Classical Chinese poetry genres

Similarly to the classification of Chinese painting, some poetry is regarded as "landscape poetry", because it primarily utilizes images of scenes of nature. Some of the genesis of this can be seen in the nature imagery of the Shijing. Also, the Orchid Pavilion Gathering was an important influence in this regard. Similarly, this genre may be divided into two subgenres: the more domestic nature poetry of the "Fields and Gardens" genre and the more completely untrammeled nature encountered in the "Rivers and Mountains" (shansui shi).[1] The landscape style of poetry also developed an impetus through a happy conjoining with similar generic developments in Chinese painting such as the Shan shui style.

"Border Fortress" (traditional Chinese: 邊塞; simplified Chinese: 边塞; pinyin: biānsài), but also known by other names such as "Beyond the Borders", this genre of Classical Chinese poetry deals with the experiences – real or imagined – of life on the edge of the Chinese empire. They are set especially in the arid regions to the North and West, which were remote, subject to temperature extremes and to sand and dust storms, and populated with sometimes exotic and often hostile people. Yet these frontier areas were vital to the empire: politically due to imperial ambitions, economically due to the Silk Road trade, and symbolically. Important poets who wrote in this genre include Gao Shi and Cen Shen, both of the Tang Dynasty.

Gufeng (古風), literally "ancient airs" are a Chinese poetry genre based on the "Airs (feng) from the Kingdoms (States)" section of the Shijing. Examples include Li Bo's gufeng on Mount Taibai. Li Bo also wrote a poem entitled 古風.[4]

One widespread genre is known as Huaigu (traditional Chinese: 懷古; simplified Chinese: 怀古; pinyin: huáigǔ). In this type of poem, the poet looks back at some bygone time, place, or persons. This is "one of the perennial themes of Chinese poetry," according to Burton Watson, in which "the poet contemplates the ruins of past glory."[5]

Reproductions of the lost original of Su Hui's "Xuanji Tu" palindrome poem.

The major exponent of this was Su Hui. Her "Xuanji Tu" poem is in the form of a twenty-nine by twenty-nine character grid, and can be read forward or backwards, horizontally, vertically, or diagonally.

Midnight Songs poetry also known as, Zi Ye, or "Lady Midnight" style, supposedly originating with an eponymously named fourth-century professional singer of the Eastern Jin dynasty.[6]

Xiaoxiang poetry has a long tradition in China, and later has been of influence more globally. This poetry was associated with the Xiaoxiang region of China, which was in turn historically associated with social and political exile.

One genre of Classical Chinese poetry is known as sangluan (traditional Chinese: 喪亂; simplified Chinese: 丧乱; pinyin: sāngluàn; Wade–Giles: sang-luan): this is a genre of verse associated with the poetry of the Yuan Dynasty which thematically has to do with the devastation of war and its associated death and disorders, specifically regarding the violent and tumultuous events leading up to and occurring during the course of the establishment of the Yuan Dynasty by Kublai Khan.

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• Davis, A. R. (Albert Richard), Editor and Introduction, The Penguin Book of Chinese Verse. (Baltimore: Penguin Books (1970).
• Frankel, Hans H. (1978). The Flowering Plum and the Palace Lady. (New Haven and London: Yale University Press) ISBN 0-300-02242-5
• Hinton, David (2008). Classical Chinese Poetry: An Anthology. New York: Farrar, Straus, and Giroux. ISBN 0-374-10536-7 / ISBN 978-0-374-10536-5.
• Stimson, Hugh M. (1976). Fifty-five T'ang Poems. Far Eastern Publications: Yale University. ISBN 0-88710-026-0
• Yip, Wai-lim (1997). Chinese Poetry: An Anthology of Major Modes and Genres . Durham and London: Duke University Press. ISBN 0-8223-1946-2
• Watson, Burton (1971). CHINESE LYRICISM: Shih Poetry from the Second to the Twelfth Century. New York: Columbia University Press. ISBN 0-231-03464-4

• Chinese Wikipedia article on Shi (詩) Chinese Wikipedia article on Shi (詩)
• Chinese Poems, a collection of Chinese poems in the original Chinese, pinyin and English translations
• Understand the basic forms of jintishi (regulated verse)