[1] Hanan was born in Morrinsville, New Zealand and raised on a farm in the Waikato where his father retired from a career in dentistry.
[1] In the 1999 Queen's Birthday Honours, Hanan was appointed an Officer of the New Zealand Order of Merit, for services to Chinese literature and languages.
He chose the title of " Records of the Grand Historian (Shiji)" in the beginning, wanted to study this historical masterpiece from the literary viewpoint.
He chose Jin Ping Mei for his doctoral dissertation, and finally formed three series of papers which were published.
Hanan also made a detailed outline of the relationship between the original and the complement of the book by examining the meaning of the text.
However, in the monograph "Chinese fiction of the Nineteenth and early twenties centuries", Hanan proved this view misguided by presenting eleven detailed critical essays.
He was interested in examining writings in this period from an integrated approach of combining Chinese classical literary tradition as well as the western narratological techniques.
[citation needed] A state-of-the-field article written by Robert Hegel, of Washington University in St. Louis in 1994 grouped Hanan with scholars who combine Eastern and Western critical approaches, both close reading of texts typical of Western schools and intense scrutiny of Chinese pingdian, or commentator/ editors.
Studies in Dating, Authorship, and Composition (1973) was a "pioneering effort to utilize stylistic analysis to group huaben stories of Yuan and Ming periods that exhibit similar characteristics."
Hanan accommodated evidence from more conventional analysis, the reviewer continued, with the result that "his classification scheme is extremely useful in general despite the reservations some have concerning specific details.
"[4] David Tod Roy, University of Chicago, wrote of Hanan's "amazing erudition and fecundity ... one of those rare scholars of whom it may be said that his work has permanently altered the landscape of the field.
"[5] Robert Hegel reviewed Hanan's collection of essays, Chinese Fiction of the Nineteenth and Early Twentieth Centuries, in the sinologolical journal T'oung Pao, and said "Any scholarly writing by Patrick Hanan ... is to be welcomed; regardless of topic, it is sure to be worth our careful consideration.
This essay collection marks yet another direction taken in his four-decade long career of distinguished publications, and it is as important as his previous writings.
His translation of Li Yu's The Carnal Prayer Mat (1990), a reviewer wrote, "has caught the author's sardonic tone, the tongue-in-cheek apology for outlandish ideas and practices, and the uproarious or deadpan humor of both speeches and narration.
"[8] His last translation published before his death was Mirage (2016), an anonymous novel about the lives of Guangdong merchants who traded with the West.
The following six chapters are specific case study with detailed analysis of the writing of novelist during the late Ming and Qing era, such as Feng Menglong, Langxian, Ling Mengchu, Li Yu, and Aina.
Both of these two novels could be traced to the origin of a tragic ancient Chinese myth, that the daughter of the Fiery Emperor takes the rebirth as a bird after drowns in the Eastern Sea.
Readers should be impressed by its wide selection of topics, the span of time, and definitely the honor of both authors and editors/coeditors, such as Judith T. Zeitlin, Lydia H. Liu, Wu Hong, Shang Wei and Sophie Volpp.
This is the collection of translation of seven outstanding late Ming vernacular stories––"Shengxian", "The Oil Seller" "Marriage Destinies Rearranged", "The Rainbow Slippers", "Wu Yan", "The Reckless Scholar", and "The Lovers’ Tomb".
Also, Hanan discusses the technique of simulated context of late Ming story-writers in addressing their readers and rise a sense of sympathy.