"the Book Of The Study Of The Style

Shangshu, as one of the most important Confucian or Ruist classics, has made a profound influece on almost every aspect of traditional Chinese culture, and therefore become the object of study to scholars of all times. After the declining of study of Confucian classics, people began to turn their focus of interest on the literainess of Shangshu. Innumerous great achievements have been made in this field. However, little attention has been paid so far to the style or genre of Shangshu, which, the author of this dissertation believes, is of great value. Having this in mind, the present dissertation aims to connduct a thorough study of the style of Shangshu.Baed on the studies on"style"done by scholars in various fields, the present dissertation believes that the"style"of a text is composed of three leves with defferent functions: the lowest level performs the communicative function; the middle level, the representative or expressive function; and the surface level, the function of discourse sequencing. Of the three levels, the lowest decides the middle, which in turn, is represented in the surface one. So, the three level are interrelated with and interdependent on each bother. For the convenience of analysis, we separate them and discuss them one by one.The whole dissertation falls into four parts, which include six chapters.Part I (Chapter 1) analyses the communicative function, namely, the lowest level of the style of Shangshu. This chapter starts with the discussion of the traditional classification of style of Shangshu into six categories.Firstly, the"six styles"refer to"canon","counsel","charge","speech","instruction", and"announcement". It should be pointed out that the six terms were not assigned to Shangshu untill East Jin Dynasty. They were raised first in the"Big Preface"to the"false"Shangshu. They were raised then most probably because at that time the study on ancient Chinese stylistics had made great progress. Because no further classification was made under the"six styles"in"Big Preface", many debates arisen ever since the appearance of the"six styles". It is the initiative of the debades, the present author believes, that has formed the traditon of"debating style". With the cognition of styles, people have more puzzles about the"six styles".Secondly, the hottest debate has been centering around the"ten styles of Shangshu"put forward by Kong Yin-da, an expert on Shangshu in Tang Dynasty. Almost no one has acknowledged his classification. After a careful carding of relevant literature, however, we find that while the latter four genres belong to the title-based classification of style, the first six belong to the very traditional Chinese way of text-based classification of style.Thirdly, referring to Zhou Li and other pre-Qin historical literature, we find"canon", which is quite different from the other five, to be a category covering many styles. Meantime, the five categories have more functions and can apply to a farther range than their actual use in Shangshu. Even in West Zhou Dynasty, the five categories had blending features. Therefore, trying to assign each of the"six styles"to the texts respectively is of no practical value.Fourthly, ever since the appearance of Shangshu as a book, the original"six styles"of the texts have lost their original respective functions and have been used solely to serve the purpose of praising the higest sovereign and his government and producing the scholar-officials. This"new function"has changed the formerly multi-styled texts into a mono-styled book with only one function—enlightening by education.Part II, which covers Chapters 2, 3, and 4, is a part dealing with the surface level of the stlye of Shangshu.We believe that any style of a text is represented through the text itself. Consequently, the analysis of style should begin with the analysis of the text. In the following three chapters, the state of the texts of Shangshu are analyzed.Chapter 2 analyzes the texts of Shangshu from the perspective of language. It is known to all that Shangshu is famous for its"unprononciability", which is actually the result of a diachronical knowledge of ancient Chinese language. Synchronially, on the other hand, the language of Shangshu could be said of a mixture of spoken language, dialects, and standard written language. In other words, all of the three varieties were intertwined and could be used interchangeably in West Zhou Dynasty. With the passage of time, however, the spoken language and dialects contained in Shangshu became"unpronounceable". But it is this characteristic that mades Shangshu a unique gaoguqijue style, which means literally refined, archaic, unpronounceable and peculiar.Chapter 3 is devoted to the analysis of the"style"of Shangshu. Seemingly, the word"style"is a borrowed term from modern western stylistics. In effect, it had been a familiar concept discussed in ancient Chinese literary criticism, though no systematic theory had ever formed at that time. This issue is well discussed in Cao Pi's paper entitled"On Articles"in his works Dian lun (or On Canons), which says:"All articles have one common root but different branches. The writing of a memorial to the emperor should aim at refinement and elegance, the writing of a persuasive argumentative should focuses on reasonability; the writing of a eulogy over the dead should pay special attention to truth, and the writing of poety and poetic proses should sresses on beauty. These are four different types of texts; and each needs a particular style to go with it. But unfortunately, few are experts of all four styles. And to write the four types well, one needs to be familiar with the four styles."We hold that language is a static system. Only after it is used, it can be put in a discourse sequence. Style is a system developed by adapting to particular communicative function, surving particular contexctual purpose and forming particular employment of language. After a detailed analysis of the texts, we find the language style of Shangshu can be summarized as: using mono-syllable words, using sentences of irregular lengths, paying little attention to ryming, and directly stating of the meaning. Simplicity and directness are the most obvious features of the style, or language style, to be more exact, of Shangshu.Chapter 4 is the textual analysis, which is also a borrowed term, of Shangshu. Yet it was by no means a totally new concept to the ancient Chinese. Liu Xie, for example, discusses in his masterpiece Wenxin Diaolang, in a statement like this:"In article writing, words are grouped into sentences, sentences into parapraphs, and paragraphs into passages."Our focus is on how sentences are grouped into paragraphs. Text is not a formal unit, but an information unit, a meaning chain made from the organization of pieces of information. We call the connecting chain"cohesive devices". There are such cohesive devices in Shangshu, which make the seemingly"unpronounceable"and"uncomprehensible"texts semamtically coherent.Part III contains only Chapter 5, which deals with the middle level of the style of Shangshu, ie. expressive means. There are two kinds of expressive means in Shangshu: one is argumentation, and the other is narration. Several ways of argumentation are found to be used in Shangshu. They include: making a an argument according to historical events, using a similie or metaphor, using contrast, and using quotation. By using these methods, a new style came into being in Shangshu, which can be called"the Emperor's Air"and"the gentlema's Manner". The narrative technique in Shangshu was not mature yet, but it already possessed many factors necessary for narratives. It was the only road for narratives in inscriptions on bones and tortoise shells to later mature narrative.Part IV, which contains only Chapter 6, discusses the impact of the style of Shangshu on later literature.Taking the common view that"All articles derived from the five classics"as the starting point, in addition to a careful carding of relevant studies on Shangshu, a detailed analysis of both reasonable and unreasonable factors involved in the developing process, and some comments on the opinions given by scholars of past ages, this dissertation discusses the stylish and textual impact of Shangshu on later Chinese literture.