Norms And Beyond

Zhang Dai is an important writer between Ming and Qing Dynasty, whose essays' achievement has given him very high reputation. This paper is on the study of their regulation and transcendence on essays of the late Ming dynasty.The lifetime of Zhang Dai is conflict. In former half of his life, he is a celebrity, while he becomes an adherent of the former dynasty in the latter half. He has lived in Ming Dynasty for 48 years. His family property and reputation do not only offer him a comfortable life in Jiang Nan area, but also let him make friends with varied personage good at literature and art, who appreciate and encourage each others. In this period, Jiangsu-Zhejiang area is prosperous and has an extravagant custom, which makes him pursue the exquisite and high art rank life. However, all these are lost at the end of Ming Dynasty. Zhang Dai becomes a cultural survivor. He expresses the deep grief in Iris essays for the former dynasty and the life.Zhang Dai's essays contain pride and bitter, which reflects his deep love for the former dynasty. But with the consolidation of the Qing regime and the trend of the pragmatism being on the rise, Zhang Dai's essays become more and more simple and elegant. Furthermore, this style has covered author's real emotion. In fact, this style is between elegance and popularization. They have merged elegant literature and popular literature, and also mix together with tradition literature and newly popular literature. So they are admired by all people. This style reflects that they will return to elegant tradition.Zhang Dai's essays are standardized by the essays of late Ming dynasty and their authors, while the value of Zhang Dai's essays embodies in their transcendence over them. Zhang Dai's essays remove the innate frivolous style of the late Ming dynasty essays with the historical depth. They have exceeded restriction of essay and integrate prose, poetry, novel, and traditional opera as a whole. When Zhang Dai's essays show the trend of returning to the elegant style and get to the peak having a comprehensive expression, they are just back to the tradition literature involution actually. Thus they lost their unique characteristics, and go to the grave in the end.