森鸥外文学中的近代化书写--《半日》《修建中》论

The Modernization Writing in Ogai Mori's Literary Works--th Half Day and Under Construction as Major Case Studies

近代化书写是森鸥外文学的一大创作主题。作为兼具东西方文化视野的近代文豪,森鸥外在文学表达中一贯坚持尝试寻找东西方价值观的结合点,通过调和东西方文化的矛盾积极探索日本近代化模式,其作品聚焦封建与近代、保守与进步、秩序与个体等日本近代化进程中的突出矛盾,体现出知识人对社会的自觉思考和文学的时代关照。步入创作丰硕期后的森鸥外文学在拓展初期主题的同时,表现方法上有了较大的变化,较之初期作品的感伤性与抒情性,中后期作品则表现出冷峻的凝视、理性的写实与批判的精神,《半日》《修建中》中鲜明地体现出这种转变特征。在两部作品中森鸥外运用高超的象征性叙事揭示了日本近代化进程中的困境与矛盾,他将新旧价值观的问题、先进与落后的问题、个人利益与国家利益的问题等日本近代化进程中需要超越的重要课题统摄于两作中,从文学层面为在近代化困境中挣扎的近代日本人提供了反思的视角。其对近代化进程所进行的理性思考与批判性书写,正是时代的迫切性与作家个体的自觉性催生的产物。

Ogai Mori was born into a feudal medical family.The Confucian education he received during his childhood and the study of medical science and overseas study in Germany in his youth,not only offered him the responsibility and ambition of the traditional scholar-bureaucrats but also cultivated his spirit of positivism,rationalism and pragmaticism.Exposed to both eastern and western cultures,he was able to understand the differences between the two from a macro perspective while analyzing the social problems caused by these differences from a micro perspective.The profound knowledge of the East and the West laid a solid ideological foundation for Ogai Mori's novels.He never gave up exploring eastern and western cultures and devoted his whole life to searching for a road of modernization that would integrate eastern and western cultures from the literary aspect.Modernization writing has become one of the major themes of Ogai Mori's novels.As a literary giant with both eastern and western cultural visions,Ogai Mori insisted on finding the combining site of eastern and western values in his literature expression.He actively searched for Japan's modernization mode by reconciling the contradictions between eastern and western cultures.His works focus on the prominent conflicts in the process of Japan's modernization,such as feudalism vs.modernization,conservatism vs.progress,order vs.individuals,giving expression to the intellectuals conscious reflection on society and the concern of literature for the times.In his prime time,Ogai Mori made new breakthroughs in the manners of presentation while expanding his early themes.Compared with the sentimental and lyrical descriptions in his early fiction,his middle and later works demonstrate more sober gaze,rational realism and critical spirit.This transformation is clearly embodied in Half Day and Under Construction,among other novels.Based on a profound understanding of the society and the times,Half Day and Under Construction focus on social reality.Half Day accurately reflects the dilemma of the Meiji“big family”in the process of Japan's modernization by presenting the conflicts within Dr.Takayama s“small family”.In Under Construction,Counselor Watanabe,who returned home after studying in Germany,demonstrates his determination to participate in the construction of Japan's modernization as a Meiji intellectual deeply influenced by Confucianism and with the ambition of governing the country.In both works,Ogai Mori used excellent symbolic narration to reveal the dilemma and contradiction in the process of Japan's modernization.He integrated the important issues that required transcending in the process of Japan's modernization into this two works,such as the problem of new values vs.old values,the problem of the advanced vs.the backward,the problem of personal interests vs.national interests.He provided a perspective of reflection on modern Japanese who struggled in the dilemma of modernization from a literary perspective.The harmonization of eastern and western cultures is a core issue in the process of Japan's modernization,which has profound historical and practical significance.Ogai Mori's rational thinking and critical writing of Japan's modernization progress are the products of the urgent times and the consciousness of writers.