Chapter 286 The dangers of "Zolaism"

When one hears "naturalism", one can't help but think of "Zolaism", and can't help but think of Zola's prejudice of "only seeing animal nature in the world"; thus, one can't help but hate naturalism. I ask them to stop being disgusted, I ask them to think about it calmly: Several critics have nicknamed naturalism "Zolaism" and called the naturalistic works of Zola "Naturalism". ", but called the naturalistic works of writers from other countries "realism".In order to distinguish each other's special features and prejudices, there are naturally some reasons for such a division; It's not until one person is alone.Therefore, if we want to classify many writers, it seems more appropriate to use their common spirit as the standard and ignore small differences.

From this point of view, Flaubert, Zola and others in France, Hauptmann in Germany, Chamasas in Spain, Serravan in Italy, Chekhov in Russia, Wordsworth in England, and After all, Dreiser and others can still be pulled together.Inviting them to live together in the hall of "naturalism"—or call it realism, but there can only be one, not two at the same time—I think they may not be happy. The true spirit of naturalism is scientific description.Write whatever you see, don't want to put a cover on ugly things, this is their common spirit.I think this point is not only boring, but also has lasting value; no matter how many new things will be said in the art world in the future, this point should be respected.Although "the doctrine of the future is endless", although "there are many bright places and roads to the bright", but this true spirit is at least the ABC of literary scholars, and a pair of legs for those who travel far.

If we say that naturalism is worthy of attention, we certainly mean that the scientific description method of naturalism is worth noting at all; as to what Zola's prejudices are, it has nothing to do with it! (If we want to praise Zola's outlook on life and introduce his novels with great fanfare, that's a different matter.) Zola's "only sees animal nature in the world" His prejudice seems to be the result of his special environment. If our fundamental concepts are different, even if we try to "imitate" by force, we may not be able to see animal nature everywhere like him.