Lin Yutang's works and their characteristics

Representative works such as Smoke in Beijing, My Country and My People, The Art of Life and the Wisdom of Laozi, etc.

Lin Yutang (1895 65438+1October1March 26th, 976), born in Longxi, Fujian (now Zhangzhou), was originally named Lehe, later changed to Yutang, and later changed to Yutang, a famous modern writer, scholar and China.

In his early years, he studied in the United States and Germany, and obtained a master's degree in literature from Harvard University and a doctorate in linguistics from Leipzig University. After returning to China, he taught in Tsinghua University, Peking University and Xiamen University. 1945 went to Singapore to set up Nanyang University as the president. He used to be the director of fine arts and literature of UNESCO and the vice chairman of the International Pen Club. Lin Yutang was nominated by Nobel Prize in Literature twice in 1940 and 1950. He founded the Analects of Confucius, The Life on Earth, The Wind of the Universe and other publications, and his works include the novels Smoke in Beijing and Ridiculous. Prose essays, the feast of life, the art of life, and the translation of Selected Poems of Dongpo and Six Chapters of a Floating Life. He lived in Taiwan Province Province from 65438 to 0966, and was employed by the Chinese University of Hong Kong as a research professor from 65438 to 0967, presiding over the compilation of Lin Yutang's Contemporary Chinese-English Dictionary. 1976 died in Hong Kong at the age of 80.

Literary features

Prose creation

Lin Yutang's prose covers a wide range of fields. In his view, the ideal prose "is one with natural rhythm of language, such as chatting around the stove in the rain and dusk, good at pulling, rich in emotion, harmonious, simple and easy to understand, such as talking with eminent monks about Zen, talking with celebrities, coherent and seamless, rambling, unable to stop, unable to delete, able to read what they say, and listen to what they say." (See the Heritage of Essays) From his creative translation of western humor to his self-proclaimed Taoist spirit in his later years, Lin Yutang has always maintained the artistic paradigm of this style of conversation, with leisure humor as the style and transcendence as the position.

Lin Yutang's prose is semi-elegant, semi-vulgar, harmonious, simple and reasonable. He often looks at the world with a detached and leisurely attitude, praises beautiful prose with plain words, and forms a leisurely style combining Zhuang with harmony and private residence. His writing style is natural and fluent, humorous but not absurd, and has its own taste. But sometimes it's too easy and a little heavy. Lin Yutang's style is related to his views on writing. He believes: "There are two kinds of mines in the world: one is an old mine and the other is a new mine. The old mine is in the book, and the new mine is in the language of ordinary people. Second-class artists dig materials from old mines, while higher artists dig materials from new mines. "

Lin Yutang's writing style is different from the fighting style advocated by left-wing writers, but stands on reality and writes a wise article of "looking at the world warmly and coldly" in the spirit of liberalism. Although his article also talks about facing life directly, it is not embellished with desolate pen and ink; He also talked about reforming national character, but he didn't attack anyone. He regards the world as a play with the attitude of a viewer, writes its funny points, and then pursues a spiritual enlightenment to achieve the best state of mind. In the end, he failed to listen to Lu Xun's advice not to treat essays as "knickknacks" (see Lu Xun's "The Crisis of Essays"), and insisted on writing in prose style, thus being complacent and expressing his spirit.

Throughout the prose works during the May 4th Movement, Lin Yutang combined the humorous sentiments of the wisdom of the East and the West, which not only lacked the criticism of mainstream literature, but also expanded the aesthetic dimension of modern prose and found a new way, which was of great significance to readers at that time, especially at present.

Novel creation

As a cross-language, cross-culture and cross-era comparative literature phenomenon, Lin Yutang's novels show distinct inheritance and transcendence characteristics, which are embodied in the ternary framework of "artist", "world" and "reader". Lin Yutang's cultural marginal characteristics, liberal intellectuals' personality symbols and personality nourishment are grasped by "artists", and Lin Yutang's sexual spirit and aesthetic world outlook are expressed by "world".

Translated works

Lin Yutang's translation is characterized by fluency and understandability, and rarely uses jargon, which can be understood by readers of middle culture, which is also the result of his exploration. 1936, he "made" the art of life and wrote 260 pages. He thinks the language is abstruse and the argument is boring, which will lose readers. So he started all over again, using a set of words, observing the game with delicate and moving oriental feelings such as wind, clouds, rain, snow, moon, mountains, water and stones. He avoided the concept of philosophy, abandoned political slogans, turned vulgarity into elegance, elegance into vulgarity, and elegance into vulgarity, and wrote a philosophy of life that was unlearned, intelligent and happy.