Imagining Peasants

The relationship between contemporary literature in China and Chinese politics hadintertwisted each other anfractuously since the birthday of contemporary novels in China.The origin and development of contemporary literature was related closely to themodernization process of country China. Because Chinese peasants were main body ofChinese population being in the majority, the modernization of country China could not steerclear of peasants and were full of imagination and construction when it was exhibitedaesthetically through literature.1840 was the dividing point between traditional Chinese history and latter-day history.China after 1840 had been in modern historical process of turning from traditionalagricultural society to modern industrial society. Prophetic intellects began to think of themodernization of country China. In 1895, Yan Fu talked of the obscurant and enslaving reignto peasants since dynasty of Qin in Chinese feudal society and pointed out straight from theshoulder that peasants had been enslaved and governed for about a thousand years andtherefore turned to have slavish consciousness from inside mind. Therefore, Yan Fuproposed the famous "Three-Civilian" theory: "to arouse civilian power", "to unseal civilianwisdom" and "to renew civilian virtue". "Three-Civilian" theory was the first ideaisticcognition and spiritual scan of Chinese peasants from a kind of modernistic consciousnesssince late Qing-dynasty, and it was also the origin of thoughts of imagining Chinese peasantsof Liang Qichao, Chen Duxiu, Zhou Zuoren and Lu Xun et al. Liang Qichao succeeded toYan Fu's thoughts and developed it. He suggested the modernistic thoughts-enlightenedroute of "renewing civilian" with novels developed as the idea of "literature of human"during the period of Wu Si New Cultural Movement and therefore forming the modernisticorigin of thoughts of contemporary literature imagining Chinese peasants.Contemporary literature in China depicted imaginatively peasants, a historical mainbody of Chinese revolution, by the way of aesthetics, shaped all sorts of peasant figures andparticipated directly in the historical process of modernization of country China. Peasantfigures became the largest figures' group of productions of Chinese contemporary literaturein 20 century from the new literature starting from 1917 to liberation.Because contemporary literature in China shaped a large peasant figures' group whileresearchers' studies on this group still existed holistic default and shortage, this dissertationselected peasant figures as a cut-in point and basic unit to study relationship between themodernization of country China and contemporary literature. This was a kind of researchusing "China" as a visual angle and method and was a holistic research on peasant figures ofcontemporary literature in China in the sense of noumenon. Therefore, based on theperspective of ideaistic cognition of different cultural and political forces for county Chinaand Chinese peasants, this dissertation unscrambled the left-wing writers such as Lu Xun,Shen Congwen, Mao Dun et al., writers' group in the Northeast, writers in the liberated areasuch as Zhao Shuli and so on, explored idea of the modernization of country China ofmodern writers, views on peasants and ideaistic relationships among peasant figures incontemporary literature, studied the ideaistic root underlying different peasant figures andtheir intrinsic spiritual links, and exhibited the hard awakening course of peasants' thoughtsand consciousness during the historical process of the modernization of country China.Many different peasant figures in Chinese contemporary literature rooted in modern writers'different ideaistic cognition and aesthetic imagination of country China and peasants.Peasant figures were ligaments and bridges between contemporary literature and themodernization of country China and were Chinese intellects' ideal construction andrevolutionary rebuilding of modern main body, which embodied Chinese intellects'recognition, understanding, and choice for the road to the modernization of country China.Peasant figures were not only the aesthetic and artistic crystal on the exploring road to themodernization of country China, but also by itself a kind of important revolutionary resourceand cultural force of participating in constructing the modernization of country China.Peasant figures in contemporary literature brought forth the narrative characteristics ofmodernistic "country China" of Chinese contemporary literature, which was a importantcharacteristic of Chinese contemporary literature' modernity, i.e. all sorts of peasant figuresin contemporary literature were central content of aesthetic narration of the modernization ofcountry China and one of unique features that contemporary literature in China held. Themodernization of country China and Chinese peasants, contemporary literature in China andpeasant figures had an isomorphic relationship reflected in each other, forming an interactinglinks. So, studying peasant figures were an important way to explore the modernization ofcountry China and contemporary literature's modernity.Furthermore, this dissertation also absorbed the newest theoretical results of currentresearches on peasants and country's modernization home and overseas, reflected on thethought limits of Chinese modern intellects' cognition of country China and peasants andaesthetic and imaginary peasant figures, further reviewed and scanned the different choicesduring historical course of modernization of country China, opened out the relationshipbetween peasant figures in Chinese contemporary literature and modernization of countryChina, and analyzed limits and shortcomings of contemporary literature's peasant figures.