Chinese Psychological Novels From The Background Of The World

The thesis, traversing Chinese and Western literature traditions and sweeping through the length of the whole twentieth-century, investigates the Chinese psychological novels from the background of the world literature and culture. Centurial Retrospection aims at making critically conclusive comments on previous researches, highlights the importance of macroscopic research and illustrates the principle of the selection of individual cases and the analysis of special topics. Origin and Development, beginning with the ancient Greek maxim 'Recognize Yourself, demonstrates the emphasis of medieval religions upon soul relief, the rational brilliance of Renaissance humanistic tradition and the humanistic exploration of the rational and irrational philosophies since the nineteenth century, and argues that psychological novels as well as the theory of psychoanalysis are twins of human beings' ancient wisdom of self-recognition. The psychological novels can be defined from a broad sense and a narrow sense respectively according to different composition schools. The thesis then analyzes the specific condition and influential factors of the twentieth-century Chinese psychological novels in three different developmental stages. In the Innermost Soul, originated from Oscar Wilde, in the form of special topics, compares quantitatively the different achievements gained by Chinese and western psychological novels in psychoanalysis. Sorrow and Thought explores the root causes from the viewpoint of the psychology of national culture so as to draw the attention of those who intend to remedy the plight and make a little contribution to the future of Chinese novels.