Lyricism and Mimeticism in Aesthetic Thought

Gu, Ming Dong

doi:10.1007/978-3-030-73730-6_9

Ming Dong Gu^3,4

Part of the book series: Chinese Literature and Culture in the World ((CLCW))

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Abstract

This chapter inquires whether Chinese and Western aesthetic thought are compatible in terms of ontological and epistemological grounds. It chooses two groups of aesthetic thinkers from the Chinese and Western traditions and compares such key issues as mimesis and representation, lyricism and expressionism, metaphysical foundations of art, and other topics. With both conceptual analysis and critical evidence, it argues that the aesthetic consciousnesses of the Chinese and Western traditions are compatible though each tradition displays a different emphasis in the course of history and exhibits culture-specific characteristics. Chinese and Western aesthetic thought are essentially the same in ontology and epistemology, differing in degrees of intensity and formal features.

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Notes

1.
Bernard Bosanquet, A History of Aesthetics (New York, Macmillan & Co., 1892), p. xii.
2.
Chu Kwang-Tsien (Zhu Guangqian) , The Psychology of Tragedy: A Critical Study of Various Theories of Tragic Pleasure (Strasbourg: Librairie Universitaire d’Alsace, 1933); Chinese translation: Beiju xinlixue (Psychology of Tragedy) (Nanjing: Jiangsu wenyi chubanshe, 2009).
3.
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4.
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5.
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6.
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7.
Opinions differ as to the author of the “Great Preface,” and there is no definitive answer. The possible authors include Confucius, Confucius’s student Zixia, and Wei Hong. But one thing is relatively certain that Wei Hong is the person who finalized the Preface by synthesizing various source in history.
8.
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9.
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10.
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11.
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12.
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13.
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14.
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15.
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16.
M. H. Abrams, The Mirror and the Lamp, p. 98.
17.
English translation is quoted from Stephen Owen, Readings in Chinese Literary Thought (Cambridge, MA: Harvard-Yen-ching Institute, 1992), pp. 87, 90, 92, 94.
18.
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19.
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20.
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21.
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22.
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23.
Martin Heidegger, Early Greek Thinking, pp. 69–70.
24.
Plotinus, “On the Intellectual Beauty,” pp. 265–267.
25.
For a detailed account of the equivalence between the Dao and One, the Logos and One, see Gu (2002): 86–105.
26.
Plotinus, “On the Intellectual Beauty,” p. 243.
27.
Plotinus, “On the Intellectual Beauty,” p. 245.
28.
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29.
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30.
Cao Pi, “Dianlun-lunwen” (On Literature), in Wenxuan [Selections of Refined Literature] (Taipei: Qiming shuju, 1960). pp. 720.
31.
Liu, Dakui, “Lunwen ouji” (A Random Note on Literary Discussions], in Zhongguo liedai wenlun xuan [Selections of Chinese Literary Theories through the Dynasties] (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1963), p. 137.
32.
M. H. Abrams, The Mirror and the Lamp, p. 44.
33.
Plotinus, “On the Intellectual Beauty,” p. 253.
34.
Plotinus, “On the Intellectual Beauty,” pp. 253–255.
35.
Plotinus, “On the Intellectual Beauty,” p. 255.
36.
Liu, Xie, Wenxin diaolong [Literary Mind and the Carving of Dragons], annotated by Lu Kanru and Mu Shijin (Jinan: Qilu shushe, 1995), p. 102.
37.
Ye Xie, Yuanshi (Origin of Poetry) (Beijing: Renmin wenxue chubanshe, 1979), pp. 22–23.
38.
Plotinus, “On the Intellectual Beauty,” p. 255.
39.
See László K. Géfin, Ideogram: History of a Poetic Method (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1982).
40.
For a discussion of how Chinese ideograph-making helped Pound to formulate the ideogrammic method, see Gu “Classical Chinese Poetry: A Catalytic ‘Other’ for Anglo-American Modernist Poetry,” Canadian Review of Comparative Literature vol. 23, no. 4 (1996): 1006–1009.
41.
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42.
Liu, Xie, Wenxin diaolong [Literary Mind and the Carving of Dragons], p. 102.
43.
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44.
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45.
Liu Xie, Wenxin diaolong, English is from Vincent Shin’s translation, p. 9.
46.
Schelling, “On the Relation of the Plastic Art to Nature,” in Critical Theory since Plato, p. 448.
47.
Liu Xie, Wenxin diaolong, English is from Vincent Shin’s translation, pp. 9–10.
48.
Schelling, “On the Relation of the Plastic Art to Nature,” p. 453.
49.
Liu Xie, Wenxin diaolong, English is from Vincent Shin’s translation, p. 1.
50.
Liu Xie, Wenxin diaolong, English is from Vincent Shin’s translation, p. 9.
51.
Liu Xie, Wenxin diaolong, English translation is mine.
52.
Schelling, “On the Relation of the Plastic Art to Nature,” p. 448.
53.
Schelling, “On the Relation of the Plastic Art to Nature,” p. 448.
54.
Liu Xie, Wenxin diaolong, English is from Vincent Shin’s translation, p. 12.
55.
Liu Xie, Wenxin diaolong, English is from Vincent Shin’s translation, p. 12.
56.
See Source Book in Chinese Philosophy, tr. and comp. Wing-tsit Chan (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1963), p. 203.
57.
Schelling, “On the Relation of the Plastic Art to Nature,” p. 448.
58.
Schelling, “On the Relation of the Plastic Art to Nature,” p. 449.
59.
Liu Xie, Wenxin diaolong, p. 98. English translation is mine.
60.
Schelling , “On the Relation of the Plastic Art to Nature,” p. 446.
61.
Schelling, “On the Relation of the Plastic Art to Nature,” p. 453.
62.
Schelling, “On the Relation of the Plastic Art to Nature,” p. 457.
63.
Schelling, “On the Relation of the Plastic Art to Nature,” p. 455.
64.
Ludwig Feuerbach, The Essence of Christianity (1841) (New York: Prometheus Books, 1989).
65.
Schelling, “On the Relation of the Plastic Art to Nature,” p. 456.
66.
Slightly adapted form Vincent Shih’s translation, p. 227.
67.
Schelling, “On the Relation of the Plastic Art to Nature,” p. 451.
68.
Schelling, “On the Relation of the Plastic Art to Nature,” p. 449.
69.
Quoted from Zhongguo meixue shi ziliao xuanbian (Selected Materials on the History of Chinese Aesthetics) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1985), vol. 1, p. 175.
70.
Quoted from Zhongguo meixue shi ziliao xuanbian, vol. 2, p. 36.
71.
Schelling, “On the Relation of the Plastic Art to Nature,” p. 448.
72.
Schelling, “On the Relation of the Plastic Art to Nature,” p. 453.
73.
Schelling, “On the Relation of the Plastic Art to Nature,” pp. 448–449.
74.
Schelling, “On the Relation of the Plastic Art to Nature,” p. 453.
75.
Schelling, “On the Relation of the Plastic Art to Nature,” p. 448.
76.
Schelling (1797), Ideas for a Philosophy of Nature as Introduction to the Study of this Science, translated by E. E. Harris and P. Heath (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1989), p. 42.
77.
See Source Book in Chinese Philosophy , p. 183.
78.
Vincent Shih’s translation, p. 270.
79.
Schelling, “On the Relation of the Plastic Art to Nature,” p. 453.
80.
Jacques Derrida, Limited Inc., ed. Graff, trans. Weber, (Evanston: Northwestern University Press, 1998), p. 236.
81.
Schelling, “On the Relation of the Plastic Art to Nature,” p. 449.
82.
Schelling, “On the Relation of the Plastic Art to Nature,” pp. 449–450.
83.
William Blake, “Auguries of Innocence,” in The Complete Poetry and Prose of William Blake (New York: Anchor Books, 1984), p. 490.
84.
Quoted from Vincent Shih’s translation, p. 349.
85.
Sikong Tu, “Ershisi shipin”(Twenty-Four Grades of Poetry), in Lidai shihua (Poetic Talks through the Dynasties), pp. 40–41.
86.
Schelling, “On the Relation of the Plastic Art to Nature,” p. 455.
87.
Ming Dong Gu, “Suggestiveness in Chinese Literary Thought: Symphony of Metaphysics and Aesthetics,” Philosophy East & West, vol. 53, no. 4 (2003), pp. 490–513.
88.
Longinus, On the Sublime , VIII, 3, in Critical Theory since Plato, ed. Hazard Adams (San Diego and New York: HBJ, 1971), p. 80.
89.
Quoted from D. C. Lau’s translation. See Lao Tzu, Tao Te Ching, p. 94.
90.
Liji zhengyi [The Corrent Meanings of the Record of Rites], juan 37, 300c, Shisanjing zhushu (Thirteen Classics Annotated) (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1980), p. 1528.
91.
Schelling, “On the Relation of the Plastic Art to Nature,” p. 450.

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School of Foreign Languages, Shenzhen University, Shenzhen, China
Ming Dong Gu
School of Arts and Humanities, The University of Texas at Dallas, Richardson, TX, USA
Ming Dong Gu

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Gu, M.D. (2021). Lyricism and Mimeticism in Aesthetic Thought. In: Fusion of Critical Horizons in Chinese and Western Language, Poetics, Aesthetics. Chinese Literature and Culture in the World. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-73730-6_9

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-030-73730-6_9
Published: 08 July 2021
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