Cao Xun Poetry

Cao Xun was a politician and literati between Northern Song Dynasty and Southern Song Dynasty. He had many excellent works handed down for hundreds including poems, ci, and prose. The Song Poems'Selection and Explanation of Qian Zhongshu has high comments on his poems, which were written on his journeies to Jinguo for three times. Unfortunately scholars haven't paid enough concern to his poems or made research in them on the whole. The thesis intends to study on his whole poems and makes an objective comment through linking the time background and Cao Xun's life experience. The full thesis is divided into four chapters.The first chapter has discussed Cao Xun's experience, friendship and writing. His experience was very rich. He had ever followed Emperor Huizong to go to the North during Jingkang Event and went to Jinguo as a diplomat for three times later. His friends were not only in a large number but also a complexity of identity, ranging from the bureaucracy, the literati and the Buddhist monk to the Taoist priest. His works are quite rich- forty volumes of Song Yin Collection and one volume of North Kano Recorded Knowledge. The special experience and friendship had a great impact on his activity of poetry.The second chapter has introduced Cao Xun's thought. He claimed war in the early period and peace in the later period, which varied a lot. When he was young, his political thought was very positive and then turned the seclusion thought after "Peace during Shaoxing' Period". This change resulted from not only his time, but also his own association. The change of thought brought the change of poetry style, from the Poem of One Mission to Jinguo and Political Allegorical Poetry to Landscape Lyric Poetry and Communication Poetry.The third chapter has studied about the Poems of One Mission to Jinguo of Cao Xun'. During the time of Cao Xun's period, the Song and Jinguo were confronting, who sent diplomatic envoys to each other and contacted frequently. These poems were rich in contents, which were full of the grief on his native country, the tragic life of the North descendants and the hardships of the road to Jinguo. It can be said that Cao Xun opened the first road of the Poem of One Mission to Jinguo in Southern Song Dynasty and had a significant influence on the subsequent writers. In comparison with the poems of Hong Hao and Zhu Bian, the Poem of One Mission to Jinguo of Cao Xun's has more magnificent value and meaning.The forth chapter has commented on the other poems of Cao Xun. According to Cao Xun's creative experience, the content of poems can be generally divided into Political Allegorical Poetry, Landscape Lyric Poetry and Communication poetry except the Poem of One Mission to Jinguo. The sections of this chapter are described in order to show the full view of Cao Xun's poems.