Chronicle of the World Literary Tides

Author: Shen Huihui
Publisher:
Publishing Date: 2005-03-01
Features: I was once a carefree middle school student who loved both reading and playing. In that era, because I was a good student and eager to improve, coupled with a relatively stable background, I was fortunate enough to enter university directly from middle school and majored in English as required. After graduation, I was hired as a teaching assistant at the university, and from then on, I had to pursue other hobbies as side activities, diligently fulfilling the revolutionary work entrusted to me by the Party and the people. However, my innate love for books and play never changed. Therefore, I was unwilling to settle for a mundane job and pursued a graduate degree, eventually reaching the position I hold today—as an editor at World Literature magazine. Being an editor is indeed a tough job. It involves selecting materials, which means finding good works from a vast amount of original literature; writing selection opinions and hoping for approval from superiors; finding suitable translators; and doing original proofreading, a task that is both (offensive) and laborious; editing published articles; reading proofs; and regularly reviewing the journal—six issues a year, with each issue containing 240,000 words. But at the end of the year, the amount to read is countless 240,000 words! The work is hard, yet I only earn four or five hundred yuan a month, along with a symbolic editing fee. Often, I feel that in this increasingly money-driven commercial society, my own sense of worth has become negligible. Such thoughts inevitably give rise to an indescribable sense of unease. Then, a desire to vent and make something of myself emerges. Yet, I am truly incapable. For a scholar like me, the only way to vent is through reading and writing. Therefore, I try to read as much as possible. I have read many books related to or unrelated to my field, and without realizing it, I have gained a clearer understanding of society and myself. For example, the meaning of life, the essence of success, the wealth of America, and the current state of China. The more I think about it, the more I realize that the excessive focus on material quality of life by most people in the world (including myself) is a fundamental mistake. This only makes me more determined to prove, through reading and reflection, how to live a more reasonable life. This question has haunted me for a long, long time. After returning from my studies at Harvard, it became even more difficult for me to let it go. I firmly believe that the world and the individual are always in conflict. Excessive narrow-mindedness leads only to extremes. Today’s world is a highly unbalanced one. Post-industrial civilization has disrupted humanity’s natural way of life and further driven human nature toward greed and even competition. As material living standards improve, spiritual living standards deteriorate. Never before have there been so many psychiatric and psychological patients, nor such widespread and popular attention to various cults and pseudosciences. Material desires and sexual desires run rampant. The world has never been as decadent as it is now. In a daze, one can’t help but wonder if this is the scene of the final judgment. Of course, this is just my suspicion. However, it is precisely this doubt that drives me to explore continuously in my literary research, seeking answers. The world is forever imperfect. The closer you get, the more imperfect it seems. Our dissatisfaction with the real world actually reflects humanity’s innate pursuit of beauty. The end of the colonial era, the rise of multiculturalism, and the political independence and economic development of Asian, African, and Latin American countries stand in stark contrast to the economic decline of Western post-industrial nations, simultaneously revealing optimistic factors in the future of the world. In this sense, the essays and articles included in this collection (most written in the 1990s), though about literature, are all specific steps in the process of exploring the meaning of the world and life. Now, due to the global crisis of humanistic spirit, the domestic cultural circle is also quite restless. To stay content in one’s corner and remain loyal to one’s duties seems to have become synonymous with "incompetence." In fact, intellectuals, long regarded as the "conscience" of the nation, should be especially vigilant during the tide of commerce, providing the public with essential spiritual nourishment and tranquility. Some of the articles in this collection address this very issue. However, to sum up, I have always wanted to contribute to literary criticism on this level, while maintaining a detached stance toward reality to achieve objectivity. Finally, I would like to thank the leaders and editors of Sanlian Bookstore for the publication of this collection, as well as all my teachers, friends, family, and colleagues who have supported and helped me.