Focusing on literary tradition and innovation, this paper examines Lu Xun＇s poetics as represented in his early treatise On the Power of Mara Poetry （Moluo shi li shuo）. As a leading writer and thinker deeply engag...Focusing on literary tradition and innovation, this paper examines Lu Xun＇s poetics as represented in his early treatise On the Power of Mara Poetry （Moluo shi li shuo）. As a leading writer and thinker deeply engaged in the dramatic social and cultural transformations taking place in early twentieth- century China, Lu Xun was very concerned about how to build up the New Man and new society via new literature. Advocating Maratic poets who are full of the spirit of revolt and nonconformity, Lu Xun endeavored to disturb and reinvigorate Chinese minds by bringing in foreign dynamics and energies based upon modem individualism and humanism. At the same time, Lu Xun insisted that, while moving toward a bright future, people should constantly consider China＇s prosperous past. For Lu Xun, tradition was still of great relevance in creating and nurturing new poetry, new men, and a new society. To simply lump Lu Xun together with pure anti-traditionalists is problematic. Lu Xun is commonly seen as an iconoclastic pioneer in modem China; however, I argue that Lu Xun demonstrated a dialectical reflection on the relationship between tradition and modernity. Actually, Lu Xun envisioned a process by which, galvanized by imported Maratic spirit, selected cultural legacies would undergo modem reconfiguration and revitalization.展开更多
This paper aims to contribute to the ongoing debate about the ＂socialist New Man＂ in modem Chinese literature. Focusing on the ideas of humanity, individuality and the people, it attempts to show the prehistory of t...This paper aims to contribute to the ongoing debate about the ＂socialist New Man＂ in modem Chinese literature. Focusing on the ideas of humanity, individuality and the people, it attempts to show the prehistory of the ＂New Man,＂ i.e., the emergence of the concept-figure of ＂the people＂ out of the discourse of human!ty. The making of a new historical subjectivity of ＂the people＂ was part and parcel of the singular historical experience of the Chinese Revolution and the precondition for its social experiments. Yet this issue receives insufficient critical attention. This paper gives an outline of this idea＇s genealogy, by concentrating on Guo Moruo＇s literary-intellectual trajectory. It will show how the enlightenment project and romantic historical imagination paved the way for the concept of the people, and how the new subjectivity of the people prepared for the ideal of the new man.展开更多
This article examines Liu Qing＇s 1959 novel The Builders, an epical work on the Agricultural Cooperation Movement, from the perspective of configuration of the Socialist New Man. Illuminated by the works of the May F...This article examines Liu Qing＇s 1959 novel The Builders, an epical work on the Agricultural Cooperation Movement, from the perspective of configuration of the Socialist New Man. Illuminated by the works of the May Fourth generation, especially Lu Xun, the author argues that the figure of the Socialist New Man usually differentiates itself into two literary prototypes--meditator and doer. Liu Qing attempts to maintain a productive and dialectic tension between meditations and deeds, instead of mere discrepancy or incompatibility. The article demonstrates that in literature, while the meditator can be depicted thoroughly through psychological dynamics and unconscious dreams, it is more problematic to represent the doer. Such a formal and philosophical problem is central to literature, as well as corresponds to the socio-historical paradox of the 1950s China.展开更多
文摘Focusing on literary tradition and innovation, this paper examines Lu Xun＇s poetics as represented in his early treatise On the Power of Mara Poetry （Moluo shi li shuo）. As a leading writer and thinker deeply engaged in the dramatic social and cultural transformations taking place in early twentieth- century China, Lu Xun was very concerned about how to build up the New Man and new society via new literature. Advocating Maratic poets who are full of the spirit of revolt and nonconformity, Lu Xun endeavored to disturb and reinvigorate Chinese minds by bringing in foreign dynamics and energies based upon modem individualism and humanism. At the same time, Lu Xun insisted that, while moving toward a bright future, people should constantly consider China＇s prosperous past. For Lu Xun, tradition was still of great relevance in creating and nurturing new poetry, new men, and a new society. To simply lump Lu Xun together with pure anti-traditionalists is problematic. Lu Xun is commonly seen as an iconoclastic pioneer in modem China; however, I argue that Lu Xun demonstrated a dialectical reflection on the relationship between tradition and modernity. Actually, Lu Xun envisioned a process by which, galvanized by imported Maratic spirit, selected cultural legacies would undergo modem reconfiguration and revitalization.
文摘This paper aims to contribute to the ongoing debate about the ＂socialist New Man＂ in modem Chinese literature. Focusing on the ideas of humanity, individuality and the people, it attempts to show the prehistory of the ＂New Man,＂ i.e., the emergence of the concept-figure of ＂the people＂ out of the discourse of human!ty. The making of a new historical subjectivity of ＂the people＂ was part and parcel of the singular historical experience of the Chinese Revolution and the precondition for its social experiments. Yet this issue receives insufficient critical attention. This paper gives an outline of this idea＇s genealogy, by concentrating on Guo Moruo＇s literary-intellectual trajectory. It will show how the enlightenment project and romantic historical imagination paved the way for the concept of the people, and how the new subjectivity of the people prepared for the ideal of the new man.
文摘This article examines Liu Qing＇s 1959 novel The Builders, an epical work on the Agricultural Cooperation Movement, from the perspective of configuration of the Socialist New Man. Illuminated by the works of the May Fourth generation, especially Lu Xun, the author argues that the figure of the Socialist New Man usually differentiates itself into two literary prototypes--meditator and doer. Liu Qing attempts to maintain a productive and dialectic tension between meditations and deeds, instead of mere discrepancy or incompatibility. The article demonstrates that in literature, while the meditator can be depicted thoroughly through psychological dynamics and unconscious dreams, it is more problematic to represent the doer. Such a formal and philosophical problem is central to literature, as well as corresponds to the socio-historical paradox of the 1950s China.
