Editors: "Dangerous Women: Warriors, Grannies and Geishas of the Ming," will be available Dec. 1 from Rowman & Littlefield (1-800-462-6420). For more information contact Joyce Lynn (415) 267-7620 or e-mail: joyce_lynn@hotmail.com. Author Victoria Cass is signing copies of 'Dangerous Women' at the Tattered Cover on Dec. 1.
In the time of lush prosperity during China聮s Glorious Age and the Ming Dynasty, a guild of feminine archetypes threatened the social order and was silenced by ruling patriarchs.
These powerful women were creative, passionate, mystical and outspoken in a variety of roles including theater, publishing, medicine and war.
According to University of Colorado at Boulder Chinese professor Victoria Cass, "There seemed to be a hidden story, and those hidden stories are what 聭Dangerous Women聮 is all about." Cass' book, "Dangerous Women: Warriors, Grannies and Geishas of the Ming," will be published Dec. 1.
The women lived in a time of fertility, danger, power and love, and their stories survived in poetry, private journals and popular literature. Cass translated those stories in order to reveal the myth and history of these women.
This is the first English-language book to put the entire feminine cast on one stage. It is full of vividly illustrated Ming women by Hung Liu, a renowned artist from Beijing.
Cass will be available to sign copies of "Dangerous Women" at the Tattered Cover on Dec. 1.
Cass writes about the feminine culture between the 13th and 17th centuries and how these archetypes challenged the traditional images of women during this time.
Her stories and books show how powerful women of the past influence the lives of women in China today and how these "wild women" are re-emerging in politics, the economy, arts and popular culture as China is again poised to become a world economic leader.
"My primary field of interest has been in the mythology, the folklore, the whole underpinning of these women that seemed to have much more power than society prescribed for them," Cass said.
Although some believe that there weren聮t any strong women in China before the Communist party, Cass聮s book proves otherwise.
"There were very strong women - there were mystics, warriors, healers, etc., that were very forceful, very articulate, very independent," she said.
Cass is associate professor of Chinese Language and Literature in the department of East Asian languages and civilizations at the University of Colorado at Boulder and past chair of the Committee on Women in Asian Studies.
She received her doctorate in Chinese Language and Literature from the University of California at Berkeley and a master聮s degree in Chinese Language from Yale University.
She has lectured and written on women in Asian history and is known for translations of a wide variety of Chinese texts, including folk songs, diaries and biographies.
Chinese Language and Literature is a program housed within the department of East Asian languages and civilizations, the only department in the state of Colorado to offer undergraduate and graduate degrees in Chinese and Japanese. It is also the only department in the CU system to focus entirely on the study of non-Western cultures.