Chu people are lively, love music and dance, and folk witchcraft prevails. When offering sacrifices to ghosts and gods, we should sing witchcraft songs, thus producing Chu culture based on the integration of witchcraft culture and Central Plains culture. In Chu, from the king of Chu down to the people, they all believe in ghosts and gods, like to sacrifice, tell ghosts and gods about all human activities and pray for their blessing. Such a strong witchcraft style is naturally full of superstitious elements. But at the same time, a large number of magical and magnificent myths and legends not only provide rich materials for literary creation, but also stimulate the poet's imagination. At the end of the Warring States period, Chu people headed by Qu Yuan created a new poetic style, which is Chu Ci. Chu ci "writes Chu language, Chu sound and Chu land, and is famous for Chu objects", which has a very strong local color.
The name of "Chuci" first appeared in the Western Han Dynasty. When the Han Dynasty became emperor, Liu Xiang, a writer, collected the works of Qu Yuan and Song Yu and the copies of later generations on the basis of previous compilation, which was called Songs of the South. Chuci is mainly composed of Qu Yuan's works.
Chuci is another peak of ancient poetry after The Book of Songs. The unique style of Chusheng and Chuge provides rich nourishment for the emergence of Chuci. In addition, the exchange and integration of North and South cultures also played an important role in the emergence of Chu Ci. Moreover, the thought and expression of The Book of Songs also have a certain influence on Chu Ci.
Qu Yuan is the most important and greatest creator of Chu Ci. Qu Yuan, born in 340 BC in a noble family of Chu, has the same surname as the King of Chu. Qu Yuan is a very talented person. He is knowledgeable, good at coping and has great political ambitions.
In the early days of Qu Yuan's political career, he held an important position and was deeply trusted by Chu Huaiwang. He can influence the policies of the country and give full play to his great talent of saving the world and helping the people. However, Qu Yuan's road to being an official was not smooth sailing, but full of twists and turns. When he was full of ambition, his political opponents, such as Doctor Shangguan, challenged him and tried to discredit him in front of Chu Huaiwang.
Chu Huaiwang is a monarch who is partial to hearing and partial to believing. He listened to rumors, began to alienate Qu Yuan, who refused to wronged himself, and finally lost his official position. Since then, Qu Yuan has been exiled twice. After the second exile, Qu Yuan has been living as an escaped prisoner, but he still sticks to his ideal and refuses to give up.
In 278 BC, the army of Qin occupied the capital of Chu. Qu Yuan, who was in exile, was very angry after learning the news of his national subjugation. His ideal was shattered and he was cornered. So he threw himself into the Miluo River and left the world angrily.
Qu Yuan's works, Han Shu? There are 25 pieces of Yiwenzhi, and 25 pieces of Qu Yuan's works were also identified in the Songs of Chu by Wang Yi in the Eastern Han Dynasty, including Li Sao, Jiuge 1 1, Tian Wen, Jiuzhang, Yuanyou, Buju and Fisherman.
These works, represented by Li Sao, established Qu Yuan's lofty position in literature. Li Sao is the longest political lyric poem in ancient times. The whole poem is 373 sentences long and has 2477 words.
In the long poem Lisao, Qu Yuan, with his unique romantic thoughts and deep passion of grief and indignation, combined with his own life experience, created a lyrical hero image with flesh and blood, showing rich and profound thoughts and superb art.
Li Sao has made great achievements in image building, creative methods, expression techniques and forms, language and so on.
Li Sao is based on realism and characterized by romanticism, and the two are perfectly combined. The realistic tone of Li Sao is reflected in the poet's highly personalized brushwork, which truly and profoundly reveals the political darkness and social turbidity of Chu at the end of the Warring States period and frankly expresses the poet's ideals and feelings.
The whole poem of Li Sao has a strong romantic tone, which is embodied in three aspects: (1) to describe the sublimity of the lyric hero in a concentrated and exaggerated way by contrast; Create a series of images of gods to set off the protagonist; It depicts magnificent fantasy and ethereal realm.
Li Sao has a neat and meticulous artistic structure. Long poems not only describe the realm of fantasy, but also describe real experiences, which not only state their aspirations, but also express their feelings. Rich in content and many clues, but the poet writes methodically and compactly.
The artistic achievement of Li Sao is also reflected in the innovation of poetic form and language. Li Sao has a long length and flexible sentence structure, with six or seven words, and the word "Xi" is used as an auxiliary word. In terms of language, the use of disyllabic, rhyming and tautology has made new progress compared with the Book of Songs, especially the absorption of Chu language into poetry, showing a new look.
Besides Li Sao, Nine Chapters, Nine Songs and Tian Wen are also important poems in the Songs of the South. These poems fully express the poet's love for Chu, his nostalgia for the ancient capital, and his noble integrity to the death. These poems not only have high ideological value, but also have their own characteristics and high artistic value.