On Literary Convention In Literary Activities

Literary convention is a conception proposed by Jonathan Culler in Structuralist Poetics. Linguistic theory founded by Ferdinand de Saussure inspired structuralists to find a pair of binary opposition as langue and parole. In Jonathan Culler's Structuralist Poetics, the deep structure is literary convention and shallow representation is literary works.As the deep structure, literary convention is the grammar of literature. It not only maintains the order of literature, but also forms the literature activities. Literary convention not only affects the way that the author feels the world, but also expresses his experiences into words. Literary convention is a reading pattern for the reader. With the guidance of literary convention, the reader can obtain the meaning of the text. Genre is the solidification of literary convention in the text. Literary convention has three states. It is the creation rule in the creation phase; it is genre solidified in the text; it is reading pattern for the reader. In other words, genre solidified in the text, which is the second phase of convention, is a agreement that the author and the reader reaches in the text on the premise of observing literary convention.Literary convention has a variety of classification from different angles. Each kind of genre represents a literary program from genre; Each one represents a literary program from style; The fixed theme type of writers can also become a literary program. Different literary position can also reform different literary programs. Additionally, it's normal to distinguish different literary programs from text function point.As the deep structure of literary activities, literary convention is not contradictory with literary creativity. Literary convention doesn't mean to abolish creativity. The old convention assimilates and accommodates the creative factors, so the innovation can be understood; literary convention itself is not a static form. It can adjust itself, such as changing tributaries to mainstream. This kind of adjustment is also creation, In addition, there is innovation space for the participants of literary activity, because the communication between the author and the reader is not contacted, and the communication between the text and the reader is unequal.In the literary activities, the author, the text and the reader is not always in a state of exchange and conversation, but in the two states of static isolation and dynamic exchange. In the stage of static isolation, the literary convention is that the internalized ability of authors and readers explicates as the generic features of the text. However, in the stage of dynamic exchange, the author, the reader and the text exchanges and dialogues with the literary convention to determine the nature and meaning of the text.