Ye Xie's "On the Origin of Poetry" (Yuan Shi) a Poetic of the Early Qing

Abstract

In the history of Chinese literature, times of poetic bloom only rarely appear to coincide with a flowering of literary theory. In most cases, reflection on begins after a period of blooming has subsided. We experience, for example, the first blooming of literary criticism during the late Six Dynasties as a reaction to the flourishing of during the preceding Han, Wei, and Jin dynasties. It was in this era that Zhong Rong AftV (/1. 483-513) wrote the Shipin 5n4rx (Classification of Poets) and Liu Xie WIR', (c.465-c.520) his great theoretical treatise Wenxin diaolong I'L'tfit (The Literary Mind and the Carving of Dragons) which, with its comprehensive, systematic, and profound probing into the essence of literature, stands unrivalled in the history of Chinese literary criticism. The minor theorists of the High Tang, the Golden Age of Chinese poetry, such as Wang Changling 3Piff (c.690-c.756) and the monkJiaoran A (730-99), are more acknowledged for their rather than their theoretical works; and Sikong Tu's J1 (837-908) influential series of critical poems Ershisi shipin -t+VANN (Twenty-four Classes of Poetry) was written, long after the bloom, at the very end of this dynasty. Likewise, the theoretical and critical reception of the flowering of during the Tang and Northern Song first began with Yan Yu's #11 important treatise Canglang shihua (Canglang's Poetry Talk), written during the Southern Song period. This work, which interprets in analogy to Chan-Buddhist ideas-i.e., understood as a reflection of the intuitive, enlightened apprehension of reality-was to have a lasting influence on literary theory in the centuries to come, particularly on the archaist movements of the periods that concern us here, the Ming and early Qing dynasties. The Qing period fits right into this pattern: insignificant regarding poetry, but flowering in theory. The critical literature of this time, the so-called poetry talks (shihua 'i# ),' outmatches in