Xu Xuan is pronounced xú?xuàn.
1. Introduction to Xu Xuan
Xu Xuan was a Chinese philologist and writer from the Five Dynasties to the early Northern Song Dynasty. His ancestors were from Kuaiji (now Shaoxing, Zhejiang). His father Xu Yanxiu was an official in Shaoyin of Jiangdu, so he moved to Guangling. Xu Xuan was born in the literary class at the age of ten and lived next to Qixia Temple. When he first started working in the Southern Tang Dynasty, he served as a censor, a doctor, a commander in charge, a regular attendant on Yousanqi, and a minister in the Ministry of Personnel.
Xu Xuan and his younger brother Xu Kai studied hard since childhood, and before they were weak, they took their literary names and became known as "Two Xus" and "Big and Small Xus". When Xu Xuan was in the Southern Tang Dynasty, his articles were as famous as Han Xizai's, and he was called "Han Xu" at that time.
2. Characteristics of literary works
The poems are elegant and leisurely, sincere and natural, without rhyme or strange words, they are plain and simple, similar to Bai Juyi. His writing inherits the style of parallel prose in the late Tang Dynasty. Most of the surviving writings are in parallel prose, and even the epitaphs are in the four-sixth style. Xu Xuan is good at philology and is good at writing Li Si Xiaozhuan.
Xu Xuan’s literary achievements.
1. Ancient prose
When Xu Xuan was in the Southern Tang Dynasty, his articles were as famous as Han Xizai's, and he was called "Han Xu". ". He once revised "Shuowen Jiezi" together with Ju Zhongzheng and others, adding 19 words to the main text and 402 more words to append to the main text. The version revised and supplemented by them is known as the "Da Xu Edition".
2. Calligraphy
Xu Xuan is good at calligraphy, likes Li Si Xiaozhuan, and is also good at official script. Xu Xuan's running calligraphy is also highly praised, and his representative work "Private Notes" is now in the collection of the National Palace Museum in Taipei. The structure of the whole article is stable, but it does not lose interest. The calligraphy style is implicit and natural, which is the first time that people in the Song Dynasty cared about calligraphy style.
Ouyang Xiu of the Song Dynasty recorded in "Collection of Ancient Records Postscript: Taiyi Mountain Carving Stones": "In the past, Xu Xuan was famous for his small seal script in Jiangnan. Zheng Wenbao was also a disciple of Xuan, and he was also famous in Xuan. "For a while."
3. Poems
Xu Xuan's poems are easy to understand, straightforward and natural, without rhymes or strange words, which is quite close to Bai Juyi's poetry style. His poems such as "Composed out of the city after being demoted to Taizhou", "Send off the King to the Eastern Capital on the 45th", and "Sent to Chen Langzhong in Gaoyou" are all written from the heart, with emotion flowing into the words, without any harshness or polish.
Xu Xuan once said, "The speed of writing makes the meaning quick and strong, while the slowness makes the posture sloppy" ("Jun Zhai Shu Zhi"), so his poems are more fluent but not deep enough. But there are also interesting sentences from time to time, such as: "Wells and springs produce earth veins, and anvils and pestles produce the sound of autumn" ("Poems of Xi Li Shaobao Divining Neighbors"), which shows that his thoughts are far-reaching and meaningful.