Literature of Hàn & Táng Dynasty

206 BC-220 AD
 The Influence of Confucianism and
Taoism
• Confucianism: an emphasis on ethical, social,
and political concerns ─secularism
• Taoism: metaphysical significance of life beyond
history and society ─transcendentalism
• sī mă qiān : inherited both, made terseness
and profundity the foremost criteria of prose
style.
• The 8 literatis of táng sòng dynasty
 Hán Yù 韓愈(768-824)
Picture source:National Palace Museum, Taipei, Taiwan.
 Made a Claim to Prose Writing
• Han Yü (768-824) is ranked high as a poet but,
more importantly, is revered as a master of
prose writing. His writing is characterized by a
devotion to classicism both in form and in
content.
• Broke the Boundary of Literature Form: The
form is decided by feeling.
• “Tip of the Brush” , “The Dragon”
• Good at on teasing and ironic skill
 Narrative Art
Traditional Chinese esthetic ideal:
sounds beyond the strings
Means: distrusting the potentialities of language
to represent Phenomenon, The Taoist
estheticians offer the suggestive function of
language to achieve a flash-like perception of
total Phenomenon.
~ ‘Conception of Media and Intermedia’ , Wai-lim Yip
 Narrative Art
Zhuang zi:
It is for the fish that the trap exists. When
we get the fish, we can forget the trap… It is
for sense of things that words exists; when we
get the sense(i), we can forget the words.
The same idea in painting:
Sense of things, not the things themselves
Means to emphasis the “vital rhythm.”

~ ‘Conception of Media and Intermedia’ , Wai-lim Yip

 Narrative Art
The Chan Buddhists equally distrust linguistic
communication and offer a logical and
intuitive approach to experience. e.g.

Q: What is the general idea of law?

A: Spring comes, grass green by itself.

~ ‘Conception of Media and Intermedia’ , Wai-lim Yip

 Narrative Art

In the mountain sets forth red calyces

A home by a stream, quiet. No man.
It blooms and falls, blooms and falls.
~Wang Wei

A lone sail, a distant shade, lost in the

horizon
~Li Bai
 Narrative Art
Ching Ke ran after the king, who dashed around
the pillar of the throne room. All the courtiers,
utterly dumbfounded by so unexpected an
occurrence, milled about in disorder. …In his
panic the king had no chance to give the
command for the soldiers to appear, and thus
Ching Ke was able to pursue him. Having
nothing with which to strike at Ching Ke, the
king in panic-stricken confusion merely flailed
at him with his hands. …
~’The Biography of Ching Ke’ , translated by burton Watson
 Narrative Art
Hsiang Yü then ordered all his men to dismount
and proceed on foot, and with their short
swords to close in hand-to-hand combat with
the enemy. Hsiang Yü alone killed several
hundred of the Han men, until he had suffered
a dozen wounds. Looking about him, he spied
the Han cavalry marshal Lü Ma-tung. “We are
old friends, are we not?” he asked. Lü Ma -
tung eyed him carefully and then, pointing
him out to Wang Yi, said, “This is Hsiang Yü!”
~ ‘The Death of Hsinang Yü’ , translated by burton Watson