On The Cultural Spirit In Lin Yutang 's Works

Lin Yutang is unique in the history of Chinese literature with his complicated experiences and creative works. As a result, it is hard to study his works and ideas. His works cover both Chinese and western literature, and his ideas are influenced both by traditional Chinese cultures and fine cultures absorbing from the western history. In the cultural history of 20 th century China, Lin Yutang becomes one of top cultural masters because of his open and multicultural ideas and spirits with special characters.In this thesis, the introduction firstly explains the reasons why select the topic, three stages of researches on Lin Yutang and how Lin Yutang is studied both at home and abroad. In this part, the basic contents and new viewpoints about my paper are expounded, which fully demonstrates the value and significance to study Lin Yutang. Besides, this paper also points out some problems and insufficient aspects in the research of Lin yutang.After some necessary definition of the keywords of the thesis, the article lays special stress on the analysis of the construction of the multicultural spirits in Lin Yutang’s works. Firstly, the article introduces the reasons why the multicultural spirits are formed in Lin Yutang’s works. Then,introduce the Confucian cultural spirits,Taoist cultural spirits and western cultural spirits in the works of Lin Yutang. The Confucian culture mainly elaborates such spirits as “the benevolent loves others", "the doctrine of mean harmony", "activity and enterprise". The Taoist culture mainly explains the mysterious aesthetics which denotes that Tao manipulates the nature, a uniquely outlook on women of a blend delicacy and force and a view of free life to do nothing. The western culture mainly introduces the humanitarian spirit as "Christ’s love",the existential spirit as"dissolve the tragedy" and the spirit of expressionism as “art is expression”. The last part writes that the multicultural spirits are not separated. Lin holds the multicultural spirits from the macroscopic perspective of the integration of every culture all over the world. He makes multicultural spirits cummunicate and exchange with each other in order to learn from others’ strong points to offset one’s weakness to achieve mastery through a comprehensive study of the subject by adopting a dialectical method.The multicultural spirit in Lin Yutang’s works presents its special cultural value and significance. Besides, his unique personal charms and wisdom also teach us how to live a happy life in a defective environment, and how to pursue for a free and comfortable life by complying with one’s inner requirement. He deserves a name of a great master in modern Chinese literature given by his contemporary.