The poetics of appropriation

"The poets of the Northern Song dynasty (960-1126) were writing after what was then and still is acknowledged to be the Golden Age of Chinese poetry, the Tang dynasty (618-907). Many Northern Song poets were haunted by a deep sense of self-consciousness, an awareness of the challenge to emerge from the shadows of the greatest poets of the tradition even as they claimed an affinity with their predecessors. This study examines how these Song poets responded to their uncomfortable proximity to such impressive predecessors and reveals how their response shaped their literary art." "The author's focus is on the poetic theory and practice of the poet Huang Tingjian (1045-1105). Huang regarded the past as an inescapable presence, and in response, he engendered a poetics that recognized and incorporated the textual histories of words in order to create new meanings, meanings with his imprimatur. Critics chide Huang for expounding a theory that they see as a platform for plagiarism, an excuse for acts of mere poetic appropriation. The author shows how this criticism ignores the historical forces that occasioned Huang's poetics and consequently misses the reasons why in many respects Huang i