伍尔夫精英主义批评观的美学问题

The Aesthetic Problems of Woolf’s Elitist Critical View

在以创作意识流小说而成为现代派文学代表人物的同时,伍尔夫以“走向纯粹”和“拥抱高雅”的精英主义文学批评观,确立了她在当代小说诗学中的重要位置。长期以来,相比对她文学创作成就的高度关注,学界在究竟如何评价其文学批评的业绩方面基本停留于空泛的赞美,缺少认真深入的讨论和准确把握。由于对作为一种文化身份的“社会精英”和属于一种阶级意识的“精英主义”两个概念之差异的忽视,我们对伍尔夫精英主义批评观所存在的美学问题视而不见。事实表明,精英文化中蕴含的“超越平庸”品质固然可贵,但渊源于英国贵族文化的精英主义,在根本上是一种以借花献佛方式张扬文化霸权的“西方主义”意识形态。我们有必要对伍尔夫精英主义批评观所存在的美学问题做出认真审视。

While using stream-of-consciousness technique to become the representative figure of modern literature,Woolf established her important position in contemporary novel poetics with the elitist literary critical view of“leading to purity”and“embracing elegance”.For a long time,compared with the high attention paid to her achievements in literary creation,the academic circle has basically remained empty praise on how to evaluate her achievements in literary criticism,lacking serious and in-depth discussion and accurate grasp.Ignoring the difference between the two concepts of“social elite”as a cultural identity and“elitism”as a class consciousness makes us turn a blind eye to the aesthetic problems existing in Woolf’s critical view of elitism.Facts show that the quality of“transcending mediocrity”contained in elite culture is valuable,but the elitism represented by the spirit of British culture is fundamentally the ideology of“Westernism”under the guise of spreading cultural hegemony.This makes it necessary for us to carefully examine the elitist stance of Woolf’s critical view.