史统散则小说兴——以续书为例看中国古代小说的发展

History Falls Apart,the Novels Flourish——Take Continuation of Novels as an Example

史传孕育了中国古代小说,又阻碍了它的发展。明末清初出现的续书繁盛现象,是中国古代小说发展史上从内容到形式对史传传统的一次强有力的突破。由于续书作者既依傍于名著,又在创作过程中体现了自觉的创作意识,采用了想像和虚构的文学手法,从而为中国古代小说挣脱史传传统的影响做出了贡献。续书是中国古代小说由依傍史实创作走向以想像和虚构为特征的现代小说创作、由群体型创作走向作家个体型创作的一个转折点。这是中国古代小说发展的必然结果。

＂Shi Zhuan＂ was fraught with the Chinese novels from the ancient times, and also blocked the development of novel as a literary form. The flourishing of the continuation of novels emerged in the late Ming early Qing dynasty was a powerful breakthrough in Chinese ancient novel development history in its betrayal from traditional composition of ＂Shi Zhuan＂ both in content and literary form. Since the authors who continued classics mainly depended on the original works in the first place, and also exerted their creative consciousness voluntarily, this new form of literary creation had shaken off the limited tradition of ＂Shi Zhuan＂ by adopting imagery and fiction in literary creation. Therefore a contribution had been done in shaking off the deep-rooted influences from ＂Shi Zhuan＂ in novel creation. The emergence of continuation of novels was the turning point in ancient Chinese literary creation from totally depending on historical facts to creating new works characterized by imagery and fiction, and from group creation to individual creation. This had been destined to be the inevitable result of the development of Chinese ancient novels.