Research On Ci By Poets During The Tang Dynasty, Five-Dynasty Period And North Song Dynasty

In Chinese literary history, there might be authors writing both poetry and Ci(a form of classical Chinese poetry composed to certain tunes in fixed numbers of lines and words, originating in the Tang Dynasty and fully developed in the Song Dynasty), while few of them could manage to score excellent successes in both poetry and Ci composition careers as the efforts they made on both were not equal and they did not view these two kinds of composition with same seriousness. Besides, the different styles and nature of poetry and Ci and "different people being endowed with different talents" also contributed to the writers being savent of either composition rather than "both-rounders". Those whose talent and aptitude were in line with the nature of poetry would embark themselves on the track of poetry composition, while they might also write Ci besides. The author of this paper is going to name the Ci they wrote as "Ci by poets" after "essay by poets" and"poetry by essay writers"were coined. In this paper, I am going to cite some Ci by poets, such as Bai Juyi, Huang Fusong, Pan Lang, Ouyang Xiu, Wang Anshi and Su Shi, during the Tang Dynasty, Five-Dynasty Period and North Song Dynasty and introduce the result of my research on them, that is the same characteristics of "Ci by poets"—as a move from the suggestive or amatory subjects to diverse themes, as a breakthrough in the monotanous and saccharine romantic style with, then, the parallelling existence of the bold and unconstrained style and the graceful and restrained style, as a kind of expression of their aspirations and implied suggestions and no longer merely as entertainment means, as a style of literature increasingly matching with poetry, more and more reflecting the graceful and beautiful features of poetry, "allowing for pleasure without being lewd and allowing for grief without being too painful". Anyway, to some extent, "Ci by poets" helped enhance the formerly-inferior status of Ci and carry forward the spirit of classical poetry. While through the research on "Ci by poets", the paper further attested the correctness of dividing these works into the category of "Ci by poets" and more inclusiveness and comprehensiveness of it than the category some divided as "poetrylized Ci" or "poetry taken as Ci" because this division highlighted the fact that these Ci works were composed by poets and also suggested the source of poetry elements and poetic essence in Ci, revealing the linking relations between poetry and Ci.