Classical Poetry Appreciation Methods

Author: Zhou Xiaotian
Publisher:
Publishing Date: 2003-02-01
Features: "Appreciating the Four Books of Ancient Chinese Rhyme" is a series of books personally written by Mr. Zhou Xiaotian, focused on appreciating ancient Chinese rhymed literature such as poetry, fu, ci, and qu, and introducing methods of appreciation. The series consists of four volumes: "Appreciating Poetry and Fu of the Pre-Qin and Eight Dynasties," "Appreciating Poetry and Ci of the Sui, Tang, and Five Dynasties," "Appreciating Poetry, Ci, and Qu of the Song, Yuan, Ming, and Qing Dynasties," and "Methods of Appreciating Classical Poetry and Ci."
"The Pre-Qin and Eight Dynasties" mark the period of the emergence and development of ancient rhymed literature. Poetry was primarily in five-character and classical forms, while fu evolved from Shao-style and grand fu to lyrical short fu. "The Sui, Tang, and Five Dynasties" was a flourishing era for poetry, with all major poetic forms fully developed, covering every kind of beauty. Meanwhile, ci emerged and began to gain popularity. "The Song, Yuan, Ming, and Qing Dynasties" were a period of evolution in poetry, with particular creativity in ci and qu composition.
The first three volumes of "Appreciating the Four Books" follow this chronology, analyzing famous works. The fourth volume focuses exclusively on introducing methods of poetry appreciation and includes illustrative examples. Each volume in the series begins with an introduction or overview, providing detailed explanations of the basic categories of Chinese rhymed literature and their processes of emergence, development, flourishing, and evolution. The books also feature short biographies of rhymed literature authors, placed before each selected work.
Thus, the entire series integrates the history of poetry, poetics, famous works, appreciation, and methods into one cohesive whole. With a single volume in hand, readers can gain systematic knowledge about Chinese rhymed literature and its methods of appreciation.
"Appreciating the Four Books" includes stroke-order and phonetic indexes for author names and work titles, placed at the end of the fourth volume, "Methods of Appreciating Classical Poetry and Ci." The texts of the famous works are based on widely accepted editions, with variant readings chosen for their superiority without individual annotation. Additionally, a list of major reference books is provided at the end of the fourth volume for readers to consult and reference.