Chapter 78 Afterword Say a few words for novel technology

Since about seven or eight years ago, Chinese novels have been dominated by a "new technology", that is, "strong narrative".The characteristic of this technical method is that everything is completed in the recounting, the recounted scenes, the recounted dialogues, and even the recounted psychological activities, all of which are shrouded in the halo of a foreign word—narrative. This superficial technological innovation is actually a retrogression, and it is a manifestation of the author's technical means. The development of novel technology did not happen overnight. The development of European novel technology was after the successful combination of the two narrative technologies of epic and drama. It was not until the 19th century that the peak of traditional novel technology was formed. Note that this is based on Western languages. peak.At that time, no matter in terms of narration, description, characters, dramatic scenes, psychological description and novel structure, very mature technical techniques had been formed. These regular and operable techniques played an important role in every writer's work. status.Without technology, there would be no novel in the modern sense.

The rise of modernist novels in the early twentieth century was based on philosophy and developed with the breakthrough of new novel technology.Their success is a reliable model for our later generations to develop novel techniques. However, we must clearly realize that these great writers have strengthened one or several special skills on the basis of mastering traditional novel techniques. In order to serve their literary ideals, whether we read Woolf's works or Robert Grillet's works, their descriptions and their occasional conversations will all show complete individual characteristics under traditional technology (the personalization of the writer and the personalization of the characters), their selection and structural method of free association with rebellious spirit, also has a strong "implicit technique" of author manipulation, which is an interesting narrative.

I accuse the technical regression in Chinese novels today because the "strong narrative" novels that are popular are a manifestation of crude technology.Narrative is one of the most primitive narrative means in novel technology, and novels based on this means will inevitably show the proceduralization of event narration, symbolization of characters, weakening of the role of scenes, and the language characteristics of the main narrator. There are many defects such as replacement and sudden decrease in reading interest. In today's era, readers are willing to take the precious time to read our works, which is already a big face to us, and what they expect is a feast of satisfying various interests. Our task is how to let readers Accept our hidden thoughts in gratifying contentment.If we are too lazy or clumsy to use all the technical means, we will tie the reader tightly to the pen at the beginning of the novel, let him happily follow us through the long journey of hundreds of thousands of words, they will Likely to be disgusted by the dozen or so pages, while keeping our names in mind so as not to waste time with the same author in the future.

Every novelist understands that narration is the most time-saving and labor-saving method, and it is also the easiest method to hide the author's technical and intellectual defects. There are not many ways to attract readers to complete a work with this single method. It is usually Fiction a frighteningly complicated story, or a personal analysis pretending to be modernism, but too complicated stories and side details will also bore readers, not to mention the boring psychoanalysis of the author's self.I'm really embarrassed to say that this is most likely the result of some authors rushing to the computer before they are ready to write novels, or even learn most of the technical techniques of fiction.The situation we are seeing now has to be worrying. The spread of fallacies will not only hurt a generation.

Of course, many Eastern European and African writers have won some major international literary awards in recent years, and some of their narrative-based works provide strong evidence for today's opportunistic creative methods, but we must Note that there are some very important differences here, one of which is the difference in the language system.In this narrative, Western languages ​​have their unique advantages, such as precise tenses, rhetoric with precise meanings, and nouns that can strictly distinguish categories, etc., which are not available or lacking in modern Chinese. Western writers use The narration in their language can still retain a certain degree of drama, and the interest of the description is still there, but the interest of the fate of the characters is strengthened, and the rapid development of the event process is analyzed in detail due to the tense.These are the difficulties in modern Chinese writing. We cannot use the weaknesses of our own language system to learn the strengths of other people's language systems. This is an extremely unwise method, just as unrealistic as a paralyzed patient insisting on jumping high.

Chinese writing has its own advantages. Our novel tradition is different from that of Europe. Although the techniques of novels have a lot in common with Spanish novelists, there are still considerable differences in the use of techniques.If today's Chinese-language novels want to achieve success in the world, the characteristics of the Chinese language itself and the special expression techniques derived from the Chinese language are our important capital. We can't just throw away our most precious things. Own technology exaggerates its own flaws.If that is the case, readers of our novels will be the first to rebel. No matter what kind of packaging we use, what kind of rhetoric and public opinion propaganda, when readers can’t find something that can bring him pleasure in the novel, they will leave. we go.Fiction readers are like bison on the North American prairie. Its huge herd makes it difficult to notice their decline, and once it is discovered that the population is rapidly disappearing, it is already irreparable.Quantity is the basis for the survival of the population of novel readers. Let each of us practitioners respect and love them, and don’t let them leave because of our poor writing skills. Otherwise, novelists will die first. The top animal in the food chain.