余寶琳的中西詩學意象論

Pauline Yu's Reading of Imagery in the Chinese and Western Poetic Tradition

余寶琳 （Pauline Yu，1949-） 是一位傑出的美籍華裔漢學家，現任美國學術團體聯合會 （The American Council of Learned Societies） 的主席，曾任加州大學洛杉磯分校東亞語言文化系教授，並兼任文理學院院長。余教授的學術專長是中國古典詩歌，特別是盛唐詩的研究，其學術論著亦頗為多見，主要集中於中國古典詩歌、文學理論和比較詩學方面。余氏早年著有《王維的詩：新譯及評論》（1980），在美國漢學界評價甚高，甫一問世，便能凌駕當時英譯諸作，乃因她提供一種可讀性高的王維詩英譯及箋釋，而且是一部敘評相當準確的王維評傳。後來她又出版了《中國詩歌傳統中意象的讀法》（1987） 一書，論者以為此書能「擺脫筌蹄，直探驪珠」，從歷史的觀點來檢視詩歌意象的理論、構設和詮釋，有助於我們了解中國古典詩的意象組合及運用。本文以融合中西詩學為鵠的，將針對余寶琳相關的學術著作詳加探討，特別著重於中西詩歌意象理論概述、余寶琳的中國詩歌意象研究、漢學界的回應與挑戰。本文旨在探討余寶琳的中西意象詩學的理論與實踐，以中國古典詩詞為主要的探討對象，希望就中國傳統詩學的觀念，在異質文化的參照中加以比較闡發，坐收攻錯之效。而在論文最後我將指出，余寶琳的融合中西詩學意象研究，乃植基於她對中西詩學的深入理解，移植西論以為中用，並嘗試為中西詩學的對話求同存異，其對中國詩學與西方文論之移植研究，毫無疑問地，可令中西比較文學的視野開闊，更能提供一種跨語際跨文化的詩學研究典範。

Pauline Yu (1949- ) is an eminent Chinese-American Sinologist who has chaired The American Council of Learned Societies since 2003. Professor Yu's scholarly specialization is the study of classical Chinese poetry, especially that of the High-T'ang period. She is particularly well known for two volumes on classical Chinese poetry: The Poetry of Wang Wei: New Translations and Commentary (1980) and The Reading of Imagery in the Chinese Poetic Tradition (1987). In recent years, She has edited or co-edited and contributed several essays to three books on Chinese literature, history and culture: Voices of the Song Lyric in China (1994), Culture and State in Chinese History: Conventions, Accommodations, and Critiques (1997) and Ways with Words: Writing about Texts from Early China (2000). Lately, she has also joined the editorship of Longman Anthology of World Literature Volume I&II (2004) and strived to promote a better understanding of Chinese literature in the world stage. This paper aims to fuse the horizon of Chinese-Western poetics, paying attention to Pauline Yu's reading of imagery in the cross-cultural context, and the methodology of comparative literature. In the first part of this study, I will make a survey of the theory of poetic image. The discussion of poetic image in the Chinese and Western tradition is my concentration in the ensuing two parts of paper. Thereafter, I will continue to examine Pauline Yu's study on Chinese poetic imagery, and focus on the responses and challenges of the book in Western Sinological circle. Finally, I will demonstrate how Pauline Yu's interpretation of Chinese- Western poetics appropriate and successful is, when she adopts western theories to analyze classical Chinese poetry. Above all, Pauline Yu has attempted to seek common poetics and preserve the cultural differences, and I believe this is what she could ever have offered a heterogeneous dialogue and a broader view to the study of comparative literature.