Construct a theoretical system of ancient novels with Chinese characteristics

Author: Wan Qingchuan (Professor, College of Liberal Arts, Yangzhou University)

In modern times, with the strong import of Western culture, Chinese literary theory has been in a state of aphasia, and the academic circles have been accustomed to "using Western rules and mainland novels", so that they are out of place, and for a long time, the true face of the development of ancient Chinese novels has been obscured. In recent years, in the context of the revival of traditional Chinese culture, many people of insight have begun to reflect on this issue, and based on the local area, they have begun to redraw the development map of ancient Chinese novels. The main points are as follows:

First, ancient Chinese novels have two major text systems, literary and vernacular, which are very different, but commentators tend to focus only on the former and ignore the latter. Vernacular novels did not enter the stream in ancient times, and the official history "Art and Literature Chronicles" was not recorded. However, vernacular novels have the characteristics of folk, story, aesthetics, entertainment and colloquialism, which are basically in line with the concept of modern novels. For example, on the issue of fiction and reality in novels, the Ming scholar Xie Zhaoqian pointed out in "Five Miscellaneous Groups": the creation of novels and operas "must be half of fiction and reality" and "the scene is extreme". "If things are too real, they are close to corruption", and fiction "is also reasonable", that is, it conforms to human physics. Li Rihua's "Preface to the History of Guanghuan" also advocates that the creation of novels should be "virtual and real, and real and virtual." The real is not tied to the virtual, the virtual is not taken off by the real, the real is not taken off, and the vitality is vibrant." Feng Menglong's "Cautionary Words· Narrative" made a more wonderful exposition on the question of truth and fiction in the novel: the content of the novel does not have to be true, it does not have to be false, and it does not have to "remove the fake and keep the truth". The characters in the novel are not necessarily true, and the events do not necessarily have to come from this person, "People don't have to have their own things, things don't have to be beautiful." "Events, even if they are real but not typical, are fake; Even if the incident is fake, it conforms to the laws of life and is true. These remarks involve the core propositions of typicality and particularity, the truth of life and the truth of art in modern literary theory. Ling Mengchu also expressed the same opinion in the preface to the "Surprise · the First Moment of Shooting", saying that the artistic charm of the novel is like a vivid and realistic painting. These expositions are very profound, coupled with the novel criticisms of Jin Shengsi, Zhang Zhupo and others, in fact, some important issues in novel theory have been solved, forming a relatively systematic system of novel theory, which is much earlier than the relevant Western discourses. Therefore, from the perspective of vernacular novels, the so-called "Western examples" have long existed in the continent, and they are not their patent. According to Song Lihua's "The Connection between China and the West in the Concept of "Novel" in Ancient China", in the 18th century, Chinese vernacular novels began to be introduced to the West one after another, which influenced the definition of the concept of "novel" by Westerners. At the end of the Qing Dynasty and the beginning of the Republic of China, the concept of Chinese "novel" was borrowed by Japan scholars and translated by the West, and finally transplanted and reconstructed by late Qing scholars and transformed between ancient and modern to form a modern academic new language. Therefore, the construction of the concept of modern fiction is indispensable to the Chinese.

The most conflicting with the concept of modern fiction is the literary novel. The concept of "novel" in the pre-Qin classics is far from today's. "Small" is embodied in value judgment, which refers to the shallowness of this style; On the chapter, "everything is trivial, and everything must be ruined", which is not a long work. In the principle of writing, it advocates the record of what he has seen and heard. From the "Hejaz" to the "novelist", the "novel" is quite broad and the content is extremely complex. A large number of miscellaneous works of history and miscellaneous biographies recorded in the Sui Shu · Jing Ji Zhi and the Old Tang Shu · Jing Ji Zhi were classified as sub-novels in the New Tang Dynasty Shu · Art and Literature Chronicles, and the storytelling and fictional characteristics of the novels were highlighted. However, in the Qing Dynasty, the concept of literary fiction regressed to the "Hejaz", and the principle of the selection of "novelists" in the "Siku Quanshu General Catalogue" was: "Those who are close to elegance and tame are widely seen and heard, but those who are obscene and absurd, and those who are confused are not degraded." "A large number of legendary works with distinctive characteristics such as "Strange Tales from Liaozhai" have been discarded.

Second, it is necessary to admit that there is a process of development in human beings' correct understanding of things. When sympathizing with the understanding of the ancients, we should also fully consider that there is a tortuous and repeated exploration process in the final formation of their concept of fiction, and when restoring the "natural state" of the development and evolution of the novels of the ancients, we should make a realistic evaluation of the views of the ancients. Mr. Huang Lin said well in "Novels, Notes and Notebook Novels: The Preface to the Collected Novels of the Republic of China": "We cannot simply think that accepting the new concept of fiction is 'using the law of the West' and abandoning the tradition. …… As far as the 'novel' is concerned, the cognition of the narrative, writer, fiction and other characteristics of this genre is also moving from chaos to clarity step by step, so when the Western concept of fiction is introduced, it can be instantly integrated and integrated with each other, forming a new style of 'novel'. That is to say, China and the West have different paths and coincide. Therefore, we should not ignore the commonality of Chinese and Western novel concepts by emphasizing the particularity of the concept of ancient Chinese novels, which will erase the outstanding contributions made by our ancestors to the theoretical construction of modern novels.

Needless to say, the ancients also had a wrong understanding of novels, and there was often inconsistency in the division and description of literary novels, such as "The Classic of Mountains and Seas", "The Biography of Mu Tianzi", "Sou Shen Ji" and other novels, often drifting between geography, biography, actual records, stories and miscellaneous histories in the history department, and they were at a loss. As late as modern times, scholars also divided novels into prose and rhyme, and the lyrics, drum lyrics, and opera were all included in the "rhyming novels", such as Guan Daru and Lu Simian. The "rhyme novels" in Xu Jingxiu's "Common Sense" even include prose, poetry, etc. Huang Shizhong's "The Function of Fiction Is More Popular than the Influence of Newspapers" divides the genre of novels into "chapters, short stories, songs, nanyin, photo, and vernacular." "Huang Ren's "Novel Words" called Yuanben, Hui Tone, Beijing Dialect, Qin Dialect, etc. "The novel has become a hodgepodge of almost all literature and art. In other words, the formation of our ancestors' correct concept of fiction did not happen overnight, and Westerners are no exception. United Kingdom modern theorist Terry · Eagleton pointed out in his book "Phenomenology, Hermeneutics, Reception Theory: Contemporary Western Literary Theory" that in United Kingdom the late 16th and early 17th centuries, the word novel was used for both real and fictional events, and it was difficult to distinguish between fiction and journalism. In 18th-century United Kingdom, the concept of literature was not as confined to "creative" or "imaginary" writing as it is today, and it included not only poetry, but also philosophy, history, essays, and letters. "Whether an original text is 'literary' is not a matter of whether it is fiction – the eighteenth century was very skeptical of whether the emerging form of fiction was literary or not – but whether it meets certain criteria of 'pure literature'." The criterion of literature is deeply ideologically imprinted, "Writing that embodies the values and tastes of a particular social class can be counted as literature; And street ballads, pop legends, and maybe even dramas are not considered literature. "Europeans in the 19th century also included Chinese opera works such as "The Pipa Story" and "The Legend of the West Chamber" into novels. As Mr. Huang Lin revealed in "Is the Modern View of Fiction the Surname "Zhong" or the Surname "West"": "As for the Western view of the novel, starting from the mythology and epic of Greece, to recognizing the 'fictional character story', and being 'a kind of prose literature' rather than poetry, it has also gone through a long historical process. He also quoted Hu Huaichen's 1933 book "Studies in Chinese Novels" as saying that the English titles of novels include "story", "fiction", "novel", "tele", "romance", "mythos", "sagas" and other nouns with different meanings. Therefore, it is inevitable that there will be a tortuous process in the correct understanding of certain things, and there is no need to shy away from the erroneous view of fiction of the ancients, and there is no need to make good faith justifications.

Third, the construction of an academic system of ancient Chinese novels is not a self-closed-loop and self-talking, but ultimately transforming the theory of Chinese novels into worldwide knowledge and realizing mutual learning between civilizations. Mr. Huang Lin pointed out that the concept of fiction in the 20th century was neither surnamed "Zhong" nor "Western", but was formed in the process of mutual exchange and integration based on the local area and borrowing from the West. The establishment of this new stylistic outlook on fiction and the refinement of its classification mark the progress of the Chinese nation's culture, and also show that our nation has the mind and ability to tolerate and digest the world's advanced culture (Preface to "Selected Novels of the Republic of China"). In our study of ancient novels, we must certainly stand on a Chinese standpoint, adopt a Chinese perspective, and embody Chinese values, but the premise is that the novel theories summarized from them should have a dialogue with the world, form a consensus, and make Chinese novels global. This is what Mr. Qian Zhongshu pointed out: "Although the phenomenon is unique to China, it can be universal and global in application." Only by placing Chinese literature in the context of world literature can we discover the global value and significance of Chinese literature. In fact, although in modern times, scholars have been "using Western precedent mainland novels", but "narrative as the ancestor" and "words without cliffs" are the common essential characteristics of Chinese and Western novels, and important novel theoretical vocabulary such as image, typical, narrative, and correspondence have long existed in Chinese literature. The vernacular novel is an important contribution to the aesthetics of the world novel, such as the tradition of vernacular fiction established by storytelling, the integration of novel techniques with painting, calligraphy and other arts, and the internalization of witchcraft culture into the artistic expression of novels.

In short, we are based on China itself, not to close ourselves off, but not to reveal the origin, development and evolution of ancient Chinese novels, to restore their true development features, but also to refine a set of analytical models and theoretical frameworks that are not only in line with the actual development of ancient Chinese novels, but also can dialogue with world civilizations. We should not only avoid treating the ancients with the heart of the present, but also take the concept of modern fiction as a reference for research, not shy away from saying that the ancients had cognitive errors, and face up to the fact that the ancients had made great contributions to the theoretical construction of modern novels.

Guangming Daily (2024-08-05 13th edition)

Source: Guangming Net-Guangming Daily