追尋與超越：陸士諤《新野叟曝言》的少年中國和外星殖民

Pursue and Surpass: Young China and Interstellar Colonization in New Humble Words of an Old Countryman

陸士諤 (1878-1944)《新野叟曝言》借用續書模式，在前作《野叟曝言》世界線架構，發揮「少年」與「醒獅」兩個晚清時常用來思考國族出路的符號，想像以及期許一個覺醒之後的強大中國。至於「飛艦」與「海艦」情節，則反映出晚清知識分子對西方「鐵甲艦」與「船堅炮利」感到威脅和焦慮的同時，也以此作為追尋與超越歐洲的方向。此外，小說刻意將木星設計成無人地帶，嘗試展示一種有別於西方殖民的殖民，以此區別未來強大的中國和當下強大的歐洲。可就在一切功德圓滿之際，基於陸士諤「不忘苦難」的意識，其挪用當時「彗星滅世」說法，斷開中國和烏托邦的連結，令小說結局返回當下時空。以往學者多注意到小說受到西方影響，本文則嘗試強調小說複雜的矛盾交織。

New Humble Words of an Old Countryman新野叟曝言was written by Lu Shi’e陸士諤(1878-1944) as a sequel to Humble Words of an Old Countryman. He wrote this sequel in order to present the two concepts of“Young China”and“Waking Lion”for imagining a powerful China and thinking about the bright future of the nation. This imagination reflected a common desire of scholars in the late Qing Dynasty. Secondly, the plot involving“flying battleships”and“sea battleships”shows that the intellectuals in the late Qing Dynasty felt threatened and anxious about Western ironclad warships and their powerful navies with excellent weaponry. At the same time, the intellectuals took this as a direction to pursue and surpass European countries. Furthermore, the author deliberately designed Jupiter as a formerly uninhabited zone. This was because he wanted to depict a new model of colonization that was different from Western-style colonization. It means that the activity would not harm any original inhabitants in the process of building the new interstellar community on Jupiter. However, at the end of the novel, Lu Shi’e incorporated the concept of comets destroying the world in order to disconnect China from utopia because Lu could not ignore the actual crisis that China was undergoing at the time. Although scholars have formerly paid more attention to Western influences on Lu’s work, this article attempts to emphasize the complex contradictions presented in his novel.