Faculty & Staff
Teaching Faculty
Faculty & Staff - Teaching Faculty
Prof. LAI Tsz Pang John
Professor
Associate Dean (Student Affairs), Faculty of Arts
Visiting Scholar, Harvard-Yenching Institute (2015–16)
B.A., M.Phil. (HKU); D.Phil. (Oxon)
Email: johntpl@cuhk.edu.hk | Tel: 3943-4276 | Office: KKB 225
Research Interests
- Religion and literature in China
- Theories and practices of religious translation
- Biblical reception in Chinese contexts
- Global Yijing (Book of Changes) studies
Research Projects
- “Protestant Interpretations of the Yijing: A Comparative Study of Thomas McClatchie and James Legge in Late Qing China,” General Research Fund, Research Grants Council, Hong Kong, 2020–2022. (Principal Investigator) (HK$403,000)
- “Transforming Morality and Society: Chinese Jesuit Fiction and Drama in the Republican Era (1912–1937),” General Research Fund, Research Grants Council, Hong Kong, 2015–2018. (Principal Investigator) (HK$428,356)
- “Rediscovering the Lost Heritage: The Religious Poetics of the ‘New Age Novels’ (1895) and Its Far-reaching Impact on Chinese Literary Modernity,” General Research Fund, Research Grants Council, Hong Kong, 2013–2016. (Principal Investigator) (HK$332,371)
- “Chinese Christian Novels in Late Qing China (1807–1911): An Interdisciplinary Study of Religion and Literature,” General Research Fund, Research Grants Council, Hong Kong, 2010–2013. (Principal Investigator) (HK$570,481)
Most Representative Publications
- An Annotated Anthology of the Yijing Commentaries by the Early Qing Jesuit Joachim Bouvet (in Chinese: 清初耶穌會士白晉《易經》殘稿選注) (Taipei: National Taiwan University Press, 2020). (refereed) (384 pages)
- Literary Representations of Christianity in Late Qing and Republican China (Leiden: Brill, 2019). (Studies in Religion and the Arts Book Series; Volume 14) (refereed) (205 pages)
- Gusheng Ruose Juben: An Annotated Anthology of Chinese Catholic Biblical Plays of the Republican Period (in Chinese: 古聖若瑟劇本──民國天主教聖經戲劇選輯) (Taipei: Rev. Dr. Lien-hwa Chow Memorial Foundation, 2019). (refereed) (736 pages)
- Attuning the Gospel: Chinese Christian Novels of the Late Qing Period (in Chinese: 福音演義──晚清漢語基督教小說的書寫) (Taipei: National Taiwan University Press, 2017). (National Taiwan University (NTU) & Harvard-Yenching Institute (HYI) Academic Book Series; Volume 2) (refereed) (316 pages)
- Negotiating Religious Gaps: The Enterprise of Translating Christian Tracts by Protestant Missionaries in Nineteenth-century China (Sankt Augustin: Institut Monumenta Serica, 2012). (refereed) (382 pages)
- The Afterlife of a Classic: A Critical Study of the Late-Qing Chinese Translations of The Pilgrim’s Progress (in Chinese: 經典的轉生──晚清《天路歷程》漢譯研究) (Hong Kong: Christian Study Centre on Chinese Religion and Culture, 2012). (refereed) (327 pages)
- “Wellspring of Inspiration: The Mandarin Union Version and Modern Chinese Poetry in the Early Twentieth Century,” Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), Vol. 30, Issue 1 (January 2020), pp. 163–177.
- “Performing Religion: Chinese Catholic Biblical Drama in the Republican Era,” Journal of Chinese Religions(London and New York: Routledge), Vol. 45, no. 1 (May 2017), pp. 39–62.
- “Robert Morrison’s Chinese Literature and Translated Modernity,” in A New Literary History of Modern China, edited by David Der-wei Wang (Cambridge, MA.: Harvard University Press, 2017), pp. 56–62.
- “Pilgrimage to Heaven: Timothy Richard’s Christian Interpretation of The Journey to the West,” in David Jasper, Youzhuang Geng and Wang Hai, eds. A Poetics of Translation: Between Chinese and English Literature (Waco, Texas: Baylor University Press, 2016), pp. 59–72.
Other Projects, Achievements, and/or Awards
- Research Excellence Award, Chinese University of Hong Kong (2020) (2011)
- The Faculty of Arts Outstanding Teaching Award, Chinese University of Hong Kong (2017) (2015) (2014) (2013) (2011) (2010)
- Harvard-Yenching Visiting Fellowship, Harvard-Yenching Institute, Harvard University (2015–16)
>> Click here to Prof Lai's CV.