On Yang Wanli's Poems And His Poetry Theory

Based on the achievements already obtained by other researchers, and from the traditional poetic viewpoint, methods and classification, my paper intends to provide an overall and systematic analysis of the most important sectors of Yang Wanli's poetry structure, namely, the theory of poetry functioning as the means of moralizing the society, the conception of "taste" as the tenor of poetry, and ideology of "following the nature" as the source of poem writing. It is hoped that a fresh image be illustrated about this poet whose creativity, originality in verse composition and perception on poetry played a key role in the transformation of poetry style in the Southern Song Dynasty.This paper is made up of three parts, with the introduction briefing the basic situation about Yang Wanli and his poetry theory research, the conclusion generalizing Yang's poetry, and the main body of the thesis which consists of three chapters.The first chapter focuses on Yang's theory of poetry functioning as the means of moralizing the society, with a detailed dissection of his guiding program On Poetry and a thorough comparison with traditional viewpoints, thus revealing the in-depth of Yang's theory. The article states that, under the influence of the rationalistic Confucian philosophy of the Song Dynasty, Yang's functioning theory of poetry as a "tool" combines both the spirit of the Song Dynasty rationalism and the tradition of ancient literary pursuits.The second chapter probes into Yang's conception of "taste" as the tenor of poetry. Starting from his own preface, poetry studies and verse composition, the paper discusses Yang's research on poetry itself, analyzes his concept of "poetry taste", and describes how Yang broke away from the bound of the "Jiangxi School" and got on to the path of originality and creativity. The paper holds that the creation of "Yang's Style" resulted from his recrudesce to traditional poetry theory and his extraction from others' in poetry practice and theory.The third chapter discusses Yang's ideology of "following the nature" as the source of poem writing. From the perspective of Yang's theory, the dissertation provides an analysis of Yang's poems and his viewpoint, and states that the ideology of "following the nature" enabled Yang to bid farewell to the forked path of the "Jiangxi School", which neglected the objective reality and stuck to the archaic doctrines and to open new...