Gu Lin And Mid Ming Literary Trends

The thesis is on the study of the birth, development and evolution of Gu Lin's literature thoughts, as well as the reaction and impact on the main literary genre at that time, basing on the trend of literary thoughts of Mid Ming, in order to revaluate Gu's active role in the reactionary literary movement in Ming Dynasty.The first chapter focuses on Gu Lin's life, career and the background of his time. It scripts the general social trends and the impact on Gu's literary thoughts, by introducing the general facts of economic development, scholars' minds, literary structures and many other aspects of the society of Mid Ming. It also studies Gu's life and works. It is divided into three parts:beginning, turning point and maturation period, basing on his literature life, as well as his political experience, in order to find out the external reasons of the development of his literary thoughts. At the end of the chapter, it combs Gu's writing works to fully grasp his literary activities, and represent his mind and literary thoughts at that moment.ChapterⅡfocuses on the formation course of Gu's Literary thoughts from Chenghua Year 12 to the early Zhengde years. First, it studies the friendship between Gu lin and Chaling school, such as Qiao Yu, Shao Bao and Chu Guan, and the Pre-Seven, such as Li Mengyang and Xu Zhenqing, from whom he got the reactionary literary ideas, after he got the JinShi Honor. And then it studies Gu's annotation works of the book Tangyin in Hongzhi Year 10 (1497), which represents Gu's concentration on "Xing Yi", reality, forms and art of poems, which reflects his early reactionary literary thoughts.The third chapter studies the development and change of Gu's literary thoughts during early Zhengde years and Jiajing Year 2 (1523). At first, Gu's thoughts innovated by matching original reactionary literary thoughts and abandoning the Six Dynasties' literature style, because of the close contact with the writers of Reaction School in early Zhengde years. And then, in the late Zhengde years, because of the frustrating political life and the seeping of Xinxue, Gu Lin's literary thoughts tended to Confucian poetry education, advocating "Wen" and "Dao" by abandoning Classics, learning from various schools and giving up extravagant writing, to go back to nature. Compared to previous ideas, it has more signs of self-reflection.Chapter Four studies the course of the maturity of Gu's thoughts from Jiajing Year 3 (1523) to Jiajing Year 24 (1545). First, due to the long residence in Nanjing, frequent literary activities and the prestige of reactionary literary movements, Gu Lin became the leader of Nanjing's literary world, which did not only promote the personal development of literary thought and creativity, but also promoted the integration of all the powers of poetry schools of Nanjing, as well as leading the regional literary customs. Secondly, as a native of Suzhou, Gu Lin had a wide friendship circle in Wu. Gu and Xu Zhenqing's cognition and guide of Suzhou literary schools had an impact on the direction of the literary thoughts of Wu, causing the spreading of the reactionary literary thoughts from the north to the south. In the end of the chapter, it combs the literary thoughts of Gu's late years.