Recomment On The Status Of Liu Kai In Essay History In Song Dynasty

In Song Dynasty LiuKai is not a great writer, however, he is an very important one in changing the style of essays. In spite of background of poor family and little education, he has the strong self-consciousness and sense of responsibility. He realizes that since WangTang Dynasty and WuDai Dynasty the intellectuals' general mood is superticial and the writing style is bombastic and decadent. So he criticizes this situation and becomes the first one who advocates the style of classical works.Respecting and following the writing principles of HanYu and "Six master-pieces". LiuKai emphasizes the importance of education and the use of essays, and most of his essays are based on the real life. To some extent, he wakes up the writers' social sense of responsibility. Adhering to these principles and researching a lot on the classical works, his followers write a large number of influential articles. In LiuKai's articles, the style of plain words containing rich meaning is also inherited by a lot of writers.LiuKai advocates HanYu and brings the Han's style into the literary workers of SongDynasty. Furthermore, he also prefers "DaoTong" which pays too much attention on the social functions of literary works, so there still exists some disadvantages. Later on the literary ideas of many writers, OuyangXiu, for example, become mature not only by inheriting but also by modifying and developing the thoughts of "WenTong" and "DaoTong".In a word, liuKai contributes a lot in the maturing of the pain and smooth style of SongDynasty's essays.