The Fate Of Misery And Spiritual Ignorance

With Lu Xun as one of the leading novelists,featured by the rural life and distinctive local traits, the Chinese rural novels in 1920s have played an important role in the Chinese modern literature. Among them,the most prominent achievement is the creation of a specific rural culture and countryside female characters.However,scholars have shown greater interest in the former and less in the latter.Accordingly,this paper will mainly focus on the rational analysis and comparison of the female characters depicted in the rural novels so as to complement the gap in this aspect.Besides, this paper will give a detailed analysis of the laboring women's tragic destiny and their causes.The rural novels in 1920s can be divided into two schools:one is rural realistic novels,the other is rural romantic novels.Based on rural realistic novels,this paper will analyze and discuss the artistic creation and connotation of female characters.This paper falls into three parts:Part One:In the light of identity recognition and collective spiritual features,Part One will give a quick look to the female characters,uncover their cultural identity and spiritual features of this vulnerable group,and display their common miserable life and tragic destiny.The female characters will include those characters like Sister Xiang Lin Sao in Blessing,Sister Dan Si Sao Zi in Tomorrow,created by Lu Xun,Sister Wang Da Sao in Wedding Ceremony,The fourth wife,Si Tai Tai in New Tomb,created by Tai Jing-nong,and the wife of Ji Shun in Gambler Ji Shun,created by Xu Jie,etc.having made up of a world full of the lower class women.Subsequently,these vulnerable group will be classified into two categories:One group would be very rebellious and defiant,for instance:Aunt Ai Gu in Divorce,created by Lu Xun,A Yin in Virtuous Woman,created by Peng Jia-huang,Ju Hua in A er with a Running Nose,created by Xu Qin-wen,Yi in A Lifetime,created by Ye Sheng-tao;The other group is very sheepish and submissive,for example:Mu in A Posthumous Child,created by Ye Sheng-tao,Aunt Cui Gu in Candle Flame and the fourth wife,Si Tai Tai in New Tomb,,created by Tai Jing-nong,etc..Analysis of these female characters will have unveiled their low social status and their miserable life.Part Two:Part Two will concentrate on the root causes for these women's sadness and tragedy, described in the rural novels.Therefore,no matter how defiant or submissive they are,greatly pressurized by the feudal ethical code in the old society,along with their own more or less spiritual weaknesses,they have been playing a tragic role in their life when it comes to the feudal ethical code. Based on the text analysis,the root causes of the lower class women will be discussed in three aspects,i.e.materialization,wedding customs as well as chastity.Part Three:Part Three will make a comparison of female characters in the rural novels and all of those in the Chinese modern literature,namely:the influence of female depiction in 1920s rural novels on the writings of 1930s,reflection of the epoch-making topic such as "discovery of people" and women's liberation in May the 4^th Movement,and its significance and far-reaching effect on the history of Chinese literature.The rural novels,discussed in this paper,are those,written by the male novelists such as Wang Lu-yan,Qian Xian-ai,Xu Qin-wen,Peng Jia-huang,Tai Jing-nong,etc.,who have depicted many female characters and described their tragic fate and miserable life.Their rural novels are different from the popular feminine literature,because the feminine literature in a narrow sense belongs to the novels,written by female writers,reflecting women's life.Nevertheless,because of his outstanding ideas and aesthetic value,the novels,written by Lu Xun,have not been classified into the category of rural novels.However,novels,written by Lu Xun's and other writers,based on rural life,are put together for discussion,because these novels in 1920s and Lu Xun have distinctive heritance relations.