A Study Of Allegoric Prose In Tang Dynasty

Allegory is the rhetorical case conveying the satire and instructive intention.Generally speaking, allegory is completed by the tale having some plot or referringsimilar case. This can be the base that allegory which is one kind of rhetorical casecan develop into a work or a genre. If a prose is totally consisted by an allegory, it canbe allegoric prose. In other words, if a prose through figures (refer to allegoric tale orsimilar case) represent the author's satirical and instructive intention aboutcontemporary issues, it can be denominated allegoric prose. A number of allegoric prose in ancient Chinese is abundant and they have a highliterical and artistic value. And also they have their own unique characteristics to bediscerned from the other literatures. As a result, allegoric prose can be established aliteral genre. Allegoric prose is classified by the three kinds of types such as allegoric tale,allegoric miscellany and general miscellany type. All of them have the innatecharacteristics of allegory, but their creation method or meaning carry method isdefinitely different. The history of Chinese allegoric prose is long. Especially, much independentallegoric prose arose from the influence of the development of literature,culture-societal environments, writer's utilitarian thoughts and Buddhist literature andetc. in the Tang Dynasty. But, the allegoric prose in Tang Dynasty flourished at decadeperiod not prosperity period. It is due to that allegoric prose is one conveying author'ssatirical and instructive intention about various conflicts and issues in human society,so it is difficult to flourish in politically and socially prosperity period. Since the An-Shih Rebellion (安史之乱) to the Wen-zong(文宗)period was theperiod that reformation thoughts was most abundant in the whole Tang Dynasty. Inthis period, writers usually represented their own satirical and instructive intentionabout various issues in political and societal areas through allegoric tale or allegoricmiscellany. As a result, this period became the first period of prosperity of allegoricprose. Since after An-Shih Rebellion, all various reformations were failed and TangDynasty was entirely declined. Especially writers lost their reformation will andutilitarian thoughts since Gan-lu's accident(甘露之变). Therefore after Gan-lu'saccident, allegoric prose became declined too. But, at the time of Huang Chao'srebellion(黄巢之乱), a lot of writer who had discontents about politics and societyappeared and they wrote many acrid allegoric prose with new atmosphere. So, thesecond period of prosperity of allegoric prose came in the Tang Dynasty. Allegoric prose through the statements of figurative tale or similar casesrepresent author's thoughts and opinions. So, generally speaking, allegoric prose hasits own basic characteristics. They are figurativity, narrativity and argumentatity. IIIBased on them, the artistic methods adopted by allegoric prose in Tang Dynasty canbe summarized "yiqianyushen"(以浅喻深), "yishimingli"(以事明理), and"jiegufengjin"(借古讽今). Excepting them, allegoric prose wrote in Tang dynastyhave two other principal artistic methods. They are "tuodaichenshu"(托代陈述)and"yunsanjiehe"(韵散结合).These five methods have their own unique functions andcontribute to convey author's intentions effectively and definitely. A lot of allegoric prose in Tang Dynasty induced the evolution of traditionalgenre and the production of new genre. The important characteristics of the allegoricprose in Tang dynasty is the educational function of politics and society. All of thefamous allegoric prose writers in the Tang Dynasty were called guwenjia. (古文家:the person who writes archaic style prose) The flourish of allegoric prose and themovement of the ancient Chinese prose were rise simultaneously. In addition, thetransformed genres by the creation of allegoric prose were the major...