.jpg)
Eileen Chang at the University of Hong Kong:
An Online Presentation of Images and Documents from the Archives
百年愛玲，人文港大:
張愛玲百年誕辰紀念文獻展
Introduced by Nicole Huang
Curated by Prof Nicole Huang, Dr Florian Knothe and Kenneth Shing-Kwan Chan
策展人：黃心村教授、羅諾德博士、陳承焜
Introduction
This online exhibition pays tribute to Eileen Chang (1920-1995), a major twentieth-century writer and one of the most illustrious alumni in the history of the University of Hong Kong, on the occasion of the centennial celebration of her birth. With this collection of images and documents selected largely from the HKU Archives, we hope to identify new material and help generate fresh scholarship in the burgeoning global Eileen Chang studies. By piecing together a narrative that highlights the beginning of an extraordinary literary career, we celebrate Chang’s connection with HKU as an important chapter in the history of both the Faculty of Arts and the larger university community...
導言
今年是張愛玲誕辰百年，也是她逝世二十五週年。張愛玲戰爭年代在香港大學文學院度過兩年半的時光，她說過香港記憶與她有著「切身的、劇烈的影響」。我們此番發掘和梳理的資料大多是第一次面世，將這些零散的文字和影像融合在一起，我們可以看到， 港大的人文教育以及香港之戰帶給張愛玲的衝擊，直接影響到她日後的一舉成名。港戰前的張愛玲是個安靜的、不太引人注目的年輕學生。港戰的爆發是重要的契機，使她萌生要以最個人的方式書寫亂世眾生相的強烈願望，並在一夜之內脫穎而出：「時代的車轟轟地往前開。我們坐在車上，經過的也許不過是幾條熟悉的街衢，可是在漫天的火光中也自驚心動魄….」。(〈燼餘錄〉)
「百年愛玲，人文港大」以原始檔案中張愛玲及其師友的資料文獻來全面呈現她的港大生活與因緣。首次面世的文件與圖片包括有張愛玲、許地山等人在內的文學院師生的集體合影，列有張愛玲在大學二年級獲得的獎學金的原始檔案紀錄，張愛玲所住的港大女生宿舍的文字和影像記載，歷史講師諾曼∙佛朗士的照片和檔案資料，文學教授許地山的珍貴手稿，好友炎櫻及家人在港大就讀的相關文件等。這個線上展覽只是一個開始，我們的梳理和研究還將繼續，在外界條件允許的時候我們會在馮平山樓舉辦一個更全面的文獻展。將這次挖掘的文獻資料與張愛玲筆下的港大和戰時香港並置對照，我們希望能重構一個重要的歷史場景，還原作家早期生活的一些片段，並為下一階段的張愛玲研究提供新的材料和靈感。
Figures 1-3, Eileen Chang’s HKU student registration and transcripts (HKU Archives)
圖 1-3, 張愛玲香港大學學籍紀錄和成績單（香港大學檔案館藏）
Eileen Chang arrived at HKU in August 1939 and left without completing her degree in May 1942 during the Japanese occupation of Hong Kong, when classes had been interrupted by the war since December 1941. Her wartime experience had lasting impact on her, indeed as she wrote in “From the Ashes,” that it “cut too close to the bone, affecting me in an altogether drastic fashion” (Written on Water, p. 39). Although the Battle of Hong Kong badly damaged the HKU campus, it is not true that “the university documents and records were completely burned, leaving no trace at all” (“The Way I Look at Su Qing”). In fact, her student record has survived, well preserved in the HKU Archives, which contains her registration form as well as pages of her transcript that reflect her grades in the first two years (Figures 1-3). The courses she took included English, History, Chinese (Literature & Translation), Logic, and Psychology, and she scored better in English and History than in the others. Her class attendance was near perfect, in stark contrast to her meagre participation in extracurricular activities. In the photograph on her student registration, she wears a dark cheongsam and a dark cardigan, round glasses, and a hesitant smile, pretty much still a high school girl from St. Mary’s Hall in Shanghai (Figure 4).
張愛玲於1939年8月港大開學前夕到達香港，1942年5月離開香港回到上海。港戰爆發的1941年12月學校就停擺了，接下來五個月裡的親身經歷對她有著「切身的、劇烈的影響」(〈燼餘錄〉)。香港之戰對校園毀壞巨大，但並非如她所言的「學校的文件紀錄統統燒掉，一點痕跡都沒留下」(〈我看蘇青〉)。帶有她證件照的學籍紀錄以及兩個學年的成績單都保存完好(圖1、2、3)。兩年多裡她修的課程有英文、歷史、中國文學、翻譯、邏輯和心理學，其中英文和歷史的成績勝出其他科目。她是不缺課的學生，考勤幾乎完美。學籍紀錄上的證件照裡，她穿著深色旗袍和深色針織外衣，戴著圓圓的眼鏡片，含著微笑，是即將從上海聖瑪利亞女中畢業的高中生模樣(圖4)。
Figure 4, Eileen Chang ID photo, extracted from her student registration (HKU Archives)
圖 4, 張愛玲香港大學學籍紀錄上的證件照（香港大學檔案館藏）
The HKU Archives hold other important documents that bear an Eileen Chang connection. Files of her teachers, especially the two that influenced her the most—Norman H. France, Reader in History, and Hsu Ti-shan, Professor of Chinese—are yet to be fully studied. A highlight in our archival search is the discovery of group portraits of teachers and students of the Faculty of Arts, taken annually in front of the Main Building (Figures 5, 6). In each of these portraits, Chang can be seen in the third row, among other female students. The 1941 portrait was taken only a few months before the outbreak of war, when Eileen Chang was already a third-year student, and Prof. Hsu Ti-shan had just passed away in August. If juxtaposed with her own portrait from her college years, wearing the same pair of glasses, long hair, thin face, it is no surprise that she describes herself from those years as “an ugly duckling turning into an ugly little egret,” having not yet escaped “the awkward age” (Figure 7).
學籍紀錄和成績單之外，港大還保存了其他與張愛玲有關的檔案資料。文學院師生1940年和1941年秋季在本部大樓前留下的大合照裡均有張愛玲的身影（圖5，6）。1941年秋季的合照，時間恰是港戰爆發前的幾個月，此時的張愛玲已是三年級學生了，許地山教授於當年八月倏然離世，合影裡沒有了他的身影。細心的讀者應該可以在第三排的女學生中找到當年的張愛玲。仍然是那一副厚厚的圓圓的眼鏡，披著長髮，臉型瘦削，沒有一絲微笑。《對照記》裡有她一張戴著同一副眼鏡的單人照，邊上的文字說，大學時代的自己是「醜小鴨變成醜小鷺鷥」，總是脫不出「尷尬的年齡」（圖7）。
Figure 5, Faculty of Arts group portrait, Fall 1940 (HKU Archives)
圖 5, 香港大學文學院師生1940年秋季在本部大樓前的大合照（香港大學檔案館藏）
Figure 6, Faculty of Arts group portrait, Fall 1941 (HKU Archives)
圖 6, 香港大學文學院師生1941年秋季在本部大樓前的大合照（香港大學檔案館藏）
Figure 7, Portrait of Chang as a college student (© Roland Soong and Elaine Soong through Crown Culture Corporation)
圖 7, 大學時代的張愛玲 ©宋以朗、宋元琳 經皇冠文化集團授權
Figure 8, Minutes of the Arts Faculty Board meeting, report on Eileen Chang selected to win a Ho Fook scholarship, 22 May 1941 (HKU Archives)
圖 8, 1941年5月香港大學文學院議會獎勵張愛玲何福獎學金的紀錄（香港大學檔案館藏）
9, Minutes of the HKU Senate meeting, to approve Chang’s Ho Fook scholarship, 26 May 1941 (HKU Archives)
圖 9, 1941年5月香港大學校級參議會通過張愛玲所獲何福獎學金的紀錄（香港大學檔案館藏）
Eileen Chang received two scholarships toward the end of her second year of undergraduate studies at HKU. One was a Ho Fook Scholarship, in the amount of £25. Minutes of the Arts Faculty Board meeting on 22 May 1941 indicate that the decision was made by the Board “on the evidence of the examination results” (Figure 8). This was then approved on the University level, at the Senate meeting on 26 May 1941 (Figure 9).
This evidence from the archives corroborates Chang’s own account. She reminiscences in her essay “From the Mouths of Babes”: “After I went to Hong Kong for college, I was awarded two scholarships, and because I had saved my mother a substantial sum of money thereby, I decided that I could finally indulge myself by having a few outfits made precisely to my specifications. And ever since then, I’ve been immersed in clothes and fashion.” (Written on Water, p. 6)
張愛玲在散文〈童言無忌〉中回憶道：「我到香港去讀大學，後來得了兩個獎學金，為我母親省下了一點錢，覺得我可以放肆一下了，就隨心所欲做了些衣服，至今也還沉溺其中。」我們在檔案館裡找到了她在大學二年級得到兩項獎學金的準確的文字證明。1941年5月香港大學文學院議會中教員們集體做出了授予她何福獎學金的決定，並說明是獎給考核成績優異的學生（圖8）。幾天後的校級參議會通過了文學院的決定（圖9）。
For two and a half years, Eileen Chang resided in a women’s hostel called Our Lady’s Hall, run by the sisters of the French Convent School. Peter Cunich in A History of The University of Hong Kong describes in great detail how HKU had adopted the hall tradition since the founding of the University in 1911. While the three main halls on campus were all built for male students, the University did not establish any female dormitory until the 1930s when the number of female students had considerably grown. The administration decided to select an off-campus site for a female dormitory and eventually accepted a proposal made by Mother St. Xavier from the French Convent School, who acquired a large house on Po Shan Road in Mid-Levels behind the HKU campus (Figure 10). Mother St. Xavier not only secured the right to use the building, but also expanded it and bought additional land for students’ outdoor recreation (Figure 11). In March 1939, the French Convent School officially gifted the dormitory, named Our Lady’s Hall, to HKU. When Eileen Chang moved in with 12 other students that Fall, the once private residence had been converted into a women’s hostel, with a garden in the front and a larger fenced yard in the back.