Ma Yifu Poetics Thought

New Confucianism, a school of philosophy , sociology, ethnics as well as a school of poetics, budded in the early 20^th century. Compared with the "New Confucianism" originated from the Song dynasty, there are inner relations as well as obvious ideological differences between the two kinds of New Confucianisms. Quite obviously, New Confucianism studied in the paper is a modern academic school of unique culture rather than just a copy of the traditional Confucianism. It has exerted great influence on social culture. Since in the books written by these famous new confucianists. there are lots of realistic and profound ideas about literature and art, New Confucianism also enriched the study of literary theory with Chinese characteristics.As an outstanding scholar of the early new confucianists, Ma Yi-fu"s idea was quite representative in poetic theories. Yet fewer comments on Mr. Ma's poetic theories are available now, which is the true situation with the research of the whole New Confucianism poetics. The thesis is focused on the generalization of the main ideas of Mr. Ma's poetic theories by means of analyzing his poetic conceptions, theories, criticism and creation. The author aims at revealing its main characteristics and its significance to our contemporary poetic research.The thesis is composed of seven parts. Besides an introduction and a conclusion. five chapters discussing Mr. Ma Yi-fu's poetic theories in detail constitute the main body of the thesis.The introduction aimed at grasping the status and significance of Mr. Ma's poetic theories in the modern new Confucianism research. In this part, the author discussed the academic status of Mr. Ma in the modern new Confucianism and made a brief study of the main content and character of his philosophy. Emphasis is laid on the main character of Mr. Ma's poetic theories based on his new Confucianism idea. By a comparative study of relevant objects, the author concluded that Mr. Ma Yi-fu's poetics was the most abundant and profound among the whole modern new Confucianism. To deny the fact that Mr. Ma Yi-fu is one of the New Confucianists, just because of its special way ofresearch, is no more than to deny the new endeavor of his academic research, which means the end of any possibility of New Confucianism's development._As a modern scholar with profound knowledge of Chinese and western culture, Mr. Ma Yi-fu didn't simply agree with Chinese traditional poetics, neither did he follow what western scholar said blindly. He tried to find out the modern significance of traditional Confucianism poetics and wanted to develop it into a contemporary poetic theory which was more energetic, more opening and more tolerant.Chapter 1 is an introductory study of Mr. Ma Yi-fu's scholastic career, trying to reveal the relationships between the experiences of his life and his academic achievements. This chapter consists of four parts for the analysis and generalization of his whole career life. Mr. Ma once confessed:" At first I did textual research, then turned to western culture. Later. I realized its shortcomings, so I began to study Buddhistic sutra. In the end, I returned to Confucian sutra." The above confession was true to the fact. Despite his changing in study objects for several times, we can find that he never gave up his poetic creation and criticism. In fact, his poetic theories have become more and more mature along with his academic career. Therefore, it is absolutely necessary to know about his career for the understanding of his poetic theories.Chapter 2 mainly analyzes the philosophic foundation of Mr. Ma's poetic theories. As a transcendent scholar living in 20th century, Mr. Ma Yi-fu was not only a successful poet, but also a master of Chinese culture with great accomplishments. We can find in Mr. Ma's works that his philosophic views and poetic criticism are complementary and promoting mutually. Therefore, it is necessary to know about his philosophy for the understanding his poetic theories. In his philosophy, the Six Confucian Sutra is obviously the most important content. However, before his final determination to Confucianism, Mr. Ma had studied several other subjects, such as textual research, western culture and Buddhistic sutra. Though having extricated himself from these subjects and concentrated on development of Confucianism, he was still much benefited from these subjects. Thus, in Mr. Ma's late books, we can still see influence of his early career. While textual research was regarded as a kind of catalogue of knowledge and a means of research by Mr. Ma, western culture and Buddhistic sutra played a moreimportant role in Mr. Ma's late research. Therefore, besides the Six Confucian Sutra. western culture and Buddhistic sutra are very important resources for Mr. Ma's poetic theories.Chapter 3, 4 and 5 are the main body of this thesis. Chapter 3 discusses Mr. Ma's poetic conception and poetic theories. Chapter 4 and 5 discuss Mr. Ma's poetic criticism and poetic creation.As for his poetic conception, both its philosophic foundation and its inherent logics are embodied in Mr. Ma's thought about Confucianism. Firstly, chapter 3 analyzes Mr. Ma's understanding about the perceptual features of the poetic creation. Mr. Ma believed that poems should convey thoughts aiming at moving the readers as well as the author himself or herself. This theory is based on the fundamental idea that poems should aim at moral improvement, which is both the author's motivation of writing and the readers" purposes of reading. So, the ideas of poems have become the medium between poets and readers. Secondly, this chapter focuses on Mr. Ma's understanding about the forming elements of poems. Mr. Ma once confessed: "Good poems consist of open breadth of mind, great boldness of vision, strict form of rhythms and profound depth of spirit." From this point of view, we can see the arrangements and logics of his poems. In Mr. Ma's poems, the strenth and depth of the poet's personality are more important than the forms and charm. Although Mr. Ma believed that the levels of spirits and the anistic attraction are both important, as an outstanding scholar, he has paid more attention on the former. In regard of his poetic theories. Mr. Ma mainly discussed the relationship between poem and its function, content and form, the course of creating and appreciating a poem , which are very important to his poetics. As to the relatonships between poem and its funtion,form and content, he emphasized that poetic form and function should be an organism and form is the carrier of function.There is no possibility of division between them. In line with the traditional poetics,Mr. Ma valued the significance of spirits more than the form. He agreed that it was necessary to have the poetic content conforming to Confucianism. However, it did not mean that he did not know the importance of poetic forms; As a profound philosophic poet. Mr. Ma knew that deep thought without proper artistic form cannot make a good poem.Mr. Ma has published no special books of poetic criticism. His views are scattered in his teaching notes, correspondence, and the recorded utterances written by his students. In his specific poetic criticism. Mr. Ma paid much attention to the analysis of all poets and poems in different dynasties with the two standards of Confucianism and poetics, for instance, the poets" breadth of mind and boldness of vision, the rhythms and spirit of poems. The scope of his poetic criticism is extremely far reaching, ranging from the time before Qin dynasty to the early Republic of China, Mr. Ma paid attention to almost ail poems and poets in different dynasties. Unlike many other poetic critics, Mr. Ma never minded giving pertinent criticism to his contemporary poets, such as his friends, students, even his most respected senior poets like Shen Zeng-zhi, Chen San-li, etc. Moreover, Mr. Ma was not afraid of criticizing his own poems, analyzing the good and bad aspects seriously and comparing them with those poems of the first-class poets like Libai and Dufu. Mr. Ma thought that he had even exceeded Li and Dui in some aspects.From his first poem named YongJu to his last poem named Intend to say good-bye to my friends, Mr. Ma Yi-fu created some 3000 poets in his whole life. Actually, Mr. Ma is almost the most productive poet among modern Chinese scholars. Mr. Ma once said. "I found that the range of subjects of ancient poets can be classified into 4 categories: the admiration of lovers, the anxiety about the livelihood of the people and national security, the contemplation of life and the enjoyment with the nature. The above four categories covered all the possibilities of poets' complexes. While the depth of the feeling and precision of wording are related with the personality of the poet. " The above summary is also true of his own poems. The most important characteristics of his poems is reserved, which was an inheritance from the traditional Chinese poetics. Another feature of Mr. Ma's poems is implicit. As a modern poet who is good at classic poems. Mr. Ma can write every type of Chinese classic poems. However, just as what he has said, he is especially in love with "Wu gu", a type of Chinese classic poem with 5 characters in a line.In the conclusion of this thesis the author tried to valuate and analyze the significance of Mr. Ma's poetic theories. The achievement and shortages of Chinesecontemporary poetics are obvious, and we can illuminate these achievement and shortages in several aspects, such as the conception, the method, and the form, etc. From the viewpoint of Chinese modern history, we can say that these achievement and shortages are the inevitable result of the collision between Chinese traditional culture and the western modern culture. After competing for about 100 years, It is quite obvious that the western modern culture got the upper hand. The traditional research method has retreated from the center of cultural research. In this course, what we lost is not only the out-of-dated thinking mode, but also lots of excellent cultural tradition. As a result, our contemporary poetics is deprived of its own national colors. Furthermore, it is becoming difficult for us to internalize other nation's theories. In this awkward circumstance, we find that we need to re-evaluate these poetics which persist in our traditional research method and our old expressing way. In this sense, the significance of the poetic theories of Mr. Ma Yi-fu and other "Modern New Confucianism" scholars are emerging.