On Diplomatic Declaration And Discourse In The Spring And Autumn Period

The large quantity of diplomatic declarations and discourses in Zuozhuan are not simply the casual conversations or written by the author of the book, but compiled according to record of the time. They should be viewed as the literature of Spring and Autumn Period on account of their relative independence in the book. This thesis is going to make the special research on diplomatic declarations and discourses in Zuozhuan on the respect of the style, including four chapters:The first chapter makes analysis on the background of diplomatic declarations and discourses in Spring and Autumn Period, and also the authors of them, diplomats' circumstances. During that time, the Zhou Dynasty was declined, hegemony states took the leadership of middle China, but everyone attach great importance to manners, which brought on a flourish of various diplomatic activities among states. For the sake of their states, diplomats were sending to make mediations. Some states even had set diplomat system. Diplomats were the most active group in that time; they should have high quality and ability in order to complete the missions.The second chapter discusses the formation of diplomatic declarations and discourses in Spring and Autumn Period. It evolves from Ci and Ming, two of top witchery's six kinds of aticle, becomes diplomatic declarations and diplomatic discourses. The former is written in the annals before diplomatic activity while the latter presented according to certain style. The inditing diplomatic declarations and discourses is a complicated process, which was completed by not only one person or in one time. They were record by official historian occasionally, so the author of Zuozhuan could make the compilation.The third chapter illustrates on artistic features of diplomatic declarations and discourses in Spring and Autumn Period. Various rhetorical devices such as metaphor quotation, rhetorical question and parataxis, as well as excellent argument technique are used in diplomatic declarations and discourses; this represents the upgrade of people's language ability in Spring and Autumn Period. Genarally, They show us the mix aesthetic styles of implicit and mild, couple hardness with softness, elegance, which match the age. The third chapter assess on historical position of diplomatic declarations and discourses in Spring and Autumn Period. Diplomats were the earliest researcher of the Songs; their diplomatic communication facilitates spread and reception of it in Spring and Autumn Period, which make an important phase of the research on the Book of Songs. Confucius' rhetorical theory is also elicited by diplomatic declarations and discourses. They have an important impact on tacticians' discourse in Warring States, but after that time, they came down to their prosperity because of the changing circumstances and traditional literary concept. So they were seldom attached importance.