Canonization And Decanonization: Gadfly In China

Gadfly， the masterpiece of Ethel Lilian Voynich，gained an ordinary reputation whenit was published in Britain in1897, but after it was introduced to China in the50’sand60’s of the20thcentury, it aroused great interest among Chinese readers. Gadflyenjoys a high prestige in China. The earliest version was translated by Li Liangmin in1953which was very popular in the fifties and sixties of the20th century in China.Itwas a best-seller at that time and it became British canonization in China quickly.There were two main points: Firstly, it was translated and admired widely. After thenovel was published in China and it spread widely and also influenced so manypeople of that times, the novel’s edition was printed many times, as many as millionsof copies. At the same time there are more comic books, movies and music recordswhich were adapted according to the version etc. The multi-channel transmissionphenomena in the translation of foreign literary works are very rare. Gadfly gained thehighest circulation of British literature at that time, and became the best-seller as atranslated novel. Under the background of the "political first, art standard second"policy, the study of Gadfly was focused on the theme of the revolutionary heroism,Gadfly’s hero quality, his courage, perseverance has also been highly praised.Secondly, Gadfly was highly praised and appeared in many course books of foreignliterature as the representative of the late20thcentury English realism.Since theninety-nineties, however, a single ideological and political discourse of the bondageof culture started to slack off, with the diversified development of ideology, in chinaGadfly was no longer a canonization.It presented in the following aspects: readerstreat it coldly; the judgment tends to be sensitive; the study of it broke through therevolutionary heroism of the illustration, gradually toward diversification; itdisappeared from course books. As the tide of "red canonization" and the diversity ofthe value connotation, Gadfly in China has become decanonizationized. Generallyspeaking, special comment system and interest of different times may create greatworks, but with time passing, a canonization would become a decanonization.Through the canonization route of Gadfly in China, the present author explores thedifferences in contents and characteristics between “red canonization” and literatureclassics.