Chapter 18 Section 3 Reflections on "Pioneering Literature"

The trend of modernist literary thought has been the focus of academic attention since it landed in mainland China, and debates about it have continued. At first, it was a debate about whether China should use modernism. Modernist literary creation, we have discussed this point in the first section of this chapter.Since then, the debate about "modernism" or "pseudo-modernism" in the late 1980s has aroused great repercussions.The influence of modernist literary thoughts on the literary world in the 1980s is unquestionable. However, due to the obvious intertextual relationship between Chinese modernist literary works and Western modernist literary masters at that time, some writers even had a deep understanding of Western modernist literary works. The relatively direct imitation made the Chinese academic circles and critics doubt the local modernist literature. After thinking about it, they came to the conclusion that Chinese modernist literature is an imitation of the West and does not have independent value and value. Meaning, that is, the so-called modernism in China is "pseudo-modernism", and Chinese modernist literature is unreal, and the life it reflects is different from the life of ordinary people at that time, and has no metaphysical meaning.Representatives who hold this view include Liu Xiaobo, Li Jiefei, Ji Hongzhen, Wang Xiaoming, Yang Jie, etc.

Liu Xiaobo pointed out in 1986 that there is a separation of external forms and internal concepts in Chinese modernist literature, and that the content they want to express is fundamentally inconsistent with modernist artistic techniques, and that modernist literary works must improve the content to be expressed, and believes that At that time, the new aesthetic trend of thought in China had not yet finally found an art form that was completely suitable for the spirit of the times in contemporary China. (42) Ji Hongzhen also expressed a similar point of view. She believed that the modernist literature in the West had its specific social and cultural background, while China did not have the necessary conditions for the emergence of modernism, and also lacked the conditions for the survival and reproduction of modernism. In the soil of social culture and philosophy, avant-garde literature only accepted the influence of Western modernist literature at different levels, but did not create a real modernist text, and she even denied the possibility of such creation. (43)

Li Jiefei's point of view is more clear. He believes that "more and more 'pseudo-modernist' works are flooding the literary and artistic circles", (44) "in the exploration and experimentation of literature in the new era, the function of literary language is always single, that is, As a tool to convey a certain meaning above literature. In this way, the borrowing of modern literary and artistic techniques actually becomes a purely technical activity, without any meaning of life.”Taking "Variations Without A Theme" as an example, he argued that this work "is nothing but an imitation of the Chinese translation of Salinger's "The Catcher in the Rye". (45) In addition, Chen Chong, Chen Jin and others also put forward the theory of "transferring to the West", completely denying the possibility and authenticity of the existence of Chinese "modernist literature".As a result, a debate about the "pseudo-modernism" was launched in the literary world at that time.

In the debate, Huang Ziping, Zhang Ling and others stood on the opposite side of this argument. They saw that the concept of "pseudo-modernism" was imprecise in language logic and flawed in composition, and they had no doubts about the concept itself. questioned its correctness: "'Pseudo-modernism' is not a well-thought-out concept", "Behind the term 'pseudo-modernism' lies a deep-seated notion that there is an 'authentic' or 'orthodox' Modernist literature or other schools, even if they cannot be imported intact, can still be a clear reference for the success of the introduction. If you realize that modernist literature was produced in an era when the value standards of Eastern and Western cultures were changing, you will be conscious If we see the 'anti-normative' tendency of modernist literature, then we will feel that it may be futile to set up a priori norm of 'true modernism'". (46) In the face of Huang Ziping's dismissal of this concept, Li Jiefei wrote a special article to fight back against it. He said: "The concept can be dissolved, but the phenomenon still exists-until now I still insist on the concept of 'pseudo-modernism' as a phenomenon. That kind of reality. It is proved by the following two facts: (1) in the development of literature in the new period, there is indeed a compelling desire and speech to imitate the 'modernism'; (2) a large number of so-called Not only many of the 'new trendy works' have an indirect reference relationship with the concepts and techniques of the 'modern school', but there are even some cases of direct imitation of a certain 'modern school' work." (47) In this article, he also pointed out that criticizing some works is Part of the meaning of "pseudo-modernism" goes beyond the direct content of "modernism". The most important thing about modernism is not only specific works, artistic principles and experience, but also a spirit, a kind of artistic initiative that breaks through tradition, while " "Pseudo-modernism" goes against this spirit.This debate did not fundamentally solve the problem of the attribution of "modernist literature" in China. It only made the concept of "pseudo-modernism" silently recognized by academic circles and critics.The main reason is that the positions of the two parties in the debate are not incompatible. Their standpoints are from different angles. Li Jiefei and others focus on criticizing the imitation of Western "modernist" literature by Chinese "modernist" literature, while Huang Ziping, on the other hand, dispelled this proposition by taking advantage of the conceptual impreciseness of the other party's denial of this phenomenon with "false", and freed Chinese "modernist literature" from the "false" situation.

The debate around Chinese modernist literary thought has gone from whether China needs modernism to whether Chinese modernism is "pseudo-modernism". Chinese modernist literary thought has gone through a road of striving for existence rationality and existence value.How to evaluate Chinese modernist literary thoughts has become one of the unavoidable problems in contemporary literature research. In the 1990s, postmodernist literary thoughts entered the Chinese literary world. Therefore, the postmodern characteristics of Chinese modernist literary thoughts in the 1980s Research has once again become a hot topic in the literary world, and scholars represented by Wang Ning, Chen Xiaoming, and Wang Yichuan clearly affirmed the postmodernity of contemporary Chinese avant-garde novels.Wang Ning expressed six forms of postmodernism, and summarized the six characteristics of postmodernism in Chinese avant-garde novels: loss of self and counterculture, opposition to existing language conventions, binary opposition and its decomposition of meaning, A return to primitive and nostalgic orientations, blurring of the lines between elite and popular literature, mocking parodies and ironic depictions of violence. (48) Chen Xiaoming and Wang Yichuan are more focused on the different levels and characteristics of Chinese postmodernism. (49)

Since the beginning of the new century, re-evaluation of the trend of modernist literature has once again become a hot topic. The spiritual source, knowledge pedigree, and rebellion against the realist literary tradition of "modernist literature" have all become the objects of reinterpretation. (50) These re-evaluations Most of the articles on the modernist literary trend of thought focus on the phenomenon itself and the significance of this trend of thought in text form.Cheng Guangwei, through the analysis of the phenomenon of "modernist literature", proposed that the rebellion of "modernist literature" against "contemporary literature" constituted another assumption of "contemporary literature". (51)

From the cultural standpoint of the new century, what we must face and ponder is: what is the value and significance of the modernist literary trend of thought in China in the 1980s in the history of contemporary Chinese literature?It is precisely because people criticize it first and then suppress it and are confined in the vicious circle of whether this trend of thought is imitation or innovation, so its true value and significance in the history of literature appear to be confused and unclear.If we want to have an objective and long-term understanding of this trend of thought, that is, if we want to make a pertinent evaluation of its value and significance in the history of literature, we should re-evaluate the influence of the modernist literary trend of thought in China in the 1980s on contemporary China. The value and significance of literary history.Specifically, the value and significance of this trend of thought in the history of contemporary Chinese literature are as follows:

First, it completely changed the course of contemporary literature in which literature serves politics, and became the gravedigger and terminator of pseudo-realism literature in the history of literature from the 1950s to the mid-1980s. As we all know, since the 1950s, Chinese contemporary literature has followed the tenet of "literature serving politics" and opened up a Chinese-style realistic literary creation path.This kind of realist literature had a strong critical color at the time, and it also played a great role. However, when looking back at this literary path decades later, people can't help but find that this "serving politics" The literary concept of "Reality Reflection Theory" is a superficial literary view. Compared with the great tradition of world realism in the nineteenth century, this Chinese-style realism literature belongs to pseudo-realism literature.The reason why it is called pseudo-realism literature is also because it has become a political tool on the one hand, and on the other hand, the reality it reflects is extremely superficial and does not touch the reality of historical truth and human nature.However, this kind of realist literature still had an extremely strong market in the early 1980s, and still occupied the mainstream discourse power.Modernist literary thought is a reaction against this mainstream discourse, and a reaction against this pseudo-realism. Although this "reaction" still manifests as pseudo-realism and pseudo-modernism in the later period, it has a profound understanding of our understanding. The literature and literary views from the 1980s to the early 1980s are of great significance.

An important manifestation of realism is the grand narrative. Pioneer novels, one of the representatives of modernist literary thoughts, reject grand narratives; realism often uses the authenticity of history to reveal the authenticity of a period of history, but pioneer novels emphasize the fiction of history. realism wants to create typical characters, but avant-garde novels deconstruct the characters, and even have no specific characters; realism wants to criticize reality, and avant-garde novels are ambiguous; "Tao"; realism emphasizes meaning, while avant-garde novels emphasize text, or even pure language, and so on.In short, the avant-garde novels constitute a strong reflection of Chinese-style realist literature since the 1950s.

Such a feature of rewriting the history of literature makes people re-understand the various limitations of contemporary Chinese realism literature, and has launched a series of discussions.The important function of the modernist literary trend of thought is that it sharply cleared the concept of "literature serving politics" from the minds of writers and made literature self-conscious.The later "realism" and "new realism" novels were produced against the background of this change, although they still belong to the category of pseudo-realism.And the diversified development of the entire literature should also be attributed to the "revolution" of the avant-garde novel.

Second, Chinese literature began to integrate into world literature and became a branch of the mainstream of world literature. No matter how much we abuse and criticize the modernist literary trend of thought and even the postmodernist literary trend of thought that appeared in the later period is an imitation and worship of Western modernism, and no matter whether we accept this reality or not, in fact, since the mid-1980s, China Novelists do not just imitate and borrow from Western modernist literature, but the whole world literature.For example, magic realism literature is not Western literature, but Latin American literature. If we examine the entire world literature, we will find that Western literature has become a major trend impacting the entire world literature, and China is not immune.On the contrary, China needs the cleansing of the whole world literature, and in this cleansing, it will inevitably have the impact and integration with the powerful culture, that is, Western literature.At the same time, Western literature is also absorbing nutrients from world literature. In this absorption, Chinese literature will naturally contribute its own unique factors to world literature.This kind of absorption and dedication is actually fusion. Ma Yuan is called "China's Borges", Can Xue's fascination with Kafka, Yu Hua and Can Xue's consistency in essence, Liu Suola and Joseph?Heller's black humor, Xu Xing's and Salinger's rebellion, Sun Ganlu's and Derrida's deconstruction, all these seem to be intentional imitations, losing the independence of Chinese writers and the characteristics of Chinese culture. From one perspective, it is a process for Chinese writers to learn from world literature under a special background. In the history of contemporary literature dominated by socialist realism with the purpose of "reflecting reality" from the 1950s to the 1980s, almost all Chinese writers regard Lu Xun, Mao Dun, Ba Jin, Lao She, and Cao Yu as their spiritual idols , In addition, it can be extended to Tolstoy, Gorky and other Russian and Soviet writers at most. In addition, Chinese writers have nothing to rely on.Literature other than socialism and realism has been obscured, and the great tradition of Chinese classical literature and the mainstream of world literature have no chance with Chinese literature.The tradition of Chinese literature has been confined to a small tradition since the May Fourth Movement.The modernist literary trend of thought broke through this limitation, and it opened up a new scene of learning from the whole world literature.To some extent, it continues and develops the tradition of Chinese literature learning from Western and modernist literature in the whole world since modern times. The result of learning from world literature is that literature is diverse and has multiple possibilities. At the same time, it also tells us that there is a distance between Chinese literature and world literature.This distance is not only the distance caused by the difference between Chinese culture and Western culture, but also the distance in expression, that is, the distance between the monotony of Chinese literature and the richness of world literature.For a period of time, there was a great discussion in the literary world on "how Chinese literature goes to the world", which was triggered by the avant-garde novels.This kind of debate is actually beneficial to creation. It makes many writers start to become self-conscious in their creation. At the same time, it also makes many writers turn their eyes to the world.In recent years, Mo Yan, Yu Hua, and Su Tong have become more and more influential abroad, and another very eye-catching event is that Gao Xingjian, a French-Chinese writer who started out with pioneering creations (in fact, modernist creations), won the Nobel Prize for Literature Although its nationality is not Chinese, the culture it created and inherited is a Chinese culture under the perspective of world culture. Of course, among the contemporary Chinese writers and poets who are actively "seeking innovation" and "seeking differences", there are also many "Western modernist" writers, and this trend has greatly inhibited Chinese writers from pursuing the greatness of China for thousands of years. An interest in the study of literary traditions.This kind of criticism has become stronger and stronger since the mid-to-late 1990s. Third, the trend of modernist literature thought in the 1980s experienced a period of artistic exploration of "doing nothing", which opened up a variety of development spaces for new literature. The representative writers of the modernist literary trend of thought’s exploration of text, language and other aspects have led to a further and further distance between them and readers, but they seem to have become obsessed with this kind of utilitarian exploration. They stubbornly believe that this is the real In art, they even declare that their efforts are for future generations. Just like Kafka, people's understanding of them can only be changed after their death.Therefore, some commentators believe that the modernist literary trend of thought is the real artistic period in the new era of literature, the era of literary self-consciousness. This exploration of "inaction" in art and the comments accompanying this literary trend of thought are also worth mentioning.The emergence of the modernist literary trend of thought has attracted the attention of the academic circles. Its exploration of texts and its rebellion against previous literary conventions have been recognized by the academic circles, but the debates arising from it have always found no answers.These debates have not fundamentally resolved the issue of the avant-garde novel's attribution.Aside from the appearance of these debates, it can be seen that no matter whether the participants in each debate are affirmative of avant-garde novels, no matter what position they stand on, they are all concerned with a deep-seated issue, that is, the development trend of Chinese contemporary literature.The most representative one is Cheng Guangwei's analysis of "Modernist Literature", which proposed that "Modernist Literature" rebelled against "Contemporary Literature" and constituted another assumption of "Contemporary Literature". (52) Looking at avant-garde novels from this perspective, one will find its significance in the history of literary development.For avant-garde novels, imitation or not is not important, what is important is that it completely rebelled against the previous literary stereotypes and concepts through a form of imitation, and opened up a great new development for the subsequent development of contemporary literature. possibility space. Fourth, the modernist literary trend in the 1980s has left many "Goldbach conjectures" for the history of contemporary literature, and these conjectures have become important propositions that all writers and critics face and think about. It is self-evident that the impact of the modernist literary trend on the traditional socialist realist literary trend and its contribution to contemporary literature. guess". Such as the relationship between literature and readers.The avant-garde writers believed that literature need not serve the contemporary people, but literature should exist for the history of literature.There are also avant-garde writers who believe that literature exists for the writer himself, and there is no need to worry about the likes and dislikes of readers.There are even avant-garde writers who criticize the poor reading level of current readers, and believe that writers have the responsibility to guide readers to read well, and so on.In short, the "reception aesthetics" of literature is pointedly raised. Such as the language problem of novels.Does the language of novels have meaning?Is the novel the art of language, or is language just a tool to express the content of the novel? Such as the treatment of the traditional "text to convey the way" problem.Many writers representing the modernist literary trend of thought do not advocate "Writing to Convey Tao", but only emphasize the text. However, as long as it is a novel, it will have a meaning, it is conveying meaning, and it has a spiritual direction. Even if it is nothingness, it is also a kind of Containing Tao, then, is there really literature that does not contain Tao? For example, the question of whether the novel needs to tell a story, whether or not the novel needs characters.These problems that should not be novels have become problems for avant-garde novelists.But if you don’t tell a story or write characters, how can you write a novel?The final fate of pioneer novels seems to prove from the negative side that novels still need certain stories and characters. Although the trend of modernist literature thought in the 1980s was fleeting like a flash in the pan, their spirit did not seem to be cut off because of it. On the contrary, a series of explorations they carried out have become the "common sense" of today's literature, and still There are some writers who are still exploring.Does it show that the series of propositions they put forward have their rationality? Fifth, there is a subtle inheritance relationship between contemporary literature and traditional Chinese literature, and people begin to attach importance to tradition. Today, when we re-evaluate the significance of modernist literary thought in the 1980s, we must not forget that it has another important significance, that is, a very small number of writers very rarely cast their eyes on tradition.Gao Xingjian, a French legal person writer who started as an avant-garde, attached great importance to traditional Chinese culture in his later works. He frankly admitted the influence of Chinese Taoism and other classics on him.More writers are learning the artistic conception and language in traditional literature, and some writers are looking for new meaning and value directly from tradition.For example, in Su Tong's recent publication, he wants to reinterpret the ancient Chinese myth of Meng Jiangnu crying on the Great Wall. These rare phenomena show that Chinese writers have begun to learn from the great Chinese tradition. To re-evaluate the trend of modernist literature in the 1980s in the new century, we should examine it in the context of the entire history of contemporary literature and even contemporary world literature, and should affirm it more from a positive perspective, instead of remaining as it was in the past Take it with a sarcasm or even a good attitude.Only when its positive aspects are affirmed, can contemporary literature really draw lessons from it.