Destiny·Sufferings·Anti-Enlightenment

Yu Hua is an outstanding contemporary Chinese literary writer; especially his novel writing and verified style have been well received by readers and critics. According to the inherent style, Yu Hua's novel writing style can be divided into three phases:the period 1986-1992 is avant-garde period of his novel writing, during which the status of Yu Hua's pioneering novelist has been laid; 1992-1995 is his transitional period from the pioneering Enlightenment narrative to folk narrative,with his representative To Live and Chronicle of a Blood Merchant; 2005-2006 the publication of "brothers" series, after which Yu Hua's novels also entered into a "absurd realism" period with a bizarre plot and exaggerated techniques.After the transformation of his writing style, Yu Hua always prefers the folk narrative for he has a precise understanding for the destiny and sufferings in popular folks. His unique and unprecedented writing adds a bright glam to the literary world. This paper analyzes Yu Hua's novels based on two levels of "the contents of folk life" and "folk narrative standpoint".The existence of surreal power in mysterious folk is first a "destiny" world. The mystery of elusive fate, a normal phenomenon in folks, is an inescapable state of existence. Its forms in folks are diversified, mainly showing as the absurdity and ugliness of human nature. In Yu Hua's novels, the ways of solving the entanglement of fate are forbearance and subversion, but the final destiny is that folk individuals still have nowhere to escape in the entangled fate.The folks, existing as vulnerable groups, are actually a world full of "suffering". On the basis of showing people's pain experience and spirit torture in face of natural disasters suffering, Yu Hua has dug deep severe awareness of suffering in folks. Folk individuals have achieved their own resistance to the suffering and salvation in the form of traditional folk art. They express their sufferings in the form of "rap" art, play down in sufferings in "fairy tales", place hopes on the "legend" of small potatoes, which reflects the tenacious life of the folk as well as demonstrates the inevitable tragedies of overall fate of people in folks.In face of people's inescapable fate and inevitable difficult situation, Yu Hua consciously digs deep in folks. In terms of value orientation and creation standpoints, he achieves subversion of the traditional enlightenment narrative literature and reflects a strong "anti-Enlightenment" color. In subtle and implicate "folk" writing style, Yu Hua consciously abandons the enlightenment writing style as a traditional intellectual and shows the existence of real life and mental outlook with a bottom-up review attitude. Comparing with Lu Xun the enlightenment literary master, Yu Hua's rejection of reason and respect for the sensibility reflect the subversion of traditional enlightenment narrative position and value and Yu Hua's writing has thus acquired a new space for development.