The Game Of Wei Chi And The Spirit Of Chinese Arts

Wei chi is always a competitive game, which in ancient China was classified as one of the four arts, i.e. qin (music playing), qi (chess playing), shu (calligraphy) and hua (painting). However, as such a game has tended to become more competitive and belligerent since the beginning of the 20th century, and the Chinese traditional artistic system has been submerged in the sea of the "worldness", wei chi has gradually lost its identity as a "true art". In contemporary time, there are numerous experts and scholars who devote themselves to the studies of qin, shu, hua, shi (poetry and bi-poetry) and wen (prose), but few achievements can be seen in the study of qi (chess) culture. It is true that ancient China has handed down to us a prodigious repository of intellectual and aesthetic relics of the art of wei chi. Moreover, to our surprise, the Chinese theories of wei chi share much in common with those of literature & arts in sense of value and ways of discourse. The present dissertation attempts, by employing interdisciplinary methodology in Comparative Literature, to sort out whatever intellectual and aesthetic significance of wei chi and the theories concerning the art of wei chi in ancient Chinese cultural context, and to examine the possible relationships between wei chi and wen (literature), yi (arts) and the theories of arts and literature in Chinese tradition.The dissertation fits into five chapters.The first chapter, "Wei Chi and Yi (Arts)", first explores how the game of "wei chi", as a competitive activity of tournament, has been accepted in ancient China into the system of "arts". Then it tries to pursue the reason why such a game as a "true art" gradually retreats and returns to the field of competition. It also discusses the categories and historical evolutions of "wei chi" and "arts" in the ancient Chineseknowledge hierarchy. It concludes that the transition of the science of arts from the ancient Chinese "yi" to the "arts" of modem Chinese disciplinary system is actually nothing but a transformation of artistic discourse as well as intellectual paradigms.The second chapter, "Wei Chi and Dao", mainly examines how wei chi as a "true art" has been signified as "dao" and what relationships there are between "wei chi" and the icons of tian (the heaven) & di (the earth), "wei chi" and Confiicianism, "wei chi" and Daoism. The author thinks that, since "ji (skill)" and "xi (amusement)" are the forms of being for "wei chi", "dao" can reasonably become the ultimate rationale for the beingness of "wei chi". Thus, "wei chi" steps in communion with the "daos"of the tian, the di and the mankind, to establish the three realms of tian and di, morality, and aestheticism.The third chapter, "Wei Chi and Wen (Literature & Literary Theories)", specifically investigates the relationships between wei chi and Chinese literary theories, Chinese poetry (including bi-poetry), and Chinese fictioa It also explicates how different literary genres are enabled to impart various meanings to "wei chi". To the author's understanding, as "wen" is between "dao" and "yi", "wen" will be "dao" if it aims high; it will be "ji" if it aims otherwise. In other words, "Wei chi" itself means "ji", and when the black and white pieces are placed in a confronting game, "wen" (the Chinese character "wen" may chiefly have three archetypal meanings: a) complexity of colours and shapes; b) structure; c) beauty) appears. Such a "wen" is a true reflection of Nature, which characterizes the features of both the heaven and the earth. In this way, an internal communion between wei chi and wen is finally realized.The fourth chapter, "Thinking and Saying", endeavours to shed much light upon not only the ways of thinking and saying regarding ancient Chinese wei chi theories, but also the correlations and distinctions between the theories of wei chi and those of arts & literature in terms of discourse, thought and spirit of culture. It is clear that ancient Chinese wei chi theories usually comprise two sets of discourse systems-one the syst...