Editor's Note
Creation and criticism, such as the wings of a bird, the axle of a car. The development of literary creation is inseparable from the prosperity of literary criticism and the efforts of generations of literary critics. In 1998, the Southern Literary Circle launched the "Critics Today" column, which has introduced more than 100 critics so far. Critics of different personalities speak "my view of criticism" with their sharpness, talent, and agility, and hundreds of articles have accumulated to form a sensitive, vivid, and full of vitality and talent.
Now the China Writers Network has re-launched these articles to share with you, so stay tuned.
Critics of the day
Li Donghua (Filmed in 2012)
Li Donghua, female, was born in Gaomi, Shandong province in 1971 on the Chongyang Festival. Graduated from the Department of Chinese, Peking University. Vice Dean of Lu Xun College of Literature. He has published more than 20 novels such as "The Glory of Youth", "Fireworks", "Xiao man" and other works, and has won awards such as the 13th and 15th "Five One Project Awards" of the Central Propaganda Department, the China Publishing Government Award, the National Outstanding Children's Literature Award, the Wenjin Book Award, the Chen Bochui International Children's Literature Award and the Bingxin Children's Book Award. In 2017, he was selected as a cultural master of the Propaganda Department and a "four batches" of talents.
My view of criticism
My critical view of children's literature
Li Donghua
Children's literature is not just a genre, it is a worldview. Children's literature points to a fascinating utopia in which the protagonist is often an ant, a pig, or a fallen leaf or a mouse, not necessarily a human. This is a literary world without the blindness and arrogance of anthropocentrism and the true realization of the equality of all living beings. So, the innocence of children's literature is not childishness, it is a belief. In this era of commercialization, no matter how many new functions of children's literature have been developed - pastime entertainment educational games..... As a creator and researcher, I am willing to dig out those works that really have the spiritual texture of children's literature from the vast sea of books and recommend them to children.
Childhood and children's perspectives are more than just a narrative strategy. Bashera said in The Poetics of Dreams: "Childhood is hidden deep in our hearts, still in our hearts, always in our hearts, it is a state of mind. "Think about us who have almost no books to read when we were children, and then look at the children who were overwhelmed by olympic numbers and foreign languages early this morning, generations of Chinese have almost never had a complete childhood psychologically, and the experience of reading children's literature is quite insufficient, so there will be so many adults who regard children's literature as "pediatrics", and their words are full of prejudice against it.
Therefore, children's literature is not only meaningful to children, but really good children's literature can also bring adults into such a state of mind. Childhood is a lifelong affair, it is not an old dress that can be thrown away casually. Shen Congwen said: "When the childlike heart disappears in human life, all meaning loses its meaning. "Therefore, as a children's literature researcher, especially a Chinese researcher, your research, your theory, in addition to showing a limited number of peers, but also to do popularization work, to take care of those ordinary adults who lack childhood reading experience, after one or two generations of efforts, so that early reading really becomes a childhood lifestyle." Only by cultivating a deep soil of reading can children's literature, an imported product from the West, plant more and more robust roots in the land of China.
Every time I read the picture book "Little Blue and Little Yellow" and "Hen Rose Goes for a Walk", I always sigh that the simplest is the closest to philosophy, the simplest is the richest, the most shallow is the deepest. This is the character that those classic children's literature has. A person engaged in children's literature writing must have the artistic ability to cut out the complexity and simplicity of four or two pounds, must be able to face all the difficulties of human existence, dare to show their own positions and attitudes, all of which are conveyed in the most rambunctious and childish form, in a way that children like, and at the same time, the iceberg hidden in the depths of the sea will slowly present its deeper meaning as children grow. Calvino said: "A classic work is a book that brings discovery every time it is reread as if it were the first reading. "Really good children's literature is exactly the kind of book that, even when read as an adult, will still have new discoveries, will still bring inner touches, will still produce meaning." I am willing to work with my colleagues to move towards this fascinating goal. Chinese children's literature in the modern sense has only gone through less than 100 years of road, the lag in time has brought about a large gap in artistic standards and literary accumulation, as a researcher, there is no need to argue too much about the moon circle in China, or the moon circle in the West, our culture has an inclusive mind since ancient times, and has the confidence to assimilate foreign cultures into self-spiritual resources. So when recommending books to children, I want to recommend the best in the world, not necessarily for the sake of local protectionism, stuffing them with something less than satisfactory, damaging their initial judgment and sensitivity to beauty.
A critic should have such an independent spirit, not moved by business and human feelings, not to be complicit in the media, publishing houses, and authors, and to be able to make his own independent voice. Especially since you're a children's literature critic.
Because you're dealing with children.
Their reading history is a piece of white paper, a clean snow field that has not been stepped on, and you cannot leave gray marks and dirty footprints on it.
The article was published in Southern Literature Circle, No. 2, 2012
Critic Impressions
"Three Inner Residents" Li Donghua
Gao Hongbo
First of all, I would like to state that "Sannei Jushi" is a fabrication of mine, and this nickname has not been recognized by Donghua. The reason is that after fifteen years of knowing Donghua, the "Southern Literary Circle" asked for an impression of Donghua, and when the editor-in-chief Zhang Yanling asked me for a manuscript, everyone was crowded in the Eight Great Places of Xiangshan to evaluate the Eighth Mao Dun Literature Award, and when they were in a hurry, they were careless and actually agreed to it -- later, after careful consideration, they realized that the more familiar people are, the more difficult it is to write "impression notes", which is clearly a difficult problem.
Why did the title of "Three Inner Residents" come to mind? Is it because of Donghua's personality, personality and literature? She is introverted, introverted, and is a literary show, which is called "three inner". Or it is the feeling that I have been with Donghua for fifteen years, the feeling is often inaccurate, and if the title of "Three Inner Residents" is not recognized by Donghua, it will be taken off.
From the beginning of 1995 to the late autumn of 2005, I served as the director of the China Writers Association's Creative Union Department for ten years, Donghua was the fresh graduate I transferred after two years in office, and she also entered the Creation And Creation Department at the same time as Xu Zhongzhi and Huang Guohui. The three of them, respectively from Peking University, Inner Mongolia University and the China Youth Political College, were the major events of the Creation and Alliance Department that year, enriched the new forces, not to mention, but also added a lot of joy, remember that soon after the three people were happy to marry each other, the Creation And Alliance Department held a dinner party for the three young couples, deputy director Xie Zhenzi came forward to run the operation, that night everyone said a lot of words, drank a lot of wine, the family atmosphere was strong, in fact, this tradition has been maintained in the Creation and Alliance Department.
When I met Donghua, I was led by Sister Xie Zhenzi, the two of them were old Peking University, one was little Peking University, Donghua said that the first thing I said when I met her was "Welcome to the self-projection net", I really don't remember saying no, but Peking University is also my alma mater, we have a common class teacher Cao Wenxuan, this is certain. Perhaps it is precisely this factor that after the retirement of Guan Dengying, an old comrade of the Creation and Creation Department, Li Donghua took over the post of secretary of the Children's Literature Committee of the China Writers Association, which enabled Donghua to quickly get to know a large number of children's literature writers, intervened in a number of awards, styles, and seminars, and also made her breed a strong interest in children's literature creation, from practicing pens, trying to write to becoming famous, until she became an excellent children's literature writer and critic, and even an award-winning professional household and a member of the Children's Literature Committee.
This shows that opportunities are prepared for those who are prepared, and there are many accidental choices in careers and interests and even career orientation.
Donghua was only six or seven years in the Creation and Alliance Department, and suddenly the Writers Association had an opportunity to compete for a division-level position, and she was successfully admitted, so she was transferred to the Creative Research Department. I remember that I was one of the examiners at that time, her on-site answer was very good, from the perspective of localism, I did not want her to leave the creation and alliance department, but the overall situation did not allow me to have any obstacles, I sincerely congratulated her, this is almost ten years ago.
Li Donghua, who was transferred to another department, while completing her own work, was more diligent and assiduous in literary creation and theoretical research, she wrote fairy tales, poems, novels, and also conducted macroscopic research in the field of children's literature, and in the review album of "Thinking Innocence - Scanning Contemporary Children's Literature", she expanded the common "simplicity" of children's literature into "infinite possibilities", and then thought that fairy tales, a seemingly simple style, is the warmest spring breeze, a beam of sunshine, a drizzle, so that the children's spiritual tree thrives. She has written many novels, such as "Vera's Sky", which is known as "excellent juvenile psychological novel", which has a writer's self-conscious artistic concept and confident artistic posture. She sorted out and summarized the spiritual trend of children's literature in the sixty years of new China, thinking that it was three types, namely "indoctrination", "happiness" and "redemption", the first two varieties were luxuriant, and the latter type of "redemption" was much weaker, under the premise of rational cognition, Donghua used her own creative efforts to fill the "redemption" type of children's literature space, and her novels "Cornflowers in the Distance" and "Boys To the Left and Girls to the Right" all show this artistic self-consciousness.
Donghua did not enter the field of children's literature creation because of her sensibility, it was her active choice after rational thinking and rational preparation, which will determine that she will go further than now.
Rational, introverted Donghua, there is another naughty, humorous self hidden in the body, which can be flashed from her long fairy tales such as "The Happy Time of Pigs" and "Mud Wandering", and can also be felt from her short stories such as "Dreams Filled with Sunshine", but it is a pity that Donghua has buried this potential deeper, or the nature of the "Three Inner Residents" makes her longer than creating deep, slightly dignified and beautiful fairy tales such as "Maple Leaf Girl", "Bamboo Elf", and "Flying Creek". This point is very close to the aesthetic style of her teacher Cao Wenxuan, the language is simple or even pure, the style is melancholy and even depressed, and there is mysterious thinking in the literary style, which leads people to pursue, and does not pursue superficial hilarity and pleasure...
Donghua really likes and loves the cause of children's literature from the bottom of her heart, especially after she became a mother, the mother's love was fully awakened by the birth of her daughter, which made her children's literature creation have a specific object of conversation and became deep and powerful, she once wrote a small poem for her daughter "You are...", in which she described her daughter as "little fish", "goose yellow poem" and "little dragonfly who flips and fights" "little forest demon that will make magic", after a series of intimate and interesting metaphors, in the last two sections of the Middle East Hua wrote: You are the little paper boat of Mom's childhood / Filled with starlight and the brightness of the moon / Drifting on the river... / You are a white and white paper / Oh, Mom's eyes are used to shadows / and dusty crayons / What will be drawn on it, what will be drawn?" Press yourself to the point of harshness!
It is worth mentioning that the phrase "shadow eyes" accustomed to exposing the heavy and repressive side of Donghua's heart can also decipher her investment in the "redemption" genre. Life for Donghua is not all the way sunny and smooth, her living state makes her frequently cross in happiness and pain, I believe that Donghua's happiness is the happiness created for children, and Donghua's "shadow" is the projection caused by many unhappiness in real life.
Perhaps this is the inescapable fate of the "Three Inner Residents"?
I have a copy of "My Lu Yuan" at hand, and I would like to add that Donghua was the class teacher of the children's literature advanced study class held by Lu Xun Academy of Literature in 2007. I once taught a lesson in this class. "My Luyuan" included five articles of the students in that period, namely Wang Lichun, Tang Sulan, Yang Shaojun, Xiao Ping and Zhang Huaicun, who depicted unforgettable learning scenes from different aspects, and I inadvertently saw a scene of the party recorded by Zhang Huaicun, a Turkish student (mistaken for a Tujia family in the book): "The singing, laughter, applause, and cheers are higher than a wave, and the students are immersed in joy, and the class teacher, Teacher Li Donghua, said: 'Get this program list, it is like getting the program list of the Spring Festival Gala of CCTV. Our program is more exciting than the Spring Festival Gala, where everyone showed their talents, expressed their passion and love, and everyone will be happy and harmonious in the days to come. ’”
Talent, passion and love can make a strange collective reach the peak of boiling and joy in an instant, and Donghua is the commander who controls this collective.
It can be seen that nothing in the world is impossible, and the only thing to do is to overcome oneself, including one's own depression, cowardice, one's own inferiority, confusion, and inexplicable shade from the depths of the heart, which are not innate, and therefore do not need to "get used to it".
Therefore, in this huge and complicated "impression record", what I want to say is: love is on the left, compassion is on the right, walking on both sides of life, sowing seeds at any time, blossoming at any time, making this path long,embellished with flowers, so that pedestrians can step on thorns without feeling pain, there are tears to fall, and it is not sad.
This was actually said by the old man of Bingxin, and it was used to end the impression of Donghua, which was just right.
(Gao Hongbo, then vice chairman of the China Writers Association)
Read more
Impressions of a Critic
Zhang Yanling, Zhang Ping, editor-in-chief
Writers And Publishers September 2019
My View of Criticism
Guangxi Normal University Press, January 2016