Analysis Of The "Chi Li Phenomenon"

Chi Li is a woman writer of New Realism in contemporary China. She became famous in the late 1980s, and her works were in active demand for nearly 20 years. But as we trace Chi Li's creation path and the evaluation on her inside and outside the literature circle, we find that she was not fully successful. She won the market and readers, but the value of her works has not been recognized in literature circle.There are three kinds of people who always pay attention to her -- critics, readers and the media. For the media and her readers, she was a star writer. Her books always receive wide concern and high praise. The evaluation of her works from critics, however, witnesses an obvious change. In the 1980s and 1990s, Chi Li was thought highly by some critics. But in recent years, many critical voices appear. A great number of experts and scholars even choose not to read her works. These phenomena imply or show that Chi Li has not won the recognition in her own cycle.Comparing the different evaluations inside and outside the literature circle, we find an interesting"Chi Li phenomenon", that is, though attention was paid on her inside literature cycle, Chi Li got much lower evaluation than that outside her circle. Chi Li is not an individual case. In contemporary literature cycle, writers often face tradeoffs between numerous factors that are unrelated to writing, and some of them can still carry on writing under the guidance of their work ethics.The thesis explores the factors that drive the"Chi Li phenomenon"and presents a real Chi Li through the analysis of her achievements and deficiencies. Also on the basis of comparing Chi Li's different methods to handle her relationship between the ones inside and outside her cycle, the thesis discusses writer's value orientation reflected in their tradeoffs and the referential meaning of"Chi Li phenomenon"to the contemporary literature creation.