Bo Yang’s Essays On Criticism Of Chinese Traditional Culture

Bo Yang’s given name is Guo Ding Sheng. He is a famous Taiwanese writer. His works can be subdivided over 3 decades, comprising 10 years novel writings,10 years short essay writings and 10 years historical writings. Despite he started off as a novelist, his works in short essay writings are much more outstanding. He is quite an influential character in the 60s Taiwan and his works have inspired numerous readers. He is also the first Taiwanese writer that received the admiration of million worldwide readers. His style of writing is using humor to touch on issues that are controversial in nature and this angered the Guo Min Dang government. He translated the comic "Da Li Shui Shou" in 1968, and interpreted "fellows" as "fellow soldiers and countrymen" which became the cause of his imprisonment. After his released from prison, he continue his essay writings and soon he begin to translate "Zi Zhi Tong Jian", a Chinese historial record.Bo Yang flew to United States in September 1984 to give a talk in the University of Iowa, on the topic "Chou Lou De Zhong Guo Ren" meaning the ugly Chineseo He criticized Chinese bad cultures such as "Zang, Luan, Chao" (dirty, messy and noisy), "Wo Li Dou" (fight among themselves) and other bad habits. Later Taiwan Lin Bai publishing company published "Chou Lou De Zhong Guo Ren" in August 1985. This book comprises of 3 speeches,1 interview report, a compilation of 30 former essay writings into 1 essay entitled "Lao Hun Bing Da Zhan" and 20 readers’articles.This PhD dissertation focuses on Bo Yang’s essay writings on criticism of Chinese traditional culture. Owing to the publication of "Bo Yang Quan Ji", readers can have more complete views on Bo Yang’s philosophy. This research paper focuses mainly on Bo Yang’s complete essay writings as documented in "Bo Yang Quan Ji", and to analyze systematically how Bo Yang’s essays criticized Chinese traditional culture. As calculated, there are 845 essays written by Bo Yang. Through reading the text in depth and also read articles from scholars ’critics about Bo Yang. We are thus able to examine the values of Bo Yang’s essays and its impact on contemporary society.Chapter 1:The study of Bo Yang and his works started in the late 1990s. The Centre for Asian Studies under the University of Hong Kong hosted "Bo Yang Si Xiang Yu Wen Xue Guo Ji Xue Shu Yan Tao Hui"seminar in 1999. Over the years, some scholars focused their research into Bo Yang life encounters, while others carried their research study on those Bo Yang novels and short essays that criticize Chinese traditional culture. However the research on the latter was insufficient and incomplete. In the past, Bo Yang complete writings were not easy to collate. Fortunately "Bo Yang Quan Ji", the complete works of Bo Yang was published in 2010 by Beijing publishing company "Ren Min Wen Xue Chu Ban She". The complete works comprises of 25 volumes in total, classified under 4 categories, namely Bo Yang essay writings, historical writings, novels and others. With such a favorable condition, scholars should be able to do more in-depth study.The methodology of research is based on a Social and Historical criticisms. Social and Historical criticisms basically analyses the life encounters and experiences of the writer and his environment.Bo Yang admits that he is greatly influenced by Lu Xun’s novels rather than Lu Xun’s essay writings. He admires Lu Xun’s works but his essay writing style is completely different from him. Lu Xun’s essay writings belong to the intellectual, Bo Yang’s essays is meant for the common people. Bo Yang’s essay writings are more tolerant and not aggressive in nature.Chapter 2:Bo Yang primary reason in essay writing is for a livelihood. In order to get them published, the content of his essays must be written to cater to the needs of the public audience. During this period, his essays were published in "Zi Li Wan Bao" a Taiwan newspaper under the given column "Yi Meng Xian Hua", he created an unique figure as the writer-"Zao Lao Tou Bo Yang" meaning the poor old chap Bo Yang.The contents on Bo Yang’s essays are far and wide, be it about living, marriage, love, family life and social issues. When there is injustice or immorality happening in society, he will not hesitate to write about it. Despite his fiery criticisms against politic in his essay writing, he is more focused with the cultural issues.The main attraction of his essay writing style is humor. His humor is overwhelming. Together with his ability to use vivid words and descriptions, he can transform a piece of solemn essay writing into something more readable for most readers.Bo Yang described China’s feudal cultures as "Jiang Gang Wen Hua". He pointed out that these cultures will greatly threaten nation. The Chinese, who is soaked in "Jiang Gang", will be influenced by the moral standards of the "Jiang Gang". He further hits the nail on the head by pointing out that such mal-practices is a disease and it will become the Chinese weakness.Chinese’s traditional cultures are not perfect and are two sided. They have existed over thousands of years; definitely there are good ones and bad ones. Feudalisms and Hierarchical System are the pitfalls of the traditional cultures. As the Chinese cultures is one that based on Confucius studies, which resulted in the combination of imperial powers with politics, using traditional cultures as a tool for political manipulation. Such controls and manipulations have been exhibited in the "emperor-servant’s" relationships, the "father and son’s" relationships and the "husband and wife’s" relationships. This has also created the scenarios of official standard ideas and Patriarchal attitudes which have been deeply engraved on their minds.Chapter 3:"Yi Meng Xian Hua" is a compilation of 10 volumes of essays writings, which was published in the newspaper’s column. The 10 volumes includes "Yu Diao Ji" and "Guai Ma Ji" which were published in 1962; "Bao Lei Ji", "Shen Ren Ji", "Feng Huang Ji" and "Hong Xiu Ji" in 1963, "Li Zheng Ji"in 1965; "Qian Chang Ji" in 1966; "She Yao Ji" and "Bo Pi Ji" in 1967. According to "Bo Yang Quan Ji" record, the series have a collection of 340 essays.Chapter 4:"Xi Chuan Sui Bi" is another newspaper column that are compiled into another 10 volumes which includes "Gao Ghan Gun Gu Ji" and "Dao Mao An Ran Ji" in 1963; "Qian Yang Hou He Ji", "Wen Guo Zhe Nu Ji" and "Shen Hun Dian Dao Ji" in 1964; "Gui Hua Lian Pian Ji","Da Yu Ruo Zhi Ji" and "Yue Bang Yue Mang Ji" in 1965; "Xin Xue Lai Chao Ji" in 1966 and "Si Bu Ren Cuo Ji" in 1967. According to the record of "Bo Yang Quan Ji", the series have a collection of 370 essays.Chapter 5:After Bo Yang’s released from prison in July 1977, he returned back to Taipei. Soon after he started to write essays again in the Taiwan newspaper "Zhong Guo Shi Bao", under the given column "Bo Yang Zhuan Lan", where he had stopped writing essays due to imprisonment in the past 10 years. These essays writings are later compiled into 5 volumes namely "Huo Gai Ta He Lao Jiang" in 1978; "An Pai Li Chu Pai" and "Da Nan Ren Sha Wen Zhu Yi"in 1979; "Zhao Qi De Chong er" in 1980 and lastly "Cai Le Ta De Wei Ba" in 1982. According to the record of "Bo Yang Quan Ji", the series have a collection of 135 essays in total.When comparing Bo Yang’s 80s essays writings with that of his 60s, it is obvious that his criticisms against traditional cultures has changed to a more moderate approach and are not as radical. This can be illustrated by comparing his essay writings in 1980 ("Bo Yang Zhuan Lan" series) with his earlier works "Yi Meng Xian Hua" series and "Xi Chuang Sui Bi" series.Bo Yang always looked at social issues from the perspectives of the man on the street. The structure of his essay writings are relatively concerns with the common people and common readers can easily relate to their daily lives. His criticisms are against both traditional cultures as well as the present daily mundane cultures; this in itself is part of the secular life.After reading in depth Bo Yang 845 essays, an obvious fact reflected by some scholars is that there is no originality on the topics of his essays. For instance, Bo Yang believes that the Chinese’s cultures gene is lack of human rights ideology. This is not a new concept as Lu Xun had mentioned in his essays.Nevertheless, Bo Yang’s creative writing style is definitely affirmed. The structure of his essay writings is unique. His humors in written languages and dialogues have been executed cleverly and uniquely. His essay writings are much loved by the Taiwanese readers at that period of time and have definitely influenced the Taiwanese society.Even till this day, Bo Yang’s criticisms against China’s traditional cultures shave certain values and influences. Despite the essays were written in the 1960s based Taiwanese society, the social issues remains relevant and still exist. The Chinese "Zang, Luan, Chao", "Wo Li Dou" and other kind of bad habits still exist. Being a writer, Bo Yang’s contributions to Chinese contemporary literature should be recognized.