Remaking early poetic tradition: publication and reception of ancient-style poetry anthologies in late imperial China
type: CreativeWork
description: Situated at the intersections of literary studies, book history, and print culture, this dissertation studies how literary anthologies were shaped by and shaped literary tradition in late imperial China from the sixteenth century to the eighteenth century. Specifically, by combining approaches from the fields of literary studies, book history, and digital humanities, this dissertation focuses on the practices of compiling, publishing, and reading ancient-style poetry (Ch. gushi or guti shi) anthologies. Through examining poetry anthologies from both macroscopic and microscopic perspectives, this dissertation argues that the late imperial practices of compiling, publishing, and reading a large amount of ancient-style poetry anthologies have transmitted, transformed, canonized, and popularized the ancient poetic tradition in Ming-Qing China. This process is marked by (1) the reinvention of the pre-Tang tradition, (2) the expansion of the readership of pre-Tang poetry, (3) the transformation of the general perception of the term gushi, and (4) the emergence of new methods of interpreting and reading gushi. Ultimately, by the 1700s, these practices have resulted in a significant remaking of the ancient and early poetic tradition. The main body of this dissertation contains five chapters. The introductory chapter introduces the topic, materials, and methodology. Chapter 1 argues that late imperial China witnessed the rise of “ancient-style poetry anthology,” a genre native to Ming-Qing society. It is a unique genre of books neutered within and by late imperial society. Chapter 2 delineates the formats and forms for this genre of books, identifying several new late imperial ways of compiling and reading these anthologies. Chapter 3 focuses on the production of pre-Tang poetry anthologies in the 1500s, examining the contributions of the sixteenth-century anthologizing practices to the reinvention of an all-inclusive pre-Tang poetic tradition. By the end of the 1500s, a gus…
abstract: Situated at the intersections of literary studies, book history, and print culture, this dissertation studies how literary anthologies were shaped by and shaped literary tradition in late imperial China from the sixteenth century to the eighteenth century. Specifically, by combining approaches from the fields of literary studies, book history, and digital humanities, this dissertation focuses on the practices of compiling, publishing, and reading ancient-style poetry (Ch. gushi or guti shi) anthologies. Through examining poetry anthologies from both macroscopic and microscopic perspectives, this dissertation argues that the late imperial practices of compiling, publishing, and reading a large amount of ancient-style poetry anthologies have transmitted, transformed, canonized, and popularized the ancient poetic tradition in Ming-Qing China. This process is marked by (1) the reinvention of the pre-Tang tradition, (2) the expansion of the readership of pre-Tang poetry, (3) the transformation of the general perception of the term gushi, and (4) the emergence of new methods of interpreting and reading gushi. Ultimately, by the 1700s, these practices have resulted in a significant remaking of the ancient and early poetic tradition. The main body of this dissertation contains five chapters. The introductory chapter introduces the topic, materials, and methodology. Chapter 1 argues that late imperial China witnessed the rise of “ancient-style poetry anthology,” a genre native to Ming-Qing society. It is a unique genre of books neutered within and by late imperial society. Chapter 2 delineates the formats and forms for this genre of books, identifying several new late imperial ways of compiling and reading these anthologies. Chapter 3 focuses on the production of pre-Tang poetry anthologies in the 1500s, examining the contributions of the sixteenth-century anthologizing practices to the reinvention of an all-inclusive pre-Tang poetic tradition. By the end of the 1500s, a gus…
author: Chen, Jing
language: en
keywords: anthology, late imperial China, ancient-style poetry, poetic tradition
date published: 2018-09-27T16:30:29Z
date modified: 2026-07-22T22:24:40Z
provider: University of Illinois - Urbana-Champaign
publisher: Networked Digital Library of Theses and Dissertations
type: WebPage
source organization: University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign

PropertyValue
property ID: Handle
value: http://hdl.handle.net/2142/101695