An Interpretation Of "Reinterpretation" Study About The Literature Of "Seventeen Years" (1949-1966)

Since the literature of "seventeen years" came up in 1949, its position in the academic circles was always unstable. It was valued very high in sometime but also be denied in some other time. During the 1949-1966 it was praised highly by the mainstream ideology but it was also regarded as poisonous weeds during the Cultural Revolution period. In the 1980s, because of the aestheticism which was advocated by "the Rewriting Literary History", almost no scholar wants to study on it. In the 1980s, the research works which refer to the literature of "seventeen years" mostly used social-political critical methods to admit it or deny it. As it was lacked of researches at this time, it left a lot of research space for the following scholars, literature of "seventeen years" became a very good starting point for them to do 20th century Chinese literary research. Since the 1990s, an approach to literary studies, roughly termed "reinterpretation" and colored by reinterpretation of literary canon, was first initiated by overseas Chinese scholars and has gradually drawn extensive attention in contemporary and modern literary. "Reinterpretation" study is an approach specific version and used several cultural theories of the 1960s includes Structuralism, Deconstruction, Psychoanalysis, Feminism, New Marxism, New-historicism and so on to study on the Chinese Left-wing literature and culture in the 20th century. It also provided a new study vision for literature of "seventeen years". This thesis, researches on the historical context of "reinterpretation" study, its interpreting method, its awareness of questions, and the significance of these questions in the reconstruction of 20th century's literary. This thesis also researches on the interaction between Chinese and overseas Chinese scholars in this research field, to discuss the significance of "reinterpretation" study which was used to research on literature of "seventeen years" and the 20th century Chinese literary critics. Also, the existing problems of "reinterpretation" study are under discussion, in order to provide some inspiration for the modernization process of 20th century Chinese literary critics.