Wang Yucheng's literary thoughts.

Wang Yucheng was an accomplished writer in the early Song Dynasty. His poetry and prose creation are outstanding, which promoted the change of poetry style and writing style in the early Song Dynasty. There are many schools of poetry in the early Song Dynasty, but there are mainly three schools: vernacular, Kunxi and late Tang. Wang Yucheng is a "white body" He is one of the first outstanding writers who stood up against extravagant writing style and advocated simplicity since the early years of Northern Song Dynasty and the end of Tang Dynasty. Wang Yucheng advocated "Yi Dao of sentence, Xiao Yi of meaning" ("Answer to Zhang Fushu") and opposed abstruse and obscure sentences, paving the way for later poetic innovation movements of Ouyang Xiu, Mei Yao Chen and others, so he was highly valued by later generations. In the early Northern Song Dynasty, the literary world followed the decadent aesthetic style of the late Tang Dynasty and the Five Dynasties. In order to get rid of this abuse, Wang Yucheng advocated inheriting the spirit of Han Yu and Liu Zongyuan's ancient prose movement, advocating "learning the Six Classics from afar" and "learning from the official department (Han Yu)" and writing ancient prose with "the heart of preaching and dispelling doubts". He particularly emphasized "to talk about", and the article should be "Yi Dao" and "Xiao Yi", which played the "preface" in the theory and practice of Han Yu's ancient prose. His prose works are rich in content, full of emotion and fluent in language. Leaking the Courtyard is a political treatise, which puts forward the topic that "the government of a country and the lives of ten thousand people depend entirely on the prime minister" and exhorts the rulers to be diligent and love the people, rather than "stealing the position and taking care of the whole body".

His representative work, Hsinchu Building in Huangzhou, was written during the period of demoting officials to Huangzhou. In this paper, the joy of exile is strongly exaggerated, and the labor-saving and low-cost bamboo building is described as full of fun, which implicitly shows a kind of resentment. The article uses parallelism, with beautiful tone and poetic flavor. Tanghedian Biography tells the story of an old woman who killed the enemy tactfully in the border region, and used the topic to condemn the improper military and political measures of the authorities. The characters are vivid and sincere. In addition, Biography of Flowers on the Sea and Answering Zhang Fushu are both representative works of his prose. As the most important essayist in the early Song Dynasty, his ancient prose theory and creation had a great influence on the formation of prose style in the Song Dynasty. Su Shi said that he was "independent from the world with heroic prose" and that he was "brave as autumn frost and summer, and could not play" (preface to the portrait of the king), which was not a compliment.

In terms of literary theory, Wang Yucheng proposed preaching, dispelling doubts, having words and writing. Wang Yucheng said in Answer to Zhang Fushu: "Wen Fu, preaching and teaching to solve doubts." In addition to preaching in words, he also requires clear thinking in words in order to express his political views and inner feelings in preaching. It is Wang Yucheng's theoretical contribution to put forward a "clear mind" that transcends "speaking" and "writing" that transcends "speaking". The so-called "clear heart" means that the inner world is lofty, with a clear conscience, and preaches with a civilized heart. In essence, it requires the unity of literature and Taoism, the unity of literature and reality, and the emphasis on literature. In poetry, Wang Yucheng was full of praise for Du Fu and Bai Juyi. At the end of the Song Dynasty, Fang Hui said, "Song shovel the old habits of the Five Dynasties, and the poems are in white style, Kun style and late Tang style." (Luo Shouke's Preface to Tongjiang Continuation, Volume 32) Obviously, this statement is a bit exaggerated, but the poetic style in the early Song Dynasty was indeed divided into Bai style, Kun style and late Tang style, and Wang Yucheng was also regarded as an important Bai style poet by Song people. However, Wang Yucheng's poetic style is different from that of white poets such as Li Yun and Xu Xuan. Wang Yucheng wrote more leisurely poems in his early years and more allegorical poems in his later years, which is just the opposite of Bai Juyi. It is this profound sense of introspection that prompted him to learn from Bai Juyi and then take Du Fu as a model. Even in his later years, his Little Livestock Collection rarely included his early works. According to legend, he once wrote a sentence of "Ben and Lotte are backward, but they dare to look forward to it" because of his own poems and Du Fu's poems, and praised "Zi Mei's collection opens the poetry world". In his creation, he tried hard to practice Bai Juyi's thought of "taking poetry as poetry and taking songs as things", and created poems such as Snow Pile, Feeling Exile, Bamboo and Snow Care. He described the plight of farmers and soldiers at that time with deep sympathy, exposed the darkness of reality, and was strict with his own criticism, inheriting and carrying forward the styles of Du Fu's Three Officials, Three Farewells and Bai Juyi's Qin Zhongyin. Five Shetian Ci poems vividly recorded the scene of slash-and-burn cultivation in mountainous areas and praised the virtues of hard struggle, unity and mutual assistance of ordinary people.

His poems, like his prose, are simple and fluent in language and simple and elegant in style. He also has some short poems with lyrical scenery, but the style is beautiful and charming. For example, A Journey to the Country depicts the touching scene of dusk in a mountain village and the poet's feelings. He is also good at absorbing ideas and artistic nutrition from folk songs. Such as "Shetian Ci": "Drumming and hunting for drunkenness, mountain chaos. I am self-sufficient, self-sufficient. I don't know that Yao Shun is my king. " Full of workers' optimistic feelings, it has a fresh and lively folk flavor. His long poems, describing his life story and embrace, can speak freely, which opened the atmosphere of prose in Song Dynasty. Lin Bu praised: "I was Huangzhou in the Song Dynasty." Hu Zai added: "In the early days of the founding of the People's Republic of China, after the Five Dynasties, all the philosophers lived in Bai Letian's poems, so Wang Huangzhou was in charge of the alliance for a while." (Volume 22 of the first episode of Tiaoxi Fishing and Conceiving Conghua) Wang Yucheng's Ci is a unique one in the early Song Dynasty, with profound style, vigorous and mature art. Specifically, the contribution of the word Dianjiang Lip in the early Song Dynasty focused on two aspects: winning with beauty in a beautiful atmosphere; Be good at opening up in a narrow ci realm. In the past, people generally only paid attention to Fan Zhongyan's "Pride of Fisherman" ("The Scenery of Qiu Lai is Different"). In fact, no matter from the ideological content or artistic style, this word is very distinctive. It can be seen from Liu Yong's Xuemei Fragrance (Xiao Jingsuo), Xin Qiji's Hidden Water Dragon (Chu Qian Tian Dora) and Jiang Kui's Touching the Lip (Yan Yan Unintentional) that it is influenced by Wang Yucheng. Therefore, Wang Yucheng's "Dianjiang Lips" should be regarded as an important poem that opened the curtain of the Song Dynasty. Wang Yiqing praised the word "beautiful and lovely", and therefore praised Wang Yucheng's "fame is not limited to poetry" (four quotations from thorns in past dynasties). Wang Yucheng is an important writer who initiated the writing atmosphere of Ci in the Northern Song Dynasty.