The Crisis of Chinese People's Self - awareness 43L --- "Cambridge History of Chinese Literature" to be published at the end of this month, all authors are American scholars
2013 - 07 - 18 kircheis 41905 39 18
Article Introduction
And the traditional society does not cultivate people's self - awareness. It restrains individual desires and suppresses instinctive self - interest. Self - awareness is a product of modern freedom concepts. It is a bit like opening a window for you while the door must be locked from the inside. Without self - awareness, there is no true freedom, or that kind of "freedom" is just low - level self - interest. Self - awareness is the first course of freedom. Without this taste, one cannot enjoy the feast of freedom.
Text Content
There is a French program that picked several young and middle - aged men and women, dropped them in a strange country, with no money, and asked them to do a thing or complete a journey. In mainland China, no matter in Beijing or in remote towns, they could find people willing to help them with food, accommodation and transportation without spending a penny, and there was never a time when they went hungry or slept under the stars. But in Hong Kong, no one paid attention to them at all. The only person who invited them to have a meal was a mainland Chinese businessman. But ----
In the modern society of strangers, abiding by public behavior rules is the bottom line that makes this ruthless world bearable. To do this, one must restrain a little self - interest. People with strong self - awareness are good at covering up, while those with weak self - awareness do not cover up. Because self - awareness is not the same as instinctive self - interest, but is the awareness of the relationship between oneself and the environment. That is to say, self - awareness is connected with attribute awareness. Otherwise, it is just instinctive self - interest.
And the traditional society does not cultivate people's self - awareness. It restrains individual desires and suppresses instinctive self - interest. Self - awareness is a product of modern freedom concepts. It is a bit like opening a window for you while the door must be locked from the inside. Without self - awareness, there is no true freedom, or that kind of "freedom" is just low - level self - interest. Self - awareness is the first course of freedom. Without this taste, one cannot enjoy the feast of freedom.
The traditional society does not strengthen self - awareness because once it is generated, people's authenticity disappears. One can only see this clearly after living in the West for a long time. Modern people's self - awareness is obtained at the cost of authenticity, not for free. The society that has already obtained the collective superiority of modern people starts from despising authenticity, and often throws authenticity away as if it were dirty water, along with the baby inside. As early as the end of the 19th century, Westerners who had transitioned to a society of strangers, with their already domesticated collective superiority, came to the "East" that had not been domesticated. While despising the natives who were different in every move, especially those lacking self - awareness, they also realized that they had completely and forever lost the authenticity in the natives.
I remember a few years ago I accidentally fell into a French TV entertainment program because it involved China, so I watched it. The program was called "Beijing Express", which was to pick several young and middle - aged French men and women, drop them in a strange country, with no money on them, and ask them to do a thing or complete a journey. The purpose of the program was first to see how the French people coped with difficulties (lack of money exacerbated the survival dilemma) when they knew nothing (including language) about the other world, and second to see the attitude of the people in this strange country towards foreigners who needed help but could not pay (in France, there are many TV programs with similar ideas, especially liking to enjoy the magnanimity of "the East"). They traveled a lot in mainland China, including modern cities and poor villages. No matter in Beijing or in remote towns, they could find people willing to help them with food, accommodation and transportation without spending a penny, and there was never a time when they went hungry or slept under the stars, although the Chinese people they met rarely smiled at strangers (it was not because of inherent bad nature but because of the lack of domestication of the separation of private behavior and public behavior). Especially in the remote countryside, a group of extremely poor people really believed that they had no money on them (in fact, they had money prepared in case of emergency), and each person took out all the money they had and pooled a sum of money for them. But they not only continued to pretend to have no money, but also felt annoyed that these Chinese locals did not know how to leave privacy space for others, and围观 and followed them. The next episode of this program went to Hong Kong. The shortcomings of the locals all disappeared, and the advantages of the locals also disappeared. No one围观 them, and no one followed them. It was impossible to find free food, accommodation and transportation. The only person who invited them to have a meal was a mainland Chinese businessman (I recognized it from the accent). At night, they could only sleep on the street.
People who have thoroughly understood the outer shell of Western social manners and the inner core of cold - bloodedness, when they look back at the "East" society that still has some authenticity, will have a tolerance for the people who show their small self at any time due to lack of self - awareness, and also know what will replace these shortcomings, which is not from ideal to ideal. A few months ago, I was queuing up to check in at an airport in China. The line was long, but there were many windows, and it was not too slow. The people in the line were in good order. Then I saw an old man from the countryside walking past the side of the line, heading straight to the front of the line as if no one was there. I stopped him and told him that everyone was queuing up, and it was not allowed to go from the side to the front. From his embarrassed silly smile and his immediate retreat, I saw that he just realized that it was necessary to abide by the rules to join this stranger's line. Now the people who often make a big fuss in public places when they encounter something unpleasant are not these so - called locals still immersed in the traditional society, but the big and small upstarts in the city full of "rights" fluff. They are the disabled who cannot digest freedom because of lack of self - awareness.
Later, I met a group of peasant tourists in the waiting hall. It seemed that they were going somewhere collectively. They were huddled together playing cards in the relatively quiet waiting hall, just like playing at their own home, and laughing and talking loudly without hiding. I went up to remind them that this was a public place. They were not unhappy and immediately lowered their voices, but after a while, they forgot. From these peasants who had not yet stepped out of the traditional society, I did not see absolute self - interest and incurable problems, but lack of domestication.
I found that these two things had a common feature, that is, the parties all understood and dealt with the relationship between oneself and the external world based on instinct and habit. They did not understand that in the modern society, under all the connected appearances, oneself and the outside world are isolated. Because they did not understand this isolation, they also did not understand what maintains together the isolated individuals. At this time, "together" is the unified norm in public places. Having realized this, when you look at Westerners again, you will find that every move, every frown and smile of them is keeping the proper measure. Even their carefree demeanor is directed by the heart. The unconscious willfulness is far less than that of "the East" people. All their efforts are to maintain the isolation. Their own society has this kind of insurance lock, and then sprays the fragrance of freedom to decorate the "禁闭室", but sells the fragrance to the "East" which has no insurance lock at all, making the people who fall into chaos after being smoked by the fragrance look down on themselves to the extreme.
The authenticity of the traditional society not only comes from weak self - awareness, but also from the fact that people do not need to have two sets of behaviors: private behavior and public behavior. At that time, a person's life behavior did not need to be completed in a strange world, and often the life square did not exceed several kilometers. The complete separation of private behavior and public behavior is the result of industrialization, urbanization and citizenization. It requires the life of two or more generations of citizens, and more importantly, the conscious domestication by the superstructure that is aware of this.
By reading this, we have understood what the things that Chinese scholars have envied for more than a hundred years and hated themselves for not having actually are, and we have generally known the path to obtain them. Next, let's take a look at the true teachings in these two Western learning masterpieces. In addition to laying the foundation for the modern free society, there is another side. In the West where there has long been a religious exclusive tradition, the ruling group has used the carefully strengthened self - awareness and collective superiority to deal a fatal blow to other civilizations for two hundred years.
Collective superiority is a good thing within, but not necessarily outside. The "East" people who have lived in the West for a long time, after first tasting the outer shell of manners, gradually taste its bitter inner core. That is, collective superiority is often directly proportional to the narrowness and aggressiveness towards the outside. It can be said that they rise and fall together. People who have tasted it even have a逆反心理. They feel that it is better to be with the people who are directly bad than to be受这种 roundabout bad, not only because the degree of bad is different, but also because the degree of injury is smaller. If self - awareness is an indispensable internal balance in the modern "individual freedom" society, when it condenses into collective superiority, it becomes a sharp knife towards the outside. In the West where there is no deep cultural tradition (because of historical interruption caused by religious belief), operating collective superiority not only relies on one foot of maintaining public behavior standards, but also on the other foot of creating identification and exclusion and establishing external opposites. This superiority is different from the natural superiority of the ancient advanced civilization towards the backward civilization. It is not conservative but aggressive. It is a spiritual track specially designed for stepping on the opposite side, and is part of directing the world which is complementary to conquering the world. This track has been paved into the heart of the different civilization with the steps of conquest, and has triggered reverse racism in almost all places where there is no corresponding collective superiority to defend oneself. For more than a hundred years, the "Westernized elites" in China have not escaped this spiritual track, because this is the threshold to enter another world, and they are unconsciously even unconsciously led up. The Japanese who squeezed into the ruler's "club" first as thugs is also pulled by this spiritual track.
This sharp knife divides the world into two parts, one side is "savage" and the other side is "civilized". If the lead in industrialization and military strength is not enough to break the spiritual backbone of a defeated civilization, this unprecedented cutting has completely knocked the loser to the ground, and dug a big gap that is almost impossible to close on the body of each civilization. For more than a hundred years, it is the fact that the superstructure of China has almost unanimously accepted the moral卑贱ness of Chinese civilization, which has led this civilization to collapse step by step. And a large part of the reasons for acceptance are not the backwardness of military and industry, but from this fatal gap. Because under the psychological offensive of Western collective superiority, we have unconsciously accepted deep - rooted self - denial. This is a self - denial without a return path. This inertial spiritual track has input positive and negative thinking unconsciously, and under the guidance of this thinking watershed, objective rationality automatically gives up self - defense. The rare reverse prejudice in the world has become a habitual thinking orientation, which controls people's judgment ability on themselves and the outside world, and reverses people's vision.
The key is that people are completely unaware of this psychological offensive, and do not know that the hand directing the public opinion is premeditated and organized. The "East" placed on this operating table not only suffers military occupation and economic secession, but also suffers psychological fission unconsciously. The Western ruling group secretly uses "removing collective superiority" (which natural has in some civilizations with deep traditional culture) and "creating collective superiority" (creating identification and exclusion) to split other people's territories, operating superiority and卑贱ness in the world to direct the world and pave the way for conquest. And this psychological planning that takes a long time is mostly not noticed by the conquered people. The contempt of Hong Kong citizens for mainland Chinese people (the so - called Hong Kong identity), and the psychological barrier of Taiwan people calling themselves Chinese, seem to be spontaneous, but actually are captured by this spiritual track. The "group" is very sophisticated in doing this. It can make people in a certain place regard卑贱ness as dignity by psychological manipulation. On the surface, it is to despise that the opposite side does not have the courtesy (unified standard public behavior) that they have learned, but actually it is the作怪 of the sense of boundary.
Not long ago, I saw a travel documentary from a Canadian TV station. Such programs in the West generally have a kind of formula, which I call the "dividing formula", specially used for "hostile countries". As long as it is a country they regard as an opponent, even if it is traveling, it is pre - set with this framework in advance. Therefore, this program has a guide in advance, that is, Hong Kong must be separated from the mainland. Just like the previous episode of this travel documentary that visited Vancouver where Chinese people gathered in Canada, when talking about Chinese cuisine, a reporter picked out the best Chinese restaurant in his eyes. Guess where the chef is from? A Japanese - French mixed - race person. This title cannot be attributed to pure Chinese people, especially mainland Chinese people, unless it is a mainland Chinese person who secretly surrenders or openly opposes China. As long as you understand this kind of "dividing formula" I said, you can basically see the routine under the words of what they will do wherever they go.
Sure enough, as soon as they arrived in Hong Kong, the reporter first invited a guide: a British Reuters correspondent in Hong Kong. From this set of techniques for creating discourse, we will find that firmly controlling the discourse power starts from strictly controlling the right of interpretation. To travel in Hong Kong, find a guide, do not find a Hong Kong person, and the right to interpret Hong Kong still has to be in the hands of the British. This is even more the case for their reports on mainland China. No matter what field, even in the purely technical field, such as archaeology, the final right of interpretation will not be handed over to Chinese experts. Recently, I saw a TV documentary about Chinese ancient civilization on France 5 TV. To be honest, it has been very positive (it's just that every time the camera returns to contemporary China, it always focuses on the poor and dirty corners). I have never seen such a thing before. It must be to answer the doubts of many French people about China's "sudden prosperity", because under long - term deception, China has been the epitome of poverty and backwardness. How did it become a rich master? So the purpose of this film is to admit that Chinese ancient civilization was still developed. But when talking about Chinese Shang, Zhou, and Qin dynasties, Chinese experts only have the right of interpretation for some specific archaeological details, and the overall right of interpretation is not handed over to the Japanese but transferred to the French.
The final impression is that although your ancient civilization is extraordinary, you are just like the Egyptians today or the Maya who have disappeared. The research and interpretation of Egyptian and Maya ancient civilizations still have to rely on us Westerners. This kind of domination is generally not seen by the Chinese people, because it is very skillful, but it is "dominated" to the root and "dominated" to the extreme. The freedom of the West is mostly controlled by this kind of "domination and tyranny". The exclusive right of interpretation is a very clever cover - up for Western - style dictatorship. This method of ensuring core power is a bit like hiding and protecting private behavior with public behavior standards. Democratic forms and freedom of speech are similar to public behavior rules. Everyone tries to abide by them, but they do not touch the core power. The tolerance, openness, sharing, transparency, relativity and rationality of the former do not affect the narrowness, closure, domination, concealment, absoluteness and irrationality of the latter at all. This extreme duality of Westerners' nature is almost completely extended to their system, which is also the reason why we have been kept in the dark for two hundred years when dealing with the West. So we look at people and only regard the individual's surface public behavior as the whole, look at society and only see the outside but not the inside, and even do not know the existence of the inside at all. Of course, this double - layer ruling model inside and outside is not feasible everywhere. It needs the historical tradition and social foundation that the people consciously靠拢 to the powerful right of interpretation.
Speaking of which, the British journalist who was entrusted with the great task of the right of interpretation really cooperated tacitly. He immediately set the framework for the documentary according to the "dividing formula", and also brought his Hong Kong girlfriend to support from the side. When the Hong Kong woman appeared, she was still called a Chinese by the Canadian reporter, but she was quite unhappy and specially emphasized that she was a Hong Kong person, not a Chinese. She probably did not know that this was just the performance of weak self - awareness in the eyes of Westerners. People always call themselves Hong Kong people to stab China in the back. In essence, they will not regard you as a person other than a Chinese (the fact that the UK refused to give British passports to Hong Kong people in 1997 is a clear proof). Deliberately creating the collective superiority of Hong Kong people (compared with mainland China) has a hidden sinister intention, just like the operation of creating collective superiority for Taiwan people, Tibetans, and Mongolians (the fact that the Japanese - invested film about Genghis Khan was nominated for the best foreign language film at the Oscars is within the plan, not for art at all, and every link, even cross - national, is well coordinated). Western various "international" media and cultural institutions are sparing no effort and material resources to do this long - lasting relay. If corresponding measures are not taken to stop this long - planned, never - stopping, and unremitting psychological secession war, defeat is only a matter of time.
In order to have moral reasons for their卑贱 behavior, this Hong Kong woman began to criticize the mainland more fiercely than her British lover, nothing more than the food being "poisonous" (specially emphasizing the food health in Hong Kong, as if the agricultural and sideline products in Hong Kong were not supplied by the mainland), the air being "poisonous" (as if the mainland and Hong Kong were not connected by mountains and waters), and product counterfeiting (forgetting that Hong Kong is a big source), etc., which have become the "chorus" of that kind of thing.
The more "elites" who are deeply embedded in the weaknesses of the Chinese people (weak self - awareness) are, the less distance they can maintain from the object of scrutiny (both inside and outside), so their vision is so narrow and their views are so extreme. The above - mentioned Hong Kong woman who thought she had joined the Western ranks only learned to step on her own people when learning "self - awareness", but did not really learn the self - awareness of Westerners. That kind of self - awareness takes the bond between the individual and the group as the thinking track. How could she speak ill of her own people in front of foreigners?
Under such secret attacks, strengthening self - awareness and collective superiority by oneself has become a self - defense and self - strengthening weapon as important as military self - defense. Two centuries of turmoil and chaos (external powerful countries dominating or side - guiding external suppression and internal consumption), this country has not only been hollowed out physically, but also the spirit has been sucked up. First - class thinkers have been marginalized, the superstructure has become a feast for third - and fourth - rate imitators. In addition, capitalization itself is to knock down the spiritual head of a civilization. Thirty years of family planning has also led to a sharp decrease in high - quality population, resulting in intellectual weakening and spiritual depression.
The traditional society constructs social groups by restraining personal desires. In the modern society with rampant self - interest, if self - awareness is not strengthened, there will be social chaos and materialism, making the inherently disorderly capital competition society more disorderly. Chinese society is at this critical juncture. The traditional moral education has collapsed. The already weak self - awareness has not only not been strengthened but also been lost with the falling traditional society. The most可怕 thing in a society without self - awareness self - discipline and moral decay is not social disorder, but that the superstructure lacks self - awareness, is swallowed up by the self - interest instinct, leading to the inversion of the selection mechanism, falling into a vicious circle, high - quality people being eliminated, the system gradually being occupied by incompetent scoundrels, responsibilities, principles, and precepts being a mere formality, loyalty being lost, and villains being in power.
External pressure plus internal hollowing out, the pace of civilization disintegration will accelerate. When the upper - class collective unconscious enters the folk subconscious level, no matter whether the aesthetic right and moral right are recovered or not, it is irreparable.
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Guo Jishi: The Hypocritical Brainwashing Behind the Western Praise of Malala 2013 - 07 - 19 15:55 Global Network 50 Font Size: TT
Article in Hong Kong's "Ming Pao" on July 19, original title: The Hypocritical Brainwashing Behind the Western Praise of Malala. Less than a week after the brave girl Malala went to the United Nations Headquarters to defend women's right to education last week, Rashid, a high - level member of the Pakistani Taliban, suddenly released a public letter to Malala, claiming to be shocked by her being shot and seriously injured last year, claiming that the Taliban does not oppose anyone, including girls, to receive education. Malala became the target of the Taliban gunman's attack because she promoted anti - Taliban smear propaganda, and also called on her to return to Pakistan to receive Islamic and Pashto cultural education in any Islamic girls' school.
Taliban public letter propaganda counterattack
As many comments pointed out, Rashid did not apologize in the letter at all. However, he claimed that he hoped the incident had never happened, which is probably the truth - because Malala survived the shooting, and instead became the most powerful propaganda weapon for Western governments and public opinion to strongly criticize the Pakistani Taliban. Rashid released the public letter, the object was not Malala herself, but to try to make a propaganda war counterattack for Muslims everywhere.
Malala's determination to defend women's right to education is worthy of praise and support from the world; the attack of radicals on children and educational facilities should also be strongly condemned. But behind the Western politicians, leaders and even the mainstream public opinion in praising Malala, is there also a hidden political water - pumping subtext?
Westerners choose to value the girl who volunteers to save the world
Assed Baig, a Pakistani columnist in the UK, recently talked about the hypocrisy behind the Western government and media in praising Malala. He mentioned another Iraqi girl who was rarely known by Western politicians and media - Abeer Qassim Hamza al - Janabi, who was only 14 years old when she died. In 2006, 5 US soldiers stationed in Iraq gang - raped her, and then killed her and her family, including her 6 - year - old sister. However, unlike Malala, there is no international anniversary named after her, the United Nations has never mentioned her, and former UK Prime Minister Brown has never vowed to do something for her like for Malala.
There is indeed a world of difference between the Western politicians' and public opinion's attention to Malala and their attitude towards the harm to women and children in Iraq and Afghanistan over the years, and even the current continuous drone bombing in Pakistan and other places to execute bombings and wantonly kill the innocent.
Behind this selective attention, there is indeed a set of brainwashing propaganda subtext: in order to save women and children and help girls like Malala, NATO and the US military should continue military operations in Pakistan and other places. Although the colonial era has long ended, the Western society still retains the white man's burden thinking of the 19th century (it is euphemistically called helping the people outside the colonies to move towards modern civilization, but actually it is to claim its own interests under the guise of morality). Malala's story just perfectly fits into this thinking - Malala fought against extreme Islam and was persecuted, and then was saved by Westerners as white knights, and得以 continue the educational struggle. Assed Baig's view that Malala's discourse has been hijacked by the Western white savior complex is not without reason.
"Cambridge History of Chinese Literature" is one of the series of national history of literature of Cambridge University Press. This series is divided into two volumes, upper and lower, with 1.375 million words each, respectively edited by Stephen Owen and Kang Yi. The authors include more than a dozen famous American sinologists, such as Martin Kern, David R. Knechtges, Xiaofei Tian, Stephen Owen, Ronald Egan, Michael Nylan, Shuen - fu Lin, Stephen H. West (upper volume); Kang Yi, Lily Xiao Hong Lee, Wei Shang, Wilt Idema, David Der - wei Wang, Michelle Yeh (lower volume), etc. The whole book introduces the development process of Chinese literature for three thousand years from the ancient oral literature, inscriptions on metal and stone to the eve of the founding of the People's Republic of China in 1949 in a chronological rather than literary form, and the stories about writing in Chinese culture - writing is not only a tool for national rule, but also a cultural medium outside the country. Each chapter presents different narrative features due to the different academic and expression styles of the authors.
In the process of writing "Cambridge History of Chinese Literature", the whole team has invested a lot of energy in translating the title and terms. Unfortunately, this part of efforts cannot be shown in the Chinese translation.
The Life·读书·新知三联书店 introduced and published the simplified Chinese version of "Cambridge History of Chinese Literature"
Borges once fictionalized a 19th - century writer named Pierre Menard, who rewrote Cervantes' famous work "Don Quixote" in a foreign language. "That is a technique of intentionally creating anachronisms and random attribution," Borges wrote.
A group of American sinologists practiced Borges' concept in a "relay race" of rewriting the history of Chinese literature. "Borges' 'Pierre Menard, Author of Don Quixote' walks with us all the way," Stephen Owen, one of the editors - in - chief and a professor at Harvard University, wrote in the preface to the upper volume of the "Cambridge History of Chinese Literature" (Cambridge History of Chinese Literature) that is about to be published in the mainland.
In this new history of literature positioned as a "history of literary culture", the more than a dozen American sinologists participating in the writing are all looking for the traces of the above - mentioned "Pierre Menard" and trying to make him visible. He is elusive, playing multiple roles, from the early inscriptions in the late 2nd millennium BC to the online literature in 2005 (the simplified Chinese version is up to the eve of the founding of the People's Republic of China in 1949), especially the literature before the popularization of printing. Kang Yi, a professor at Yale University, wrote the chapter "Literature in the Early and Middle Ming Dynasties", and "Pierre Menard" disguised as Li Kaixian, one of the "Eight Talents of the Jiajing Period".
Just as Pierre Menard rewrote "Don Quixote" with excitement, this history of literature written by an all - star team is full of passion and boldness, exploration and insight, and also breaks many historical views that are difficult to break away from due to deep - rooted accumulation in the traditional Chinese history and culture. It can make us re - examine the civilization forged by Chinese characters, and let us start from each text.
All American scholars
Stephen Owen, Martin Kern, David Der - wei Wang, Shang Wei... These people get together and run a relay race.
Does the "Pierre Menard rule" apply to the history of Chinese literature for thousands of years?
"In the past, the history of literature only told us that 'The Orchid Pavilion Rain' and 'The Palace of Han Autumn' are Yuan operas. But few people know that their final versions were not in the Yuan Dynasty. Until the Ming Dynasty in the 16th century, Li Kaixian rewrote them into the current form. We should give Li Kaixian a great credit." Kang Yi told reporters that the history of Chinese literature is actually a continuous rewriting of the past.
From the interpretation of "The Book of Songs" to the shaping of Qu Yuan's image, from Su Shi's rewriting of Tao Qian's poetry to the afterlife of Du Fu, the power of "Pierre Menard" is very great. He preserves and combines texts according to his own interests and value orientations, and also reshapes the texts of predecessors according to his own concepts.
But in the previous framework of the history of Chinese literature, it is very difficult to find the trace of "Pierre Menard". Jiang Yin, a researcher at the Institute of Literature, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences and director of the Ancient Literature Research Office, believes that this is closely related to the way of seeing problems between China and the West. "In the past, when we studied literature, we would accept literary works as established facts, and works are the creations of writers." But Western sinologists pay more attention to the concept of text. A past text has been passed down to the present, and has gone through a series of complex intermediary processes, "and the relationship with the author has also become less certain."
At the end of this month, "Cambridge History of Chinese Literature" co - edited by Stephen Owen and Kang Yi will be introduced and published by the Life·读书·新知三联书店. The origin can be traced back to ten years ago.
On October 2003, Sun Kangyi received an email from Linda Bree, the general editor of the "Cambridge History of Literature" series of Cambridge University Press, hoping that she could host the writing of a "single - volume, best - selling - looking Cambridge History of Chinese Literature". Before that, three national history of literature had been published in this series, namely "Cambridge History of Russian Literature" (1989), "Cambridge History of Italian Literature" (1996) and "Cambridge History of German Literature" (1997), all of which were warmly welcomed by readers.
"Is it possible to rewrite the history of literature, especially the history of Chinese literature?" Sun Kangyi told reporters that her mood was very complicated after receiving the letter. On the one hand, the "Cambridge History of China" that had been planned since 1966 had gone through half a century of writing and had formed a complete series of more than a dozen volumes, but there had never been a "Cambridge History of Chinese Literature"; on the other hand, what excited her was that the "Cambridge History of Literature" divides the history of literature by age. In her impression, whether it is Wang Guowei's "History of Yuan Operas" or Lu Xun's "History of Chinese Novels", the classic history of literature is still based on literary genres. In the European and American sinology circles, there is also only the concept of Chinese poetry history, Chinese ci poetry history, Chinese novel history, Chinese drama history, and there is a lack of a comprehensive history of literature thinking. "Even the way American universities hire literature professors is based on literary genres. Although I study a very wide range of fields, the tag of my position is 'classical poetry'." Sun Kangyi is the first Malcolm G. Chace '56 Professor of East Asian Languages and Literature at Yale University, and her main research fields are Chinese classical literature, lyrical poetry, gender studies, etc. She is worried that once sinologists get used to specializing in a certain literary genre, they will ignore other literary genres of the same era. Moreover, the volume of the history of Chinese literature is much larger than that of Russia, Germany and Italy, and a single - volume book may not be able to accommodate it.
Sun Kangyi
Unexpectedly, the publisher replied that it was willing to make an exception for the history of Chinese literature alone, not limited to a single volume. The project is huge, and Sun Kangyi began to invite friends of sinologists in the United States. What she did not expect was that within two days of sending the invitation email, top scholars including Stephen Owen, Martin Kern, David Der - wei Wang, and Shang Wei all readily agreed.
"We really need such a book very much." When talking about the motivation for participating, Martin Kern, the director of the Department of East Asian Studies at Princeton University, recalled that in 2001, Columbia University Press had published a "Columbia History of Chinese Literature", but this history of literature based on literary genres rather than age was pieced together by 40 to 50 small articles. "There is no connection between the articles, and it also does not reflect the historical narrative." Martin Kern wrote a book review specifically for this, and severely criticized the "collection of papers" - style history of literature.
In view of this, Sun Kangyi hopes that readers can read "Cambridge History of Chinese Literature" from the beginning to the end like reading a novel, driven by interest. Her definition of the reader group is also - ordinary but with a certain amount of knowledge, and hopes that this book will become an undergraduate textbook for East Asian history and literature courses in the Western world.
Finally, Sun Kangyi gathered 17 American sinologists to participate in the compilation. So, an old European university press has gathered a team of "all - American" university professors. Martin Kern explained that this just illustrates the current situation of Western sinology. Although he obtained a doctorate in sinology at the University of Cologne in Germany, there are almost no scholars in Europe who study ancient Chinese literature. The only young professor who does classical literature research at the University of Frankfurt in Germany is also a student he taught at Princeton. And in the research of unearthed documents, European sinology is stronger. "Especially in Germany, it has obvious advantages in philology. This is because the climax of the German humanistic tradition is philology."
Sun Kangyi said that she had also considered her old friend Gu Bin, "but he is writing a history of Chinese literature in German and is fully occupied, so he has no time to help me." As for the well - known Swedish sinologist Lothar von Falkenhausen, Sun Kangyi considered that he was not interested in writing the history of literature, so she did not invite him. "It's not a matter of the difference between Europe and America, but whether these people are suitable to get together and run a relay race."
Breaking the division by dynasties
Martin Kern insisted that "early Chinese texts" should be written until the Western Han Dynasty, and David Der - wei Wang redefined the beginning of "modern".
Since it is a relay race, the把握 of the rhythm of the start, transition and conclusion, and where each author takes over, has become the top priority.
David Der - wei Wang
Regarding the periodization of the history of literature writing, Sun Kangyi frankly said that although every scholar who studies Chinese literature knows that the dynasty periodization method cannot fully describe the changes in the history of literature, it is deeply rooted and most current history of literature still uses this approach.
There are also examples of breaking the division by dynasties. For example, the "History of Chinese Literature" edited by Yuan Xingpei, a professor at Peking University, which is widely used in domestic universities, is based on the "three ancient seven periods" theory (that is, dividing the history of Chinese literature into the ancient period, the middle ancient period, and the near ancient period, and within the "three ancient", it can be further divided into seven periods).
But "Cambridge History of Chinese Literature" is more thorough. Martin Kern, who was first invited to write the first chapter, clearly told Sun Kangyi in the first reply that the premise of "joining the team" is that the "early Chinese literature" he is responsible for must include the Western Han Dynasty, otherwise he would rather not write it. In his opinion, the so - called "early Chinese texts" were actually formed in the process of "canonization" in the late Western Han Dynasty. Before that, there was not even the concept of "book" and "author". Martin Kern also pointed out from the perspective of textual research that the so - called culprit for the interruption of the spread of early texts - Emperor Qin Shihuang's "Burning Books and Burying Scholars" is just a traditional saying that "is conducive to constructing the identity of Confucian scholars". On the contrary, there was no change in the inheritance of classical learning before and after the so - called "Burning Books".
Sun Kangyi originally planned to use 1400 as the watershed between the upper and lower volumes. Because "in the 'Cambridge History of Literature' series, the already published histories of Russian, German and Italian literature are mostly from around 1400. And in the UK, this year the famous Chaucer died, and Boccaccio's 'The Decameron' also appeared almost at the same time." But when it came to 1400 in China, she realized that deliberately pursuing this series "starting line" of 1400 was not faithful to history, "it is equivalent to cutting off Zhu Yuanzhang's waist." Finally, the lower volume chose 1375 (the founding year of the Ming Dynasty was 1368) as the starting point, with the reason that "in this year, Zhu Yuanzhang executed the poet Gao Qi, and started the Hongwu period with strict literary prohibitions and cruel executions. The generation of literati left over from the Yuan Dynasty was basically eliminated."
David Der - wei Wang, a famous contemporary history of literature scholar and a professor at Harvard University, redefined the beginning of "modern". He did not take the May 4th Movement as the beginning of Chinese modernity, nor did he use 1840, but chose the special year of 1841. In the midsummer of this year, the scholar and poet Gong Zizhen died suddenly in Dangyang Academy in Jiangsu. In David Der - wei Wang's words, "This chapter does not intend to regard the May 4th Literary Revolution and its subsequent events as a one - way linear development, but to focus on regarding the modernity of Chinese literature as a long and tortuous process, and to trace its beginning back to the middle of the 19th century."
For the interception and amplification of the above - mentioned historical details, Sun Kangyi believes that this makes the narrative of the history of literature more dramatic, just like the close - up shots of a movie. She told Nan Du that Harvard University has started to plan a set of history of literature recently, and David Der - wei Wang, who is responsible for the modern history of Chinese literature, is using this method to design. Sun Kangyi was also invited to write the sub - volume of the history of literature in the "white terror" period in Taiwan, "starting with the 'February 28 Incident' at the beginning, the scene of the National Government sending troops to massacre the people in Taiwan."
A personalized history of literature
The foundation of deconstructionism, the writing of literary culture history, the argumentation of the history of literature...
This year, Sun Kangyi has been teaching at Yale for the 32nd year. In 1982, when she arrived at Yale, Stephen Owen, who had been teaching at Yale for 10 years, had just transferred to Harvard. In the 1980s, under the influence of Derrida's讲学 in the United States, deconstructionism replaced the dominance of the New Criticism, and Yale became an important town of deconstructionist literary criticism in the United States. Sun Kangyi said that including Harold Bloom, the "four gangsters of Yale" of deconstructionism were all teachers of Stephen Owen, so "Stephen Owen has been a 'product of Yale' from going to school to getting a doctorate and teaching." And when Sun Kangyi "defected" from the structuralist camp at Princeton University to Yale, she was unconsciously influenced by deconstructionism - literature is no longer a closed structure of "reader" and "author".
Different from Harold Bloom's emphasis on canonization including individual writers, in "Cambridge History of Chinese Literature", Sun Kangyi pays more attention to a tendency or trend, such as paying more attention to how the past literature was filtered and reconstructed by later generations.
In 2008, Stephen Owen published the article "History in History" in "Reading" magazine, focusing on analyzing the historical view of "Cambridge History of Chinese Literature": a history of literary culture, which not only emphasizes the historicity of the text, but also the textuality of history.
In order to explain this somewhat convoluted judgment that "authors and readers write and read in the imaginary history of literature narrative that is indispensable for writing and reading", Stephen Owen made a scenario assumption: if you find that a certain Tang poem was actually written in the Ming Dynasty, or a certain sonnet of the Elizabethan era was written in the 1930s, you will feel deceived. "The poem itself has not changed, but the way you understand the poem has changed."
After reading this article, Jiang Yin, a researcher at the Institute of Literature, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences and director of the Ancient Literature Research Office, was very inspired and recommended it to the students in the Ancient Literature Research Office of the Institute of Literature, Chinese Academy of Social Sciences. "Western sinologists are very concerned about the process of text generation, the so - called historical text of the text itself. But in China, especially in the field of classical literature research, we accept literary works as established facts. Literary works are the creations of writers, just like a chicken laying an egg."
Jiang Yin explained to reporters that behind the different expressions of "literary works" and "texts" is the different position of the Chinese and Western academic circles in understanding historical phenomena. Domestic scholars often base their view of their own history or literary knowledge on the deeply ingrained understanding accumulated over many years. For example, when it comes to Qu Yuan, one will naturally think of the "Biography of Qu Yuan" in "Records of the Historian" and the narrative in Jia Yi's "Lament for Qu Yuan". "According to the way of writing history or writing history by people of the same country, we will be convinced that such things cannot be fictional."
In Martin Kern's analysis, Qu Yuan is "the prototype of a poet driven by unbearable despair". And "Li Sao" "from the very beginning, has been regarded as the tragic biography of the supposed author Qu Yuan. Since Jia Yi's 'Lament for Qu Yuan', this text has been regarded as an elegy for the talented people who are ignored and exiled. During the Han Dynasty, Liu An, Sima Qian, Liu Xiang, Yang Xiong, Liang Song, Ban Gu, Wang Yi and others all contributed to this interpretation."
Regarding the uncertainty of historical knowledge contained in "history of literary culture", Sun Kangyi emphasized that because the initial reader group is English readers, this approach is completely in line with Westerners' cognition. On the other hand, she believes that the rejection of uncertainty by Chinese audiences is related to "euhemerization" (myth historicization). "Chinese people like to elevate 'fictional' things to 'history' - for example, the 'historical' stories of Yao, Shun and Yu. It seems that certainty finds a sense of security. So some sinologists think that Chinese civilization is the most standard example of 'euhemerization'." Sun Kangyi is also very clear about the weakness of "history of literary culture". This doctrine emphasizes the narrative with theoretical color and loses the fun of literature mainly for appreciation.
Although unified under the general framework of "history of literary culture", "Cambridge History of Chinese Literature" is after all a narrative history of literature, and the style differences of each author are relatively large. In Jiang Yin's view, the two chapters "Eastern Han to Western Jin (25 - 317)" by David R. Knechtges and "From the Eastern Jin to the Early Tang Dynasty (317 - 649)" by Xiaofei Tian are more in line with the general writing of the history of literature, with the purpose of providing readers with complete and reliable knowledge. And the "early Chinese literature" chapter by Martin Kern is much beyond the general common sense knowledge, and the writing is more like a history of literature theory. "Strictly speaking, the history of literature is narrative, and it is the accepted and recognized knowledge, so it does not need to be argued. But a personalized history of literature must need argumentation."
About the periodization of early Chinese literature (narrated by Martin Kern)
In "Cambridge History of Chinese Literature", we do not say "pre - Qin and Han dynasties". The Han Dynasty is of course a traditional concept, but I think the Western Han Dynasty and the Eastern Han Dynasty are very different, so the periodization of this chapter is from the Shang Dynasty to the late Western Han Dynasty. This periodization is my research experience for more than ten years.
In 1996, I obtained a doctorate in sinology at the University of Cologne, and the next year I went to the United States to start researching the Western Han Dynasty. I found that "wen" in early China means "writing as culture". Originally, it referred to "patterns" of various forms in nature and human activities. Before the imperial period, "wen" was not only used to refer to "articles", but also widely used to refer to "cultural achievements", especially to refer to "patterns" in ceremonial manners, ceremonial performances, including music and material decoration. It was not until the late Western Han Dynasty that "wen" was mainly used to refer to "writing". This change is not only in the change of word meaning: it symbolizes the overall migration of the cultural core from ceremonial to textual expression, which leads to the emergence of the cultural history of written texts, and at the same time, the emergence of institutions that maintain this written text, the most important of which is the imperial bureaucratic system and the civil service examination system. Interestingly, several sinologists in different fields used their own specialties and materials to reach the same conclusion.
In the late Western Han Dynasty, Emperor Cheng of the Han Dynasty asked Liu Xiang to sort out and collate the court collections and compile the royal library catalog "Bielu". Around 6 BC, his son Liu Xin abbreviated and revised "Bielu" into "Qilue"; at the end of the 1st century AD, Ban Gu further abbreviated "Qilue" into "Artificial Annals·Bureau of Education". "Bielu" is by no means an objective and complete record. It is absolutely a selective and standardized perspective on the text heritage. Because according to all the unearthed documents from the Warring States Period, about 90% have no corresponding传世 copies, only a few works are related to "Artificial Annals·Bureau of Education".
About "Burning Books and Burying Scholars"
I specially wrote a book "Qin Shihuang's Inscriptions - Texts and Meanings in the Representation of the Early Chinese Empire", which was published in 2000. At that time, I checked all the materials about "Burning Books and Burying Scholars" and found that this was a statement of the Eastern Han Dynasty. Before Sima Qian's "Records of the Historian", no document mentioned this incident; before Wei Hong's "Preface to 'Book of Documents'" (lost) in the 1st century AD, no document thought that Confucian scholars were the victims of this incident. As far as is known, the earliest condemnation of brutal Qin and "Burning Books and Burying Scholars" comes from the forged Kong Anguo version of "Book of Documents" that appeared in 317. Second, various early documents all record that the Qin court appointed "doctors" to study classics. In 213 BC, doctors were allowed to monopolize the research and teaching of classics, and perhaps also to compile classics; in addition, these doctors also participated in formulating the empire's rituals and writing inscriptions. It was said that it was two "alchemists" who angered Emperor Qin Shihuang and caused him to kill a large number of people. There is no evidence that famous and famous Confucian scholars were killed in the Qin Dynasty. Third, the official documents written in the Qin and early Western Han dynasties frequently quoted "Shi" and "Shu". It can be seen that these classic texts were easily available in the court, and from the situation of the reference of classics in unearthed documents, there was no change in the inheritance of classic learning before and after the so - called "Burning Books".
"Why is it difficult to write 'early Chinese literature'"
All our texts are texts from the Han Dynasty. If there were no academic activities in the late Western Han Dynasty, especially Liu Xiang, Liu Xin, Yang Xiong, etc., we might not have these "pre - Qin texts". For example, to write "The Book of Songs" of the Zhou Dynasty, but in fact, our materials about "The Book of Songs" of the Zhou Dynasty are not much, and our "The Book of Songs" is "Maoshi", which is a text of a certain interpretation of "The Book of Songs". If there were no annotation of "The Book of Songs" by "Maoshi" on the interpretation of characters, it would be difficult to understand "Guofeng". So the biggest problem in writing this article is: on the one hand, I want to write a continuous and historical history of literature with development and process, and there is a logical order of time in it. But at the same time, we should also be aware that we cannot do the above - mentioned point, because the understanding of the original form has been affected by later generations, so we cannot directly write a line from early to late, which is a fantasy. We should understand that including unearthed documents, like Shangbo, Guodian, etc., which are texts around 300 BC, are not the original forms of these texts, so I often talk about the front from the back. The whole structure of my article also has this reason, and the difficulty is here.
Appendix: Table of Contents of "Cambridge History of Chinese Literature" (Upper Volume)
Contents of this volume
Chapter 1 Early Chinese Literature: Beginning to the Western Han Dynasty Martin Kern
Chapter 2 Eastern Han to Western Jin (25 - 317) David R. Knechtges
Chapter 3 From the Eastern Jin to the Early Tang Dynasty (317 - 649) Xiaofei Tian
Chapter 4 Cultural Tang Dynasty (650 - 1020) Stephen Owen
Chapter 5 Northern Song Dynasty (1020 - 1126) Ronald Egan
Chapter 6 North and South: The 12th and 13th Centuries Michael Nylan, Shuen - fu Lin
Chapter 7 Literature from the End of the Jin Dynasty to the Early Ming Dynasty: About 1230 - About 1375 Stephen H. West
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