This literary study will define the “division of labor” between Song dynasty classical poetry and lyrical poetry (ci) as a way to identify the differing themes of personal emotions and working environments in Kong Pingzhou's "The Grain is Ripe" and "Song for the River Tune" by Su Shi. The primary division of labor is based on the Su Shi’s method of ci style in a lyrical mode, which define the personal feelings of a poet through an emotional appeal to a more sophisticated reading audience. In this way, Su Shi meant for this poem to be read for an elite audience aka. the royal court, since the ci style was meant to abstract traditional lyrical songs to a more experimental use of line and metered in the personal expression of the poet. For instance, …show more content…
The poem “The grain is Ripe” expresses the “division of labor” in Chinese life, since it defines the experiences of the peasant farmer before, during, and after the harvest.. For instance, Pingzhao expresses the working life of the peasant perspective by poetical expressing the beauty of millet before and after the harvest has been brought in: “The millet smells sweet in the west wind/across a hundred miles,/streams draw back to underground channels,/the harvest is brought in” (Owen 657). Surely, the theme of the working life of the present farmer is beautified by landscape imagery, but the poem also expresses the experiences of the laborer in contrast with the personal emotions of court officials in Su Shi’s poetic expressions. This poem defines a personal experience of the laboring classes through the classical approach to poetry in the Song Dynasty tradition. In this manner, Su Shi and Pingzhao were peers that wrote during the same historical period, but they express different views of class-based experiences in the context of elite court poetry and the contrasting elements of peasant labor experiences as a division of labor. Pingzhao beautifully expresses the landscape, which also include imagery of the “old ox” that chews grass “in the setting sun” to identify with the peasant
First of alll, the poem is divided into nine stanzas, where each one has four lines. In addition to that, one can spot a few enjambements for instance (l.9-10). This stylistic device has the function to support the flow of the poem. Furthermore, it is crucial to take a look at the choice of words, when analysing the language.
P’u shamelessly addresses the fact that despite preaching honor and virtue, the nobility were the most lawless, yet only an idealized account would be recorded in history, as has always been. The author mocks this relinquishment in his own stories, as the moral is driven to immorality as rebels receive little to no punishment for their flagrant abuse of others and adultery against virtue. He describes the turmoil as “the ways that misery spawned recklessness and sudden, unreasoning violence that were almost impossible to deal with” (Spence 79). Laws themselves proved to be as wicked and depraved as their creators. For example, a horrific clause even encouraged men to take advantage of widows for profit. While the peasant class resisted their struggled by simply trying to survive, the upper nobility fought their problems by making the existence of those below them harder to bear. Enforced laws were done so with no due process, yet were made flexible by their own creators. Therefore, Spence exhibited the lawlessness and the government and its constant effort to contain this disorder. By hand-selecting the sources and settling on rural China, Spence felt the format effectively depicted his purpose. He effectively detailed history in relation to the average person of 17th century China and created a personal perspective that imbued the historical events with meaning. He most fully and accurately captures the greed, vision of morals, unaltered by elite preference and ironically one can draw parallels to our modern times. His purpose results in a richness of detail seldom observed in Chinese history. The principles of the time are captured through the poverty within the peasant class as every moment of their lives was set forth
“I Beg of You, Chung Tzu” and “Thick Grow the Rush Leaves” share many similarities. For example, both poems include refrains, a typical element of Chinese poetry in which word phrases are repeated at regular intervals. The refrain, “Chung Tzu I dearly love,” from “I Beg of You, Chung Tzu” and the refrain, “He whom I love,” from “Thick Grow the Rush Leaves” both emphasize the emotions each speaker feel for her beloved. In addition, the poems share the Chinese poetic
The story began in the day of Wang Lung's marriage. Precisely, the author gives a brief description of the routine obligations of Wang Lung as a son. Waking up early in the morning so as to boil the water and prepare the breakfast for his father and cleaning the house are not just what Wang Lung did in every single morning, but he also went to the field to do farming so that his family, which most of the time included his uncle's as well, would not be starved to death. He did manage the farm very well, and year by year he worked the field, produced the food, and sold to the market. He did these things cleverly. To increase the farm productivity, he practiced crop rotation method. Importantly, although he was not educated and could not even figure out any letter, he was quite a good businessman which was not commonly found. He kept his products and waited until the demand went high and supply went scare before selling for a good price. And this gave him `silver'. Remarkably, not a single piece of silver had he spent carelessly. He did not even go to the tea house where people of his age and the elders usually went to and spent their money as easily as water flows. Indeed, he saved little by little in hope of getting married and improving his life and to care for the old man, who stayed at home but did nothing except demanding food, demanding care, complaining, and so on like a little hungry child.
From the beginning of Wang Lung’s marriage to O-lan, she saved him time, money, and effort without complaint. She offered wisdom when asked and was smart in the ways of the world. During the famine, when the family went south in search of food, O-lan taught her children how to beg for food, “dug the small green weeds, dandelions, and shepherds purse that thrust up feeble new leaves”(p. 128). She raised her children prudently. She knew how to bind her daughter’s feet, and she gave them a better childhood than she had had. O-lan knew that the land was the only consistent thing in her life, so she willingly helped Wang Lung as he bought more and more land. O-lan knew her place in the family was as a wife and mother. As a wife, she fe...
The Death of Woman Wang, by Jonathan Spence is an educational historical novel of northeastern China during the seventeenth century. The author's focus was to enlighten a reader on the Chinese people, culture, and traditions. Spence's use of the provoking stories of the Chinese county T'an-ch'eng, in the province of Shantung, brings the reader directly into the course of Chinese history. The use of the sources available to Spence, such as the Local History of T'an-ch'eng, the scholar-official Huang Liu-hung's handbook and stories of the writer P'u Sung-Ling convey the reader directly into the lives of poor farmers, their workers and wives. The intriguing structure of The Death of Woman Wang consists on observing these people working on the land, their family structure, and their local conflicts.
Timothy Brook’s book, The Confusions of Pleasure: Commerce and Culture in Ming China is a detailed account of the three centuries of the Ming Dynasty in China. The book allows an opportunity to view this prominent time period of Chinese history. Confusions of Pleasure not only chronicles the economic development during the Ming dynasty, but also the resulting cultural and social changes that transform the gentry and merchant class. Brook’s insights highlight the divide between the Ming dynasty’s idealized beliefs, and the realities of its economic expansion and its effects. Brook describes this gap through the use of several first hand accounts of individuals with various social statuses.
Literature shows us the changes of our society from time to time. It also gives us an idea about people, culture, politics, gender traditions, as well as an overall view of previous civilizations. As a part of literature, poetry introduces us to different cultures with different perspectives. Ancient Egypt and ancient China may differ in terms of culture, politics, economic stability, tradition, or even in religious belief. However, in poetry, especially in love lyrics both Egyptian and Chinese poems portray common area of describing women, social attitudes toward love, sexuality and the existence of romance or selfishness in relationships. . If we look at the Egyptian poem “My god, my Lotus” and the Chinese poem “Fishhawk”, we will see both poems have similarities in describing relationships. Also, they have the similarity of imagining the lovers and their expression of love toward each other. However, both poems have some significant differences in terms of representing female sexuality, gender disparity and the display of love.
Power and Money do not Substitute Love and as it denotes, it is a deep feeling expressed by Feng Menglong who was in love with a public figure prostitute at his tender ages. Sadly, Feng Menglong was incapable to bear the expense of repossessing his lover. Eventually, a great merchant repossessed his lover, and that marked the end of their relationship. Feng Menglong was extremely affected through distress and desperation because of the separation and he ultimately, decided to express his desolation through poems. This incidence changed his perception and the way he represents women roles in his stories. In deed, Feng Menglong, is among a small number of writers who portrayed female as being strong and intelligent. We see a different picture build around women by many authors who profoundly tried to ignore the important role played by them in the society. Feng Menglong regards woman as being bright and brave and their value should never be weighed against
Also, the soldier’s word that chairman Mao wanted every peasant to have rice and Cuiqiao’s songs eulogized the Communist Party because they promised to treat the people equally and be able to lead them to defend the country for better lives. The comparison of villagers lived in different areas served to stand out the good relationship between the Communist Party and their supporting
...ery and veiled political references in Bei Dao’s poem, “Notes from the City of the Sun”, are used to exemplify the struggles of the people during the Cultural Revolution.
Valuing the Beauty of the “Jade Flower Palace” Beauty has been known to be one of the most subjective concepts in existence, yet Tu Fu, a renowned Chinese poet from the eighth century, writes so vibrantly that not many disagree with him. During his lifetime, Fu’s familiarity with both wealth and poverty showed the lack of importance money had on his world. Fu instead wrote about the elegance of the natural world and eventually humanitarianism, often commenting on beauty and its ability to go unnoticed. The poem “Jade Flower Palace” brings the latter to life, tying the allure of nature in with the passage of time.
..., he acknowledges and reinterprets traditional Chinese art in his works. This is his mode of expression via shanshui tradition, and his ways of thinking, viewing and perceiving are infiltrated by the literati ethos. He works in the computer with his countless digital photographs, he creates virtual city landscape, combining the countless small format snapshots in a way that imitate the characteristic structure and composition of the classical shanshui. In his works, we can see that it always visualizes how China is developing and illustrates the consequences of modernization, globalization and the destruction of China’s ecological equilibrium caused by the speedy growth of its megacities over the past few decades. Yang said, “ The media… is not important, no matter what method you use to create, to maintain the creative spirit of the ancients is the most import.”1
It will further deal with the development of tension throughout the poem. By making a distinction between tension through formal aspects, such as rhyme scheme, and tension through content it will try to show the interconnection between both of them. Additionally, the paper will deal with the possible effect of tension on the reader and how the poem might be perceived by him/her.
The poets integrated ?metaphysical conceits? as focal parts of these poems. Along with these, they used effective language as a basis for their convincing arguments, they included subjects of periodical importance (e.g. ?courtship? and ?religion?), and use very clever structures that are manipulated in order to make the poem read in the desired way. The very clear indication of the theme in question was strongly aided by the way in which the personas portrayed the emotions they felt and the way they showed their attitudes towards the subject. Considering all these factors, the poets made critical arguments to the mistresses in order to alter their views, thus changing their minds, on denying the poets the sex that they desired so strongly.