1. Five Elements of the Formation of Ningxia Frontier Travel Poems in the Tang Dynasty Ningxia belonged to Shuofang in the Tang Dynasty, and governed seven military offices, namely Lingling, Salt, Xia, Sui, Yin, Yi, Feng, Hui, Lin, Sheng and Zhenwu, including Shufu, Jinglue, Dingyuan, Xiadu, Anbei and Zhenwu. Tracing back to its formation process, five factors, such as the location of the capital, the layout of the city, the transportation network, the imperial examination system and the establishment of the shogunate, all played a role in promoting it. Among them, the location of the capital is particularly critical. The establishment of the capital plays a decisive role in the development of a country's territory, transportation and literature. Where the capital city is built, the political, military, cultural and literary focus of the country will be set there. Not long after the completion of the capital, a transportation network will be formed, and literati from all directions can enter and leave the capital along these roads. The location of the capital determines the mobility of literati, and the transfer of the capital means the transfer of literati mobility and the adjustment of literary resources. Guanzhong, the capital of Qin and Western Han Dynasties, had the advantage of developing literature, but literature could not keep up with the development of transportation at that time, so there were no frontier fortress travel poems in Guanlong area of Qin and Western Han Dynasties. After the Western Han Dynasty, the capital moved out of Guanzhong, and the capital of the Eastern Jin and Southern Dynasties was further in Jiankang. The center of gravity of the country is in the central and eastern parts of the mainland, and the scribes rarely go to the northwest inland. Although the Sui and Tang Dynasties settled in Guanzhong, the rise of literature could not keep up with the movement of the political center. In the early Tang Dynasty, the main border town was in the west of Helong, and the border town under Ningxia was only Shuofang. In the prosperous Tang Dynasty, scholars had more choices to travel. Although there are military towns in Shuofang, there are not many poems by literati. It was the middle and late Tang Dynasty that really formed the creative momentum. During this period, the boundary moved inward, and the system of taking scholars in imperial examinations and selecting officials in official departments normalized. Due to the excellent selection and high elimination rate, a large number of uneducated scholars and unsuccessful officials can't find a way out every year. At this time, ten Fang towns, such as Fengxiang, Jingyuan, Yongning, Lingzhou, Fengzhou Tiande County, Anbei Hufu, Shengzhou Zhenwu County, Xiasui, Yanfang and Taiyuan, became the first choice for raising children, scholars, candidates and interviewers because of their proximity to Beijing. Shen Yazhi's "Records of Longzhou Cishi Hall" contains: "In the past, Anxi and the vast sea were controlled, and dragons and Hao went to plug 33,000 miles ... Now, from Shangguan and Qingshui to the west, six towns and fifty counties have lost their land. The land is, the city is, and people are slaves of Rong, Gu Long, Jing, Yan and Ling. At this time, the geographical environment and social features to the west of Ningxia are "only aware of the dusk in the north, and there is no state in the west" (Ye Wei's "East View Collection", Volume III, "Deng Yuanfu is engaged in Zhangben"). Such a place will not be easy if it is not forced by livelihood. The road between towns is far away, often hundreds of miles away, and a lot of time is spent trudging in border towns. His frontier poems were written under this background. In this sense, from the Middle Tang Dynasty to the Five Dynasties, there was a literary production field that promoted the creation of frontier fortress travel poems. If described, it is a great cycle of Tang people's trips based on Chang 'an-Taiyuan-Lingzhou-Fengxiang. Its establishment is not based on the establishment of publishing positions and the formation of authors by literary societies and literary periodicals as it is today, but on the joint efforts of three elements: city, transportation and system construction, and the resulting two drivers: on the one hand, it is to build the capital of Guanzhong, the rise of emerging cities, the acceleration of traffic construction, and the networking of public and private roads; On the other hand, it is imperial examination, civil service election, local town construction and shogunate system. The role of the first hand is to provide tourists with a fixed creative space and an independent geographical environment, and the role of the second hand is to organize creative personnel and train writers. Because the imperial examination, the town dynasty and the shogunate system are all once a year, relying on the system arrangement, a large number of authors can be guaranteed to invest in them every year, which can take care of the long-term, and the creation of frontier fortress travel poems will be normalized, not a temporary thing.
Dense cities, convenient transportation and short distance have created convenience for literati to travel. Candidates often take advantage of the opportunity of completing the last round of imperial examinations and civil service elections in the spring of each year to take a "queue-jumping tour" and then return to Beijing before the next round of imperial examinations and civil service elections. Traveling from Beijing, no matter from west to east, takes several months at a time, from spring to autumn. The route is the public and private road between Beijing West and Beijing North. According to Yan Gengwang's Traffic Map of the Tang Dynasty (Volume 1), there are five traffic routes from Beijing to northern Xinjiang in the middle and late Tang Dynasty: one is the post road from Chang 'an to Taiyuan, the other is the post road from Tongling in the northwest of Chang 'an, the third is the post road from Tiande County in Fengzhou in the north of Chang 'an, the fourth is the post road from Zhenwu County in Tongsheng Prefecture in the northeast of Chang 'an, and the fifth is the post road from Tiande County in the east. Except for the fifth road, which runs east-west, the others run north-south. Synthesizing a four-star transportation network is particularly beneficial to the creation of frontier fortress poems. The northern army where Ningxia is located is located between Fengxiang, Jingyuan, Yongning and Tiande, occupying a key position in the traffic network of northern Xinjiang. As long as you go to Hetao and go out from Jingyuan in the north, you have to pass through here. Zhang Ji's "Jingzhou Fortress": "When you visit Jingzhou Fortress, you only hear about the Qiang defense. The ancient doubles on the roadside are still remembered in Anxi. " It is recorded that Anxi Post Road passed through Jingzhou in the prosperous Tang Dynasty, which shows that Chang 'an had a large post road leading to Yongning, Jingyuan, Shuofang, Hexi and Longyou in the early prosperous Tang Dynasty, and the traffic was in good condition. From the northwest of Jingzhou, into Yuanzhou and out of Xiaoguan, that is, to Lingzhou. Yang Kui's Ningzhou Road: "The small official road is the city pillow, and Hu Bing is near at dusk. Comfort people with a torch fire. " Huang Furan's "Send a doctor often, ride a regular servant to the north": "After the smoke, the new army river is blocked. The golden sable dotes on the Han generals, and the jade festival is Xiao Guan. " Everyone mentioned Xiao Guan, indicating that if you want to go to Lingzhou, you must pass Xiao Guan. It can be inferred that all references to Xiao Guan in Tang poetry are actually written except some farewell poems, and there are no two situations of going to He Long in the west and Lingzhou in the north. The poets who went out to the west and the dragons were mainly in the early Tang Dynasty, while the poets who went out to Lingzhou in the north were concentrated in the middle and late Tang Dynasty. They are poems describing the frontier fortress trip in Ningxia. The authors are Ju Zi, Xuan Shi, Aide and Zhen Fang, but the following examples of the first guest trip are more common. Xiang Si: "Go ahead of the ancient town, Chang 'an Road is in the east. The cold light is bright, and the flag wind is broken at night. There is nothing wrong with museums, and Confucianism also has bows. In order to prevent my hometown from dying in autumn, I like the same voice for the time being. "Fang Hui commented:" Without the sixth sentence, I don't see the significance of a scholar wandering around. "As you can see, the author is a scholar wearing Confucian clothes, and his trip starts from JD.COM and goes north via Taiyuan Post Road. Huang Tao's Zhou Xia Dao: "Yan Longnan flies to the river, and Qin Cheng lives for thousands of miles. I'm going to Zhou Xia in mid-September. The sentence "Seeking the Name" shows that it is the last example. In front of it is Leaving Beijing in the same year, and the cloud "The Blooming Gate of Sophora japonica" is followed by "Xie Langzhong" and "Ma Wei". Cizhou belongs to Hedong Road, and Ma Su is in Jingxi, which means that he came from the East Gate of Beijing, went north to Taiyuan, passed through three surrendered cities and Lingzhou, went south to Longzhou, and returned via Jingxi Post Road. Xu Tang's Zhou Xia Road: "The vast desert is far away from Liancheng. The bunker met the bonfire, the river moved and the waves swirled. There are no cicadas, but there are soldiers. If you can't stand hunger and cold, who will come here? "There were Chusaimen, Northern Yanzhou Book, Wuyuan Book and Wild Hope of Yanmenguan before, followed by Dragon Tree Book and Qinzhou Book, indicating that he also came back from Chang 'an-Taiyuan-Wuyuan-Yanzhou-Longzhou. "A Letter to Li Zhongcheng from a Trip to Longzhou": "Three guests recite it, but Chang 'an has no intention of returning it. Autumn sound is still, Yan is still idle. "Tour": "Summer tour is poor and the road is blocked, and spring tour is drunk and negative. It should be a day, and it will teach the old. "It means that he went to Beisai disgracefully and never returned to Beijing from summer to autumn. The examples of Huang Tao and Xu Tang show that there are many ways for Tang literati to choose from. From east to west, from south to north, choose any two of the four post roads of Taiyuan, Shengzhou, Fengzhou and Lingzhou to complete a one-stop tour. There are also three east-west directions, one from Taiyuan northbound, passing through Dai, Shuo, Sheng and Fengzhou, westbound along the north bank of the Yellow River, and reaching Lingzhou. You, Yan, Yi, Xia, Yin, Sui and Shi arrived in Fenzhou and Taiyuan. One from Yuan, Jing, Ning, Qing, Yan, Fang, Dan, Ci and other states reached Jin and Jiang, and merged into Chang 'an-Taiyuan Post Road. In this way, you can complete a border trip by taking any four of the seven routes, and everyone can choose freely and be more flexible. Ningxia counties, such as Ning, Xia and Lingzhou, are the only places for most literati to travel in the frontier fortress because of the main roads and geographical location, so there are many poems about frontier fortress travel here.
Second, the frontier poems in Tang and Ningxia have triple marginality, which has the triple marginality of geographical territory, national culture and subject category.
The first is the marginal nature of the geographical environment. Ningxia is located in the northwest border with scarce precipitation and dry land. The landforms are mainly loess, hills and gravel. Agricultural production, residential buildings and living habits are not all inland, nor are they all nomadic, but are in between, with the transition of cultural regions. Politically and militarily, it is a confrontation area between Hu and Han, with a strong military atmosphere and military geography everywhere. This feature is very striking, and it was written into the frontier poems of Ningxia in the Tang Dynasty, which constituted its symbolic regional feature. Li Yi's "Five Cities in the Road": "The golden cymbals follow the jade festival, and the sunset is by the river. After humiliating the ride, the goose rose to the front. Five cities repel and three qins recruit. The weather is cold and white, cloudy and foggy. " "I drink horses and sharpen my sword and stone at night in northern Hubei": "I walked in the air and saw phosphorus in the sand grass. I didn't have Hu Er to sharpen my sword and stone. At that time, the sword was washed into a river, and the grass and sand are red so far. " Huang Tao's Fortress: "There is a road in the long river, but there is no journey in the wilderness. The oriole is sandy and rainy, and the grass grows in Yuanmen. The horse belongs to Qin, and people are ploughing the fields. Cattle and sheep gather in the sunset and the autumn wind drums. " Referring to the establishment of various military geography, it is different from the nomadic landscapes in the border areas of the Central Plains, such as long rivers, wasteland, yellow sand, snow, valleys, hills, cattle and sheep. It shows the characteristics of Ningxia, such as long winter and short summer, scarce rain and snow, dry climate and heavy sandstorm, and the transitional regional characteristics from south to north, from farming to animal husbandry, and from soft and conservative folk customs to vigorous and open. It can be regarded as the edge of Ningxia in geographical mountains and rivers.
The second is the marginal nature of national culture. At the beginning of the Tang Dynasty, Jingxi and Jingbei were the main resettlement places for Mobei to drop Hu. Since Tang Gaozong, in the southern border of Lingzhou and Zhou Xia, six Huzhou cities, namely, Lu, Li, Han, Sai, Yi and Qi, have been established successively, and the Sogdians and Zhes have settled there. The local area is a famous multi-ethnic community. There are more than 20 ethnic groups living in the territory, including Turkic, Xianbei, Tangut, Uighur, Tuguhun, Qidan, Shatuo and Ji Hu, all of which are mainly hunting by riding and shooting. However, due to the mixed residence of Hu and Han, and the fact that many mainland Han people moved here for official business, there is no lack of Chinese culture here, so the diversity of national culture is another remarkable feature here. In this regard, the Tang poetry chapters are also quite recorded. Li Qiao's "I was asked to build six cities in the north according to the rate": "When I was asked to accept frontier services, I always built the north. Drive away other dogs and sheep. It's summer. " Li Yi's Song of Giving People a Gift to Liuzhou Hull: "Liuzhou Hull can speak six languages. At the age of ten, he rode a sheep to chase gerbils. Shatou herded horses and geese flew alone, and the Han army swam and rode mink brocade. " Feng Xue's "Seeing off Lingshou Tian Shangshu": "The evil wind is full of flagpoles, and the white grass is swaying. The soul of the nine surname Qiang follows the Han Festival, and the six countries fall into the saddle. " They all mentioned the diverse cultural characteristics here, indicating that there are conflicts and competitions among ethnic groups here, and they can also reconcile complex relations. From its description, many Hu people have similarities in diet, speech, clothing and living habits because they face the same living environment, and the similarity is greater than the difference. The local ethnic characteristics recorded in the poem are all owned by Hu and do not belong to a certain ethnic group. This transitional feature, in which you have me and I have you, can also be regarded as the marginal nature of Ningxia's national cultural characteristics.
Third, the marginal nature of poetry themes and literary types-clustered on the edge of various literary styles. The frontier fortress poems in Tang and Ningxia are on the edge of frontier fortress poems, tourism poems and many other themes. It is neither a real frontier poem nor an ordinary travel poem, but an alternative and sideline of it. It is in a non-mainstream position and has been neglected and despised for a long time, and people don't know much about it. Its constituent elements are itinerary+landscape+interest, showing three-stage structural characteristics. Unlike authentic frontier poems, they are profound in thought, imaginative, artistic, close to reality, memorable, too solid in meaning and realm to arouse readers' imagination, and do not have the social criticism and political rationality of frontier poems in the prosperous Tang Dynasty. The third person is not used in the poem, but the first person, not another perspective, but a self-narrative tone. The characters in the poem are not typical conscripts and garrison soldiers summarized by the poet, but wandering literati, who are the poet's own self-statues. The theme is not the hardships of the border towns, the hardships of the troops and the defense of the country, but the arduous road of the long journey in the border, the anxiety about the future and the yearning for relatives. It is different from authentic frontier poems in all aspects, and it is hard to say that it is a real frontier poem. Academic circles believe that regionality is not the main symbol to distinguish frontier fortress poems, but the main criterion should be theme and artistic style. According to this view, frontier fortress travel poems are not real frontier fortress poems. Just as idyllic poems can fake the countryside and only rely on the countryside to construct the spiritual home of literati, frontier poems usually fake frontier fortress, and only regard the artistic conception of frontier fortress as a lyrical port to express the theme of killing the enemy, serving the country and homesickness. Most frontier fortress travel poems do not have these characteristics, so it is difficult to be recognized. But it actually says frontier fortress,
It has diversified ideological connotations. Such poems are either frontier poems or frontier poems. Borrowing the views of scholars, it can be called frontier fortress literature, frontier fortress literature or frontier fortress literature, and its main connotation is frontier fortress narration, not frontier fortress lyric; Its value lies in expressing the unique geographical space of the frontier, opening up a new realm for the literature of the Tang Dynasty and constructing a self-expression model centered on the life and psychology of frontier literati. There is no need to repeat the predecessors, and continue to use the old-fashioned first-person narrator to fabricate an imaginary space for the literati to kill the enemy, but to meet with the eyes and ears and observe on the spot, which has regional and cultural significance.
This marginalized creative feature is embodied in specific works, which is reflected in the triple marginal state:
One is the marginalization of characters. Compared with the officials in Beijing, the candidates in these poems are small people, with no glory, gloomy and humble images, pushed to the edge of the country and society, and left out for a long time. But without these marginal people, there would be no center. Their appearance perfected the pedigree of the characters in the frontier poems in the Tang Dynasty, and reflected the richness and multi-level of the literati's social life in the middle and late Tang Dynasty, indicating that the policies of imperial examination, civil service election, local towns and shogunate led to the division of the literati group, and the capital poetry circle accelerated the division of the literati group in the middle and late Tang Dynasty, indicating that this division had a far-reaching impact on the literary pattern. Despite many efforts, he was still unable to squeeze into the bureaucratic system and was forced to leave Beijing for the border, so the poet's realistic brushwork extended to the distant northwest. Although the style of this kind of works is not high, the image of wandering literati it creates profoundly reflects their difficulties in survival and truly shows their pain of advancing and retreating. It is a self-statue of wandering literati, which has the significance of literary history and social understanding.
The second is the marginalization of living conditions. You can't squeeze into the mainstream society. You are forced to travel in the desert, live in the wilderness, live as a staff member in the border town, and become famous as the head coach of the border town. No one cares about your birth and death. This kind of living condition is marginalized compared with the big officials and dignitaries who are the mainstay of society. Generally, you don't write poems, but you can only see them in the poems of border towns in the middle and late Tang Dynasty. Because it is reproduced by realistic means, it has documentary effect, profoundly reflects the living reality of these vulnerable groups, shows a real and ordinary world, and can arouse people's attention and awaken the conscience of society.
The third is the marginalization of the realm. The vast frontier, desolate desert, long glaciers, rolling mountains, endless roads, grasslands, pastures, drums, cattle and sheep, castles and military cities presented in the poem are desolate places compared with the densely populated and narrow hinterland of the Central Plains. Generally speaking, they are regarded as afraid of the road, which is rare in frontier poems based on imagination and can not be seen in poems of other themes. Before the Tang Dynasty,
Although frontier fortress travel notes are well documented, they are different from ordinary travel notes. Common travel poems are about mainland travel, which are often expressed by descriptive and symbolic images such as post stations, lamps and candles, floating clouds, flowing water, chaotic mountains, willows and geese, and are a kind of lyrical structure of freehand brushwork. This feature is not found in the frontier fortress travel poems in the middle and late Tang Dynasty, but a true record of the personnel of the mountains, rivers and historical sites in the northwest frontier. Because the content is obscure, it rarely enters the discussion scope of travel notes. The famous travel poems in the Tang Dynasty have a clear and deep realm, a long lasting appeal and a weak style. On the other hand, frontier fortress's travel poems are just the opposite, focusing on documentary, strong generality, not beautiful enough, but very solid, which is rejected by literary researchers.
The above-mentioned frontier poems in Tang Dynasty are contrary to the mainstream literature in subject matter, theme and style, which determines their embarrassing position in the literary system of Tang Dynasty. No matter the author or the writing object, it is difficult to enter the public's field of vision and is not recognized by the mainstream society. The author is on the edge of society, and his works pay attention to the marginal feelings that the mainland does not have and cannot enter the mainstream society. The non-mainstream features mentioned above also show their unique value.
Third, the unique frontier writing and the record of national customs. If we study the frontier poems in Tang and Ningxia from the front, it is obviously not as good as the frontier poems in the prosperous Tang Dynasty and the inland poems in the middle and late Tang Dynasty. But if we look at it from another angle, it is a rare artistic treasure, because it was born in the special geographical environment of Ningxia in the Tang Dynasty. Shuofang and its subordinate military towns of five cities and six cities were established only in the military geography of the Tang Dynasty, but no longer existed in the Northern Song Dynasty, and all kinds of cultural relics left here in the Tang Dynasty also disappeared. With the change of dynasties and the migration of the capital, the historical conditions for the generation of Ningxia frontier fortress travel poems no longer exist, such poems disappeared, and a large number of similar poems never appeared again. During the Song, Yuan, Ming and Qing Dynasties, scholars seldom traveled because Ningxia was not close to Beijing. In the Northern Song Dynasty, only a few aides, such as Ye Wei and Zhang Shunmin, wrote poems in the first and second trips, but they did not belong exclusively to Ningxia. If you want to know the life of frontier fortress scholars in Ningxia in the history of Tang Dynasty, you can only rely on Tang poetry. In this sense, this kind of poem cannot be copied, and it is a record of the northwest frontier in the middle and late Tang Dynasty, and its uniqueness is very remarkable. With his profound travel life experience, the author truly reproduces the natural environment in the northwest frontier and shows the social state of multicultural life here. The remote living environment, long national boundaries, numerous ethnic minorities, strange dialects and castle beacon towers can be seen everywhere, which are invisible in later literature. If you write well, you can also extend your pen to the depths of history, melt the personnel in the border area into the art world, and dig out the inherent characteristics of the border area. The work appears to have a broad realm and a changeable picture. Compared with famous works and noble literature, this is the literature of poor writers at the bottom. Because it is about traveling in the vast frontier, the works deeply cut into the social reality of frontier fortress in the middle and late Tang Dynasty and expressed the true feelings of frontier literati. Without the limitation of the narrow vision and small circle of Beijing aristocratic literature, even trivial details of life can reveal the social outlook, reveal the truth of life and touch the hearts of readers. The acquisition of this spiritual and realistic character is related to the author's writing attitude. The author insists that life comes from life and is higher than life, and can absorb materials with regional characteristics and the spirit of the times from his own travel life and reproduce them artistically. This attitude, in today's literary position, can be called guarding the border. The vast frontier, diverse cultures, magnificent scenery, mysterious ancient buildings, backward material life, closed living environment, and the marginality and heterogeneity of frontier culture have made innovative answers from the literary point of view, so they cannot be abandoned.
The acquisition of this realistic character is also related to the realistic techniques of the works. China's ancient poems emphasize freehand brushwork rather than realism. The travel poems of frontier fortress in Tang and Ningxia are not, but the opposite. They all write about the real life themes of traveling and visiting historical sites. Originally, according to the mainstream creative habits, they can use symbols, hints, metaphors and other means to aestheticize the objective scenery and turn poetry into beautiful and implicit lyric works. However, they did not do this, but faithfully and objectively described what they saw and heard with a realistic pen, which had an obvious realistic orientation and was quite different from the writing style of frontier poems dominated by virtual imagination in the early Tang Dynasty. Nevertheless, in the hands of clever authors, we can still reach a higher level. Such as the book of the Great Wall in Tang Dynasty: "The road leads to the poor, and you can only watch the smoke. The river is flooded and the moraine is sky-high. When the sun went down, I was surprised to see the horse. Empty fishing ground, undecided. " Zhang Shuo's Fang Shu Shi: "Autumn is bitter, and everyone is only interested in harmony songs. There are few cities to Gansu, and there are many ways to cross the customs. The geese hang far down to the ground, and the peaks shadow into the river. I still heard about Montenegro. I am looking for Han's family. " The two poems quoted can write unique scenery in just a few words, accurately summarizing the mountains and rivers, urban beacon towers, phenological population and ethnic customs of Ningxia and other border cities, just like the silhouette of the times. There is a line in Liu Kezhuang's Post-Shi Cun Dialect: "(Du Fu)" Qin Zhou "has five lines and twenty lines:' The map of the state leads to the same valley, and the postal road drains the sand. There were thousands of people living in the Tang Dynasty ...' There are three articles in dozens, and one of them is recoverable. If the mountains and rivers are different and the land and atmosphere are suitable, there are all these twenty articles. "Although frontier poems in the middle and late Tang Dynasty did not reach such a high level, they were good at writing landscapes, and many good sentences were common. To this end, eight poems by Yao He, Xue Neng and Xue Neng were selected for travel or farewell, and more than ten poems were selected in Volume III of Ying Sui for travel or farewell. The reason why these poems were chosen lies in their advantages in frame meaning and wording. These frontier poems are also rare today, because they reproduce the social features of Ningxia in the Tang Dynasty, help to understand the marginal state of frontier scholars, and complement each other with traditional frontier poems in content and style. Although it did not occupy the mainstream and was not paid attention to, it only existed temporarily in the history of literature. Later, with the change of historical conditions, it lost the foundation of development, but it still has irreplaceable literary value because it faithfully records the special life of special people in special periods.
[This paper is the result of the national social science fund's major project "Research on China Ancient Literature System" (17ZDA238) (Xiangjiao [2004] No.284)]
(Author: China Ancient Literature and Social Culture Base of Hunan University of Science and Technology)