Reality and Illusion Intertwined, Humanity at the Core: An Analysis of Anti-fiction Techniques in Ma Jia's Novels

Abstract

Ma Jia claims that "a novel is about presenting the false as the true." The core of his creation lies in employing "anti-fiction" techniques to construct a seemingly solid "realistic runway": real-name narrators, fabricated archives, interview notes, historical markers, and interlocking perspectives. He then deliberately exposes the “fabrication edge” through ghost narratives, self-contradictions, blank maps, and intertwined plots, making readers oscillate between belief and doubt. This study, through close textual reading and cross-referencing of historical materials, systematically analyzes his representative works and argues that Ma Jia’s bidirectional narrative strategy of “revealing the false within the true and the true within the false” dismantles the barrier between fiction and reality, shifting the narrative anchor from “event truth” to “human authenticity.” From four dimensions—the narrator’s identity, internal focalization, the blend of historical fact and fantasy, and the creation of suspenseful gaps—the paper reveals how this “real-and-unreal” aesthetic offers a new paradigm for contemporary espionage fiction.