| Zhou Boyi was born in Dantu, Zhenjiang. With a special life experience and complex mentality, he was a scholar of late Qing dynasty who lived in middle and low society. This thesis contains four chapters. In the first chapter, the author introduces all Zhou Boyi's life, his works and thoughts. On the basis of Zhou Boyi's birth and death year, life time, family background, making friends, name of shop and creation, the author tries to verify a point and analyze the relationship between Zhou Boyi's works, experience and thoughts. She thinks that good cultural training, rich life experience and his complex transformation from Confucian scholar, knight-errant and merchant made him struggle between the collision which was made by tradition and revolt. Finally, Zhou Boyi returned to orthodox tradition.In the second chapter, according to some information expressed in Dream of Yangzhou, through some separate anthologies, local records and some other documents and data, from the angle of consulting and differentiating from Zhou Boyi's birth place, making friends and birth year, the author proves that Mr Zhou from Jiaodong is Zhou Boyi from Dantu, Zhenjiang.In the third chapter, the author does some researches on Dream of Yangzhou. First, she has a footing on the version itself and tries to verify a point that this novel was written during 1854 and 1861. Then the author presents its intricate creational mentality and points out that Dream of Yangzhou is a complete collection of Chinese classical novel system, it contains a collection which records the weird, occult and mysterious and legends. At the same time, it's a collection of novel which absorbs the styles of Chinese traditional poems, ci (statement poetry originating in Tang dynasty and flourishing during Song dynasty) and fu (rhyme-prose) and classical Ch. Prose. Second, through the similarities and differences between Dream of Yangzhou(as a classic novel about brothel) and the same kind novels, the author makes a conclusion that this novel not only specializes in its content and structural arrangement, feeling expression and language style, but also reflects its concern and indifference,self-development and self-degenetation on female consciousness. At last, the author examines this novel from the angle of citified novel and points out that as a picture of social genre painting about brothel of Yangzhou in late Qing dynasty, this novel contains something about history and consciousness of dream.In the fourth chapter, in order to collect those literatures and historical materials which are connected with Zhou Boyi according to the clue of time and verify those historical problems which haven't been involved in the above-mentioned, the author provides a chronicle of Zhou Boyi's life. |
