The Narrative Study Of "Historical Records: The Benji Of Five Emperors"

As the opening chapter of the Historical Records,the Biographic Sketches of Five Emperors has important meanings in making the purpose clear from the very beginning and setting out examples.Taking the biographies of the five ancient emperors,Huang Di,Zhuan Xu,Di Ku,Yao and Shun as the contents,Sima Qian showed the political development model of the emperor of ancient China from the entrepreneurship to a better leader and the momentous historical development process.It reflects Sima Qian’s profound historical perspective and superb narrative ability.However,the literary value of the Biographic Sketches of Five Emperors has not been fully explored.Based on the current research status,this article explores the profound intension and narrative art of the Biographic Sketches of Five Emperors by scrupulous reading the text of it and supplementing other relevant contents in Historical Records,aiming to reveal the literature value of the Biographic Sketches of Five Emperors and show the literary achievements of Sima Qian.The full text consists of five parts:The introduction part explains the reason and significance of the topic selection,as well as the research status and literature review.The first chapter studies the emperor,Huang Di,who created this country.First of all,to explore the reasons for the opening of the Huang Di.Sima Qian,in the atmosphere of the Great Unification era,for historians’ responsibility and inheriting the traditional concept of Confucius,traced the origin of China’s unification to the Huang Di and thought of him as the first person in thriving the emperor’s trails and creating a unified the country on a credible historical basis.Second,to explore whether Huang Di is the upper limit of history.Combining the text of the Biographic Sketches of Five Emperors and other texts from Historical Records,this paper analyzes the methods and principles of this question.Thirdly,to analyze the political and military achievements of Huang Di.Finally,to discuss the significance of narrative of Huang Di.The second chapter studies the image of the emperors who serve the security industry.First of all,we discussed the merits of the two emperors,Emperor Zhuan Xu and Emperor Di Ku,to demonstrate the succession and development of the Huang Di’s cause in the progress of the territory and the cultivation of the people.Then it analyzes the roles played by Zhuan Xu and Di Ku in the great cause of the Five Emperors to create the Chinese nation and develop the Chinese civilization.The third chapter conducts research on the period when the system is fully prepared and developed by Yao and Shun.First of all,to analyze the images of the two emperors.Emperor Yao chose the talented person rather than his relatives to be the heir of the throne,which shows his universal love and original intention of serving the world.Emperor Shun was famous for filial piety and became a model of improving ourselves,managing the family,governing the country and appeasing the aspirations of the people in the world.Then it analyzes the significance of the narratives of Yao and Shun.In terms of social development,from Huang Di to the emperor Yao and Shun,they went through the military expansion to the development of internal affairs,from the geographical expansion to the economic development;and in the replacement of the dynasties,they had experienced the changing attitude towards the choice of heir to the throne.That is,from achieving national reunification by force conquest to completing the succession of the throne peacefully.The fourth chapter discusses the overall narrative art of the Biographic Sketches of Five Emperors.The narrative structure of it likes a chain of rings,the narrative techniques are various and interspersed with changes,and the narrative language is of dredging neatness,simplicity and elegance.All of these are the hallmarks of Sima Qian’s superb narrative ability.