On Lu Yao's Literary Narrative In The Prototype

'Mother Earth', as one of important anthropological archetype, has profound meaning. Since 1he earth has given birth to all the creatures, it is often regarded as a symbol of life, warmth and tolerance and love. From the time Carl Gustav Jung started to study the connotation of archetype, 'Mother Earth' archetype has become one of the most influential and profound archetypes so far. The focus of archetypal criticism is to find the connection between the work under discussion and the other works or the connection between the very work and the archetype, and then discover the connotation of collective unconsciousness through the searching and illuminating of the archetype. The application of this very theory into the interpretation of text will deepen and expand the researches on literature.With the experiences in north of Shanxi Province as the background, LuYao's works represent a special existence in Chinese contemporary literature. Therefore, this paper will choose the author LuYao as the subject and intend to discuss his literary narrative model from archetype criticism. The image of LuYao's literature works takes root deeply in life and ideas were deeply rooted in the loess. On the one hand he was eagerly concerned about everyone's fate on this barren land, attempting to find an outlet for their suffering lives; On the other hand he could not conceal his intense love for the land. Meantime, the contradict feeling of love and pain led him to search for psychological and cultural maternal harbor. From the perspective of archetype criticism, it's found that his works were not only influenced by his own thought, more importantly, by the 'Mother Earth' archetype in collective unconsciousness which was manifested as the two pervasive core images, namely land and maternal female. These two images serve as the spiritual support and life matrix for the 'sons of the land' to return to her. Returning to land and to motherhood are the psychologically unconscious reflections of human wish to looking for sense of belonging. The unification forms the connotation of 'Mother Earth' archetype. The 'Land complex' and the 'Mother complex' in human cultural consciousness reach the organic unification as far as the meaning of returning spiritual home is concerned.In this paper, the reflection and origin of 'Mother Earth' archetype in LuYao's works will be analyzed by re-understanding LuYao and his works, and further more, the influence and conditionality of archetype will be discussed from archetype criticism in order to provide a fresh reference for readers to understand LuYao and his works. The thesis is divided into five parts:Part One: Introduction. Based on the deficiency of current research on LuYao as well as his works, this chapter shows the development of archetype theory and the appreciation of his works. This part proves that it is mature enough to study LuYao's works from the perspective of archetypal criticism as far as theoretical-method and target-text are concerned.Part Two: The human 'Land complex' based on the culture will be traced and explained, and the fundamental reason of the 'Land complex' will be expounded, which lie in 'primitive image', namely collective unconsciousness hided in the human race's heart deeply. At the same time, a comparison will be made between the eastern myth of the 'Goddess of Sky-patching created human' and the western legend of the 'Mother Earth Gaia' in order to expound the same nature between the lands and mother and find the theoretical foundation of the archetype in the literature.Part Three: According to the text it will be discussed that land, as one of the image of the LuYao's works, is the spiritual paradise bearing the suffering of the people on the land. The mysterious influence of the archetype and emotional identicalness to the hometown urge the author to write the suffering of the human by the heart. 'The sons of the land' who are so nostalgic will not get the sense of belonging until they live on the loess plateau and care about the loess.Part Four: The maternal female images, namely the embodiment of the land, will be discussed. As another 'Mother Earth' archetype, they are the sweet harbors of men's broken soul. Due to portraying the traditional female image as Mother Earth, LuYao were fond of description of maternal love, which makes men obtain the spiritual sense of belonging like maternal love. LuYao's combines his unique experience with mythical archetype of 'Mother Earth', hence proves that they are identical in essence.Part Five: The 'Mother Earth' archetype will be discussed from archetype criticism. The 'Mother Earth' is a poetic habitation built delicately by writers. Therefore, to return to 'Mother Earth' is to get to the imaginary way of redemption through temporarily forgetting the pain leading, to re-build writers' dream for human home of Utopia.Conclusion: LuYao's greatly influenced by collective unconsciousness. He blended 'Mother Earth' archetype into his experiences about life so that he formed his special literary narrative.In sum, analysis of the 'Mother Earth' archetype in LuYao's works provides a helpful inspiration that it is difficult for literary research and creation to avoid the influence of ancient spiritual heritage. Literature will possess everlasting artistic charm only if it absorbs the nutrition from ancient spiritual heritage.