Abstract
Natural grace and exquisite craftsmanship stand as polarities in the aesthetics of classical Chinese poetry. As early as the Chu ci, a style of ornate embellishment can be distinctly seen. This reached inundating proportions in the Han (206 B.C.-220A.D.) epideictic fu, and remained visible in shi poetry in a line of poets from Cao Zhi (192-232) through the Southern – Northern Dynasties (420-589), who display a penchant for flowery adornment that underpinned Chinese aesthetics until the early years of the Tang (618-907). The eager forging of parallelism in poetry represents one feature of this aesthetic of elaborate refinement; as Liu Xie (c.465-C.532) observes, poetry from Liu- Song (420-479) times up to his age has “adopted parallel couplets that extend to a hundred words” (Wenxin diaolong 6, Ming shi, Liu 1960, 67).
| Original language | English |
|---|---|
| Title of host publication | The Yields of Transition: Literature, Art and Philosophy in Early Medieval China |
| Publisher | Cambridge Scholars |
| Pages | 203-224 |
| Number of pages | 22 |
| ISBN (Print) | 9781443827140 |
| Publication status | Published - 1 Jan 2011 |