The Tale of Li Wa

The Tale of Li Wa (traditional Chinese: 李娃傳; simplified Chinese: 李娃传; pinyin: Lǐ Wá Zhuàn; Wade–Giles: Li Wa Chuan) is a short novella by Bai Xingjian (or Bo Xingjian).

Song Geng (C: 宋 耕, P: Sòng Gēng), author of The Fragile Scholar: Power and Masculinity in Chinese Culture, wrote that this was one of three Tang Dynasty works that were "particularly influential in the development of the caizi-jiaren model". There is a poem by Yuan Zhen, "The Ballad of Li Wa," that is a companion to the novel.

It was translated into English by Arthur Waley, who used the title The Story of Miss Li and included it on pages 113-36 in the collection More Translations from the Chinese, which was published in 1919 by Alfred A. Knopf. It was also translated into English by Glen Dudbridge, who used the title The Tale of Li Wa: Study and Critical Edition of a Chinese Story from the Ninth Century. This version was published in 1983 by Ithaca Press.

Linda Rui Feng of the University of Toronto wrote that the novel features the "unpredictability and unintelligibility" of Chang'an and a conflict between "career accomplishment" and "youthful transgressions".

There is a debate over two possibilities of how the story evolved. One group believes that in 795 three friends told the story amongst one another. Another position states that a professional storyteller had performed in front of Bai Xingjian and Bai Juyi, and Yuan Zhen, and that Bai Xingjian obtained the story from the storyteller. One author, Tatsuhiko Seo, believes that the story comes from a storyteller.

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