What does mainstream Japanese literature mean? What is the masterpiece?

The earliest literary classics are Ancient History, Journal and Local Records. The first two books trace the national history of Japan, while the latter records the natural conditions and customs of various parts of Japan. Both of them contain rich myths and legends and vivid ancient songs. Later, China's poetry collection Huaifengzao marked the beginning of literati poetry creation, and the successful compilation of Ye Wan Collection represented the first peak of Japanese poetry development.

Heian period (8th ~12nd century)

Influenced by the culture of the Tang Dynasty in China, a large number of collections of China's poems and essays came out one after another, and the literature craze in China lasted for a century. The collection of poems "Ancient and Modern Harmony Songs" restored the status of Japanese national poetry. At the same time, the prose creation is fruitful: The Tale of Wude and the Tale of Ise opened up two roads, the legendary story and the Song story, and the Tale of Yujin Bao opened up the first one with a long story, which laid the foundation for the birth of the story literature masterpiece Tale of Genji. The long realistic novel Tale of Genji is the work of Murasaki shikibu, a female writer. The author describes Genji's bitter life and the unfortunate fate of court women in a gloomy and sad style, and expresses the author's impermanent Buddhist outlook on life and aesthetic view of mourning as the ultimate. In addition to Murasaki shikibu, many women writers' works also stood out at this time, such as Diary of Dragonfly, Diary of Spring Department, Diary of Higher Level, etc. These diaries became the origin of private novels in Japanese literature. The most striking female prose is Pillow Grass written by Shao Qing Yan Na. The author's keen observation and delicate brushwork have always been praised by later generations. The final harvest of prose creation in this period is the collection of Buddhist words, the story of the past and the present, and the story of the big mirror These stories changed the delicate writing of dynasty stories and expanded the literary expression range of stories.

Kamakura Muromachi Era (12 ~16th century)

With the samurai class on the historical stage, the nobility and Song literature declined. 1205 The Collection of New Ancient and Modern Harmony Songs, together with Ye Ji and Ancient and Modern Harmony Songs, formed a tripartite confrontation, but it was a spent force after all, and was replaced by the rise of Lian Ge and Hehe. Ertiao Ji Liang, Yamazaki Zongjian and others established the literary status of Lian Ge and Nuo He. In the prose, there are also military stories describing the life of emerging warriors and essays by monks expressing hermit feelings. The classic story in the army is the story of Pingjia, which describes the rise and fall of two samurai groups. The novel depicts the heroic images of Ping Qingsheng and other warriors, reproduces their confident and uplifting spirit, and objectively reflects the essence of the times when aristocratic society changed into samurai society. The masterpieces of monk prose handed down from generation to generation are The Abbot by Ya Changming and Grass in vain by Yoshida Kenko. The two essays have their own characteristics and are regarded as two treasures of prose literature. The gifted scholars and wild words born in this period are the glorious beginning of japanese theatre's history. "Neng" is mainly a song and dance performance, with solemn and elegant drama characteristics, and "KuangYan" is mainly humorous, reflecting a relaxed and humorous comedy style. Xie Mi (1363 ~ 1443) has made pioneering contributions to the performance art and creative theory of energy efficiency.

Edo period (17 ~19th century)

The development of commodity economy has brought about changes in social structure, and the citizen class, as the main body of society, has gradually become the appreciator of literary works. In order to meet their aesthetic requirements, Matsuo Bashō introduced banana-style secularization harmony on the basis of chastity and forest harmony, while Ihara Xihepu wrote about the business life and pleasure life of machimachi people, which enriched Yayoi Kusama's creative content. In the new gate near Songmen, the clear glass (puppet show) shows the joys and sorrows of the lower class more widely. This aesthetic pursuit of taking vulgarity as beauty led to the appearance of light literature (drama component), which had a certain negative impact on later literature.

Meiji period (1868 ~1911)

1868 Meiji Restoration marked the beginning of modern Japanese literature. The publication of "The Essence of Fiction", a theoretical novel written by Pingnei Xiaoyao (1859 ~ 1935), has the nature of modern literature enlightenment. Futabatei Shimei wrote the first realistic novel "Floating Clouds" in modern times, and Mori Yoshiro successively published the earliest romantic novel "Dancing Ji" in modern times, which established the development direction of modern literature. Golden hag is the representative work of Toyo Ozaki (1867 ~ 1903), which is a best-selling novel at the end of 19. At the beginning of the 20th century, influenced by the West, naturalistic literature rose. The representative writer Shimazaki Tōson's novel Breaking the precepts has a strong tendency to criticize reality, while Tayama Katai's novel Quilt has many characteristics of naturalistic literature and is highly praised by naturalistic literary theorists. Li Zhuo writer Natsume Soseki's masterpiece "I'm a Cat" made a powerful attack on all kinds of drawbacks of modern society with the irony of laughing and cursing.

Dazheng period (19 12 ~ 1925)

At the end of modern literature, Saneatsu Mushakoji (1885 ~ 1976) and Ryunosuke Akutagawa, the writers of the new trend of thought, became the mainstream of the literary world. Akutagawa's novels examine the social reality such as "selfishness of human nature" with suspicion, and the pessimistic conclusion leads to his suicide, which also means the end of the development of Taisho literature.

Showa period (1926 ~ 1988) and beyond.

Modern Japanese literature began to form and develop. The mainstream of the early literary world was proletarian literature. 1928 The establishment of the All-Japan Proletarian Art Alliance (NAP for short) promoted the maturity of proletarian literature. Kobayashi Takiji and De Yongzhi (1899 ~ 1958) wrote two novels, Crab Boat and Streets Without the Sun, which are typical works. Parallel to the revolutionary literature are writers of the New Sensation School, represented by Yokomitsu Yili (1898 ~ 1947) and Kawabata Yasunari, who had a certain influence at that time. From 1937, when the Japanese war of aggression against China was launched in an all-round way to the end of World War II, many writers were drafted into the army, and the literary world was desolate.

After the Second World War, literary schools sprang up and writers came forth in large numbers. The novels of progressive writers Yuriko Miyamoto (1899 ~ 195 1), Ye Ping in Bozhou (1946 ~ 1947), the novel Jing Shan by De Yongzhi, and Grey by the old writer Shiga Naoya. Kawabata Yasunari, who became famous before the war, won the Nobel Prize in Literature with three novels: Snow Country, Thousand Cranes and Ancient Capital. Among postwar novelists, Noguchi Hiroshi's Vacuum Zone, Jing Shangjing's Tian Ping, Tsutomu Minakami's (19 19 ~) Qian Yue Bamboo Shadow, Seicho Matsumoto's Japanese Black Fog and Ryotaro Shiba's (1923 ~) Dragon and Horse Running. In the mid-1960s, the development of literature entered a new era. In addition to the works of social significance written by many serious writers, the science fiction novel The Sinking of Japan and some mystery novels by Komatsu Sasaki (193 1 ~) are also quite popular.

In the 1970s, the works of representative writer Akio Abe (1924 ~) and other economic novels describing the contemporary era promoted the prosperity of the literary world. A group of writers who were active in 1980s, such as Saburo Chengshan, Ryo Takasugi and An Shi, promoted Japanese economic novels to a new height. After entering the 1990s, with Kenzaburo Oe's works winning the Nobel Prize in Literature, realistic literature was re-valued.