※ Date: October 30 (Wed) to November 1 (Fri), 2024

※ Location: Conference Hall, 3rd Floor, National Central Library

※ Agenda: https://reurl.cc/XR9zZ3 (Tentative)

※ Registration: https://forms.gle/JjVVtzojJgY9qmxF8 [Deadline: October 25 (Fri)]

※ Organizers: 

Center for Chinese Studies at the National Central Library,

Research Center for Chinese Cultural Metaverse in Taiwan at National Chengchi University,

Taiwan Cultural and Creativity Development Foundation,  

Yuan-Liou Publishing Co., Ltd. 

(in alphabet order)

※ Introduction:

Chinese people around the world, from Taipei to New York, from Hong Kong to London, from Tokyo to Shanghai, may speak different dialects, eat different cuisines, and hold different political views. Still, they all read Jin Yong. Jin Yong’s works have sold over 20 million copies in Taiwan, transcending generations and fields of politics, culture, and entertainment, and influencing more than three generations in Taiwan.

Jin Yong is a common language for Chinese people worldwide. This name is more than just two characters; it is a cultural phenomenon that spans all fields in the Chinese-speaking world, connecting different eras in the press, literary publishing, film and television media, and politics and business. It has had a profound influence and endless resonance, and is a unique and magnificent manifestation of culture.

“A great hero is someone who serves his country and his people.” Jin Yong’s depiction of the martial arts world has created the most expansive cultural universe for Chinese people worldwide. It has profoundly influenced modern Chinese culture, reflected the spirit of chivalry in present-day Taiwanese society, and demonstrated the power of words.

2024 is the 100th anniversary of Jin Yong (1924–2018). The martial arts world, symbolic empire, textual dynasty, video universe, and digital cosmos he created have become a “shared language for global Chinese people” across multimedia and regions, spanning from the early Cold War era to the post-Cold War era. Through the cross-cultural dissemination of translations of Jin Yong’s wuxia novels into Japanese, Korean, Vietnamese, Indonesian, Thai, English, French, and other languages, the image and status of “International Jin Yong” have gradually taken shape, and Jin Yong’s wuxia works have increasingly exerted influence in cross-cultural communication. To commemorate Jin Yong and explore the positioning of his works in literary history, as well as their dissemination and influence on Chinese culture and the world, the Taiwan Cultural and Creativity Development Foundation, the Research Center for Chinese Cultural Metaverse in Taiwan at National Chengchi University, the Center for Chinese Studies at the National Central Library, and Yuan-Liou Publishing Co., Ltd. jointly organized the international academic symposium “Jin Yong’s Century-Long Legend: Dialogue, Reflection, and Transcendence.”

This symposium has invited dozens of speakers from around the world, aiming to bring together scholars, translators, and cultural figures specializing in Jin Yong’s works to exchange research perspectives and findings on Jin Yong’s novels and their cross-media intertextuality, as well as to explore the multifaceted values and cross-regional dissemination of Jin Yong’s novels. Additionally, it examines the social realities reflected in the variations of wuxia narratives from the pre-Jin Yong, Jin Yong, and post-Jin Yong periods, as well as how Jin Yong has influenced young writers in the digital age to inherit, transform, and transcend his works in genres such as Xuanhuan (玄幻), fantasy, and cultivation novels, thereby demonstrating its living and enduring contemporary significance.

The symposium will feature presentations of research papers, roundtable discussions, and performances by the Comedians Workshop “Laughing Jianghu.” For the first time, participants will also be able to chat with an AI chatbot about Jin Yong’s novels and experience the MR novel role-playing. We welcome everyone to join us and get to know Jin Yong, as well as read his works in various formats.