Lu Xun’s writings

Lu Xun (1881–1936), pen name of Zhou Shuren, is widely regarded as father of modern Chinese literature. Born in a declining scholar-official family, Lu Xun received a traditional education in his early life and laid a solid foundation of traditional Chinese scholarship. This chapter examines how Lu Xun&s;s use of two registers of language reveals the interconnections between consciousness and language, and how linguistic form conveys a subtle message. In dividing the story into the preface in classical language and the diary proper in the vernacular, Lu Xun has pioneered a model of writing that builds on the opposition between the conscious and the unconscious, and the interplay of different registers of language. Lu Xun is a multitalented writer and scholar, and mainly a writer of stories, old-style poetry, lyric essays, miscellaneous essays, social criticism and commentaries. In addition to his first story collection, he published two more collections of stories, Wandering and Old Stories Retold .