On The Recollection Theme Of Modern Chinese Novels

During the 30-year course of modern Chinese literature, a massive collection of litrrary works that feature reflection and recollection have appeared in the novel creation. By remembering their childhood or recalling their hometown, modern writers have presented to their readers an exotic esthetic space. Thus, recollection has become one of the important themes in modern Chinese novels.However, the research into the recollection theme of modern novels is far from profound. Although critics have inevitably touched some aspects of recollection in thire comments about individual novelists, most of the comments are empirical and stay at the superficial level. A major presentation of such comments is the concentration on the equal or reflective relationship of art to real life. Such research has been confined to the reflective research paradigm, and hardly any true breakthrough has been made. An example of such research is the research by Ding Fan and Chen Jihui on rural novels. This situation has changed in some way when it comes to the research on modern novels featuring childhood perspectives, such as the research of Tan Guilin on childhood and mother theme of modern novels, and the research of Wu Xiaodong on the narration of modern childhood perspective novels. Nonetheless, their research is still confined to the notice of childhood memory. Therefore, it is necessary to start the research of modern novels by establishing the individualism of the recollection of novelists, and treat the research of the recollection theme as an independent research subject. By doing this, we can further explore the formation of the recollection theory, its presentation, and its cultural connotation and literature values.The examination into the recollection theme of modern Chinese novels cannot naturally exist out of the grand background of Chinese literature seeking a modern construction. In the history of Chinese modern literature, freedom and equality, revolution and liberation are the core of the concentration of modern writers. Thetheme of revolution and liberation is particularly the main trend of modern Chinese novels. For the recollection theme, Most of these writers and their works have been wrongly read or criticized due to their separation from reality and the political ideology of their times. It is inevitable that they are positioned peripherally outside of the mainstream. However, it is from here that the literature esthetic values of the mainstream theme and the recollection theme have formed a dividing line. Revolution and liberation, as the mainstream writing theme, have become rapid and transient because of their chase with the political trend, while the recollection theme, outside of the mainstream, has obtained a permanent esthetic meaning thanks to recollection's distance from the reality.Firstly, the theory formation of recollection and its influence on writing. From the birth of art, human beings have had a close tie with recollection. From the time of Plato, many literary theoreticians and philosophers, such as Heidegger, Schopenhauer, Roth, Engden, and so on, using their individual theoretical thinking system, have put recollection in an important position in esthetic thinking, and have sufficiently proved that recollection, as an experience of human life, has the characteristics of esthetic creation. Recollection is the source of art, and has a profound influence on the writer's creation. Accordingly, recollection has had a profound influence on the writings of modern Chinese writers. Recollection has formed the soul of the writings of Lu Xun, Fei Ming, Shen Congwei, Xiao Hong and so on, and has simultaneously become the core theme of modern Chinese novels.Secondly, recollection on childhood. In modern Chinese novels, recollection on childhood has been a center of concentration for writers. It is a major trend for the recollection theme of modern novels. Although the past events of the childhood are gone and remote, they have become a free life paradise in the hearts of modern Chinese wri...