The Study On The Autobiographical Prefaces Of Han Dynasty

The so-called "autobiographical preface" refers to the autobiographical articles presented in the form of preface.The Han Dynasty was the beginning of Chinese literati self-consciousness and literary self-consciousness.With the gradual awakening of literati’s self-presentation and self-flaunting,autobiographical preface,the literary genre with dual attributes of preface and y,came into being and became an important part which cannot be ignored in the history of Han Dynasty autobiography literature.The autobiographical preface originates from the preface,and it was influenced by the early preface,such as Preface of Mao Poems,Huainanzi Yaolue,etc.At the same time,it belonged to the early form of biographical literature,in which the summary of personal experience and the analysis of inner world of ego were obviously autobiographical in nature."Be unappreciated by emperor" was an important literary theme in the early and middle Western Han Dynasty.Literati had the anguish of being unappreciated in the contradiction between ideal and reality,so they turned to writing books and expressing their opinions for immortality.This is an important opportunity for the individual conscious awakening of literati.Under such historical background and academic atmosphere,Sima Qian created the The Self-preface of Taishigong,which described his family background,personal experience,writings and comments,and the writing mode of the autobiographical preface was finalized.After the enlightenment of the first chapter of Qu Yuan’s Lisao and the further development of Sima Xiangru’s Self-preface,the writing paradigm of autobiographical biography in Han Dynasty became mature from Sima Qian’s The Self-preface of Taishigong.In addition to the origination in the literary genre of autobiographical preface,the strong lyricism of The Self-preface of Taishigong also has distinctive features in the autobiographical preface of Han Dynasty and even in the history of Chinese literature.Since the literary genre of autobiographical preface was finalized in The Selfpreface of Taishigong,a few long autobiographical prefaces with similar structure appeared from the late Western Han Dynasty to the Eastern Han Dynasty,namely Yang Xiong’s Self-preface,Ban Gu’s Self-preface of Han Shu and Wang Chong’s Self-preface of Lun Heng.Yang Xiong’s Self-preface and Ban Gu’s Self-preface of Han Shu have obvious traces of imitating and inheriting The Self-preface of Taishigong.On the basis of inheriting predecessors,Wang Chong’s Self-preface ofLun Heng,influenced by the times and personal values.presents new features in language style and ideological content,among which the creative intention of anti-tradition,anti-trend and selfexpression is very strong.In addition to the long autobiographical prefaces,the creation of short autobiographical prefaces has gradually increased since the end of the Western Han Dynasty,with representative articles such as Feng Yan’s Self-preface of Xian Zhi Fu,Ma Rong’s Self-preface and Cao Pi’s Self-preface of Dian Lun.This kind of short autobiographical prefaces generally abandons the established writing structure of recording family background and including works and comments,and focuses on the description of personal experience and the analysis of personality characteristics and principles of life,so it is more personalized and lyrical,from which we can get a glimpse of the differences in mentality and academic interests between literati in the Eastern Han Dynasty and those in the Western Han Dynasty.The self-writing and self-expression of the autobiographical prefaces of the Han Dynasty promoted the awakening and in-depth development of the literati’s individual consciousness,and laid the foundation for the real personality liberation and literary consciousness of the literati in The Wei-Jin and Southern and Northern Dynasties.The various structures and ways adopted in the autobiographical prefaces of the Han Dynasty had a great influence on the writing of autobiographical texts of later generations.In addition,the mode of "works&.authors" of autobiographical prefaces has also influenced other literary genres,especially bibliography,which aims at"examining the academic of past dynasties,and identifying the source of books." In short,autobiographical prefaces of the Han Dynasty have a certain position in the history of Chinese literature because of their fixed writing paradigm,rich selfexpression and far-reaching influence.