Abstract: Compared with the study of other phenomena, trends of thought and schools of literary criticism in the 1980s, the academic circle have paid little attention to the “new concept craze” in literary criticism in the 1980s, the hidden level of some “limitations” of the problem in particular. This area has become almost a “forgotten corner.” From the perspective of wholeness, this paper re-sorts, analyzes and ponders upon the “new concept craze” of literary criticism in the 1980s. There are three kinds of limitations: mistaking “old words” for “new words”, equating “new concept” with “new idea”, and reproducing some political culture “ghosts” in deep history. These “limitations” in the “new concept craze” of literary criticism in the 1980s more or less “passed down” to the literary criticism since the 1990s. A deep reflection on these “limitations” is of great significance to the construction of the discourse system of localized Chinese contemporary literary criticism.

Key words: “Return”, 1980s, literary criticism, the “new concept craze”, “limitation”