Qin And Han Poem

Among all of forms of ancient poetry in China,seven-syllable poetry,which is the important part and one of the most outstanding representatives,has great vitality because of its harmonious rhythm,fabulous art infections and the popularity among ordinary people.Seven-syllable poetry has been popular since pre-Qin dynasty. Book of Poetry,ballads of pre-Qin dynasty ,the Elegies of Chu and Cheng Xiang by Xunzi all effected the development of seven-syllable poetry in some way. Although we can't identify which one is the source of it,researches proved that there were closer relationship between ballads of pre-Qin dynasty,Cheng Xiang by Xunzi and seven-syllable poetry.There have been so many arguments about the origination of seven-syllable poetry,but nobody has reviewed and organized the remained seven-syllable poetry in Pre-Qin and Han Dynasties fastidiously. Based on pre-researches,This thesis is based on The Poems of Pre-Qin Dynasty,Han Dynasty,Wei Jin Period,Northern and Southern Dynasties by Mr. Lu Qinli,and also covers the other seven-syllable poems from history works,reference books,wordbooks,notebooks and poetry anthology. All my research objects as follow:in pre-Qin dynasty:all the seven-syllable poems in Book of Poetry,The Elegies of Chu,Cheng Xiang by Xunzi,the lost ones and7 folk songs;in Han dynasties:84folk songs,the seven-syllable poems of 21 literates,398 seven-syllable inscription on bronze mirror,Shi Ce Wen in Tai Ping Scripture of Taoism and seven-syllable poems stone carving on a cliff in the Later Han dynasty in Henan Province.This thesis contains two parts:the first part raises some different views against that seven-syllable poetry came from The Book of Songs or from Chu Ci. and proves that there is closer relationship between seven-syllable poetry and Cheng Xiang by Xunzi.The second part which contains the systematic research of seven-syllable poetry is the major part of this thesis. This thesis not only points out that most of ballads and folk songs in Han Dynasties took seven-syllable as their forms but also analyses the reasons of the popularity of seven-syllable poetry in Han Dynasties. The detailed analysis of three special seven-syllable songs in The History of Wu and Yue proves that there were obvious differences in both the length and the rhythm of the poems between these three songs and the ballads in Pre-Qin Dynasty,so they should be regarded as the works in the name of person in Pre-Qin Dynasty other than the real author in Han Dynasties,so that it is unsuitable for Mr. Lu Qinli to include them three into the Chapter Two of Poems in Pre-Qin, Han, Weijin, South and North Dynasties. In this part author draws the outline on the development of literati's seven-syllable poetry through the analysis on why the seven-syllable poetry in Han Dynasty weren't known as Poetry. What's more,there were many seven-syllable inscriptions on the bronze mirrors in Han Dynasties and this thesis collects more than 300 of them. The word"seven-syllable"appeared in the inscriptions frequently and the contents of the inscriptions proved that the record of seven-syllable originated from the inscriptions on bronze mirrors. As the concrete evidence,these inscriptions on the bronze mirrors reflected the character and the popularity of seven-syllable poetry,which wasn't regarded as Poem at that time. Seven-syllable poetry was not the main stream of the literati's works in Han Dynaties,but it was a special literature phenomenon. The detailed performance as following:The seven-syllable ballads and proverbs with the main content about personage comments didn't appear in any other ages except of Han dynasties. What's more,they gave notable social influence in Han Dynasties. Seven-syllable poetry was the main literature form of inscription on the bronze mirror in Han dynasty for its large quantity. The attaching importance to rhyme and the rhythm called"Two Two Three",which was up to the rhythm of later seven-syllable poetry,as the concrete evidence,reflected the characters of seven-syllable poetry in Han dynasties,as the result,seven-syllable inscriptions on bronze mirrors became an important literature form in literature history.The limited number of literati's seven-syllable poetry show us an obvious artistic process of development:pay more attention to syllabic rhyme and rhythm gradually mainly with the form of same numbers of words in one verse and notional words in the style; transfer the contents from the enumerating the names of objects to emotional outpourings;turn the literature technique from Fu to the combination of rhyme and emotion.The standpoint of poetry study on poetry structure can make us a better understand of the development , performance function , character and the particular culture connotation in which the seven-syllable poems were born.Seven-syllable poetry in pre-Qin and Han dynasties is an important literature phenomenon which is worth studying seriously. That is the main reason why I choose it as my subject.This thesis reviews and organized the texts of seven-syllable poetry in Pre-Qin and Han Dynasties fastidiously on the base of the overall research of them,so it can show us a more clear picture of its initial performance,its transformation of style and the particular culture connotation in which the seven-syllable poetry was born.