René Wellek (1903— 1995) is one of the most influential literary theorists and critics in the 20th century. His eight-volume History of Modern Literary Criticism:1750-1950 was finally completed before his death, and was recognized as a "landmark" imperial masterpiece by the literary world. The Literary Theory, which he co-authored with Austin Warren, has been published for nearly half a century and has been popular for a long time. It has been translated into more than 20 languages, and is not only used as a teaching material for literature majors by universities in many countries in the world, but also included in the list of world famous works. For such an important theorist and critic, some senior domestic scholars have a certain understanding. For example, in the "Brief Bibliography" in the appendix of the History of Western Aesthetics written by Mr. Zhu Guangqian in 1960s, Webster's "History of Modern Literary Criticism" was included, and made a pertinent evaluation, calling it "rich in information and clear in description", but it also pointed out its weakness of not paying enough attention to "the overall mental outlook of the times". Qian Zhongshu repeatedly quoted his "Cone in a Tube" in Literary Theory, which confirmed the descriptions in China's ancient books. 65438-0984, Translation of Our Literary Theory was published by Sanlian Bookstore, which had great influence in domestic academic circles. This book was printed twice in a row and distributed tens of thousands of copies, which made many scholars understand his theory. In the following 20 years, Literary Theory was used as a teaching material by Chinese departments of many universities, and was also included in the 100 recommended bibliography read by Chinese students by the Ministry of Education. However, this book has been sold out since the late 1980s. At present, the academic circles are in urgent need of this book. Therefore, we revised the old version slightly and delivered it for reprint. Before the publication of Fu Zi Manuscripts, it seems necessary to have a detailed discussion on Wellek and his works.

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1903, Wellek was born in Vienna. This cultural cradle has trained many world-class musicians, philosophers, psychologists and writers. His family members are all very literate. My father, Bolognislav Wellek, was originally from Czech Republic. He likes music since he was a child. He is an excellent local singer. He once wrote an article commenting on Wagner's opera, wrote a biography for the famous Czech composer Bedrich Smetana, and translated the poems of Czech poets Vicki Ricky and Maha. Mother Gabriel comes from a noble family in West Prussia and is of Polish descent. She can speak four languages: German, Italian, French and English, and she has a high cultural quality. Influenced by the strong cultural atmosphere of his family, Wellek developed the habit of reading at an early age. He greedily reads works in literature, history, religion, philosophy, geography, military and other fields, often enjoys opera performances and learns to play the piano. He speaks German at school and Czech at home. He began to learn Latin at the age of 10. In the next eight years, he insisted on reading Latin classics for eight hours every week, reading works by famous artists such as Cicero, Caesar, Catullus, Virgil, Horace, Ovid and Tacitus. From the age of 13, he studied Greek and read the works of Xenophon, Plato, Lucian and Homer. During his suspension from school due to scarlet fever, his father read Dickens' The Biography of Pickwick for him in German. After returning to school, he stopped learning Greek and started learning English, which laid the foundation for his long-term teaching and research in the future.

After the collapse of Austria-Hungary, the Wellek family moved from Vienna to Prague, an ancient city full of Catholic flavor. When he was in middle school in Prague, the school offered courses such as historical geography, Latin literature, Germanic literature and Czech literature, but there was no English. Therefore, after school, he can only read Shakespeare and English romantic poets. In addition, he also read a lot of works by Schopenhauer and Nietzsche. 1922 He entered the famous Charles University (now Prague University) in Czech Republic, majoring in Germanic literature, studying languages, literature, comparative folklore and other courses, and also made a special trip to Heidelberg to listen to a lecture by gondola, a critic who was famous for his comparative study of Shakespeare and Goethe. But the history of English literature taught by Matthews (1882- 1945) is the course that attracts him most. Matthews is one of the founders of Prague Language School. Like Wellek, he spent his childhood in Austria. He had a strong national enthusiasm and devoted his life to the revival of Czech national culture. He advocates simple and fresh style to guide students to explore and invent hard, but does not approve of catering to fashion and being unconventional. The history of English literature he talked about was completely unaffected by positivism at that time, and was often full of new ideas and brilliant. Young Wellek benefited a lot from his courses. Trust and friendship have been established between their teachers and students. Under the guidance of Matthews, Wellek read the works of Shakespeare, Romantic poets and Victorian poets. After Matthews lost his sight, Wellek vividly read Spencer's The Fairy Queen and listened to his unusual comments on Spencer.

Wellek went to England twice in 1924 and 1925 to prepare his thesis Carlisle and Romanticism. At that time, Britain was in the upsurge of reevaluating17th century metaphysical poets, such as Dunn and Marvell, which aroused Wellek's great interest. During this period, he began to publish papers. The first article is a comment on the Czech translation of Romeo and Juliet. Subsequent articles discuss Byron, Shelley and other romantic poets. Under the guidance of Matthews, he finished his thesis "Carlisle and Romanticism", and put forward a new view that Carlisle's weapon against the Enlightenment was borrowed from German romanticism, which attracted academic attention. 1926, Wellek, who was only 23 years old, received a doctorate in literature.

With the support of the Czech Ministry of Education, Wellek went to Britain for the third time and planned to complete a monograph on the relationship between Marville and Baroque and Latin poetry. But at Oxford University, he learned that Pierre Legouhy, a famous French literary historian, was writing a masterpiece about Marville, so he gave up his original research idea. Later, due to the recommendation of Oxford University, he got help from the Institute of International Education. /kloc-in the autumn of 0/927, I went to Princeton University for further study and took various advanced courses. However, most of these courses are difficult to attract people's attention. In addition, Princeton University did not teach modern literature and American literature at that time, so he turned to study the works of new humanists Mencken, Van Wickbrooks, Babbitt and Moore.

After that, he taught German at Smith College for one year and returned to Princeton the following year. He still teaches German and attended a seminar on Hegel's logic. The earlier study of Carlisle naturally led him to Coleridge, and the study of Coleridge had to contact Kant and Schelling, so he decided to write his second paper, Kant's Influence on Britain. Later, he returned to China via England, carefully read Coleridge's Logical Manuscripts in the British Library, and discussed the gains and losses of the English poet and critic's reference to Kant's thought.

1930 autumn, Wellek returned to Charles university, quickly completed the monograph Kant in Britain: 1793- 1838, and actively participated in the activities of Prague Language School. He not only teaches English in universities, but also translates Conrad's Opportunity and Lawrence's Sons and Lovers into Czech. During this period, the theories of Russian formalism and Czech structuralism aroused his keen interest, and he paid special attention to the works of shklovsky, Jakobson, Mukalov, Ingarden and others.

1935- 1939, Wellek taught at the University of London and wrote an important theoretical article on the history of literature for the sixth volume of Prague Language School. In this article, he first commented on Russian formalism and Ingarden's phenomenology in English. In addition, he also debated with Levi's in Review magazine, criticizing his mistake of lacking understanding of idealism and romanticism since Plato.

1in the spring of 939, Hitler's army captured Prague. At this time, Wellek lost his source of livelihood, but he soon got help from American scholars. Foster Shu Chi, dean of the College of Liberal Arts of Iowa State University with a new humanistic view, invited Webster to be a lecturer in the English Department of the university. Webster and his wife stayed in Cambridge for another six weeks on the way, and lived in a house in Iowa City on September 1 day of that year, the day when World War II broke out.

At Iowa State University, Wellek offered the course of "European Fiction" and the workshop of "German-British Relations", and made several like-minded colleagues, among whom Austin Warren was the closest partner. At that time, American academic circles were similar to British academic circles. Most scholars still adhere to the old-fashioned empirical research methods, while others think that traditional methods should be re-recognized. The two factions sometimes argue about whether to attach importance to historical criticism or aesthetic criticism, facts or ideas, but both sides lack theoretical consciousness. Wellek supported Foster's new humanism position and the reform he led, and tried to explain it theoretically. He revised and published the Theory of Literary History, published The Rise of British Literary History (University of North Carolina Press, 194 1), and began to be the deputy editor of China Literature Quarterly.

During this period, Wellek met several leaders of "New Criticism" successively: Wemsart, Brooks, Tate and Warren. Wellek was deeply impressed by the new critical theory. In contrast, he deeply felt the deficiency of the new humanism theory, so he decided to co-write Literary Theory with Austin Warren, focusing on the nature, function, internal structure and formal characteristics of literary and artistic works, and at the same time expounding the relationship between literature and adjacent disciplines. This book organically combines Russian formalism, Czech structuralism and British and American new criticism.

Because of the war, Wellek broke off contact with Prague School, but his interest in theory increased. 1944 promoted to professor. The following summer, with the support of Rockefeller Foundation, he successfully cooperated with Warren in Cambridge, Massachusetts, exchanged views on various chapters of literary theory, and completed the writing of some chapters.

In the autumn of the same year, they returned to Iowa. Then came the news that his former teacher Matthews had died on the eve of Czech liberation. When he planned to return to Prague to inherit the teaching career, Yale University offered to provide him with a chair. So he changed his mind, stayed in America and became an American citizen. At this time, Yale University awarded him an honorary master's degree and invited him to join the editorial department of Journal of Modern Linguistics Society. He was hired as a professor of Slavic Literature and Comparative Literature at Yale University to teach "Russian Fiction". He deeply felt that the traditional setting and teaching methods of this kind of courses were inherently inadequate, because in his view, many different nationalities' literature had internal relations, especially the European literature which inherited the tradition of ancient Greece and Rome, and should be regarded as an organic unity. Therefore, the setting and teaching of literature courses should be extended from the past national literature to the field beyond national boundaries. During the summers of 1947 and 1948, Warren came to Yale to continue writing literary theory with Wellek.

1947 and 1948, Wellek gave lectures at the university of Minnesota and Columbia university. 1in the autumn of 948, the Department of Comparative Literature was established in Yale University, and Wellek was appointed as the first department head, becoming the editorial board of the newly-established Comparative Literature magazine at that time. In issue 1 of this journal, a famous paper "The Concept of Romanticism in the History of Literature" was published, which refuted Lovejoy's view that romanticism in Western Europe was not a unity. /kloc-in the summer of 0/949, Wellek joined the ranks of new critics such as J.C. Lanson, A.Tate and Y.Winters, and became a researcher at Kenyon College. This year, Literary Theory was published. After that, he devoted himself to writing the history of modern literary criticism: 1750- 1950.