The Chinese equivalent term of quatrain, i.e., jueju, literally means “cut-off lines.” It was erroneously believed by many critics that this meant the wujue and qijue forms had originated as quatrain segments cut from the eight-line lüshi forms. This episode begins with close readings of representative poems to provide readers a sense of the thematic and formal origins of jueju. A detailed examination of common jueju features then follows. Guest Host: Prof. Charles Egan, San Fransico State University English poem recital by Andrew Merritt @ Andrew Merritt (divacatrecords.com ..read more

This episode provides a close reading of Du Fu’s “Jiang and Han Rivers” and shows how the poet makes a masterful use of topic+comment construction to project his Confucian vision of the universe and the self and earns himself the title of poet-sage. Host: Zong-qi Cai, Lingnan University of Hong Kong; University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign English poem recital by Andrew Merritt @ Andrew Merritt (divacatrecords.com ..read more

Xie Lingyun (385–433) is generally recognized as the progenitor and paradigm of poetry on "mountains and waters" (shanshui 山水). Where Tao Qian had written predominantly of the only-partly wild landscapes near his cottage, Xie made his theme the dramatic wildernesses of the southlands. Much of his poetry concerns the scenery of his massive estate, which he staffed with a small army of servants and retainers. His most powerful verse, however, was written in the rugged, unforgiving landscapes he passed through on journeys into exile. Guest Host: Lucas Rambo Bender, Yale University English poem re ..read more

This episode concludes our exploration of Six Dynasties landscape poetry by considering the verse of Xie Tiao (464–499). By Xie Tiao's time, landscape was becoming an increasingly common topic within the world of courtly verse. Partly for this reason, Xie's poetry begins to efface the previously definitive distinction between the human world and the natural landscape, and moreover imbues that landscape with the passions of the courtier—in Xie's case, both his yearning for the court and capital and his well-justified fear of the dangers of court politics. Guest Host: Lucas Rambo Bender, Yale Un ..read more

The first of the “Nineteen Old Poems”, the best known poem of an abandoned woman in the collection, features a mosaic combination of time, space, and emotion fragments and thereby captures the otherwise inexpressible melancholy of an abandoned woman.  Such a mosaic combination is to become a preferred structure for the most intense of lyrical expressions in later poetry. Host: Zong-qi Cai, Lingnan University of Hong Kong; University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign ..read more

This episode discusses the prehistory of Chinese landscape poetry. In the centuries before poets began to write consistently of their concrete, personal experiences out in nature, landscape appeared in poetry primarily as a foil for the city and the court, where most poets were writing. In this role, the natural landscape could be terrifyingly inhospitable or wondrous and pure. Either way, it was for the most part imagined rather than experienced, a site more often for mental roaming than for extended in-person exploration. Guest Host: Lucas Rambo Bender, Yale University English poem recital b ..read more

This episode discusses how the genre begins to broaden thematically in the work of somewhat later literati poets who continued to write in the short xiaoling form. Poems by the Last Emperor of the Southern Tang, Li Yu, and by Northern Song statesman Yan Shu demonstrate how the genre begins to take on themes like nostalgia and friendship. Guest Host: Dr. Maija Samei ..read more

This episode analyzes this yuefu piece from different perspectives. As many of the popular songs of the Han, this poem contains dialogue and monologue at the same time. The poem follows a daring woman’s emotional changes from her initial rage against her lover from the south who jilted her to an unsettling feeling of anxiety. Guest host: Jui-lung Su, National University of Singapore ..read more

After nearly one millennium since its birth, Chinese poetry achieved an optimal convergence of sound and sense in its pentasyllabic poems developed during the Eastern Han (25-220 CE).  Taking full advantage of an explosive rise of two-character compounds, the anonymous Han pentasyllabic poets created a poetic rhythm far more flexible and expressive than all existing rhythms and adapted it for philosophical reflection and emotional brooding on human transience. Host: Zong-qi Cai, Lingnan University of Hong Kong; University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign ..read more

This episode introduces us to the genre of the song lyric using two anonymous poems that present a male and female speaker in dialog. The episode discusses the origins of the genre during the Tang dynasty, its formal characteristics, and its connection to female voice and feminine themes. Guest Host: Dr. Maija Samei ..read more