This substantial collection of Tang Dynasty poetry includes extensive commentary and notes—offering insight into this rich literary heritage. "Stretching out my hand I feel the pulse of the stars," wrote Li Po, one of the most famous of the T'ang dynasty poets. This superlative study of the Golden Age of Chinese poetry, based on nearly 50,000 poems written by more than 2,000 poets, captures not only the pulse of that period but also the spirit and soul. Of this Tang blossoming, Dr. Wu says that for nearly thirteen centuries after Christ, poetry in Europe, with the exception of Juvenal, kept a death–like silence. It hibernated so long that when it woke up again in the person of Dante, the last poetic voice it could remember was that Virgil. It seems though Mother Earth purposely rocked Europe to sleep for some time that she might teach Asia to sing. These poetic interpretations, including comparisons with many Western poets such as Shakespeare and T.S. Eliot, represent a remarkable scholarly achievement.

Classical Chinese poetry reached its pinnacle during the T'ang Dynasty (618-907 A.D.), and the poets of the late T'ang-a period of growing political turmoil and violence-are especially notable for combining strking formal inovation with raw emotional intensity. A. C. Graham’s slim but indispensable anthology of late T’ang poetry begins with Tu Fu, commonly recognized as the greatest Chinese poet of all, whose final poems and sequences lament the pains of exile in images of crystalline strangeness. It continues with the work of six other masters, including the “cold poet” Meng Chiao, who wrote of retreat from civilization to the remoteness of the high mountains; the troubled and haunting Li Ho, who, as Graham writes, cultivated a “wholly personal imagery of ghosts, blood, dying animals, weeping statues, whirlwinds, the will-o'-the-wisp”; and the shimmeringly strange poems of illicit love and Taoist initiation of the enigmatic Li Shang-yin. Offering the largest selection of these poets’ work available in English in a translation that is a classic in its own right, Poems of the Late T’ang also includes Graham’s searching essay “The Translation of Chinese Poetry” as well as helpful notes on each of the poets and on many of the individual poems.

Tang poetry is one of the most valuable cultural inheritances of Chinese history. Its distinctive aesthetics, delicate language and diverse styles constitute great literature in itself, as well as a rich topic for literary study. This two-volume set is the masterpiece of Professor Lin Geng, one of China’s most respected literary historians, and reflects decades of active research into Tang poetry, covering the “Golden Age” of Chinese poetry (618–907 CE). In the first volume, the author provides a general understanding of poetry in the “High Tang” era from a range of perspectives. Starting with an indepth discussion of the Romantic tradition and historical context, the author focuses on poetic language patterns, Youth Spirit, maturity symbols, and prototypes of poetry. The author demonstrates that the most valuable part of Tang poetry is how it can provide people with a new perspective on every aspect of life. The second volume focuses on the prominent Tang poets and poems. Beginning with an introduction to the “four greatest poets”—Li Bai, Du Fu, Wang Wei, and Bai Juyi—the author discusses their subjects, language, influence, and key works. The volume also includes essays on a dozen masterpieces of Tang poetry, categorized by topics such as love and friendship, aspirationsand seclusion, as well as travelling and nostalgia. As the author stresses, Tang poetry is worth rereading because it makes us invigorate our mental wellbeing, leaving it powerful and full of vitality. This book will appeal to researchers and students of Chinese literature, especially of classical Chinese poetry. People interested in Chinese culture will also benefit from the book.

Tang poetry is one of the most valuable cultural inheritances of Chinese history. Its distinctive aesthetics, delicate language, and diverse styles constitute great literature in itself, as well as a rich topic for literary study. This two-volume set constitutes a classic analysis of Tang poetry in the “Golden Age” of Chinese poetry (618–907 CE). In this volume, the author provides a general understanding of poetry in the “High Tang” era from a range of perspectives. Starting with an indepth discussion of the Romantic tradition and historical context, the author focuses on poetic language patterns, Youth Spirit, maturity symbols, and prototypes of poetry. The author demonstrates that the most valuable part of Tang poetry is how it can provide people with a new perspective on every aspect of life. This book will appeal to researchers, scholars, and students of Chinese literature and especially of classical Chinese poetry. People interested in Chinese culture more widely will also benefit from this book.

This book examines the development of English-translated Tang poetry and its propagation to the Western world. It consists of two parts, the first of which addresses the initial stage of English-translated Tang poetry’s propagation, and the second exploring its further development. By analyzing the historical background and characteristics of these two stages, the book traces the trend back to its roots, discusses some well-known early sinologists and their contributions, and familiarizes readers with the general course of Tang poetry’s development. In addition, it presents the translated versions of many Tang poems. The dissemination of Tang poetry to the Western world is a significant event in the history of cross-cultural communication. From the simple imitation of poetic techniques to the acceptance and identification of key poetic concepts, the Tang poetry translators gradually constructed a classic “Chinese style” in modern American poetry. Hence, the traditional Chinese culture represented by Tang poetry spread more widely in the English-speaking world, producing a more lasting impact on societies and cultures outside China – and demonstrating the poetry’s ability to transcend the boundaries of time, region, nationality and culture. Due to different cultural backgrounds, the Tang poets or poems admired most by Western readers may not necessarily receive high acclaim in China. Sometimes language barriers and cultural differences make it impossible to represent certain allusions or cultural and ethnic concepts correctly during the translation process. However, in recent decades, the translation of Tang poetry has evolved considerably in both quantity and quality. As culture is manifested in language, and language is part of culture, the translation of Tang poetry has allowed Western scholars to gain an unprecedented understanding of China and Chinese culture.

In this "guided" anthology, experts lead students through the major genres and eras of Chinese poetry from antiquity to the modern time. The volume is divided into 6 chronological sections and features more than 140 examples of the best shi, sao, fu, ci, and qu poems. A comprehensive introduction and extensive thematic table of contents highlight the thematic, formal, and prosodic features of Chinese poetry, and each chapter is written by a scholar who specializes in a particular period or genre. Poems are presented in Chinese and English and are accompanied by a tone-marked romanized version, an explanation of Chinese linguistic and poetic conventions, and recommended reading strategies. Sound recordings of the poems are available online free of charge. These unique features facilitate an intense engagement with Chinese poetical texts and help the reader derive aesthetic pleasure and insight from these works as one could from the original. The companion volume How to Read Chinese Poetry Workbook presents 100 famous poems (56 are new selections) in Chinese, English, and romanization, accompanied by prose translation, textual notes, commentaries, and recordings. Contributors: Robert Ashmore (Univ. of California, Berkeley); Zong-qi Cai; Charles Egan (San Francisco State); Ronald Egan (Univ. of California, Santa Barbara); Grace Fong (McGill); David R. Knechtges (Univ. of Washington); Xinda Lian (Denison); Shuen-fu Lin (Univ. of Michigan); William H. Nienhauser Jr. (Univ. of Wisconsin); Maija Bell Samei; Jui-lung Su (National Univ. of Singapore); Wendy Swartz (Columbia); Xiaofei Tian (Harvard); Paula Varsano (Univ. of California, Berkeley); Fusheng Wu (Univ. of Utah)

Contains English translations of Chinese writings drawn from throughout a period of four hundred years, including poems, drama, fiction, songs, biographies, and early works of philosophy and history; arranged chronologically and by genre, with introductory quotes and comments.

With this groundbreaking collection Classical Chinese Poetry, translated and edited by the renowned poet and translator David Hinton, a new generation will be introduced to the work that riveted Ezra Pound and transformed modern poetry. The Chinese poetic tradition is the largest and longest continuous tradition in world literature, and this rich and far-reaching anthology of nearly five hundred poems provides a comprehensive account of its first three millennia (1500 BCE to 1200 CE), the period during which virtually all its landmark developments took place. Unlike earlier anthologies of Chinese poetry, Hinton's book focuses on a relatively small number of poets, providing selections that are large enough to re-create each as a fully realized and unique voice. New introductions to each poet's work provide a readable history, told for the first time as a series of poetic innovations forged by a series of master poets. From the classic texts of Chinese philosophy to intensely personal lyrics, from love poems to startling and strange perspectives on nature, Hinton has collected an entire world of beauty and insight. And in his eye-opening translations, these ancient poems feel remarkably fresh and contemporary, presenting a literature both radically new and entirely resonant, in Classical Chinese Poetry.

"Elegant representations of nature and the four seasons populate a wide range of Japanese genres and media. In Japan and the Culture of the Four Seasons, Haruo Shirane shows how, when, and why this practice developed and explicates the richly encoded social, religious, and political meanings of this imagery. Shirane discusses textual, cultivated, material, performative, and gastronomic representations of nature. He reveals how this kind of 'secondary nature, ' which flourished in Japan's urban environment, fostered and idealized a sense of harmony with the natural world just at the moment when it began to recede from view. Illuminating the deeper meaning behind Japanese aesthetics and artifacts, Shirane also clarifies the use of natural and seasonal topics as well as the changes in their cultural associations and functions across history, genre, and community over more than a millennium. In this book, the four seasons are revealed to be as much a cultural construction as a reflection of the physical world."--Back cover.