Red Rose, White Rose (novella)

Red Rose, White Rose (Traditional Chinese: 紅玫瑰與白玫瑰; simplified Chinese: 红玫瑰与白玫瑰), is a novella by Eileen Chang, one of the most well-known authors in modern Chinese literature. The novel was first published in 1944 and later included in her short-story collection Chuanqi (1944; "The Legend").^[1] In 1994, Hong Kong director Stanley Kwan adapted the novel into a movie of the same name Red Rose White Rose, which was widely acclaimed and entered into the 45th Berlin International Film Festival.^[2]

Set in the 1930s and 1940s Chinese society, the story focus on the tangled love between Tong Zhenbao and two women: his spotless wife Yanli ("white rose"), and his passionate mistress Jiaorui ("red rose").^[3] With finely detailed writing, the novel explores the women's survival status, tragic fate, and loss of self-consciousness in a patriarchal society. It describes ordinary people's emotions and marital status under the collision of traditional Chinese culture and Western culture.^[4]