Late Ming Literati Tea Art Of Living Spirit

Ming dynasty is an important age in the history of Chinese tea culture, forming a connecting link betwween the past and the future. Literati at the middle and late period of Ming danasty caught people's eyes for their tea-drinking activities. Shanshui tea parties, Yaji tea parties, Mingxin tea parties were popular among the literati at that period,especially those accompanied by the beauties, possessing a particular taste. Tea-drinking in their eyes was a process of aesthetic appreciation and a way to cultivate one's moral qualities and was embodied more spiritual meanings and aesthetic taste. Tea, as a spiritual symbolization, was artistically beautified to its maximum extent and was given an elegant and graceful culture character. One's taste of tea and one's moral characters seemed to be the same. The pursuit of tea flavor and tea ceremony was in fact a perception and pursuit of the true meaning of life, reflecting an aesthetic spirit of returning to one's original nature.The first chapter mainly analyzes the interaction between the literati and businessmen, the populization of travelling together in literati and the connection between the two and the various tea-drinking activities.The second chapter,through an analysis of the detailed styles and content of literati's tea-drinking activities, based on a series of historical materials of poems, articles, paintings and accounts of travels, reveals its unique taste.The third chapter explores the spiritual pursuit of literati in their tea-drinking activities, examplified by the stories of Wen Zhengming, Xu Wei and Zhang Dai.The fourth chapter analizes the aethetic spirit of returning to one's original nature in literarti's tea-drinking activities and studies its significant influence on the tea culture construction at the present age.