"Shi-Kan" And The Poetic Creation In1980s

The1980s were great years for Chinese contemporary poetry. In such social and cultural context,“Shi-Kan”, as one of the most important official journal, had accomplished a lot to leave a profoundinfluence upon the poetry development in1980s.The revival of1980s’ poetry was actually preluded in the end of1970s, the time a movement ofideological liberation was rising to accelerate the step of “renaming the art and literature”. Based on“two directions” and “two principles” as a guideline in1979,“Shi-Kan” accordingly made someadjustments in its development with an aim to gear up the prosperity of new poetry creation and buildup the array of new poetry creators. Under the new guideline,“Shi-Kan” indicated a remarkabletransformation by the token of the themes and artistry of poems published. It also shaped the formationof major contributors in1980s from the view of the poet group convened by the journal.Reprinting the misty poetry was one of the transformations embodied by Shi-Kan” in the end of1970s. In early1980s, the journal played a pioneer role in the trend of misty poetry and showed itsmagnitude by not only initiating and participating in the storming debate on “Misty Poetry” and “ThreeRises”, but also weighing the thought connotation and art expression of misty poetry published on it.In carding two conflicting views of new and old poetry, a discussion over the clarification of poetics andnon-poetics had made an academic controversy ended up with the ideology of “clean or corruption", inwhich "Shi-Kan” exposed its limitation obviously related to the main stream of ideology and literarysystem. After the trend of misty poetry, the new generation was rising to start a poetry revolution.Under this circumstance,"Shi-Kan” stably and flexibly developed itself with its keen eyes, goodquality and tolerant attitude toward poetic creation, poetic critics, poetic theory, journal design, editingideas, critic articles and seminar, with aim to search for the multiple developments of the poetry trendafter misty poetry.In addition to the poetry trend,"Shi-Kan”, as a medium, had also undertaken the tasks of guidingand molding the high-end and ordinary writers through its two significant trademarks of "Youth PoetryParty" and "Correspondence School" as well as envisaged its reader with the items of "Poetry Mailbox"and "Reader Correspondence". All of which had made the poetic ideas and esthetics reach consensusand harmony in reading, writing and editing. In the aspect of circulating poetry, the journal expeditedthe synchronic dissemination by way of advocating poetry recitation and meantime canonized thepoetry through the mechanics of award to facilitate its diachronic inheritance.As to the resources outside the country in1980s, the translation of poetry from Russia, EasterEurope, Western Europe and America" by Shi-Kan” had exercised a tremendous influence on thecontemporary poets no matter in the poetic ideas or the expressing method. Other than that, theintroduction of poetry from Taiwan was also accounted for an absolute proportion. In the history of newpoetry disseminated from one side of the cross straits to the other,"Shi-Kan" showed its leading and inciting effect and demonstrated the ups and downs phenomena of poetry development between crossstraits.The achievements made by "Shi-Kan" in1980s were in many ways: to embody its views about theprinciple of poetic esthetics and structure through emphasizing realism, retracing cultural root, andpersisting in lyric tradition; to manifest its promotion of poetic cultural system in exploring the poeticlanguage, short poems and narrative poems; to present the poets’ life and express their poetic thoughtsvia the journal.In this paper, the former three chapters focus on time, respectively discussing the opinion of"renaming the art and literature" under the movement of thought liberation in the end of1970s, the trendof misty poetry as well as the multiple developments of the new poetry after misty poetry. The latterthree chapters examine the influence of "Shi-Kan" on the production and dissemination of poetry in1980s, the introduction of important poetry resources from Taiwan, and the poetic esthetics establishedby "Shi-Kan" itself, with aim to display its leading position in poetry development of1980s.