History of Classical Chinese Poetic Theory (Revised Edition)

Author: Xiao Huarong
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2005-12-01
Features: Some insights from the foolish, though not without merit, are briefly mentioned in the book: For instance, it argues that the history of Chinese poetic thought can be divided into the "Poetry vs. Ode" debate starting from the Song Dynasty; the underlying conflict in the later period is "emotional vs. ritual," which manifests as the "Tang vs. Song (poetry)" debate; the mid-Tang period is the turning point of evolution, with Du Fu as the pivot of the pivot; the Song Dynasty's interpretation of Du Fu's poetry took over from the Han Dynasty's interpretation of the Book of Songs; the principles and theories of the Han Dynasty's interpretation of the Book of Songs are called the "scriptural spirit" of the Book of Songs (the scriptural spirit of the "Three Hundred Poems"), distinguishing it from the commonly referred to "spirit of the Book of Songs"; the "Poetry vs. Ode" debate is actually a conflict between the scriptural spirit of the Book of Songs for education and the aesthetic principles of the Chu Odes; correspondingly, "metaphor and allusion" has both the scriptural theory of metaphor and allusion and the literary theory of metaphor and allusion, while Zhu Ziqing's definition of "allusion" is confused, starting from the "allusion" in "sensitive words" (gǎnxìng) by Zhi Yu of the Western Regions, who interpreted the "allusion" in "metaphor, allusion, and description" as the "allusion" of allegory, which remains confused to this day; regarding the Tang vs. Song debate, the book introduces the categories of "typical Tang poetry" and "Song-style poetry," the former mostly referring to the high Tang poetry, while the latter includes not only the mainstream Song poetry but also parts of the mid-Tang poetry that were "pre-Song" and various Song poetry schools that followed; the debate originated in the late Song Dynasty with Yan Yu, so his Canglang Poetic Discourse has the greatest influence in the history of poetic discussions, almost rivaling the Preface to the Book of Songs, becoming the theoretical cornerstone of the poetic mainstream in the Ming Dynasty, while Wang Shuzhen's "divine charm" (shényùn) is the echo and culmination of the evolution of the mainstream poetic theory. For example, the four-character titles summarizing the poetic mainstream of each era in the chapters are all derived from the original texts of poetic discussions in that era, with particular emphasis on the title "Technique advances to the Dao" for Ning Yuan, "Imitation and transformation" for Ming, and "Challenge Tang, worship Song" for Qing, which required careful consideration at the time. And so on.