Forbidden imaginations: Three Chinese narratives on mother-son incest

Abstract

This paper explores the representation of incest in contemporary Chinese fiction. Specifically, it looks at three short stories by Chinese woman writers, focusing its discussion on their relation to psychoanalytic models, the significance of trauma and causality and the arising discourses on incestuous desire. It asks the following questions: To what extent do incest narratives challenge or reinforce extant norms on sexual relations? What are the ethical implications of these stories for (de)situating incest within the popular erotic imagination? The analysis indicates that in articulating the occurrence of incest, different narrative trajectories project divergent discourses on consanguineous sex. The various guises in which the Oedipal narrative is replayed also reveal the tensions and anxieties involved in representing the culturally tabooed.