都市化分别在十五到十六世紀的中國及十七到十八世紀的英國風行逾百年，但兩國小說的濫觴恰巧符合這樣的都市化。我将探究兩部麥可雷藍(McLellan)所謂的「型成」時期的兩個中英小說,費爾定(Fielding)的「强那生」(Jonathan Wild)寫於十八世紀的英國，而施耐庵(Shih Nai-an)的「水滸傅」巴克(Buck)英譯爲「四海皆兄弟」(All Men Are Brothers)寫成於十六世紀中葉的中國。兩部小說都處理一幫强匪，而其故事架構淵源於兩個國家的曆史及傅奇。這群强匪都有位深具领袖氣質的领導者－在「水滸傅」中的宋江，「强那生」中的強那生。兩部小說中層出不窮的盗匪間的背信有如對腐化政治社會的嘲諷。雖然在「强那生」中的領導者從未想取得官職，「水滸傅」而中的領袖则積極謀求官職或者至少是獲得官方的合法認可。
Urbanization began to flourish over a hundred years apart in China and England, beginning in the l5th-l6th centuries in China and the 17th-18th centuries in England, but the origin of the novel in both countries coincided with this urbanization. I am comparing two books written in what McLellan (1981) has called the "formative" period of both the Chinese and English novel during this period, Fielding's "Jonathan Wild" written in England in the 18th century and Shih Nai-an's "The Water Margin" ["All Men Are Brothers" in Pearl S. Buck's translation] completed in the middle of the 16th century in China. Both novels deal with a gang of bandits whose origins were firmly entrenched in both history and legend in both countries. The bandits were led in both cases by charismatic leaders, in the Chinese case by Sung Chiang, in the English case by Jonathan Wild. Layers of irony in both novels reveal the perfidious workings of the bandits as parodies of corruption in civil and political society, although in the English case the leader never aspired to political office per se while in the Chinese case the Chinese leader aspired to it or at least to legitimatization by official society.
