Realistic works are mainly narrative, which first reflects the objective world and reveals the deeper truth behind the world on the basis of reflecting the objective world. Because the west is the place where narrative literature forms and develops, analyzing its development process from the west mainly includes Greek and Roman epics, naturalistic literature, realistic literature, revolutionary realism, new realism and so on. From Plato and Aristotle's "imitation" to "mirror theory" and then to "lamp theory", the western exploration of the essence of literature is a reflection of objective things. This is mainly due to the "metaphysical" thought of subject and object in western values.
The characteristics of realistic literary works are reproducibility and reality. Generally speaking, realistic literature is a literary form that focuses on reproducing objective reality in a realistic way.
Examples of works include: The Comedy of the World by Balzac in the West, and many works by Stendhal, Dickens, Flaubert, Tolstoy and Zola. China: Most of Lu Xun's works, such as The True Story of Ah Q, are typical.
2. Ideal literature: it is a literary form that focuses on expressing subjective ideals in a direct lyrical way. Features: vivid, illusory. For example, the works of romantic poets such as Li Sao and Shelley. This is easy to understand, no examples.
3. Definition of realistic literature and narrative works: Narrative works do not necessarily belong to realistic literature, but realistic works should all belong to narrative works. Narrative works are literary works with narrative function as the main function. Narration, that is, "telling stories", constitutes the same characteristics of some narrative literary works. Narrative works do not necessarily belong to realistic literature because many works in symbolism literature belong to narrative works. For example, modernist literature works, Kafka's Metamorphosis belongs to both expressionism (symbolic literature) and narrative works in structure, while post-modernist work Beckett: Waiting for Godot belongs to post-modernist works (symbolic literature) and is also narrative works in structure, because both of them have complete narrative structure, narrative discourse and narrative action. However, these works are not realistic literature, but symbolic literature. "Symbolism literature is mainly reflected in the trend of thought of western modernist literature." So the two are actually very easy to distinguish. The difference between the two mainly depends on whether the "narrative" structure is used. Generally, all works with stories to discuss belong to narrative works, and the further division of narrative works depends on the function or purpose of narrative. Narrative works aimed at revealing the world and the profound truth hidden behind it are realistic works, while narrative works aimed at expressing feelings through narration (usually mainly indirect expression) are not realistic works. For example, Metamorphosis mainly describes the "tragedy" encountered by the protagonist when he becomes a beetle, which reflects the alienation of human nature in capitalist society and expresses the author's exploration of capitalist mind. The work does not reproduce the literary form of objective reality in a realistic way.
Generally speaking, the main difference between the two is that narration is only the way of organization of the work, and the ultimate function of the work is the difference between the two, that is, the boundary. One is to reflect the world, the other is to express feelings.
4. The difference between ideal literature and lyric works is more obvious. Lyrics can be divided into direct lyrics and indirect lyrics, and the main genre of lyric works is lyric poetry. Therefore, some ideal literature belongs to lyric works, such as the poems of Wordsworth and Shelley, the representatives of romantic literature. Some ideal literature belongs to narrative works, such as some myths depicting heroes that don't exist in reality or some wonderful books with the theme of ascension. Some symbolic poems also belong to lyric works, such as Baudelaire's Flowers of Evil. Therefore, an ideal literature is not necessarily a lyric work, and a lyric work is not necessarily an ideal literature. Mainly depends on whether the works tell stories with the meaning of words, or prefer to express feelings symbolically with the sound organization and picture organization of words. The former belongs to narrative works, while the latter belongs to lyric works.
5. Realistic literature, idealistic literature and symbolic literature are the external forms of literary works. Realistic literature, idealistic literature and symbolic literature mainly study literary works from a macro perspective. Narrative works and lyric works belong to the aesthetic level of the text. It belongs to the study of texts in literary works from a microscopic perspective. So the boundaries are actually very clear.