The May Fourth Literature And The "Imperfect Individual"

Chen Xianghe, the most important members of Asakusa-Chen Zhong Society, has gained the highest creation achievements in literature. On the one hand, his creation is influenced by the Zeitgeist of the May Fourth Movement such as romanticism, realism and modernism and so on. He has created a series of characters with distinct self-consciousness and progressive opinion to highlight his desire of constructing "new individual", and has presented a succession of the May Fourth Literature; on the other hand, Chen Xianghe maintains his independence and social alienation in the May Fourth Literature with unique traits. What constitutes a kind of rebellion against the May Fourth Literature are that his departure from the motif of the May Fourth literary, his changed the sentimental and lyrical fiction style, and creation of a "imperfect individual"series influenced by factors from his inner experience, the external environment, the timing of conditions and so on in the pursuit of the "new individual" construction.Taking the interactive relationship between Chen Xianghe and the May Fourth literature as the core part, this paper explores how the May Fourth literature affects Chen Xianghe’s literary creation, and how he maintains his independence in May Fourth literature. That is, to analyse his creation mainly on the inheritance and rebellion to the May Fourth Literature, as well as the causes of these features so as to highlight his attitude, value and status in the May Fourth literature.The whole text is divided into four parts. Introduction outlines ideas for Chen Xianghe’s life, major works, research status and purposes and practical value of his thesis. According to collecting Chen Xianghe’s creation and research materials systematically, placed it in the particular May Fourth era to explore the unique attitude and meaning value of Chen Xianghe’s creation in the May Fourth Literature.The first chapter focuses on the literary tradition of the May Fourth Movement and the spirit of the times, as well as its impact on Chen Xianghe. Chen Xianghe was influenced by the May Fourth Movement Zeitgeist such as romanticism, realism and modernism and so on.His works exhibit an inheritance to the May Fourth Literature. He stressed a lyrical and realistic real-life experience in his works, also expressed the confusion of life questions. Meanwhile, the first chapter also analyzes the characters who has a "new individual" image with distinct self-consciousness and progressive opinion in his works.The second chapter discusses how Chen Xianghe maintains a unique, alienated and rebellious with its unique style in the May Fourth literature. He focuses on "personalized theme" of the excavation, describes the calm, gentle, compromise ordinary people with fragmented, non-sequential nature of writing method, captures routine events to express sadness. And he analyzes the four features of the "imperfect individual", they are wanderers who have no place for their souls, "broken heart experience", lost faith and double denial, as well as "extra person" and gray decadent personality.The third chapter goes on discussing the causes of this image series of "imperfect individual" that Chen Xianghe was influenced by gloomy sentiment from personal experience, the darkness situation, enlightenment interrupt and unfinished modernity and other factors in the pursuit of "new individual" construction so that it is difficult to be independent for his rational personality, and the construction of "new individual" becomes "imperfect". Besides, this chapter also discusses the common personality between Chen Xianghe and other members in Asakusa-Chen Zhong Society. This paper argues that Asakusa-Chen Zhong Society members in terms of their literary ideas, political ideas, or aesthetic tendencies, are in a neutral state which is low-key, calm, detached dispute to concentrate on pure art. However, Chen Xianghe has a more genuine and purer ideological tendency, and he strongly criticizes the political and grand themes, and focuses on the purity of the literature itself. This aspect will highlight Chen Xianghe’s unique attitude to literary creation further.