Research On The Literary And Artistic Thoughts Of Bao Hui

Song Dynasty is a splendid dynasty in China’s intellectual history.Song learning is always a topic that must be covered in the study of culture in the Song Dynasty.As a Li learning expert,poetic master and politician,Bao Hui has made great achievements in Li learning.He described himself as “I rarely write poems.How can I understand poems?”(1),but wrote numerous fruitful articles on poetics.His articles on poetics apparently bear the style of Li learning;in particular,the “true poem” theory proposed by Bao Hui cannot be ignored and is also a praiseworthy point in the history of poetics.Not many poetic articles of Bao Hui are left till now.It can be found from Bao Hui’s collected works Bi Zou Gao Lue that many of his words in his poetic articles are the typical discourse of Song learning.The literary thoughts of Bao Hui roughly stress the poetic thinking that “without artificial effort,the truth of the world will naturally manifest itself and things in the world will make a sound automatically”.This coincides with the concept that“natural poems can only be written out of the inner mind of the poet naturally” advocated by Song Ru.Therefore,when we study the artistic thoughts of Bao Hui,we must not ignore his time background.We should consider the special thinking mode of Song learning;Bao Hui reflected on literary issues through the concept of “Ti Yong”.He proposed that literature flows naturally from “Taoism” and pursues the poetic realm of being indifferent to fame and fortune.People in Song Dynasty stressed the“cultivation of one’s own moral character” and like to mention “philosophical connotations”.According to Bao Hui,“learning poems is like practicing mediation” and “even simple objectives require long-term arduous effort”.Realizing the ideal of plain and natural poetic beauty requires the constant“insight” and “gradual cultivation” of poets;in this way,it provides poets with the concrete proposals for taking specific actions.Meanwhile,Bao Hui is also a constructive politician.He pacified ordinary people and crushed the rebellion for many times with remarkable achievements for his whole life.Bao Hui held common concepts of Song Confucianism.On the issue of inner mind like a saint and external authority like a king,the latter is based on the former,while the former contributes to the latter.The two cannot be separated.Poets should realize the ideal in both areas in terms of personal spirit and social care.After carefully reading the poetic works of Bao Hui,we can find that his comments on poems are similar in many ways to the poetic arguments of Yan Yu and Yuan Haowen: they all like to “comment on poems with mediation”;and like to stress the expression of “real feelings” in poetic writing.This has also indirectly reflected the common trend of the development of poetics influenced by Li learning and Xin learning,pointing out new inspirations for the way out for poems in Song Dynasty.Based on the above points,this thesis studies Bao Hui and his collected works Bi Zou Gao Lue to further sort out his artistic thoughts.Chapter One discusses the background of Bao Hui’s learning influenced by Cheng Zhu’s Li learning and Xin learning.Through sorting out Bao Hui’s family academic background,we have come to know that Bao Hui’s learning was mainly handed down from his family.He learned together with the students of his father and uncles.Major figures in his family learning included Bao Yang,Bao Yue,and Bao Xun,who once learned under Lu Jiuyuan and Zhu Xi.In this way,Bao brothers learned the thoughts of both schools.Under such a family academic background,Bao Hui was influenced by what he saw and heard.In particular,he later mentioned for many times in his articles the learning on mentality and cultivation of moral characters.They were undoubtedly influenced by other schools.Secondly,this chapter sorts out his friendship.From the poems and letters between Bao Hui and his friends,we can see Bao Hui had many similar ideas with the poetic thoughts of Yan Yu and Dai Fugu.Finally,considering the time environment of Bao Hui,we have discussed the object viewing means under the context of Li learning from three aspects of “Ti Yong thinking”,“relationship betweenliterature and Taoism”,and “realm for the cultivation of inner mind”。Chapter Two discusses the poetic writing theory of “stressing the cultivation of moral character” and believes that Bao Hui illustrated his poetic propositions with the concept of “Ti Yong” and accumulated his poetic writing experience.Bao Hui stresses that “learning poems is like practicing mediation”.There is also the distinction between sudden realization and gradual realization.Therefore,poets should cultivate their own characters and clarify their ways and only after experiencing tribulations can they reach the realm of integration of objects and me.Song Confucianism widely cares about the theories on “moral principles” and “peace of mind”.Bao Hui started from the perspective that the cultivation of moral character shares common characteristics with poem creation.“Poetic lines all come from ambition and poets should stress the cultivation of their moral character”.However,the ambition of poets is also divided into “pursuing the truth of the world and cultivation through learning”.The concrete path for the pursuit of education by poets is that “even simple objectives require long-term arduous effort”.This chapter deeply analyzes Bao Hui’s poem writing theory from the above three paths.Chapter Three mentions the “true poem” theory proposed by Bao Hui in Preface to Shiping Collection.This chapter focuses on the core thoughts of“nature” advocated by Bao Hui.The thesis deeply analyzes “true poem”theory of Bao Hui from four aspects of “true emotion”,“true meaning”,“truthfulness”,and “true taste”.They are also the concepts raised by Bao Hui in his poetic articles such as “do not stay at book knowledge and do not rely on classics”,“people experience emotional fluctuations upon seeing natural sceneries”,and “the air in spring naturally flows and the sound of spring is revealed naturally without artificial effort”.It can therefore be seen that the writing of poetic articles should be the natural expression of real feelings and peaceful and natural poems are real creations,which are the same inside and outside.Poems should be consistent and implicit.Chapter Four is the conclusion.Bao Hui was at the later period ofSouthern Song Dynasty.Though his poetic theories failed to seek for new opportunities for Song poems to get out of the trouble,his poetic theories,in particular the “true poem” theory mentioned previously,exerted a profound impact on Ming Dynasty,while deeply influencing poetic theory advocates such as Ouyang Shoudao,Liu Chenweng,Li Mengyang and Li Dongyang.