Realist literature and art is a prominent example of a path of literature and art that combines Marxism and Chinese cultural traditions. Marxist literary realism values the role of literature and art in vividly reproducing human social activities. In China, realism has evolved into local forms such as enlightenment realism, revolutionary realism, “scar realism,” and “new realism.” The latter two have been influenced by literary trends such as modernism, as well as the classical Chinese tradition of mind-nature wisdom. A Lifelong Journey represents the maturation of the Chinese mind-nature realism paradigm. Mind-nature realism is a new Chinese aesthetic paradigm originating from the combination of Chinese mind-nature wisdom and the principles of Marxist realist aesthetics. The field of contemporary Chinese literature and art contains literary and artistic production mechanisms and aesthetic power structures that allowed A Lifelong Journey to exert an effect: national orientation, prioritized industry investment, lived experience, the desire of the audience, artistic creativity, and omnimedia support. A Lifelong Journey presents several aspects of the aesthetic paradigm of Chinese mind nature realism: the blending of truth and goodness, evocative archetypes, formation of personality through geography and contemporary trends, simultaneous praise and criticism, and a “flow-back” style. It serves as a model for current and future literary narratives in various genres.

A Lifelong Journey (Renshijian) is a novel about the fate of common people, especially of the workers, in China’s practice of changing reality from the 1950s to the present. It inherits the legacy of the realistic novels in the 19th century and endows them with contemporary features. In the humanitarian-based “stories of good men,” Liang Xiaosheng highlights the general thinking of the common people’s happy life as a goal, and gives expressive to the epic nature of contemporary novels.

This paper aims to interpret Liang Xiaosheng’s novel A Lifelong Journey. It argues that the novel reproduces life from the 1970s till now. The people from various social strata including workers, urban civilians, intellectuals, and officials who are nurtured on the soil of civilians constitute the current Chinese society. Liang Xiaosheng takes workers back to the center of social analysis by portraying the life and spirits of the working class. With “good people” as the keynote in characterization, Liang Xiaosheng, in the debate about goodness, reaffirms the value of goodness in the novel which shines with the radiance of idealism. The narration of epic nature evokes people’s memory of the socialist era, and also presents a historical picture of the world.

In a time that advocates critical rationality and knowledge based culture, Liang Xiaosheng’s full-length novel A Lifelong Journey places equal emphasis on social and historical perception and the exploration of human nature. Merging “what is” and “what ought to be” in the real world, the novel reconstructs the warmth and nobility of morality oriented culture in several aspects—the significance of literature, the creation of personae, and the condensation of historical and philosophical consciousness. It provides cognitive values by portraying “history outside history,” and explores “what makes humans human.” With a strong pertinence to the modern time, it perfectly demonstrates the profundity and integrity of realistic literature that not only enlightens the mind, but also shows the way forward.

It is an important proposition of contemporary realist literature creation to be close to the mundane lifestyles in reality and write about the Chinese experience. From the far-reaching heroic narration of the early years, to the Chinese stories since the 21st century, the realist literature creation deals with the mundane daily life, showing a turn towards worldly feelings. Liang Xiaosheng’s novel A Lifelong Journey extends the perspective to the living space of ordinary people in the cities. Unlike the epic depiction of “regretless heroes” in the zhiqing novels from his earlier years, Liang makes a shift to the writing of worldly feelings about the warmth in reality. While writing about the hardships in reality, this novel continues to construct stories of good people and adheres to the ethical positioning of good people culture. The two generate a conflict with each other throughout the text, forming the narrative tension. However, governed by the emotional structure of the good people culture, the novel lacks the expression of complex human nature while putting a focus on the mundane existence.

Liang Xiaosheng’s A Lifelong Journey depicts a panoramic picture of Chinese society and the changes it undergoes through the times. The novel unfolds around the life stories of the Zhou family, articulates the relationships among people, society and times, and presents the toughness and tenacity of ordinary people in the face of reality. The novel develops its storyline around the romance narratives of the three siblings of the Zhou family. The realistic demands, value positions, ideal forms, and spiritual trends presented in the process of romance narration echo the development of social mentality over the past 50 years of social reform and changes in China, depicting a picture of social life since then.