Is Mimetic Theory in Literature and Art Universal?

Transcription

1 Is Mimetic Theory in Literature and Art Universal? Ming Dong Gu Rhodes College Abstract Mimesis is one of the most fundamental ideas in Western poetics. Mimetic theories constitute a mainstream in Western aesthetics. In comparative studies of Chinese and Western poetics, however, there exists a widely accepted opinion that mimetic theory is a cultural invention unique to the Western tradition. And on this scholarly consensus has been constructed a fundamental dichotomy, ramifying into a series of binary oppositions: the metaphorical, figurative, transcendental nature of Western art, as against the metonymic, literal, immanentist nature of Chinese art. Critically reviewing the comparative studies of mimetic theory, this article argues against the accepted opinion. By examining various ontological and epistemological aspects of mimesis in the Chinese tradition in relation to the West, this article reestablishes imitation as a transcultural human instinct and mimetic theory in art as a universal idea across cultural traditions. It also examines how the artistic ideal is conceived of in Chinese and Western representation, how Chinese mimetic theory differs from its Western counterpart, and what implications an understanding of the differences may have for the comparative study of Western and non-western literatures. The Mimetic Controversy Mimesis is one of the oldest and most fundamental concepts in Western aesthetics. In a thorough reassessment of the foundations of mimesis, Stephen Halliwell (2002: vii) begins with an assertion that few would question: The concept of mimesis lies at the core of the entire history of Western attempts I wish to acknowledge my deep indebtedness to an anonymous reviewer of Poetics Today and the journal s editor, Meir Sternberg, for their perceptive critique and detailed suggestions for revision. Their comments were so extensive that they helped improve my article in many aspects. Poetics Today 26:3 (Fall 2005). Copyright 2005 by the Porter Institute for Poetics and Semiotics.

2 460 Poetics Today 26:3 to make sense of representational art and its values. Since its initial appearance in Plato s Republic (1978: , ) and reformulation in Aristotle s Poetics, mimetic theory has been indispensable to Western studies of the nature, function, and techniques of literature and art. As M. H. Abrams (1953: 11) points out, after the rediscovery of the Poetics in the sixteenth century, aesthetic theory in the West cannot avoid discussing mimesis or imitation or its parallel terms such as reflection, representation, counterfeiting, feigning, copy, and image. Nor is mimesis central to the Western aesthetic tradition just because it has been central to the history of ideas on language, literature, painting, music, sculpture, and other arts but also because it addresses fundamental problems that continue to be of urgent concern for contemporary aesthetics. Indeed, despite a period of eclipse following the rise of romantic expressive theories in the eighteenth century, the mimetic view of literature and art has prevailed: among other uses, it has served as the theoretical underpinning upon which theorists of fiction built their defense of realism. 1 In the postmodern era, notions of textuality and intertextuality have called into question the possibility of mimesis as representation, and the famous claim that there are no originals but only copies seriously challenges the authority of mimesis. Nevertheless, the view of literature as imitation has again survived. Paul Ricoeur s (1977: 39) remark mimesis is poiesis, and poiesis is mimesis is not just a reaffirmation of the mimetic nature of literature; it is also an indication that mimesis has once again become an important topic in literary critical theory. In Truth and Method, Hans-Georg Gadamer (1999: ) goes to great length to defend and redefine mimesis in terms of game-playing. And Halliwell s (2002: 33) recent study convincingly demonstrates that the bewildering range of aesthetic disputes and conflicting practices in the twentieth-century continued to revolve around the worldreflecting-world-simulating contrast that has given impetus to so much of the history of mimetic thinking and that the history of mimesis remains of compelling interest for anyone concerned with the status and value of representational art past, present, or future. Despite all vicissitudes, the centrality of mimesis in Western aesthetic thought may be said to be a given.this cannot but make us wonder whether mimetic theory in literature and art is universal. This topic is of great theoretical importance for comparative studies of Western and non-western poetics because, if mimetic theory were not universal, such comparative studies would have to be conducted on other theoretical grounds. The topic also has considerable urgency, for it is widely believed in at least one time- 1. See Auerbach 1953; Lukács 1964a, 1964b, 1971, and 1981.

3 Ming Dong Gu Is Mimetic Theory in Literature and Art Universal? 461 honored non-western tradition that mimetic theory is a unique Western cultural invention and that some fundamental differences between the West and its Eastern other can be traced to the difference between its presence and absence. A number of scholars have questioned the validity of this view. 2 In her attempt to reimagine the field of Chinese studies in the postmodern era, Rey Chow (2001: 10) criticizes what she views as a fundamental dichotomy between Chinese and Western literary traditions: If mimesis has been the chief characteristic of Western writing since time immemorial, then nonmimesis is the principle of Chinese writing. In her opinion, this dichotomy represents not just a surrender by scholars of Chinese and comparative studies to Western perspectives and categories; more fundamentally, she identifies it as the basis for a set of binary oppositions in which the Western literary tradition is understood to be metaphorical, figurative, thematically concerned with transcendence, and referring to a realm that is beyond this world, whereas the Chinese literary tradition is said to be metonymic, literal, immanentist, and self-referential (with literary signs referring not to an otherworldly realm above but back to the cosmic order of which the literary universe is part) (ibid). When we situate the alleged dichotomy between Western mimeticism and Chinese nonmimesis in the larger context of China-West studies, the topic assumes even greater significance. There is a predominantly oppositional paradigm in Chinese and Western studies, which conceives the differences between China and the West as a series of dichotomies. Superficially, this oppositional paradigm may have risen under the influence of cultural relativism fashionable in present-day cultural studies, but in its deep structure, it grows out of a certain historical perception of the patterns of human development and metaphysical conceptions of the respective traditions of thought. In historical development, Chinese civilization is believed to have followed a pattern of continuity between past and present, while Western civilization is viewed as having followed a pattern of rupture. In the conception of the relationship between humanity and the universe, the Western tradition is understood to be founded on a disjunction between nature and culture, the Chinese based on a continuum between them. In modes of thinking, it is believed that Chinese thought is wholly monistic, Western thought thoroughly dualistic. Whereas there is a creation God in the West, who is viewed as the creator of all things, the Chinese tradition is widely believed to have none. In consequence, whereas the Western worldview displays a tragic tension between god and man, Chinese cosmology features a 2. See Saussy 1993: 1 12, 32 35, and 2001: 58 59; Zhang 1992: ix xviii, and 1998: 1 18; Ekström 1999.

4 462 Poetics Today 26:3 harmonious collaboration between them. This oppositional paradigm was not conceived by any single theorist or scholar. In fact, it gradually took shape in the scholarship and metaphysical speculations of many, including the philosophers Leibniz, Voltaire, Hegel, and Weber and such scholars as Marcel Granet, Frederick Mote, Benjamin Schwartz, Joseph Needham, K. C. Chang, A. C. Graham, Tu Wei-ming, David Keightly, David Hall, and Roger Ames, over a long period of time. 3 It has exerted a profound influence on Chinese and Western studies, as well as on general studies of human civilization, but at the same time has aroused much discontent and been subjected to critical scrutiny. And in due course, most of the dichotomies have proved to be problematic or simply false and untenable. 4 However, the dichotomy regarding mimesis has survived this rigorous scrutiny and critique: it continues to stand as a conceptual pillar in the theoretical framework of Chinese and Western poetics. 5 The scholarly consensus in both China and the West still holds that mimetic theory is nonexistent or minimal in the Chinese tradition. Two factors have contributed to the status quo. On the one hand, except for some brief remarks by a few scholars in China (Ye 1985: 11), who argue against the dichotomy between Chinese lyricism/expressionism and Western imitation/representation, there is little well-documented research that attempts to reconstruct a Chinese mimetic theory. On the other hand, except for a few critical comments, there is no sustained theoretical inquiry that attempts to critique the conceptual basis of the perceived nonmimesis of Chinese literature. The lack of well-documented research on this topic creates a conspicuous gap that needs to be filled, and with urgency, because the lack, as I will show in what follows, has been cited as evidence to support a theoretical claim that the concept of mimesis is a cultural invention unique to the Western tradition. This article, however, is not intended as an effort to 3. See Leibniz 1994: 46 48; Hegel, 1942: 220, and 1975: 112, , 201; Weber 1951: , , ; Granet 1934: 25 29, 279, ; Schwartz 1975a: 3, 1975b: 59 60, 67, and 1985: 25, 302; Mote 1971: 15 17; Hall and Ames 1995: xiii, 257; Needham 1956: , ; Chang 1986: , , and 1989: ; Graham 1986: 8 9, and 1989: i, 3 22; Tu 1985: 43; Keightly 1990: 20, 32; Roetz 1993: For a coherent account of this oppositional paradigm, see Puett 2002: For scholarship that disputes the oppositional paradigm in the comparative studies of Chinese and Western languages, literatures, and aesthetics, see Saussy 1993: 13 73; Zhang 1998: ; Ren 1998; Ekström 2002; Chaves 1991; Puett 2001 and Also, volume 72 of the annual Bulletin of the Museum of Far Eastern Antiquities (Ekström and Fiskesjö 2000) is devoted to the discussion of the East-West dichotomies. 5. In Rey Chow s critique of the various dichotomies between China and the West, she cites many research sources to support her argument. But on the issue of mimetic/nonmimetic dichotomy, she cites none. This may be because up to the time of her critique, except for some passing critical remarks, there is no relevant research to cite.

5 Ming Dong Gu Is Mimetic Theory in Literature and Art Universal? 463 document Chinese ideas of mimesis (I have done this elsewhere). 6 Rather, it inquires whether mimetic theory is universal in different cultures through a study of relevant Chinese and Western materials. It is concerned with these questions: Is mimetic theory a cultural invention specific to the Western tradition? What is the ontological or epistemological basis of mimesis? Is the disjunction between transcendence and immanence a conceptual prerequisite for mimesis? Is a creation god absolutely necessary for the rise of mimetic theory? Why did theories of representation not become as central in Chinese literary thought as in its Western counterpart? How is the artistic ideal in representation conceived in Chinese and Western traditions? Finally, what implications do the answers have for the comparative study of Western and non-western literatures and arts? Before embarking on my inquiry, it is necessary to briefly define and delimit the concept of mimesis, so as to establish a theoretical frame of reference. Stephen Halliwell (2002) convincingly demonstrates that, in its historical development, mimesis has always been a much more complex concept than its modern equivalent imitation can possibly convey. Regarding its usage in the pre-platonic period alone, Halliwell documents five categories (ibid.: 15). It is impossible and unnecessary to cover here the huge body of scholarship on the ramifications of mimesis. For the purpose of this essay, I am going to approach the concept in two ways. First, in the history of ideas, mimesis bifurcates into two categories: a literal mimesis that is a copying of the concrete world, accessible to the senses, and a metaphysical mimesis that is a copying of the eternal forms, accessible only to intellect and reason (Makaryk 1997: 591). In terms of this bifurcation, I adopt a view of mimesis that incorporates the Platonic copying of ideal forms and sensuous reality, the Aristotelian representation of the universal patterns of human life, and the neoclassical imitation of canonized literary models. 7 Second, I am going to treat mimesis as a creative modeling of an artistic work after some original, be it an object, a scene, a person, an act, or a sequence of events. In his study of Lessing s Laokoon, Meir Sternberg (1999: 296) defines this modeling: Mimesis, as the umbrella term for representation, presupposes a world out there (actual or fictional) to be imitated and a discourse that imitates it by fashioning an image, a coded (re)semblance: one that bears in principle no more and no less resemblance to the imitated world... than the very idea of semblance entails....mimesisisarela- 6. See Gu Another article, Mimetic Theory in Chinese Literary Thought, is forthcoming in New Literary History 36:3 (2005): Both articles aim at constructing a Chinese mimetic theory with firm research data. 7. I adopted this conceptualization from the New Princeton Encyclopedia of Poetry and Poetics (Preminger and Brogan 1993: 576).

6 464 Poetics Today 26:3 tion of likeness between image and object act, thing, figure, universe whereby one represents the other through some vehicle. In terms of this definition, I will use mimesis as an umbrella term to cover its offspring and rough equivalents, such as image, copy, imitation, reflection, representation, reproducing, miming, mimicking, mirroring, enacting, counterfeiting, and feigning. Is Mimetic Theory a Unique Western Cultural Invention? If we take the centrality of mimetic theory to Western literary thought as the rule, the Chinese tradition seems to be an exception, for in the field of Chinese and comparative studies, practically all scholars uphold the belief that mimetic theory of literature is absent or minimal there. In the first introductory work on Chinese theories of literature in the West, James J. Y. Liu (1975: 48 49) classifies traditional Chinese thought into as many as six categories of theories. He recognizes that the idea of imitation is not totally absent in Chinese literary thought but concludes that it did not form the basis of any theory of literature and that it only concerns imitation in the secondary sense, that is, imitation of ancient masters.therefore he does not think that there is a mimetic theory in China. After Liu, Stephen Owen (1988) adopts a similar view in his reading of the time-honored Chinese conception of literature in Liu Xie s (AD ) Wenxin Diaolong (The Literary Mind and the Carving of Dragons), the first comprehensive theory of literature in Chinese history. Owen (1988: 20) subtly observes that the idea of imitation exists in Liu Xie s discourse but is restricted to the discussion of visual arts, which are set in a mimetic relation to the natural world: Insofar as the visual arts merely imitate nature s wen, 8 they are subject to the Platonic critique of art as a secondary (or tertiary) phenomenon. But in this formulation literature is not truly mimetic: rather it is the final stage in a process of manifestation; and the writer, instead of re-presenting the outer world, is in fact only the medium for this last phase of the world s coming-to-be. Thus advancing a similar idea to the Platonic one that a good poet is inspired and possessed, Owen concludes that literature emerge[s] naturally from the conjunction of a particular aspect of the world and a particular human consciousness (ibid.), thereby reaffirming the dominant view in the Chinese tradition that literature is a spontaneous growth. In her study of imagery in Chinese poetry, again, Pauline Yu (1987: 39) 8. Wen is a polysemous word in Chinese. It means pattern in its most general sense but refers to literature in its aesthetic sense. It also covers culture, cultivated virtue, civilization, civil aspects of society, etc.

7 Ming Dong Gu Is Mimetic Theory in Literature and Art Universal? 465 notes that the discourse on image in the Book of Changes (the first book in the Confucian canon) shows certain likeness to Western discussions of mimesis, yet she determines that the resemblance is delusory: the Chinese tradition allegedly lacks a fundamental ontological disjunction between transcendental and concrete, historical reality, a dualism necessary for the rise of mimetic theory. In an analysis of the same discourse by Liu Xie on the notion of poetry, she comes to the conclusion: Instead of the mimetic view that poetry is the imitation of an action, then, it is seen here as a literal reaction of the poet to the world around him and of which he is an integral part (ibid.: 35). Accordingly, she suggests that traditional Chinese poets generally write poetry based on a stimulus-response method of poetic production rather than a mimetic one (ibid.: 82). Likewise with Andrew Plaks (1977: 311), who, in his conceptual inquiry into Chinese narrative, points out that Liu s famous discussion of the origin of literary forms in the imitation of patterns observed in the natural world seems at first sight to suggest the emphasis on the mimetic function of narrative literature found in Western theory. But, on closer examination, Liu s idea of wen or literature does not emphasize the mimesis of action, and so his idea of imitation of patterns, Plaks claims, is not the Western idea of imitation originating from Aristotle and further developed by Erich Auerbach (1953) and Northrop Frye (1957). Finally, in a study of Chinese and Greek ways of conveying meaning, François Jullien (2000: 164) identifies a fundamental difference in the Chinese conception of poetry and expressly denies mimesis to early Chinese lyricism: Chinese poetry is...perceived as a phenomenon of incitement and has not embraced representation. While the above scholars hold similarly nonmimetic views of Chinese literature with an admirable sensitivity to the complexity of the issue, thereby leaving enough room for further inquiries, some other scholars are much more daring but also much less subtle in their approach. They have gone so far as to proclaim that the idea of mimesis is totally alien to Chinese literary thought. Among these scholars, some argue that in the absence of a division between transcendence and immanence in Chinese epistemology, the Platonic idea of mimesis based on the dichotomy between the world of literary creation and the world of Ideas does not exist in China (Shi 1994: ). Other scholars deny the existence of even the Aristotelian concept of mimesis, the idea that a piece of literary work grows out of an imitation of the natural world or human society. As an essay in an authoritative companion to traditional Chinese literature states: In China there were no concepts comparable to Aristotelian mimesis or Christian figura, both of which are bound to the representation of action in time (Fisk 1986: 49). Still others argue from a metaphysical perspective that all the ontological and

8 466 Poetics Today 26:3 epistemological prerequisites necessary for the construction of a mimetic theory in Chinese literary thought are missing. A representative view is expressed in an award-winning article, published in a journal of comparative literature. Endorsing Owen s final statement as a right understanding, the author proclaims that, because literature (human wen) is directly connected with natural wen, the distinction between original and copy hence a mimetic theory of literature does not exist in Chinese literary thought (Shi 1994: 159).The article is not content with denying the existence of mimetic theory but proceeds to explore why it is nonexistent. Having analyzed some of the cultural determinants that are responsible for the emergence of nonmimetic literary theory in China in contrast to the concept of mimesis in the West, it concludes: The three factors responsible in bringing about the mimetic theory in literature the duality of transcendence and immanence, the dichotomy of subject and object, and the visualized concept of truth all represent the most fundamental principles of Western epistemological structure, and all are missing from Chinese culture, and the concept of mimesis with them (ibid.: 163). Inversely, from the study of the Chinese case, the author generalizes that the Western concept of mimesis is a specific cultural invention (ibid.: 162). Suggestively, proponents of this view at times entangle themselves in a paradoxical situation. On the one hand, they argue that Chinese literary thought does not subscribe to Greek mimesis; but on the other hand, they have taken pains to demonstrate that what Chinese poetry represents is literally true. For Stephen Owen (1988: 15 16, 57 59), while Chinese poetry does not imitate or feign reality, the categorical correspondences in Chinese poetry are yet strictly true, and because the genesis of poetry is conceived of as a virtual transfer of substance from experience to words and from words to reader, poems were authentic presentations of historical experience. For Pauline Yu (1987: 35), Chinese literary thought does not hold the mimetic view that poetry is the imitation of an action, and Chinese poets write poetry using a stimulus-response method of poetic production rather than a mimetic one (ibid.: 82); but in the Chinese literary universe, there are no disjunctures between true reality and concrete reality, nor between concrete reality and literary work, and poetry is seen here as a literal reaction of the poet to the world around him and of which he is an integral part (ibid.: 35). Michael Fuller (1993: 21) also subscribes to the truthfulness of poetry: in the classical Chinese tradition, all poems are true by their very existence; the only questions are how they are true and if their truth is of any significance. As Haun Saussy (2001: 59) aptly sums up, the claim is that Chinese representation, unlike Greek mimesis, is always true. If Chinese representation is always true, why could it not rise to the status

9 Ming Dong Gu Is Mimetic Theory in Literature and Art Universal? 467 of Greek mimesis? Anticipating this question, Pauline Yu (1987: 6) explains: mimesis should not be misconstrued as aiming for the proto-photographic representation of sensible reality. For the Renaissance poet, on the contrary, imitation involved not a literal replication but rather the artful embellishment and ordering of nature, whether based on Platonic ideal Forms or Aristotelian universals. Moreover, Chinese representation does not rise to the aesthetic status of Greek mimesis because there is no divine model of creation. As Stephen Owen (1988: 84) describes it: In the created world little makers, the poets, bear a strange relation to the primal Maker, and their vaunted singularity in humankind apes a divine singularity. With no creative deity to emulate, the [Chinese] poet of the shih [lyric poetry] does not think to make the world anew; he participates in the nature that is; and in being of this world, he lacks the creative poet s aura of isolated divinity. Thus, in these subtly argued views, Chinese representation lacks three conceptual prerequisites of imitation proper: (1) the disjunction between transcendence and immanence; (2) a divine model of creation; (3) a conception of the poet as a maker of fiction (Yu 1987: 5 6). Because of these absences, even though Chinese representation attains an artful truthfulness comparable to modern representation in realism and naturalism, it cannot be regarded as mimesis, still less as forming a mimetic theory. The subtle views and radical assertions exemplified above are tantamount to claiming that the concept of mimesis is a cultural invention unique to the Greco-Roman, Judaic-Christian West and alien to non-western traditions. Indeed, as the radical view rules out the essential cultural determinants for the rise of mimesis, it verges on the claim that there is no mimetic instinct in ancient China, at least not in its literary thought. Like Rey Chow and others, I respectfully disagree. True, the Chinese idea of mimesis is different from its Western counterpart, but the difference is a matter of degree, not kind. In the following sections, I will argue that all the essential cultural determinants for the rise of mimetic theory exist in the Chinese tradition and that the accepted contrast between Western mimesis and the Chinese lack of it is a misconception that grew out of a preconceived notion about the differences between the respective cultures. Methodologically, it has resulted from a narrow view of some conceptual underpinnings of mimetic theory and an insufficient attention to mimetic insights in the mainstream as well as the undercurrents of traditional Chinese thought. The Universality of the Mimetic Instinct In his study of Western literary thought, Abrams (1953: 8) views mimetic theory as probably the most primitive aesthetic theory. By primitive he

10 468 Poetics Today 26:3 seems to mean that mimesis is a basic idea attached to the innate human capacity for imitation. In the Republic, Plato (1978: 640) observed that imitations start in childhood and continue into mature life, eventually growing into habits and becoming second nature in the body, speech, and mind. In the Poetics, Aristotle (1995: 37) not only conceived of poetry as an art originating from the instinct of imitation but also viewed that instinct as something lying deep in our nature: It can be seen that poetry was broadly engendered by a pair of causes, both natural. For it is an instinct of human beings, from childhood, to engage in mimesis (indeed, this distinguishes them from other animals: man is the most mimetic of all, and it is through mimesis that he develops his earliest understanding); and equally natural that everyone enjoys mimetic objects. Human beings are animals most skillful in imitation, and the instinct of imitation has therefore no exception in any tradition. In the Chinese case, as in any other traditions, the evidence for it is abundant in records from high antiquity. One of China s earliest cultural accomplishments is the invention of eight trigrams in the Book of Changes by the famed cultural hero Fu Xi. Xu Shen ( BC), compiler of the first Chinese dictionary, the Shuowen Jiezi (ElucidationsofCharactersandWords), tells how Fu Xi invented the eight trigrams in an iconic manner of imitation: In ancient times Bao Shi [Fu Xi] was the ruler of all under heaven. Looking up, he contemplated the images (xiang) in the sky, and looking down, the markings [ fa] on the earth. He observed the patterns [wen] on birds and animals and their adaptations to the earth. From nearby, he took some hint from his own body, and elsewhere from other things. Then he began to make [zuo] the eight trigrams of the Book of Changes, to pass on the model images[xianxiang] to later times. (See Xu 1963: 314) 9 As a form of imitation, iconicity, according to Sternberg s (1999: 296) definition, entails a relation of likeness between marker and thing, signifier and signified. Luo Genze (1958: 53), a scholar of Chinese literary thought, views Xu Shen s passage as an expression of the idea that writing (and hence literature) imitates Nature. In his interpretation of this legend, however, James Liu (1988: 23 24) rejects the idea that any mimesis is involved: The legend about Fu Xi s invention of the Eight Trigrams, which became the prototype of the Chinese script, does not have a mimetic conception of writing, because...thetrigramsdonotrepresentactual objects but symbolize the dynamic principles [of the yin and yang] underlying the cosmos. Here, Liu clearly overlooks the fact that the yin (a broken line )andtheyang 9. Henceforward, unless otherwise indicated, all translations of quotations from Chinese sources are mine.

11 Ming Dong Gu Is Mimetic Theory in Literature and Art Universal? 469 (a whole line ) are respectively stylized images of the land and sky. Gao Heng, a noted scholar of the Book of Changes in China, explains: When the ancients watched the boundless oneness of the sky and earth with no distinction between the two, they used one full line to represent the sky. Since the earth is divided into land and water, they used a broken line to represent it (quoted in Chen 1992: 167). 10 The eight trigrams were believed to have evolved from images that imitated phenomena in the world, and a few with stylized images still possess visible resemblances to actual things. For example, kan, which represents water, still retains the stylized shape of flowing water; li, which represents net, still looks like a net; and even qian, which symbolizes heaven, still recalls skylines. Fu Xi s invention of the eight trigrams was accomplished in the most primitive and most original way of imitation by modeling signs after the images of the sky and earth, patterns left behind by birds and animals, and the shapes of the human body. The eight trigrams form the core of the Zhouyi (The Book of Changes), one of the main sources from which Chinese aesthetic thought draws its inspiration and materials. Xu Shen s description clearly conveys an idea of imitation, but it is more concerned with the iconicity of signs than with mimesis in literary works and studies. Understandably so, because he was engaged in compiling a dictionary of Chinese writing symbols. However, Xu Shen s passage almost duplicates one from the Xicizhuan (Appendixes to the Book of Changes, ca. fourth century BC), except that it did not include the two last lines from its source: In ancient times Bao Shi [Fu Xi] was the ruler of all under heaven. Looking up, he contemplated the images (xiang) in the sky, and looking down, the markings ( fa) on the earth. He observed the patterns (wen) on birds and animals and their adaptations to the earth. From nearby, he took some hint from his own body, and elsewhere from other things. Then he began to make (zuo) the eight trigrams of the Book of Changes, so as to connect [human life] with the virtues of the Divine Luminosity and to simulate the conditions of myriad things. (Huang and Zhang 1989: 592) In the last two lines, the mimetic view is no longer exclusively concerned with the iconicity of the sign; it becomes a theory of imitation not much different from Platonic mimesis. The Divine Luminosity refers to the underlying principle of the universe, which, in the Chinese tradition, is the Dao, roughly equivalent to Plato s Idea or Form. To simulate the conditions of myriad things is to represent the operations of the universe through a highly abstract system. The Xicizhuan further affirms that the hexagrams, each of which con- 10. Gao Heng, Zhouyi Dazhuan tongshuo (A General Discourse on the Great Commentary to the Zhouyi); quoted from Chen 1992: 167.

12 470 Poetics Today 26:3 sistsofsixbrokenorwholelines,weretheresultoftheimitationofthe universe by sages: The sages were able to discover the complex rationale behind the phenomena under the sky. So, they imitated (ni) the shapes (xing) and appearances (rong) of the universe to represent[xiang] the meanings appropriate to a particular object. This was how the imitations came to be called images (xiang) (Zhouyi Zhengyi 1936: ce 3, juan 7, 19a). In this statement, words such as ni (imitate), xing (shape), rong (appearance), and xiang (represent, literally, to draw an image) are all variations on the idea of imitation. The Xicizhuan proceeds to affirm that yao, the line image (broken or connected lines) of the hexagrams, also originated from imitation: The Yao is to model after the objects of this world; the xiang is to imitate the images of the universe (Huang and Zhang 1989: 569). The Xicizhuan is full of different expressions for the idea of imitation, and the various Chinese terms for imitation evolved out of them. The Xicizhuan comprises a series of appended verbalizations to the Book of Changes. As a system of representation, the Book of Changes grew out of the imitation of the universe. Its system was created as a microcosm modeled on the operations of the macrocosm of the universe and believed to be able to represent and explain these operations. The Xicizhuan itself affirms this simulation: The Zhouyi [Book of Changes] is equivalent to heaven and earth and is therefore capable of comprehensively encompassing the principle of heaven and earth (Huang and Zhang 1989: 535). Ge Zhaoguang (2001: 73), a leading historian of Chinese thought, points out the mimetic origin and function of divination as well: They [the ancients] believed that the universe came into being like this, and the divination by tortoise shells and milfoil stalks is an imitation of the structure and genesis of the universe. Naturally, the efficaciousness of divination should be believed. Likewise, the Chinese writing system (wen) came into being as a result of imitation.the Chinese word wen is a polysemous term which means mark and pattern in its most literal sense and refers to literature, culture, and other civil aspects of society. It also refers to Chinese writing symbols, or characters. These symbols were similarly believed to have been invented in a mimetic manner. In Xu Shen s postface, he narrates how Cang Jie invented Chinese writing: Cang Jie, scribe for the Yellow Emperor 11 [accession ca B.C.], by observing the tracks of fleeting birds and animals, came to the realization that the patterns and forms of the tracks can distinguish different birds and animals. [Inspired by this observation,] he began to invent [zao] writing graphs, so that all kinds of pro- 11. The Yellow Emperor, a quasi-mythological figure, is believed to be an ancestor of the Chinese nation.

13 Ming Dong Gu Is Mimetic Theory in Literature and Art Universal? 471 fessions could be regulated, and people of all walks of life could be distinguished. (Xu 1937: juan 15a, 1a) As he did with the eight trigrams, James Liu (1988: 24) rejects the mimetic reading of this legend: The legend that Cang Jie invented Chinese characters after observing footprints of birds and beasts indicates only that he was inspired by such footprints, not that he invented characters to represent them. For some reason, Liu completely ignores the fact that the main method for creating Chinese characters is one of imitation. In the Chinese writing system, there are six graph-making methods (liushu), of which the first one,xiangxing (literally, imitating shapes), is imitative. In his discussion of the six methods, Xu Shen stated: When Cang Jie first invented writing symbols, he probably imitated the forms of things according to their appearances (Xu 1937: juan 15a, 1b). Four other methods are more or less derived from the first and therefore have varying degrees of imitation. Zheng Qiao (AD ), a traditional scholar of the Song dynasty, even generalized the principle further: All the six methods for creating Chinese characters are variations on the method of imitation (Zheng 1933: ce 4: 11). Moreover, scholars generally believe that, in high antiquity, writing and painting were not distinguished and both resulted from imitation of forms. Zhang Yanyuan s (AD ) Lidai Minghua Ji (Records of Famous Paintings through the Dynasties) makes a special mention of this shared feature. It also records the saying of a scholar who viewed the eight trigrams, Chinese writing, and painting as all based on the principle of imitation: There are three kinds of transmission by imitation. The first is to imitate the principle. The hexagram images are such imitations. The second is to imitate knowledge. Writing is such an imitation. The third is to imitate shapes. Painting is such an imitation (Zhang 1977: 27). Here, Zhang Yanyuan listed three kinds of imitation. Two of them are representations of abstract ideas, and one is the imitation of concrete images. Thus, I may conclude this section by saying that the instinct of imitation was as strong in the Chinese ancients, and as essential to the Chinese tradition, as in the West. The Conceptual Basis for Mimesis: Disjunction or Duality? Scholars who hold a nonmimetic view of Chinese literature believe that, in Western literary thought, mimesis derives from a fundamental disjunction between a transcendental and an immanent realm. In Plato s conception of the three worlds the world of Ideas created by God, the world of appearances in Nature, and the world created by the artist the world of art models itself on the world of appearances and the world of appear-

14 472 Poetics Today 26:3 ances on the world of Ideas (Plato 1978: ). In the Aristotelian conception of mimesis, the Platonic tripartite structure is simplified into a dualism between the world of universals on the one hand and the world of art on the other. 12 Scholars who deny mimeticism to the Chinese tradition consider the former as an abstract realm of transcendence and the latter as a concrete realm of immanence. The two realms are separate, unrelated, and absolutely opposed to each other. Upon this disjunction, they believe, the theory of mimesis rests: Mimesis is, after all, predicated on a fundamental ontological dualism the assumption that there is a truer reality transcendent to the concrete, historical realm in which we live, and that the relationship between the two is replicated in the creative act and artifact (Yu 1987: 5). Hence possibly the radical anti-mimeticist claim that the Chinese literary tradition lacks one of the fundamental cultural determinants: the duality of transcendence and immanence (Shi 1994: 163). I would argue that mimetic theory does not depend on a disjunction between a transcendental and an immanent realm. So long as there are conditions for a duality between the model and the copy, an imitation may arise. And the model may take various forms, whether that of the natural world, of human life, or of abstract principles of the universe like God or the Platonic Idea. In Chinese culture, the comparable concept to the Platonic Idea or God is the Dao (Tao: translated as The Way ), the first principle that controls the operations of the universe. Of course, this broad comparison leaves out other implications of the Dao, which, unlike the Western first principle, is both a transcendent and an immanent concept. This dual conception has had a profound impact on traditional Chinese aesthetic thought. In Lao Zi s Daode Jing (The Classic of the Way and Its Virtue), the most important canonical work in Daoism, the Dao is represented as something unnamable and indescribable. For the sake of metaphysical inquiry, it is tentatively called the Dao, sometimes also Shen (the divine). 13 In his magnum opus on Chinese literary thought, The Literary Mind and the Carving of Dragons, Liu Xie introduced the dual conception of the Dao into the poetic sphere. While recognizing the existence of the objective world, he believed that beyond it there exists a mysterious, supernatural entity preexisting heaven and earth. In chapter 37, Kuashi ( Hyperbole ), Liu Xie (1995: 452) accordingly began with a dual conceptualization of imitation: 12. Abrams (1953: 8 10) offers a concise account of how Aristotle dispensed with Plato s world of criterion-ideas. 13. Lao Zi elaborated on this idea in a number of places in his Daode Jing (The Classic of the Way and Its Virtue) (1995); see chapters 1, 4, 6.

15 Ming Dong Gu Is Mimetic Theory in Literature and Art Universal? 473 That which rises above tangible shapes is called the Dao; that which exists in tangible shapes is called object. The divine Dao is difficult to imitate, for even most refined language cannot capture its ultimate form. Tangible objects are easy to depict, for robust words are capable of representing their real conditions. In this statement, a theory of imitation arises beyond doubt. Liu Xie constructed an opposition between two entirely different ontic categories. One is visible, tangible, and describable, while the other is invisible, intangible, and indescribable. He did not just make a distinction between the transcendental Dao and the tangible Qi (object). He conceived of two kinds of imitation: one represents a transcendental idea and the other physical objects. We also need to note the adjective that modifies the Dao, shen or divine, and to relate the divine Dao to shenli (divine principle), which Liu Xie conceived of as a mysterious and supernatural entity responsible for the appearance of the natural world, human beings, and literature and culture: From Hetu, the Yellow River Map, were born the eight trigrams, and from Luoshu, the Writing from the River Luo, came the nine categories. 14 Forthese,and for the fruits contained in the jade and gold decorated tablets and the flowers blooming in red words and green strips, was any one responsible? No one except the Divine Principle. 15 Here, Liu Xie envisages not a personal god responsible for the creation of the universe but a divine principle, similar to Plato s first principle, the Idea. This concept of divinity suggests a process of reification of the unknown and unnamable that gives the Dao a transcendental quality independent of the visible and describable Qi. Thus, the opposition between the Dao and Qi is similar to the Platonic world of ideas versus the world of appearances. Unlike Plato s Idea or Form, however, the Dao is not just an absolute idea of transcendence; it is also immanent in the Qi, or things. In answering a question about where the Dao exists, Zhuangzi (1995: 233) replied: the Dao exists in everything and everywhere; it is in ants, weeds, potsherds, and even in excrement and urine. The idea of immanence gives rise to the natural birth of literature and art because it conceives of literary creation as something that arises naturally from the patterns of the Dao. The idea of transcendence facilitates the emergence of imitation because it conceives of the Dao as a model for humans to imitate and emulate. The difference from the absolute transcendental nature of the similar Western concepts, such as the Platonic Idea, 14. According to tradition, Yu, the ruler of Xia, received from Heaven nine categories of methods for government. 15. Adapted from Vincent Shih s translation (Liu Xie 1975: 10).

16 474 Poetics Today 26:3 Logos, God, and so forth, allows for multiple conceptions with regard to the rise of literature and culture. As a transcendental principle, the Dao, like the Platonic Idea, is the ultimate source and object of all imitations, be they hexagrams, writing, or literature. When in Liu Xie s concluding statement, people imitate the patterns of heaven, which are the manifestations of the Dao, the imitation is similar to the Platonic imitation of the first order: the world of appearances imitates the world of Ideas. When Fu Xi invents the eight trigrams, when Cang Jie creates Chinese writing, and when writers create literary works, the imitation is similar to Aristotle s idea of mimesis: a copy imitates a model and a writing represents an action. The title of Liu Xie s magnum opus on poetics offers an insight into his dual conception of literature. Nowadays the popular translation is The Literary Mind and the Carving of Dragons, but the original Chinese title is open to different interpretations. Owen (1992: 185), for example, thinks that the title may be read as a single sentence, the literary mind carves dragons, which means the way in which the more philosophical and psychological aspects of the tradition are realized in technical craft. This reading makes sense in view of the totality of Liu Xie s poetics. It suggests that literature is an art born of craft and affirms its representational nature. Dragon, which stands for artistic work in Liu Xie s title, is not a real animal. In the Chinese tradition, it may refer to many things, some concrete and some abstract, but in general it refers to a highly revered divine creature. When the literary mind is connected with dragons, therefore, something interesting emerges. In Liu Xie s (1995: 602) postface to his poetics, he explained wenxin (literary mind) as: The literary mind is the mind that one exercises in creating writing/literature. Carving dragons is a highly regarded sculptural art in ancient China. No one who visits the Forbidden City will miss the images of dragons carved in wood, ivory, stone, or metal. In carving a dragon, the sculptor needs a great deal of skill and imagination. Such artistic activity requires him not only to imitate a variety of real animals, whose body parts form the composite image of a dragon, but also to convey the ethereal divinity that the animal is believed to possess. Thus, the creative act involves both literal imitation of concrete details and imaginative representation of abstract ideas. From the representational point of view, the dragon in Liu Xie s title stands for the artistic ideal in literary representation. It is accordingly reasonable to suggest that in Liu Xie s magnum opus, which covers all aspects of literary conception and craft, literature figures as a result of both expression and imitation. I therefore argue that the ideas of the natural growth of literature and of mimetic genesis both exist in the Chinese tradition. They do not form an absolute duality but were derived from a transcendental-immanent view of

17 Ming Dong Gu Is Mimetic Theory in Literature and Art Universal? 475 the Dao. Further, I would propose that the standard view in Chinese studies that literature is a natural and spontaneous growth 16 should be modified. In a more complete view, the Chinese conception of literature s origin encompasses both a theory of spontaneous genesis and a theory of representation. The dual conception of the first principle of the universe as both transcendental and immanent has shaped Chinese mimetic theory in such a way that it is both commensurate with and different from its Western counterpart: it gave rise to a symbiosis of the ideas of natural growth and mimetic creation. The symbiosis, in turn, produced two trends in Chinese theories of literature. While expressionism is the mainstream, mimetic representation is an undercurrent. The mainstream and undercurrent do not exclude but, in fact, complement each other. In chapter 44 of Liu Xie s poetics, entitled Wuse ( The Physical World ), the two ideas exist in a symbiotic state. The rise of poetry as a spontaneous response to the natural world goes together with the idea of poetry as an imitation of the observed world: In responding to things, the Ancient Poets operated on the principle of endless association of ideas. They lost themselves in the myriads of things, completely absorbed in the visual and auditory sensations. On the one hand, they depicted the atmosphere and painted the appearances of things in perfect harmony with their changing aspects; and on the other, the linguistic and tonal patterns they used closely corresponded with their perceptions. (Liu Xie 1975: 349) This passage shows that Liu Xie s theory of poetic creation is predicated on a dual conception of affective expression and mimetic representation. Imitation has two related meanings. It is, first, an imitation of the natural world that stimulates and inspires the poet; second, it is an imitation of the natural world in linguistic correspondences to sounds and tones. In this passage, Liu Xie touched upon two aspects of mimesis: the object and medium. In some other chapters, he elaborated on the epistemological status and technical aspect of mimesis. But for reasons of space, I will refrain from analyzing such details. 17 The symbiosis of natural growth and imitation is a distinctive feature of Chinese aesthetic thought, whether it concerns poetry, drama, fiction, painting, calligraphy, or other arts. This can be more clearly seen in the poetic theories by later scholars than Liu Xie. In Xie Zhen s (AD ) poetic theory, for example, both aspects lucidly emerge. In a discussion of the relationship between poetry and the natural world, he first reiterated 16. For a canonization of this view, see James Liu 1975: 69; Owen 1992: Let me refer an interested reader to the beginning of chapter 37 and to all of chapters 8 and 46.

18 476 Poetics Today 26:3 the traditional view of poetry as a result of human response to the natural world: Scenes observed are the matchmaker of poetry; desires are the fetus of poetry: an integration of the two gives birth to poetry. He then went on to view poetry as a vehicle for imitation: Poetry is a tool for imitating and describing scenes and desires (Xie 1985: 112). In still later poetic criticism, again, Wang Fuzhi (AD ) came to realize that not all poetry arose from spontaneous growth. Some grew out of conscious imitation: One method of composing poetry is surely to establish a host in control of the guests and effortlessly describe the scenes before the eye (Wang 1985: 277). Here, the host and guest may be understood as the subject and the object, respectively. In this statement, there is an obvious tension between spontaneous growth and conscious imitation. It posits a dichotomy between subject and object and also views poetry as a spontaneous way of imitation. In his further comments on the poetry of Music Bureau, 18 Wang Fuzhi (ibid.: 275) regarded it as having attained verisimilitude due to imitation: Life-likeness is the very best achievement of the poems which sing the praises of objects in the Music Bureau poetry. At times, he privileged imitation over arduous efforts at contemplation: The subtle ingenuity of poetry originates from taking the scenes and consigning them to rhythm; it does not lie in deliberate contemplation (ibid.: 276). He also made an unequivocal claim that writing results from imitation of objects: When an object exists, its form will come into being. The form is its substance. When a form is born, an image will imitate it. What is imitated is writing/literature. As long as there is a form, an image will be completed. An image is the result of imitating the form of an object (ibid.: 272). This statement seems to claim that an object reveals its essence through its imitated form. When a writer conceives an image of the object, his or her imitation succeeds in capturing its essence. From Secondary Imitation to Representation In the Western tradition, the primary meaning of imitation lies in the direct imitation of Nature, the universe, or social life; its secondary meaning refers to the imitation of ancient masters and classical writings. The two meanings are related. In the neoclassical period, when discussions of secondary imitation flourished, John Dryden (1971) upheld the classical masters as patterns of imitation. Alexander Pope (1971) expressed the famous idea that to imitate Nature and to imitate the ancients are one and the same thing. Like- 18. A collection of Chinese ballads and folk songs dating from antiquity to the Tang dynasty and compiled by Guo Maoqian in the twelfth century.