| The Yangzhou School, an important school of evidential research in the Qing Dynasty, has gained wide recognition in its achievements in Classical studies. By contrast, little discussion has been made of the School's contributions in literary studies, although the School, as early as its first establishment, was closely related to problems in literary criticism. In an effort to make up for such a deficiency in contemporary studies on the literary history of the Qing Dynasty and on the history of literary criticism, this dissertation undertakes to collect and organize material related to the literary thoughts of the Yangzhou School.;The dissertation is divided into eight chapters. The first chapter aims to explore the factors leading to the negligence of, and thereby to explicate the significance of a study on, the literary thoughts of the Yangzhou School. The second chapter examines the core and also extensions of the Yangzhou School's literary thoughts, and defines the area and objects of the present study. The third chapter contains an analysis of the two streams of literary thoughts of the Yangzhou School, namely, that represented by Wang Zhong and that by Ling Tingkan. Wang's literary thoughts will be set side by side with Ling's for an examination of their similarities and differences. The process through which the two scholars' thoughts were mingled will be studied and the particular role played by Jiang Fan in the mingling will be introduced. Chapters four and five give a comprehensive presentation of Jiao Xun's literary theory of "yin-yan complementation." His application of the theory on such prevailing genres as guwen (classical prose), shi ('poem'), ci ('lyric'), xiqu ('opera piece') and shiwen (contemporary prose) will be introduced. In the sixth chapter, Ruan Yuan's prose theory will be reconstructed, which, together with his views on Classical studies, will be drawn on to clarify a number of problems where there have been frequent misunderstandings. In chapter seven, the literary thoughts of the Yangzhou School, set side by side with the Tongcheng School's prose-theory, will be elucidated. Conclusions of the dissertation will be given in the eighth chapter. |
