Brief Biography
Prof. Zhenjun Zhang received his PhD from the University of Wisconsin-Madison, MA from Beijing University, and BA from Zhengzhou University, China. Zhenjun Zhang’s field of research is pre-modern Chinese literature with a focus on fiction: studies of classical Chinese tales, vernacular short stories and novels, as well as their interaction with history, religion, and culture. His recent publications include Hidden and Visible Realms: Early Medieval Chinese Tales of the Supernatural and the Fantastic (Columbia University Press, 2018; Song Dynasty Tales: a Guided Reader (World Scientific, 2017; co-authored with Jing Wang), and Buddhism and Tales of the Supernatural in Early Medieval China (Brill, 2014). Currently he is working on Dreams in Early and Medieval Chinese Tales, Chinese Culture through Legends and Fiction, etc. He teaches Mandarin Chinese, “Chinese Literature and Film,” “Chinese Culture through Fiction and Film,” and “Buddhism and Daoism through Literature and Film.”
Regularly Taught Courses
- ASIA/LTRN/FILM 232: Chinese Culture through Fiction and Film
- ASIA/LTRN/FILM 234: Chinese Literature and Film
- ASIA/LTRN/FILM 235: Buddhism and Daoism through Literature and Film
- CHIN 101/102/103/104/201/202 Chinese
- CHIN SYE498/490 Independent Studies
Publications
Recent Publications:
Chinese Culture through Legends and Fiction. Routledge, forthcoming, 2025.
Routledge Handbook of Traditional Chinese Literature, co-edit with Victor Mair. Routledge, forthcoming 2025.
New Stories Told while Trimming the Wick, co-trans with Sidney Sondergard & Trever McKay. Oxford University Press, forthcoming September 2024.
Classic Chinese Poems of Mourning and Texts of Lament: an Anthology, co-edit with Victor Mair, Bloomsbury Academic, 2024.
Ming Dynasty Tales: A Guided Reader, co-edit with Victor Mair. London: Bloomsbury Academic Publishing, 2022.
Anthology of Tang and Song Tales: The Tang Song chuanqi ji of Lu Xun, co-edit with Victor Mair. Singapore: World Scientific, 2020.
Hidden and Visible Realms: Early Medieval Chinese Tales of the Supernatural and the Fantastic. Trans. with annotations and introduction. New York: Columbia University Press, 2018.
Song Dynasty Tales: A Guided Reader, co-authored with Jing Wang. Singapore: World Scientific, 2017.
Buddhism and Tales of the Supernatural in Early Medieval China: A Study of Liu Yiqing’s Youming lu. Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2014.