| IntroductionCustom culture refers to the culture that is created, possessed and passed on by the masses. Because custom culture has important influence on literature, investigation from the visual angle of custom culture is an effective way to study Chinese classical literature interdisciplinarily. Seeing that the present academia is short of research on the relation between the custom culture and literature of the Han dynasty, This dissertation will study the influence of the custom culture on the literature in the Han dynasty Comprehensively and systematically, which can break through the prejudice that the Han-dynasty literature has few customary factors in theory and prove in practice that to study the Han-dynasty literature from the visual angle of custom culture is feasible and essential.Chapter One A Synthetic Discussion on the Custom culture and Literature of the Han DynastyThe custom culture of the Han Dynasty can roughly be divided into four parts, i.e. material custom culture, social custom culture, spiritual custom culture and language custom culture. And every part can be subdivided into several small concrete classes. Each concrete kind of custom culture has some characteristics of its own. They also have some overall characteristics. Seeing from the time angle, the custom culture of the Han dynasty had strong stability, but it also had some changes. Among the changes, the custom Confucianism, i.e. the change of the social custom from profit pursuit and frivolity to morality advocacy and gentleness, is the most noticeable. Seeing from the space angle, the custom culture of the Han dynasty had some unity, but it also had obvious regional differences which were mainly caused by natural environment, geographical position, demographic situation, the action of the upper stratum and historical inheritance.The authors were the medial factor between the custom culture and literature in the Han dynasty. They had two attitudes to the custom culture, ie. acceptance and criticism. Because of the first attitude, they had absorbed some factors of the custom culture. Because of the second attitude, they had written a lot of works which were in order to verify the custom. The above factors exerted an important influence on the creation, contents and writing art of the Han-dynasty literature. The authors accepted the custom culture to various degrees, and their attitudes towards the custom culture were also different in the Han dynasty, so the customary color of their works accordingly shows some differences.We can investigate the influence of the custom culture on the literature in the Han dynasty from three angles. Seeing from the common tense angle, the literature was mainly influenced by the custom culture in four aspects: Firstly, the custom culture boosted the creation and dissemination of the literature. Secondly, the literature reflects abundant custom things, and expresses some customary notions. Thirdly, the custom culture influenced the artistic character of the literature deeply. Fourthly, the folk literature had important influence on the orthodox literature. Seeing from the lasting tense angle, the literature was mainly influenced by the custom culture in two aspects: Firstly, some changes of the custom culture caused certain changes in the contents and style of the literature. Secondly, the change of the influence power of the custom culture caused the change of the depth of the customary color of the literature. Seeing from the regional difference angle, the literature was mainly influenced by the region customs in three aspects: Firstly, the literature reflects different local customs. Secondly, it uses some dialect. Thirdly, there are certain regional differences in its artistic achievement and style.Chapter Two The Custom Culture and Poetry of the Han DynastyGenerally speaking, the poetry was mainly affected by the custom culture in four aspects in the Han dynasty: Firstly, the customs of music and dance, dinner, sacrificial offering and faith in necromancy, supernatural beings and Taoism promoted the creation and dissemination of the poetry. Secondly, the prevalence of the folk music brought about the secular inclination of the contents of the song poetry. Thirdly, the customs of music and dance, hedonism, sacrificial offering and different regions influenced the type, form, language and style of the poetry. Fourthly, the literati's poetry learned a lot from the folk songs.Among the custom culture, music and dance, traffic and travel and hedonism climate had comparatively close relations with the poetry. They influenced the poetry on different gradations and aspects. The music and dance custom influenced the artistic character of the poetry notably. Firstly, the recreational function of the music and dance brought strong interest to the poetry, which includes secular interest, anthropomorphic interest, humorous and enigmatic interest, philosophic interest and flattering interest, etc. Secondly, the combination of songs and dance and combination of songs and acrobatics gave the poetry some performing nature, which mainly refers to the nature that many poems had cooperated with dance or acrobatics. Thirdly, the customs of "sing sadly instead of weeping" and "regarding sadness as happiness" were one reason for the sad style of the poetry.The hedonism climate influenced the content character of the poetry notably. The hedonism climate in clothes, food, housing, travel, recreation, sex and so on made the word "happy" noticeable in the poetry. Under the influence of this climate, the poetry reflected the Han dynasty people's content-oriented and luxury-oriented hedonistic life and philosophy, and the spread, intensification and extension of the hedonistic philosophy outstandingly.The traffic and travel custom influenced the expression of traveling scene and psychology in the poetry notably. Firstly, these contents of the poetry reflects the customs of obtaining pleasure by riding with great speed, traveling with sightseeing and travel ostentation. Secondly, the hardness and danger of travel, the reluctant-to-part and homesick psychology, and the hope of traveling freely in the world expressed in the poetry all have close relations with the traffic and travel custom.Chapter Three The Custom Culture and Fu of the Han DynastyGenerally speaking, Han Fu was mainly affected by the custom culture of the Han dynasty in three aspects: Firstly, the custom culture was an important source of the contents of Han Fu. And the implement making custom reflected in Han Fu was especially meaningful. Secondly, the characteristics of elaborating, overstating, magnificence, richness, strangeness and beauty shown in Han Fu had close relations with the influence of the customs of strange talking, faith in celestial beings, pursuit for integrality and richness in aestheticism, and many other kinds of colorful customs. Thirdly, the literati's Fu learned a lot from the folk literature.Among the custom culture, recreation, building and region customs had comparatively close relations with Han Fu. They influenced Han Fu on different gradations and aspects.The recreation custom influenced the creation, dissemination, contents and artistic character of Han Fu all notably. Firstly, the recreation custom promoted the creation and dissemination of Han Fu. Secondly, Han Fu describes and reflects the Han dynasty people's recreational life and implements in many aspects. Thirdly, the ironic artistic tactic of Han Fu was in relation to Han dynasty comedians' language. Fourthly, The Han dynasty people's custom of get recreation through Fu was one reason for the strangeness and beauty of Han Fu.The building custom influenced the building description in Han Fu notably. Firstly, the prevalence of the geomantic omen tactics made the building description in Han Fu embody certain geomantic omen ideas. Secondly, the prevalence of the simulation idea in building made the authors of Han Fu pay special attention to the statement of the symbolic features and meanings of buildings.The region customs influenced the city Fu notably. Because of the regional custom differences, the city Fu such as Liangdu Fu, Erjing Fu, Nandu Fu and Shudu Fu reflected the different customs of some places such as Chang'an, Luoyang, Nanyang and Chengdu with local myths and legends in them separately. Therefore, the city Fu has distinct region colors.Chapter Four The Custom Culture and Prose of the Han DynastyGenerally speaking, the prose was mainly affected by the custom culture in three aspects in the Han dynasty: Firstly, the custom culture had important meaning for the content enrichment and function expansion of the prose. Secondly, the custom culture influenced the art of the description of characters, narration and argument, and style of the prose. Thirdly, the myths, legends and folk stories influenced the style and language of the prose.Among the custom culture, the faith in physiognomy, the faith in divination, and the social fashions had comparatively close relations with the prose. They exerted important influence on the description of characters' appearance in the historical prose, the narration mode in the historical prose, and the content feature of the argumentative prose separately.The effects of the faith in physiognomy on the description of characters' appearance of the historical prose in the Han dynasty are mainly as follows: Firstly, the prevalence of the faith in physiognomy made the historical prose often describe characters' appearance indirectly by physiognomy judgements. Secondly, it often made the general description of characters' appearance in the historical prose have certain implied meaning. In other words, the writers of the prose often implied characters' personality or fate by the description of the auspicious, ominous or unusual points of their appearance.The main effect of the faith in divination on the narration mode of the historical prose in the Han dynasty is the following: Because of the prevalence of the faith in divination, the writers of the historical prose often used omen(including prediction) with folk faith meaning to suggest the events' ending or correlate omen with ending when narrating historical events. This formed certain narrative patterns which mainly includes that honored persons had auspicious omen, bad events had ominous omen, dream omen came true, prophecy based on deserved fate came true, etc.The main effect of the social fashions on the content feature of the argumentative prose in the Han dynasty is the following: Because some bad social fashions provoked the literati's discontent, it became an important function of the argumentative prose to criticize the customs. And that caused a sharp inclination of "hating common customs" in the contents of the argumentative prose. It also enhanced the folk undertone and times-sense of the contents of the argumentative prose.Chapter Five The Custom Culture and Fiction of the Han DynastyThe fiction was mainly affected by the custom culture in four aspects in the Han dynasty: Firstly, the fiction originated chiefly in hearsay. And the necromancy culture and comedy culture were its nutrition. Secondly, Many fiction writers were necromancers, comedians or bookmen whose status were like necromancers or comedians. The contents of the fiction are mainly hearsay and legend including freaky stories and person anecdotes, etc. There are particularly many contents about supernatural beings and necromancy. Owing to the factors such as writer composition and content source, the fiction has the artistic features of absurdity eeriness, wittiness, rich imagination, emphasis on imagery and narration, which give it strong literary colors.SummaryThe custom culture played an important role in the development of the literature in the Han dynasty, which can not be ignored. The custom culture not only contained a variety of literary creation opportunities, but also provided a number of channels for the dissemination of literary works. The custom culture not only enriched and added to the contents of the literary works, but also was a major force in the formation of their many artistic qualities. To some extent, the secular character of the custom culture strengthened the expression of human life and feelings of the literature in the Han dynasty. Therefore, the custom culture of the Han dynasty also played a role in advancing the literature of the Han-Wei period to move towards consciousness.
|
PDF Full Text Request