Authoring the strange: the evolving notions of authorship in prefaces to classical Chinese supernatural fiction

This article considers the ways in which ideas of authorship have been portrayed in the authorial prefaces (zixu) to a selection of classical Chinese tales of the supernatural (zhiguai). It posits that the authorial preface is a unique forum for exploring the interplay between the author, reader and text. Within the controversial and contested tradition of writings about strange and otherworldly phenomena, it argues that over time the zixu provided a platform for the emergence of an increasingly individualised authorial persona.