The popularity of poetry in Song Dynasty is based on the popularity of literature in Northern Song Dynasty. The literature of the Northern Song Dynasty is a new development period in the history of China literature. After the decline of the ancient prose movement in the late Tang Dynasty and the Five Dynasties, it received enthusiastic responses from Song writers Ouyang Xiu, Wang Anshi and Su Shi. They combined the Confucian tradition with the literary tradition more closely, and made the ancient prose in Song Dynasty truly become a practical style with strong political function. The prosperity of cities and businesses in Song Dynasty promoted the continuous growth of the citizen class and the prosperity of the citizen culture. Popular literature, such as drama and rap, also developed rapidly in the Song Dynasty, and gradually formed popular narrative literature, such as storytelling, Zhugong tune, zaju and Nanxi opera, which changed the situation that ancient China literature was longer than narrative in expressing emotions and attached importance to orthodox literature while ignoring popular literature.
Judging from the content and features of Song poetry, Song people paid attention to reflecting social reality, and their themes and styles tended to be popular, which finally formed a Song poetry that was completely different from Tang poetry. Poems and songs in the Song Dynasty can even be said to be the product of market culture, showing ordinary and trivial daily life and loving children. Its emergence and development are closely related to the prosperity of urban economy and the rise of citizen culture. On the other hand, in terms of language, slang is widely used in Song Ci, which makes the language more popular.