Chen Yingzhen’s旧 early novels shed important light for us to reconsider the reconstitution of the culture of the Left. His reflexive thinking on questions such as sex and woman with regard to the left-wing male subject is entangled with profound antinomies. The most valuable legacy of the young Chen is his double-edged critique of an untrammeled idealism and an Earth-bound populism. Chen’s旧thinking implicit in his early novels implies the overcoming of the two and therefore deserves close attention from those who are concerned with the reconstitution of the culture of the Left.