A Discussion on River Elegy

The production of River Elegy has created quite a stir in the country. Following that, the ripples began to spread overseas, and for a time the program was quite the rage in Hong Kong and Taiwan. In recent months we have repeatedly received letters from across the ocean, letting us know that there was an intense debate over this among the Chinese students there as well. At the same time, however, the discussions and critiques inside China itself started gradually to change from the earlier polarization between highly positive assessments and stern criticisms to somewhat academic and scholarly studies and analyses, and then, owing to certain political factors, for some time now these varied voices on the subject have died down, leaving only a sort of neutral tune characterized by an ambivalence mixing praise and denigration about equally. While talk quieted down and became silent on the mainland of China, however, the discussion of River Elegy picked up once again overseas, and those who praised it and those who criticized it actually became even more polarized than ever, with a noticeable and remarkable chasm between the two sets of people. Whether it was on the domestic scene or overseas, those who discussed River Elegy tended, in general, to use the discussion to express their own academic or political viewpoints. From the perspective of scholarly discourse, this is, of course, a good thing. It seems to me that because of this, however, the discussion and debate on River Elegy has ultimately become something that has been greatly extended beyond the scope of River Elegy itself, and has moved too far away from the subject. As I watched the development of this River Elegy fever, I had rather mixed feelings about it. I am glad that this television production has elicited such a major discussion, something that had not been originally anticipated, so that this discussion, and the production itself, has therefore been of some benefit to the liberating of thought, and that is itself something that conforms to our (that is, River Elegy's authors') original intentions and hopes. On the other hand, what worries me is that somehow I feel, quite subtly, there is this tendency, or one may even call it a sensation of being dragged, that wants to turn River Elegy into some kind of political phenomenon in itself, and that would be to depart too far from the actual subject that River Elegy deals with, and was not my original purpose at all. We know that, as soon as anything of Chinese literature or art begins to be crowned with the term political, it is bound to turn into an inextricably messy situation, and this is by no means to its advantage- in fact, one could think of a hundred disadvantages, and not one single benefit. In my opinion, in modern society, when an intellectual expresses a certain kind of intellectual or ideological viewpoint, or analyzes some kind of social phenomenon, or even proposes some kind of "political view," he or she cannot be considered as having meddled in politics, because, after all, none of these things are specific forms of participation in a political regime, and are not, therefore, expressions of "taking up a role in politics, or government." Even though there are indeed those who say that River Elegy is a political film, that is merely a certain viewpoint that comes from among the people and in society, and it has nothing to do really with the principles, guidelines, and plans and policies of the state or its political parties. I do not understand why, when people discuss River Elegy, they insist on mixing it up with some kind of political behavior and activity

Ambivalence · Ancient history · Art · China · Elegy · Literature · Media studies · Poetry · Political science · Politics · Praise · Sociology · Stern · History · Hong Kong and Taiwan Politics · Law · Psychology · Social Psychology

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