As Reflection and Response to Wartime Life: "Emotional Remnants" in Zhang Henshui's Anti-Japanese War Novels
Abstract
The emotional writing in Zhang Henshui's Anti-Japanese War novels is a typical sample in the context of China's modern emotional transformation. Under the framework of the duality of elegance and popularity, the academic circle often separates his persistent writing of "Anti-Japanese War romance" from his early romantic works, or simply categorizes it as a continuation of the "essential traits of the Mandarin Duck and Butterfly School", yet ignores the continuity and contemporaneity of his emotional expression. An examination of Zhang Henshui's reading and life experiences, sorted out an analysis of the internal logic of his emotional expression, reveals that Zhang Henshui's wartime lyricism shifted from expressing personal emotions to epochal emotions, but was always intertwined with the contradictions and diversities of three emotional structures. "Life" and "emotion" are two key terms Zhang Henshui frequently used to structure his Anti-Japanese War novels. "Life" integrates a wider range of social daily routines into the narrative of his works, and "emotion", as a method, serves as a vessel for responding to social issues. Wartime displacement and life reconstructed Zhang Henshui's emotional experience and practice, becoming a method for his literary imagination.
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