Abstract:
Scholars in the Tang Dynasty were inclined to reminisce about historical events and personalities and trends in the Southern Dynasties, which later resulted in the theme of the Southern Dynasties, one of the important themes of the poetry in the Tang Dynasty. In the early Tang Dynasty, few poems chanted about the Southern Dynasties because the latter had not emerged yet as the object of artistic expression. In the prosperous phase of the dynasty, the theme of the Southern Dynasties rose as the favorite of many contemporary poets, such as Zhang Jiuling, Li Bai, Wang Wei and the like. They presented their highly aesthetic and lyrical imagination and chanting about romance alongside the south bank of the Yangtze in their poems. After An Lushan and Shi Shiming’s Rebellion, most poets stranded away to southern China. They began to write about the Southern Dynasties in a realistic way. Since their political situation was much similar to the former dynasties, the poets began to show interest in the history of the Southern Dynasties. Thus irony rose as a prominent trend in poem writing, which was most typically expressed in Li Shangyin’s poems. In a word, an analysis of the evolution of the Southern Dynasties as a theme of the poetry in the Tang Dynasty will help to deeply perceive the relationship between characteristics of the Tang poetry and regional cultures of the Southern Dynasties.
