A Study On TanHua Poems Of Imperial Examination In Middle-and-Late Tang Dynasty

The middle and late Tang Dynasty's Tanhua Poems refer to the poems created by newly enrolled Jinshi,gathering at a banquet at Xingyuan. Among them there are poems focusing on eulogizing the Tanhua banquet and particular sentences expressing personal emotions on imperial examination system. According to the author's statistics in Full collection of Tang Poems, the number of Tanhua pomes is close to one hundred and ten. And most of them were connected with poets living in the Middle and Late Tang Dynasty, including BaiJuyi, YuanZhen, YaoHe, WenTingjun, ZhengGu, etc, who had similar experiences in imperial examination. Tanhua poems has been regarded as an excellent art form, for its contribution to expending themes of Tang Poems and techniques of expression, as well as embodying social life and artistic charm. The body of the thesis is divided into for parts. The first part, based on the formation and development of Tanhua banquet in Xingyuan, is to define Tanhua poems by analyzing its basic style and the reasons of its popularity. In the second part, the content of Tanhua poems were expressed in three different emotional types, respectively representing three kinds of people—— A Tanhua, Being a Tanhua after several attempts and Juren(a successful candidate in the imperial examination at the provincial level). The third part mainly discuss image types, techniques of expression and linguistic style of Tanhua poems. Finally, on the basis of the former classification—— imperial examination system, etiquette and custom of imperial examination, complex emotions and mutual admiration of Jinshi, the thesis will present a further elucidation of the literary and culture value of Tanhua poems.