The challenges and opportunities of "pan-literary"

The so-called "pan-literary" refers to the important cultural phenomenon that is becoming increasingly blurred between literary and non-literary expressions. At a time when traditional literary concepts are constantly being impacted, "pan-literary" on the one hand makes traditional literary expressions lose clear and self-sufficient genre boundaries; on the other hand, it acquiesces to the different degrees of "legitimacy" of non-literary expressions that are not originally literary. In this way, literary ideography is both potentially in danger of being dissolved by non-literary ideography and giving itself new vitality while constantly expanding boundaries.

Create a new type of literary aesthetic activity

The concept of "pan-literary" is closely related to the concept of "aestheticization of daily life". British scholar Mike Featherstone explained in detail the connotation of "aestheticization of daily life" in his book Consumer Culture and Postmodernism. It has three meanings, the first meaning refers to the subcultural trend in art; the second meaning refers to the transformation of life itself into art, or the artistic way to present the state of daily life; the third meaning refers to the aesthetic illusion created by the media images that pervade daily life. Western scholars such as Lukács, Marcuse, Benjamin, Baudrillard, and Jameson have all made profound critiques of this aesthetic illusion subject to consumerism.

"The aestheticization of daily life" has also received widespread attention from The Chinese literary and artistic circles and aesthetic circles, and has triggered a heated discussion in the early 21st century, and scholars such as Tong Qingbing, Lu Shuyuan, Tao Dongfeng, Zhao Yiheng, Gao Jianping, Wang Desheng, and Jin Huimin have all elaborated and discussed the issue. Overall, the discussion focused on the key question of whether the aestheticization of everyday life has legitimacy for literature and art. Opponents argue that the aestheticization of everyday life may have a series of negative effects under the influence of consumerism and new media technology, resulting in the incorporation of literature and art into commerce and entertainment, and making creators deviate from pure literary positions and humanistic spirit. On the contrary, proponents argue that the aestheticization of everyday life helps to expand the boundaries of literature and art, and can strengthen the intrinsic relationship between literature and art and daily life.

Comparatively speaking, the opposing side stands on the elitist position and adheres to the boundaries of serious literature and high art, while the pro-side side stands in the perspective of mass culture, emphasizing the construction of a pan-aesthetic and diversified ideographic form with literary characteristics that spans the "Yangchun White Snow" and "Lower Riba people". To be sure, these two tit-for-tat views reflect an irreversible trend in the field of literature since the 21st century: the spillover effect of literary expressions. The immediate consequence of this spillover effect is that traditional literary genres (such as novels, poetry, and prose) exhibit distinct "crossover" qualities. For example, non-fiction writing between in-depth reporting and documentary literature, brand poetry between advertising and poetry, etc., these practical ideographic genres with cross-border characteristics can also have significant literary or artistic characteristics, but they do not belong to traditional literature or art forms based on non-practical ideography. The core characteristic of "pan-literary" is precisely the new type of literary aesthetic activity that is closer to the public life created by emphasizing the organic integration of non-practical ideography and practical ideography.

Dissolve traditional literary boundaries

The core crisis facing "pan-literaryization" lies in the increasing blurring and disintegration of the boundaries of traditional literature. The fundamental reason for this situation is that the communication ecology of the Internet era has undergone revolutionary changes, and traditional literary genres have lost their original critical power and influence under the impact of new media. From the perspective of essentialist literary concepts, the "loss of power" of traditional literary genres is often seen as a sign that pure literature has slipped into vulgar and superficial mass culture. In the view of those who hold an elitist stance, an important reason why classical literature is "snubbed" is that the public pursues the sensory enjoyment of immediacy too much, and lacks the ability to read and reflect deeply. This view upholds the enlightening role of literature in society and the humanistic spirit of daring to criticize reality. Specifically, the dissolution of traditional literary boundaries is manifested in three aspects.

The first is the change in the form of literary production. In the pre-Internet era, because the channels of literary communication were relatively single and the media of communication was relatively fixed (mainly paper media), literary producers in this period had a relatively professional status (such as professional writers), and they often published and disseminated works through professional literary journals or influential literary publishing institutions. However, after entering the Internet era, with the diversification of communication media, all kinds of professional or amateur network writers broke through the original gatekeeper mechanism, which contributed to the vigorous development of online literature, but also formed a mixed literary market, and made literary production tend to pursue traffic and cater to the utilitarian development model oriented to the public.

The second is the change in the form of literary expression and dissemination. In the era of print media, literary creation mainly relies on language and writing. However, in the Internet age, the image-led multi-media ideographic form occupies a dominant position, which "eclipses" traditional literary genres such as novels and poetry in the paper media era. Under the fragmented communication ecology built by the Internet, the image media is obviously easier to meet the sensory demands of the public, and it is more in line with the market logic of "traffic first", while the communication threshold of the text media is much higher than that of the image media. The immediate consequence of this situation is that traditional literary forms based on literal representations have been largely obliterated by the media of images.

Finally, there is the change in the form of literary acceptance. In the Internet era, electronic screens allow literary reading to no longer be limited to a closed world of words, and readers can easily slide their fingers into another very different multimedia world with unlimited possibilities. Therefore, the uninterrupted "attention wandering" internet-style acceptance method makes almost all literary expressions have to succumb to the logic of "transmission first", that is, in order to maximize the communication effect, we have to sacrifice the spirit of deep criticism and reflection pursued by serious literature.

However, from the perspective of development and evolution, traditional literary styles such as novels, essays, and poetry can no longer fully cover literary genres in the Internet age. At the same time, the challenges encountered by literary creation forms in the pre-Internet era show that they have not yet adapted well to the new communication environment constructed by the Internet. However, the crisis caused by "pan-literary" by no means represents the "end of literature", on the contrary, the dissolution of traditional literary boundaries means that there are more cross-border and integration possibilities between literary expressions and non-literary expressions. To activate the power of criticism of reality and the humanistic spirit of pursuing truth, goodness and beauty contained in literary discourse, we cannot draw the ground as a prison, but must find a way out outside the traditional literary ideographic form.

Embrace "cross-genre narrative" and "cross-media convergence"

On the one hand, "pan-literaryization" dismantles the old literary boundaries, but on the other hand, it also opens a new door and makes possible the "dailyization of literary activity". From the perspective of the general trend, the typical characteristics of the cross-border form of literature shaped by "pan-literary" are the "cross-genre narrative" and "cross-media integration" of literary ideographic activities, which echo each other and are superficial to each other.

First, "cross-genre narratives" have become the norm for literary ideographic activity. The essence of literary discourse is a narrative act, and the two core qualities of narrative are emotion and story, corresponding to poetry and fiction respectively. Many specific genres, such as news and advertising, have a distinct narrative. In the context of the dissemination of the Internet, literature and news, advertising and other non-literary ideography increasingly present a cross-genre mixed ideographic form, which does not mean that the boundaries of literature are "eroded" by other genres, but means that "literary" is gradually integrated into non-literary ideograms, thus constituting a "cross-genre narrative".

For example, since 2019, China UnionPay has successively held a series of "poetry POS machine" activities with a public welfare nature in Shanghai, Xiamen and other places. Users only need to swipe 1 yuan through the UnionPay POS machine to get a "poetry receipt" printed with the creation of children in the mountains. The money used to "buy" the poems will be used for pro bono education programs for children in mountainous areas. Although the "poetry POS machine" is a brand promotion activity of China UnionPay, from the objective effect, it reflects the charm of literature at least three levels. First of all, the theme of the "Poetry POS Machine" activity is "Let the talents in the mountains be seen", which advocates the society to pay attention to the spiritual life of poor children in mountainous areas and reflects the unique humanistic feelings of literary discourse. Secondly, the paper receipts printed by the "poetry POS machine" allow the poems created by children in mountainous areas to be seen by more people, which in itself can be regarded as a poetry promotion activity with a sense of ceremony. Finally, judging from the effect of public welfare activities, the donation of the "Poetry POS Machine" activity has funded more than 3,000 poor children to receive art education projects, demonstrating the true power of "literature to observe and change reality". From this point of view, the "poetry POS machine" activity integrates the three genres of literature, advertising, and journalism, and is a typical "cross-genre narrative". It can be said that the advertising poems with the theme of focusing on children in mountainous areas do not deviate from the humanistic spirit of "paying attention to and helping vulnerable groups" upheld by literature, but profoundly highlight the humanistic background of literary discourse.

Second, "cross-media integration" represents the overall development trend of literary expression. In the age of paper media, literary ideographic activity used words and language as the dominant symbolic carriers. With the advent of the Internet era, the dissemination power of image ideography far exceeds the traditional text ideogram, under the general trend of "image turning", if the traditional literary genre wants to get more recognition from the general audience, it has to go beyond the original language and writing media, and embed the literary themes and reflective humanistic feelings close to the times into different media forms, constituting a diversified and three-dimensional "new media matrix".

From the perspective of "cross-media integration", it is not enough to rely on words to express the times and life. Cross-media literary expressions are often easier to break through the barriers of language, culture and region. Through the power of video media to carry the spirit of literature, carry forward the positive energy of the times, and uphold the literary tradition of "carrying the way with literature". Whether it is a text medium or an image medium, as long as it can carry a serious proposition of the times and the humanistic spirit of "people-oriented", it shows the unique strength and beauty of literary discourse.

From the perspective of literary dissemination, "pan-literary" is by no means a sign of the demise of literature. Even if literature itself is replaced by the omnipresent "literary nature", it does not mean that literary discourse has lost its legitimacy of existence, on the contrary, it reflects the reshaping of literary boundaries and the rebirth of literary meaning. In the context of Internet communication, it is necessary for us to maintain an open and positive attitude, accept the development trend of "cross-border symbiosis" between literary ideography and non-literary ideography, and accept a new type of literary ideographic form with "cross-genre narrative" and "cross-media integration" as the basic characteristics. Only in this way can literary activities glow with the spiritual charm and human brilliance of continuous benevolence in the era of "pan-literaryization".

(Author Affilications:School of Journalism and Communication, Huaqiao University)

Edit: Zong Yue