Naturaliam And The May 4th Literature

Naturalism, which rose in France in late-19th century, is one of the most influential literatry trends in the world. It combines literature with science and brings biology and genetics into literature creatively. It guides literay creation in scientific attitude and ways and regards being true and objective as the cardinal principle and starting point of literay creation, making the style of writing realistically reach the extremity. It breaks the restriction of describing human beings only at the rational level and turns to describe them at physiological level. It realizes and animadverts modernity in its special way by exposing the dark reality mercilessly and reappearing the ugly humanity objectively. It is a connecting link between Realism and Modernism and an important cultural transcendence from premodern to modern in literary history.Soon after it had risen in France, Naturalism quickly engulfed the whole Europe and later all over the world, and became an international literary movement with many countries such as England, Germany, America, Japan and China were influenced by it in different degrees. At the beginning of the 20th century, Japanese Naturalism with its own characteristics was founded on the base of acceding the basic features of French Naturalism, which changed the Japanese literary world greatly.The May 4th New Culture Movement publicizes tools and culture rationalisms, advocates science and freedom, and pursues modernity, so it is an Enlightenment Movement, and as an important part of the May 4th New Culture Movement, the May 4th Literature also belongs to Enlightenment Literature. During the May 4th Period, an era of all-round opening to the outside, kinds of foreign literary trends pour into China and influence Chinese literature heavily. The influence from the theories and works of French and Japanese Naturalisms cannot be ignored, which together with other literary trends, enrich the literature of the May 4th period, and cause the Enlightenment Literature, the chief trend, to be multiple and complexity.This article is divided into three parts: In Part I, French and Japanese Naturalism trends which influence the May 4th Literature are overviewed and the aesthetic characters of Naturalism are analyzed. In Part II, the presentation and advocacy of the Naturalism during the May 4th Period are introduced. In Part III, the influences of the Naturalism to the May 4th Literature are analyzed concretely.