Huangfu Four Study

Huangfu Chong(皇甫冲), Huangfu Xiao(皇甫涍), Huangfu Pang(皇甫汸) and Huangfu Lian(皇甫濂) are brothers in Suzhou area. They are well known as The Four Elite of the Huangfus(皇甫四杰)and have an important status in the poetry history of the Ming Dynasty(1368-1644). The paper carried out research on their family background, biographies, acquaintanceship, and their poems and articles systematically and deeply. It is the first attempt in the field of Chinese literature. The paper has four chapters in all.The first chapter carried out research on their family background. Based on the knowledge of a person and his time, starting from the first-hand documentation, this paper makes a detailed investigation into their family and descent, and draws a nine-generation family lineage. Based on the investigation, this paper proposes that a unique family tradition and cultural atmosphere, prosperous economic conditions and a wide range of acquaintanceship are most important factors contributing to the thriving of their fame, which is actually a typical case for the reviving of cultural families in Suzhou(苏州) region.The second chapter mainly researched their biographies. Based on a detail investigation about his poems and articles, the first segment distinguishes Huangfu Pang's natal and obituary year clearly. He was born in 1504 and died in 1583. The second segment makes a textual study on Huangfu Pang's acquaintanceship. In order to kwon Four Elite of the Huangfus'activities and historical status well, the author especially complies the Chronological Life of Four Elite of the Huangfus in the third segment by used the first-hand documentation.The third chapter discusses their literature thought mainly from three aspects. First, It is a universal trend for most poets to advocate and imitate Tang poetry in the Ming poem history. Starting from their direct experience, Huangfus have the views discordant with temporal ideas. Second, when the poetic views of the former-seven(前七子) have prevailed in the Ming literature history, the Huangfus have both inheritance and transcendence. The particular reactions involved a different understanding of the nature of the former-seven's literary activities and the differences in the cognition of the values and functions of literature itself. Moreover, the last segment of this chapter discussed the book Jie Yi Xin Yu(《解颐新语》), which is the only poetic monograph of the Huangfus.The forth chapter carried on centralized research to their poems and articles, which is numerous and monumental. The research of this paper proceeds on two sides: the Wuzhong(吴中)regional culture and urban culture. It is significant to avoiding repetition and increasing the innovative progress. What is more important, the interaction between the two cultural factors is the real literary ecology in Suzhou in the Mid-Ming dynasty. In other words, the two cultural phenomenons had greatest influence on the Huangfus themselves, their literary creation principles, methods, subject matters, literary forms, styles. The poem arts between four brothers have both common ground and individual difference, and the former originated from family tradition and Wuzhong regional culture atmosphere, the later resulted from their different characters.