1977-1984: The Discourse Rebuilding At The Beginning Of New Times Literature

The changes of discourse pattern and the constant occurring of discourse conflict constructed the basic feature of the literature at the begging of New Times (1977-1984). Along with the ending of Cultural Revolution,"Cultural Revolution Discourse"characterized by narrating everything with"class/revolution"has been negated by the history, while discourse of enlightenment characterized by"Humanity","Humanism"and"Subjectivity", etc. generated and went invariably from strength to strength gradually, and further it constructed two major discourse forces in discourse pattern together with the mainstream ideology discourses at the beginning of New Times. However, the recovery, development and growth of enlightening discourse is not a smooth sailing. It faced the specifying and pressing, in a way, from mainstream ideology discourse, a discourse of superiority at that time. As a result, confliction and collision happened from time to time between the enlightening discourse and mainstream ideology discourse. Such confliction and collision constructed the focus in the course of discourse rebuilding at the beginning of New Times. The existence of conscious scale and standpoint of mainstream ideology discourse made New Times Literature still face the"Taboo area"and standards problems in a way. So, all these made the social and cultural ideological trend reflect a pattern that is mixed and interlaced with both new and old in those years at the beginning of New Times. In one hand, the deepening of reflection on the tragedy of history and cultural critique enabled the enlightenment idea sink so deep into the hearts of the people more and more, that enlightening discourse slipped the leash day by day, and showed its unique thought value and thought energy; in the other hand, the discourse standards of mainstream ideology limited the development of this trend, and in some range, still kept considerable discourse influence. Additionally, due to the restriction and"reformation"of ideology for long term, the mode of discourse of many writers still showed their inner link and thought tangle with the mainstream ideology discourse. This further caused the literary creation at the beginning of New Times showing an inner link with the past times.What this article intends to expound and analyze is that the transformation and reconstruction of literary discourse in this discourse times that the new and the old interlaced. For this topic, the following questions are to be discussed. Firstly, the historical narrative is the first problem that we meet during the discussion to the discourse relationship and pattern. The historical standpoint of the mainstream ideology discourse and enlightening discourse is the core of this problem. Secondly, it is very important to discuss the discourse"standards"and"boundary"confirmed by the ideology discourse and to analyze how these two discourses acted out conversation and diced game around such discourse"standards"and"boundary", which constructs the most important study content. Thirdly, it is necessary to discuss the subject questions of the writers. We may survey the problems faced by different writers and creative groups in respect of the discourse resource occupation and discourse tradition inheriting through the special historical background at the beginning of New Times, and we can also look into how the mainstream ideology discourse protected and occupied"legal"discourse resources through analyzing this discourse limitation. In addition, the theoretical thinking is closely related to current state of mind. In a way, the research in this article is the respond and answer to the current questions in mind. Since 1990s, rethinking or reflection to the literature enlightenment and Chinese revolution has been the focus that the ideological and literary circle had been arguing about. Such argument also generated many valuable research results. But, in the rethinking or reflection to the revolution and enlightenment brought so many prejudiced viewpoints and many unworthy mistaken ideas appeared. In fact, some of current social questions in mind originated from a light touch and discourse restriction while solving historical problems at the beginning of New Times. Therefore, in my opinion, a deep dissection to the literary and historical problems in that social transformation period is helpful to see clearly the confusing questions in mind in the context of culture in current transformation period. This is my practical thinking that I raise this research subject.Additionally, the purpose of this article is to review some concepts of literary history that have shown their limitations. Since 1980s, many researchers passed judgment on the literature confining to the enlightenment standpoint or standing at the point of mainstream ideology. They lacked the thinking to the discourse relationship, so, apparently, their judgments on many works or compositions are not accurate now. Besides, the relationship between literary creation, criticism and literary standards has not been cleared up. This is another subject that needs to be reviewed. Therefore, after a distancing from the literature at the beginning of New Times, we may survey better the discourse tangle and standards of those times. Before the end of 1980s, the researchers used to associating their research to the discourse rebuilding and discourse relationship at the beginning of New Times with the analysis to the main trend of literary history of New Times, while seldom expounded difficulties by using of the theory of discourse, in which, the researcher used to affirming In the analysis to the historical value of enlightening discourse such as"Scar",""Reflection","Novel"and"Humanism"through reflecting the"New Times literature"and qualifying the"modern"main trend. Since 1990, along with the transformation of historical and literary discourses, the thinking on the New Times Literature and enlightenment problems became much deeply, many valuable results are gained during the research on the creation confliction and creation limitation of writers, as well as the relationship between literature and social and political ideology at the beginning of New Times. However, the research on the discourse relationship and reconstruction of New Times Literature seems thin and weak. I would like to do my bit for the thinking on this problem with this article.In respect of practical research method, this article is affected by the research idea of textuality of history of postmodernism historical narratology. And this article intends to use this research method to carry out discussion on New Times Literature. As it should be, the writing of this article also, aiming at questioning and challenging to the enlightening discourse happened after 1990s, shows my private opinion that the historic construction of enlightening discourse has not been completed finally; if we accept the idea that there is repression mechanism from the historic landscape of pre-modern still obtaining in current society and the state of mind in China, then we can neither neglect the historic value and practical significance, nor pronounce the ending of enlightenment with our historicism perspective. On the contrary, to reality, the enlightenment is not a sun at dust near its end. It has a long way to go.