A Study On Fang Yizhi’s Poetry

Born in Tongcheng of Anhui Province, Fang Yizhi, a successful candidate in thehighest imperial civil service examination, is a distinguished scholar, poet andcalligrapher. He wrote a wide range of works, involved with many areas such asphilosophy, literature, phonology, medicine, astronomy, mathematics and arts.According to Ren Daobin, his one thousand and seven hundred pomes are extant andof high artistic achievement.Chapter one explicates his family background, his life and his friends. Fangfamily is a respected and influential clan in Tongcheng. Since one of his forefatherssacrificed his life for Emperor Jianwen in the Ming Dynasty, Fang family hasgradually been known by being officials. According to Xie Zhengguang’s statistics,throughout the Ming Dynasty, there were ten successful candidates in the highestimperial civil service examination, three in the imperial examination at the provinciallevel and six at the county level in Fang family. However, Fang family became famousfor academics since his father Fang Xuejian. Edified by his father in early years, FangYizhi has read extensively and made many a friend. Apart from Fang Wen, QianChengzhi, Chen Zilong, Chen Mingxia and Li Wen, Hou Fangyu, Mao Pijiang, CaoRong, Zhou Lianggong, Wang Fuzhi and Huang Zongxi are all his friends. In hisdeclining years, Fang has converted to Buddhism to avoided being appointed as anofficial by the Emperor and then lived a poor life to his death.Chapter two discusses the three stages in his poems creation and his poetictheories. Fang in one of his works divided his lifetime poetic creation into threeperiods with three poetic theories respectively. In the early stage, influenced by hisfamily and his teachers, he wrote poems mainly featured by elegance and sincerity. Inthe second stage, his poems are heroic and mournful as his country was suffered frompolitical turmoil and his family in strained circumstance. In the third stage, his poemsare gradually placid.Chapter three focuses on the discussion about his poems’ themes and their artisticfeatures. His Poems, as the voice of the poet’s inner thought, are closely correlatedwith his life experiences. Extremely intelligent and versatile as he was in early years, his poems in this period are impassioned and straightforward. In his middle years, hiscountry suffered from political turbulence with his father in prison. So in this time, hispoems are full of helpless indignation. In his declining years, as he has converted toBuddhism, his poems abound with peaceful philosophy and the languages are abstruseand elusive.