Xiao Gang Poetry

Xiao Gang. the Emperor Jianwen of the Liang, with his nearly three hundred poems left. is considered one of the most prolific poets in the Wei. the Jin and the Southern and Northern Dynasties. However. a poetry collection with such plenteousness has long been simply unified under the common title of the Palace Style Poetry. Following the canonization of the literary history and the fixation of the literary notion, the Palace Style Poetry has gradually become a synonym of the Love Poems in the Southern Liang and Chen. bearing the accusations such as "frivolity", "ornament". "decadency", "salacity" and even "the tune presaging the fallen nation". Xiao Gang's poetry, being completely included in the term of the Palace Style Poetry. naturally takes over all the blames that have been laid upon this common title. From traditional historical and literary criticism, to the academic studies in the modern and contemporary works. Xiao Gang's Poetry and the Palace Style Poetry went through the judgment of generations of scholars, but somehow were constantly and undoubtedly regarded as two appellations of one same object. Up until today, in the most general sense, people are firmly equating Xiao Gang's Poetry with the Palace Style Poetry, and furtherly equating both to the Love Poems.Many problems remain. however, exactly in this equation between Xiao Gang's Poetry and the Love Poems, the most obvious among which, is the conflict between the definition as the Love Poems and the diversity of the themes of Xiao Gang's Poetry. Apart from the theme of women and love, there is more than two thirds of Xiao Gang's Poetry in quantity which are covering a variety of themes, such as natural sceneries, objects, friendship, inner thoughts and feelings, as well as writings upon orders and reasons. Confined in the cognizance which is centered around the Love Poems, most of the studies on the background and the characteristics of both the artistic techniques and the emotional expression of Xiao Gang's Poetry tend to cater for the supposed features of the Love Poems,and result, mostly in biased conclusions. In a much deeper level, when we extend our view to the whole dynasty of the Liang, or even further to the entire Southern Dynasties, it will dawn to us that defining Xiao Gang's Poetry exclusively as the Love Poems has. in a great degree, affected our knowledge on the general traits of the literary world and on the evolutional process of literature itself. In consideration of these problems, this thesis, under the premise of being free from the definition of the Love Poems, takes Xiao Gang's Poetry as the subject. Using multiple methods including traditional philological investigation, textual collation and cultural context research, I am trying to provide a textual state as reliable and cultural background as truthful as possible. In the mean time, I bring in the "stylistic studies" as another chief means, which was performed on the levels of the words, the images and the structures of the poetic texts, respectively, in order to thoroughly explore the stylistic features of Xiao Gang's Poetry. Moreover, when it comes to the relationship between Xiao Gang's Poetry and the Palace Style Poetry, this thesis particularly lays emphasis on a properly set cognitive logic. The Palace Style Poetry, being a certain poetic "style" at the time after Xiao Gang took the throne of the East Palace and became the Crowned Prince of the Liang, shows its main characteristics in Xiao Gang's Poetry, therefore, the whole collection (not just the themes of women and love) of Xiao Gang's Poetry typically represents the stylistic features of the Palace Style Poetry. The proper research logic should base the study of the Palace Style Poetry on a full understanding of Xiao Gang's Poetry, instead of shaping a twisted frame around the latter with the rigid yet problematic definition of the former, which unfortunately, exists in most of the contemporary studies. Due to the fact that the definition and the future research on the Palace Style Poetry must wait for a clear and relatively objective knowledge of Xiao Gang's Poetry, this thesis should be able to provide a fair foundation for the study on the Palace Style Poetry and not be mistaken for one. To avoid confusion, I will be very careful with the term of the Palace Style Poetry and not use it casually.Abiding by the logic and the methods mentioned above. I carry out my studies as follows:The introduction part, through a thoroughly analytical summary of the traditional criticism and the modern studies, aims at bringing up the problems raised by the prevailing tendency of defining Xiao Gang's Poetry as the Love Poems. After setting up the research goals of this thesis. it comes to the main part of the study covering five chapters. In this part, I divided the five chapters into three study sections based on the different directions led by the research methods. The first chapter uses the traditional philological methods including the investigation of the editions and the textual collation, in order to question the general understanding on Xiao Gang's Poetry and the entire literary world of the Liang with the hard evidence provided by the empirical study. which is so far still a blank space in the related fields. With the philological studies.I also try to build up an utmost reliable textual basis for the following stylistic analysis. In the second chapter. my discussions focus on the cultural context of Xiao Gang's era. The methods used in this chapter exhibit a multidisciplinary perspective. I combine the knowledge on the philosophy and history with the studies on the literature, in the hope of setting up a background that most closely represents the cultural context of Xiao Gang's time. The third section consists of the next three chapters, in which the stylistic studies are the main methods. According to the hierarchical relationship formed among the words, the images and the structures of the poetic texts, chapter three, four and five discuss the basic, the core and the highest levels of the stylistic features respectively. Closely carrying on the studies in the main part, the extra discussion raises some new views against the common understanding that Xiao Gang's Poetry is lack of the emotional expression. In the end. with the complete research on Xiao Gang's Poetry. I extend my exploration a little further to the future studies on the Palace Style Poetry in the coda, where the proper logic emphasized in this thesis in dealing with the relationship between Xiao Gang's Poetry and the Palace Style Poetry is finally accomplished.