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Essay / Research Paper Abstract
This 8 page paper discusses the role of Confucian reflection in early Chinese poetry. It touches on the similar role played by Plato in considering early Greek writing. Bibliography lists 3 sources.
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8 pages (~225 words per page)
File: D0_HVconpoe.rtf
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Cai starts us off with a comparison of Confucius and Plato, and their thinking about poetry. These two great philosophers are often compared, Cai says, and to do so is
to "embark on an expedition back to the fountainheads of Western and Eastern cultures" (1999, p. 317). Cai compares the thinking of both men with regard to poetry; we will
concentrate on Confucius. But it is interesting to note that while many scholars have linked the two, little work has been done with regard to the Platonic and Confucian influence
on poetry, an oversight that Cai wants to correct: "To bring due attention to this topic, I would like to consider the two thinkers views of poetry in relation
to their broader educational, ethical, and philosophical concerns" (1999, p. 317). Plato and Confucius discussed poetry in the course of conversations with pupils and friends, and neither "consciously set out
to formulate a theory of poetry" (Cai, 1999, p. 317). Plato considered poetry in a very broad sense: it comprised works that were composed either by men or by the
muses; it usually rhymed; it was often set to music; and it was frequently "cast in the form of an epic or a tragedy" (Cai, 1999, p. 317). For Confucius,
the focus was much narrower: when he considered poetry, he was thinking of the Book of Poetry, the "earliest Chinese anthology of ancient poems and songs" (Cai, 1999, p. 317).
However, ever since the Han dynasty, scholars have insisted that when he was talking about the Poetry, he was in reality talking about poetry in general (Cai, 1999, p. 317).
This conflation of the two has given Confucius opinion of the book a "phenomenal significance as a coherent theory" of poetry (Cai, 1999, p. 317). His thinking on Eastern poetry
...