Analysis Of The Seven-Character Quatrain In Tang Dynasty

The seven-character quatrain is one of the most representative forms of the Tang poetry. In the history of its three-hundred-year evolution, the seven-character quatrain has been well developed: stabilization of its form, ample increase in its quantity and great improvement in its quality, increasingly abundant contents, and gradually diversified ways of expression. There are a lot of great Tang poets who wrote numerous masterpieces of poems in the form of seven-character quatrain, which have become the epitome of this form of poetry for their successors, providing them with the exquisite artistic creation and exerting an influence on the orientation of literary practice of and the literary criticism on the seven-character quatrain. All in all, the seven-character quatrain of the Tang Dynasty should be studied as the most important form of poetry both in the history of Tang Poetry and in the entire history of Chinese poetry.With only twenty-eight characters, the seven-character quatrains have vividly depicted the deserts, mountains and rivers, revealed the true picture of the Tang society, attacked the corrupted government, recorded friendships and love, described the sorrow of departure. The themes of the seven-character quatrains in the Tang Dynasty contain almost every possible subject matter: nature, politics, society, customs, traditions, scholars, homesickness, wars, history, complaints by women and etc. The themes are almost all-inclusive and are all profoundly expounded and illustrated, which is unprecedented in the history of the seven-character quatrain. The aim of this thesis is to help readers find some clues to the understanding of social situation in the Tang dynasty and the literary forms in light of the study of the various themes employed in the seven-character quatrains.Throughout the Tang Dynasty, the seven-character quatrain evolved into a regular and flourishing form of poetry, which sustains to be prominent in its artistic features: sublime words with profound themes, restrained understatements rich in connotations, mild mood with lyrical expression, and tactful rhyming and rhythm denoting true emotions. However, these features were not invariable. Due to the economical, political and social changes taking place in Tang Dynasty, there were also shifts in the artistic features of the seven-character quatrain. The author of this thesis will discuss these shifts in the Tang Dynasty from two aspects: beauty in ideorealm and beauty in sound.