Abstract: On March 31, 2016, at the invitation from the Cultural Affairs Office of the French Embassy in China, Professor Qian Linsen had a dialogue with Arnault Vivian, the French writer, critic, and editor-in-chief of Charles, a journal of literary and political criticism, about a series of issues related to the late French scholar, René Étiemble (1909-2002), and China at the Center of French Culture in Beijing. On the early morning of the following day (April 1), they met again at Guangming Hotel, where they stayed, for a second round of pleasant discussion about the topic. Also, they reached an agreement on the following: Qian would sort out 12 questions based on their two conversations and then send them to Vivian for response and feedback. With the great help from Yang Zhen, Quan Zhigang, and Xu Yuting, the transcript of their dialogue was produced, revised, and finalized both in Chinese and French after several consultations. In this text of their dialogue, Qian and Vivian reviewed Étiemble's academic career based on his scholarly achievements, ideals, and perspectives. Also, taking his book L'Europe chinioise (Europe of China) as the starting point, they conducted an in-depth exchange of their views on a range of issues, such as the image of China, Eurocentrism, the concept of world culture, the methodology of comparative literature, and the Chinese literature's coordinate of Weltliteratur (world literature).

Key words: Étiemble, the image of China, Eurocentrism, the methodology of comparative literature, world literature