The Avant-garde Poetry Twist:from The End Of The 1980’s To The 1990’s

The transformation of Chinese society in the early 1990 s led to the changes in concepts and practices of poetics.However,the internal motivation of such changes was shown in poetry-writing as early as the mid-1980 s.The most discussed phenomenon was “Epic.”On one hand,starting from Misty Poetry,ideas such as “Cultural Epic” and “Grand Poetry”surfaced and showed tremendous passion towards writing.On the other hand,this phenomenon is criticized by other poets as the embodiment of flaws of writing poetry in the 1980 s.Societal changes accelerate the pace of poetry’s self-adjustment.In 1990 s,many reflecting opinions appeared;gradually,a clear awareness of “Poetry in the 1990s” was established.Of course,the complexity of the problem lies in the fact that in the seemingly different changes,new poetics still retains the characteristics of those that it wants to surpass.This is especially obvious in some essentialist linguistic concepts touched by poetry in linguistic experimentations.Linguistic turn here,most of the time,carries on the original “theological” desire.In the void of language,there exists the absent domination of divinity.The over obsession with language sometimes is just a substitute of a utopia imagination.Of course,language does not necessary always lead to the same result.From the perspective of some other poets,linguistic problems is related to subjects like “how we are written by history”;such a subject illustrates our destiny from a special perspective.Ultimately,the linguistic problem of poetry is to be explained on a level of implication,whose operation itself refers to the basic condition of our time.For contemporary Chinese literature,the most important point is the writing and responding to history—a history that is based on personal experience or a piece of historical information that is left amidst linguistic crevice,instead of the grand narrative of history.Such an emphasis is consciously presented in the “narrative” problem of the 1990 s poetry.The dialectical relationship between memory and amnesia reflects a syndrome of the consciousness of the age.There is no an essential model to follow for poetry writing.Poetry always exists in the middle of the complex interactive relationship between different eras.To every avant-garde poet who wants to keep the vitality of their writing,their ability to acutely feel,experience,and cognize the historical condition that they are situated in,to some extent,decides the future of modern Chinese poetry.This situation requests poets to persist one attitude: be a stranger anew.