Recently, when many writers communicated, they invariably shared their worries about the current online style of writing being too "white". Once words have lost their metaphors, their rhetoric, and their boundaries with ordinary spoken language, can literature still be called literature?
What is Literature? Song Zhou Dunyi has a cloud in the book "Tongshu Wenci": "Literature carries the Tao." The wheel is decorated and the people are mediocre, and the decoration is also vain. ”
This is where the word "article comes from", which means that a good article should have a certain depth of ideological connotation, which can combine social reality and life philosophy to bring inspiration and thinking to people.
Liu Xian's "Wenxin Carving Dragon" summarized the "body has six meanings": one is deep but not treacherous, the second is clear and not miscellaneous, the third is faithful but not born, the fourth is righteous and chaste but not returned, the fifth is the body is about but not ruined, and the sixth is beautiful but not lewd.
Translated into today's words, a good article must have these six advantages: first, the emotion is deep and true; second, the style of writing is clear and beautiful; third, it is evidence-based and not absurd; Fourth, the mind is upright and not crooked; Fifth, theories should not be dry; Sixth, the rhetoric is gorgeous and not frivolous.
In short, an article with profound content, sincere emotion, beautiful rhetoric and rigorous structure is qualified in Liu Xian's eyes.
Many people believe that Chinese literati have always admired Confucianism, especially after Dong Zhongshu of the Western Han Dynasty proposed to "depose a hundred schools of thought and respect Confucianism alone", Confucianism suppressed other cultures and became the supreme boss.
This is not the case! If this were the case, Liu Xian would not have proposed that "the body has six meanings", and there would have been no ancient literature movement in the Tang Dynasty!
At the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty, the four-hundred-year-old Liu Han Dynasty was crumbling, first Cao usurped Han, and then Wei usurped Cao. The spiritual pillars of the scribes' hearts continued to collapse, and they fled into metaphysics, indulging in drinking and talking every day, and Confucianism gradually declined.
The people in the troubled times could not find a reason to live, and Buddhism provided them with a spiritual paradise. Buddhism developed further, and many nobles also indulged in it, the most typical being Emperor Wu of Liang, who devoted himself to Buddhism and wanted to give up his life to become a monk several times.
In short, during the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties, metaphysics and Buddhism flourished greatly, Confucian beliefs collapsed, and society was filled with a kind of timely pleasure and self-indulgence.
Muttered quietly, it seems a bit like today?
In the Tang Dynasty, the emperors began to realize that governing the country still needed the pragmatic ideas of Confucianism, but this atmosphere could not be reversed for a while, and many measures were just pretending, using Confucianism to dress themselves up as ancient sages, but the requirements for themselves in behavior were not "Confucian" (rigorous) at all, but very "Tao" (leisurely).
It can be seen from the "Shangguan style" that prevailed in the early Tang Dynasty that the popular court poetry style at that time was empty in content, although it also paid attention to the formal skills and beautiful words of the poems, but it was empty. This style of poetry, which met the aesthetic tastes and political needs of the ruling class at the time, was quite popular among the aristocracy.
Until after the Anshi Rebellion, the Confucian class attached to Xuanzong only knew that they could not give any useful advice in the face of social turmoil, and at this time, a group of new forces were born!
People with lofty ideals began to advocate the ancient literature movement, among which the most shining stars in the Tang Dynasty were Han Yu, Liu Zongyuan, etc., and the Song Dynasty was Ouyang Xiu, Su father and son, etc., which is what we often call the "Eight Masters of the Tang and Song Dynasties". Each of these people's essays has its own characteristics, but they all follow the criteria of a good essay: deep content, sincere emotion, beautiful rhetoric, and rigorous structure.
During the Kangxi period of the Qing Dynasty, Wu Chucai, Wu Tiaohou's uncle and nephew made a selection of articles from the Eastern Zhou Dynasty to the end of the Ming Dynasty, and they selected 222 wonderful ancient literary masterpieces from tens of thousands of books, each of which was beautifully written, reasonable, and became a classic entry-level textbook of ancient literature in the past three hundred years.
In today's era, China has been in line with international standards, and whether it still needs to learn ancient Chinese has become a relatively controversial topic. As mentioned at the beginning, if you are just communicating with people, it doesn't matter if you speak "white". But if we want to create high-quality articles and write more in-depth works, we must return to our own cultural system and carefully taste the charm and meaning behind every word, word and sentence.
The selection of articles is very rigorous, and for a work or the same writer, all works that can represent their ideas and artistic styles are included; For works of the same genre, the two artists will focus on different angles, so there is basically no sense of similarity and monotony.
For example, Han Yu's articles are more imposing, tortuous and free, and he is good at inserting detailed portrayals of human feelings and the world in his discourse; Liu Zongyuan's essay can break through the forbidden area of Confucian thought, exposing some dissatisfaction with the dark reality and sympathy for the people at the bottom.
For another example, Su Dongpo's prose is active, his arguments are novel, his realm is broad, and his language is also very clear, like flowing clouds and water, flowing **, in Su Dongpo's prose, showing a poetic realm. Wang Anshi's prose, on the other hand, is known for its profound insights, showing the sharp eye of an outstanding statesman, with refined language and upright style.
This hardcover collector's edition of "Ancient Texts" is more suitable for children to read independently, it is a set of three, using the whole book full note full translation full color picture book, in the process of reading, you can not only feel the style of the language, but also through the matching ancient paintings, to appreciate the beauty of the artistic conception of the article.
As the saying goes: "If you are familiar with 300 Tang poems, you can't compose poems and chant them." We might as well say: "Familiarize yourself with 200 ancient texts, and you can pass the literary barrier when you are free." ”
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