The Liberation And Domestication Of Body

As the material base of human being, body is the noumenon of life. Human being firstly establish contact with nature and society through body, firstly understand world and oneself through body too. Body consciousness not only concerns the constructing of the individual but also concerns the constructing of the society. The body consciousness of Chinese traditional culture and traditional literature has major impact on social development and individual construction. Modern literature proposes "cultivating human" as the theme, this makes a deep rupture between modern literature and traditional culture and literature. The protagonists of modern literature are not traditional officials loyal to his sovereign, martyr, filial son, chaste women, kings, high officials, gifted scholar and beautiful woman any more, but "human being" . This makes literature really "humanity study". The "cultivating human" ideal of modern literature includes two aspects. To cultivate sound human needs not only the social liberation of slave, but also the physiological understanding of animal. Just on these two aspects of "cultivating human", the importance of body consciousness becomes prominent. Sound human needs sound body at first. Only by making individuals on one hand have freedom of external social body, on the other hand have freedom of inherent physiological body, may the real "human being" be born. To comb and summarize the body consciousness of modern literature, can make us understand the achievement and limitation of modern literature "cultivating human" ideal more clearly.Though modern literature has common "cultivating human" ideal, the understanding of "human" of each school is inconsistent. So, when each school pursues each "cultivating human" goal, they show different styles and represent different body consciousness. According to the common grounds of theme and style, modern literature can be divided into four schools: literature for life, literature for art, literature for revolution and literature for class turnover. This dissertation regards four schools as longitudes, social body and physiological body as latitudes, attempts to wholly grasp the transition threads of the body consciousness of modern literature.Aimed at "for life and improving life", the school of literature for life is the mainstream of modern literature. It uses the enlightenment spirit as the ideological weapon, regards humanitarianism as the value core. By paying great attention to the common people's life, literature for life probes into the constraints on social body and physiological body, which are brought by traditional body consciousness. The birth of sound "human being" needs deconstruct traditional body consciousness at first. Literature for life uses democracy andscience as the weapon to deconstruct traditional body consciousness, therefore promotes the birth of sound body consciousness. To realize the transition from slave to human being needs democracy to deconstruct tradition enslavement on social body brought by "the three cardinal guides". Only by making individuals obtain the autonomy of one's own body can people's freedom be not nominal. To realize the evolution from animal to human being needs science to clear up all sorts of superstition attached to the physiological body by the traditional obscurantism, thus making people have pure and bright consciousness about body appetency. By national people's different attitudes to the prisoner's body and the dress on the bodies of common people, literature for life probes into the operation of the governmental power implied in body, and criticizes the fierce and timid characters of national people. By the bodies of the offspring and women, it probes into the operation of traditional patriarchy and authority of the husband, deconstructs traditional family power fundamentally. In the aspect of physiological body, literature for life pays close attention to sex and disease. The construction of new sexual ethic is an important component of "cultivating human". This kind of construction needs not only scientific light and art fragrant, but also the transformation of the whole social system. In the aspect of disease, literature for life gives prominence to social factor of illness. According to the illness and death of lower people, it launches to deconstruct both traditional culture and traditional society.As a big school standing up to literature for life as an equal, literature for art has more meanings of individual liberation, demonstrates more distinct individualism inclination. The individualism of literature for art makes the body's nature that body belongs to oneself be thoroughly publicized. In the view of literature for art, body may be an aesthetic target, or a tool of indulging in sensual pleasures, this causes the two different ways of literature for art to describe body. Sexual liberation on one hand can be a sign of individual character liberation, on the other hand may even slip into the modern trap of sensual pleasures; The disease on one hand may make the individual character prominent, on the other hand may form a kind of vicious circle with indulging in sensual pleasures; Maltreating oneself and committing suicide, on one hand may publicize the individual's initiative, on the other hand may become sign of decadent and hedonism. These two ways are poles apart on the surface, but their inherent essence is unanimous. In the body description of literature for art, the liberation and freedom of body has been stressed, and the individual is the absolute owner of body. Literature for art pays great attention to the physiological body belonging to one's own, reveals the important meanings of physiological body to construct human being. As an important complement to the social body which literature for life pays close attention to, literature for art pays great attention to the physiological body, this enriches and deepens both the meanings of bodyconsciousness and the study about the construction of human being of modern literature.Literature for revolution has close relationship with both literature for life and literature for art. The revolutionary purpose is a direct successor of humanitarianism of literature for life, and to certain extent, the revolutionary's passion is consistent with individualism of literature for art. Meanwhile, literature for revolution has remarkable differences with literature for life and literature for art, the latter two pay close attention to ordinary people, while the former pays even more attention to revolutionary group. The characteristic of the style and theme of literature for revolution makes the body consciousness in revolutionary literature show certain peculiar. As to revolutionaries, body has more special meanings. "Devotion" is not one metaphor, but one reality. Taking part in revolution means not only devotion of spirit but devotion of body too. In the devotion of body, the conflict between the nature of body that it belongs to one's own and its attribute that body should be given up to revolutionary group becomes prominent. This conflict makes the body consciousness in revolutionary literature demonstrate some kind of schizophrenia symptom. Early revolutionary participants and advocators are usually people who benefit from individual character liberation. They have unambiguous consciousness that body belongs to one's own, meanwhile, the revolution makes them really have their own bodies. But the revolution needs them devote their bodies to the revolutionary project, give the control power of the body to the collective. This conflict is one of the deepest conflicts in the revolution. While the revolution brings the liberation of body and realizes the nature of body that it belongs to one's own, the revolution also needs the oppression of body and praises the attribute of body that it should be given up to revolutionary group. In this kind of schizophrenia, sex is regarded as body instinct that has double meanings, and the interpretation of disease moves from a physiological phenomenon of body to a spirit phenomenon gradually. Death, the most thorough way to devote one's body to revolution, shows more outstandingly the contradiction and conflict between the nature of body that it belongs to one's own and its attribute that it should be given up to revolutionary group.Literature for class turnover mainly describes the social great change brought by class revolution and class turnover. It inherits the humanitarian concern of literature for life and literature for revolution, partly realizes the ideal of the latter two. Class turnover makes the social body liberated from traditional patriarchy and authority of the husband, makes the physiological body get basic satisfaction too. Then class turnover has enormous attraction for the individual body. Meanwhile, class turnover also needs body be domesticated to serve class turnover. In this course, literature for class turnover totally abandons the individualism of literature for revolution, thus cures the schizophrenia symptom of the latter. It replacespersonal consciousness with class consciousness, makes the individual's body become class's body, offers home to each body. But there are ranks in this kind of home. Enemy's body and comrade's body, public body and private body, man's body and woman's body, are not of the same value. Only the bodies serving the class turnover may be highly appraised. In order to serve class turnover better, the body also needs to be purified. Then the sex is conformed with the political words and gradually becomes body attribute that need to be purified. The disease, seemed unseasonable in the new society, fades out of the writers' vision while it is added political metaphor content. There is also special purifying demand on body's trappings. The domestication and control of body brought by class turnover makes body obtain equality but lose free.From paying great attention to the liberation of body during the May Fourth Movement period to emphasizing the domestication and control of body in the liberated area, the study of body consciousness of modern literature has gone through a winding evolution course. Though the study still has a great deal of insufficiency, it has deconstructed and subverted the traditional body consciousness in an all-round way as a whole, and demonstrated distinct modern characteristic. Modern writers' study of body consciousness richens and deepens the theme of "cultivating human". Compared with classical literature, modern literature has not only new languages, new form of expression and new social content, but new "human being" and new "body". Such new body consciousness forms an important factor of modernity of modern literature.