Selected Essays of Lu Xun (New Curriculum Standard Readings Series · Revised Edition)

Author: Lu Xun
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2006-06-01
Features: The essay (also referred to by Lu Xun as "miscellaneous thoughts" or "short comments") has a long history in China. However, the rise, development, and flourishing of modern essays are inseparable from Lu Xun's name. In Lu Xun's works, the essay becomes a free form of depicting the world, describing observations, commenting on human affairs, and expressing personal sentiments. Its content is all-encompassing, carrying the mission of enlightening thought and resisting reality. Thus, with its profound ideological depth and unique artistic form, it ascends to the pinnacle of Chinese literature and enters the "high platform of fashionable literature" (from the preface to "Miscellaneous Essays of Xiaojieting" by Xu Maoyong).
Regarding essay writing, Lu Xun maintained a clear and purposeful consciousness, embodying his serious, lofty, and persistent intellectual and spiritual pursuits. He once said, "I have long hoped that Chinese youth would stand up to criticize Chinese society and civilization without hesitation." ("Preface to 'Crown of Disaster'") Lu Xun's essays are precisely such critiques of society and civilization. This critique, as he himself described it, "is an immediate response or resistance to harmful things, the sensory nerves, and the offensive and defensive limbs" ("Preface to 'Miscellaneous Essays of Xiaojieting'"), and it is "a dagger and a throwing spear" ("Crisis of Short Essays in 'South-North Tones'").