Cheng Qianfan recommends the great ancient Chinese fu poets, recommends everyone to read

Author: Cao Hong, Cheng Zhangcan
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Publication Date: 2004-11-01
Features: The term "Ci" and "Fu" were originally the same and could be used interchangeably as literary forms. In the late Western Han Dynasty, the great scholar Liu Xiang compiled the works of authors such as Qu Yuan and Song Yu. Due to their strong regional characteristics, these works were collectively titled Chuci, meaning the words or literature of the Chu people, or the literature of the Chu state. However, when his son Liu Xin assisted him in compiling the imperial library catalog Bie Lun and Qi Lue, he categorized them separately as Qu Yuan Fu, Song Yu Fu, and so on. This shows that in the eyes of the Han people, there was no distinction between "Ci" and "Fu."
However, later works were more commonly titled "Fu," leading people to view "Ci" as referring specifically to the works of Qu Yuan, Song Yu, and their followers. As a general term, "Fu" could include "Ci," but "Ci" did not include "Fu." The term "Fu" has two meanings in the realm of literature: one refers to a rhetorical device, and the other refers to a literary genre.
In terms of rhetorical device, "Fu" means elaboration. Any description of objective phenomena using this device can be called "Fu." It was originally embodied in the Book of Songs and later generalized by the Han people, alongside the other two rhetorical devices, bi (comparison) and xing (evocation). This rhetorical device, due to its extensive use by writers and influenced by other indispensable factors, gradually evolved into a distinctive cultural form—Fu.