Introduction to Ethical Literary Criticism by Nie Zhenzhao

Abstract

Nie Zhenzhao. Introduction to Ethical Literary Criticism. Beijing: Peking UP, 2014. When Nie Zhenzhao proposed ethical literary criticism about decade ago, Chinese critics were just troubled by lack of their own theoretical discourse. Against this background, Nie's efforts were rather significant. The years' work yields comprehensive theoretical framework and set of core concepts and arguments, which are exemplified in Nie's new work, Introduction to Ethical Literary Criticism. The book, composed of two parts and appendixes, namely, basic theories of ethical literary criticism, application of these theories to text analysis, and list of its terms and their definitions, seeks to illuminate working mechanisms of ethical literary criticism and its terminology such as ethical taboo, ethical environment, ethical knot, ethical line, ethical identity, ethical confusion, Sphinx factor, human factor, animal factor, rational will, irrational will, natural will, and free will. The first part of book begins with discussion of origin of literature an ethical perspective. Regarding origin of literature, there are number of critical theories dealing with it, such as mimetic theory, cathartic theory, and Labor Theory. So far, most influential one has been Labor Theory conceptualized by Frederick Engels, who argues that literature, or arts in broad sense, has originated human labor. Unlike Engels, Nie forcefully argues that labor is just one of conditions for human to produce arts. Therefore, in his opinion, literature is not product of labor, but a product of morality, or a unique expression of morality in given historical and it is fundamentally an art of ethics. Nie then defines ethical literary criticism as a critical theory that approaches literary works on basis of their ethical essence and educational function perspective of ethics (13). In this part, Nie also draws distinction between ethical literary criticism and moral criticism. In Nie's conceptual system, moral criticism lays much emphasis on good or bad evaluation of given literary work today's moral principles (128), while goal of ethical literary criticism is to uncover ethical factors that bring literature into existence and ethical elements that affect characters and events in literary works, thus examining ethical values of given work with reference to particular historical context or period of time in which text under discussion is written. To illuminate this issue, Nie uses Shakespeare's Hamlet as an example. According to moral criticism, influential interpretations are play about character and that about Oedipus complex (130). However, perspective of ethical literary criticism, readers might find that it is a tragedy about ethical dilemma aroused by change of Hamlet's ethical identity (133). A big breakthrough in first part is discussion about biological and ethical section. Nie points out the biggest problem for mankind to solve is to make choice between identities of animals and identities of human beings (32). The theory of biological by Darwin and argument of labor assumption by Engels are regarded to be forceful in differentiating human animals, yet, in Nie's view, both Darwin and Engels failed to make fundamental distinction between man and animals though explained where human have come from (34). With reference to Darwin's concept of biological selection, Nie places much emphasis on its counterpart: ethical selection. Biological selection, for Nie, is only first step to help human being to be who they are in biological sense. What truly differentiates human animals is second step, ethical selection (35), which helps to endow human with reason and ethical consciousness, and thus eventually turns them into ethical beings. …