sequence Liu Yichang No matter how people's way of life changes, novels as an art form, although young, still have their existence value.However, due to the high development of the film and television industry, the novelist must open a new path. The novelists of the 19th century only need to use a method from the root to the leaves to explain a story clearly, and they can be regarded as excellent works.However, from the perspective of modern people, only writing about the surface and ignoring the tree rings not only lacks depth, but is also extremely unscientific. The characters described by Dickens are flat. E. M. Foster said: Only David Copperfield seems to have the full picture of making it round, but this character is so soluble: the feeling obtained is still a soap bubble; rather than a solid.When Dickens wrote David Copperfield, his ink was thick, and he often shook the characters in the book with his own vitality.As a result, unconsciously, he lent his own life to David.Even so, the character of David Copperfield is still two-dimensional. Readers can see the fine details on the surface, but cannot observe his soul from other angles.

Dickens is undoubtedly a great novelist, but the single-line narrative from root to leaf can never fully express the more intricate modern society and modern people. At the beginning of this century, the new theories of Schopenhauer, Nietzsche, and Freud brought about a great change in the way novelists express themselves.In particular, Freud's psychoanalysis made the novelist's work even more difficult.If the novelist can't tell a story flatly, he needs to organize a new system.Using philosophical symbolism extensively, Thomas Mann saw the decline of twentieth-century industrial society as an abnormal transgression.This point of view occupies a very important position in his "Buttenbrook".However, it is M. Proust who can completely describe a complex psychological process.His "Reminiscence of Things Past" is a very long novel, with seven volumes in total, and the characters are detailed and horrifying.Some people think: This is a chaotic book, poorly organized, without external stereotypes; however, because of the inner harmony, its chaos can still be cohesive.It can be seen from this that the exploration of inner truth has become an important goal of novelists. J. Joyce's "Ulysses" made the reading world see a new direction with a completely anti-traditional appearance.This is a novel based on stream-of-consciousness techniques, and it writes what happened in Dublin on June 16, 1904 in lengthy length.

The name stream of consciousness first appeared in the article of the psychologist W. James (note: the younger brother of the novelist Henry James).However, E. Du Yadan was the first to use the stream-of-consciousness technique in his novels.Du Yadan's method is very similar to the inner monologue performed by V Woolf in "The Waves".The inner monologue and the stream of consciousness itself are slightly different in the silent recitation of thoughts, in perception, and in feelings. Inner monologue and stream of consciousness are techniques of fiction writing, not genres.The novelist is not obliged to use this technique in his search for inner truth.As a modern novelist, one must have the courage to create and experiment with new techniques and expressive methods in order to catch up with the times and even surpass them.

Many people think that searching for the inner reality is an unconventional proposition, but in fact, this is the inevitable development of history.The decline of realism has already become a universal phenomenon. Realism requires the writer to fully reproduce the true colors of the social environment through his brushstrokes. In doing so, the effect is far less than what a camera can express.Modern society is an intricate one. Only by using cross-sectional methods to explore the erratic and psychological changes of individuals and capture the images of thoughts can we truly, completely and truly express the social environment and the spirit of the times.The skills and expression methods adopted by realism cannot be perfected. Although they do not deviate from the facts, they are only limited to external and superficial descriptions.

The age we are living in is an age of depression. Life has become a battlefield between good and evil. The subconscious mind has a much greater influence on everyone's thoughts and actions than the external environment can give him. Since the May Fourth Movement, people have always had a stubborn and superficial view of novels, believing that realistic novels that imitate nature are orthodox novels; otherwise, they are unconventional novels.Such a view, with all due respect, is erroneous. What is recorded in the history of literature is nothing more than the ebb and flow of various doctrines. If there is no new one to replace the old one, literature itself will always remain at a certain level.Of course, we cannot deny the special significance of a certain work in its era and its certain position in the entire history of literature, but we have no reason to oppose the emergence of all new and creative works.

This book "The Alcoholics" describes how an intellectual whose mind is not very balanced due to being in this depressing era uses self-abuse to survive. If anyone is disturbed by reading this novel, that is not beyond my expectation. For a living I entertained people all these years; now I want to entertain myself too. (North Point, Hong Kong, October 16, 1962)