Aesthetics As "Human Science": Study On Xu Dai’s "Poetic Aesthetic" Thoughts

Literary theorist Xu Dai as Chinese contemporary achievements, life, freedom, mystery, utopiaoccupy an important position in his thought of literature and art. The reason for selecting these four keywords of Xu Dai’s thought of literature and art is that Xu Dai’s high perspicacity can provide some newideas and methods for us to understand and construct Chinese contemporary literary theory.Xu Dai’stheories about life,freedom,mystery and utopia are different from irrationalism,life’s impulse, mysticismand castles in the air,and while his thought of literature and art is thoughtful and logical.Behind the rationalanalysis,he extracts views and opinions which are truly useful to the internal promotion of individualspirit,beneficial to maintain independent personality and dignity and to the development and progress ofhuman society from different disciplines and areas for us.This is Xu Dai’s trinity of "life aesthetics"expression of "life","living" and "ecology".Xu Dai’s poetic aesthetic thoughts starts from the perspectiveof "man",to be better "man" as the aim. Life,liberty,mystery and utopia appear constantly in Xu Dai’sworks and papers,although they are discussed respectively in the article, but they are connecting with eachother and inseparable.Life, freedom, mystery and utopia cast man’s transcendence and promotioncorporately.People’s life need freedom, unknowable mystery and their hopes of utopia provide possibilityfor them to transcend.Life, freedom, mystery and utopia are all relevant to the spiritual enhancement andhope of man.Xu Dai elaborate on every concept in depth from many subjects such as psychology,anthropology, politics, economics and so on. Taking man as the center, through discussing art fromdifferent dimensions and categories,Xu Dai’s unique position on humane spirit is composed of life,freedom, mystery and utopia.Xu Dai’s humane spirit exists the whole process from art appreciation to artevaluation.This paper is divided into three chapters in addition to introduction and conclusion.The part ofintroduction points out Xu Dai’s unique "frontier" position.This position is far from "big words" and thestuffing of concepts,paying attention to people’s experience of life.The main part discusses Xu Dai’s poeticaesthetic thoughts respectively from three chapters as follows: life poetics and the occurrence of art,purepoetics and the essence of art,art evaluation and aesthetic utopia.The conclusion starts from Xu Dai’s poetic aesthetic thoughts and discusses further about literary theorists borning in1950s’ including theirtheroy of virtue and their contribution to the development of contemporary Chinese literary theory.In conclusion,around the four key words tightly,the article elaborate on Xu Dai’s poetic aestheticthoughts which has unique style and profound influence increasingly by integrating point and sphere,andthis provides a new path for the study of Xu Dai’s thoughts as individuals and narrative virtue ofintergenerational theory of literary theorists borning in1950s’.