Artistic features of Chinese network literature on the example of the web novel by Moxiang Tongxiu “The Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation” (2016)

Abstract

This paper examines the artistic originality of Chinese online literature and its linguistic features on the example of the novelized cycle of the modern online novelist Moxiang Tongxiu “The Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation” (墨香铜臭《魔道祖师》, 2016). The research is interdisciplinary in nature, the focus is primarily on the structural features of poetics, the principles of artistic world modeling and interacting elements of various levels (genre, stylistic, ideological, thematic, figurative, compositional, etc.), as well as some linguistic features associated with the writer's idiosyncrasy. The text of the work is analyzed not only in its external, formal, but also internal, substantive aspects, a systematic description of the different structural elements is given. The genre affiliation and genre varieties of the work are considered separately, the question is raised about its multi-genre specifics and the simultaneous inclusion of various genre features of such forms as a novel, a web novella, a fantastic narrative, a fairy tale, a xianxia, etc. It is argued and put forward the hypothesis that these signs and their elements rather act not as a genre, but as a local textual effect, which can be point-episodic in nature and/or become the dominant feature of a web work. The analysis of intermediate and intertextual means and features is given. The author’s constant appeal to the ecphrastic technique in writing practice in the synthetic transmission of musical imagery, as well as to the integration of resources and materials of classical Chinese literature as an intertextual means of expressiveness of artistic literature, is proved.

Keywords:

Moxiang Tongxiu, network literature, Chinese literature, web novel, web novella, wuxia, xianxia, The Grandmaster of Demonic Cultivation