“浪漫法兰西”的变奏:晚清时期法国形象一面观

Variations of the “Romantic France”:A Study of the Image of France in Late Qing China

在晚清以来中国文化转型的过程中,中国知识分子对于法国形象的认知也出现了不同的声音,形成了"浪漫"主调的变奏,王韬与康有为的看法在这方面较具代表性。王韬与康有为在游记中都对法国的"浪漫"有所表述,但是王韬后来从普法战争暴露出的诸多问题中也认识到法国在"浪漫"之外的文化特性,而康有为则在赴法之前即提出要以法国大革命的历史结果为鉴,不能盲目照搬其政治体制。他们对法国的看法已超出了基于感官体验形成的简单印象而进入到理性层面的审视,这种转变也影响了后世知识分子看待西方的视角。

In China’s cultural transformation since the late Qing period,intellectuals voiced different images they conceived of France,chanting variations around the thematic tune of“romance”.Wang Tao and Kang Youwei were two typical songsters of such variations.They both saw France as“romantic”in their travel notes,but Wang Tao began to see other French cultural features in problems that surfaced later in the Franco-Prussian War,while Kang Youwei recognized,even before he went to France,that lessons should be drawn from the historical consequences of the French Revolution,and the French political system could not be rigidly transplanted to China.Their notions of the country were more than what met the senses and entered the realm of rational examination.Their“variations”changed the way later Chinese intellects viewed the West.