This thesis fills the need for a comprehensive study of Edmund Burke’s representation of global religions throughout the general oeuvre of his writings and speeches. My objective is to advance the study of Burke by offering a critical account of his religious thought, as a critical imprint in his literature. In addition to situating Burke’s writing in the context of Enlightenment thought and eighteenth-century public life, I make a further contribution to the study of Burke’s literature by demonstrating how twentieth and twenty-first century theories of modernity can help to articulate Burke’s conception of religion. Studies that have categorically seated Burke in the context of ‘modernity’ (for example, from Terry Eagleton, Paddy Bullard, and Stephen K. White) treat him as a ‘politician’, as ‘Edmund Burke the rhetorician’, or ‘as an aesthetician’.1 My thesis compliments these studies by filling the need to treat Burke as a multicultural quasi-religious thinker in the context of modernity. Studies that have treated Burke in a religious context (for example, from Conor Cruise O’Brien, Thomas H.D. Mahoney, Eamonn O’Flaherty, Elizabeth Lambert, J.C.D. Clark, Brian Young, Frederick Dryer, and others) have done so with the objective of understanding more about his personal religious convictions.2 Differing from such studies, I do not intend to unearth Burke’s true religious identity; rather, I intend to fill the need for a full-length study of Burke’s analysis of religion, as it appears in a literary context. There exists no monographic study of Burke’s conceptualization of global religions as translated through recent theories of modernity. This is the task set forth in this thesis. Most of the studies that acknowledge Burke in a religious context treat him in strictly Christ-centred terms, mostly to support reactionary-conservative interpretations (e.g., Francis Canavan, Bruce Frohnen, and Christopher Hitchens).3 I wish to examine political thinking about religion, beyond Christ-centred terms - his global conception of non-Christian, non-god-centred thinking. In doing so, this thesis is intended to present an interpretation of Burke that acknowledges the importance he placed on indigenous religious culture. To my mind, interpretations of Burke that emphasise his reactionary-conservatism also implicate him as being anti-modern. As I intend to explore Burke’s writings and speeches in the context of modernity, I believe it is only responsible to acknowledge these interpretations of him as a reactionary-conservative. I use the work of J.G.A. Pocock, S.J. Barnett, Bruno Latour and others to establish a context of eighteenth-century modernity, or what was modern to Enlightenment minds.4 In addition, my critical analysis of Burke demonstrates how the same characteristics and themes associated with this eighteenth-century context of modernity are reflected in representations of modernity that are more recent. I use twentieth and twenty-first century theories of modernity to enrich our understanding of Burke’s representation of religion. I deconstruct Burke’s representation of religion to suggest that it anticipates the various complexities communicated in studies of modernity (for example, from Zygmunt Bauman, Marshall Berman, and Paul Heelas, Phillip Blond, John Milbank, Jacques Derrida, and Michel Foucault).5 Ultimately, my thesis validates Burke as an originator of modern (and contemporary) religious conceptualization, which transcends things such as nation, sect, and even good and evil.

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This thesis considers the idea of 'Renaissance' in Walter Pater's writings on art. It argues that Pater's idea of 'Renaissance' is not confined by time or place and that it represents a moment of historical excellence which is materialized in certain works of art. It explores the place of Pater's writings on art in the light of changing cultural and institutional factors in the nineteenth century; providing a survey of the historiography of art and examining the establishment of institutions devoted to art. More specifically it considers the topicality of Renaissance studies in the nineteenth century and the ways in which Renaissance studies were affected by such factors. This thesis also examines Pater's knowledge and use of art historical sources, considering his travels abroad as a condition of his criticism. It looks at Pater's contact with those art works cited in his writings and discusses the ways in which he uses such sources. Finally, it presents Pater's art-historical sources as providing evidence of an evolutionary process in the history of art in which the fine arts play an important role as material evidence of 'Renaissance'.

The author assesses the life and work of the Newcastle upon Tyne born writer Jack Common in the light of the massive social, economic and cultural changes which have affected the North East of England and wider society through the period of Common's life and afterwards. He seeks to point out the relevance of Common to the present day in terms of his ideas about class, community and the individual and in the light of Common's sense of rebelliousness influenced by a process of grass-roots education and self-improvement. In addition, he draws upon his own extensive experience in community arts and education, looking, in particular, at the work he and others have carried out on Common over the last thirty years and assessing its value in the light of recent political changes. The author draws together the range of biographical and literary criticism carried out by a range of individuals over this period of time and brings into print hitherto unpublished material about Common's life and work by interviewing family members and associates, exploring the Common Archive at Newcastle University and other largely ignored sources, and studying Common's significant association with George Orwell in great detail. Through all of this, he seeks to argue that Common's life and ideas remain worthy of close attention in the present day.

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Although Han Yü is already famous as a great prose writer in Chinese literature, few Western scholars seem to be aware of the depth and originality of his poetry. This thesis is an attempt to shed some light on Han Yü's immense contributions to Chinese verse in order to correct this one-sided view of Han Yü which most scholars have. By way of introduction, a short biography of Han Yü has been prepared from the traditional historical sources and modern Chinese and Japanese materials. Also included is a short review of Han Yü's thought with particular reference to his attitudes toward Buddhism to correct the misconception that he was completely hostile to the Indian religion. Even though the thesis is mainly concerned with Han's poetry, his prose style cannot be ignored because of its importance to his poetry and Chinese literature in general. Han Yü's poetry is distinguished by the strangeness of its language and the consistent breaking of old rules of prosody. The fu device is found to be particularly prominent, and the writer's penchant for the composing of narrative verse is quite unique in China. The source of much of the weird subject material of Han Yü's verse is the mythology of the Chinese peasant, and Han's poetry is quite atypical in the predominance of an absurd humor never observed before in the Chinese tradition. Han's absurd humor is the key to his philosophy of life: a good-humored resignation to an inavoidable fate. The origin of the weirder aspects of Han Yü's poetry is hard to account for, and after an examination of possible sources in literati verse it is concluded that Han owes much to the non-literatus and folk tradition in Chinese literature. Han Yü was the center of one of the most important poetic movements in mid-T'ang times, and a school consisting of Li Ho, Meng Chiao, Lu T'ung, Ma Yi, Liu Ch'a, and others gathered about him and were all influenced by him to varying degrees. Although his contributions to Chinese poetry were nearly forgotten in late T'ang times, Ou-yang Hsiu and others renewed interest in his works, and as a result, he was one of the major sources of inspiration for the tremendous creativity of northern Sung poetry. Because of his boldness in writing verse, Han Yü was not always popular with Chinese critics, and he was frequently attacked for the prose-like quality of his poetry and the strangeness of its subject matter. However, many critics approved of his innovations, and we find that most of the adverse criticism comes from highly conservative authors. / Arts, Faculty of / Asian Studies, Department of / Graduate

劉健明 = The life and thought of Han Yü / Lau Kin-ming. / Manuscript (c. 2-3 為復印本). / Thesis (M.A.)--香港中文大學硏究院歷史學部. / Manuscript (c. 2-3 wei fu yin ben). / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 697-721). / Liu Jianming = The life and thought of Han Yu / Lau Kin-ming. / Thesis (M.A.)--Xianggang Zhong wen da xue yan jiu yuan li shi xue bu. / 論文提要 --- p.1 / Chapter 〈一〉 --- 導論 --- p.2 / Chapter 〈二〉 --- 韓愈的早年生活與仕宦 / Chapter 1 --- 韓愈的家庭背景 --- p.9 / 注釋 --- p.19 / Chapter 2 --- 長安應舉與韓愈內心的衝突 --- p.28 / 注釋 --- p.43 / Chapter 3 --- 入仕藩府與思想衝擊 --- p.56 / 注釋 --- p.75 / Chapter 〈三〉 --- 韓愈五原的分析及他對王叔文集團的評價 / Chapter 1 --- 被貶陽山原因考實 --- p.82 / 注釋 --- p.101 / Chapter 2 --- 韓愈五原的分析 --- p.121 / 注釋 --- p.166 / Chapter 3 --- 韓愈對王叔文集團的評價─兼論韓愈對宦官的態度 --- p.210 / 注釋 --- p.243 / Chapter 〈四〉 --- 領導古文運動及其中心思想 / Chapter 1 --- 古文運動之淵源 --- p.279 / 注釋 --- p.299 / Chapter 2 --- 韓愈領導古文運動的理論及其開展 --- p.327 / 注釋 --- p.374 / Chapter 3 --- 韓愈柳宗元思想的比較 --- p.416 / 注釋 --- p.457 / Chapter 〈五〉 --- 韓愈晚年的政治生涯與思想 / Chapter 1 --- 韓愈對藩鎮的態度及從征淮西 --- p.481 / 注釋 --- p.502 / Chapter 2 --- 諫迎佛骨與被貶潮州 --- p.520 / 注釋 --- p.548 / Chapter 3 --- 韓愈晚年心態 --- p.567 / 注釋 --- p.602 / Chapter 〈六〉 --- 結論 --- p.625 / 注釋 --- p.645 / 參考書目 --- p.697