These days, an article titled "A Study of the Phenomenon of "Text Regeneration" in the Creation of Wooden Hearts" has aroused the controversy of many literary enthusiasts. The author of this article, Lu Hongbei, who graduated from Nanjing University, the article itself is her master's thesis published in 2014, up to tens of thousands of words, the article spent a lot of time to compare the "regenerated text" and "original text" of Muxin, and found that the passage of Muxin's article is similar to the original text.
Suddenly, it caused a hot discussion on the Internet, and even some people said: Isn't this just plagiarism?
In fact, since 2006, Mu Xin's major works have been successively introduced and published in the mainland, and while they have won the love of many readers, they have also been questioned a lot. Some literary lovers have pushed Mu Xin to the "altar" and regarded "Literary Memoirs" as one of the most important literary primer books; many people have considered Mu Xin's literary achievements with a skeptical eye, trying to find the position of Mu Xin in the Chinese literary world, but found that Mu Xin had nowhere to stay.
The controversy over Mu Xin has actually always been there, only this time it has been placed in a more prominent position.
In the list of Douban books I have marked, Mu Xin's "Su Lu Zhi Zhi" has always been five stars. Frankly speaking, reading it, or because of the recommendation of a friend in my sophomore year of high school, after reading "Literary Memoirs" in one breath, I bought several of his other works with a "unaware" mentality. I really couldn't understand it, at least at that time, I couldn't understand it, and I never read it seriously later. Playing five stars, it is more likely that there was not enough self-confidence to face their weak and barren appreciation level at that time, and did not dare to be unsociable.
I am not writing this article in the hope of completely denying my former self, nor is it that Mu Xin's readers are followers. For me, at least, reading the obscure words and phrases in his articles still inspired me to yearn for the beauty of language and textual skills. The looming suke or prejudice in Literary Memoirs also prompted me to try to get closer to the works themselves, despite my preconceptions.
In fact, in the introduction part of "Literary Memoirs", the criticism of Mu Xin himself has been explained very clearly.
The literature lesson that Mu Xin gave to Chen Danqing and others was itself a private, informal lecture given by Mu Xin in a private, informal form, using Zheng Zhenduo's "Outline of Literature" as a framework. This is also the case, including "Wooden Heart on Wooden Heart" after "Literary Memoirs", which has been clearly stated in the preface that Mu Xin was reluctant to make these works public before. But his student Chen Danqing believed that this was a gift that Mu Xin brought to readers around the world, so he published many works of Mu Xin.
That is to say, Mu Xin himself is actually more wronged, in the face of speculation and criticism from all sides, he is actually unaware, he is just paying for the promotion and marketing of the publisher.
Imagine if these works, which have been edited into volumes and published in the world, are just manuscripts that Mu Xin himself entertains himself and does not intend to publish, then how can you accuse Mu Xin of "suspected plagiarism" against his "semi-finished product"?
Taking a step back, if we really look at these articles and poems, and look at the works that have been done and are waiting to be published, are they really plagiarized, as people say?
Readers familiar with Mu Xin should know about his two collections of poems: the Book of Poetry and the Apocrypha of Solomon. The poems in these two works are basically intertextual rewrites, active texts, and not "pure originality" of Mu Xin. It is well known that plagiarism is feared of being known, but in these two collections of poems, the name of the collection of poems is already clearly indicated to the reader.
Mu Xin is very worthy of his own readers, and the writing is extremely clean and concise, and many meanings are not explained in the text. In "The Past of SuLu", he wrote: The lowest articles are written for the public, the middle articles are written for themselves, and the superior articles are written for God.
There was no evaluation of his literary concepts, but Mu Xin's vast reading, coupled with his interest in reading and writing, doomed his manuscript to be used as a literary work or as a word game for him. But no matter how you look at it, there is a predestined acceptance threshold.
Many people's examination of Mu Xin's works only stays at the rhetorical level, but ignores Mu Xin's stylistic consciousness. Therefore, when reading some of Mu Xin's works, it may be regarded as Mu Xin's interpretation and condensation of some classic works according to his own tastes, as if he walked back and forth in the classics without hindrance, and obtained an artistic conception beyond the source text.
It is precisely because of such works, such readings, that are difficult to classify, and may be the root cause of The obstacle to Mu Xin's entry into the mainstream framework of Chinese literature. But it doesn't stop people who like him from staying enthusiastic, so the controversy surrounding him has always existed. But if his text is therefore classified as "plagiarized", I am afraid it would be biased.
After graduating from college, I went to an animation company in Hangzhou to interview for a screenwriting position, and at the same time as submitting my resume, I submitted a copy of my own "literary work" - a short story adapted from Gan Bao's "Search for God".
After the interviewer read the novel I handed him, he was half surprised, half skeptical, and then threw out a sentence: "Is there no original work of yours?" ”
Me: "This is my original." ”
Interviewer: "But you just said that this is a short story based on "Search for God". ”
Me: "You mean that Lu Xun's "New Edition of Stories" does not belong to his original?" Adapting and creating novels based on some ancient myths, legends, and anecdotes is itself the source of material for many creators, and if this is not called originality, then many works will be overturned. ”
At the end of this article, I suddenly remembered this scene. I knew I might not have convinced the interviewer that it was indeed my original work. But it does not matter, the misunderstanding of literary concepts is difficult to avoid in itself, but sometimes when the creator appears as an authority, he can offset a lot of contradictory discussions.
In the early years, when Mu Xin appeared as an "authority" in the minds of literary and artistic youth, it did not attract much debate in this regard. Nowadays, when questions and criticisms come pouring in, it may help the reader to detach from the mix of views and take a calm perspective, no longer looking at the flowers in the fog, thus outlining a clearer image of the wooden heart.
This is not a bad thing.