country in Europe ** Czech language ** Czechs, the people of the area ** Czech culture ** Czech cuisine * One of three mythical brothers, Lech, Czech, and Rus *Czech (surnam ...

sinologist Sinology, also referred to as China studies, is a subfield of area studies or East Asian studies involved in social sciences and humanities research on China. It is an academic discipline that focuses on the study of the Chinese civilizatio ...

. He was considered as the founder of the Prague School of Sinology. He trained as an historian, with an interest in the history of

ancient Greece Ancient Greece () was a northeastern Mediterranean civilization, existing from the Greek Dark Ages of the 12th–9th centuries BC to the end of classical antiquity (), that comprised a loose collection of culturally and linguistically r ...

Byzantium Byzantium () or Byzantion () was an ancient Greek city in classical antiquity that became known as Constantinople in late antiquity and Istanbul today. The Greek name ''Byzantion'' and its Latinization ''Byzantium'' continued to be used as a n ...

and

Roman Empire The Roman Empire ruled the Mediterranean and much of Europe, Western Asia and North Africa. The Roman people, Romans conquered most of this during the Roman Republic, Republic, and it was ruled by emperors following Octavian's assumption of ...

Charles University Charles University (CUNI; , UK; ; ), or historically as the University of Prague (), is the largest university in the Czech Republic. It is one of the List of oldest universities in continuous operation, oldest universities in the world in conti ...

. After graduating from Charles University, he went to Germany and Sweden and became the student of

Bernard Karlgren Klas Bernhard Johannes Karlgren (; 15 October 1889 – 20 October 1978) was a Swedish sinologist and linguist who pioneered the study of Chinese historical phonology using modern comparative methods. In the early 20th century, Karlgren conduct ...

. He was sent to China and Japan in the 1930s, where he became friends with many Chinese intellectuals, including

Lu Xun Lu Xun ( zh, c=魯迅, p=Lǔ Xùn, ; 25 September 188119 October 1936), pen name of Zhou Shuren, born Zhou Zhangshou, was a Chinese writer. A leading figure of modern Chinese literature, he wrote in both vernacular and literary Chinese as a no ...

. He went back to Czechoslovakia in 1937. In 1952, he was appointed head of Institute of East Asian Studies of Charles University. His students included Marián Gálik and

Milena Doleželová-Velingerová Milena Doleželová-Velingerová (February 8, 1932 – October 20, 2012) was a renowned Czech sinologist. Having studied with Jaroslav Průšek in Prague and Wu Xiaoling 吳曉鈴 in Peking, she left Prague in 1968 after the Soviet invasion, and ...

. He was a pioneer in a range of topics ranging from Song dynasty vernacular literature and modern Chinese literature. He lived in what Leo Ou-fan Lee called "the era of giants."

Selected works

Books

*''Dictionary of Oriental Literature'' *''The lyrical and the epic: studies of modern Chinese literature'' *''Chinese history and literature: collection of studies'' *''Chinese states and the northern barbarians in the period 1400-300 B.C'' *''The origins and the authors of the hua-pen '' *Die Literatur des befreiten China und ihre Volkstraditionen *Études d'histoire et de littérature chinoises offertes au professeur Jaroslav Průšek *''My sister China'', His memoir about his experiences in China. *''Three sketches of Chinese literature'' search results
at worldcat.org

Articles

References and further reading

* * * -- , "The Legacies of Jaroslav Průšek and C.T.Hsia," in

David Der-wei Wang David Der-wei Wang (; born November 6, 1954) is a Taiwanese-American literary historian, critic, and the Edward C. Henderson Professor of Chinese Literature at Harvard University. He has written extensively on post-late Qing Chinese fiction, compa ...

, ed., ''New Literary History of Modern China'' (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 2017), pp. 644- 650, * Xiaoqing Diana Lin, "Jaroslav Průšek: Communism, Modernization, and Chinese Literary Studies During the Cold War, 1950s−1960s," in Michael Brose and Antonina Luszczykiewicz eds., ''Sinology During the Cold War'' (Abingdon, Oxon.; NY: Routledge; 2022), * Open access online, includes extensive bibliography.

Notes

External links

* . Podcast of a talk exploring how much preconceived notions about Chinese poetry conditioned their understanding of Chinese literature, and to what extent they helped them arrive at a breakthrough in Chinese literature studies. {{DEFAULTSORT:Prusek, Jaroslav 1906 births 1980 deaths Czech sinologists Charles University alumni Chinese–Czech translators