Couplets talk

Author: Wu Gongheng
Publisher:
Publishing Date: 2003-10-01
Features: Due to the limitations of the era, there are also many erroneous, conservative, and elements in the author's thoughts. For example, he still affirmed Zeng Guofan's suppression of the Taiping Rebellion, and he often criticized the Boxer Movement's anti-imperialist and patriotic actions. Many of the self-authored works and those by his disciples and friends included in the book are of low quality. Some birthday couplets, wedding couplets, and mourning couplets are purely perfunctory, and some comments are also rather vague. These are the shortcomings of the book. The original preface by the author, which fiercely mocked and condemned vernacular Chinese, is also difficult to read and has not been included. Additionally, some works of obviously low quality have been edited out. Furthermore, punctuation has been added throughout the book, and some obvious typos have been corrected. The book was first published in early 1984 and was later reprinted. This edition adds some annotations, but there may be inaccuracies. Also, due to space limitations, many things have been omitted, and it is only for reference. The book is suitable for general readers to read and appreciate, gaining inspiration and enlightenment. When traveling, readers can refer to the couplets of famous scenic spots and historical sites included in the book to enhance their travel experience and interest. The special literary form of couplets requires equal length for the upper and lower couplets, well-matched parallelism, and coordinated tones. The so-called well-matched parallelism generally requires corresponding parts of speech: verbs match verbs, nouns match nouns, adjectives match adjectives, and numerals match numerals in substantive words; adverbs match adverbs, prepositions match prepositions, conjunctions match conjunctions, and particles match particles in functional words. The content of the upper and lower couplets should be related but not repetitive. If the parallelism is well-matched but the meaning is repetitive, it is called "hépǎng," meaning that it is like two hands that are on the left and right but both have five fingers. This is something to be careful about when writing couplets. The so-called coordinated tones generally require that the tones of corresponding positions in the upper and lower couplets are opposite, with the last character of the upper couplet being an oblique tone and the lower couplet being a level tone, although exceptions are allowed. Most of the couplets included in this book meet these requirements, and many of them have a strong rhythmic flow, beautiful wording, and naturally well-matched parallelism. Readers can appreciate and contemplate them on their own.