From "Art For Art's Sake" To "Art For Revolution"

In the history of modern Chinese criticism,Cheng Fangwu was a characteristic critic.His critical ideology,style of writing and his position in the history of modern literature all evoked numerous evaluations and reactions.He was an influential litterateur at that time.He played an important role in promoting the new cultural movement of our revolution.This thesis attempts to explore the basic connotation of the transformation of Cheng Fangwu's literary ideas from "Art for Art" to "Art for Revolution" from the perspective of the transformation of Cheng Fangwu's literary ideas.In addition,this thesis attempts to fathom the reasons of its transformation and its influence through some specific criticism activities of Cheng Fangwu.This thesis also makes a historical reflection on the clerisies of the generation of Cheng Fangwu to establish the basic paradigm of the study of the writer's literary concept transformation.This thesis is divided into three chapters:The first chapter summarizes Cheng Fangwu's literary concept of "art for art",which is based on "Expression Theory","Sympathy Theory" and "Beyond Theory".It further expands by summarizing the early criticism activities of Cheng Fangwu,and concretely analyzes the reasons of Cheng Fangwu's early literary ideas.Finally it summarizes the influence of Cheng Fangwu's early literary ideas.On one hand,he helped create a new society who strived for the right to speak.On the other hand,he improved the level of new literature and expanded the pattern of modern literary criticism,in addition he attacked the present situation of modern literary criticism effectively.The second chapter summarizes the literary criticism activities of Cheng Fangwu in his later period,and then discusses the whole process of Cheng Fangwu's transition from "Conscience Theory" to "Art for Revolution" focusing on class identity.Furthermore it sums up the impact of Cheng Fangwu's literary ideas in his later life.His later literary concept reflected the intellectuals reactions to revolutionary and artistic dilemmas of universal imagination and promoted the development of the new literature revolutionary movement.It demonstrates how the new revolutionary literature ideas deeply affected the hearts of the people.At the same time,it is noted that,to some extent,Cheng Fangwu's later literary ideas are a kind of repositioning to the traditional literary ideas but under new theoretical forms.The third chapter starts from the overall change of the literary idea of Cheng Fangwu,investigates the reasons behind the transformation of Cheng Fangwu literary ideas and then digs deeper into the inner logic behind the change of the role of Cheng Fangwu.Cheng Fangwu was deeply influenced by Confucianism both before and after the transformation.Then,taking Cheng Fangwu as the specimen,this chapter looks into the intellectuals of Cheng Fangwu's generation and carries on the historical reflection to summarize the historical contribution,limitation and influence of this generation of intellectuals.The conclusion sums up the foregoing,and probes into the limitations of the study of literary ideas of Cheng Fangwu.