Bai Juyi, a native of Xinzheng, Henan Province, was born in Taiyuan, and his great-grandfather moved to Xiaxia when he was born. He was a great realistic poet in the Tang Dynasty and one of the three great poets in the Tang Dynasty.
Bai Juyi's humble story of seeking advice
The story that Bai Juyi changed his poem for fear that women could not understand it is indeed uncertain, but there is such a legend. According to legend, Bai Juyi, a famous poet in Tang Dynasty in China, always read a poem to a shepherd boy or an old woman first, and then revised it repeatedly until they clapped their hands and said it was good. A famous poet like Bai Juyi will not despise the shepherd boy and the village woman because of their ignorance. Because he knew that real literary works must be recognized by the people, he humbly asked the people for advice to make his poems easy to understand and read by future generations.
Bai Juyi's literature
Bai Juyi was a great poet with great influence in the middle Tang Dynasty. His poetic thoughts and creations, which emphasize popularity and realism, occupy an important position in the history of China's poetry. In Jiu Shu Tong Yuan, he clearly said: "Servants aim to help the two, and they are independent. Always serve the Tao, and invent poetry. Calling it a satirical poem is also aimed at helping others; It's not bad to call it leisure poetry. " It can be seen that among Bai Juyi's four kinds of poems: irony, leisure, sentimentality and miscellaneous methods, the first two reflect his "obedience and constant goodness" and are the most valued. At the same time, he put forward his own literary proposition: "Articles should be written in time, and songs and poems should be written well." His poetic thoughts are mainly based on early satirical poems.
As early as the early Yuan Dynasty, Bai Juyi showed a tendency to emphasize realism, popularity and allegory: "If there is no textual research on today's praise and demotion, there is a lack of punishment and persuasion;" If the poem "The Beauty Sting" does not test politics, then the significance of the make-up test will be abolished. ? The satirist who admonishes Ci and Fu, though wild, will be rewarded. "The role of poetry is to punish evil and persuade good, and make up for current politics. The means of poetry is praise and criticism, and it is admonition and irony. Therefore, he advocated: "establish an official who collects poems, open a satirical way, examine their gains and losses, and understand their feelings." (Poetry Sixty-nine) He opposes the simple pursuit of "high palace rhythm" and "strange writing" without content, and even more opposes the gorgeous poetic style of "mocking the wind and making flowers" since Qi and Liang Dynasties.
In the preface to new Yuefu, he clearly pointed out that the standard of writing poetry is: "the quality and path of his words are easy to distinguish for those who want to see;" His words are straightforward, and those who want to hear them are deeply warned; Its business is nuclear and true, so people who use it can send messages; Its body is smooth and can be played in music songs. Here, "quality and diameter", "straightness and tangent", "core and reality" and "smoothness and smoothness" respectively emphasize that the language should be simple and popular, the discussion should be straightforward and exposed, the writing should be absolutely false and pure, the form should be smooth and fluent, and it has the color of ballads. In other words, poetry must be authentic, easy to understand and easy to sing in order to be considered the ultimate.