During the Wei, Jin, Southern and Northern Dynasties, the "Nine Grades System" was implemented, and most officials were selected from aristocratic families. It is difficult for many talented people with humble origins to hold senior positions in the central and local governments, which forms a monopoly of the gentry on the political power. This situation has seriously inhibited the growth and appointment of outstanding talents. In order to change this malpractice, in 587, Emperor Wendi of the Sui Dynasty ordered the implementation of a new employment system, setting up two subjects, namely Scholar and Ming Jing, and selecting officials through separate examinations. It was through the imperial examination that Fang Fang and Kong embarked on their official career. Emperor Wen of the Sui Dynasty tried to completely restore the power of selecting officials in the imperial court and abolish the system of the gentry, which caused strong dissatisfaction among the gentry. Yang Di officially established the Jinshi Department, and selected outstanding talents according to the examination results. The imperial examination system in China began. The implementation of the imperial examination system provides a convenient channel for talented scholars to enter government organs at all levels, and "learning to be excellent is to be an official" can be truly realized, thus greatly stimulating the development of culture, education and literature and art.
The Sui Dynasty attached great importance to education. Emperor Wendi of Sui Dynasty established Guo Zi Temple as the highest institution of learning in China, with one person serving wine and being responsible for the education of the central government. In the Sui Dynasty, Shi Mao was one of the five majors. During the Yang Di period, the central and local official schools reached an unprecedented scale. In 607, Guo Zi Temple was changed to imperial academy.
Due to its short history, the Sui Dynasty made little achievements in literature. Su Yang, Lu Sidao and Xue Daoheng, three poets who entered the Sui Dynasty from the Northern Zhou Dynasty, have their own characteristics, all of which are permeated with a deep and sad emotion. Su Yang was an important official in the Sui Dynasty, who was both civil and military and had a high status. Today, his poems are mostly five words, such as Two Poems on the Embankment and Poems for Xue Bozhou, all of which contain a feeling of life and a vigorous and desolate style. Lu Sidao's and Xue Daoheng's poems reflect the trend of the integration of North and South poetic styles. For example, Lu Sidao's Song of Picking Lotus has a strong palace atmosphere, while his "Joining the Army" describes the frontier scenery in seven characters, showing a magnificent and vast realm, which is even more commendable, and can be called the first of the seven-character songs in the early Tang Dynasty. Most of Xue Daoheng's poems are rich and exquisite. For example, his masterpiece Yesterday's Salt has written the traditional theme of in my heart forever, which is famous for its lyrical euphemism and delicacy. The phrase "hanging a spider web in the dark, the empty beam falling into the mud" has set off the sadness of women living alone and has always been praised; His poem Crossing the North River is generous and vigorous, and its style has changed greatly. His poem "Homecoming on Men's Day" is a poem with deep feelings and has been passed down through the ages. Sun Wanshou has a poem "seeing friends off in the south of the Yangtze River to Beijing", which is 42 rhymes long. Not flashy, but real, popular for a while.
Yang Guang, Emperor Yang Di of Sui Dynasty, was good at literature. When he was king of Jin, he liked to recruit talents. After he ascended the throne, a group of court literati gathered around him, with beautiful writing style, mostly for creative feelings and moaning without illness. Some of Yang Guang's poems are still impressive, such as one of his short poems: "West Western jackdaw flies a bit, and flowing water flows around the lonely village. The sunset is about to fall, and it looks very charming. " The pictures are cleverly arranged and full of emotion. However, Yang Guang was very conceited and jealous. Xue Daoheng, the literary leader at that time, died at his hands. The two stories recorded in Liu Xiang's The Romance of Sui and Tang Dynasties in the Tang Dynasty can illustrate this point:
Yang-ti is good at literature, but he doesn't want others to be the best. Li Si's servant Xue Daoheng was offended, but later he was punished for it. He said, "Do you want to be an empty lianghao?"
Emperor Yang-ti was named "the Song of Yan", and various schools of thought were harmonious but different. It is impossible that he was the only one who wrote Wang Lang, and the emperors got their names. He sat here and saw the harm, so he recited his epigram: "No one can be green at will. How can he make such remarks?" "
It can be seen that the supreme ruler's advocacy of literature contributes to the prosperity of poetry, but his conceit and jealousy of literature has brought great harm to the development of poetry.
Due to the preference and advocacy of the upper rulers, the society at that time generally loved poetry, and some poets' masterpieces were once told for a while. For example, Xue Daoheng's poems are very famous. The Biography of Sui Shu records: "Jiangdong is elegant, and Zhu Chen still loves carving insects. Every time Dao Heng does something, southerners are chanting. " Xue Daoheng went to Jiangnan to write the story of homesickness every day, which was described in Liu Xiang's Sui and Tang Jiahua volume in the Tang Dynasty:
Chen was hired to write a poem: "It's only seven days in spring and two years away from home." Southerners scoff: "This is the bottom line. Who said it was a poem? " Another cloud says, "When a man falls into a wild goose, he thinks of flowers before." Naixi said, "There is no empty person in my name."
Not only that, but there was also a story of being exonerated for being good at writing poems. There is a related story in the Romance of Sui and Tang Dynasties written by the Tang Dynasty: "Li is the official of the internal history, and * * * is in charge of the Sui government. The hero is arrogant and extravagant, and the woman in the back room is arrogant and extravagant. Delinzi has a hundred medicines at night, and he is called by his concubine. Everything is in court and will be cut. Baiyao is less than twenty years old and looks delicate, so it is cherished. They said, "When you hear that you are good at writing, you can write a poem about yourself. I will call you whatever I want, and I will save you from death. "Untie, give a pen and paper, right away. I am very happy to meet you. With you, I borrowed hundreds of thousands. "
As can be seen from the above examples, the poetry education in the Sui Dynasty was relatively developed. The traditional education of The Book of Songs has been greatly restored not only in official schools, but also in private schools. Recitation is still the main method of poetry education. At this time, the phenomenon of reading Chu Ci with Chu Sheng appeared. When talking about Chu Ci, Sui Shu Jing Ji Zhi said: "In Sui Dynasty, there were explanations of Tao and Qian. If you read them well, you can clearly understand the rhyme. Those who preach Chu Ci are still ancestors. " Among them, Shi Daoqian's "Chu Ci Yin" is also included. In other words, the rhymes of Songs of the South were pronounced with a special local accent and handed down. Shi Daoqian is famous for being good at this kind of reading, and also wrote a monograph "Songs of the South".
Wang Tong, a scholar at the end of Sui Dynasty, was well-read and versatile, and posthumous title was "Wen Zhongzi". He was an official all his life and devoted himself to calling his disciples to give lectures, making him famous all over the world. He advocated the theory of Confucian poetry teaching in Han Dynasty, and believed that poetry should be developed with the Three Cardinal Principles in Ming Dynasty and the Five Permanent Principles, and that "the collection should be kept to distinguish gains and losses" (Zhong Shuo Tian Di Pian), which almost obliterated all the famous poets since the Southern and Northern Dynasties, such as Xie Lingyun, Bao Zhao, Yu Xin and Xu Ling. His thoughts have a great influence on restoring the tradition of Confucian poetry teaching.