On The Technique Of Classical Chinese Poetry

This dissertation is a study on the technique of classical Chinese poetry. This subject is always ignored in the present age. The classic technique includes grammar rules and writing skill, which are the dominant parts of classical Chinese poetics. All rules in the construction of poetry are exposition, comparison, and affective image. These are the true source for the study of poetry and standards for all rules and regulations. If you can fulfill these principles anywhere in your writing, then the ancients are not hard to reach.Except introduction which explains the reason, method, and significance of the study on classic Chinese technique, this dissertation is divided into four parts according history period.Chapter 1 examines the technique of Tang Poetry. The essential rules of regulated verse include the forms of Opening, Continuing, Turning, and Drawing Together. The rules of the quatrain demand sinuousness and circling, cutting away all unnecessary growth for the sake of concision, with the result that the line break off, but the meaning does not break off. Usually the third line is dominant, and the forth line develops it. In the late Tang Dynasty, Sikong Tu put forward a writing rule "it does not inhere in any single word, yet the utmost flair is attained". This is a different type of the Tang technique.Chapter 2 is about the technique of Song Poetry which is reprinted by Jiangxi School leading by Huang Tingjian. They worship Dufu as their teacher and studied a way to bring forth new ideas in the writing. They regarded the concept as the dominant factor. They also compounded ancients' diction to make their own lines to such an extent that they always look for "sources" for every word when they discuss poems. Yan Yu, the author of Canglang Poetry Talks, is just the opposite. He uphold the judgment is the dominant factor in the study of poetry and intuitive comprehension (miaowu)is the correct way to the best poems. He thinks that poetry has five rules: construction of form; force of structure; atmosphere (literally qi-image); stirring and excitement; tone and rhythm and three areas that demand care: the opening and closing; the rules for constructing lines; the "eye" of the line (a position in a line usually occupied by a verb or descriptive, which bears special stylistic force). He advocates a writer should not have textual sources for the rhymesone uses and need not be confined to particular precedents in using words.Chapter 3 explores methodology of Old Phraseology (qizi pai) in middle and late Ming Dynasty (sixteenth century). Old Phraseology advocated the use of models to recapture the intensity and strength of classical Chinese literature. For prose writing, writings of Qin and Han Dynasties were deemed the proper model; for poetry, High Tang verse and, secondarily, Han and Wei Dynasties verse was the ideal. Xie Z/ie/i(1495-1475),a poet in Old Phraseology, proposed an idea mat "poetic inspiration is the dominant factor" to oppose the mood "setting up a conception first" in writing. He favored the conception a poem relied on the scene of world. But in fact, his writing was a form of following: following one or two good sentences to complete a poet. In this way, the method actually can be regarded as "taking words or sentences for the dominant factor". What he does contradicted his professed principle. This discussion can help to deepen our comprehension to the circle of poets in middle and late Ming Dynasty.The last chapter introduces some famous critics' position about the classical technique in Qing Dynasty, such as Wang Fuzhi{\d\9-\692), Ye A2e(1627-1703), Yuan Me/(1716-1798), etc. Wang Fuzhi deems that old-style poetry seems to have no predetermined form, but the form has its own restrictions which are natural to it and cannot be transgressed. The restrictions that he referred to as follows: that the development of the concept not divides into branches, that the diction not get swept away, that the twists show no traces, and that there be no struggle in the construotion. He thinks that affection and scene have two distinct names, but in substance they cannot be separated, at the most artful there are scene-within-affections and affections-within-scene. Ye Xie has a famous viewpoint about "rules". He said: Rules are an empty name and thus not to be considered as if existing actually. On die other hand, rules are determinate position and thus not to be considered as non-existent. That means rules cannot be established on emptiness, it wouhi be dependent on some alien entity in order to be manifest.The conclusion of the dissertation is the further discussion, trying to emphasize the method and important idea of this study. This dissertation offers a systematic way for the discussion of the technique of classical Chinese poetry.