Abstract
Bai Juyi (772846) classified his poems into four categories: allegorical, carefree, sentimental, and miscellaneous regulated verses. This classification is of great significance in the history of Chinese poetics as it encapsulated the poetic traditions preceding the Tang Dynasty. These include the aspiration-expressing tradition of The Book of Songs, the sentimental tradition that began with the Songs of Chu, the nature-fitting tradition represented by Tao Yuanming, and the ornate style of the Liang and Chen Dynasties. Compared to his contemporaries, Bai's classification was innovative, particularly through his introduction of “carefree poetry.” This highlighted the long-neglected nature-fitting tradition in poetics. The creation of this category was shaped by the cultural and poetic context of his time. Bai Juyi's classification also invites reflection on classical Chinese affection-expressing poetics, suggesting that, beyond the aspiration-expressing and emotion-expressing types, there exists another poetic type of affection-expressing and a non-affection-expressing poetic type. Analyzing Bai Juyi's classification deepens our understanding of the traditions and evolutions of classical Chinese poetics.
Keywords
Bai Juyi, poetic classification, carefree poetry, affection-expressing poetics
First Page
204
Last Page
212
Recommended Citation
Yuewu, Ye. 2024. "The Poetic Tradition and the Significance of Bai Juyi's Classifications of Poetry." Theoretical Studies in Literature and Art 44, (4): pp.204-212. https://tsla.researchcommons.org/journal/vol44/iss4/21
