「擬仿」抑或「似真」：歷史敘事話語與賽珍珠中國接受史的再思考

與二十世紀三四十年代對美國作家賽珍珠（Pearl S. Buck）的褒貶不一大相徑庭，近三十年來中國學界對其中國小說的研究正方興未艾，論文譯作日漸增多。當代論者針對二十世紀三四十年代以來認為賽珍珠的中國小說不夠真實或歪曲中國歷史的觀點予以駁斥，或從歷史角度闡述了賽珍珠的中國情結及其與中國文學的關係，或從女性主義、後殖民主義等理論視角分析了她在文學文化上的先驅意義，更有相當多的學者從東西方跨文化研究的角度剖析了賽珍珠小說與傳記的歷史與現實價值。倘若將二十世紀三、四十年代對《大地》三部曲（The Good Earth trilogy）為代表的賽珍珠現實主義小說的歪曲論與當代學人的文化論從對話角度進行研究，可以發現當代論者對賽珍珠小說中諸如中國形象、女性形象以及跨文化因素等論題的研究似未能充分有效地回答二十世紀賽珍珠爭議中的焦點問題：其中國現實主義小說到底在何種程度上達到歷史的真實？她對中國社會的描寫能否達到魯迅、茅盾小說的經典高度？又如何在學理上認識和回應前述批評，如江亢虎、伍蠡甫、胡風等人的批判？本文擬切入賽珍珠小說創作的兩個源頭─中國古典小說與十九世紀歐洲現實主義小說，深入探討盧卡奇（György Lukács）論歐洲現實主義小說時與利科（Paul Ricoeur）在《時間與敘事》（Time and Narrative）中分別論及的「擬仿」（mimesis）概念，並與美國學者王德威（David Der-Wei Wang）論中國現代現實主義小說時提出的「似真」（verisimilitude）概念相較，認為賽珍珠的中國小說缺少了中國古典小說、同時代中國現實主義小說所具有的「歷史敘事話語」（historical narratives），致使《大地》三部曲缺乏歷史的「似真」度，因而不可避免地帶有了東方主義（Orientalist）視角。對這一問題的探討不僅可以促使我們更加科學地理解早期對賽珍珠小說的貶斥以及賽珍珠小說跨文化的傳播方式，從而避免當代論者對所謂現實主義真實性話題的迴避傾向，也進而幫助我們更加辯證客觀地認識賽珍珠其人其文的文化意義與文學定位。

關鍵字

賽珍珠在中國；現實主義小說；歷史敘事話語；擬仿；似真

並列摘要

The studies on the Nobel Prize writer Pearl S. Buck have been revived in the past three decades in mainland China. Unlike earlier criticisms which often fault Buck for her misrepresentation of Chinese culture or for her inauthentic portrayal of Chinese society, these recent studies, adopting either feminist or postcolonial perspectives, have mainly focused upon the cross-cultural significance of Buck's realist novels. Such positive readings of Buck's realist novels such as The Good Earth trilogy, however, fail to respond well to those key issues that critics in the 1930s-40s found problematic in the trilogy; that is, the inadequacy of historical truthfulness in Buck's realist novels on life in China. To negotiate between the negative reading of Buck of the 1930s-40s and the positive reading of her realist novels of the past three decades, this paper proposes to take recent positivist readings to task by zooming in on Buck's The Good Earth trilogy. Drawing on the concept of ”mimesis” in György Lukács and Paul Ricoeur, and appropriating the theory of what David Der-Wei Wang terms ”verisimilitude,” I argue that Buck's realism falls far short of achieving verisimilitude. In this analysis, a pointed response to, and a better understanding of, the criticism of the 1930s-40s could be achieved while a re-evaluation of the East-West cultural dialogue in Buck's works might be formulated.