A Modernist In Dilemma

Xu Xu's story exhibits characteristic style through his fictional scenario and fertile imagination, as well as dramatic tense coming from humanity and exoticisms by vivid description. The romantic construction contributes to its popularity and readability, and moreover, the story has been more teeming in thought by the combination of dramatic conflict and humanity observation: Xu Xu's writing enriches the means of representation by conceiving stories which are so bizarre and diverse. Further more, most of his stories focus on the deep-seated discipline of human consciousness. All these have invited a mood of modern spirit and it is very fancy to most of the Chinese reader in the forties of the twentieth century. And it is also noticeable that Xu Xu's novel has been musing on the philosophy of life and shows an attempt to surpass the reality, which is rare in his time and laudable now in China.Xu Xu's narration bears a strong impression of individual spirit, which indicates the passion and mercy of a modernist who had been hunting after the meaning of life. But he was hesitated and escapist while pursuing his goal, and he could not think clearly because of accepting too much from others. As to the narrative itself, the tactic of limiting his visual angle within the story shows strong emotion of his own but no certainty, and the dissolve of the narrative voice implies his lost in meaning and judgment. So the vagueness and uncertainty of his narration demonstrates that he had been evading the value system. As to the comparison with Gide and other writers, Xu Xu's narration has been fastened too much on ethic instead of facing the truth of life and reality. All in all, Xu Xu had too much to express in his fiction, which makes his narration totally lost, also Xu Xu was perplexed in belief and was insufficient in understanding the reality, and all these means a dilute in connotation. So the displaying of modern spirit has been indicated by the feeling of collapse, wandering and tragedy, while the taste of a traditional intellectual has been frustrating him from getting away from his own limits.The author has been trying to be closer to the core of Xu Xu's inner world through analyzing the unique property of his narration, so as to weigh the gain and loss in his exploration in writing.