10. Tang Poetry
In 581 Yang Jian, prime minister of the Northern Zhou, seized
power and established the $ui dynasty. Eight years later he unified
China after he conquered Chen in the south, thus putting an end to
the period of division which lasted more than three centuries.
His son, who succeeded him, was a corrupt and evil emperor.
His despotic rule was hated by the people, and peasant uprisings
started. The dynasty was overthrown only 37 years after it was
founded.
Li Yuan, a military commander in Taiyuan, Shanxi, raised an
army and occupied Chang'an. In 618 he founded the Tang dynasty.
His chief advisor was his second son, Li Shimin. In a power struggle
Shimin killed his two brothers; his father had to give him the
throne.
This ambitious and capable young man turned out to be one of
the wisest emperors of ancient China. He was later called Tang
Taizong. The 130 years from his time to the time of Tang Xuanzong
was the heyday not only of the Tang dynasty, but of the whole feudal
period of China. The Tang emperors ruled over a vast area, larger
than China had been during the Hart dynasty. China was then the
largest and strongest country in the world; it was also economically
and culturally the most advanced. In Chang'an, the capital, there
were over 300,000 households, with a great number of merchants,
traders, scholars and students from foreign countries. Chinese cul-
ture, including philosophy, and political, legal and economic sys-
terns, had a far-reaching influence, especially in East Asia. At the
same time, foreign products and culture were introduced into China~
In 755 the revolt of An Lushan and Shi Siming broke out. Their
troops entered Chang'an, and Xuanzong fled to Sichuan in a hurry~
This was the beginning of the decline of the Tang dynasty~ But the
dynasty, though shaky, continued to rule China for another 150
years, and came to an end in 907.
Chinese poetry has a very long history. The Book of Songs, the
first collection of folk songs and poems, was compiled before Confu-
cius' time, for he mentioned the book and asked his students to study
it several times. Most of the poems in the book were composed dur-
ing the Western Zhou period, or the 1,000 years before Confucius. It
was said that the Zhou rulers sent officials to different parts of the
country to collect folk songs. They were then presented to the rulers,
who tried to judge the sentiments and views of the people by them.
The Book of Songs marked the beginning of Chinese literature,
and also the beginning of realism in literature. Many of the 305 po-
ems in the book deal with the lives of the common people, their daily
occupations, their joys and sorrows, their hard work and duties in
wars.
Then in the Warring States period the state of Chu in the south
produced a great poet--Qu Yuan(340- 278 BC). He was the first
Chinese poet whose name we know. When he saw that his state was
approaching ruin and yet he could do nothing to save it, he drowned
himself in the Miluo River near Lake Dongting. His representative
work is the Li Sao ( Sorrows at Departure ), which is a long poem
describing his love for his state and his disappointment at its situa-
tion. The poem marks the beginning of romanticism in Chinese poet-
ry, as it contains descriptions of imagined scenes in heaven.
During the period of the two Hart dynasties and the period of the
Southern and Northern Dynasties, many poets wrote poems with
five-character lines. Outstanding among them were Cao Cao and his
two sons, and Tao Qian. There were beautiful poems whose writers
were unknown, such as the "Nineteen Ancient Poems" and "South-
eastward Flies the Peacock".
The Tang dynasty was the golden age of Chinese poetry. In the
number of poems and variety of forms, in the beauty of imagery and
broadness of themes, Tang poetry surpassed that of all ages before it.
In The Complete Anthology of Tang Poetry, edited during the Qing
dynasty, are collected nearly 50, 000 poems by 2, 200 poets. This
means that in 300 years the Tang poets wrote more poems than all
the poets had in the 2,000 years before it.
Several factors made this possible. The Sui rulers had started the
civil service examinations with which to select officials from among
scholars. These examinations were continued in the Tang dynasty.
As a result, many people, mainly landlords' children, studied hard to
sit for the examinations, which required writing poems. Besides,
there was to a certain extent freedom of thought; Confucianism,
Taoism and Buddhism were all studied and discussed by scholars.
The unification of the country made it possible for scholars to travel
north and south, increasing their contacts and experience and broad-
ening their vision. Foreign arts, especially those of West and Central
Asia, were introduced into Central China, and they enriched the cul-
tural life of the Hah people. Finally, from the Western Zhou to the
Southern and Northern Dynasties, Chinese poetry had been develop-
ing and had become rich in content and form. This long history pro-
vided conditions for the blossoming of Tang poetry.
This long tradition had two clear features: one was that folk
songs or yuefu were the main origin of the different poetic forms;
the other was that realism was the main tendency. Most poets were
concerned about the conditions of the country and the life of the peo-
ple.
Among the most famous Tang poets are Li Bai, Du Fu and Bai
Juyi.
Li Bai (701 - 762) was born in Suiye in Central Asia. His an-
cestors had been banished there by the Sui rulers. At five he moved
to Sichuan with his father, who was probably a rich merchant. When
young, he studied not only Confucian classics, but works of other
schools. After 20 he first travelled far and wide in Sichuan, and then
he started a long journey to Central, East and North China. He did
not sit for the civil service examination, for he looked down upon it.
But he wished to become an official. When he was 42, he was rec-
ommended to Tang Xuanzong, who ordered him to go to Chang'an.
He stayed there for three years and was bitterly disappointed. During
the years of An Lushan's rebellion, he joined the staff of Prince Li
Lin. Later, because Li Lin tried to seize power and failed, Li Bai was
exiled to Yelang, in present day Guizhou Province. On his way to
Yelang he was freed by an amnesty. He went to East China and died
at 62 in Dangtu, Anhui.
He wrote as many as 900 poems. Some of them describe the life
of the people; some describe the magnificent scenery he saw; others
express his own wishes and sorrows. His poems are characterized by
unusual imagination and free and direct expression of feelings. That
is why he is called a romantic poet.
At dawn I left Baidi towering in the midst of colorful clouds,
And reached Jiangling a thousand li away in a day.
The screams of monkeys on either bank went on and on,
While my light boat passed by ten thousand hills.
Satisfaction and admiration will fill our hearts when we read such
beautiful and dashing lines. They are so colorful, so musical, and so
impressive. The image in the poem--a boat rushing forward down
the gorges--is just a description of the poet himself.
Du Fu(712 - 770) was born in Gongxian, Henan. The son of
an official, he was interested inlearning when he was young. "I read
over ten thousand volumes," he said. At 20 he started his 10-year-
long travels from north to south. At 35 he went to Chang'an, where
he stayed for ten years without getting any position in the govern-
ment. His disappointment made him look at reality and see the sharp
contrast between the life of the upper classes and that of the ordinary
people. He began to write poems about the sufferings of the poor.
After An Lushan's rebellion began, he had a hard time as a refugee,
but this brought him closer to the people. His well-known poems de-
scribing three officials and three departures were written during this
period. In 759 he went to Chengdu. After wandering in Sichuan,
Hubei and Hunan for more than ten years, he finally died on board a
small boat on his way from Changsha to Yueyang.
Deep sympathy for the people is one of the main characteristics
of Du Fu's poems. In this respect he surpassed all earlier poets. His
poems have been called "poetic history," for they reflect the political
and military situation of his time, and the life and miseries of the
people. He pushed the tradition of realism in poetry to a new level.
Here are the first six lines from the poem "The Official of Shi-
had"
At dusk I came to Shihao Village to stay overnight,
And heard an official trying to catch someone after dark.
The old man in the house climbed over the wall and fled,
Leaving the old woman: to face the official at the door.
Shouting loudly, the official was very angry;
Sobbing bitterly, the woman was full of sorrow.
Du Fu exposes the shameless luxury of the ruling class in these
famous lines:
Behind the red doors wine and meat stink,
But on the roads lie men frozen to death.
Li Bai and Du Fu are among the greatest poets that China has
produced. Their poems have given the Chinese people boundless in-
spiration and have been taken as models of poetry. Han Yu, also a fa-
mous Tang poet, wrote: "The works of Li and Du are there; their
brilliant light will shine forever."
Two years after Du Fu died, another great poet was born. Bai
Juyi(772- 846), the son of a petty official, was born in Xinzheng,
Henan. He spent his youth wandering about to escape wars, and was
often cold and hungry. He was successful in civil service examina-
tions, became an official, and worked in the central government for
about 15 years. Then because he was disliked by those in power, he
was sent to work in Jiangzhou (now Jiujiang), Hangzhou and
Suzhou. Later he moved to Luoyang, where he died at the age of 75.
Bai Juyi wrote more poems than any other Tang poet--nearly
3,000. Many of them deal with important social and political prob-
lems, and show signs of Du Fu's influence. He also wrote many lyrics
expressing his personal feelings. His two long narrative poems--"The
Everlasting Sorrow" and "The Song of a Pipa Player"--are among
the best known. Many of his poems have deep meaning, and they are
written in simple and plain language, which ordinary readers can un-
derstand.
The following are a few lines from "The Old Man with a Broken
Arnl".
In the south and in the north of my village people wept sadly;
Children were parting from parents and husbands from
wives.
Everyone said that in battles against the southern tribes,
Of ten thousand men sent there not one returned.
The poem clearly shows the poet's opposition to battles against border
tribes, which caused miseries to both Han and tribal people.
In "The Song of a Pipa Player" there are these lines describing
the beautiful music produced by the Pipa:
Strong and loud, the thick string sounded like a sudden
shower;
Weak and soft, the thin string whispered in your ear.
When strong and weak, loud and soft sounds were mixed,
They were like big and tiny pearls falling on a jade plate.
Tang poetry is indeed an inexhaustible treasury. In every sense it is
the peak of Chinese poetry. The Chinese people are rightly proud of
this incomparable heritage.