Time Line Group

This dissertation is a description of the living status of the characters in the Chinese literary works of the 20th century, with time as the focus and the traditional individual feeling and the social sense of time as its background.The sentiment of the passing of time is an everlasting theme in the works of Ancient Chinese literature by the men of letters in the face of the uncertainty and ruthlessness of time. In ancient China, people tried to surpass time with either the eternal realm of heaven and earth created by Confucianism, Buddhism and Taoism, or the Taoist immortal world of supernatural beings. However, the social sense of time in Chinese tradition is cyclical. These two different senses of time held by the individuals and the society have remained in a parallel and relatively independent status.In the 20th century, this undergoes a thorough change. To be specific, the traditional eternal sense of time is replaced by a linear sense of history and a progressive and evolutive view of history. This view, originally from the West, believes that history is integrated, continuous, progressive and evolutive, with the purpose of time standing at the end of history. This myth of future time is not only the dominant social sense of time, but also a source of value and significance of the individuals. As a result, individual time is required to be strictly integrated into the social time of history. Otherwise, people will find itself in a very dangerous situation. Not only realism and the socialist realism are the products of this linear sense of time and the progressive and evolutive view of history, but the main part of the Chinese literature of the 20th century has also evolved from this myth of future time.In the new era, the law of historical development and the ultimate purpose of history are questioned, putting the progress of history in an aimless situation. People, thus, are suddenly thrown into darkness and vanity, deeply caught by time as the source of pain. In the Chinese literature of the 20th century, the ways people tried to break away from the unbearable hold of time are various, including numbing time, transferring time, fighting time, blocking time, anchoring time, breaking time, shielding time, recalling time, boxing time, ridiculing time and destroying time.Pressured by the vanity of time, some have been forced to go back to the traditional eternalness, seeking a shelter from the interruption and torture of vanity. This world of eternalness contains the world of love, the world of beauty, the world of religion and the world of Tao. In addition, people opened up a timeless virtual world from the computer networks after 1990s.Anyway, the sense of time experienced an unprecedented great change in the 20th century, and, at the same time, the feeling and sensing of time in the Chinese literary works are also very rich and complicated. This, in a way, decides people's personality and spirit and reflects the living status of the people of the time.This article also explores the possible ways to deal with the crisis of survival related to time.