Abstract:

The practice of "theory", which has been popular for more than half a century, reveals that the metaphysical self-evidence performativity is essentially concealed in constativity. A theory of performativity cannot exclude fiction, which as the pretending unity of performativity and constativity is to be disenchanted. As fiction embodies the substitution nature of language as a symbol system, the bifurcation of performativity and constativity is inherent in discourse. Therefore, a "theory" is self-deconstructive when it reveals such bifurcation: If we believe what it says, then we cannot accept it easily. It is this paradox that gradually leads to reflection on the practice of "theory" and then "post-theory". A "post-theory" not only admits the bifurcation of performativity and constativity, but also makes it constructive rather than deconstructive. Literary writing is good at such practice and willing to perform it, since the combination of these two aspects is in line with the nature of literature as symbolic defamiliarization. In this sense, the practice of "post-theory" must be literary writing instead of any theory of capitalized cultural criticism. The rebirth of a literary theory must lie in the new forms of "deconstructive-constructive" writing, including involved writing, which reveals performativtiy to constativity so that the latter actively establishes its observation framework, and tropological writing, which actively turns to a new perspective when realizing the relativity of a performative point of view. This brings us an opportunity of localization if we correspondently examine possible contribution of zawen essays to "post-theory" and possible combination of Chinese stories and "post-theory".

Key words: post-theory, literature, “deconstructive-constructive&rdquo, writing, involved writing, tropological writing