英語中國文學史的杜甫論述與盛唐詩的概念

“Du Fu in the English Histories of Chinese Literature and the Concept of Poetry of High Tang.”

杜甫對後世詩歌產生至關重要的影響，如何介紹中國文學史最重要的詩人及其作品，成為文學史家一個必須解決的問題。學者已就杜詩的翻譯和接受發表大量論著，指出英語世界的杜甫研究經過了三個階段。本文擬延伸前人研究，以英語撰寫的中國文學史為考察對象，探討在這些著作中杜甫及其作品的論點，並說明相關論述與「盛唐詩」概念的關係。本文指出早期文學史較著重選譯杜甫的近體詩，有關詩聖的細節也有甚多可議之處；二十世紀六十年代三部由華人撰寫的文學史視現實主義為杜甫的主要風格；稍後的文學史，一方面指出杜詩在盛唐詩中的獨創地位，另一方面也具備與胡適《白話文學史》相同的觀點。杜甫與盛唐詩的關係，由最初僅涉及近體，到與李白兩人為盛唐詩的代表人物，以至在盛唐中屬於具有獨創性的偉大作家，經歷了三個階段的變化。

How to introduce the most important poet and his works in the history of Chinese literature has become an issue which must be solved by literary historians. Scholars have published numerous studies on the translation and reception of Du Fu’s poetry, pointing out that the Du Fu studies in the English-speaking world has gone through three stages. This article intends to extend the previous research by exploring the image of Du Fu and his works in the English histories of Chinese literature, and to point out the relationship between the discussion on Du Fu and the concept of“poetry of the High Tang.”This article reveals that the early Chinese literary histories written in English focused more on the translation of Du Fu’s recent-style poetry, and also, there were many debatable points found in writing about the details of the poet. Three literary histories written by Chinese in the 1960s regarded realism as the major style of Du Fu; the later literary histories, on one hand, pointed out the status of originality of Du Fu’s poetry in the High Tang, and on the other hand, it also share the similar views as Hu Shi’s A History of Vernacular Literature. The relationship between Du Fu and the poetry of High Tang, from the first stage that only concerned recent style poetry, to the second stage that became two representative figures with Li Bai, and to the third stage of the great poet with high originality during the High Tang, has gone through three stages.