Zhong Rong's Shi Pin is a famous monograph on poetry theory criticism in Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties. Zhong Rong lived in the Qi and Liang Dynasties and was about the same age as Liu Xie. He was born in 468 AD and died in 5 18. But his poems were written later than Liu Xie's Wen Xin Diao Long. According to his own principle of "no recording, no saving", it can be determined that the Book of Songs was written between 5 14 and 5 16. Zhong Rong was born in a poor family, with a "low rank" and only worked as a clerk in Wang Fu. Although he wanted to make a difference in politics, he could not do so under the strict control of the gate valve system. Zhong Rong advocated "ruling by doing nothing" politically, and was less influenced by Confucian traditional ideas ideologically. He dared to sharply criticize the bad atmosphere at that time in literature and was a progressive literary theory critic. Zhong Rong commented on 122 poets in his poems, and analyzed the ideological and artistic characteristics and historical origins of each poet. According to their achievements, they are divided into three categories: upper, middle and lower. In the preface, the history of poetry development and important theoretical issues related to poetry creation are systematically discussed with five-character poems as the center. This method of criticism he adopted was influenced by critics since the Han and Wei Dynasties. He himself said in the Preface to Poetry: "Nine people commented on the Seven Laws in the past, and scholars commented on them. Is it worthwhile to learn incorruptibly?" At that time, the theoretical criticism of poetry, literature, books and paintings was very developed. Xie He has records of ancient paintings, Yu Jianwu has books and chess, and poetry is also produced in this social atmosphere. The main value of Zhong Rong's poems can be illustrated from the following three aspects.

First of all, the relationship between literature and reality is profoundly expounded.

Zhong Rong emphasized in Preface to Poetry that poetry is the expression of human feelings, and the excitement of human feelings is caused by the feelings of real life. He said: "The beast of Qi is touching, so it shakes its temperament and dances." Zhong Rong's understanding of "things" includes not only natural things such as "spring breeze, spring birds, autumn moon in Qiu Chan, summer rain in Xia Yun and cold winter moon", but also many touching and complicated social life contents. For example, "Chen Chu went to the border, Han Yu resigned from the palace, or was stunned; Or negative Ge Waishu, murderous male edge; Plug the guest's clothes list and cry; Or a scholar goes out to the DPRK and never returns; Women have young moths as pets, and then look forward to dumping the country "and so on. He said: "How can all kinds of responses and feelings of the soul show their significance without Chen's poems?" Why not Long song? "The objective and real life content inspired the poet's passionate feelings, so he became a poem. Zhong Rong showed a correct understanding of the relationship between literature and reality here with a clear view of simple materialism, which was not easy at that time. In ancient times, China put forward that literary creation is the result of "people's feelings about things". "Book of Rites" said: "Every sound begins with people's hearts. When the heart moves, everything does its best. Feeling things and then moving are shaped by sound. "Although this is about music, its principle is also related to literature. Lu Ji's "Wen Fu" said: "Sigh at the four seasons and think about everything. Sad leaves fall in golden autumn, and they rejoice in soft and fragrant spring. It is the application of the idea of "feeling things in people's hearts" in Yue Ji in literary creation. Lu Ji, on the other hand, mainly talks about natural things and does not involve the social life content of things. When discussing the relationship between literature and the times in Wen Xin Diao Long, Liu Xie emphatically pointed out the characteristics of literature reflecting the real life content of society, and pointed out that "the change of literature is influenced by the world, while the prosperity and decline are related to the time sequence". Zhong Rong is talking about the further development on this basis.

What is more valuable about the relationship between literature and reality is that Zhong Rong not only points out that literature reflects the essence of real life, but also thinks that only works that show progressive thoughts and feelings in the process of describing real life are the most valuable, meaningful and beautiful works. Zhong Rong highlighted the word "resentment" in his poetry criticism. For example, he praised "ancient poetry" as "sad" and said that Li Ling's poems were "full of sadness and people complained". He believes that Cao Zhi is the most successful poet in the creation of five-character poems, and his characteristic is "elegance and resentment, and literary talent flying". RoyceWong's poem "It originated from Li Ling, and it is a sad word" is also full of resentment. A very important performance of Zuo Si's Wind is that "the text is very detailed in complaining". Liu Kun's "festival of striving for success" can't be separated from his words of kindness and sorrow and words of many complaints. If we examine the specific content of "complaints" advocated by Zhong Rong in combination with the creation of these poets, we can see that it either reflects the dissatisfaction with the hierarchy of aristocratic families, for example, Zuo Si wrote in "Ode to History" that "the world stands tall and graceful, and sinks down." Because of the terrain, the origin is not once. "Or feel the economic decline, sympathize with the sufferings of the people, as RoyceWong wrote in" Seven Wounded Poems ","When you go out, there is nothing to see, bones cover the plain ","When you realize that you are going to spring, you will feel sad when you sing ". Or because of the corruption of the ruling class and the darkness of politics, the progressive political ambition of people with lofty ideals cannot be realized, and their chests are full of depression and resentment. For example, Liu Yao's "Reward" says that "before the achievement is built, the setting sun suddenly flows to the west", "How to turn it into steel and turn it into a soft finger", "Faithfulness is a sin, and the Chinese martial arts are unclear" and other "Fufeng Songs". I want to write this song, sad and long. " This is a kind of affection and grievance. This "resentment" emphasized by Zhong Rong not only broke through the shackles of Confucianism, but also was essentially different from the palace pornography advocated by Xiao Gang and Xiao Yi. It is a progressive tradition in the history of China's ancient literary thought that literature should show the "resentment" of the lower class towards the upper ruling class. As early as the end of the Spring and Autumn Period, Confucius fully affirmed the dissatisfaction of lower-level officials and people with dark politics and decadent rule in the Book of Songs. In the Han Dynasty, Sima Qian developed the idea that Confucius' poems can be blamed, especially pointing out that the great patriotic poet Qu Yuan's masterpiece Li Sao was "self-pity and self-pity", and on this basis, he put forward the far-reaching theory of "writing books with anger". Zhong Rong's poems inherit and carry forward this progressive literary tradition.

Secondly, Zhong Rong advocates natural beauty and opposes the formalistic aesthetic.

During the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties, there was a wrong tendency to unilaterally pursue formal beauty in literary creation, which was particularly serious in the Qi and Liang Dynasties. In Zhong Rong's era, this tendency was very prominent in two aspects: piling up allusions and parallelism. Poetry creation can of course use allusions. Properly used, it can make the meaning of poetry more profound, the language more concise, the lyric more thorough, the image more vivid, and play a positive role in the endless meaning of words. However, a large number of allusions make poetry cringe and obscure, which will violate the characteristics of art and make poetry lose its natural beauty, but have the opposite effect. Xiao Zixian once pointed out in the Biography of Southern Qi Literature that the poetry creation at that time, due to the abuse of allusions, resulted in "borrowing all the old sayings, applying the current situation, being rough and straightforward, only seeing examples, and losing its luster". In view of this shortcoming, Zhong Rong emphasized that allusions can be used in general non-artistic practical writing from the perspective of maintaining literary characteristics; Poetry, as an art, is mainly lyrical, focusing on "natural English purport" and cannot be based on more allusions. The art of poetry should focus on image-building, not showing off knowledge. He said that some famous sentences such as Xu Gan's "Thinking of a gentleman like running water", Cao Zhi's "Hating Taiwan on a High Platform", Zhang Hua's "Going to the Dragon's Head in the Morning" and Xie Lingyun's "The Moon shines on the Snow" are only descriptions of "seeing" and "seeing" without using any allusions. "Words are not expensive, but innovative" violates the characteristics of poetry art. He believes that poetry creation should express feelings and express the beauty of nature by "direct search" instead of becoming a vulture who has lost his schoolbag!

Based on the principle of advocating the truth, goodness and beauty of nature, Zhong Rong strongly opposed the creative tendency of the overly critical temperament school at that time. Zhong Rong doesn't want the musical beauty of poetry at all, but he thinks that "the style of writing should be ironic and not hindered, but it should be clear and accurate." As long as the rhyme is natural and smooth, it is a good work, and there is no need to pursue those fine rules. According to Shen Yue's proposal, it is necessary to realize the transformation of "Gong Yu stage, low and high, and unite with each other. There is a floating sound in front, so you must cut it at the back. In a short period of time, the phonology is different; Between the two sentences, the weight is different, and it is wonderful to achieve this goal. It can be said "("Song Xie Shu Lingyun Biography "). Then, it will inevitably lead to the evil consequences of "taboo hurts its beauty." Of course, Zhong Rong's evaluation of temperament school is too one-sided, and his contribution to it is definitely not enough. In fact, the metrical school has played a very important role in the formation of China's classical poetry. However, Zhong Rong's criticism of the disadvantages of the theory of soul is completely correct, which has played a positive role in promoting the healthy development of China's ancient literary thought.

Zhong Rong advocates the beauty of nature and opposes the aesthetic view of carving and piling up, which is also clearly reflected in his comments on many poets. He praised Xie Lingyun's poems. "The famous chapters are full of sentences, rising everywhere, and Li Dian's new voices will emerge one after another, like a shrub pulled by a pine tree, and the white jade reflected in the dust and sand is not enough to belittle its nobility." He also said that Xie Tiao's poems are often full of surprises. It's enough to make Uncle Yuan out of step and change his color. However, he also pointed out that there are still some shortcomings in Schell's poetry creation, such as complexity and delicacy, which are not completely in line with nature, beauty and wealth. Zhong Rong criticized Lu Ji's creation as "a miracle that hurts the gods" and Yan Yanzhi's creation as "fond of using ancient things, shy and restrained, good but elegant, frugal and elegant". These can also clearly show his aesthetics.

Thirdly, Zhong Rong advocates paying equal attention to style and rhetoric, emphasizing "taste" and immortal artistic charm.

Style is an important aesthetic category in ancient China. The "wind power" in Zhong Rong's Poems also refers to the strength of character. He believes that poetry creation should be "air-dried by Cai Danrun", that is, style should be given priority, rhetoric should be supplemented, and both style and rhetoric should be paid equal attention to. When Zhong Rong talked about the development of five-character poems before Qi and Liang Dynasties, Jian 'an literature was the highest model, and Jian 'an literature creation was characterized by vigorous wind. Zhong Rong especially praised Cao Zhi's poetry creation, thinking that he was the most outstanding representative of five-character poems before Qi and Liang Dynasties. He said, "Chen Sizhi is also in the article. For example, there are Kong Zhou in human relations, dragons and phoenixes in scales and feathers, Qin Sheng in music and women workers." And his evaluation of Cao Zhishi's "extremely high personality, which is taken from Huamao" is based on two aspects: wind power and Cai Dan. He commented on Serina Liu's poems, "The fighting spirit is strange, and the movement is even more strange." True bone cream, high wind custom. But if you are angry at your words, you will hate less. "That is to say, although Serina Liu's poems are awe-inspiring, they are slightly inadequate in terms of diction and sentence making. At present, there are quite different views on the meaning of Chinese characters. Its significance in different artistic fields and different literary critics is not exactly the same. Zhong Rong's Jian 'an Wind has the following characteristics: First, there should be generous and tragic resentment, which is very clear and strong. The second is to express your thoughts directly, naturally and truly, without affectation or affectation. The third is that the image is distinct and prominent, with concise and clear style characteristics. Generally speaking, "wind power" refers to the beauty of spiritual essence of poetic images, and "Cai Dan" refers to the beauty of material expression of poetic images. Only by combining them closely can literary works be vivid and vivid. The combination of "Wind Power" and "Cai Dan" is another important aesthetic standard for Zhong Rong to evaluate poets of past dynasties.

In his creation, he criticized the tendency that "soup tastes the same as Zhu Xian". There are about a dozen places where Liu Xie talked about "taste" in Wen Xin Diao Long. Liu Xie's understanding of "ignorance" focuses on the image characteristics of literature. For example, the article "Hidden Show" says that only works with the characteristics of "hidden show" can have endless "aftertaste". What is that?

In addition to the above aspects, the value of Zhong Rong's poems is also worthy of our attention. He summarized the historical origin of poetry development into two clues: The Book of Songs and Songs of the South. This is in line with the actual situation of the development of ancient poetry in China. The Book of Songs and Songs of the South are the earliest representative works of two different schools of realism and romanticism in ancient China. Of course, when Zhong Rong classified the poets before Qi and Liang Dynasties according to these two clues, his classification was unscientific, and the discussion on the inheritance relationship of some poets' creation also had the shortcomings of simplification. But he can put forward two basic clues to the development of poetry, which is of great reference significance for us to study the history of poetry development. At the same time, Zhong Rong's summary of the creative characteristics of more than 100 poets also provides valuable enlightenment for us to study the creation of these poets. In this sense, Shi Pin is not only a monograph on poetry theory criticism, but also a monograph on the literary history of five-character rhythmic poetry writers' works.