20世纪汉语_史诗问题_探论_林岗.pdf

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1、“Epic in Chinese”: A Tentative Insight into theProblem under Discussion in the 20th CenturyLin Gang*本文探讨了二十世纪一直为学界争论的汉语“史诗问题”。一个世纪以来，为解决这个在西方文学起源的视野下而产生的问题，前辈学人提出了许多看法。可是在仔细检视之下即可发现，各种假设和解释均不具有切合事实本身的充分真实性。这件学术公案是学者们在西风东渐的大背景下，将西方文学的起源模式移至中土，解释中国文学的起源而产生的。本文认为，将西方文学史的起源模式当作具有普世性的文学史起源的解释框架，以史诗作为解说中国

2、文学源头方案的合理性是可以质疑的。因为其学术意识并非源自对事实和材料本身的深切了解，而它背后存在的对西方话语不加反省的盲从，也应引以为鉴。Along with the eastward expansion ofWestern culture in the early 20th century,China began to get acquainted with West-ern-style concepts of the history of literature,and the composition of literary history be-came popular. As the c

3、radle of Western lit-erature and philosophy, Greece was wellknown for its myths and epics, the very foun-tain of its literature. It is an established cus-tom that when you speak of Westernliterature, you begin by speaking of mythsand epics. But this convention, though con-sonant with Western literar

4、y phenomena andenshrined as the necessary background forunderstanding the history of literature, runsinto trouble as soon as it is applied on Chi-nese soil, for in ancient Chinese texts onefinds no genre similar to epic or even refer-ences to such a genre. Even myths can onlybe found in fragmentary

5、form in historiesand the work of ancient philosophers. Whatcan explain such a fact? I believe the inter-pretive problem that arises from observingChinese literary history against the backdropof Western literary conventions has troubleda good many scholars of Chinese literaryhistory. This disquiet wi

6、ll be referred to hereas “the epic problem.” This article aims tosort out this century-long scholarly concernby reviewing different explanations and ar-guments and thence examining the very ra-tionality of the “problem” itself. The “epicproblem” is nothing but the problem of theorigin of literature.

7、 The questions then natu-rally arise of whether this is a rational frame-work for explaining the origin of Chineseliterature, and whether there were not ideo-logical factors not directly connected withacademic research underlying this “epic prob-lem” that for so long plagued research intothe literat

8、ure of remote antiquity? Sorting outthe “epic problem” in ancient Chinese litera-70SOCIAL SCIENCES IN CHINASummer 2007ture may provide an answer to these ques-tions and offer us new insights into the ori-gin of Chinese literature.IExiled in Japan after the fiasco of the1898 Reform Movement and inspi

9、red by theway novels had spread knowledge of West-ern learning in Meiji Japan, Liang Qichao(1873-1929) began to advocate a “revolu-tion in the realm of fiction.” Borne on thetide of the times, Western literature and liter-ary history gradually became known in China.In this way, at a time when both s

10、ociety andthe nation were in the throes of an unprec-edented crisis that demanded urgent reformand improvement, the theme of comparisonbetween things Chinese and Western natu-rally entered the public domain. The first tooffer views comparing Chinese and West-ern myths and epics were Jiang Zhiyou(186

11、6-1929) and Wang Guowei (1877-1927). The former found Chinese mythslacking extensive narration: they had trunksbut no branches, much less detaileddescription. The latter, for his part, follow-ing the practice of Western literary theory,identified two kinds of literature: lyrical andnarrative. He ext

12、olled the lyrical tradition ofChinese literature, while regarding Chinasnarrative literature as “immature,” findingtherein no great works worthy of WesternEurope, whether in narrative, epic or drama.Espousing Wang Guoweis views, LuXun (1881-1936) pointed out explicitly thatin the absence of epics th

13、at would havepieced together different myths and legendsinto extensive works of grand narrative, thefragmentary stories of our ancestors had hadto be presented as mere ornaments for poetry,prose and fiction. Owing to Lu Xuns work,comparison of the differences between earlyChinese and Western literat

14、ure gave rise to aquestion that was hard to answer: why therewere no epics on Chinese soil? According toLu Xun, in Chinese folkloric tradition, therewas no clear-cut distinction between themortal and the spirit world, and the mingledpresence of both ended up detracting fromthe sacredness of the latt

15、er. Shorn of theirdivinity, the gods lost their halos over time,thus putting an end to mythology and mak-ing any extended narrative impossible.The problem underwent some subtlechanges with Hu Shi (1892-1962), who,while inclined to believe that there were noepics in Chinas literary tradition because

16、ofthe matter-of-fact spirit of the Chinese peopleand their lack of imagination, came up witha hypothesis he himself didnt firmly espouse:maybe there had been epics in ancient times,but owing to problems with writing they hadnot been written down and so had not comedown to posterity. That is to say,

17、Hu Shiinherited the problem Lu Xun had posed andbusied himself with explaining the absenceof epics in China. Hu Shi, however, cameup with the hypothesis that Chinas ancientliterary traditions were not so different fromthe universal laws of world literature, and itwas only difficulties in the written

18、 languagethat had prevented them from being passeddown. Setting aside differences in the detailof their formulations, we can see that theviews of Wang Guowei, Lu Xun and Hu Shion the “epic problem” are representative ofthe views of later scholars such as ZhengDekun (1907-2001), Wei Juxian (1899-1989

19、)and Ma Xueliang (1913-1999). Hu Shis ca-“EPIC IN CHINESE” UNDER DISCUSSION IN THE 20TH CENTURY71sually raised hypothesis influenced a goodmany scholars from the 1930s on. Forinstance, Mao Dun (1896-1981), while in-tensely opposed to Hu Shis views, was infact profoundly influenced by his opinion.In

20、1929, Mao Dun published his ABCof Chinese Mythological Studies, the first ofits kind in China, in which he expressed hisdisagreement with the view that mythologyhad died out in China because its peopleslack of innate talent and hard work had af-fected their capacity for imagination and be-cause of t

21、he practical nature of Confuciusteachings. He instead came up with two ten-tative explanations: one was the historicizationof myth, the other the absence of great eventsat that time that stirred mens souls andbrought forth great poets. Mao Duns boldhypotheses were supported by ZhongJingwen (1903-200

22、2), known as the founderof Chinas folklore. In an essay, ZhongJingwen questioned the theoretical and fac-tual viability of some scholars conclusionthat the fragmentary nature of the myths re-corded in ancient texts meant there had neverbeen any systematic or complete myths orlegends in the history o

23、f Chinese culture. LikeMao Dun, he believed that a system of mythsnarrated in the epic form had just “dissipated”over the long years of history. In this way,the “dissipated” theory initiated by Hu Shigradually became the accepted explanationamong those engaged in studies of the his-tory of literatur

24、e.After the 1980s and 1990s, the balanceseemed to tip toward the “never were” theoryrather than the “dissipated” theory. RaoZongyi (Jao Tsung-I) (1917- ), apparentlyinclined to the “never were” theory, cameup with three explanations. First, the simpleand concise syntactic structure of ancientChinese

25、 pursued brevity rather thanexpansiveness. Second, little attention wasgiven to narrative and descriptive detail sothat it was difficult to portray complexity anddetail. Third, limitations in terms of writingtools and the use of bamboo strips as a writ-ing surface made it difficult to write at lengt

26、h.While espousing views similar to Raos,Zhang Songru (1910-1998) came up withdifferent explanations. Applying Marxstheory on Asiatic society to explain the ab-sence of epics in ancient times, he believedthat this was due to the relatively low levelof productive forces in ancient China, theunderdevel

27、opment of commodity productionand exchange, the persistence of remnantsof communal ownership, the absence of anindividual private economy and the weaknessof the stratum of freemen and the resultantabsence of urban centers that were economichubs. The absence of a developed urbaneconomy and urban poli

28、tical democracymade it impossible for epics and poetic dramato emerge.As to the “epic problem,” we should like-wise refer to another view, the affirmativeone as opposed to its negative counterpart.While the latter, taking for granted a nega-tive answer, provides several explanationsthat seek to miti

29、gate the problem, the affir-mative view simply assumes that epics didexist in ancient China. The sources of Chi-nese literature were the same as those ofother great civilizations of the world and thesame rules applied. This affirmative view iscapable of resolving the tensions of the “epicproblem” wi

30、thout having to resort toexplanations.Among those holding the affirmative72SOCIAL SCIENCES IN CHINASummer 2007view Lu Kanru (1903-1978) and his wifeFeng Yuanjun (1900-1974) stand out. Ac-cording to their “Self-introduction” repub-lished in 1955, they wrote their History ofChinese Poetry in the perio

31、d between 1925and 1930, when the opinions of Lu Xun, HuShi and Mao Dun concerning Chinese mythsand epics were already widespread and in-fluential among Chinese scholars. Obviouslyin disagreement with views that they sus-pected of belittling the great tradition of Chi-nese poetry but having to reckon

32、 with theirrefutable presence of the “epic problem,”they expressed in their History of ChinesePoetry the following opinion: scholars werewrong to complain that there were no greatepics in ancient China. In the Shi Jing (TheBook of Songs) certain linkages could befound between some poems, suggesting

33、thatthe author or authors might have been tryingto piece them together and organize an ex-tensive epic of the Zhou nation, but had failedin uniting them into a single long narrative.This opinion of theirs was in open opposi-tion to the views of Hu Shi and Mao Dun.To Lu and his wife, epic was nothing

34、 but akind of narrative poetry, only more extensive.In the Shi Jing, the first poetry collection toappear in China, some poems in the “Da Ya”section were clearly of a narrative character,and were thus narrative poems, differing fromWestern epics only in their shorter length. Ifjoined together, altho

35、ugh they would still notbe on a grand scale, they would be nearenough to an epic. By enlarging the conno-tation of the concept of “epic,” they weretrying to make it possible for the sources ofChinese poetry to fit into the unified frame-work of world literature. Their scholarly in-tention was as ing

36、enious as its negativecounterpart. However, their contention thatsome Da Ya poems could be regarded as aZhou epic is a farfetched interpretation ofthe concept “epic.” Although it may be pos-sible to draw extremely limited analogies be-tween the poems and Western epics, the twoare not the same. Never

37、theless, the depth ofthe couples scholarship lent prestige to theirview, one which did at that time serve as aplausible answer to the “epic problem.”IIThe academic issue known as the “epicproblem” lasted a full hundred years, duringwhich our predecessors raised explanatorytheories and hypotheses tha

38、t included pov-erty of imagination, the intermingling ofmortals and divinities, difficulty in writingdown long compositions, underdevelopedAsiatic mode of production and thehistoricization of myth. Now lets ask: howrational are these explanatory theories? Havethey satisfactorily solved the “epic pro

39、blem”?The theory that the straightforward na-ture of the Chinese and their lack of imagi-nation were responsible for the absence ofany systematic mythology or epic was firstraised by Japanese scholars and later sup-ported to a certain degree by Hu Shi. Themain flaw in this theory is that it uses the

40、concept of national character to explain aspecific problem. As we know, Japan hasunified records of ancient mythology; theKojiki and the Nihongi, compiled in the 6thand 7th centuries, provide a complete recordof the theogony of the Japanese. On cominginto contact with Chinese myths, Japanesescholars

41、 were astonished to find that, bycontrast, a nation with so long a history as“EPIC IN CHINESE” UNDER DISCUSSION IN THE 20TH CENTURY73China turned out to be lacking so much as acomplete record of its own theogony, butinstead had fragmentary mythological epi-sodes scattered here and there in the ShanH

42、ai Jing (The Book of Mountains and Seas)or in works of the pre-Qin philosophers. Thisthey found inconceivable. Used to thinkingof mythology as the result of the imaginativeinquiries of ancient people about the originsof nature and the world around them, includ-ing themselves, they came readily to th

43、e con-clusion that, since ancient China had no com-plete records of the genealogy and lineage ofthe gods, it followed logically that the Chi-nese people were too concerned with therealities of mundane life to be blessed withimaginative capacity. We should, however,raise a further question: is a myth

44、ological ge-nealogy necessarily relevant to a peoplesimaginative capacity? Even if mythologymirrors a peoples imaginative capacity, thiscapacity can only be evaluated according tothe narratives themselves, and one cannotdraw conclusions merely on the basis of thecompleteness or otherwise of a mythol

45、ogi-cal genealogy, an issue more likely to be re-lated to record-keeping than to nationalimagination. Chinese literature has alwaysbeen nurtured by a grand imaginative tradi-tion with its origins in mythology, a traditionthat extends uninterrupted from Qu Yuan (c.340-277 B.C.) to Li Bai (701-762) to

46、 WuChengen (1504?-1582), and it can hardlybe regarded as reasonable to explain the frag-mentation of Chinese myths and the absenceof epics in China by saying that the Chineseare straightforward and unimaginative.Lu Xuns guess that intermingling be-tween mortals and divinities had made it hardfor epi

47、cs to emerge in China was quitecreative. However, this cannot be the causeof the underdevelopment of myths and epics.In Lu Xuns time, modern folklore had barelystarted, and the myths and epics of ethnicminorities in Chinas border regions did notfall within the visual field of researchers. Hisview th

48、at Shamanism and witchcraft hinderedthe emergence of myths and epics was basedon a comparison with Greece and shows thelimitations of his times. Today we have tomake use of what we have learned throughmodern folklore studies and take into con-sideration developments in ethnic minorityareas and even

49、the whole of East Asia, so asto get a clear picture of the “epic problem.”In fact, over the vast area of East Asia, asidefrom the Han Chinese-speaking areas, eth-nic minorities had their own oral tradition ofmyths and historical legends which appearmore systematic and complete than their Hancounterp

50、arts. Indeed, most even have epics.For instance, the Mongolian epic Jangar, theKirgiz epic Manas and the Tibetan epic Gesarare known together as “the three great epicsof China.” They have been or are being putin order. These epics are still being circu-lated and sung, so they exist not just as writ-