(East and West Questions) Short Comment: What contemporary enlightenment does Lu Xun's view of world civilization have?
China News Service, Beijing, September 25th, title: What are the contemporary enlightenments of Lu Xun's view of world civilization?
Author Han Yu
On September 25, Mr. Lu Xun’s 140th birthday.
The current situation of the interaction of world civilizations is quietly changing. Looking back at how this great literary master responded to the collision between Eastern and Western civilizations, does it have any meaning?
Lu Xun's view of world civilization is based on human beings, and civilizations are equal and independent.
In the preface to the translator of the Japanese writer Samurai Koji’s play "A Young Man’s Dream", Lu Xun wrote, “I think that'everyone treats each other as human beings, not the state treats each other, in order to have permanent peace, but "It must be from the people's awakening," I think it's true, and I believe it will be done in the future." He also said with emotion that when people talk about North Korea, they always think that it is a vassal state of China, and never think of others' selves.
It can be seen that the relationship between world civilizations in Lu Xun's mind should be independence, equality, and human nature as a bridge.
Data map: Lu Xun's hometown.
Photo by Xiang Jing
When Lu Xun looked at Eastern and Western civilizations, he started from the real people and pointed to the essence.
When talking about "preserving the national quintessence", he proposed that "preserving us" is the "first righteousness", "just ask him if he has the power to preserve our national quintessence, regardless of whether he is the national quintessence." For foreign culture, he advocates "possession, selection." "As long as there is nourishment", it can be absorbed and used.
This kind of reality consciousness, perhaps because Lu Xun never deified a certain civilization, he was able to see the light and the dark in a comprehensive way, positioning and criticizing.
For example, Lu Xun's literary borrowing of images such as "cannibalism" and "refuge" uncovered the complexity and cruelty of the secular society under the cover of elegance and morality.
As for the capitalist representative system which advertises "innate human rights" and "freedom and rationality", Lu Xun also points out his original features of "recovering the notoriety of self-interest" and "representing the public to govern and suppressing the tyrant."
Seeing each other as equals, considering rationally, and using them for my own use are Lu Xun's position at the time of the collision of Eastern and Western civilizations.
When Lu Xun compares Eastern and Western civilizations, he often shows conflicts and entanglements. This is determined by his cultural and historical position.
Cultural historian Wang Hui pointed out that Lu Xun is an anti-modernity character of modernity.
From the perspective of the regionality of the world system, Lu Xun knew the advanced modern civilization of the West and tried to introduce modernity to change the backward state of China at that time. At the same time, he witnessed that the West has fallen into a modernity predicament and tried to reflect on it. Modernity prevents China from repeating the same mistakes.
This is also the place where Lu Xun showed his most profound insight when he was in the European era of wind, beauty and rain.
He enthusiastically calls for democracy and freedom, criticizes autocracy, and is full of vigilance against "majority autocracy"; he advocates scientific progress, writes popular science articles, and has reservations about the social significance and function of science; he conceals traditional moral articles. "The Feast of Human Flesh" profoundly exposes, but he is full of inheritance awareness of the essence of traditional culture; he criticized the old China for standing still in front of industrial civilization, but actively translated and introduced Maisyller, Kollwitz and other critics of capitalist industrial civilization. An artist; he is dedicated to human enlightenment and calling for human reason, but his writing always reveals the existential loneliness and absurdity of human beings in the wilderness of meaning.
This kind of ideological contradiction is that Lu Xun is in a special situation of interaction between Eastern and Western civilizations, as an advanced intellectual in an ancient eastern country, a subtle, complicated and well-intentioned cultural position.
Data map: Citizens visit the exhibition.
Photo by Zhou Yi
Looking back at Mr.'s early work "A Brief Discussion on Chinese Geology", the national stand and national sentiments in it reveal the profile of Mr.'s life: "The Chinese are the China of the Chinese. The study of foreigners can be accommodated, and the exploration of foreigners is not allowed; It can tolerate the admiration of foreigners, but not the coveters of foreigners."
At the time when Eastern and Western civilizations converge, we should base ourselves on our own country, treat each other as equals, learn from each other's strengths, and blend together.
This is the master's choice of the times, and it is also a glorious example of today's people.
Today, there are still profound enlightenments for the great changes in the world unseen in a century and the great rejuvenation of the Chinese nation.
(over)