Subjectivity and Realism in Modern Chinese Fiction review (1)

Dear Colleagues,

I read Prof. Yunzhong Shu’s review of my monograph, and I would like to thank him for offering the review and I welcome the critique. I would like to provide some feedback.

Firstly, I admit that there are some grammatical errors in my book. The monograph was completed more than ten years ago as a byproduct of my dissertation. And when I revised it, I updated some messages based on some new publications of the same subject in the English world in recent years. Before the formal publication, Lexington Press told me that it would offer professional proofreading service. However, when I received the first version of the proof, I found many problems there and personally made more than 3000 changes by myself. I contacted the assistant editor complaining the ill service of the press’ proofreader, and suggested that either the press’ proofreader goes through the whole text once more, or I could hire a professional proofreader by myself, yet the assistant declined my suggestion and ensured me that the project manager and the team are “very capable and have worked hard to ensure your book went to the press in great shape.” As a non-native speaker, I chose to trust in the professional service of the press. This, to be sure, does not mean that I do not admit my fault of not insisting on more proofreading work by myself.

Secondly, even though the book is not an immaculate work, I do not think the grammatical issues would hinder the comprehension of my arguments for those readers responsible. Otherwise, the major part of the first and the second chapter would not have passed the peer review and was published in the English journal Critique: Journal of Socialist Theory in the year of 2012.

Thirdly, I like to mention that almost all the contents of this monograph had been translated and published in top Chinese peer-review journals in addition to one English journal (altogether there are five Chinese papers and one English paper), and I list them as the appendix for interested readers. I had intended to include the messages in the acknowledgment part of the monograph, but finally decided not to do so because most of them are in Chinese. Needless to say, they are also the materials for responsible readers to make judgment of the value of the manuscipt. Apparently, the reviewer has not read any of them: alas, nowadays the English academic world and the Chinese academic realm are also worlds apart, and there are rarely fruitful dialogues. This is also the reason or the necessity for this monograph, which articulates challenging views to the existing scholarship, to appear in the English world. I also believe that these published peer-reviewed articles themselves indicate the academic merits and argumentative strength of the manuscript. Meanwhile, they are also helpful for those readers who understand the Chinese language (which I suppose that it should be so as a sinologist) to understand the arguments of the book. To avoid the impression of self-promotion, I just attach the messages as the appendix to this response. Those who do not study the subject may just ignore those messages.

Fourthly, let me go a step further to ponder why the reviewer said that he could hardly understand my analysis. In this book, I mainly conduct a dialogue with Prof. Kirk Denton’s work The Problematic of Self in Modern Chinese Literature, which I think very thoughtful, well-executed, and useful, and I try to develop his thesis. To be honest, although I know the reviewer’s work on this subject and his major arguments there, I did not read through his book — though I would not say that I could hardly comprehend it. The major notion I develop in the introduction of my book is that “Against this general paradigm of the Party’s persecution of upright intellectuals, a cliche of the cold-war rhetoric and a theoretical straitjacket more or less undertaken by all the existing scholarship in the English academic world, the present study calls for jumping out of the ghetto of intellectual’s political laziness/correctness, and re-examines the debates and controversies between Hu Feng and other left-wing theorists from a cultural-political perspective, which will yield to fresh, new insights into the unusual phenomenon, apart from the simple and simplified argumentation” (pp.xxi). That is, I basically call for transcending the cold-war mentality and delving deeply into the controversy themselves through a close textual analysis as as an analysis from the cultural-political perspective. Though the reviewer rejects this position, I would like to leave the book for the perusal of more sympathetic readers. I do not feel strange that ideologically divided readers would have opposite ideas regarding the same subject, and I understand that they could hardly have the patience to read through the manuscipt to try to understand the arguments, though they are the “experts” of the subject. Therefore, I choose to wait for more open-minded new readers rather than count on some “established scholars.”

Fifthly, the reviewer also boldly mentions my other published works, though he acknowledges that he has not read any of them. In addition to the three reviews that have been published in MCLC, I list the review articles, again as appendix to avoid the impression of self-promotion, for interested readers to make their evaluation, which is also my response to the reviewer’s ungrounded, sweeping generalization, and I would like to express my gratitude to those readers for their patience of reading through my books and digesting the gist of my arguments there.

Finally, I also would like to call your attention to a new article just published in Zhongguo xiandai wenxue yanjiu congkan中国现代文学研究丛刊(Journal of Modern Chinese Literature Studies), vol.4, 2022, written by Ni Wei 倪伟。It is entitled “走向人民的艰难旅程 ——路翎解放初(1949—1950)的创作转变”. Ni Wei probably has not read my articles, but I find his many views echo the points of my monograph. In particular, I find one paragraph of this paper answers to the only question of the reviewer challenging my argument that Hu Feng remains fundamentally unchanged regarding the writer’s attitude and position during the creative process, therefore I would like to quote it here without the English translation,

“在胡风这里,作家的先在的主观是他赖以体现或克服对象所不可缺少的,是构成他战斗立场的出发点。虽然这种主观也会在作家的自我斗争过程中不断发生变化,但它始终都是一种以我为主的观念情感构造,也就是说主体和对象之间始终存在着对立和抵抗的关系,而主观的改变在某种意义上只是自我扩张的一个自然结果。由于不是从自我否定出发,也不曾经历过完全融入对象的阶段,身、心、意都没有彻底转化

Thanks and again, I welcome all the serious comments and critique.

Appendix I

Most chapters of this book have been translated and incorporated into some articles which were published in the following journals, I wish to thank them for allowing them to be reprinted here.

Some contents from Chapter 1 and 2 have been published as “Subjectivity and Realism: The Cultural Politics of Hu Feng’s Theory of ‘Subjective Fighting Spirit’,” in Critique: Journal of Socialist Theory, vol.40, no.2, 2012. pp.215-234.

Some contents from Chapter 1 and 2 would be published as “主体性”和现实主义理论再探——胡风“主观战斗精神论”的文化政治) in Wenyi lilun yanj 文艺理论研究 (Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art) (paper accepted, forthcoming).

Some contents from chapter 3, 4 and5 have been published as “Zhutixing wenti yu wei wancheng de chengzhang xiaoshuo: Li Ling Caizhu de ernvmen zaijiedu”“主体性”问题与未完成的“成长小说”:路翎《财主的儿女们》再解读 (Subjectivity and an Incomplete Bildungsroman: A Reinterpretation of Lu Ling’s Children of the Rich), in Zhongguo xiandai wenxue yanjiu congkan中国现代文学研究丛刊(Journal of Modern Chinese Literature Studies), no.5, 2018, pp.34-54.

Part of Chapter Six have been published as “Lun Lu Ling 1940 niandai de chuanzuo yu zuoyi wenxue xin fazhan” 论路翎 1940 年代的创作与左翼文学新发展(On Lu Ling’s Creative Works in the 1940s and the New Development of Left-Wing Literature), in Beijing jiaoyu xueyuan xuebao 北京教育学院学报 (Journal of Beijing Institute of Education), Vol.33, No.2, 2019. pp76-84.

The Chinese version of Chapter Seven has appeared as “ ‘Chengren de zhengzhi’ yu fengge de zhengzhixue” “承认的政治”与风格的政治学:路翎《财主的儿女们》的“精神现象学”再解读(Politics of Recognition and Politics of Style: A Re-interpretation of Lu Ling’s Children of the Rich with the Hegelian “Phenomenology of Spirit”),in Zhonnguo bijiao wenxue中国比较文学 (Comparative Literature in China), no.2, 2018, pp. 163-181.

Parts of Chapter Eight and Nine have been published as “‘Wusi’ jingshen de huisheng zai 1940 niandai de jingyu: Lu Ling xiaoshuo yu Hu Feng lilun de duihua” “五四”精神的回声在1940年代的境遇:路翎小说与胡风理论的“对话” (The Encounter of the Repercussion of the “May Fourth” Spirit in the 1940s: The Dialogue between Lu Ling’s Fiction and Hu Feng’s Theory), in Zhongguo xiandai wenxue yanjiu congkan中国现代文学研究丛刊(Journal of Modern Chinese Literature Studies), no.8, pp.129-150.

Appendix II  A list of Some reviews of my other books,

Marija Adela Gjorgjioska, “Review of Ideology and Utopia in China’s New Wave Cinema: Globalization and its Chinese discontents, Springer International Publishing: Palgrave Macmillan, 2018. 265 pp, ” Global Media and China 6(4), 2021. pp. 511-513.

Gong Haomin, “Review of Contending for the Chinese modern:The Writing of Fiction in the Great Transformative Epoch of Modern China 1937-1949, Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2019, 604pp,” International Comparative Literature, Vo.2, No.4, 2019. pp.827-828.

Huang Yingying, “Review of Postsocialist Conditions: Ideas and History in China’s Independent Cinema, 1988–2008. Leiden and Boston. Brill. 2018. 472pp.” Chinese Literature Today: Vol. 8, No. 2, 2019, pp. 123-123.

Zhang Zhen, “Review of Postsocialist Conditions: Ideas and History in China’s Independent Cinema, 1988-2008 (Leiden and Boston: Brill, 2018), by Xiaoping Wang,” Cambridge Journal of China Studies, Vol. 14, no.3, 2019, pp.54-56.

Best Regards,

Xiaoping Wang

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