"Artless" Realism

It has been over a dozen years since 1991 when BiFeiyu published his maiden work "Detached Island" ("Flower City" 1991/1). In 2001 and 2005 he respectively published Maize, which won him several awards, and the saga novel Plain. The course, by his own words, involved "several swerves": from the metaphysical historical narration in the early 1990s (Narrative, Cotton Floss, etc), to the description of the blatant worldly city (Nine-floor Elevator, Linhong's Vacation, etc.), to the severe objective depiction and social criticism (The Moon Opera, Maize, etc.). Undoubtedly these transitions helped BiFeiyu become more mature in his creation and attract increasing attention from the critics. He once remarked," What I should point out is that I am more eager than ever to become a realistic writer, the type of the most inornate, rather than the traditional one. I just want to see what Realism would be like when it comes to me."To survey BiFeiyu's works, realism can be seen to be penetrated in them. But the ways to express and convey the realism in different phases are widely divergent. BiFeiyu admitted he used to think that realism was what he was contemptuous of and it was the sign of lack of imagination in the early stage. So he applied historical discourse to give vent and shuttled and chased willfully at the space-time tunnel. But later on his creation concept greatly changed and he became to believe that observation is indispensable and "its value lies in its help in establishing a sort of relation between you and the world, which implies that you are close to the world instead of being isolated. The presence of the world is more than your fancy. Instead, it is what you have to face up to." Hence, BiFeiyu began to portray the life in the present age. It was nearness to life and intimacy between people that BiFeiyu intended to stress, i.e. he did not try to make the characters or the surroundings typical type, neither did he painstakingly reflect the magnificent theme of the epoch. He tried hard to return to the real life and make the content and form of his works understandable to common people, to practise "artless realism" integrated with certain eternal life philosophy.The thesis attempts to have a thorough study of the style transition in BiFeiyu's novel creation from the aspect of its "artless realism". By analyzing and studying the content of the BiFeiyu's novels, exploring the new trait he infused into "realism" in his creation and the presentation of "artlessness" in his realistic novels, it can be achieved to have a better understanding of the growth of the "Younger Generation Writers".