Editor's Note
"Old-fashioned and stubborn" Lu Xun watchman
——Foreword to Wang Dehou's "Lu Xun's Research Notes"
Text | Qian Liqun
For many years, I have always had a plan to conduct a serious academic discussion on lu xun's research on my brother, and I also want to compile and select his research papers to summarize history. But my idea has been repeatedly rejected by my brother-in-law: he thinks that his research is very limited, and he has only done what he wants to do and should do, and it is not worth summarizing and studying. After that, it was my brother, and I had no choice but to face his stubbornness. But this year there was a sudden opportunity. The first is the beginning of next year (2022), which is worthy of the "rice shou" of the stepbrother, which has a sufficient reason to compile a book for him as a memorial. More importantly, this year (2021) is the 140th anniversary of the birth of Lu Xun (1881-1936), so there are constantly publishing houses that find us "old guys" to assemble manuscripts, which provides a historical opportunity for the republishment of our research papers. I was asked to compile two books, "Qian Liqun Talks About Lu Xun" and "Lu Xun Contemporary Reader". The "Complete Compilation of Lu Xun's Essays" and "Complete Compilation of Lu Xun's Miscellaneous Essays", which were co-edited with me that year, were also included in the plan for republishment. In this way, under the repeated suggestions of Zhao Yuan and zhao yuan, brother Dehou finally relaxed; thus, there was the compilation and publication of this Qian Liqun commentary book of Wang Dehou's "Lu Xun Research Notes".
Left: Wang Dehou's "Research", Tianjin People's Publishing House, 1982
Picture right: Wang Dehou's "Lu Xun's Heart Solution", Zhejiang Literature and Art Publishing House, 1996 edition
Just as I was preparing to write this "Preface," the Northwest Yue Literature and Art Publishing House sent the "Wang Furen Academic Anthology" edited and selected by Li Yihe Gong Li, the most important of which was naturally Fu Ren's "On Lu Xun" (part 1 and 2): In this way, the treatises of The Queen, Fu Ren and I, three old friends who are engaged in Lu Xun research, can actually reappear in front of the reader at the same time, which really has a different meaning. In particular, I opened the book and read a heartfelt remark by Fu Ren in the "Afterword to the First Edition": "The reason why I" was able to go to the road of Lu Xun's research, in addition to the guidance of my mentor Mr. Li Helin, mainly relied on "My doctoral supervisor Mr. Yang Zhansheng", "Mr. Fan Jun of the Institute of Literature", "Mr. Wang Xin of the Editorial Department of literary review", and "Mr. Wang Dehou" of the Lu Xun Museum. Reading this, my heart was moved: it evoked the same historical memory. Wasn't it precisely under the guidance of Mr. Wang Yao and the influence of Mr. Li Helin (I wrote the article "Scholars Who Hold High the Banner of 'Lu Xun'May Fourth'--Mr. Li Helin'" and Yan Jiayan, Fan Jun, Wang Xinhe's support and inspiration to enter the door of Lu Xun's research community? Here, in fact, there is a historic encounter between three generations of Lu Xun researchers: the older generation of Lu Xun researchers in the 1930s and 1940s represented by Li Helin and Wang Yao; the middle-aged generation of Lu Xun researchers in the 1950s and 1960s, represented by Fan Jun, Yan Jiayan, and Yang Zhansheng; and senior editors like Wang Xin; and Wang Furen and the relatively young generation of Lu Xun researchers of the 1980s like Wang Furen and me. As far as the time of entering the Lu Xun research community is concerned, Dehou and Furen and I both belong to the reform and opening up generation of researchers, but his age, seniority, and cultivation belong to the middle-aged generation of Fan Jun and Yan Jiayan; I have said many times, "Among the contemporary Lu Xun researchers, the most influential thing for me is to get the queen." His proposition that 'the idea of Chinese and the transformation of Chinese society is the core of Lu Xun's thought', and his thinking on 'Left-wing Lu Xun' has become an important starting point for my Lu Xun research," and we "influence and echo each other." The middle-aged generation of "Fan Jun, Wang Xin, Yang Zhansheng, Wang Dehou" specifically mentioned by Furen to "have a lifelong impact" on Furen (including me) is not only an academic path, but also a spiritual influence on the path of life. After Wang Xin's departure this year, I wrote an article about the "pure academic spirit" that Lu Xun's research circles and modern literary research circles once had: "There was no worldly atmosphere that paid attention to personnel relations, there was no selfishness, there was no consideration for personal academic status and interests, and I was bent on pursuing academic independence, freedom, innovation, and equality," and at the same time, "I was extremely strict with myself, and I reached a harsh level." In my mind, the representatives who have such "academic publicity and righteousness" are Fan Jun, Wang Xin, Yang Zhansheng and the four of them. Now, Yang Zhansheng, Fan Jun, and Wang Xin have all passed away one after another, and later withdrew from academia: "There will be no more such 'pure people'."
Qian Liqun and Wang Dehou edited The Complete Compilation of Lu Xun's Essays, Zhejiang Literature and Art Publishing House, 1991
Therefore, when I compiled and commented on the "Lu Xun Research Notes" after the selection and evaluation, the most touching thing was that I still got "this person". Over the years, I have been doing the study of "scholars" in the field of modern literature research and Lu Xun research; the Li Helin, Wang Yao, Fan Jun, Wang Xin, and Wang Furen mentioned here have written special articles, and now that I have written them, I have no regrets. In my opinion, the discussion and summary of "academic research" ultimately comes down to "scholars".
Fu Ren once said, "Those of us who are engaged in Lu Xun research" are inevitably a bit "old-fashioned and stubborn" ("Me and Lu Xun Research"). In my mind, Dehou is such a typical representative. "Obsolete and stubborn" has penetrated into his research on Lu Xun and has become a distinctive feature: he "identified" the four characteristics of Lu Xun, thus determining his four major choices, and "old-fashioned" to the point of inflexible and "stubborn" to the end.
Wang Furen, "My Lu Xun Research", published in Lu Xun Research Monthly, No. 7, 2000
First, he determined that Lu Xun was an independent thinker with his own unique ideological system of "taking the establishment of people as the starting point, destination and center"; Lu Xun was a rare original thinker in modern and contemporary China. At present, the problem of Chinese thought and academia is not the "deification" of Lu Xun, but the originality and foresight of Lu Xun's thought, and its role and impact on the reality and future of China and the world are far from underestimated; and a "China that has nurtured Lu Xun" will sooner or later "recognize Lu Xun more and more, believe in Lu Xun, and accept Lu Xun." This determined the "choice of The Queen of Wang": "Take Lu Xun Thought as the basic belief, and take the study and dissemination of Lu Xun Thought as its historical mission", and if there is an "afterlife", it is also necessary to study and disseminate Lu Xun Thought.
Second, he determined that as a thinker and writer who "saw through the soul of the masses", Lu Xun's own soul and inner world were also extremely "complex, rich", extremely "individual", and had a certain "concealment" and "contradiction". This also determines that the study of Lu Xun cannot only stay in a simple summary of Lu Xun's external thoughts, but also explore Lu Xun's heart, his emotional world, psychological world, his unique personality, internal contradictions, and the most hidden aspects through Lu Xun's various texts (not only publicly published treatises, but also private correspondence and diaries), and conduct emotional and psychological communication and soul dialogue with Lu Xun: this is more fundamental for Lu Xun's research and academic research.
It is precisely out of the forerunner of Lu Xun's thoughts, the full realization of the richness, complexity, concealment, and contradiction of thought and heart, and also a sober understanding of the serious inadequacy of the knowledge preparation and cultivation of his own generation and his own generation, that he later positioned himself as "the person who told Lu Xun": "To truthfully and comprehensively sort out the original meaning of Lu Xun's original text as a pursuit", and chose his basic method of Lu Xun's research, that is, to "search and collect Lu Xun's views on a certain issue from Lu Xun's works; to understand Lu Xun's original meaning as much as possible." Pay attention to revealing its multi-faceted and multi-layered structures and systems". And "not to understand is not to understand, to doubt oneself; never to take the meaning of the chapter, to use excerpts to construct the so-called 'words of the family'". Therefore, he had a high degree of self-consciousness about the limitations of his research on Lu Xun, and repeatedly emphasized that he did not really and fully understand Lu Xun, but only realized in some aspects. He refused to over-publicize the so-called "academic achievements" and named the relevant treatise "Lu Xun's Research Notes", which is not a general modesty, but a very valuable academic sobriety.
Third, he believed that criticality and independence were Lu Xun's most basic spirits. Lu Xun insisted on the negation of all forms of civilization, the existing forms of real society, and himself, and ruthlessly criticized them. This determines that he is a unique existence in the ideological and cultural fields of China and the world, and it is another possibility: his irreplaceable meaning and value lie in this.
Picture left: Wang Dehou, "Lu Xun Taught Me", Fujian Education Publishing House, 2006 edition
Right: Wang Dehou's "Lu Xun and Confucius", People's Literature Publishing House, 2010 edition
Therefore, he chose to conduct independent research on Lu Xun with the critical spirit of Lu Xun. He repeatedly emphasized, and pursued the "special exercise" that Lu Xun researchers should have: "Not only superior, not Ashi, not affectionate, not swayed by popular fashion views." What he was most pleased about was that although he had succumbed to various external and internal pressures in the first half of his life, after entering the field of Lu Xun's research, he never became an "ideal slave" that Lu Xun deeply hated; although his academic achievements were limited, he had never been the same, always insisting on independent thinking, saying that his words were "not mediocre".
Fourth, he determined that Lu Xun was a "practical thinker who understood life with his unique ideas and engaged in improving it", and that Lu Xun chose essays as his main style in order to establish a closer connection with real life and the spiritual development of Chinese. Therefore, he demanded that his Lu Xun research should also "have a certain practical character, with the transformation of Chinese and society as the guide." He set himself the research goal of "talking about Lu Xun, then Lu Xun talking down, going down", and took the initiative to create "Lu Xun-style essays" as a specific practice method of "talking down and doing it down".
In the face of these four major determinations and choices of the latter, I have an indescribable sense of intimacy; it can also be said that this is the common or similar understanding and choice between me and the latter, and perhaps Furen. But later he had more characteristics: his identity as an essayist in the nineties was something that Fu Ren and I did not have; more importantly, my research gradually shifted to the study of the intellectual history and spiritual history of contemporary intellectuals, and Fu Ren also opened up a new field of "new Sinology", and after that, he always insisted on Lu Xun's research post without distraction. Although since the 1990s and the 21st century, some people have constantly avoided and turned away from Lu Xun, and even made it fashionable to criticize Lu Xun, they still unswervingly responded to all the denigration and attacks on Lu Xun with their new research. In this way, he became a rare "watchman" of Lu Xun in the "new era".
Wang Dehou, Qian Liqun's Selected Commentary on Lu Xun's Research Notes, The Commercial Press, 2021 edition
But he did not absolutize his choice. Just as Fu Ren said, "I like Lu Xun, I can't ask everyone else to like Lu Xun", knowing that my views on Lu Xun cannot be accepted by many people, but we must also safeguard our right to study and speak about Lu Xun, "We are all intellectuals who seek survival and development in China, we will not be the same, but we must have more understanding and sympathy between us" ("Lu Xun and Me Study"). In my habitual parlance, it's —
"I (we) exist, I (we) work hard, we hold each other again – that's enough."