A Study Of Zhang Hu's Poetry

Zhang Hu, a famous poet who had never secured an official position between middle and late Tang Dynasty. He left us nearly five hundred poems which is a large quantity even in entire Tang. Unfortunately, for a series of reasons, people left out the analyzing work of Zhang Hu's poetry in the cold for a time, and his name was not popular too. Even people worked in the following study, they still attached less importance to the status of his poety. This article try to introduce all Zhang Hu's life, then dig into his thought and investigate his poetry's feature of the times and various artistic styles through examining his poems comprehensively. After that, it will sum up his contribution to the history of poetry to make a proper evaluation. Zhang Hu's life was full of frustrations, but he still paid a great deal of attention on national affairs, as it had a positive effect on his poems which mainly depicted palace life, mountains , rivers, temples , or were written for each other, recalled antiquity and song historic events, described the objects and his sense of that time. His poems embodied the great influence of Yuan Zhen and Bai Juyi, and in some other aspects, they reflected the characteristic of Mid-Tang poetry. However, his pomes were filled with diverse artistic styles and achievements. Not only did they inherit the essence of poetry written in the previous dynasty, but also learned from contemporary poets and seached for a way for the Late-Tang poet out. His poetry performed a transitional function between Mid-Tang and Late-Tang poetry. Moreover, Zhang Hu's poetry got a remarkable achievement in describing wide-ranging life in palace(especially for palace maid) , mountains and rivers, temples, pavilions, terraces etc. All of these established his station in the poetry history of Tang Dynasty.