The Revision And Annotation Of Cheng Ju’s Poems

Cheng Ju (1078-1144), also named Zhidao and titled Beihan from Kaihua, Quzhou (Quzhou of Zhejiang Province today), was an important poet in Song Dynasty during its capital transition towards the south. Born in a Confucianism family and naturally straightforward, Cheng Ju had a very rough political career with lots of ups and downs. He made friends with officials, monks, Taoists and hermits. Cheng Ju’s thought was a combination of Confucianism, Buddhism and Taoism. Cheng Ju was a productive writer, his famous works including Stories In Lin Tai and Collections In Beishan. Present research about him has mainly been focused on Stories In Lin Tai and his poetic style. There is more room left to the revision and annotation of his poems. The paper first tries to sort through Cheng Ju’s life, family history, the situation of making friends as well as the content and characteristics of his poems, then goes further to make revision and annotation for Collections In Beishan, aiming to make up for the deficiency of the present research.Collections In Beishan covers ancient poems, quatrains and regulated verses. Most of the poems were written in the form of singing and responding; others are description of landscape and natural scenery. The paper summarizes the characteristics of these poems via classification.The revision and annotation done here is based on the poems of Collections In Beishan which is taken from Carving Copy of Series of the Four Categories Sequel, with some references to Imperial Collection of Four, Yuan’s Codex In1825and The Complete Collection of Poems In Song Dynasty.