First of all, in terms of quantity, the poems compiled by Patten in the Qing Dynasty alone are two or three times more than the total number of poems left over from the Western Zhou Dynasty to the Southern and Northern Dynasties in 16700. There are 2837 poets included, which greatly exceeds the sum of poets in previous dynasties. As for how many poets and works in the Tang Dynasty have not been collected or forgotten because of their age, it is even more incalculable. As far as quality is concerned, the Tang Dynasty not only produced great evils like Li Bai and Du Fu, but also emerged a large number of outstanding poets with unique features, such as Wei, Meng Haoran, Bai Juyi, Li He, Li Shangyin and Du Mu, whose works reached a high ideological and artistic quality.
Why are the poems and songs of the Tang Dynasty so prosperous? On the one hand, it is based on the conditions of national unity, economic development and cultural prosperity, but the prosperity of Tang poetry has a lot to do with the system of selecting officials in the imperial examination.
Following the Sui system in the Tang Dynasty, talents were selected through the imperial examination, and middle and lower-class scholars also had the opportunity to become officials and politicians. Choosing scholars with poetry and calligraphy has also greatly stimulated the enthusiasm of scholars to learn poetry and calligraphy. Choosing scholars by poetry began in Tianbao, Xuanzong of Tang Dynasty, but it was interrupted between the establishment of imperial examination and Yamato eight years, and then resumed. Exam-oriented poems are generally rare because of the strict restrictions on subject matter and meter, but this method of selecting scholars by specialized subject forces scholars to practice the basic skills of poetry. Selecting scholars with poems will drive the whole society to admire poetry from the system, which will undoubtedly play a great role in promoting the prosperity of Tang poetry.
Most emperors in the Tang Dynasty loved poetry. They not only practiced, but also actively advocated, which greatly promoted the prosperity of poetry and the formation of the ethos of the times. The whole Tang poetry contains the poems of eleven emperors in the Tang Dynasty, accounting for half of all the emperors.
In the middle and late Tang Dynasty, from Emperor Gaozong to Zong Rui, the trend of good poems in court became more and more fierce. The monarch and his subjects not only sing with each other, but also often hold poetry competitions.
After the Anshi Rebellion, although Li Tang suffered great damage in politics and economy, it was used to choosing scholars by poems, and the emperor's interest in good poems also increased. Tang Dezong is jealous by nature, but he is very good at poetry. In his spare time, he often sings with his lieutenants or evaluates his merits. Xian Zong and Mu Zong, both of whom don't pass on their poems, are also famous for their good poems.
The Li Dynasty in the late Tang Dynasty was in jeopardy. Culture and art are also on the decline, as are poetry and calligraphy. Fortunately, Du Mu's and Li Shangyin's modern poems and Liu Gongquan's regular script can all follow the prosperous Tang Dynasty and rival the middle Tang Dynasty, putting the last glory on the poetry and calligraphy circles in the late Tang Dynasty, and finally drawing a decent end to the 300-year history of the prosperous Tang Dynasty.