Lecture at the international workshop “Chinese Christian Women Writers”
6–8 July 2026, Academy of International Ecumenism, Hamburg
This workshop was organized by Isabel Friemann (China InfoStelle, Hamburg), Barbara Hoster (Institut Monumenta Serica, Sankt Augustin), Liu Ruomin (Nordkirche weltweit, Hamburg) and Ma Tianji (Missionswerk OMF International), in cooperation with Anton Knuth (Akademie für internationale Ökumene, Hamburg).
It focused on Chinese women writers from different generations, from the Republican era to the present, and from different regions of the Sinosphere, including Hong Kong, Taiwan, and the Chinese diaspora. Their work – explicitly or implicitly – relates to Christianity, Christian-influenced interpretative frameworks or religious experiences. The aim of the workshop was to bring together perspectives from literary studies, theology and the social, cultural and religious sciences with regard to gender issues.
Barbara Hoster’s lecture “‘As If in a Trance, She Saw the Gates of Heaven Wide Open’ – Su Xuelin’s Literary Representation of Her Encounter with Christianity” offered further insights into how the Chinese writer Su Xuelin 蘇雪林 (1897–1999), after being baptized as a Catholic while studying in France, continued to explore Christianity throughout her life in many of her works. In particular, her autobiographically inspired novel Jixin 棘心 (Heart of Thorns) from 1929 (revised edition 1957), which deals with her experience of conversion, depicts the protagonist’s encounter with Christianity in numerous passages using various literary devices: the reflective engagement with Christian doctrine in the form of letters and diary entries, the aesthetic reception of Christian art in the form of descriptions of paintings, the depiction of baptism as a dreamlike vision, and the personal profession of faith in the form of a prayer. The combination of these diverse stylistic devices not only reflects the novel’s period of origin but also expresses the protagonist’s varied motivations and inner conflicts as she embraces the Christian faith.