Wealth Writing In Stories Of Wei–jin And Southern And Northern Dynasties

Wei–jin and Southern and Northern Dynasties is full of vitality and innovation in the development history of Chinese literature.Although the stories in this period were short in length,their narrative was fantasy and interesting and they had begun to take shape.This paper untangles the stories of this period from the perspective of wealth writing,and analyses the characteristics and forms of wealth writing in the stories of this period,as well as analyses the author’s purpose to describe wealth in the story.In the first part,the background of social economy,religion and folklore influences the writing of wealth in the story.In the period of Wei–jin and Southern and Northern Dynasties,the clan stratum controlled the economy of the society.Under this background,the social economy became polarization.The upper stratum of the society generally formed the atmosphere of extravagant and enjoyment,however,due to the limited means of making money,people in lower class suffered from a relatively straitened circumstance.The economic disparity in reality was reflected in the novel by wealth writing,which means that the upper class indulged in luxury and the lower class was eager to become rich.Influenced by religion,the novel constructs a fantastic fairy world by means of wealth writing,which makes the world gorgeous and admirable.In this period,the belief of auspiciousness and spiritual worship in folklore directly affected the writing of wealth,thus reflecting the people’s eagerness of thirst for wealth.The second part is about author’s sentiment carried by the portraits of the characters in the story by wealth writing.There are many characters in the story.Based on the concept of wealth,the characters in the story can be divided into three categories: the images of the miserly,the images of the extravagant and the images of the indifferent and open-minded.When creating these group portraits,the author used details,comparisons and other ways to show the characteristics of people in the story,and expressed his wealth outlook by means of praise and criticize the characters.The third part explores the function of wealth writing in three kinds of stories.In the stories of fighting against the rich,wealth was repeatedly mentioned as the subject matter,and wealth writing plays a role in exaggerating the atmosphere of fighting against the rich and promoting the plot development.The wealth was often presented as the finalresult in fortune stories.Wealth writing here is wrapped in the cloak of religion.In addition to making the story achieve magical effects,the author wants to use wealth and fortune as tools to induce or persuade good conduct.In the stories of marriages between two dead persons or one living and one dead,wealth often appears when the hero and heroine are separated.Wealth is not only a token to prove the relationship between them,but also a windfall.The author integrated the common man’s ideal of longing for romance with getting rich,which reflects the real desire of the lower class.The fourth part analyses the significance and influence of wealth writing in the story.The wealth writing played an important role in the creation of artistic atmosphere,the classification of characters and the fate of characters in the story,and also exerts an influence on later novels.Above all,this paper mainly starts from four major parts and from the perspective of wealth writing to analyze the stories of this period,based on this perspective to grasp the wealth form of the story,the purpose of the author’s creation and the impact on the wealth writing in the later stories.