Beacon Fire and Shooting Star: The Literary Culture of the Liang (Harvard-Yenching Institute Monograph Series): The Literary Culture of the Liang (502–557): 63 - Hardcover

Tian, Xiaofei

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0674026020 ISBN 13: 9780674026025

Publisher: Harvard University Press, 2007

Synopsis

The Literary Culture of the Liang (502-557)

About this title

Review:

The Liang is usually remembered (if for anything) for court, or palace (gongti), poetry, which scholars have traditionally looked down on as lascivious and decadent...Tian offers a fascinating, refreshing reading of many heretofore undervalued poems.-- (05/01/2008)

Synopsis:

The Liang dynasty (502-557) is one of the most brilliant and creative periods in Chinese history and one of the most underestimated and misunderstood. Under the Liang, literary activities, such as writing, editing, anthologizing, and cataloguing, were pursued on an unprecedented scale, yet the works of this era are often dismissed as "decadent" and no more than a shallow prelude to the glories of the Tang.This book is devoted to contextualizing the literary culture of this era - not only the literary works themselves but also the physical process of literary production such as the copying and transmitting of texts; activities such as book collecting, anthologizing, cataloguing, and various forms of literary scholarship; and the intricate interaction of religion, particularly Buddhism, and literature. Its aim is to explore the impact of social and political structure on the literary world.

About this edition

• Publisher: Harvard University Press
• Publication date: 2007
• ISBN 10: 0674026020
• ISBN 13: 9780674026025
• Binding: Hardcover
• Number of pages: 450