【现当代文学史论文】《TrendsinFictionovertheLastTwoDecades》.docVIP

Trends In Fiction over the Last Two Decades Ding Fan and He Yanhong I Critics use“conflict between civilization and the savage.” discovery and recasting of the national soul，”anti- faudalism，” humanism，” etc.，to describe the main literary currents of the first decade of the New Period. By these labels they refer to such trends asScars，”“Introspection，” “Reform and“Roots.”We can actually putthem all under one single heading，“Enlightenment，”considering theprevalence of the enlightenment ethos in the 1980s. In fact，all the fourfictional trends from“Scars”to“Roots”were very well attuned tointellectual liberalism and concern for rationality，democracy andhumanism. In general，the journey from“Scars”through“Introspection”toReform mirrored the process of this intellectual enlightenment. The first two trends kept pace with the political setbacks from or crusadeagainst the Leftextremism of the cultural revolution，” which served thepurpose of legitimizing the New Period. This provided the basic narrative for the Scars and Introspection fictions. Political and ideological strugglemade their way stealthy into the narrative model of many such fictions. The scars were invariably caused by the wrong policies enacted duringthe揷ultural revolution攐n education and agriculturede，and by thepersecution against senior officials and the intelligentsia. Examplesinclude the distorted souls of Me Huimin and Song Baoqi in“The Class Advisor,”sufferings of peasants in“Xu Mao and His Daughters，”the morbid psyche of Wu Zhongyi in“Oh!”by Feng Jicai and the“Tenth Bullet Hole of Cong Weixi. In fact，A General in a Small Town，”Xu Mao and His Daughters，”Red Magnolia in Jail and A Byway Covered by Flowers dealt directly with the political struggle of the day. TheIntrospection school that came in the wake of Scar fiction features a wider intellectual vision in addition to