Playing chess doesn't know how to change the world, and the bar is helpless to miss home.
—— Ouyang Xiu
In classical poetry, there are many dreams or poems written in dreams. In the Qing Dynasty, Zhao Yi once said that there were as many as 99 dream poems written by Lu You in Ou Bei Shi Hua. Some of these works really write dreams, and some express the poet's feelings through dreams.
The four sentences in Ouyang Xiu's poems describe four different artistic conceptions, all in dreams, and the theme is difficult to grasp, because the poet expresses a tortuous and complicated feeling here.
The first sentence is about the quiet night scene. From the words "cool" and "moon", we can know that the time is probably autumn. A bright moon shines on the mountains far and near like day. The author plays the flute when the night is as cool as water and everything is silent, and the surrounding environment is particularly quiet. The word "Qian Shan Moon" has a broad artistic conception, giving people a sense of exquisiteness.
The second sentence depicts another realm. "It's a long way to go in Xiu Yuan", which means that the time is also at night. The following words say "Let a hundred flowers blossom", so the festival at this time is replaced by spring when a hundred flowers bloom. The roads here are dark and full of flowers, which makes the scenery of spring night so confusing, just like a poetic scene in a dream. These two sentences are hazy in artistic conception and quiet in language, which set off the latter two sentences.
The third sentence refers to changing the world through a legendary story. Ren Fang of Liang Dynasty said in Strange Tales: Wang Zhi of Jin Dynasty went into the mountains to collect firewood, and when he saw two boys playing chess, he set his axe aside. The boy gave the king a jujube stone and put it in his mouth, so he didn't feel hungry. After the chess game, the boy hurried home, and the king found that his axe handle was rotten. Since I came back, all my relatives and friends have passed away, and I have changed the world. This sentence reflects the author's desire to be above the world.
After writing the last sentence, I can't help but miss home. It can be seen that although the author wants to be detached, he can't forget himself in the world after all, similar to Su Dongpo's "I want to go home by the wind, but I am afraid of the beauty of the building and can't stand the cold."
Although these four poems are written in four different artistic conceptions, they are in harmony and unity, which implies that the author wants to transcend time and space and nostalgia for the contradictory thoughts between the official and the hidden in the world.
"Poetry expresses ambition". After reading the whole poem, the meaning will gradually become clear. The poet's depression and trance were related to his political frustration at that time. This poem is in Volume 12 of the Collection of laymen, and the original notes of the two directories are marked as the first year of you (1049), which may have been written at the same time. At this time, Ouyang Xiu was still in Yingzhou and had not been reused by the court. Therefore, these four sentences are expressing the feelings in the heart, and its beauty lies in not directly expressing this feeling. This subtext technique needs careful observation to understand what it is.
Yang Shen made an analysis of this poem in Sheng 'an Poetry in Ming Dynasty. He believes that the quatrains of the ancients generally have two different characteristics: one is a unique poem, and the four poems are four different independent artistic conceptions. For example, the ancient four seasons fu: "Spring is full of four colors, and Xia Yun has many strange peaks. The autumn moon shines brightly, and the winter ridge is solitary and loose "; Du Fu's quatrains: "Two orioles sing green willows, and a row of egrets go up to the sky. The window contains autumn snow in Xiling, at the gate of Wu Dong Wan Li boating "; Ouyang Xiu's poems all belong to this category. The other is "a couplet is round", four sentences have the same meaning and are closely related, such as Jin Changxu's "Spring Complaint". As Sheng 'an said, this poem "Dream" is written in four different artistic conceptions: autumn night, spring night, chess strike and bar, but it is natural, so Chen Yan said: "This poem is really a dream, if God helps." (The Essence of Song Poetry)
Another feature of this poem is that the antithesis is ingenious and seamless, and the two words are opposite. This is obviously influenced by Du Fu's quatrains.