Ren Yuanxiang And His Literary Studies

Ren Yuanxiang(1618-1675),a literati from Yixing Country in the late Ming and early Qing Dynasties,participated in the children's test in 1634,and became a student after taking the test.He was not served as an official in the period of the demise of the Ming Dynasty and lived a semi-hermit life.After entering the Qing Dynasty,he successively served as the staff of Peng Rongyuan,the manager of Jiahe,and the Shi Jixia's Assistant to the Governor of Anren County.In his later years,he was keen on discussing Yangming's theory of mind.He was adept to writing articles,especially his poems and ancient writings are well-known,including The Song Crane Hall Poetry Collection and The Song Crane Hall Literature Collection.And his poems are highly appreciated by Hou Fangyu Living in XueYuan and Wei Xi residing in Ningdu.His poems are straightaway,elegant and precise,which was celebrated paralleling with Chen Weisong.As an important literati in Yangxian area in the early Qing Dynasty,Ren Yuanxiang's poetry style is similar to the mainstream literary style in the early Qing Dynasty and has its own characteristics,which occupies a certain position in the literary arena in the early Qing Dynasty.Therefore,this paper takes the poetry and literature of Ren Yuanxiang as the research object,firstly examines his family background,life and social relations,then makes an in-depth analysis of his poetry content and artistic style,and explores its literary ideas.The full text is divided into four chapters:The first chapter is mainly about Ren Yuanxiang's personal experience and works.First of all,through Ren's genealogy,local chronicles and other documents,sort out Ren's family relationship;secondly,combined with personal biography and related information,explore Ren's life trajectory and personality characteristics;thirdly,through the collection and collation of literature,focus on the circulation of the editions of his works;finally,according to his life writings and related historical materials,study his relationship.The second chapter mainly studies the content and artistic characteristics of Ren Yuanxiang's poems in light of the academic background of the late Ming and early Qing dynasties and the regional literature.This article divides it into five categories according to the theme:epic poems,friends poems,landscape poems,chanting epic poems and sentimental poems.His poems are based on the ancients,stressing temperament and presenting simple and elegant artistic style.The third chapter mainly studies the content and artistic features of Ren Yuanxiang's prose.Ren Yuanxiang's prose includes four categories:preface,biography,miscellaneous records and mourning and memorial articles.It has the artistic characteristics of advocating ancient learning and the characteristics of simple and precise style.The fourth chapter mainly studies Ren Yuanxiang's poetic thoughts and prose theory.Combining with his literary theory scattered in poetry,letters and prefaces of poems and essays,this paper first describes his poetic concepts,and secondly studies his theory of ancient prose.Appendix 1 is Ren Yuanxiang's life chronology,trying to present Ren Yuanxiang's life track intuitively and intuitively.Appendix 2 collates the literati's comments on Minghe Hall Collection in the early Qing Dynasty in order to have a better understanding of its prose features.