Great literary works are often born in times of crisis and turning point, and experience the fragility and absurdity of life in the turmoil and twists of the times, which is often the awakening of the poet's consciousness. The environment and life that you understand in this environment no longer insist on the perspective of present, morality, and history, but have an ultimate questioning and moving towards the ultimate destination of individual personality.
Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties is an era of breaking and pioneering, rebellion and transcendence coexisting in Chinese history. It is also in this context that the intellectual class gradually turned from pursuing standard personality ideals to seek personal spiritual independence and freedom. If you cannot find a space for personal ideals in the "political system" and "dao system", why not calmly bulge your belly in the world of aesthetics and nature and be happy from desire? If the ultimate care of the universe and metaphysical cannot be found in benevolence, righteousness, ethics, , and cannot respond to the tears and pain in reality. The poets who sing softly in frustration and comfort may happily find that their life feelings are deposited in mountains and rivers and love.
The literature and spiritual temperament of the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties are an alien in the history of Chinese thought and literature. Amid the drastic changes of the times and the depression of the intellectual class, Chinese literature found its own soul voice for the first time. The individual consciousness of the scholar-officials was liberated from the group consciousness, and they were eager to find freedom of responsibility and adaptability in the subtleties of their hearts. Against this ideological background, Chinese literature has created its own lyrical tradition. The poets on the edge of this edge and the rebellious era - pastoral poetry created by Tao Yuanming, landscape poetry created by Xie Lingyun, and long-lasting consciousness of family and country and the sorrow of change of generations in the poems and essays of Yu Xin, have become the tradition of poets in later generations who remember and look back on them.
This article is from the B02-B03 edition of the special topic "The Scenery Is Different - Literature and Lyricism of the Wei and Jin Dynasties" on September 16 of "The Scenery Is Not Different" by "The Literature and Lyricism of the Wei and Jin Dynasties".
"Theme" B01丨The scenery is different - literature and lyricism in the Wei and Jin dynasties
"Theme" B02-B03丨From the Wei and Jin dynasties to the late Ming Dynasty: Looking for the suppressed lyric voice
"Theme" B04-B05丨Made Tao Yuanming: The literary style created by rhythm, mystery and fine wine
"Economics" B06-B07丨Is economics just the knowledge of the rich?
"Theme" B08丨Xie Lingyun A life of indulgence and love for mountains and rivers
Written by Yuan Chunxi
The dynasties of change and chaos are often in a romantic dynasty, and the upset emotions surge out, appealing to poetry and imagination.
Western, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties and late Ming dynasties are two extremely similar eras. The poet appeals to moral choices, traumatic memories and the sorrow of family and country into his writings. The few drastic changes in historical books are the contradictions and pains of the poet's life. The poet is both a recorder and an implicit and forbearing actor. They hide themselves under the curtain of history, and through images and descriptions, they reveal their own destiny to readers who have been thousands of years later. Because at that time, excellent poets were often personal participants in history.
Yu Xin The palace style poem in "The mirror is round and round. I have many complaints in the empty room. How many years have you left the Weaver Girl. You should also listen to cross the river" is written about his life of being wandered between the north and south palaces? Qian Qianyi Is the "I hope to break the pass and rivers are not the Han banner, but blowing the rest of the sun and the moon is Hu Ba " in my later years also a powerless defense for the gray life between his loyalty and betrayal? They integrate their own encounters into the description of scenery, love and friendship. The poems carry their historical memories and have a deep understanding of history through emotion.
Although difficulties and hardships make the poets unfulfilled ambitions, they will also inspire them to regard their creation as an echo of the times and rewards of their souls. There are many such times and such figures in Chinese history, and they are left behind not only a volume of poetry and books and a sigh of lament through the corridor of history, but also a breath and murmur under the storm of storm. They are not only their sigh of lament for history and life, but also a defense under the craze of the times.
Historists hope to discover their hidden writing and metaphors in it, and whether they can discover more space for interpretation and interpretation.Literatures keenly explore the flow of their self-image and emotions, as well as the self-reflection and emotional flow hidden between poems and essays. This painful life experience between mountains and rivers also allows us to understand the irreplaceable meaning of literature at one end of the book - we can pass through the boundaries of time, region and language, and empathize with the ancients thousands of years ago. Their feelings for the remnants and their nostalgia and persistence for a disappearing world can be restored and reproduced in today's world of readers and researchers. They transform into images and allusions, unfolding a territory independent of power and reality for people today to express their feelings and travel. Just like Chen Yinke in " Liu Rushi's Biography ", Zhao Yuan in "Research on the Scholars and Doctors during the Ming and Qing Dynasties".
"Research on the Scholars and Doctors during the Ming and Qing Dynasties", written by Zhao Yuan, Peking University Press, June 2014 edition.
The research works of Sun Kangyi, director of the Department of East Asian Languages and Literature at Yale University and famous retired lecturer, "Lyricism and Description: Introduction to Poetry of the Six Dynasties" and "Love and Loyalty: Poems of Chen Zilong and Liu Rushi" are also an expansion and imagination of the two declines of the Wei, Jin and late Ming dynasties. Sun Kangyi, who experienced the Anti-Japanese War, moved to Taiwan, and the terror of whiteness, compared her life experience and devoted it to the works of poets such as Tao Yuanming, Xie Lingyun, and Chen Zilong and . The world of poetry and prose is not only a pastoral escape from her and her seclusion, but also drives her to further think about the meaning and structure of Chinese literature. Why is it often the era of separation and distress when poets use their temperaments to write poems that shock the world and cry ghosts? Why do those poets on the edge of the world of power often be loved by later poets and become the tradition in the mainstream of literature later?
Perhaps those frustrations and sorrows in the real world will be unexpectedly compensated in the literary world. Perhaps the obscuration of ethics and career will inspire repressive temperament and rebellion. Those subtle poetics and images are both accusation and questioning, and are also escapes hidden between Buddha and the mountains and rivers.
Wei and Jin Dynasties and the late Ming Dynasty: "alien" in Chinese history
Beijing News: The fields you study mainly focus on the two periods of Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties and the late Ming Dynasty. These two periods have many similarities, such as the historical background of the mountain and river reform, ideological unruly and liberation, the impact and transformation of foreign thoughts on traditional culture, etc. For you, what is the biggest attraction of these two periods? Is this a contrast and reference with your early life experience?
Sun Kangyi: I think it must be related. My doctoral degree mainly studied the late Tang and Northern Song lyrics under the guidance of Professor Gao Yougong, but when I was studying for a doctorate in Princeton, I was interested in the literature of the Six Dynasties. I am studying comparative literature. The "Theory of Imitation" by the late Jewish professor Erich Auerbach of Yale University has a great influence on me. He believes that Western literature has two traditions, one is the Greek tradition, and the other is the Hebrew tradition. The two writing methods are different. One is relatively parallel (paratactic) , and the other is gradual (hypotactic) . This is actually very similar to the stylistic classification of Chinese literature. When I finished my research on late Tang poetry and went to Yale to teach, I thought about studying poetry in the Six Dynasties.
My early experience did have a great influence on my research, especially after the War of Resistance Against Japan, the relocation of Taiwan and the white horror, it is natural that I will empathize with the life experiences of poets in the Wei and Jin Dynasties. Later, when I wrote Bao Zhao, Xie Xiao , especially Yu Xin, I would think of the sad past and all kinds of obsessions in life. I am not a pedantic scholar, I like to combine my life experience with my knowledge. When he was in Yale, Mr. Yu Yingshi was my colleague. At that time, his paper "The Thought of Famous Church and the Evolution of the Scholar Style of the Wei and Jin Dynasties" explained the breakthrough in Chinese culture in the Wei and Jin Dynasties, and his research inspired me a lot. So I started with Tao Yuanming and discussed Tao Yuanming and Xie Lingyun in a comparative way.
My research is synchronized with the literary criticism at that time. Yale has always been the forefront of American literature criticism. At that time, analysis of two perspectives of description (Description) and lyric (Lyric) was popular. Later I thought that these two perspectives may be able to examine Chinese culture, because Tao Yuanming and Xie Lingyun both belong to the type that emphasize both lyricism and description. The study of Wei and Jin literature is also related to my influence from Du Fu . Du Fu has the highest evaluation of Yu Xin. His "Yu Xin's life is the most bleak, and his poems in his late years touched the Jiangguan" is his feelings in his late years. To a certain extent, Du Fu can feel Yu Xin's life experience. My later interest in Ming and Qing literature and Chen Zilong also originated from this.
"Love and Loyalty: The Poems of Chen Zilong and Liu Rushi" is called The Late-Ming Poetry Ch'en Tzu-Lung: Crises of Love and Loyalism. I am interested in the era of crisis, because only this era can see the spiritual essence of people. Chen Zilong was unwilling to surrender to the Qing Dynasty and finally committed suicide by jumping into the water. In the eyes of later researchers, he was a national hero, and his personality and poetry had far-reaching influence. After his death, his friends were silent in order to escape the pursuit of the Qing court. In the 18th century, Emperor Qianlong posthumously named Chen Zilong "Zhongyu" in order to commend loyalty. Compared with Chen Zilong, another great poet Qian Qianyi, who was in the late Ming Dynasty, was neglected and criticized. After the Qing army captured Nanjing, he wanted to commit suicide, but he became an official of the Qing Dynasty on the excuse of "the water is too cold". This caused his relationship with Liu Rushi to fall to freezing point for a while. However, according to the research of historians, even after the Qing Dynasty, Qian Qianyi was secretly funding and helping the rebel army in the Southern Ming Dynasty to fight against Qing . Mr. Chen Yinke's "Biography of Liu Rushi" also had a very profound influence on me. Stills from the movie "Liu Rushi" (2012).
Every time I study is related to literary criticism. Because I have all American students (especially undergraduates) in my class, I have to use their language to get them to know, so I took advantage of Auerbach's theory. In Auerbach's so-called "Bible tradition", there is an important point that refers to metaphor. " Old Testament " often previews the upcoming content in the New Testament. Later I found that Chen Zilong had many similar uses in his poems. He often used the images in his early love poems to refer to and metaphor as patriotic poems in his later years. For example, in his later years, he also liked to use images such as lovesickness, clear tears, rain and wind. I later discovered many comparisons in his works, and this discovery became an important point in my research.
Beijing News: The Wei, Jin and late Ming dynasties not only had earth-shaking innovations in literature, but also had breakthroughs in traditions in philosophy and thought. For example, the rise of metaphysics and Buddhism in the Wei and Jin Dynasties, Qian Qianyi, , Huang Zongxi and respected the study of the heart in the late Ming Dynasty. Does this unconventional and pioneering nature of literature in Wei, Jin and late Ming also resonate with this kind of innovation in the ideological world?
Sun Kangyi: This influence of must exist. Mr. Yu Yingshi defined the rise of various schools of thought in the Spring and Autumn Period and Warring States Period, the rise of free personality since the end of the Han Dynasty, the transformation of new Confucianism in the Song Dynasty, and the confluence of scholars and merchants in the late Ming Dynasty as four major breakthroughs in the history of Chinese thought. Since the end of the Han Dynasty, the individual consciousness of scholars not only turned to Lao and Zhuangzi in their thoughts, but also expanded to all aspects of the spiritual field. Literature, music, and landscape appreciation have become projections of inner freedom. Even the popularity of running script and cursive script can be regarded as a way of self-expression. Individuals consciously liberate the personality of "scholars", making them unwilling to suppress their spontaneous emotions and refuse to abide by unreasonable secular norms. By the end of the Ming Dynasty, due to the rise of Yangming Studies and regional business gangs, the status of merchants was improved, and the concept of "aware of the people and practicing the way" became the pursuit of the scholar-official class. The scholars and merchants joined forces to resist the imperial power.
5th generation ten countries Dong Yuan "Xiaoxiang Tu".
Tao Yuanming has many traces of metaphysics in his poems, such as "There is life and death, and it will never be a long time to be successful." However, most metaphysical poems are full of mystery and a little boring, while Tao Yuanming breaks through their influence and shows a unique individual experience and universal emotional pursuit in his poems, with a vibrant lyrical meaning. Xie Lingyun was deeply influenced by Buddhism and Taoism , and he transformed philosophical experience into an aesthetic attitude. Because all things follow the "Tao", the harmonious world that grows in it is also the most beautiful.
In the Ming Dynasty, the rise of Yangming studies was actually a resistance to the harsh moralism of Zhu Yuanzhang in the early Ming Dynasty. Wang Yangming 's psychology has a great impact on the entire literati and official group. In the late Ming Dynasty, some intellectuals even "escape from Zen" and hid in Buddhism to escape reality. My student Professor Yan Zhixiong studied the Buddhist factors in Qian Qianyi's poems. Chen Zilong became a monk for a period of time because he escaped from the Qing army's hair shaving order. But I think he is just for real political reasons. He is not a Buddhist in essence, but a purely scholar-official.
Lyric tradition of breakage and crisis
Beijing News : We often read this statement in the history of literature that the lyrical tradition of Chinese literature originated from the Wei and Jin Dynasties, that is, from the seven sons of Jian'an to Yu Xin. What are the special historical reasons that led to the tradition of Chinese literature in an era of breaking and crisis like the Wei and Jin Dynasties?
Sun Kangyi: is first and foremost related to the overall background of the Wei and Jin Dynasties, which is still based on Mr. Yu Yingshi's point of view. The reactionary reaction to Confucianism in the Wei and Jin Dynasties, the ideological liberation brought by metaphysics and Buddhism brought a completely different experience to the scholar-official class. However, the lyrical tradition of Chinese literature did not entirely begin in the Wei and Jin Dynasties. For example, "The Book of Songs" " Chuci " and " Climbing the Tower Fu " by "" by Wang Can in the Seven Sons of Jian'an. They are actually individual lyricism.
But I think that the impact of the chaos in the Wei and Jin dynasties on the spirit and thoughts of scholars is actually allowing scholars to examine themselves more deeply and carry forward this lyrical tradition. This is actually a common phenomenon in the history of world literature. In times of distress, writers are actually better at finding the characteristics of lyricism and writing.
However, there is a very different point between Chinese literature and Western literature. I also hinted to readers in the book that lyricism is not the most important thing in Western literature. The most important thing in Western literature is drama and narrative, and this tradition began with " Homer's epic ". Lyricism is not the most important thing, especially for British literature. If you want to find a purely lyrical tradition, it may not begin until the romantic era of the 19th century, in the era of poets such as Coleridge, Wordsworth, and Keats. Because Westerners' thinking is still straight, they focus on a story with a beginning and an end. The narrative tradition of Chinese literature is relatively weak, but the Chinese pursue "poetry expresses aspirations", which refers to feelings, ambitions, and ideals, and is the most important thing in life.
Beijing News: "Love" is an important concept in Chinese literature. However, as modern people, we often think that love is a value orientation belonging to the private field, targeting friends and lovers. But in Chinese literature, we will find that a large number of lyrical objects are actually targeted at the political field or the monarch, but the borrowed objects are often based on friends and lovers. The most typical one is Qu Yuan’s “Chu Ci” by . You have also written an article "The View of "Love" in Chinese Culture". How do you understand the jump in "Love" in Chinese literature?
Sun Kangyi: The question of is very interesting. Writing this article has something to do with my teaching in the United States. American students often ask me why Chinese men dare not express their feelings directly? Why does Tao Yuanming always remind himself to restrain his feelings, and even at the end of " Leisure Fu ", he still has to "think hard to be sad, and he will eventually block the mountains and stagnate the river.Welcome the breeze to relieve fatigue, send weak ambitions to return to the waves, reminding yourself not to indulge in emotions. Even in "Strange Stories from a Chinese Studio", whenever you talk about the love between children, you should use ghost stories to tell them, and dare not admit your emotions openly. Moreover, when expressing the feelings between family and country, you should use the fable (allegory) . Similarly, my students will also ask me, why do Chinese female poets write poems more directly than male poets? Because female poets always express their feelings directly, and do not use fables.
"New Words of the World" Tang Dynasty manuscript.
I think this is a very important issue in Chinese culture, because the direct pursuit of Chinese men is always political and public, and I hope that they can take the emperor's actions, so his destiny is actually closely related to the emperor's attitude. No matter what subject he writes, the most direct concern is always political, including Qu Yuan and Du Fu. And it is very interesting that even if a Chinese male poet directly wrote about love, he was very embarrassed to admit this feeling in his heart and hoped that readers would regard it as a fable poem. For example, Tao Yuanming's "Fu of Leisure" clearly wrote about love, but he wanted to say in the preface that "Zhang Heng wrote "Fu of Determined Love" and Cai Yong wrote "Fu of Quiet Love", he was indifferent to the clan. At the beginning, you will think with thoughts, and at the end you will be idle and upright. I will suppress the evil intentions of the flowing and drooping, and I will help to make satirical advice. "He wants to explain that his poems are just imitating his predecessors.
By the time of the Ming and Qing dynasties, Chinese poets made a big turn. For example, Chen Zilong directly expressed his love between him and Liu Rushi, and love and loyalty are no longer opposite. Chen Zilong believed that "erotic" would never damage popularity. The scholars and officials in the late Ming Dynasty respected their lovers, and they did not want others to interpret their feelings for their lovers as loyalty to their homeland. By the late Ming Dynasty, the concept of women was no longer a disaster for beauty. In such an era, Chen Zilong and Qian Qianyi both regarded their lovers as their partners and comrades who fought against the Qing Dynasty. The female poets at that time, whether they were Liu Rushi, Bian Yujing, , or , Gu Mei, were all talented, and their partners also cherished their talents and published works for them. The female poets of the Tang Dynasty, , Xue Tao, , Yu Xuanji, , were considered unworthy of being the matchmaker for the Ming media because of their identity as singing girls. Therefore, the late Ming Dynasty was a pair of A unique era. Stills from
Movie "Liu Rushi" (2012).
The entanglement of literature and history
The Beijing News: So can we liberate this personality of the late Ming Dynasty and women The poet's self-expression is regarded as a precursor to the modernity of Chinese literature?
Sun Kangyi: I think it can be said that. Although in the view of the American literature department, whether to count Ming and Qing literature as classical literature or Modern literature is a questionable question. So we invented a term called early modern (early modern), but I agree with Professor Wang Dewei , that the study of modern literature should start from the Ming and Qing dynasties. As the saying goes, "Without the late Ming Dynasty, how can we come from the late Qing dynasty." I think this modernity has a great relationship with Wang Yangming's mind study, because Wang Yangming's "inventing the original mind" actually has the intention of discovering human subjectivity and self-consciousness. The association of intellectuals in the late Ming Dynasty actually has many similarities with the concepts of modern society.
In fact, the so-called fables in Chinese literature have a long history. For example, Cao Zhi's " Luo God Fu " by must be a love poem in my opinion. Cao Zhi compared his lover to a beautiful water bird to mourn her death. However, in the Chinese hermeneutic tradition, he believed that this poem was written by Cao Zhi to Cao Pi , expressing that he was not satisfied with his talent. The Chinese hermeneutic tradition began in " Mao Shi ". When Confucian scholars of the Han Dynasty commented on the Book of Songs, they implemented the educational ideas of "thinking without evil" and "respect for the whole world" of Confucius . Therefore, to a large extent, the romantic colors in the Book of Songs, especially the "National Style" are weakened.Therefore, when translating the Book of Songs, the British translator Arthur Willy always emphasized that we should not regard the Book of Songs as a fable, but as a lyrical work. In the Ming and Qing dynasties, this hermeneutic tradition was gradually challenged. We can find more sincere expressions from the poems of Chen Zilong and others, and feel a way similar to that of modern people expressing emotions.
Beijing News: Whether it is Tao Yuanming, Xie Lingyun or Yu Xin, they have become the objects of imitation and praise of poets in later generations. For example, Su Shi’s love for Tao Yuanming, Wang Wei’s landscape poems and Meng Haoran’s landscape poems also inherit Xie Lingyun’s pursuit of “character”. In his later years, Du Fu had an empathy for Yu Xin. Pastoral poems represented by Tao Yuanming, landscape poems represented by Xie Lingyun, and Yu Xin's feelings for family and country are actually important mottos of Chinese literature. Can we conclude that the important traditions and motifs of Chinese literature have actually laid the prototype as early as the Wei and Jin Dynasties?
Sun Kangyi: I think the status of Wei and Jin literature can be defined in this way. According to Auerbach, Western literature is also divided into two models: (model) , one is Greek-Roman type, and the other is " Bible ". This model actually exists in the Chinese literary tradition. For example, pastoral poetry is influenced by Taoist thought. Xie Lingyun's landscape poetry is Han Fu type.
If we compare poetry to a circle, then Tao Yuanming is working hard to explore the parts within the circle. He tried to find peace and order of the mind, while Xie Lingyun tried to expand the scope of the circle and find freedom of the mind in the external world. Look at Xie Lingyun's " Mountain Residence Fu ", which is entirely a spiritual world he built for himself, including mountains, water and animals. He hopes to use this to shape a world, which is influenced by Han Fu. Tao Yuanming's poems are very short and concise, but they are enough to express his essence. The so-called "I have forgotten my words if I want to distinguish" actually means that he has returned to the countryside, truly got rid of the external world, and became a hermit. It was not until the Song Dynasty that Tao Yuanming became important with the rise of Neo-Confucianism and the taste of scholars and officials. Su Shi regarded Tao Yuanming as an idol. But in the Tang Dynasty, Tao Yuanming was very marginal. Du Fu once criticized Tao Yuanming: "Tao avoids a vulgar man and may not be able to achieve Tao. Looking at his collection of poems, he still hates it withered." He believed that Tao Yuanming gave up his ideals and pursuit of becoming an official may not have really achieved "Tao", so "it may not be able to achieve Tao." However, by the Song Dynasty, Su Shi and others improved Tao Yuanming's status. But I personally think that (also Mr. Gao Yougong's idea) is: Du Fu's outlook on life is very different from Tao Yuanming. He has always been loyal to the emperor and patriotism, and he regards becoming an official as his highest ideal. I thought Du Fu misunderstood Tao Yuanming, and Su Shi was the one who truly understood Tao Yuanming.
However, in the Ming and Qing dynasties, Yu Xin's status was rediscovered and affirmed. Especially the background of the late Ming Dynasty and Wei and Jin Dynasties was similar. For example, the young poet Xia Wanchun wrote, "The Su vassal state (Su Wu) is the festival of , and the Yu Kaifu Jiangguan will always be abandoned." This expresses his position of resisting the Qing Dynasty, and his "Great Ai Fu" is also an imitation and tribute to "Great Jiangnan Fu". Mr. Chen Yinke believes that "The Fu of Abdicating Jiangnan" is one of the most important works in Chinese literature.
Beijing News: In fact, Tang Dynasty literature was also influenced by Wei and Jin literature to a certain extent. For example, the "Jiangzuo Yufeng" was prevalent in early Tang literature, and poetry was deeply influenced by the so-called Yu and Xu schools. Including the ancient Chinese movement, it is also necessary to break the beautiful style of the Six Dynasties literature and return to simplicity and simplicity. Whether it is inheritance or transcendence, we can see that the influence of Southern Dynasty palace poetry has a profound influence on the style of Tang Dynasty literature. As the peak of Chinese poetry, what is the relationship between Tang Dynasty literature and Wei and Jin literature?
Sun Kangyi: Poets in the early Tang Dynasty may be consciously imitating palace poetry. But critics at that time believed that these were all mediocre sounds, and poetry in the early Tang Dynasty was just blindly imitated. Du Fu favored Yu Xin, so to some extent, Du Fu improved the status of palace poetry through his evaluation of Yu Xin.However, Yu Xin's poems in his later years were different from those in the early days, especially after he was captured and went to the Northern Zhou Dynasty, the problem completely changed. In his early years, Yu Xin wrote palace poetry under the influence of Xiao Gang and . However, his style in his later years was a fresh and simple style, especially many poems took Tao Yuanming as an example.
Perhaps many people will think that palace poetry is part of palace etiquette and has strict rhythm, so it is difficult to have room for personal lyricism. But I think that as long as it is a poem, there will be a lyrical part. Because the purpose of poetry must be "poetry expresses one's aspirations." For example, in Yu Xin's "Ode to the Beauty and Look at the Painting", "If you want to know that painting can be clever, you can call the truth to reflect it. It also looks like a clone, and looks at each other like a mirror. Anchai and others are sparse and dense, and they are all in a straight line. If you don't break the siege of the city, who will compete with the painting?" In fact, it expresses your feelings about your life experience and destiny. If we look at the preface made by Xiao Gang for "Yu Tai Xin Yong" ("Therefore, the pepper palace is turned, the zheguan is in the yin, the crimson crane is strict in the morning, and the copper li is quiet in the day. Three stars are not allowed to stay in the night, and the quilt is not allowed to be kept in the quilt; five days are still credited, who can understand the song. Being good at traveling less, loneliness and leisure. I hate long-lasting joy, and the slow arrows of the palace. I am weak and weak, and I am afraid of the pounding clothes in the Nanyang; growing in the deep palace, I laugh at the brocade of the wind.") We will find that the readers of the preset palace poetry are actually women in the palace, so I found a lot of descriptions of the appearance of women in the palace poetry, but not all parts of the palace poetry are descriptions, and there must be space for personal lyricism and thinking.
Beijing News: Poetry and history are an important tradition of Chinese literature. Excellent literary works will definitely become historical materials and research objects for historians. For example, Mr. Chen Yinke borrowed the poems and essays of the literati of the Ming and Qing dynasties to write the immortal masterpiece "The Biography of Liu Rushi". You once called Chen Zilong's poems a historical concept with a sense of tragedy. How should we feel and understand the existence of history in literary works?
Sun Kangyi: When I was studying in Princeton before, my teachers Gao Yougong and Mou Fuli have always emphasized that those who study literature must think of history at any time, and those who study history must never leave literature. These two gentlemen have had a deep influence on me, and I have always believed that there is no distinction between literature and history. Stills from the movie "Liu Rushi" (2012).
When I was writing about Chen Zilong and Yu Xin, I always paid attention to describing their historical background. What I am interested in is what kind of era and environment will inspire the imagination and creativity of geniuses like Yu Xin and Chen Zilong? When I trained my students, I always emphasized to them that we should not only see literature itself, but also history. While I asked them to pay attention to text reading (close reading) , I hope they pay attention to the era of text generation. Only when the Southern and Northern Dynasties were opposed to Yu Xin, could Yu Xin write such great works, and what created Yu Xin was his unique experience. If it were not for the Hou Jing's rebellion, Yu Xin would not be able to return to his hometown, nor would he write such unique and tactful feelings in "The Fu of the South of the Yangtze River". As Sima Qian said in his book "Report to Ren'an", "This person is all determined to be depressed and cannot understand the truth, so he tells the past and thinks about the future." Sima Qian, Yu Xin, Du Fu, and Chen Zilong all created their greatest works after experiencing hardships. These works are full of traces of their displaced and struggle in a great era.
"Where is a thousand-year-old family and country: From Yu Xin to Chen Zilong", written by Sun Kangyi, Guangxi Normal University Press, July 2022 edition.
Therefore, ancient Chinese commentators often interpret these articles full of personal life experience and personal colors as patriotic poems, or extend them as a political ambition. I do not agree with this statement. I hope that my readers can put literature and history together to feel and interpret the personal experiences of these poets at the time of the transformation of mountains and rivers.
Beijing News: One discovery was found when reading the works of female poets in the late Ming Dynasty, that is, they often treat themselves as men. However, when reading the poems and essays of scholars and officials, they often use women's images and allusions to express their destiny and worries about the current situation.Through this phenomenon, do we feel that the emergence of so-called female poets actually changed the lyrical tradition of Chinese literature and is a more direct tradition?
Sun Kangyi: I think the concept of gender in Ming and Qing literature is an important turning point in Chinese literature. If my research in the United States has contributed to this, I think it is. Because what is changed is not only the concept of gender, but also the concept of "emotion" and the concept of "clearity" we just talked about. "Qing" means clean, lofty, and depressed, and not lingering in the world. In the Wei and Jin dynasties, "Qing" was a evaluation that belonged only to men, such as Ruan Ji and Tao Yuanming. But in the Ming Dynasty, this concept no longer belonged to men only. On the contrary, many men choose not to take the imperial examination because of political corruption, but instead sponsor their wives' literary career. For example, Lu Qingzi and Wang Duanshu's husbands Zhao Huanguang and Ding Shengzhao, both of them live like hermits.
In the summer of 1993, I and Professor Wei Ailian jointly organized the Yale International Seminar on Women's Literature in Ming and Qing Dynasties, which attracted outstanding Ming and Qing literary researchers at home and abroad. In order to better study female poets in Chinese literature, my student Su Yuanxi (Haun Saussy) and I compiled the book "Traditional Chinese Women Writers: Selected Poetry Criticism" ( Women Writers of Traditional China: An Anthology of Poetry and Criticism ) . Therefore, the literature of the Ming and Qing dynasties has always been the most important in my research, and I am not only concerned with female consciousness, but also why such an era gives women the opportunity to write with self-consciousness and liberation and awakening. The library collector Hu Wenkai collected 3,000 works of female poets from the 16th to the 19th centuries. Later, I went to the Library of Congress, Yale Library, and Harvard Library, and even asked someone to go to Japan to find Wang Duanshu's "Yinhong Collection". The only one I collected was only 5% of Mr. Hu Wenkai's.
Beijing News: As you said just now, Chinese and Western literature has different thinking patterns. When you teach Chinese classical literature to Western students, do you feel a barrier in context and culture? Or, when you communicate with Western scholars and students, how do you explain the value of the universality of Chinese literature to them?
Sun Kangyi: I always hope to put Chinese and Western literature into a comparative perspective and framework. Most of the students I face are undergraduates, and they don’t understand Chinese, but after two weeks of class, they will naturally find that they understand the Book of Songs and Chu Ci, because literature has some commonalities between cross-domain languages and national boundaries. When I was giving lectures, I would ask them to compare what happened to Western literature in the same period. I was talking about the era of Du Fu and Su Shi, and British literature had just begun. Naturally, they will understand the charm of Chinese literature through comparison. Many students have gained a new understanding of Chinese literature through my course "Man and Nature". For example, many of my students are now famous figures in the Sinology community, but their earliest interest in Chinese culture began from this.
This article is exclusive original content. Interview and writing: Yuan Chunxi; Editor: Zhang Jin Shang Chongming; Proofreader: Xue Jingning Fu Chunqing. Reproduction may not be made without the written authorization of the Beijing News.
