Imagery Research In Chinese Utopia

In the West,utopian literature contains the development of utopian ideal and the reincarnation of anti-utopia ideology,and rich utopian works have raised the human exploration of the ideal society to a certain level.In China,the exploration of ideal society and ideal national system are not the mainstream literary works.But as early as the pre-Qin,some fragmented discourses have been presented.By the Wei and Jin Dynasties,The ideal blueprint of the Chinese-style utopia was completely depicted by Tao Yuanming.The panoramic imagery of Peach Blossom Spring’ paradise has been inherited and carried forward by later generations.Imagery is a very important form of artistic expression in Chinese and Western literary tradition.This paper studies imagery in utopian texts and explores the differences of imageries in Chinese and Western Utopian Texts.I think that the use of imagery in Western utopia is “fragmented”,however,“imagery inheritance” presents in Chinese-style utopia.The so-called “imagery inheritance”,that is,the tradition that through the imagery to sentiment the poetry in Chinese classical literature is extended to the text of utopian country imagination,and the imageries in these texts are recognized and inherited under the writings of different times’ literati.Take the two texts Peach Blossom Spring and The Girl’s Face and the Peach Flowers as examples,The inheritance of imagery is reflected on the use of the Imagery group and the use of the Peach blossom imagery.Firstly,Tao Yuanming described the poetic scene paradise through the imagery group,while Ge Fei took the imagery group as a writing skills of the novel and even a clue or signal of the story.Secondly,in these imageries,the common is to inherit the original imagery of peach blossom: Tao Yuanyming inherited the implication of the artistic conception of peach blossom since ancient times and Ge Fei inherited Tao Yuanming’s artistic conception of utopian ideal that is set by Peach Blossom Spring.The inheritance of the Peach blossom stems from its symbolic meaning of "primitive imagery" since ancient times,and the tradition of imagery writing style is derived from the penetration of collective unconscious.Seemingly,Chinese utopian expressed thinking vaguely through the imagery,which is a look backward looking and escape way.Actually,the imagery inheritance is to get to a kind of ideological succession,and then to realize the common ideal of the state in the pursuit of the highest social ideal of Tao.