This is a powerful account of how the ruin and resurrection of Zhuangzi in modern China's literary history correspond to the rise and fall of modern Chinese individuality. By examining the twentieth century reinterpretation and appropriation of Zhuangzi, the author explores modern Chinese writers' complicated relationship with "tradition." [Liu] presents a rigorous and insightful investigation of a certain Daoist philosophical heritage that has played no small part in modern Chinese intellectual and literary life...The result is a study that offers an intriguing view of not only the various treatments of Zhuangzi over the past century, but also of the ways in which ideas from Zhuangzi have become relevant for different writers at different times ... Liu's study is a pleasure to read, and her methodology allows for a series of succinct and effective investigations that invite a broad range of historical, literary, and intellectual insights ... the work is undoubtedly a significant contribution to our understanding of a number of prominent literary and intellectual figures in terms of their encounters with Zhuangzi, and will greatly enhance our understanding of Zhuangzi in the modern world.