历史与虚构:美国汉学界90年代以来中国叙事学研究

History and Fiction: Chinese Narratology Study in American Sinology since 1990s

以鲁晓鹏、史良、顾明栋为代表,美国汉学界90年代以来的中国叙事学研究,表现出试图以中国传统小说中历史与小说、真实与虚构的关系为线索,突出小说虚构性特质的倾向。这一倾向既是他们用西方文学、文化理论关照中国“小说”的必然结果,又是他们出于“理论的焦虑”从中国本土批评话语内部,搜寻中国“小说”特殊性的理论尝试。从三人相对疏离于国内学术的知识背景和差异性来看,美国汉学界90年代以来的中国叙事学研究一方面十分重视中国本土批评话语,另一方面仍难以完全摆脱自身的视野局限。

Chinese narratology study in American sinology since 1990s has attempted to establish the fictionality of the novel on the basis of the relationship between history and novel, and truth and fiction in traditional Chinese novels. This attempt is the inevitable result of their perspective of Western literary and cultural theories in studying Chinese notion of "fiction". it is also their theoretical attempt to search for the particularity of Chinese "novel" from indigenous Chinese critical discourses. Judging from the scholars’ alienation from the domestic academic knowledge and their differences, the American study of Chinese Narratology attaches great importance to indigenous Chinese critical discourses, although they can hardly go beyond their own academic limitations.