New Perspectives on Han, Wei, Six Dynasties Literature: On Imitation and Gift-Giving Poems

Author: Mei Jialing
Publisher:
Publish Date: 2004-11-01
Features: "Imitation" refers to poetic and prose works completed through the methods of "imitation" or "proxy representation"; "Gift Exchange" refers to "gift exchange poems," which are poems used by scholars to communicate and interact with each other. Since the Han and Wei dynasties, these two types of literature have been the major works of scholars at the time. The former commemorates the trajectory of the progression and transformation of the humanistic world; the latter depicts the individual existence context of the contemporary moment and the multiple relational networks intertwined with it. The various literary styles of this period are thus vividly revealed through their formation, development, and mutual influence. This book takes the "imitation" and "gift exchange" of the Han, Wei, and Six Dynasties as the basic material and attempts to propose several new concepts. It not only repositions the misunderstood phenomenon of imitation and proxy representation in literary history but also delves deeply into the gift exchange poems, which have long been little attended to.