论中国小说与史之关系

On the Relationship between the Chinese Stories and History

中国小说与史同源于上古神话。进入文明社会以后,史官承继了“神话”的记事职责,崇实斥虚,逐渐形成地位尊贵的雅文化;而初民们创造“神话”过程中所形成的那种天真烂漫的想象、寓理想于叙事之中的思维习惯,依然以口头创作的形式流行于民间,它的最终结晶是小说史上具有里程碑意义的宋元话本的出现。小说与史两种文体在漫长的发展的进程中,往往是界限不清,且相互影响。但由于中国务实文化传统,更缘于历代封建统治阶级极力垄断修史权力,对不利于自身统治的舆论严加控制,使“史”得以畸形的繁荣,而小说则备受冷落和歧视。因此,小说创作在长时期内不得不有意无意地依附于“史”,从而也就打上了“史”的烙印。

The Chinese stories and the history both originated from the mythology of ancient times. When the civilized society was entered, the historical officials inherited the duty of keeping a record of events from the mythology, worshipping truth and reprimanding falseness, thus developing a noble elegant culture. However, the innocent and naive imagination and the thinking habits of implying ideals in the narration, shaped by (he folks in the process of creation of mythology, are still popular among people in an oral form. Its ultimate treasure is the appearance of the dialogues in Song and Yuan Dynasties which were assumed as the milestone in the history of stories. In the long history of development, the two styles, stories and history, were confused in boundary and influenced with each other. But because of the Chinese practical traditional culture and more of desperate monopoly of the revision right of history by the feudal ruling classes, they tried to control closely those opinions disadvantageous to their ruling, making history abnormally prosper, but stories were desolate and despised. Therefore, the story creation, for a long time, had to follow ' history' intentionally and unintentionally so as to be imprinted with the brand of ' history' .