'Tell My Mother I’m Sorry': On Chinese as a Minor Discourse

Taking its inspiration from a line in Chinese that appears in an episode of the popular US television series Buffy the Vampire Slayer, this essay reflects on the broader phenomenon of minor or minoritized discourses and, specifically, insofar as it relates to modern Chinese literature. The focus, however, is not on discursive formations positioned at the margins of what might be regarded as mainstream Chinese literature (such as ethnic minority literature, Sinophone literature, and so forth), but rather on works by authors who may be viewed as paradigmatically canonical.