An Introduction to Chinese Poetry: From the Canon of Poetry to the Lyrics of the Song Dynasty (Harvard East Asian Monographs)

"This innovative textbook for learning classical Chinese poetry moves beyond the traditional anthology of poems translated into English and instead brings readers--including those with no knowledge of Chinese--as close as possible to the texture of the poems in their original language. The first two chapters introduce the features of classical Chinese that are important for poetry and then survey the formal and rhetorical conventions of classical poetry. The core chapters present the major poets and poems of the Chinese poetic tradition from earliest times to the lyrics of the Song Dynasty (960-1279). Each chapter begins with an overview of the historical context for the poetry of a particular period and provides a brief biography for each poet. Each of the poems appears in the original Chinese with a word-by-word translation, followed by Michael A. Fuller's unadorned translation, and a more polished version by modern translators. A question-based study guide highlights the important issues in reading and understanding each particular text. Designed for classroom use and for self-study, the textbook's goal is to help the reader appreciate both the distinctive voices of the major writers in the Chinese poetic tradition and the grand contours of the development of that tradition."-- Provided by publisher Copyright Contents Author’s Note How to Use This Book Chronology List of Terms 01 The Classical Chinese Language 02 The Formal and Rhetorical Features of Chinese Poetry Interlude: On the Translation of Poetry 03 Origins of the Poetic Tradition 04 Poetry in the Han, Wei, and Jin Dynasties 05 The Maturing of Convention: The Poetry of the Northern and Southern Dynasties 06 Early and High Tang Poetry before Du Fu 07 Du Fu 08 Middle and Late Tang Poetry 09 The Growth of a New Poetic Form: The Song Lyric 10 The Song Lyric in the Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries Appendix I - List of Poems, Sources, and Translators Appendix II - List of Variant Characters Suggested Readings Permissions "A textbook for learning how to read classical Chinese poetry. A four-part format is used throughout to help both students with and without knowledge of Chinese to better understand the poems: the Chinese text of the poem, a word-by-word rendering, a "technical" translation, and a polished professional translation"-- Provided by publisher Michael A. Fuller's innovative textbook for learning classical Chinese poetry moves beyond the traditional anthology of poems translated into English and instead brings readers including those with no knowledge of Chinese as close as possible to the texture of the poems in their original language.