Basic theory of literary aesthetics·Literary aesthetics
A branch of aesthetics. With the development of the times, people's cognitive abilities have also developed and improved, and so has their understanding of beauty. As a result, aesthetics has produced many branches, such as technical aesthetics, practical aesthetics, architectural aesthetics, etc., among which literary aesthetics is also one of the branches. Literary aesthetics is an emerging interdisciplinary subject, which is both related to and different from aesthetics and literary theory.
Aesthetics is the study of all the beauty that exists in the world. Its research scope includes natural beauty, social beauty and artistic beauty. Literary and artistic activities are the most concentrated expression of human aesthetic activities. This kind of human aesthetic activities should be studied separately. Literary and artistic aesthetics is such a discipline that conducts separate aesthetic research on literary and artistic activities. Since there are many different categories of literature and art, literary aesthetics includes novel aesthetics, poetry aesthetics, drama aesthetics, prose aesthetics, dance aesthetics, music aesthetics, film aesthetics, painting aesthetics, photography aesthetics, etc. Since literary aesthetics is a branch of aesthetics, it certainly has a certain connection with general aesthetics; however, it has its own research objects and disciplinary characteristics, so general aesthetics cannot replace literary aesthetics. Literary aesthetics can enrich and develop aesthetics by conducting detailed and in-depth aesthetic research on literature and art, combining aesthetic theory with the practice of literary creation and appreciation.
Literary aesthetics and literary theory are also related and different. Literary aesthetics and literary theory are both theoretical studies of literary and artistic activities, but their scope and focus are very different. Literary theory is the theoretical study of all factors and aspects related to literary and artistic activities. It includes the sociology of literature and art, which studies the relationship between literature, art and social life, and the psychology of literature and art, which studies literary and artistic activities from a psychological perspective. , including reception aesthetics that studies literary and artistic activities from the perspective of appreciators, etc. Literary aesthetics, which studies literary and artistic activities from an aesthetic perspective, can be said to be a branch of literary theory. Since literary and artistic activities are mainly aesthetic activities, it is very necessary to focus on the study of literary and artistic activities from an aesthetic perspective, which can better reveal the aesthetic characteristics of literary and artistic activities. Literary aesthetics takes literary and artistic activities as a system and studies the aesthetic issues related to the three aspects of creation - works - appreciation. Aesthetic activities, simply put, are an activity of judging beauty and ugliness. Literary aesthetics studies the internal reasons why excellent works are beautiful and why inferior works are not beautiful, and provides regular explanations and summaries from a theoretical perspective. Therefore, literary aesthetics is also a discipline that explores and studies the aesthetic mysteries of literary and artistic activities.
Today, people do not have unified views on what literary aesthetics is. The main views are as follows: One is that literary aesthetics is the aesthetics of literature and art, which is the product of the combination of literature and aesthetics. , which specializes in studying the aesthetic characteristics and aesthetic laws of social phenomena such as literature and art; the other is that literary aesthetics should be a science that studies the aesthetic characteristics of literature and art and people's aesthetic laws of literature and art from an aesthetic perspective; the third is, Literary aesthetics is a science that studies the aesthetic characteristics and unique aesthetic laws of art and artistic activities. It mainly studies the aesthetic essence of art and its manifestation in the form of phenomena; another view is that literary aesthetics can also be called art philosophy, which It talks about art from a philosophical perspective, or it talks about philosophy from the perspective of art. It does not apply philosophy to art, but to study issues with philosophical depth and significance in art, and to raise issues that are different from literary and art theory. The unique insights of writers and artists; some people believe that literary aesthetics is an applied discipline of aesthetics and the application and embodiment of aesthetic principles in literary research; etc.
When talking about the relationship between literary aesthetics, philosophy, and aesthetics, most people’s opinion is that literary aesthetics is a branch of aesthetics, and aesthetics, if pushed further, is philosophy. As for the relationship between literary aesthetics and literature and art, some people believe that literary aesthetics is a high level of the development of literature and art; others believe that literary aesthetics is a partial discipline of literature and art, and a branch of it. Literary studies include literary aesthetics, literary sociology, literary philosophy, etc. The two opinions are at odds. Regarding the relationship between literary aesthetics and literary theory, some people believe that literary theory focuses on the study of the general laws of literature and art (such as the relationship between literature and art and politics, philosophy, religion, etc.), while literary aesthetics focuses on the study of the unique internal contradictions and internal laws of literature and art. (Such as the aesthetic characteristics and aesthetic laws of literature and art, etc.); literary theory focuses on specific laws, while literary aesthetics focuses on basic principles; literary theory focuses on the perspective of sociology, and literary aesthetics focuses on the perspective of philosophy and psychology.
From the current discussion on literary aesthetics, it is not difficult to find that whether it is the issues of literary aesthetics itself (research objects, scope, etc.), or the vertical aspects of literary aesthetics (literary aesthetics in philosophy, aesthetics, There are different understandings of the position in departmental aesthetics and the relationship between literary aesthetics and literature or art. This reason is mainly caused by the nature of literary aesthetics itself. Because before literary aesthetics was proposed, aesthetic principles and literary theories already existed, and people also had certain views on their respective research objects and their mutual relationships. Now that we are talking about literary aesthetics, if we do not clarify its special research object and scope, and do not draw a clear boundary between it and general aesthetic principles, literature and art, and literary theory, then its existence will be very problematic.
Of course, a large number of studies on literary aesthetics only last a few years in China. As time goes by, more in-depth and detailed research on this subject will be carried out, and a large number of convincing arguments will be put forward.