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杨喆 香港大学
Abstract
Generally speaking, modernity and postmodernity both refer to the historical period characterized by political and cultural events, technological change and intellectual and ideological movements. In other words, modernity and postmodernity can be regarded as an epoch but also an attitude. Undoubtedly, as an attitude, the ideas of modernity or postmodernity will penetrate into people’s external and internal world to some extent, then cultivate people’s way of acting and behaving, as well as thinking and feeling. Particularly, writers in modern or postmodern condition will more or less attach some features of modernity or postmodernity to their works. Therefore, literature works provide us an approach to study modernity and postmodernity. As far as I am concerned, the detective genre serves as a practical instrument for our study of modernity and postmodernity. Specifically, by analyzing the process of detecting, we can understand the key notions of rationalism, truth and subject, as well as explore the different attitudes towards them in modernity and postmodernity
Key words: Modernity; Postmodernity; Detective Genre
In conventional detective story which embodies several features of modernity, rationalism finds its highest expression in the detecting process. For instance, in The Murders in Rue Morgue of Edgar Allan Poe, the protagonist, Auguste Dupin, is characterized as a modern detective of rational quality and “the instrument for pure logic” (Michael Holquist, 141). In the process of detecting, Dupin heavily relies on on-the-spot investigation and rational reasoning. With rationalism sense, Dupin ultimately puts pieces of traces together into an ordered system, and solves the case. The successful detecting process demonstrates the authoritative validity of rationalism in crime-solving, or problem-solving, through which we can obtain the idea of rationalism in modernity, which regards rational reasoning as a reliable way to find the only one right answer and highlights the authority of rationalism.
However, in anti-detective story influenced by the postmodenity, rationalism does not always serve as a dependable tool to solve the case. The failure of detecting in City of Glass illustrates the above point. In this story, the main character, Daniel Quinn at first firmly believes in authority of rationalism. Therefore he tries to follow the mode of a modern detective to solve the case. He thinks if he puts the clues together and does some rational reasoning, the truth will be revealed eventually. However, along with the unfolding of this story, Quinn gradually declines. The modern detective’s rational reasoning turns out to be inoperable, which implies that rationalism enjoying the authoritative position in modernity does not always help us to solve the case and problem in postmodern condition.
From the previous analysis, it is believed that rationalism can lead to an absolute answer for the readers in classical detective story. In other words, the process of detecting is a progress and will bring forth the only truth to the case. As Holquist argues that “there is no mysteries” (Holquist, 141) in traditional detective story, which also means that the readers just passively receive the only truth and are left no room to consider other possibilities of the problem. Therefore, through the conventional detecting process, we can see clearly that the truth in modernity is objectively determined and can be revealed by rational reasoning.
Unlike the traditional detective story, the process of detecting in the postmodern situation is not a bringing-forth. In anti-detective story, “all these clues end---when put together ---in zero, or a circle, the line which has no end” (Holquist, 153). Take the Man of Crowd as an example. Although the narrator, as sort of detective, tries to trace the old man and reveal the truth, the old man turns out to be unreadable in the end. The ending is opening and like a circle, keeping the threatening world of crime in hiding, and totally illegible. Also, the detecting process in City of Glass ends up with the image of whiteness and the nothingness. The ending, in the view of modernity, seems meaningless and empty for “the goal of detection is to uncover the whole story” (Little and Auster, 133). However, from the perspective of postmodernity, such kind of nothingness can be regarded as exactly the sort of truth which is not the only one and waits for the readers to interpret. The disclosure of case, namely the nothingness, in the anti-detective genre vividly embodies the postmodernity ideology on truth that it is undetermined and positional, as well as relative to the observer.
Apart from rationalism and truth involved in process, the image of detective, real or illusive, also exists within and acts as an intermediary to interpret diverse ideas about the notion of subject. In conventional detective genre, the detective always presents as a unified, centered and stable subject. The modern detective always clearly knows their goal in the detecting process and persists on finding out the absolute truth. Moreover, with their hyper-logic and rational reasoning, the split clues and the mysteries are finally solved. As a result, they will reconstruct the world into an ordered and balanced system without losing their centered subject and stable self in modern condition. From the analysis above, it is argued that the modern subject is a stable and unified self. In modern situation, we, as a subject, can maintain a certain identity.
Nevertheless, the detective of anti-detective story is de-centered and no long stable in the process of detecting. For example, Quinn, the detective in City of Glass splits into “triad selves”, namely Quinn, William Wilson and Max Work. Both Wilson and Work are created by Quinn himself, but it seems that “over the years, Work had become very close to Quinn. Whereas William Wilson remained an abstract figure to him, Work had increasingly come to life.” (Auster, 6). From this description, we can see that Quinn, as a detective, is not a centered and unified self like the modern detective. Moreover, in the view of Quinn, “everything becomes essence, the center of the book shifts with each event that propel it forward. The center, then is everywhere”. (8). As a result, in order to respond to the multiple centers, Quinn is split into various selves to experience different situations and examine possibilities of the truth in the detecting process. The process of detecting becomes a journey to pursue self-identity as well. During this journey, Quinn, as a postmodern detective, even loses his previous unified identity, accompanied with the failure of disclosing only truth. In this sense, it is clearly shown that the postmodern subject is unstable and not a coherent whole.
Taking all the statements into consideration, we can come to a conclusion that the process of detecting in detective genre is helpful for us to further our study of modernity and postmodernity. Specifically, in the detecting process of traditional detective story, modern detective of rational quality and certain identity of self reveals the only truth. What the modern detective shows all interprets particular features of modernity. In anti-detective story, the detective no longer succeeds in finding the only truth with rationalism, and also fails to remain a stable self. From this process, we can understand postmodern suspicious attitude on authority of rationalism, the positional truth, as well as the instability and fragmentation of self-identity in a vivid way.
Most importantly, by learning detective genre and analyzing the detecting process, it is also beneficial for us to cultivate multiple ways to view the world and ourselves. With the notion of modernity, we can maintain the reassurance and certainty of the problem and ourselves. As for the ideology of postmodernity, we are inspired by it to form critical thinking and seek for more possibilities of the world and ourselves.
作者简介：杨喆（1989----），女，籍贯广西贵港，香港大学2014届文学硕士研究生，研究方向：文学与文化研究。
Works Cited
Auster, Paul. “City of Glass”. The New York Trilogy. London: Faber and Faber, 2009. 1-134.
Holquist, Michael. “Whodunit and Other Questions: Metaphysical Detective Stories in Post-War Fiction”. New Literary History. Baltimore: The Johns Hopkins University Press, 1971. 135-156.
Little, and Paul Auster. “Nothing to Go On: Paul Auster’s ‘City of Glass’ ”. Contemporary Literature. Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1997. 133-163.
论文作者:杨喆
论文发表刊物:《文化研究》2015年9月
论文发表时间:2016/6/16
标签：贵港论文; 香港大学论文; 期刊论文; 文学论文; 广西论文; 尽在论文; 籍贯论文; 《文化研究》2015年9月论文;