Concreteness and Subversion of the Use of Artistic Conception of Classical Poetry in Jin Ping Mei

Wenyong BAI Guangxi Vocational & Technical College, School of Arts, Media and Architectural

Abstract: Jin Ping Mei is a secular novel in the late Ming Dynasty, which integrates the images of classical poetry into specific content, the use of it in specific content, subverts the beautiful realm of the classical poetry, to a certain extent. Key words: Classical words; Artistic conception utilization; Concreteness; Subversion DOI: 10.12184/wspciWSP2516-252708.20190303

n many vernacular novels of the Ming and Qing Dynasties, many styles are gen- I erally used in a novel. And many people like writing novels by the way of add- ing the elements of poetry to the novel, at that time. This way often made the novel more coherent and specific. In addition, some authors add poetic elements to the novel in order to show their talents to readers. With the continuous development of novels in the late Qing Dynasty, it has become more and more mature to integrate other elements into the novel, and the two can be perfectly integrated.

1. The Use of Artistic Conception Jin Ping Mei can be said to be a turning point in the history of Chinese novels, mainly because of its use of opera poetry in this novel. Jin Ping Mei combines the beautiful images in these styles: the beautiful women look back and play with the beautiful people, etc. According to the trend of the novel, we add these beautiful images to the specific content, which is the combination of this specific content and beautiful images. This combination subverts the beauty of image utilization in classical poetry. Therefore, we can not only interpret the emotion that the author wants to express, but also feel the more real world in beautiful images in this novel.

About the author: Wenyong BAI (1964-12), male, Han nationality, Guangxi，Binyang, Postgraduate, ancient novel research, writing theory and secretarial education.

Creativity and Innovation Vol.3 No.3 2019

In the nineteenth chapter of the novel, in order for Li Pinger to remarry, Ximen Qing set up a plan to kill Jiang Zhushan, after finishing that, he came back home and saw Pan Jinlian. This plot is described as follows: lifted up her skirt, sat on Ximen Qing’s body, spit out the wine in her mouth into Ximen Qing’s mouth, and then grabbed a lotus seed for Ximen Qing to eat with her slender jade hand. Ximen Qing said : “It is so as- tringently, why did eat it for?” Pan Jinlian said: “My man, don’t you eat what I am hold- ing?” She took a fresh walnut kernel from his mouth and gave it to him. Here we can see that Ximen Qing likes Pan Jinlian’s enchanting charm. In addition to this, Pan Jinlian can play the pipa, is very proficient in poetry, songs, chess and so on. The most important thing is that she can write. In the Southern Dynasty’s Yuefu of traditional Chinese literature, the lotus and pity in most poems are associated together. In Buddhism, lotus is a flower that only grows in Buddhist realm. In ancient poems, there are also descriptions of lotus. Lotus is a flower that can be viewed from afar but cannot be mocked. But in Jin Ping Mei, Pan Jinlian has a certain understanding of the beauty of lotus flower. However, it is not reflected in her. What she shows to the world is her sincere desire. At first, She and Ximen Qing agreed that they should live up to each other. However, Ximen Qing violated this agreement. After Pan Jinlian, he took more concubines and did not see any pity and love for Pan Jinlian. It was also a passage in the nineteenth chapter, Pan Jinlian’s hand for catching lotus seeds is a slender jade hand. But in the 8th chapter of Jin Ping Mei, Pan Jinlian misses Xi- men Qing, who has not been contacted for many days. Every night, she plays the pipa and sing some sad songs to express her miss. Here, she also used her slender jade hands, but at the same time, when she misses Ximen Qing very much, she also counted the dumplings in front of her. At this time, if she found one dumpling missing, she will beat and scold Yinger, and also used her delicate slender hands. A person in missing is also worthy of our pity and cherish. However, in this novel, although Pan Jinlian is very worthy of people’s pity, she is also a very mean and ruthless woman. There are lovesick beauties in classical poems and songs full of bitterness, but there are many ironies in the novel. The use of the above contents to the artistic conception of classical poetry is mainly reflected in some single words, the author makes use of the concreteness and subversion of the classical artistic conception of classical poetry. Many of their applications in this novel are also reflected in in the frontispiece words and poems. For example, in the 25th chapter of the novel, the frontispiece words here are: after swinging on the swing, stand up and pat the slender jade hands, the sweat soaked through the clothes, see someone coming, slip away shyly, lean on the door and look back, but smell the green plum. Read the first words of this volume carefully, the first impression that appears in the reader’s mind is not that a shy girl is swinging on the swing. This frontispiece is the same as the

66 Concreteness and Subversion of the Use of Artistic Conception of Classical Poetry in Jin Ping Mei classical poetry we are familiar with. It writes the moment of swinging in gorgeous language. However, if this word appears in the novel, it will often show people very limited things. If we look at this word in combination with the novel, the impression of it, is not because of shy young girl, but because of some young women who appear in the book, and the coming person is they are Ximen Qing. Similarly, these young women will not leave with shyness, but will let this person push the swing for them. Spring day swing is a kind of beautiful image in classical poetry. But in this novel, there is a brother-in-law named Chen Jingji in the beauty heap, so there is no such beautiful artistic conception. There is also a very ironic point here. It was Wu Yueniang who told everyone that they should not laugh when playing on the swing. She gave another example, she used to play on the swing with her neighbor Miss Zhou. Miss Zhou loves to laugh very much when playing on the swing. And finally, she fell off the swing. Since then, her husband has divorced Miss Zhou. So Wu Yueniang came to the conclusion that one should not laugh when playing on the swing. In this inappropriate example Wu Yueniang told, we can see that her preaching is very pedantic. By com- paring her preaching with the frontispiece words, we can see that this secular novel mainly describes the family life in ancient China, which also reflects that the use of classical poetry in this novel subverts the tradition.

2. The Concrete Realization of the Realm of Ancient Poetry In the 49th chapter of this novel, we can see that the author uses the artistic conception of classical poetry more concretely. And there is a very obvious irony in it. The main content of this chapter is that Ximen Qing reached the highest political position. It can also be seen from here that Ximen Qing has different ways of speaking to different people. The way of speaking to Song Censor is more official and very polite. Because he is very familiar with Cai Censor, the way speaking to Cai Censor seems to be more com- mon. And you can imagine the way Ximen Qing talks with prostitutes. Here Ximen Qing applies different ways of speaking to different people, which is also the author's revelation that language is not only the function of communication between people, and the way of speaking often represents different classes and positions. For some of the traditional beautiful realms in China, many literati like the beautiful artistic conception of seeking plum blossom through snow. In the novel of Jin Ping Mei. There are also applications for seeking plum blossom through snow. But here it com- pletely subverts the beautiful meaning of seeking plum blossom through snow. In this novel, it is described that Ximen Qing went to brothels in the snow twice. The first novel displays the moral meaning through the description of the characters’ language, a beautiful beautiful artistic conception of seeking plum blossom turns into looking for a pros-

Creativity and Innovation Vol.3 No.3 2019 titute in the snow. In the novel, on the surface, it criticizes and satirizes the vulgarity and shamelevss of Ximen Qing and other people. In fact, it is the author’s revelation of subversion of elegant culture through a phenomenon in real life. There is an elegant thing here, only Li Guijie’s deep love for Ximen Qing. But there is another layer of irony here, that is, Li Guijie is deeply attached to Ximen Qing while hiding with another client in the house. Here, the beautiful artistic conception of seeking plum blossom through snow, has been replaced by vulgar life phenomenon, which makes the elegant culture get a certain degree of irony. Once again Cai Zhuangyuan wrote a poem when he passed by the gate Ximen Qing’s house. From the literal point of view of this poem, it can be put into Tang and Song poetry collections. However, it appears in the novel of Jin Ping Mei. Through the narrative context of other parts, the essence of this poem is revealed as true: Where is the wind and rain? Where is the medicine shop? The beautiful woman is a prostitute. Cai Guangyuan once wrote a poem for Dong Jiao’er’s fan. And the last sentence of the poem is a kind of blasphemy to Bai Juyi’s poem. In Bai Juyi’s poem, Ziweilang here is the real Lagerstroemia flower. In the novel, Cai Zhuangyuan is facing a prostitute named Wei Xian. Among the beautiful artistic conception of classical poetry, the false life state is perfectly displayed. In the late Qing Dynasty, there was a novel called Lao Can’s Travels, which often revealed the beautiful realm of poetry. However, compared with Jin Ping Mei, there were still some slight deficiencies. In Jin Ping Mei, the beautiful artistic conception in many classical poems could be revealed in a smooth way. Traditional classical poetry is often described around elegant culture, mainly to show such a beautiful realm of elegance. The quotation of poetry, in novel of Jin Ping Mei is indispensable, but this is only the novel needs to use poetry to embellish the language, and the essence of poetry is not reflected in this novel. Throughout Jin Ping Mei, the author expresses its beauty through the use of the artistic conception of classical poetry, which is often satirical at the same time. So it requires us to read and understand it carefully. It can be seen everywhere in the whole novel. In this novel, we can see that the elegant and vulgar content is interspersed with the whole novel. At the same time, this novel and other classic novels have different understanding of reality.

Works Cited [1] Li Lin. “Research on the Function of Seasonal Literary Literature in Jin Ping Mei”. Qingdao University, 2018. [2] Shi Xiaojun, Zhang Jing. “Comparison of Environmental Imagery Poems in Three Ver- sions of “Jin Ping Mei”.” Research on Ming and Qing Novels, 2017 (02): 132-55.