中国“现代小说”的理论建构及其文学史意义

The Theoretical Construction of the“Modern Novel”in China and Its Significance in Literary History

从1902年梁启超提倡“小说界革命”到五四新文学运动,是中国小说逐步走向现代的重要历史时期。经中国近现代作家批评家的理论和实践探索,“现代小说”概念呈现出从朦胧意识到理性自觉、再到明确生成的发展过程。“现代小说”既是中国文学文体的不断裂变与重构,也是小说文体的返本与开新。从“林译小说”到鲁迅小说,从梁启超到胡适,中国近现代作家批评家对“现代小说”所作的不同阐释,及其对小说文体所进行的多样探索,构成“现代小说”的复杂形态,同时,现代小说观念与创作也表现出“型类的混杂”的特点。中国“现代小说”在回到小说本体的同时,又突破中国古代小说和西方小说的理论局限,最终构建起中国现代小说的文体理论。

The period between Liang Qichao’s advocacy of the“revolution in the realm of fiction”to the New Literature Movement of the May 4 th Movement was of historical importance for Chinese novels’move into the modern era.Theoretical and practical exploration by modern writers and critics in China led to a process of development of the concept of the“modern novel”from a hazy awareness to rational consciousness,and thence to clear creative production.The“modern novel”involved not only the continuous division and reconstruction of Chinese literary style,but also a return to and innovation in the traditional Chinese style of fiction.From“Lin Shu’s translations”to Lu Xun’s fiction,and from Liang Qichao to Hu Shi,the various interpretations of the modern novel made by modern Chinese writers and critics,as well as their various stylistic explorations,constituted the complex form of the modern novel.At the same time,the concept and creation of these novels also show the characteristics of“mixed genres.”They break through the theoretical limitations of Western and ancient Chinese fiction and return to the novel’s original essence,ultimately constructing the stylistic theory of the modern Chinese novel.