Deploying Method According to the Title: On the Techniques of Examining the Title in Qing Poetics of the Examination Poem
Abstract
After the twenty-second year of the Qianlong reign, the five-character eight-rhyme examination poem was gradually introduced into the imperial examinations at every level, and examining the title became a core issue in the poetics of the examination poem. Drawing on the examination-poem commentary and the writings on poetic method by Ji Yun, Ye Bao, Liang Zhangju and others, the techniques of examining the title that Qing writers summed up can be sorted out along three dimensions: the meaning of the title, the eye of the title, and the types of the title. Examining the meaning of the title requires investigating the original intent of the source of the poem title and weighing what to keep and what to discard in light of the context of the examination; discerning the eye of the title lies mainly in clarifying which words on the surface of the title are primary and which are secondary, and in attending to how the meaning of the title blends with the scene of the poem; dividing the types of the title turns individual experience of writing into a general pattern that can be referred to. This technical system of "deploying method according to the title" both reorganized the experience, found in earlier poetics, of conceiving meaning and arranging layout, and reflected the deep influence of the examination system on the form of poetic knowledge in the Qing, and it provides a reference for understanding how poetics and the examinations acted on each other.
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