"Research on the Jiangxi Poetry School" is Professor Mo Lifeng's doctoral dissertation, and it is also the earliest monograph on the comprehensive study of the Jiangxi Poetry School, and was rated as the "Greatest Achievement of the Study of the Song Poetry School" in 1987. In this article, Professor Mok shares with us his writing experience, which is also his philosophy of learning, which was written 30 years ago and is still relevant today.
The editor asked me to talk about my experience of studying classical literature and writing papers in the column of "Ways to Study", and I was really "flattered." In my mind, this section is designed for my teachers to share their academic experiences. As for myself, I always feel that the wall of classical literature is "counted, and no one can enter", so how can I know the way to enter the room? However, considering that the readers of this journal are mainly young friends, it is necessary to exchange experiences among classmates.
I have loved to read classical poetry since I was a child, and when I was in the countryside, several crumpled pamphlets of Tang and Song poems accompanied me through ten years of loneliness. But my real interest in classical literature came in 1979 after I was admitted as a graduate student with Professor Cheng Qianfan at Nanjing University. Mr. Cheng teaches students in a step-by-step manner, but he also pays great attention to cultivating students' ability to think independently. When I started writing my dissertation, although my husband was very strict with me on some specific operating procedures, he completely let go of the viewpoint of the dissertation and often encouraged me to put forward my own opinions. In this way, in the process of writing "Research on Jiangxi Poetry School", in addition to following the teachings of Mr., I also have some experience of my own. To sum up, there are three points:
1. In the study of classical literature, it is necessary to grasp detailed materials and avoid making empty arguments.
The classical literature of the mainland has a history of several thousand years, and all kinds of classics are vast. For people of our generation who are not reading "Ziyun Poems" since childhood, it is indeed a little daunting. I often hear young friends sigh and say: We can't read so many books in the wombs of old-timers in our lives! I think it's true, that we really can't compare with our predecessors in terms of erudition. However, the overall disadvantage does not prevent us from fighting with superior forces in individual campaigns, that is to say, when studying a specific topic, we can still master as much material as possible, even surpassing our predecessors.
I spent a year collecting materials when I was researching the Jiangxi Poetry School, and I think one of the reasons why the academic community lacks a correct evaluation of the Jiangxi Poetry School is that they do not have detailed materials. For example, a very influential "History of Chinese Literature" said: "The Tales of Tiaoxi Yuyin Cong once quoted Huang Tingjian's poem and said: 'Follow others to plan for the end of posterity', and also said that 'articles are most taboo to follow others'." Obviously, the author believes that Huang Tingjian's original poems no longer exist, but in fact, both poems can be found in the "Valley Poems Outside the Collection", and there is no need to quote from other people's works. This "History of Chinese Literature" also says that Lü Benzhong's "Sect Map of Jiangxi Poetry Society" "first lists Huang Tingjian, Chen Shidao, and Chen Heyi", but in fact, there are four Song works that record Lü's picture, and none of them mentions Chen Heyi. This can sometimes have serious consequences. The works on the history of literature and literary criticism published after the liberation almost without exception criticized Huang Tingjian's poetry for not reflecting social reality and lacking the breath of life, and so on. In fact, if our eyes are not limited to "The Inner Collection of the Valley", then it is easy to find many good poems in Huang's poems that profoundly and vividly reflect the social reality of people's livelihood and suffering, and some of them, such as "Tiger Nanshan", are very sharp when exposing feudal harshness, which is better than similar works by Wang Anshi and Su Shi. Why do people not mention Huang Tingjian's such works when they affirm poems such as Wang Anshi's "Hebei People" and Su Shi's "Wu Zhongtian's Women's Sigh"? This is obviously because I didn't read through the Yellow Collection.
So, how can you collect the material as exhaustively as possible? My experience is that we should first make full use of the existing research results in the academic world, especially some informative books. I am very grateful to Mr. Fu Xuancong, who compiled the "Huang Tingjian and the Jiangxi Poetry School Volume", which enabled me to collect materials according to the map, thus saving a lot of time. Nowadays, there are a lot of informational reference books, which is a great convenience for young friends. The second is to read more diligent records, which everyone knows, needless to say.
Fu Xuancong, ed. Huang Tingjian and the Jiangxi School of Poetry
After collecting the materials, there is also a process of sorting out the fake and preserving the truth. In the writings of the ancients, there are often completely different records of the same person and the same thing, which requires us to do some research and verification. Generally speaking, young people are less skilled in this area. But I think that since it is impossible for us to bypass this process, we should start as soon as possible and seriously exercise our ability in this area. In my research, I touched on issues such as Lu Benzhong's "Sect Map of Jiangxi Poetry Society" and "General Collection of Jiangxi Poetry School". Regarding the time when the "Sect Map" was written, the records in the Song books contradict each other, some say that he was "young" in Lü Benzhong, and some say that he was in his later years in Lü Benzhong. I tried to do some research, and I believe that this picture was made in the early years of Chongning in the Northern Song Dynasty, when Lu Benzhong was about 19 years old. (Of course, it is still questionable whether my research can be established, and recently Comrade Zhou Yukai of Sichuan University wrote a letter pointing out that there are defects in my research.) Regarding the "General Collection of Jiangxi Poetry School", the "History of the Song Dynasty· Art and Literature Chronicles" said that it was compiled by Lu Benzhong, and Mr. Guo Shaoyu also thinks so. Mr. Guo is an authoritative scholar in the history of literary criticism, and he is also a senior whom I have always admired. However, after repeated examination of the relevant materials, I think this statement is debatable. I believe that only after a thorough examination of the materials we have can we make the materials a truly reliable object of study and lead to correct conclusions.
Second, we must carry forward the spirit of a hundred schools of thought contending and dare to be different.
Compared to other academic fields, the air in the world of classical literature studies is somewhat dreary. One of the reasons is that our profession requires a lot of skill, and this skill is not something that can be acquired overnight. As a result, young people with vigor are often afraid or not easy to express their opinions, and I think this phenomenon is abnormal. The life of academic research lies in development and change, and all viewpoints can be further discussed, except for a simple description of certain historical facts. When we young people engage in research and write papers, we must not be unstable and should dare to express our own unique opinions. Even if only one percent of these new insights are correct, they are a step forward in scholarship. If everyone pursues a steady and repetitive view, then the one percent of progress will be lost. Moreover, many issues can only be clarified through the debate of different opinions, so as to reach more correct conclusions.
"Jiangxi Poetry School Studies" is my doctoral dissertation, and whether it can pass the defense is very important to me, but I did not consider these factors when writing my dissertation and tried to be safe, but I still put forward some new insights based on my own analysis and understanding of the material. For example, Huang Tingjian's saying of "reincarnating and turning iron into gold" has always been ridiculed. Wang Ruoxu of the Jin Dynasty thought that this was a "plagiarist", and most of today's literary and historical works also said that he advocated plagiarism, and then believed that Huang Tingjian himself often plagiarized in his creation. I don't think that's right. First of all, Huang Tingjian put forward this theory with the aim of "making the old new", that is, making full use of the legacy left by his predecessors in the art of poetry and language art, so as to bring forth the new. Secondly, because the Tang Dynasty was the heyday of classical poetry in the mainland, the Tang people left an extremely rich heritage in the art of poetry, which made the poets of the Song Dynasty face a great pressure, because it was difficult for them to find any untouched treasures in the artistic territory of Wuqiyan poetry. Therefore, in Huang Tingjian's time, there is a certain positive significance in proposing this method. Thirdly, Wong did not have the vice of plagiarism in his creations, and most of the examples cited by later generations when criticizing Wong Ting-kin were due to misunderstandings. Huang Tingjian was a famous calligrapher who often wrote other people's poems into calligraphy works, but later generations mistakenly included these works when compiling anthologies for Huang Tingjian. Due to the fact that the original work was written in a different text or Wong Ting-kin had made a mistake when writing it, people mistakenly thought that Wong Ting-kin had plagiarized someone else's work. In fact, there are indeed many examples of "rebirth and turning iron into gold" in Huang's poems, but most of them have achieved the purpose of "turning the old into the new". Of course, whether my view is correct or not is open to further debate, but I think it can at least draw everyone's attention so that we can have a deeper understanding of Wong's theory in the discussion.
The doctoral dissertation at that time was copied by hand
3. To examine a literary phenomenon, we must not look at the problem in isolation, but must study it in a specific historical context.
Of course, this historical background also includes political, social and other factors, but more importantly, it is the process of the development of literature itself.
For a long time, there has been a "leftist" tendency in the field of classical literature studies, that is, too much emphasis is placed on the general description of the class attributes, political ideas and ideological nature of ancient writers, while ignoring the detailed analysis of the development of literature itself and the art of the works. Some treatises even show the influence of vulgar sociology, a tendency that leads to the undesirable consequences of the easy rejection of ancient writers or the simple attribution of literary phenomena to political and social causes. For example, the Jiangxi Poetry School was born in the era when the Northern Song Dynasty was in decline, and some people in the academic community believe that its emergence was inseparable from the weak national strength in the late Northern Song Dynasty and the early Southern Song Dynasty, and the situation of concession and compromise with ethnic minorities. I have studied the political attitudes of the members of the poetry school and believe that the above views do not correspond to historical facts. First, the vast majority of the poets of the Jiangxi Poetry School who experienced the Jingkang Revolution stood on the standpoint of the main battle faction, and their poems reflected the thoughts and feelings of the patriotic army and the people. Second, most of the early members of the Jiangxi Poetry School sided with the old party in the struggle between the old and the new parties, but their attitude was very negative and played no role in the actual political struggle. Therefore, the emergence of the Jiangxi poetry school was not necessarily related to the political struggle and national struggle at that time. It can be seen from this that although the emergence of a literary genre is closely related to the era in which it lives, we cannot think that this literary genre must be a product of the political situation at that time, still less that its emergence must reflect the political needs of the ruling class at that time.
People's evaluation of the Jiangxi poetry school is unfair, and it is often due to a lack of historical vision. For example, most of the predecessors' ridicule of the Jiangxi poetry school focused on their artistic style quite different from Tang poetry, and their criticism of the Jiangxi poetry school was actually a criticism of the artistic characteristics of Song poetry, and the Song people Zhang Jie, Yan Yu, and Ye Shi all held this view. In fact, if the Jiangxi Poetry School is examined in the entire development process of classical poetry, then the Jiangxi Poetry School cannot be easily denied because of this. Because although Tang poetry is a peak in the history of the development of classical poetry in the mainland, literature and art are constantly moving forward, and classical poetry should not always stay at the stage of Tang poetry. Otherwise, there would be no Song poems with their own characteristics in the history of Chinese literature, but only "Tang poems" written by the Song people imitating the Tang people, that is, classical poetry could no longer develop after the Tang Dynasty. Fortunately, the poets of the Song Dynasty did not bow down in front of Tang poetry and did nothing, although they were in the difficult situation of "Song life after the Tang Dynasty, it is really difficult to open up", but they were still able to find a new way, strive for change, and finally created another peak in the history of classical poetry that can be confronted with Tang poetry. The Jiangxi poetry school played a great role in the process of establishing the unique style of Song poetry, and the difference between their poetic style and Tang poetry should be affirmed.
"Tiaoxi Yuyin Cong Words" records the sectarian map of the Jiangxi Poetry Society
Another example is Huang Tingjian's "awkward body" in the seven laws, his predecessors often criticized him for being too curious, but in fact, Huang Tingjian's reason for doing this is for Xikun style. In the early Song Dynasty, the Xikun School was all the rage, and their works were dominated by the Seven Rules, which were written in harmony and maturity without exception. Huang Tingjian saw the shortcomings of the Xikun School in art, and consciously went the opposite way. Although a literary history work of the present people sees Huang Tingjian's correction of the Xikun School, it also believes that this is "the wrong way to oppose formalism with formalism". In fact, when Huang Tingjian was active in the poetry circle, the task of removing the influence of Xikun style from the perspective of ideological content had been basically completed by Shi Jie, Mei Yaochen, and Ouyang Xiu, while the bad influence of Xikun style in art still remained in the poetry circle. Therefore, Huang Tingjian's correction of some of the shortcomings of the Xikun style from the perspective of art form is actually a continuation and supplement of the anti-Xikun poetry and literary innovation movement of Ou, Mei and others. Obviously, whether or not there is a dual perspective of history and aesthetics will affect the evaluation of literary historical facts.
In recent years, methodology has been a hot topic in literary studies, and many young people are interested in new methods. In my opinion, "system theory" is a new method that can be used as a reference in the study of classical literature. However, I also believe that if we can study specific literary historical phenomena in connection with specific historical backgrounds at different levels, and examine this phenomenon in the long river of the entire literary history, we will actually embody the spirit of systems theory, and we do not need to mechanically apply a bunch of new terms such as "parent system" and "subsystem".
"Studies on the Jiangxi School of Poetry" has been officially published by Qilu Publishing House, and I am looking forward to receiving criticism and advice from the academic community. Now, I try to contribute some of my experiences in the research process, and I also hope to get corrections from young friends.
Original title: "I Write<江西诗派研究>", in Classical Literature Knowledge, No. 1, 1988