China News Agency, Beijing, April 23rd: Yang Qingxiang: How to "Let Shakespeare find you" on World Book Day?
China News Agency reporter Gao Kai
"Does listening to books count as 'reading'?" "Will the influx of information anytime and anywhere affect the essence of reading?" "Will fragmented reading destroy reading?"... Another year of World Book Day, which is constantly evolving and changing In the modern human society, reading, which is considered to "coexist with civilization", also has a different appearance than before.
Yang Qingxiang, deputy dean of the School of Literature of Renmin University of China, literary critic and poet, said in an exclusive interview with China News Agency "Dongxiwen" that reading is a very personal behavior. With the increasing tide of information and the continuous expansion of sources, While reading becomes more everyday convenience, true readers need to accept new challenges in their abilities.
He firmly believed that free reading would "allow Shakespeare to find you".
The following is a summary of the interview transcript:
China News Agency reporter: German aesthetician Jaus once said that even if a work has been printed as a book, it is only a semi-finished product before the reader reads it. What kind of relationship do you think the reader has with the text?
Yang Qingxiang:
Yao Si is the representative of "reception aesthetics", "reception aesthetics" believes that the final completion of all texts must be based on the reader's reading comprehension, because the reader tends to "infinity", so the intelligibility of the text also tends to " endless".
This is similar to the "a thousand Hamlets in a thousand eyes" that we often say.
Even for the same text, everyone will have different emotions and judgments in different states, and the text will bring him different values. Therefore, reading is a human behavior with a high degree of subjectivity and free orientation.
For example, readers who read Dostoevsky's works at a certain moment may feel a stiff barrier, but at another time, they may feel the greatness and richness of the works.
Reading experience has a subtle and close relationship with the reader's age, experience, daily life experience, and even the mood and weather of the day.
Reading is an individual act that can be repeated, but never completely coincides, and cannot be sampled.
This is precisely what I find most fascinating about reading - extremely personal and experiential.
Because of this, readers can get a unique and wonderful experience every time the "encounter" that really fits with the text.
When readers are attracted by a book, it is a powerful and deep feeling of life, and the degree of beauty is no less than that of a loving love.
Sometimes we are in it, even reluctant to finish reading a book.
Of course, the emergence of this kind of experience is by no means inevitable in every reading, and we need to seek and wait in a large number of readings.
No matter how the times develop, the charm of reading is eternal.
Read freely and widely, as the critic Bloom put it, "let Shakespeare find you"—the canon works on you, and your taste and appreciation are continually improved.
Visitors view Shakespeare's manuscripts on display in the National Library of China.
Photo by China News Agency reporter Ying Ni
China News Agency reporter: According to data, the reading rate of books and the contact rate of digital reading methods have been on the rise in recent years, especially the number of "listening to books" has grown exponentially. Will reading in different media affect the essence of reading?
Yang Qingxiang:
Audiobooks have experienced explosive development in recent years, but in fact, strictly speaking, they are not completely new.
Chinese people have been listening to storytelling for a long time, and it is also a type of audio reading.
It's just that the development and popularization of the Internet and various smart devices has expanded the promotion of the "sound" approach.
As for the "reading" meaning and effect of "listening to books"?
I think that different media, different content, different reading states and moods are sometimes like emotional experiences in life. It is difficult to say that one is necessarily good and the other is bad. Peter.
The so-called good reading experience is actually a state of establishing a common emotional space with the text. This can be the moment of reading or hearing a sentence, or it may be a long-term experience in an in-depth reading.
Of course audiobooks also have their limitations.
At present, the most popular ones are mainly novels, inspirational works, biographies, historical popular science and other content, and the common point is that they are relatively easy to understand.
Overall, I hold a very positive view on the broadening of the reading medium.
Audiobooks and paper books meet different reading needs of the people, and there will be no so-called audiobooks squeezing the development space of paper books.
On the contrary, with the development of science and technology, different media or mediums will definitely appear, which are in line with the expectation of more personalized and diversified reading.
Digital intelligent reading "listening experience" at the 2020 Shanghai Book Fair.
Photo by Chen Yuyu issued by China News Agency
China News Service reporter: People live in a flood of information every day. When knowledge becomes readily available, the original functions of reading, such as seeking knowledge and self-cultivation, seem to be affected. What do you think about people's ability to read?
Yang Qingxiang:
In the past, we had an elitist and humanistic imagination about reading. In fact, reading itself has many aspects. Sometimes it is for obtaining practical information, sometimes it is for entertainment or relaxation, and sometimes it is even for socializing.
Each reading aspect has its emotional logic and value acquisition.
The multi-media dissemination method has made our understanding of the world very broad, but the influx and reading of information is also very likely to lead to unilateral transmission of information, forming the so-called "information cocoon room" state. Filtering and pushing make things worse.
For example, on the mobile phone, what readers read may only be what the big data thinks readers want to see, which actually leads to self-enclosure of reading information.
This is what contemporary people need to be especially vigilant about in the current reading environment.
For readers, the key is to develop a discriminative ability to deal with large amounts of information.
The paradox here is that if readers want accurate information, they must have more information.
In the context of the "post-information age", the first thing to do is not to refuse or deliberately cut off some channels of information acceptance, but to gain stronger judgment through more free reading without prejudice.
This judgment determines whether a person can be a competent reader.
In the past, the main basis for judging competent readers was how much knowledge and information they could obtain, but now the criteria for judging have changed.
Being able to distinguish which is valuable and which is really related to oneself from the uninterrupted mass of information is a truly capable reader, and it is also the challenge posed by the reading conditions of the times to every reader.
Passengers in a Beijing subway car.
Photo by China News Agency reporter Hou Yu
China News Agency reporter: In the era of touch screens, too much information attracts people's attention while distracting people's attention. What is your opinion on the statement that "fragmented reading will destroy reading"?
Yang Qingxiang:
I personally do not agree with this point of view.
First of all, I don't think the so-called fragmented reading is caused by the era of touch screens. Reading itself has various forms, which is an inevitable manifestation of the individualization of reading.
Secondly, what is a complete reading for the so-called fragmented reading?
If it is understood as really sinking down and completing a large-scale reading, then this form of reading has never been part of most situations. This reading state is worth pursuing and is very precious, but for various reasons, it is actually in many people. It doesn't happen often.
Therefore, in reality, there is no binary opposition between the so-called complete reading and fragmented reading.
I have always believed that formal things do not affect the meaning of reading.
Whether emotionally or cognitively, truly effective reading is to gain an intimate relationship with the text, and there should be no grading of reading.
(Finish)
Interviewee Profile:
Yang Qingxiang, poet and critic.
Renmin University of China professor, doctoral tutor.
His main works include the critical collection "Post-80s, What to Do", "Social Problems and Literary Imagination", the poetry collection "I Choose to Cry and Love You", "The World Equals Zero" and so on.
The editor-in-chief includes the large-scale young writers research series "New Coordinate Book Series", the science fiction series "Blue Science Fiction Series", and the English version of "Post-80s" short story collection The Sound of Salt Forming.