Tao Yuanming is known as "the sect of reclusive poets". His creation created the unity of pastoral poetry and created a new realm for our country's classical poetry. From ancient times to the present, many people like Tao Yuanming's philosophy of life that sticks to the humble cottage, conveys the pastoral meaning, and his unparalleled artistic style that dilutes remoteness, tranquility and nature. At the same time, they express their feelings about the reasons why Tao Yuanming returned to the countryside and his secluded life. Follow or conduct research and analysis. The following is an attempt to explore this in conjunction with Tao Yuanming’s poetry.
Reason 1
Tao Yuanming was influenced by his family tradition and Confucian scriptures when he was young, and he had the ambition to help the world and the common people. However, due to the existence of the clan system, it is impossible for people born in poor families to break through the clan's monopoly on high-ranking officials. Under such circumstances, it is difficult for Tao Yuanming's ideals to become reality. , his ideal dream is destined to be shattered. Tao Yuanming did not become an official until he was twenty-nine years old, but throughout his life, all he did was to serve as a low-level official such as offering wine, joining the army, and serving as county magistrate. He humiliated his body and worked hard with some official figures. By the time he was thirty-nine, his many years of experience had caused a qualitative change in his thinking. He began to turn to farming to be self-sufficient and pursue peace of mind and indifference. After that, he served as the magistrate of Pengze County. Because he was unwilling to give in for five buckets of rice, he was relieved of his post more than 80 days after taking office. From then on, he put an end to his efforts and hesitation in his official career, and embarked on the road of seclusion in his country without looking back. Since returning to the countryside at the age of forty-one, Tao Yuanming has really enjoyed a period of pastoral pleasure in "the warmth of distant villages, the smoke in the ruins, the barking of dogs in the deep alleys, and the crowing of cocks on the tops of mulberry trees." However, Tao Yuanming, who came from a scholarly family, was not a good farmer after all, and the hard work of "opening up the wilderness in the south" might not enable him to live a well-off life without worries about food and clothing. In the fourth year of Yixi, when Tao Yuanming was forty-four, a disaster made his family impoverished. In the summer of this year, the poet's "more than ten acres of square house and eight or nine thatched houses" full of life were burned down by a ruthless fire. The family had to live on the boat and rely on the support of relatives and friends. In the third year of Yongchu (422), when Tao Yuanming was fifty-eight years old, his life was almost in desperation. His situation was reflected in the poem "Writing at a Meeting", "When you are weak, you will be hungry at home, and when you are old, you will be hungry. What Shumai is doing is true." Envy, who dares to admire sweet and fat food?" In the fourth year of Yuanjia (427), the poet was poor and ill. In the second self-elegy poem in his "Elegy Poems", the poet could "empty his belly and think nothing" after death. Reading the fantasy makes people feel sad: "In the past, there was no wine, but now there are glasses in the sky. Spring mash is born with ants, when can I taste it again? The table of food is full in front of me, and I cry next to me." In November of the fourth year of Yuanjia (427), Tao Yuanming, 63, sadly closed his eyes and passed away.
Reason 2
As for Tao Yuanming's career and retirement, people are accustomed to explain it from the social environment's advocating reclusiveness and his thoughts of internal Confucianism and external Taoism. In fact, by grasping Tao Yuanming's five official career experiences and analyzing the reasons why he retired and retreated from a historical perspective, we can gain some new understandings. It can be attributed to two points: one is due to Tao Yuanming's nature, and the other is due to social reality. The essential characteristic of Tao Yuanming's character is the pursuit of maximum freedom of mind and leisurely elegance of mind. Official life is not in line with his nature of advocating nature. Tao Yuanming lived in an era when freedom was advocated and mysticism was raging. Political usurpation and killing made it easy for scholars who sought to avoid disaster to develop a reclusive character. The formation of Tao Yuanming's reclusive character should be said to be related to the general admiration for seclusion and the pursuit of spiritual freedom among the gentry and literati in the Eastern Jin Dynasty. It was this natural endowment of advocating nature and being free and easy that made him unable to bear the burden of "bowing down to a village boy for five buckets of rice", and finally he resigned from the official position and returned to the fields. He wrote "Ci of Return". In the poem, he said very frankly that he was forced to make a living when he became the county magistrate; the reason why he resigned was because he was "natural in nature and not earned through hard work. Although he was hungry and cold, , Go against one's own will and make others sick." His aloof character made him rather go hungry than go against his will to flatter his superiors and get involved in officialdom. In "Returning to the Garden and Living in the Fields", the poet sang: "A young man has no suitable rhymes, and his nature is to love hills and mountains. By mistake, he falls into the dust net, and has been gone for thirty years. Birds in the tether nostalgic for the old forest, and fish in the pond miss the old abyss." "Long-lived." "In the cage, I can return to nature." In just a few sentences, his disgust for the official career was palpable. Because of his "natural nature" and "original love for hills and mountains", Tao Yuanming regarded the official career as a cage. He finally resigned and retired to seclusion, leaving behind the dust and returning to nature. Tao Yuanming's return to the countryside should not only be considered in conjunction with his outspoken personality, but also should be understood from the broad political background and his official career. It can be said that his entry into the world and his birth were related to the social reality at that time. Although Tao Yuanming was eventually dismissed from his post and returned to his fields, when he was young, he had the idea of ??making contributions and benefiting the world. In his poems such as "Drinking" and "Miscellaneous Poems", he once said: "There are few people in the youth, and the best way to travel is in the Six Classics", "The fierce ambition is to travel all over the world, the Qianhe is thinking about the far away", "When I was young, I was strong and powerful, and I traveled alone with my sword. ”, showing that he did not have the idea of ??being born from the beginning. He was born into a family of officials for generations, and was a descendant of the founding fathers. He also expected to make progress in his official career and make a difference in politics. However, the situation in the late Eastern Jin Dynasty where he lived was turbulent: intra-clan struggles and warlords' ambitions for political power constantly caused bloody killings and even fierce fights. This kind of social unrest not only brings disaster to the people, but also creates serious uneasiness among the upper classes of society. This forced Tao Yuanming's political ambitions to be reduced.
In addition, in this struggle for power, all dirty and bloody conspiracies are all under the guise of noble morality, which makes Tao Yuanming, who has a true nature, intolerable. From the eighteenth year of Taiyuan of Emperor Xiaowu of the Jin Dynasty, when the twenty-nine-year-old Tao Yuanming first became an official, it was thirteen years until he returned to his field at the age of forty-two. During this period, Tao Yuanming has been in the contradictory struggle between "coming out of the world" and "joining the world", which is reflected in many of his poems. In poems such as "Going on vacation in the seventh month of the Xin Chou year and returning to Jiangling for a night trip to Tukou", he sighed: "How can I leave here and go as far away as West Jing", "The sun and the moon throw people away, and those who have ambitions will not be hired." In the poem It contains too much disappointment and sadness for the poet. It can be seen that the poet also had painful hesitation and hesitation about whether to return to his fields. However, in the end, his long-cherished wish to "love Qiu Mountain" overwhelmed his ambition to "escape the world", and he finally found it. His final path - to retire to the countryside. Therefore, his retreat was due to social reality and the result of the inability to reconcile his thoughts with social reality.
Reason 3
Judging from Tao Yuanming’s life after he returned to seclusion, Tao Yuanming’s seclusion was different from other hermits who bought fame and reputation during the Eastern Jin Dynasty. He was a true hermit, a kind of hermit. The choice of life is a kind of aversion to "the whole world is dirty" and "everyone is drunk". Let’s take a look at the general experience of Tao Yuanming’s life: he first served as a wine sacrifice for the state, but he was unworthy of his official duties. After a few days, he was discharged and returned home. Later he served under Huan Xuan, Liu Yu and Liu Jingxuan, and finally served as Peng Zeling for more than 80 days. Because he was unwilling to give in to the villagers for five measures of rice, he resolutely resigned and returned to farming. Later, someone persuaded him to become an official again and serve the Liu Song Dynasty. He would rather be poor, sick and impoverished than to get involved in officialdom again. It can be said that Tao Yuanming returned to seclusion and remained humble. In poems such as "Returning to the Garden and Living in the Fields" and "Drinking Drinking", the poet described his life after returning to seclusion, "In the daytime, I cover my firewood and think about the wine. Sometimes people in the ruins come and go with straw. There are many words in the sky, but the road is full of mulberry trees. "There are more than ten acres of square houses and eight or nine thatched houses." "The house is built in a human environment, without the noise of carriages and horses. I ask you how you can do it, but my mind is far away. I am picking chrysanthemums under the eastern fence, and I can see Nanshan leisurely." These villages and ordinary things that others look down upon, Rural life, in the poet's writings, is so beautiful, peaceful, and particularly cordial. After returning to seclusion, Tao Yuanming also personally participated in production labor, got close to the working people, and praised labor, which made his pastoral poems more flavorful of working life. "Spring at the Beginning of the Year of Guimao", "Returning to the Garden and Living in the Farm", "Harvesting Early Rice in the West Field in the Mid-September of the Year of Gengxu", etc. all describe the poet's participation in labor: "In the past, I heard about the southern seedlings, but I didn't practice them back then. There are many people in the sky, so spring is coming. I'm in love with you early in the morning. "Gui" is planting beans at the foot of the south mountain, and the grass is full of bean sprouts. I'm picking up the filth in the morning. "Start the spring with regular work, and the achievements of the year will be considerable. If you work hard in the morning, you will be paid back by the day." "Wen Yuan grew up like this, and it is unreasonable to work hard." In the hard work of going out early and returning late, the poet and the working people The relationship between them is closer, and the feelings for the working people are also more sincere: "When we meet each other, we will work with our neighbors." "The road is full of mulberry trees," "I hear knocking on the door in the morning, and I open my clothes. I ask who I am for, and Tian's father has a good idea. I am looking forward to seeing the pot and the goblet." From these poems, readers can see. It turns out that in this leisurely pastoral life, the poet's mood is natural and peaceful, and he has reached a truly harmonious state of spiritual development. This is the real retreat. Tao Yuanming's seclusion life is not completely out of the world. His seclusion itself is a kind of resistance against the dark reality, which is different from escaping reality. The poet has been involved in field work in the countryside for a long time, and he has become increasingly close to the working people emotionally and has a better understanding of the people's sufferings. In his poems, he often reflects the poor life of the working people and the darkness and hypocrisy of the official career. He wrote in the poem: "I feel hungry every day in the summer, and I have no sleep in the cold nights." Xi Nong has been gone for a long time, and the whole world has rarely returned to reality." Although he retired to the countryside, the poet was not at peace in his heart. He was unwilling and unable to completely abandon social reality. He embodied his unfinished political ideals in his poems. In "The Peach Blossom Spring", the poet describes an ideal society in his heart: "Spring silkworms gather filaments, autumn ripens waste the king's tax", "The heavy children sing songs, and the grizzled people travel happily", everyone is "pleased with themselves" . There is no exploitation or oppression here, everyone works, and everyone lives a prosperous and peaceful life. This "Utopia" reflects the poet's beautiful wishes. It is in sharp contrast with the dark social reality at that time, and is a kind of negation of the real society by the poet. It is the crystallization of the poet's rural life practice after returning to the fields and the result of the further development of the poet's thoughts. This is enough to prove that Tao Yuanming was not completely divorced from reality after he retired.
Summary
From Tao Yuanming’s retirement and his life after retirement, we can see that the society Tao Yuanming longed for was peace and tranquility, self-cultivation, self-reliance, no competition, no hypocrisy, A society without mutual oppression and harm; a life that is simple and sincere, indifferent and lofty, with no external pursuits; the life environment that one likes is a quiet and natural countryside. Because of these pursuits, most of his pastoral poems present a calm, peaceful, and distant appearance, but behind them are full of hatred and uneasiness about the real society, and anxiety about the short life and the inability to feel the body. So as Mr. Lu Xun said: "Tao Qian is great just because he is not full of silence."