Modern Perspective on Traditional Chinese Literary Theory

Author: Deng Xinhua
Publisher:
Publishing Time: 2004-05-01
Features: How did ancient Chinese artists and aestheticians develop such a unique understanding of the artistic appreciation theory and reception methods of "taste"? What are the reasons behind the formation of this artistic appreciation theory and reception methods? And why did it gain widespread recognition among ancient art appreciators and recipients? To comprehensively address these questions, it is necessary to examine them from a cultural perspective. This is because the artistic reception theory and methods of "taste" are deeply rooted in the soil of traditional Chinese culture and are inseparably linked to it. From this angle, not only can we clarify the internal reasons for the emergence of the artistic reception methods of "taste," but we can also explore and glimpse the various genetic factors of traditional culture embedded within this reception method.
I. The Influence of Traditional Chinese Thinking on the Theory of "Taste"
From a cultural perspective, examining the artistic reception methods of "taste" cannot fail to first study the traditional Chinese way of thinking, as it is precisely the latter that inherently determines the thinking character and theoretical nature of the former. The connection between traditional Chinese thinking and the artistic reception method of "playing with taste" can be examined from the following three aspects.
1. The Influence of Intuitive Insight as a Method of Knowing on the Theory of "Taste"
Mr. Zhang Dainian regards "valuing insight over argumentation" as a significant characteristic of Chinese philosophy, and this is indeed insightful. Methodologically speaking, ancient Chinese philosophy did not, like ancient Western philosophy, emphasize rigorous logical reasoning and abstract speculation but rather advocated an intuitive method of insight that directly grasps the essence of things without analysis or deduction. In ancient China, thinkers from Confucianism, Taoism, and Buddhism elaborated on the theory of intuitive cognition from different perspectives, thereby establishing the basic tone of traditional Chinese thinking.
Confucianism, oriented toward real-life experiences, emphasized "learning." The way of "learning" lies in "extensive learning" and "gathering knowledge," but it cannot stop there. To obtain true knowledge and understand the great principles, one must "apply one principle throughout" (from Analects, "Warring States" chapter), that is, use an intuitive method to integrate all learned knowledge. Among the later Confucian scholars, many shared this recognition of this method, such as Cheng Yi and Zhu Xi, who proposed the theory of "investigation of things to attain knowledge" and regarded "sudden illumination" as the prerequisite for understanding all things. This shows that, in terms of grasping the knowledge of real-life experiences, Confucianism, which advocates "learning and reflection" and "careful reflection," does not exclude the method of intuitive insight.
Taoism, which reveres naturalness and non-action, does not emphasize "learning" but speaks of "learning the Dao," meaning the grasp of the natural Dao beyond real-life experiences. Laozi first described the state of existence of the "Dao" as the universe's fundamental principle: it is formless and nameless yet omnipresent, neither graspable by the senses nor knowable through conceptual knowledge ("The Dao that can be spoken is not the eternal Dao; the name that can be named is not the eternal name"). Therefore, Laozi proposed that to grasp the Dao, one must "abandon wisdom and intellect" (Tao Te Ching, chapter 10) and "purify the mirror of the profound" (Tao Te Ching, chapter 19), relying on an intuition that transcends both the senses and reason to directly harmonize with the Dao. Zhuangzi inherited Laozi and further emphasized and highlighted the transcendent and non-rational nature of intuition. He repeatedly stated, "Do not listen with your ears but with your heart; do not listen with your heart but with your spirit" (Zhuangzi, "Human World" chapter), "Only by being free from thought and care can one know the Dao" (Zhuangzi, "Northward Journey"), and "Separate from the world, discard intellect, and align with the great Dao" (Zhuangzi, "Great Master"). In Zhuangzi's view, the process of "learning the Dao" is a multi-level, intuitive process of deepening the understanding of the subject from "externalizing the world," "externalizing things," and "externalizing life" to "sudden enlightenment" and "seeing the unique."
The Chan sect of Buddhism, unlike Confucianism in its emphasis on practical knowledge of real-life experiences or Taoism in its grasp of the natural Dao, pursues the enlightenment of the eternal and unchanging ultimate reality of the universe—the true nature of human original awareness, or the Buddha-nature. How can one achieve this enlightenment of the true nature of Buddha-nature? The Chan sect proposed the "sudden enlightenment" method of "not relying on words, directly pointing to the mind." The forerunner of Chan theory, Zhu Daochen, explained "sudden enlightenment" as follows: "The term 'sudden' indicates that the principle cannot be divided, and enlightenment fully illuminates it. Through non-dual enlightenment, it matches non-differentiated principle. When rational understanding is released, it is called 'sudden enlightenment'" (Hui Da, Commentary on Zhao Lun). Thus, "sudden enlightenment" refers to the sudden, one-time realization of the true nature of Buddha-nature achieved after eliminating all conventional thoughts and language, canceling all conventional conceptual knowledge. The Chan sect, therefore, still promotes an intuitive method of insight.
The distinctive methods of intuitive insight of Confucianism, Taoism, and Chan Buddhism have been fused and permeated into the hearts of the Chinese nation, forming a unique way of thinking and providing direct ideological nourishment for the formation of the artistic reception methods of "taste" in classical aesthetics. From the perspective of poetry reception, it advocates appreciating poetry without seeking "understanding" (Fang Dongshu, Zhao Mi Zhan Yan), and "the way of poetry also lies in sudden enlightenment" (Yan Yu, Changlang Shihua, "Discernment of Poetry"). From the perspective of painting reception, it requires "meeting the spirit without relying on the eyes" (Dong Bi, Yang Su Ju Hua Xue Gufen). From the perspective of calligraphy reception, it is the same, as Yu Shishan noted in The Theory of the Brush: "Skill must be achieved through sudden enlightenment."
2. The Model of Mindful Experience as a Way of Thinking's Influence on the Theory of "Taste"
Mr. Tu Weiming said: "The way Westerners know the world is 'cognition,' while the way Chinese know the world is 'embodied knowing.'" In his view, "cognition" emphasizes observing, analyzing, synthesizing, and judging the objective material world, which is "scientific knowledge." "Embodied knowing," on the other hand, involves incorporating external objects into "one's own life," making them "intertwined with one's body and mind," and experiencing external objects with the heart, which is "moral knowledge." These two different ways of thinking indeed reflect a profound difference in the thinking characters of the East and the West.
The method of mindful experience, like intuitive insight, has also been throughout two thousand years of philosophical exploration. "Poetic flavor" and "moment of inspiration" are two important categories in ancient Chinese aesthetics and literary theory. Their formation and development reflect the gradual deepening of our ancestors' understanding of the psychological characteristics and laws of literary activities. A serious examination and study of these two categories are undoubtedly of great significance for better understanding the essential features of literature, grasping the psychological laws of literary creation, and comprehensively excavating and clarifying the thoughts of ancient literary psychology, thereby constructing a nationally distinctive literary psychology system. This paper attempts to preliminarily sort out the formation and development of the theory of "poetic flavor" and the theory of "moment of inspiration" to provide the necessary theoretical foundation for better incorporating them into the contemporary form of literary psychology in the future.
I. The Formation and Development of the Theory of "Poetic Flavor"
In the history of Chinese poetry theory and criticism, the concept of "flavor" was widely used by literary critics to evaluate poetry, gradually forming a highly distinctive theoretical viewpoint in ancient Chinese literary and aesthetic theory—"poetic flavor." From the perspectives of literary theory and aesthetics, the "flavor" in "poetic flavor" has two main meanings: one refers to the artistic aesthetic power inherent in poetry itself, i.e., "poetic flavor"; the other refers to the appreciation, savoring, and understanding of the artistic beauty of poetry by the audience, i.e., "savoring poetry." When examining the formation and development of the theory of "poetic flavor" from the perspective of the history of literary psychology, our research task should be: on the one hand, to historically explore the creative psychology of the poet—how the poet creates the artistic beauty in the poem to attract the audience's aesthetic attention and interest; on the other hand, to historically study the aesthetic appreciation psychology of the audience—what methods the audience should use to grasp the aesthetic characteristics of the poem. It is precisely from this perspective that the theory of "poetic flavor" has been included in the research scope of literary psychology.
As an aesthetic and literary psychological theoretical viewpoint, the formation and development of the theory of "poetic flavor" have gone through a long historical process, which can be roughly divided into four major stages: pre-Qin and Han Dynasty, Wei, Jin, and Southern and Northern Dynasties, Tang and Song Dynasty, and Ming and Qing Dynasty. As early as the pre-Qin period, people had already been using the concept of "flavor." However, at first, the understanding of "flavor" was limited to the physiological activity of the human sense organs, such as the mouth and tongue, in perceiving matter. For example, the words of Yi He in Zuo Zhuan, "The sky has six colors, and it gives birth to five flavors," and the words of Zi Chan in the same book, "Qi gives birth to five flavors, and it manifests as five colors, which are expressed as six sounds, six livestock, five kinds of meat, and three kinds of sacrificial animals, to serve the five flavors," all use the concept of "flavor" in its original sense of taste. Later, people gradually used "flavor" more commonly as a metaphor to explain the aesthetic power of music, literature, and language. For example, the Analects records that Confucius forgot the taste of meat while listening to the Shao music, showing that he was conquered by the aesthetic power of the music, and "the flavor of music" replaced "the flavor of meat." The Zuo Zhuan, "Twenty Years of Zhao," records Yan Zi using the harmony of flavors to explain that music can only produce aesthetic power when it "complements and enhances each other." The Book of Rites, Records of Music also uses "the lingering flavor of the great soup" to metaphorically describe the artistic of the lingering sound of the red strings. Until the Han Dynasty, this situation had not fundamentally changed. For example, Wang Bang used "flavor" to metaphorically describe the aesthetic effect of music: "The sorrowful and quiet is deeply cherished, and the mellow and rich is full of flavor" (The Flute). Wang Chong of the Eastern Han Dynasty used "the great soup's bland flavor" as a metaphor to defend his writing, which did not emphasize literary artistry: "The great soup must have a bland flavor, and the discerning must have their limitations, and the literary must have their omissions" (Lunheng, Self-Eulogy). Ban Gu's Book of Han also records the evaluation of Zheng Chengshi's words as "flavorful words," with Yan Shigu's note: "Flavorful means that his words are very beautiful."
So why was the physiological sense of taste "flavor" so commonly used as a metaphor for the aesthetic power of music, literature, and language in the pre-Qin and Han Dynasties? This is because the concept of "flavor" was initially closely linked to beauty. Research in the history of Chinese aesthetics shows that in China, the understanding of beauty, although initially closely tied to practical utility and moral goodness, also existed a distinct beauty different from utility and goodness, namely the beauty of sound, color, and flavor that could give people sensory pleasure. For example, the Zuo Zhuan, "Heng's First Year," records: "Song Huafu saw the wife of Kong Fu on the road, looked back and sent her off, saying, 'Beautiful and charming.'" The Xunzi, Wang Bang states: "Human nature loves flavor, and there is no more beautiful flavor than the best; human nature loves sound, and there is no more beautiful music than the best; human nature loves color, and the most beautiful patterns are the most intricate, and women are the most numerous." Moreover, from the perspective of etymology, beauty originally meant delicious taste. For example, the Shuowen Jiezi states: "Beauty means sweet, composed of the sheep radical and the big radical, as sheep are the main source of food among the six livestock, and beauty is similar to goodness." (Xu Xun's note: "Big sheep are more beautiful, hence the big radical.") From this, it can be seen that the early human pleasure of taste is closely related to the development of aesthetic consciousness. The reason people used "flavor" to metaphorically describe the aesthetic power of literature and music was fundamentally because the pleasure of taste already contained the seeds of aesthetic feeling. Moreover, this early aesthetic concept of beauty, where flavor was considered beautiful, gave us many important insights: first, the pleasure of taste is direct or intuitive, not rational thinking; second, it has characteristics beyond the satisfaction of utilitarian desires, not just the desire to be full; third, it is closely related to the subject's interests and preferences (Mencius's proposition "the mouth has the same preference for flavor" itself contains its inverse proposition). And these three points are precisely the important characteristics of beauty that differ from scientific knowledge and moral judgment. Understanding this makes it easy to understand why later literary artists insisted on seeking the expression of poetic flavor rather than the explanation of poetic principles, and why readers insisted on savoring poetry rather than analyzing it.
Jin Shengtan was not only a famous novel aesthetician of the late Ming and early Qing Dynasties but also a famous dramatic aesthetician. In the past, many scholars believed that Jin Shengtan's dramatic theory was not as good as his novel theory, so more attention was paid to his novel theory, and his dramatic theory was relatively neglected. In fact, Jin Shengtan's dramatic aesthetic theory is very rich in content and full of fresh insights, greatly enriching the treasure trove of Chinese dramatic aesthetics. Since Jin Shengtan's dramatic aesthetic thought is mainly concentrated in his comments and corrections on The Story of the Western Chamber, this paper attempts to describe and analyze Jin Shengtan's dramatic aesthetic thought from the following three aspects by combining his comments on The Story of the Western Chamber.
I. The Tendency of Jin Shengtan's Dramatic Aesthetic Theory Against Neo-Confucianism
Wang Shifu's The Story of the Western Chamber is a famous work in classical Chinese drama. Because this play depicts the pursuit of love and marriage freedom by young men and women, it has always been fiercely criticized and attacked by pseudo-Confucianism, being slandered as a "book that teaches debauchery." Jin Shengtan, on the other hand, declared that The Story of the Western Chamber was by no means a "book that teaches debauchery" but rather a "wonderful text," and he systematically elaborated his reasons, showing a strong tendency against Neo-Confucianism. Those pseudo-Confucians regarded The Story of the Western Chamber as a "book that teaches debauchery" because of one fundamental reason: The Story of the Western Chamber "contains this matter," that is, the depiction of the sexual love between Zhang Sheng and Cui Yingying. In Jin Shengtan's view, the reason of pseudo-Confucianism was completely unfounded. He elaborated his opinions from two aspects. First, the sexual love between men and women is originally a natural and universal physiological need inherent in human nature. People call The Story of the Western Chamber a book that teaches debauchery, and they only do so because of this matter. If one thinks about this matter, when and where is there no such thing? Is the world abolished just because there is this matter? Some people say that this part of The Story of the Western Chamber is the most vulgar, this is the talk of ignorant scholars from the villages. If one discusses this matter, then from Pan Gu to today, who does not have this in their family? If everyone has this in their family, then what is vulgar about it?