From “Iron House” to “Sorghum Field”: A Comparison of the Fate Trajectory and Spiritual Dilemma of Lu Xun and Mo Yan’s Rural Characters

DOI

10.2991/978-2-38476-541-6_21How to use a DOI?

Keywords

Xianglin Sao; “The White Dog and the Swing”; Rural Society; Character Fate

Abstract

As two peaks of rural writing in the history of modern and contemporary Chinese literature, Lu Xun laid the spiritual foundation for modern rural literature through profound critiques of national character, while Mo Yan expanded the aesthetic dimension of rural writing with narratives brimming with wild vitality. Though separated by nearly a century, both have formed a timeless resonance in their contemplation of rural China. This study examines Xianglin Sao and Nuan from Lu Xun’s “Blessing” and Mo Yan’s “White Dog and the Swing” as research subjects, exploring the differences in character spiritual construction across temporal contexts through spatial criticism theory and textual comparison. By investigating the disciplinary space of Luzhen and the wild growth space of Northeast Gaomi Town-ship through spatial characteristics, it reveals their intrinsic influence on characters’ life trajectories and spiritual worlds. The differences between the two works reflect variations in rural writing across eras, collectively constituting the eternal theme of “trauma and resilience” in Chinese rural literature.

Copyright

© 2026 The Author(s)

Open Access

Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

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TY  - CONF
AU  - Ziyue Yuan
PY  - 2026
DA  - 2026/02/26
TI  - From “Iron House” to “Sorghum Field”: A Comparison of the Fate Trajectory and Spiritual Dilemma of Lu Xun and Mo Yan’s Rural Characters
BT  - Proceedings of the 2025 5th International Conference on Culture, Design and Social Development (CDSD 2025)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 175
EP  - 185
SN  - 2352-5398
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/978-2-38476-541-6_21
DO  - 10.2991/978-2-38476-541-6_21
ID  - Yuan2026
ER  -