1. The Uniqueness of Lu Xun's Novels If Western narratology is a kind of "linguistics" of the novel, which points to abstract generalization, and is to find an eternal and universal structural model that maintains the lifeblood of all novels in the complex world novels, then Lu Xun studies in the new Chinese era are the opposite. It is not the "linguistics" of the novel, but the "linguistics" of the novel. It studies a form of speech in the novel—Lu Xun's novel. The reason why we need to study Lu Xun's novels is not because Lu Xun's novels are novels with all other novels, but because Lu Xun's novels are different from other novels at home and abroad.
2. The Lack of Subjectivity in Chinese Culture from the Perspective of Linguistics Before formally analyzing the narrative art of Lu Xun's novels, I would like to start with a question of Chinese linguistics raised by Zhang Dongsun, a famous philosopher during the May Fourth period in mainland China. In his article "Chinese Philosophy from the Structure of Chinese Speech", he put forward the idea that the subject of Chinese speech is not clear. He said: "The distinction between subject and predicate in Chinese speech construction is extremely unclear, in other words, it can be said that there is no such distinction. This is the most special feature of the Chinese language structure, and its influence is very great. Speaking about its influence on the minds of the Chinese, he cited four points: "The first point is that because the subject is not clear, the Chinese do not have the concept of 'subject'; The second point is that because the subject is not clear, the predicate is also not valid; The third point is that because there is no ending, there are no cases such as tense and mood; The fourth point is that there is no logical 'proposition'. "Any value judgment has a biased side, but from the perspective of comparative linguistics, we cannot but admit that Zhang Dongsun's view has a reason to be taken seriously. If the subject is not clear, that is, the subjectivity of the discourse is not clear. Discourse is not explicitly used as a specific manifestation of specific thoughts, wishes, wills, emotions, etc., of a specific person under specific spatio-temporal conditions, but is more like an expression in which all people "will" or "should" be so under all spatio-temporal conditions. It can be transferred to another person's mouth or pen at any time, and its meaning does not change substantially. It's not about who is saying it, it's about what he says.
My view differs from that of Mr. Zhang Dongsun is that the subjective consciousness of Chinese intellectuals cannot be produced in the characteristics of the Chinese Chinese language itself, but it can exist in the peak state of a certain emotional experience. Like Qu Yuan, like Sima Qian, like Li Bai, like Cao Xueqin, when their emotional experience makes them reach a state of "getting carried away", their words also have a strong subjectivity.
3. The limited audience of Lu Xun's works To this day, Chinese Lu Xun researchers have always tried to make all people in society love and even worship Lu Xun's novels, which I think is impossible and unreasonable. Lu Xun's novels are not only not written for those who have become addicted to being slaves, not for those "generals" who have been killed and killed all the way under the protection of others, not for those who are complacent about a little profit and thus curled up in their own birdcages and singing some sweet songs, not for those who are complacent and self-satisfied by stroking the wounds of our ancestors in the pile of old papers, and at the same time it is not written for those naïve teenagers who are still dreaming of their own lives. It is not written for those who have found a wide space for themselves to play a role in society and are concentrating on one of their own undertakings, not for those who are kind enough to read or have no appreciation for literature at all.
4. Children's Perspectives in Lu Xun's Works (Kong Yiji, Social Opera, Hometown) Each generation must reconstruct themselves and the world around them from childhood. He is still in an unconscious state under the influence of the outside world, he does not see himself, and he has no preconceptions about the world in front of him. The differences in the external world unfold gradually in this undifferentiated hazy mind. …… This is a process of constitutive meaning, but also an aesthetic process. It is the same way that primitive man originally constituted his own world. The difference between the two is only that primitive human beings are faced with a natural world, and their forms of consciousness coexist with the forms of the natural world, and "mythology" is the cultural expression of this form of coexistence. At this time, people are facing a society that has long been humanized and divided, and the main thing it constitutes in the consciousness of childhood is not mythology, but a humanized world. The art world of childhood can easily be destroyed by this humanized world. But no matter how quickly the world is destroyed, it still has an artistic character at the beginning of its formation, and its composition of meaning and aesthetics are still closely intertwined, and there is no serious division. This is precisely how an artist constructs his own art world. "When you cry for a long song, you must be after the pain. ”
The "I" in "Kong Yiji" did not have a clear feeling of the world around him at the beginning, but he gradually discovered the differences in this world and the contradictions between people. He dimly felt Kong Yiji's flaws, but also dimly felt his kindness and pain. All of this is still in a state of harmony, shrouded in an artistic atmosphere, but in the end he feels the incompleteness and unhappiness of this world.
5. Metaphorical and symbolist works Lu Xun's novels are not realistic and romantic, but metaphorical and symbolic, in terms of their basic tendencies. Its metaphorical significance goes far beyond the meaning of the events themselves. In Lu Xun's novels, the "signifier" of an event is only its "signifier"; The "signifier" of an event is precisely its "signified". In "Diary of a Madman", the illness of this "madman" really has little to do with us, but the thoughts and feelings of a prophet who is detached from the inherent tradition in his own social life environment are extremely important, meaningful and bitter. Behind the events narrated in the novel, the author and the reader rely on their own associative power to associate the "signifier" of the novel, and the events narrated in the novel themselves are its "signifiers".
In "Casting the Sword", the "sword" has long become a symbol of power in Chinese culture, and many stories about male and female swords in ancient China have clearly had the significance of social power distribution in Lu Xun. Man's power was originally obtained in the conquest of nature and is a symbol of man's vitality. However, in social relations, the political ruler gains the power to rule the whole society in the name of maintaining social stability, and the people must transfer the power to the political ruler in order to obtain the protection of the political power for themselves. However, if the people completely surrender their power to the political rulers, the political rulers will have absolute political domination, and they will be able to put the people under their complete control, and they can ignore the freedom and rights of the people, and thus turn back to oppress the people and destroy the people, thus turning power completely into their own private property. ...... "Feast of Ao" is clearly a symbol of abstract spiritual power that embodies the "soul of the people". He has no power of his own, and he derives it from the lives that have been practically mutilated by the dictatorship, from the sacrificial spirit of an avenger like the ruler of the eyebrows. He has no room for existence under the dictatorship, he hates the entire dictatorship, and therefore does not care about the princes, ministers, servants and people who maintain the dictatorship. Only he can take the place of a personal avenger like the ruler between the eyebrows to achieve the purpose of revenge. However, once the goal of revenge is achieved, he also disappears from society at the same time. Without dictatorship, there can be no revolution against dictatorship. Revolutions coexist with autocracy. Lu Xun used the legend of the "Tomb of the Three Kings" to make it clear that in the history of mankind, autocratic kings, personal avengers, and social rebels are actually extremely difficult to distinguish, and they are all engaged in a struggle for political power, and they are all destroying lives. However, in the history of China, which is centered on political power, only these three types of people have really shown strong vitality, and they are all the "kings" of Chinese society, the masters of Chinese history, and the victims of Chinese history. "Forged Sword" shows the relationship between these three "kings".
1. The entanglement of two concepts of time One is the concept of time of the author and his reader, who are looking forward to change and development, and this concept of time is brought into the narrative of the novel in different forms through the narrator of the novel; The other is the concept of time of social groups that only have a sense of "rotation" and no concept of "development", as well as the actual social reality of which they are composed. These two different concepts of time have always been entangled and conflicted in Lu Xun's novels. It is embodied in two plot lines in the novel, which are carried out at different speeds, rhythms, and frequencies in different time directions.
2. The Tense Transformation of Lu Xun's Novels The syntactic structure of Chinese is not as clear as that of Western languages, which has a very clear division between present, past, and future tenses. Its tense is expressed through the structure of the passage. Generally speaking, ancient Chinese poetry (including those poems that hang nostalgic for the past) and prose (including most literary essays and discourses except historical essays) are in the present tense, and expressing the feelings of the present and discussing the present are the main characteristics of ancient Chinese poetry, while ancient Chinese novels, like ancient Chinese historical works, mostly belong to the past tense. In ancient China, novels and stories were inseparable, and the Chinese word for "story" means "something that happened in the past", which is in the past tense.
When the novel recognizes the events narrated not as events that happened in the past, but as events that are narrated in an instant, not just as actual events, but as an imaginary world fictionalized by the author, the basic form of the novel is no longer in the past tense, but in the present tense. There is no doubt that Lu Xun's novels were directly influenced by Western novels, and his innovation of Chinese novels was realized under the influence of Western novels. At the same time, it also turned the ancient Chinese novels with the past tense as the main narrative tense into novels with the present tense as the main narrative tense. Lu Xun's novels are no longer a "real" retelling of real things that have happened, but an imaginary world constructed by the author artistically. Here, there is no such thing as a "past" that has existed beforehand, and even if there is, it is only the material that the author relies on to write the novel, not the object that the author must truthfully paraphrase.
3. Different tenses are intertwined with "now" When I returned to the fourth uncle's study, the corrugated was already snow-white, and the room was also brighter, and the big "Shou" word of Zhu Tuo hanging on the wall was very distinct, written by Chen Tuan's ancestor; The couplet on one side has fallen off, loosely rolled up and placed on the long table, and the other is still there, saying that "things are reasonable and peaceful". I went to the desk under the window again bored, and saw a pile of seemingly incomplete "Kangxi Dictionary", a "Notes on the Collection of Recent Thoughts" and a "Four Books Lining". It is in the present tense, but in the present it is full of relics of the past. You feel the oppression of the past against the present and the mockery of the past in the present. This conflict between the present and the past is the main reason why this depiction of the real environment is full of artistic charm.
I want to take the first step towards a new way of life, I want to hide the truth deep in the wounds of my heart, and move forward silently, with forgetting and lying as my guide...... ("Death by Injury")
This is also in the present tense, but in the present is full of anticipation for the future. The future seems to be about to break through the shackles of the present and sprout its own new sprouts, but the present is still the present, it suppresses the future, binds the future, and makes the future still only a trickle of wishes, a determination, an ideal that may not really be realized.
4. The Situation of Intellectuals Reflected in "Kong Yiji" Is there really four ways to write the character "Fen"? Is there any difference between knowing that there are four ways to write the character "Fen" and not knowing that it has four ways to write it? I am afraid that only Kong Yiji himself can understand this. Naturally, others don't want to listen to his explanations, they don't need his explanations, and of course they have no way of knowing. This is just like when we say that Lu Xun's novels have "sociological research methods", "historical research methods", and "psychological research methods", and now there are "narratological research methods". But these are only some differences that we have made up ourselves, and for the broad masses of society who do not care about Lu Xun's novels at all, it is meaningless whether Lu Xun's novels have these four or more research methods, or whether there is any difference between having these four research methods and not having these four research methods. If we try to tell others this, they will find it ridiculous. We are always very precious to these forms of our words, without them, there is no existence of us, there is no value of our existence, there is no form of our self-consciousness, and in the eyes of others, it is ridiculous, and the more precious we are to them, the more ridiculous we appear. From this, I feel that I and some Chinese intellectuals like me are like Kong Yiji. We also wore "cheongsam", like an "official" and a "broad man", but our "cheongsam" was "dirty and torn", neither arrogant nor dignified, and it looked ridiculous. In Chinese society, we do not have a "identity" that we have determined for ourselves. Sometimes we are classified as "bourgeois" and are called "bourgeois intellectuals" or "petty-bourgeois intellectuals", and sometimes we are classified as "proletarians" and are called "proletarian intellectuals". But no matter what class we belong to, we are a little different. Among the "bourgeoisie" we don't have so much money; In the "proletariat", we are not so simple, and others are not as comfortable with us as they are with the "proletariat". To this day, our society is still composed of three worlds: the world of power, the world of money, and the world of labor. Each of these three worlds has its own values and standards, and we Chinese intellectuals cannot find a place suitable for us in any of these worlds, because our values and standards cannot be recognized and understood in these three worlds.
Chinese intellectuals are timid, weak, thoughtful, and thoughtful, but they often use their heads to touch the iron wall of power and do stupid things that people find difficult to believe. It shows that Kong Yiji does not steal the hotel shopkeeper but steals Lord He and Ding Juren, there are deeper psychological reasons. In its essence, it is a declaration of war against power, a declaration of war against the authority of society. Probably because of this, Lord He and Ding Juren were so cruel and ferocious to Kong Yiji. For He Daren and Ding Juren, "books, paper, pens, inkstones" may not be so important, and what they deplore is by no means this "property", what they are indignant about is Kong Yiji's contempt for their authoritative position, and it is the unspeakable secret wish in Kong Yiji's heart. But Kong Yiji's secret psychological desire cannot be understood by the customers of the Short Clothes Gang. All they know is Kong Yiji's "stealing", and "stealing" is naturally bad and should be punished.
5. Kong Yiji who still has no voice in the face of children Anyone who feels powerless in the real society will inevitably want to serve the future. And it is the children who embody the future: "Kong Yiji himself knew that he could not talk to them, so he had to talk to the children. But can a person who is not respected in the adult world be respected by children, and will a person who has no power in the real world have a role in the development of the future society? This is unreasonable, and this is only an illusion of self-control on the part of a Chinese intellectual like Kong Yiji. Kong Yiji taught the hotel guy to write, and the hotel guy subconsciously looked down on Kong Yiji, and he didn't think he had the power and ability to teach himself. Because in a world like Luzhen, a child hopes to become a "kaftan wearer", wants to become a hotel shopkeeper, or has never thought about what kind of person he will become, but he will never want to be a down-and-out person like Kong Yiji. …… Such people. There are two main ways to get close to them: indoctrination of knowledge and financial help. But "knowledge" does not change our destiny in life, and they are instinctively skeptical of our so-called "knowledge"; The economy is also lacking, and we feel anxious when they really need our financial help: "The children are still not going to disperse after eating the beans, and their eyes are on the plates. Kong Yiji panicked, stretched out his five fingers to cover the plate, bent down and said, "It's not much, it's not much." ’”
6. The intellectual who lost his legs It was when Kong Yiji was at his most depressed that he stole to Ding Juren's home, and the result was that Ding Juren's family "beat him for most of the night and discounted his legs". From then on, his livelihood became more difficult: "His face was black and thin, and he was no longer what he looked like; Wear a torn jacket, cross-legged, a pouch underneath, and hang it on your shoulders with a straw rope. "I have often encountered such intellectuals in society, those who have been branded as Hu Feng elements, those who have been classified as rightists, those who have been condemned as bourgeois academic authorities in "You know what", who can no longer walk on their own legs on their own life path, but use their own hands, dragging their own bodies, and crawling with difficulty step by step - the legs of their lives have been broken...... They disappeared in society, like Kong Yiji disappeared in Luzhen, but society still exists. There is one less challenger in the world of power, one less consumer in the economic world, and one less joke in the world of labor.