库尔提乌斯的主题学与文学批评方法

Ernst Robert Curtius:Topology and Critical Method

本文聚焦德国文学批评家库尔提乌斯,对其主题学展开批判性解读。本文追溯了库尔提乌斯的学术历程,揭示了主题学批评法形成的过程。起初,库尔提乌斯对以巴尔扎克和普鲁斯特等为代表的法国现代文学颇感兴趣,尤其关注其中的'整体性'。20世纪30年代,库尔提乌斯转向针对中世纪文学的系统研究,将欧洲理念理解为一种整体化的历史现象。他在拉丁文化中追溯各国文学传统的源头,并透过这些联系来揭示一个模式,试图通过揭示存储在文学传统中的集体记忆,来唤起人们对人文主义的关注。为了达成这一诉求,库尔提乌斯与主题学相遇,并通过后者找到了一种基于语文学数据的综合性新方法,即追踪'新式主题的起源',从而在西方历史中发现'一种变化的心理状态的迹象'。针对库尔提乌斯的主题学方法,本文进行了批判式反思,指出了该方法的局限性,即无法彻底地实现历史化阐释。

This paper, focusing on German literary critic Ernst Robert Curtius, presents a critical interpretation for his research method as Topology. First of all, it introduces his academic development, explaining how his topology was constructed. Initiated from the studies on the unity from French modern writers such as Balzac and Proust, Curtius turned to a systematic research on Latin Middle Age literature, regarding the idea of Europe as a unified historical phenomenon. By tracing Latin sources of the various national literary tradition and their relations, he advocated a pattern that calls for the public attention to humanism by finding the collective memories storing in the cultural traditions. To complete this mission, Curtius, in the way of topology, got a new synthetic method grounded on the data of philology, that is, to uncover indications of a changed psychological state in western history by tracing the genesis of new topoi. At last, this essay suggests critically that the incomplete and halfway historical literary interpretation leads to the limitation of Curtius’ s topology.