China's poetic dialogue
Peng Wang
□: Ask the teacher to talk about his views on China's modern poetry.
■: China's poetry is dead! He was abandoned, tossed, imprisoned and died by those new poets, monopolists and bureaucrats.
□: Ah, China's poems are dead! What does this mean?
■: As China's poetry, once the most representative of China culture, the most vital literary world in China, with the largest number of authors and readers and the most important artistic form, does it still have an author? Are there any readers? People have long rejected these superficial, empty, pretentious, false, rough and mediocre "but they are rough and harsh, harsh" so-called China's poems. People would rather rub mahjong tiles to close their eyes and have no interest in opening poetry magazines. As for the famous sentences that are spread all over the world and the epic that affects an era, not to mention. At this point, China's poetry completely lost the revolutionary power and was eliminated, just like a zombie. Therefore, "China's poetry is dead!" Perhaps this is a bit harsh, so let's say that China's poetry has declined.
□: Why do you say that you have been abandoned, tossed and imprisoned by new poets, monopolists and bureaucrats in the field of poetry?
■: This is a very complicated problem. It began to trace back to the modern new culture movement.
□: Why is this?
■: 19 15, the New Culture Movement, was a great ideological revolutionary movement in modern China. It advocates democracy and opposes autocracy; Advocating science and opposing ignorance; Advocate new morality and oppose old morality; Advocate new literature and oppose old literature. After the October Revolution in Russia, the propaganda of new Marxist ideas was intensified.
□: What does this have to do with poetry?
■: The New Culture Movement advocates new literature and opposes old literature. Under the banner of "literary revolution", it is proposed to express freshness.
Thought, easy-to-understand vernacular, not Chen Fusi's sermon.
Think, the obscure slogan in classical Chinese.
□: Isn't this an improvement?
■: Yes, it is very progressive. However, under such a literary trend, great waves wash sand, and mud and sand fall. At the same time, classical Chinese is abolished, and the form of China national poetry, which has been perfected after thousands of years of artistic tempering, is replaced by a completely Europeanized free poem.
□: Shouldn't China's national poems be innovative?
■: China's national poetry needs innovation, and it has been constantly innovating in history. From the Book of Songs to the Songs of the South, to the Han Yuefu, to the ancient poems of the Wei, Jin and Six Dynasties, to the metrical poems of the Tang Dynasty, and to the songs of the Song and Yuan Dynasties, China's national poems are always constantly enriching and perfecting themselves.
□: So, after the New Culture Movement, what's wrong with China's poems becoming freestyle new poems?
■: China's national poetry is a unique art form of China culture, a very perfect, developed and exquisite art, which emphasizes strict rhythm, rhyme, meter and rhetoric, formal beauty and musical beauty. It is an advanced art, and this art form is the crystallization of's 5,000-year-old poetry art, with profound historical significance. It is also closely related to the Chinese language and literature in China and the aesthetic taste of the Chinese nation, which is determined by the characteristics of Chinese. It is an art form born from the same language, literature and aesthetic concept of the Chinese nation and has a strong national character. Therefore, the artistic form of national poetry is the product of China's history and the Chinese nation, and it is the solidification of history and nation. The New Poetry Movement in the New Culture Movement cut off the historical inheritance, the national origin, and abandoned the artistic form of national poetry, and suddenly became a European-style new poetry that had nothing to do with China's history and the Chinese nation, which made China's poetry lose its unique, perfect, developed and exquisite artistic form and become a monster that is neither native nor foreign, neither Chinese nor western nor neither Chinese nor western. This is really a reflection of the development of national poetry.
□: Why do you always emphasize the artistic form of poetry? Does form matter?
■: Poetry is an art ... Art should have form and pay attention to formal beauty; Without form and formal beauty, it is not art. It is precisely because national poetry has a perfect, developed and exquisite beauty form that adapts to the aesthetic taste of the Chinese nation that it has become the most popular and appreciated art by the people. It is precisely because of the lack of formal beauty and the contradiction with the aesthetic taste of the Chinese nation that free verse is unpopular and rejected by people.
□: However, it is difficult to create the artistic form of national poetry, which will affect its popularity.
■: It's difficult. This is a manifestation of advanced art forms. Only developed and advanced art has charm, which can arouse people's pursuit and appreciation and produce excellent works of art that have been passed down through the ages. Just like acrobatics, those thrilling and difficult movements are appreciated and respected by the audience. Judging from the historical practice of national poetry creation, it does not affect the popularization. China's poetry developed to the Tang Dynasty, and its artistic form was highly developed, forming a nearly perfect metrical poem. But in the Tang Dynasty, from emperors and generals to literati and businessmen, to woodcutters, beggars, singers and monks, everyone could write poems. There are so many famous sentences. Isn't it popular? It is important that Tang poetry is really popular because of its eternal artistic charm.
On the other hand, modern free poetry and new poetry have no artistic difficulty. We only know the names of many modern poets and their laurels, but we can't remember any famous sentences. As for a long poem that can be recited as a whole, such as Bai Juyi's Song of Eternal Sorrow, don't do it reluctantly, let alone expect any epic works that will last forever and affect an era.
□: Some people say that the old-style poetry is complicated in form, which is easy to bind young people's thoughts and should not be advocated.
■: Yes, it was typically put forward by Comrade Mao Zedong in a letter to Cang Kejia, editor-in-chief of 1964 Poetry Journal.
A point of view. However, Mao Zedong wrote this letter in the political background at that time. At that time, the left-leaning line adopted historical and cultural nihilism, and regarded all historical cultures including old-style poems as feudal dross. Besides, Mao Zedong's personal letter to Cang Kejia is only a personal opinion. It should be pointed out that Mao Zedong, as a revolutionary, is also a modern poet in China. Looking back at his life's poems, from youth to old age, they are all old-fashioned poems. This separation of practice and theory can only show that Mao Zedong advocated the form of national poetry in essence, and he set an example for China's poetry creation with practice.
□: Some people say that China is backward and needs to be in line with the world culture, so European-style new poetry appears.
■: As an art form, nationality is its vitality and value. Art has always been colorful, there is no advanced and backward, and there is no question of who meets whom. For national poetry, it should be how to develop and carry forward its nationality. This is not very contradictory to learning advanced foreign science and technology culture. At the same time, foreign poetry does not pay attention to artistic form, but its artistic form is consistent with its national language, literature and aesthetic taste, which is formed in its historical development.
□: Therefore, the New Culture Movement did have a negative impact on the development of China's national poetry.
■: Yes, the New Culture Movement did play a negative role in the development of China's poetry. Of course, it should be affirmed that the New Culture Movement as a whole is a great ideological emancipation movement in modern China, which is revolutionary, progressive and positive. However, everything has two sides, and its negative effects also exist. Under the revolutionary tide at that time, many problems were difficult to see at the moment. However, with the passage of time, truth and falsehood will inevitably surface gradually and become increasingly clear, which will enable people to make an objective, calm and rational analysis and deeper understanding of the development of China's poetry and other issues of the New Culture Movement, and thus draw scientific and correct conclusions.
□: Are these all the reasons for the decline of China's poetry?
■: No, the above is only one aspect of the problem. The reasons for the decline of China's poetry are very complicated. We just discussed the reasons mainly from the artistic form. Yes, art form is very important. Without form, it can't be art, and poetry without formal beauty can't be poetry. However, poetry is by no means a word game of art simply for the sake of art; It is the inner singing, the eruption of thoughts, the agitation of feelings and the sublimation of life. There must be rich people,
Profound and active ideological connotation. Ideology is the soul of poetry. Poetry without ideological content, no matter how artistic, is just a formal beauty.
□: You just emphasized the form of poetry, and now you emphasize the ideological nature of poetry. So in your opinion, who is more important?
■: There is no question of who is more important than who. They are two interdependent sides of the same thing. Form is like body, thought is like soul. Without body, the soul can't bear it; Without soul, the body can't live; The combination of the two can form a perfect life. Only when exquisite art forms are organically combined with profound and active ideological content and highly unified can perfect poetry be created. Therefore, like art form, ideological content is another crucial factor in poetry. The lack of rich ideological content is another important reason for the decline of China's poetry after the New Culture Movement.
□: Without substantial ideological content, there would be no social life in China society at that time that could arouse the passion of poetry creation?
■: On the contrary. Contemporary China is a great era undergoing profound changes. The invasion of China by foreign powers caused an unprecedented national crisis in China, which in turn triggered an unprecedented climax of various political, economic and ideological movements. The Revolution of 1911 overthrew the feudal monarchy for more than two thousand years and established the Republic of China. Great changes have taken place in China society. During the rule of Beiyang government, the New Culture Movement rose. With the spread of Marxism in China, the working class of the May 4th Movement stepped onto the political stage, and the China Revolution entered a new stage. The people of China overthrew the rule of imperialism and feudalism through the revolutionary war, completed the democratic revolution and established the new China. This is a great event of world significance. After the founding of New China, the construction of a new society began. There have been so many major events and such rich historical contents in more than 100 years. In this historical process, great changes have taken place in China's social system, social relations, mode of production, lifestyle, ideology and folk customs. It should be said that such historical conditions provide very sufficient conditions for poetry creation. Du Fu experienced eight years of "An Shi Rebellion" and created a large number of epics in the open era. Du Fu is called "the history of poetry". So, for more than a hundred years, China
Great social changes in modern times have no reason not to produce many epic works and great poets.
□: But what about the situation?
■: Unfortunately, the above logic was not reflected in China's poetry creation in modern times, especially after the New Culture Movement. There are neither epic works nor great poets.
□: What is the reason?
■: The Qing government, the Beiyang government and the Kuomintang government practiced cultural absolutism, and people were not allowed to freely and truly express their thoughts and feelings and reflect social life. It is even more forbidden to expose social darkness and call for revolution. They vigorously promoted the literary inquisition and stifled people's thoughts. Under such a high-pressure policy, it is difficult to have truly thoughtful works.
□: Is cultural absolutism an inherent phenomenon in China's feudal society?
■: Cultural absolutism is the concrete embodiment of feudal absolutism in cultural policy and one of the internal connotations of feudal politics. China's feudal absolutism was strengthened unprecedentedly in Ming and Qing Dynasties. Therefore, after the Ming and Qing Dynasties, China's cultural absolutism was also strengthened unprecedentedly. This is also an important reason for the loneliness of China's poetry circles after Ming and Qing Dynasties.
□: China's poetry gradually declined after the New Culture Movement. Apart from the general reasons of cultural absolutism, what are the special reasons for the ideological nature of poetry?
■: That is the problem in the mechanism of poetry creation.
□: What was the mechanism of poetry creation before the New Culture Movement?
■: Before the New Culture Movement, there were no specialized occupations and positions such as poets and writers in poetry creation. Poetry creation comes from all walks of life. Of course, it is mainly the intellectual class. People from all walks of life use poetry as an artistic form to express their observation, experience, feeling, thinking and views on life. On the basis of such a large number of creative personnel, a variety of poems reflecting various social life have been produced. Among them, the author with a large number of works, profound thoughts and superb art has a wide influence and a high reputation, and objectively becomes a poet. This is a poem before the New Culture Movement.
Song creation mechanism. Or a non-professional creative mechanism.
□: What is the significance of this creative mechanism to poetry creation?
■: This creative mechanism makes poetry creation have a wide range of sociality, produces works that reflect the broad social life, ensures that poetry creation has rich and profound ideological content, and provides a huge and solid foundation for producing excellent works and excellent poets.
□: What has changed since the New Culture Movement?
■: After the New Culture Movement, professional poets and monopolists appeared. These people gradually monopolized and manipulated the social creation of poetry, forming a mechanism for a few people to create poetry, or a professional poetry creation mechanism.
□: How was this mechanism formed?
■: In the New Culture Movement, under the banner of advocating vernacular Chinese and abolishing classical Chinese, freestyle new poetry appeared. Because most people don't appreciate this kind of new poetry which lacks artistic form, the old-style poetry is abandoned as a feudal old thing, so few people write poetry. Therefore, a very small number of people engaged in the creation of free-style new poetry, of course, mainly those who have achieved, influenced and become famous in the creation of new poetry, have become leaders, authorities and manipulators in the social creation of poetry. After the founding of New China, due to institutional reasons, a class of professional writers was formed. Those poets, relying on their fame, entered an important literary and art department, not only became professional poets, but also firmly controlled the China poetry circle. Don't allow others to challenge their honor, status, works and poetics. In this way, there are only a few, dozens, hundreds and billions of professional poets engaged in professional poetry creation, and the social poetry world is vast. This is a typical professional poetry creation mechanism, but also a very small number of people's poetry creation mechanism.
□: What influence does this professional mechanism of minority poetry creation have on poetry creation?
■: This mechanism stifles the sociality, authenticity and creative passion of poetry, which is one of the most important reasons for the poor, superficial, empty and exhausted ideological content of poetry and the decline of China's poetry.
□: Why do two different creative mechanisms have such different influences on poetry creation?
■: Ideology is the soul of poetry. The ideological content of poetry contains three elements. Namely sociality, authenticity and creative passion. In a word, poetry is the reflection of the whole social life, thoughts and feelings, including the poet himself, and the poetry works of an era must be the reflection of the whole social life. Poetry is the inner voice, the truest expression of the heart, the truest expression of feelings and the truest portrayal of the life of Ehuang Society. Only truth is honest, pure, noble and kind. Only truth and goodness are beautiful. Only in this way can poetry become the art of truth, goodness and beauty. However, only frank life, thoughts and feelings have accumulated in the heart for a long time, forming an impulsive passion, and under the trigger of inspiration, can the spark of poetry be generated.
□: What does this have to do with the creative mechanism?
■: The sociality of poetry requires all members of society to participate in poetry creation, so as to ensure that all aspects of social life can be reflected in poetry in this period. In the mechanism of professional creation, only a few professional poets are engaged in poetry creation, and their lives are very limited. In the final analysis, they can only reflect people's lives, thoughts and feelings in ivory towers, but only a few aspects of social life.
□: But they can experience life.
■: The experience is very limited. It is actually impossible to experience all kinds of social life. More importantly, experience life is completely different from real life. There is a world of difference. Experiencing life is just a superficial observation and feeling that has no essential connection with this life. This observation and feeling is sometimes a superficial knowledge and understanding of the essential life, and sometimes even a distortion of the essential life. Imagine a professional poet who experiences life. Did he suddenly have the life connotation, thoughts and feelings of workers, farmers, scientific and technological personnel, soldiers, cadres, students and businessmen through a period of life experience? This is obviously a lie that deviates from materialism. It is precisely because of this professional poetry creation mechanism that poetry creation is carried out through the so-called experience life, which makes the modern poetry world full of superficial, empty and mediocre works, full of affectation, affectation and falsehood.
Works. It completely deviates from the principle spirit of poetry authenticity and has a very negative impact on poetry creation.
□: But these poets have rich passion for poetry creation.
■: Yes, these people may be more passionate. Because passion is a poet's character. However, it must be pointed out that the passion of poetry creation is concrete, not abstract, and it is impossible to produce it out of thin air. It is related to all the internal and external conditions of the poet, determined by many factors and produced by the accumulation of long life. Those professional poets may have some passion when they become the poetic beginning of life and describe real and familiar life. But when they are imprisoned in pagodas for a long time, their lives are empty and poor, and they are forced to write about strange lives that do not belong to them, it is difficult for them to have real passion. Passion can only exist in the real, rich and fiery life of the majority of social members. Therefore, only a socialized and non-specialized poetry creation mechanism can ensure full passion and thus produce passionate excellent poetry.
□: Every member of society can freely participate in poetry creation. No social barriers!
■: Yes, everyone can write poems freely, and there are no obstacles today. But the prosperity of poetry in an era is by no means a simple personal act; It needs certain social propaganda, organization and mobilization, exchange and discussion, criticism and encouragement. Only under such conditions can poetry creation form socialized creation and produce many excellent works, which has long been an era of poetry prosperity. Those professional poets occupy an important position in the poetry world, monopolize and manipulate the poetry world, and form a bureaucratic group in the poetry world. This bureaucratic system tends to form egoism, refuse criticism, tolerate new ideas and suppress new people. The monopoly of new works makes the flourishing poetry world, which should be full of flowers and Ma Si, look like a dead situation. This is the inevitable result brought by the professional creation mechanism to the poetry circle.
In short, due to the above reasons, China's poetry circles have lost their vitality. It is full of poems by a few professional poets, which have neither artistic form nor ideological content, and are mediocre, rough, superficial, empty, melodramatic and false. People hate it, stay away from it and finally abandon it. China's poems, once the proudest, the most popular and the most brilliant in China culture, declined.
□: Your point of view is really refreshing.
■: I only make a historical and objective comment on the problems existing in China's poetry creation since the New Culture Movement. However, I hope to attract more attention and arouse a wider and deeper debate on this issue.
□: So, what do you think can revitalize China's poetry?
■: Yes, this is an important position for our conversation. In my opinion, to revitalize China's poetry, we must first restore the inherent artistic form of China's national poetry.
□: Isn't this retro? Is it not the feudal restoration? Isn't it a retrogression of history?
■: Yes, we are going to launch a nationwide poetry revival movement. There is no feudal restoration here. We should restore, inherit and develop China national poetry, an artistic form with a long history and tradition, which conforms to China's language and literature and the aesthetic concept of the Chinese nation and has been tempered, accumulated and perfected for thousands of years. As a form, it has no class nature, let alone feudal restoration. In fact, retro is not necessarily retrogression. The ancient prose movement in Tang and Song Dynasties is a well-known progressive literature movement.
Second, change the mechanism of professional poetry creation. Cancel the institutions related to this mechanism, cancel professional poets and break the monopoly of poetry. Take measures to mobilize, encourage and promote the poetry creation of the whole society, form a socialized poetry creation mechanism, make poetry creation rooted in deep fertile soil, absorb multiple nutrients, and create works with profound ideological content and epics of the new era.
When China's poetry recovers and develops a perfect art form, when China's poetry is full of vitality, true, substantial, profound and passionate ideological content, and when China's poetry has a large number of authors and readers on the broadest basis, a new golden age of China's poetry will come. A nation with a long history, fine traditions and brilliant achievements will certainly be able to revive.