1. Some titles can reflect the general idea of this poem. For example, "Morning Trip to Shangshan" tells us that the content of this poem is in the place of Shangshan, and the protagonist leaves early and travels far. We can also see the main idea of this poem from "Watching the Rain" and "Titling Li Ningju Youyou", so we can roughly understand the main meaning of this poem according to the title.
Some titles can tell you the lyric scope of this poem. For example, we can know that it should reflect frontier life, express patriotic feelings of making contributions and defending the country, or be homesick. According to the word "nostalgia", "goat Tongguan" can be understood as a poem that wants to hurt, metaphor and satirize the present. The book "Shuxiang" in the title of "Shuxiang" has actually told us that this is about Zhuge Liang, but the main idea is to write about himself through the ancients.
Second, read the author well.
Reading the author is to help us understand poetry. That is to say, we should know people and discuss the world and grasp the style of poetry. We can help us understand poetry from the background of his time, his attitude towards life and his style. Li Bai, for example, is an outstanding representative of romanticism. His style is fresh and elegant. His poems, such as Looking at Lushan Waterfall, express more reluctance to go along with the rulers, such as "Climbing Mount Tianmu in a Dream" and "Entering Wine", which can help us understand poetry. For example, we can think from Du Fu's poems that the Anshi Rebellion led to people's displacement, which is helpful for us to understand poetry.
Third, read this poem.
This poem itself is the focus of our reading. But we know that the language of poetry is highly concise and generalized, and the requirements of ancient poetry are strict. What should we do?
We might as well start with the following aspects to analyze.
1. Understand the meaning of words
Ancient poems are written in classical Chinese. If we want to understand poetry correctly, we must pay attention to grasping its meaning. Attention should be paid to the phenomena of synonyms, polysemy and flexible use of parts of speech in ancient and modern times.
(1) Different meanings in ancient and modern times.
For example, the word "poor" in "Mu Jiang Yin" and "poor in the third night of September" is a typical word with different meanings in ancient and modern times. We can also associate it with Jia Sheng's word "midnight poverty", which is the same as our usage today.
(2) The word is polysemous.
The word "fitness" in Peacock Flying Southeast has more meanings, so let's take a look. The word "suitable" in The Return of the Native can be said to be "married", while the word "suitable" in Disposal of Suitable Brother can only be said to be "suitable", while the word "suitable" in the book "suitable politics" means "right". Therefore, we need to grasp it carefully.
(3) Flexible use of parts of speech.
In ancient poetry, there are many flexible uses of parts of speech. For example, the word "green" in "Spring breeze is green in Jiang Nanan" is an adjective used flexibly as a verb. We can also find many such examples in other poems.
(4) Pun meaning of words.
The word "silk" in Li Shangyin's Untitled is a homophonic pun of "thinking", which means that my feelings are like silkworms spinning until they die.
Isn't the word "sunny" in Liu Yuxi's "Zhi Zhu Ci" a pun on "work at sunrise, rest at sunset, and sunny in the Tao"?
2. master sentence patterns.
Due to the need of meter, ancient poems often adopt some special sentence patterns. For example, inverted sentences and ellipsis sentences. Let's try to analyze:
"Affectionate Ying Xiao Wo, born early", we infer that it is a prepositional object, which should be "affectionate Ying Xiao Wo".
"Apricot blossom rain is wet with clothes, and the breeze blowing surface is not cold", and it is concluded that it is the subject-predicate inversion, which should be "apricot blossom rain is wet with clothes, and the breeze blowing surface is not cold."
"Stop and sit in love with the late maple forest, and the frost leaves are red in February", and you will know the poem "Love is the late maple forest" at a glance.
The above analysis can be regarded as the representative of inverted sentences, so there are also many ellipsis sentences in poetry. Please see below:
"Two orioles sing green willows, and a row of egrets go up to the sky." -Omit the preposition "Yu".
"For me, take a hug home as a symbol of our love."-omit the selected object "this thing-red beans".
"A maid-in-waiting lived here for twenty years, a thousand miles away from home."-omit the predicate verbs "far" and "deep residence".
"Although my body doesn't have bright phoenix wings, I can feel the harmonious heartbeat of the sacred unicorn." -Omit the related word "although" ... but ... "
From the above analysis, we can see that there are many forms of ellipsis, which can be subject, predicate, object, head, preposition, or related words. Then when we read a poem, we need to supplement the omitted content, so as to better understand the poem.
In addition, ancient poetry often uses some nouns to form poems. Ma Zhiyuan's "Tianjingsha Qiu Si" is "a dead vine and an old tree, a flowing bridge, an ancient road and a thin horse". When the sun sets, heartbroken people are at the end of the world. "The first four sentences are all formed by the superposition of nouns, so when we analyze them, we need to give full play to our associative ability and imaginative ability, analyze many of them, connect them properly, and appreciate their rich meanings. The first two sentences of the article "Walking in the Morning" are "Crows crow in Maodian, and there is frost on the bridge. "It showed us a set of pictures. What shall we do? Let's give full play to our associative ability.
Step 3 master rhetoric
Rhetoric is often used in poetry to increase its charm and enrich its feelings.
(1) Bold exaggeration
This kind of exaggeration is not simply to enlarge the true colors of things, but to integrate with the poet's beautiful feelings. For example, in Li Bai's Dream of Climbing Mount Tianmu, the poem begins with the majestic posture of Mount Tianmu, which contains the poet's admiration and yearning for Mount Tianmu. Du Fu said that "floating in the air is not a group", which can be seen here. In modern poetry, there are many exaggerations, such as Mao Zedong's "Yanshan snowflakes are as big as seats". Then, when we read poetry, we must understand it carefully.
(2) Contrast technology
Contrast is an artistic technique, which compares two opposing things and two opposing situations in a poem. The use of contrast can make the depicted image more vivid. Mao Zedong's "Qinyuanchun Changsha" contains many contrasts. For example, the colors of Wan Shan Hong Bian and Jiang Jiang Lan Bian are mainly contrast: Eagle Strikes the Sky, Fish Shallow, Pointing to the Jiangshan and Inspirational Words are mainly action contrast: Xuedi Xuemei, Teenager and Wan Huhou are contrast; "All kinds of frosts strive for freedom" and people's oppression (not specified in the words) are. Li Yue's "Watching the Rain": "Mulberry strips are leafless, native to smoke, and flute pipes welcome Longshui Temple. Zhumen indulged in a few songs and dances, fearing that the sky would be swallowed up. " It is a clever use of contrast.
(3) Foil technology
In addition, rhetorical devices such as synaesthesia, metaphor and intertextuality are also used in poetry. When we appreciate it, we should look at specific poems.
Fourth, read the notes.
Annotation is a good supplement to poetry, and its function is to help us understand poetry. When reading, we should analyze the function of annotations. We can divide annotations into the following categories:
(1) Introduce the background of this poem. Then when we read a poem, we can understand the theme of the poem in combination with the background of the annotation.
(2) explain the author's situation. The author's situation is very helpful for us to understand the theme and style of this poem.
(3) Annotate the poem. The annotation of a poem is often difficult for us to understand, and we can bring it into the poem to understand.
(4) Introduce allusions. Some poems often use classics to increase the connotation of poetry. "Yong Yu Kou Ting Nostalgia" is a word that we are most familiar with. It has many allusions, and the notes explain it well, so we can better understand this poem according to these.
When we read annotations, we can make full use of annotations to better grasp poetry, understand the general idea of poetry and serve our appreciation.
Above, we talked about four aspects of understanding poetry. Therefore, when we appreciate poetry, we should not only grasp the image and understand the artistic conception, but also explore the skills and taste the language, so as to appreciate poetry better.