A Comparative Study Of Confession Consciousness On Rousseau’s LES Confessions And Ba Jin’s Capriccio On My Past

This paper chooses two reminiscences as the object of the analysis. One is les confessions written by Rousseau, the French enlightenment writer, the other is Capriccio on My Past written by Ba Jin, the famous Chinese novelist. With the aspect and approach of the influence study in comparative literature, this paper will first generally compare the "Guilt Culture" belonging to the western culture and the "Shame Culture" belonging to the eastern culture, both of which are the thought foundations of two cultures. Then, the similarities and differences of the two works are compared in detail and the accepting relation between these two works is further studied. Finally, this paper gives an objective and fair evaluation about the status of Ba Jin’s Capriccio on My Past in the history of Chinese modern literature.The nature of confession is thoroughly rectifying one’s faults by feeling regretful about one’s past mistakes. What filled in confession is absolutely unbearable misery and extraordinary courage, for that revealing all of one’s weaknesses to the public is not easy at all.Westerners reflect on themselves by confession every day, because they have been living in the cultural environment based on Christianity which contains deep sense of guilt for hundreds of years. On the contrary, people in the east have a long history of "Shame culture" based on the Confucian culture, which makes them less conscious in expiationThrough Les Confessions, Rousseau exposes his immoral behavior, lust for erotic desire and his most ugly aspect, which astonishes the whole world. As an eastern writer influenced by Rousseau, Ba Jin’s sense of confession rarely seen in eastern world is relevant with his experience of studying in France. It deserves the compliment that Ba Jin not only reflects on his past mistakes in his mind, but also reveals them to people all over China, even the rest of the world. In his writing, he dissects his weakness, reflects on them and confesses like taking himself a surgery. All these make up the irreplaceable precious spiritual heritage to the offspring— Capriccio on My Past. The true voice deep down in Ba Jin’s heart can be heard in his Capriccio on My Past. His confession is not only a self perfection aiming at a personal inner peace, but also a confession of a time and a nation. Socrates has ever said, "Everyone is stupid, but no one knows it. " However, Rousseau and Ba Jin know themselves very well and dare to confess all the faults and weaknesses. In the daily life, we should also avoid the arrogance and impetuosity, thinking of what the shame exactly is, and always reflect on ourselves and confess.In a word, Ba Jin’s Capriccio on My Past is deeply influenced by Rousseau’s Les Confessions, and it can be named as "Les Confessions in Chinese"...