Du Fu transforms : tradition and ethics amid societal collapse / Lucas Rambo Bender.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Bender, Lucas Rambo, author.

Series:

Harvard-Yenching Institute monograph series ; 126.

Harvard-Yenching Institute monograph series ; 126

Language:

Chinese

English

Subjects (All):

Du, Fu, 712-770--Criticism and interpretation.

Du, Fu.

Du, Fu, 712-770.

Manners and customs in literature.

Ethics in literature.

Chinese poetry--Tang dynasty, 618-907--History and criticism.

Chinese poetry.

Literature and society--China--History--To 1500.

Literature and society.

Tang Dynasty (China).

History.

Criticism and interpretation.

China.

Genre:

Criticism, interpretation, etc.

History.

Literary criticism.

Physical Description:

xiii, 411 pages ; 24 cm.

Place of Publication:

Cambridge : Harvard University Asia Center, 2021.

Summary:

"Often considered China's greatest poet, Du Fu (712-770) came of age at the height of the Tang dynasty, in an era marked by confidence that the accumulated wisdom of the precedent cultural tradition would guarantee civilization's continued stability and prosperity. When his society collapsed into civil war in 755, however, he began to question contemporary assumptions about the role that tradition should play in making sense of experience and defining human flourishing. In this book, Lucas Bender argues that Du Fu's reconsideration of the nature and importance of tradition has played a pivotal role in the transformation of Chinese poetic understanding over the last millennium. In reimagining his relationship to tradition, Du Fu anticipated important philosophical transitions from the late-medieval into the early-modern period and laid the template for a new and perduring paradigm of poetry's relationship to ethics. He also looked forward to the transformations his own poetry would undergo as it was elevated to the pinnacle of the Chinese poetic pantheon"-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Introduction: Tradition and transformation

Time and authority : early poems (before 755)

Omen and chaos : poems of frustration and foreboding (through 755)

Convention and nature : the outbreak of the rebellion (756-57)

Narrative and experience : poems of the western frontiers (late 759)

Vision and the mundane : Du Fu's years in Western Sichuan (760-65)

History and community : Kuizhou poems (766-68)

Contingency and adaptation : last poems (768-70)

Conclusion: Poetry and ethics.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9780674260177

0674260171

OCLC:

1240774131