Selected Poems and Critiques of Liu Zongyuan

Author: Shang Yongliang
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2003-12-01
Features: Liu Zongyuan, who passed the imperial examination at the age of twenty-one, was a young man of remarkable success. He was full of ideals and eager to contribute to the middle-aged prosperity of the Tang Dynasty. However, ten years later, due to the failure of the Yongzhen Reform Movement led by Wang Shuwen, as an active participant, he suffered an unexpected exile and spent the last fourteen years of his life in the remote and impoverished Yongzhou and Liuzhou. The life of being abandoned and betrayed, accompanied by loneliness and frustration, gave Liu Zongyuan's literary creation a transcendent depth. His poetry is both mournful and sharp, as well as simple and classical; his fables and satirical writings are incisive and profound in their implications; while his landscape essays, infused with his personal experiences and melancholic emotions, are unparalleled in both ancient and modern times. This book selects and annotates over 60 of Liu Zongyuan's poems and prose, integrating the achievements of scholars past and present, aiming to provide readers with a reading that best reflects the literary characteristics of Liu Zongyuan.