Narrative Frenzy and Aesthetic Variation - Narratology and Contemporary Avant-Garde Fiction in China

Author: Nan Zhigang
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2006-05-01
Features: This paper takes cultural localization and aesthetic subjectivity as its basic stance, employing comparative narratology to analyze the conflict and integration between Western modern narratology and Chinese narrative traditions within the context of globalization. By dissecting the narrative characteristics and aesthetic attributes of contemporary Chinese avant-garde fiction represented by Ma Yuan, Yu Hua, Mo Yan, Su Tong, and Ge Fei, it explores strategies and pathways for Chinese literature in the face of globalization.
Introduction: First, by analyzing the universal and abstract human concepts in narratology, such as the human subject, narrative subject, and technical subject, it grasps the cultural essence and literary values of narratology. Second, in light of the actual situation of contemporary Chinese avant-garde fiction, it examines the profound influence of narratology's humanistic perspective on the value orientation and narrative techniques of avant-garde fiction. It argues that the "misaligned connection" between contemporary Chinese avant-garde fiction and Western narratology reflects the different choices made by Eastern and Western cultures in the context of human and intellectual liberation during the 1980s. Chapter, it dynamically describes the Chinese reception context and process of narratology, analyzing the underlying reasons for the dominance of Western discourse and the absence of national discourse during this period. It points out the pitfalls in the Chinese reception of narratology, such as Westernizing China, validating the West with China, neglecting national aesthetic experience and cultural traditions, and simplistic technical analogies. Under the title "China's Voice," it provides a necessary review of the status and major achievements of Chinese narratology research.
Chapter 2 analyzes the influence of Western narratological theory on Ma Yuan's narrative traps. From the perspectives of the narrator, narrative attitude, and narrative perspective, it reveals the fatal weaknesses of Ma Yuan's "narrative traps" in highlighting the narrative subject and experimenting with Western narrative techniques while diluting the aesthetic subject and life consciousness of literature, as well as neglecting national life experience and narrative literary traditions. It affirms that literature is first and foremost a life aesthetic, then a technical aesthetic.
Chapter 3 traces the emergence of human temporal experience, comparing the temporal concepts in ancient and modern narrative literature, as well as Eastern and Western narrative literature. It proposes that story time, text time, signifier time, and reading time collectively constitute the temporal series of narrative literature, corresponding to human universal experience and individual emotional experience to form the narrative order of literary works. Based on this, it analyzes the temporal experience of contemporary Chinese avant-garde writers (especially Yu Hua).
Chapter 4 examines the issue of narrative time in Yu Hua's novels, proposing that the narrative time in Yu Hua's works underwent three stages: the avant-garde period in the mid-to-late 1980s, the early 1990s, and the mid-1990s. It presents two interconnected threads: narrative pleasure—self-revival—character voices; cold time—experiential time—life time. This analysis reveals Yu Hua's shift from Western modernist literary concepts to contemporary Chinese cultural realities, from abstract humanistic reflection to real-life concern, and his journey from self-neglect to individual self, ultimately regaining cultural selfhood.
Chapter 5 addresses critical commentary on Mo Yan's "folk writing" from the perspective of narratological discourse theory. By analyzing the relationships between elite cultural stance and folk cultural stance, elite discourse and folk discourse, Western discourse and Chinese discourse in Mo Yan's novels, it exposes the spiritual essence of Mo Yan's pseudo-folk discourse field, pseudo-folk narration, and pseudo-folk stance, questioning the necessity of the "folk writing" theory itself.
Chapter 6, based on the ideological foundation and formal techniques of poetic pursuit in Chinese narrative tradition, analyzes Su Tong's delicate and poetic lyrical style, traditional naming conventions, and their relationship with Jiangnan culture and Chinese narrative culture. It also examines Ge Fei's use of classical imagery-based narrative techniques and intricate, dense narrative styles, exploring the inheritance of Chinese narrative cultural traditions and the modern transformation of traditional Chinese narrative culture.
Conclusion: It proposes that Chinese literature, in the context of globalization, should participate in the construction of world literature and culture with an independent Chinese identity and its own cultural uniqueness. To achieve this, it must uphold three returns and three resistances: returning to local cultural stance and resisting Western discourse hegemony; returning to the aesthetic subject of literature and resisting abstract narrative subjects; returning to human life consciousness and resisting mere technical performance.
This paper takes cultural localization and aesthetic subjectivity as its basic stance, employing comparative narratology to analyze the conflict and integration between Western modern narratology and Chinese narrative traditions within the context of globalization. By dissecting the narrative characteristics and aesthetic attributes of contemporary Chinese avant-garde fiction represented by Ma Yuan, Yu Hua, Mo Yan, Su Tong, and Ge Fei, it explores strategies and pathways for Chinese literature in the face of globalization.
Introduction: First, by analyzing the universal and abstract human concepts in narratology, such as the human subject, narrative subject, and technical subject, it grasps the cultural essence and literary values of narratology. Second, in light of the actual situation of contemporary Chinese avant-garde fiction, it examines the profound influence of narratology's humanistic perspective on the value orientation and narrative techniques of avant-garde fiction. It argues that the "misaligned connection" between contemporary Chinese avant-garde fiction and Western narratology reflects the different choices made by Eastern and Western cultures in the context of human and intellectual liberation during the 1980s. Chapter, it dynamically describes the Chinese reception context and process of narratology, analyzing the underlying reasons for the dominance of Western discourse and the absence of national discourse during this period. It points out the pitfalls in the Chinese reception of narratology, such as Westernizing China, validating the West with China, neglecting national aesthetic experience and cultural traditions, and simplistic technical analogies. Under the title "China's Voice," it provides a necessary review of the status and major achievements of Chinese narratology research.
Chapter 2 analyzes the influence of Western narratological theory on Ma Yuan's narrative traps. From the perspectives of the narrator, narrative attitude, and narrative perspective, it reveals the fatal weaknesses of Ma Yuan's "narrative traps" in highlighting the narrative subject and experimenting with Western narrative techniques while diluting the aesthetic subject and life consciousness of literature, as well as neglecting national life experience and narrative literary traditions. It affirms that literature is first and foremost a life aesthetic, then a technical aesthetic.
Chapter 3 traces the emergence of human temporal experience, comparing the temporal concepts in ancient and modern narrative literature, as well as Eastern and Western narrative literature. It proposes that story time, text time, signifier time, and reading time collectively constitute the temporal series of narrative literature, corresponding to human universal experience and individual emotional experience to form the narrative order of literary works. Based on this, it analyzes the temporal experience of contemporary Chinese avant-garde writers (especially Yu Hua).
Chapter 4 examines the issue of narrative time in Yu Hua's novels, proposing that the narrative time in Yu Hua's works underwent three stages: the avant-garde period in the mid-to-late 1980s, the early 1990s, and the mid-1990s. It presents two interconnected threads: narrative pleasure—self-revival—character voices; cold time—experiential time—life time. This analysis reveals Yu Hua's shift from Western modernist literary concepts to contemporary Chinese cultural realities, from abstract humanistic reflection to real-life concern, and his journey from self-neglect to individual self, ultimately regaining cultural selfhood.
Chapter 5 addresses critical commentary on Mo Yan's "folk writing" from the perspective of narratological discourse theory. By analyzing the relationships between elite cultural stance and folk cultural stance, elite discourse and folk discourse, Western discourse and Chinese discourse in Mo Yan's novels, it exposes the spiritual essence of Mo Yan's pseudo-folk discourse field, pseudo-folk narration, and pseudo-folk stance, questioning the necessity of the "folk writing" theory itself.
Chapter 6, based on the ideological foundation and formal techniques of poetic pursuit in Chinese narrative tradition, analyzes Su Tong's delicate and poetic lyrical style, traditional naming conventions, and their relationship with Jiangnan culture and Chinese narrative culture. It also examines Ge Fei's use of classical imagery-based narrative techniques and intricate, dense narrative styles, exploring the inheritance of Chinese narrative cultural traditions and the modern transformation of traditional Chinese narrative culture.
Conclusion: It proposes that Chinese literature, in the context of globalization, should participate in the construction of world literature and culture with an independent Chinese identity and its own cultural uniqueness. To achieve this, it must uphold three returns and three resistances: returning to local cultural stance and resisting Western discourse hegemony; returning to the aesthetic subject of literature and resisting abstract narrative subjects; returning to human life consciousness and resisting mere technical performance.