Rolling In The Dust Of The Stick And Harmony

Zhang Xin made her name in the1990s’ Chinese contemporary literature arena as arepresentative and prolific writer of “Neo-Urban Literature” and “Neo-Citizen Novels”. Unlikethe style of “frostily focus” by other writers, Zhang’s novels are born with her own style of“flowing out smoothly with warmth, earthiness and broadness”, which distinguishes her from herpeers. The author of this thesis attempts to explore the transformation of citizens’ outlook ofvalue by comparing the conversion of heroes and heroins’ attitudes towards love in Zhang’snovels of different times, and then reveal Zhang’s thoughts on subversion and reconstruction ofvalue and love in the time she is in.The eternal theme of Zhang’s novels is love and she describes various experiences andoutlooks of value, through which the author presents to her readers the inner world of thoseliving in modern towns and cities. Zhang’s attitude towards love experienced enormoustransformation. In her earlier works, she eulogizes the beauty of love, so protagonists in her earlyworks are all in the pursuit of pure and great love. While in her later works, her focus is put ondescription of the strenuous path to love and the twists and turns of love when protagonists are inface of harsh reality. Zhang’s works go far beyond the description of modern citizens’ love andlust. Her target is to shed light on the realistic living condition of modern citizens and theprofound impact of social transformation on people’s outlook on value, by depicting the conflictsbetween material world and inner world, tradition and moderness in the context of marketeconomy. However, Zhang does more than simply resist urban civilization, or negate the earthlylove for this; instead, she not only becomes open enough to embrace the present situation,understand those young men and women in modern society and console those weary minds, butalso attempts to dredge and cultivate people’s apolaustic lust with haughty virtues and authenticemotions. This reflects Zhang’s compromise to the secular society as well as her persistence inpoetic romance. This combination of tradition and moderness, ideal and reality could be possiblyattributed to such elements as her living environment, experiences and her orientation to wiring.Zhang Xin’s writing enriches the enclosure of urban novels, and promotes the developmentof urban literature. Certainly, it is wise to see the shortcomings of Zhang’s works, besides herstrength. Luckily enough, Zhang herself also realized her own weak points, and that’s why shehas begun to extend her horizon of writing by exploring a wider world and describing manycritical social issues, which helps win a wider reading public.