Aesthetic Yang Xiong Thought

Yang Xiong, the known litterateur, philosopher lived in Xihan dynasty, and in somesense may be an esthetician. People in the following dynasties have studied hisliterary works, thoughts and his philosophy. Even today, people still can find something new in these areas. And with a study of a onetime we find Yang Xiong'sachievements on aesthetics to which have so far not been paid much attention, need tobe studied and be give an appropriate estimate.This thesis aims to find the main idea about Yang Xiong's aesthetics, how hisaesthetics thoughts come into being and to what extend his thought affect hisfollowers. It consists of the following eight parts: Introduction;Chapter 1, on thehistoric basis and theory precondition about Yang Xiong's aesthetics ideas;Chapter 2,on the origin of Yang Xiong's thoughts and the basis of his philosophy;Chapter 3, onthe category of Yang Xiong's aesthetics;Chapter 4, on Yang Xiong's view towardsdetailed category;Chapter5, on the aesthetic characteristics of Yang Xiong's works;Chapter 6, on the characteristics of Yang Xiong's aesthetics;Chapter7, on the essence,evaluate and the affection of Yang Xiong's aesthetics. Generally to say, theIntroduction part serves a solid basis for the whole thesis. Chapter 1, 2 is anindispensable preparation. Chapter 3,4,5,6 forms the body of the thesis. And chapter 7summarizes this thesis, shows the soul of the thesis.There are three parts in Introduction. One part tells the story about Yang Xiong,highlighting his achievements in literature, his personality and his outstandingcontribution;one part tells the fact people studied Yang Xiong, indicating that weshould study Yang Xiong's theory entirely. And the other part tells the way and thesignificance of the study. What's important is in that we reveal his soul with an eye ofmodern aesthetics, both keeping its origin characteristics and using modern conceptsproperly at the same time.The historic basis and theory precondition about Yang Xiong's aesthetics ideas inChapter 1 are important for the whole study. So they are put forward to be illustratedpreferentially. In Xihan dynasty, climate of politics, economy, thoughts and literarydevelop a lot compared with the Qin dynasty, providing as the historical backgroundfor Yang Xiong's whole thoughts. And ideas on aesthetics in the area of literaturedirectly affect Yang Xiong's aesthetics, taking as the academia. Yang Xiongconcentrates on several main points in his aesthetics, they are, "is it true thatobjectivity and subjectivity of aesthetics can unit each other on certain metaphysicalbasis", "how to summarize the personality with an proper standard", "how to dealwith the relationship between art, individual and the world ", "what the relationshipbetween aesthetics and society, morality, desire and something the same kind".Chapter 2 examines the source of Yang Xiong's aesthetics thoughts. Yang Xiongabsorbs nutrition from Confucius's "gentle" and "zhongyong",elaborate Mencius's"benevolence and righteousness", "developing spiritual power" and Xun zi's"Education with Rites and Music". He inherits lineal thoughts of Confucian. On theother hand, he also studies Taoism "abstruse" ,"natural" ,"dialectic" ideas in his works,thus making his thought the aggregation of the two theories. Beside this, he absorbsknowledge from "ZHOUYI", Dong Zhongshu as well. With all these efforts, YangXiong successfully makes his thought contain all the strongpoint of those theories,gives his own theory a much solid and practical ground--abstruse. His theory then hasa final goal as "aesthetics of the heaven, aesthetics of the earth and aesthetics ofhuman beings", a suitable structure as "the heaven—the earth—human being". Hisbasis, goal and structure do has something in common connaturally, and this makeshis theory an inner balance.Chapter 3 shows the innovation and improvement in the thesis. After aelaborate study of the structure of Yang Xiong's aesthetics theory, we take twelveconceptions as the main points of his theory with the method of combining logic andhistory, they are, "beautiful, gentle, natural, honesty, classic, messiness, inner andouter, shining, peerless, magnificence, peace, harmony ". They can be divided intothree groups."Beautiful, gentle, natural" are often used in the category of appreciatingthe art. We use "beautiful" to describe the figure or the shape, "gentle" the essence,and add the two we get "nature"---both developed. "Honesty, classic, messiness, innerand outer, shining, peerless, magnificence", these seven concepts belong to a samegroup in that they are often used to describe something spiritual. "Honesty, classic,messiness, inner and outer", is the first step in one's spiritual development. As a wiseman, one must be honest firstly, do as the classic works tells, and then he can get intothe higher step as "inner and outer—shining---peerless---magnificence". And eachstep takes the former one as its base. Then "honesty, Classic, messiness"—"inner-outer(spiritual-harmony)---shining---peerless---magnificence(spiritual-sublime). And so it is the five steps in one's spiritual development. The third category suit forthe nature and society, they are "peace" and "harmony". We create so many categoriesonly to illustrate Yang Xiong's thought easily. In fact, limitations between thesecategories also can be neglected. For example, "beautiful" can also be used in the areaof nature and society, and "gentle" can be used in spiritual area as well.Chapter 4 illustrates in details Yang Xiong's aesthetics theory that contains threeparts: literature, calligraphy and music. So far by now, thesis about this aspect is rareor plain, if there is. As to literature, Yang Xiong takes "finding the law of nature""advice the saint" and " follow the classic works" as the main principle ofappreciating in literature. That is to say, the aesthetics characteristics of certain worksderive from the "mind" that to a large scale consists of "spiritual world" ,"moraldevelopment" ,"real sentiment" and "individuality". Here he also points out that thereis something may bock the speed of progressing, for example, "habitual imitation"and "concise languages". And he believes there do exist misunderstanding in betweenthe writer and the audience. Towards Song yu, Qu yuan, Sima Xiangru and Sima Qian,Yang Xiong is apt to use his own principle "beautiful". In the area of calligraphy, hisargument "handwriting show off one's soul" has been neglected hundreds of years.And with a long time study, we find it contains four layers: ①. Handwriting is antherkind of drawing. (Or to say, "calligraphy, equals to drawing.") ②. Calligraphy is avisual way to show oneself. (Or to say, "calligraphy betray oneself.") ③. Calligraphyrequires enthusiasm in creating. (Or to say, "singing and shaping, calls for energyfrom no matter what kind of people.") ④. Calligraphy to some extend represent one'smorality. (Or to say, " singing and drawing, makes oneself appearing.") Yang Xiongmixes Confucian and Taoism in view of music. What's more, he develops a new viewon music---"on the aesthetics of tragedy", thus pushes his theory.In chapter 5, we focus on illustrating the important meaning of the aestheticscharacteristics in Yang Xiong's works. It's the sensorial appearance of the works. Butlittle study has been done so far by now because Yang Xiong's works are so many,and the styles of his works differ from each other distinctly. We conclude 7 categorieson his aesthetics characteristic. ①mighty rhymed prose. It's great and significant,often describes the "height, scale, abundance, speed, manner, event and order". ②Lyric rhyme prose. It uses plentiful imagination in depicting sceneries, directly andironically. ③quotation prose. It always appears maestros. ④eulogy and funeraleulogy. It often exaggerates Interaction between Mankind and Universe. ⑤argumentative writing. It meticulously reasons and proves, making itself acceptable.⑥letter. It reflects one's manner easier compared with the other forms. ⑦philosophyworks. It is imaginative and concise. All in all, each style has its own feature, andcompared with each other, we find his main aesthetics feature through his works, thatis "beauty and virtue parallels in the way progressing".In chapter 6, we sum up Yang Xiong's aesthetics characteristics into six. ⑴richand colorful content ⑵coherent idea ⑶developmental progress ⑷steady main idea⑸dialectic ⑹oxymoron. The content is colorful and rich lie in that it also containstwelve aesthetics categories, twelve aesthetics propositions, taking " the true, the goodand the beautiful go in the same way" as the final goal and the characteristic of"beauty and virtue parallels in the way progressing". Twelve aesthetics categories are⑴words as the voice of the mind and handwriting as the figure of soul, ⑵Qi as acompliant horse, ⑶success without self-satisfaction, ⑷seeking a flexibility beauty,⑸treasure is unworthy of the human being, ⑹"finding the law of nature" "advice thesaint" and " follow the classic works" as the main principle of appreciating inliterature, ⑺literature comes from the "mind", ⑻"habitual imitation" and "conciselanguages" are principle, ⑼there do exist misunderstanding in between the writerand the audience, ⑽the standard of criticism is "beautiful", ⑾singing and drawing,makes oneself appearing, ⑿the music function in the area of educating. Based on thecategory of aesthetics, Yang Xiong combines "literary aesthetics" "calligraphyaesthetics" "music aesthetics" and other things the same as his "superstructure ofaesthetics theory" under the goal of beauty seeking. His theory is shaped in itscharacteristic and framed with its basic concept of aesthetics. And the seeking of "thetrue, the good and the beautiful" exists in every part of his whole theory, thus ties thesystem into a unit tightly. As to the process of growing up of his theory, it's stillneeded to do much more study. As a matter of fact, the process can be divided intothree parts following the times. During his former course, he pays much attention tothe formal beauty, then he thinks much of the relationship between "the true and thebeautiful" as he comes to the second period, then the "spiritual beauty" and the"relationship between content and form" the third. By this, he gets twice qualitativechanges as from "seeking the beauty of the art" to "seeking the beauty of the matterworld", then to "seeking the beauty of the spiritual world". During the course ofchanges, the main ideas function all through the course. The main ideas are "words asthe voice of the mind and handwriting as the figure of soul", "Qi as a complianthorse", "success without self-satisfaction", "seeking a flexibility beauty", "treasure isunworthy of the human being" and so on, and all appears to be dialect. But in histheory, we still find something incompatible, which lies in the way he praises thespiritual defers from the attitude he prefers towards the actual world. Imagine " richand colorful content" and "coherent main ideas" as a coordinates, they make up of theentire theory system. Then each of the six aesthetics characteristics mentioned at thebeginning of the paragraph, functions in between and is indispensable. Hence thecreative points in this thesis.Comments on Yang Xiong's aesthetics theory differ a lot from each other, and inchapter 7 we will comment on his theory in a new way. Yang Xiong mixes the theoryof Confucius, Taoism, YI and YANG and other theories, and on such a basis, he buildshis own theory, which can represent most bachelors' will of devoting to the society.As to the effect his theory brings to the followers, we find it a long way to do muchmore research. For example, Wang Chong, Liu xie and Liu xizai learn from him onhow to build the frame work of their own aesthetic theory. The famous argumentbetween the conservative party and newly party in Qi and Liang dynasty may find theroot in his works. The famous poets in ancient china such as Liu Zhiji, Li Shimin,Wang Bo, Han Yu, Li He, and Liu Zongyuan all take his theory seriously. Commentstoday on Yang Xiong's aesthetics theory always focus on such point as "materialisticor idealistic" "dialectic or metaphysical" and "Confucian or Taoist", making thecomment itself simply and superficially. On the contrary, after a hard work onstudying his theory, we find some great value in it. Yang Xiong at the beginning getsknown as a fighter against Theology and New Text School ruling in the literary field.At the same time he bravely shoulders the responsibility of reconstructing Confucius's"sheer goodness and beauty" and Mencius's "personality". His works' system, as aresult, turns to be broad and abundant, especially in that he interprets some conceptsand scale (such as " beauty, gentle" "virtue, the way, benevolence") in a new way,brings forward some new aesthetic concepts or rules such as "words as the voice ofthe mind and handwriting as the figure of soul" and "treasure is unworthy of thehuman being". All above prove that Yang Xiong deserves a higher praise in the fieldof ancient aesthetics. We at the same time find something limited in his theory. Forexample, he ignores the beauty of life and practice;criticize the literature andaesthetics with utilitarian eyes. We put so much energy in studying the master'stheory and pin our hope on finding something useful to ourselves nowadays. ⑴wemay use his theory for reference. Though he doesn't build an entire aesthetic systemdirectly, he illustrates his thoughts about that all through his works. And some of hisconcepts still work. ⑵we may learn from his theory on producing upon literature andart. for example, his view on contents and form still enlightens our producing. ⑶hiscomment "whoever can produce Fu after writing thousands of Fu" inspires peopletoday. ⑷his comments on how to cultivate one's personality---the way, virtue,benevolence , courtesy, wise and sincerity ---provide some good advices to theeducation today.