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| An Intertextual Comparison of Chinese and Western Poetics of Ekphrasis in the Sixteenth Century |
| Ying Yiwen |
| School of International Communications and Education, Communication University of Zhejiang, Hangzhou 310018, China |
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Abstract Zhang Yanyuan of the Tang Dynasty wrote the book Lidai Minghua Ji (《历代名画记》), advocating that “paintings and poems are not divided”. From Chinese theory of “painting and poem having the same origin” to the poems and paintings created by Tang Yin in the Ming Dynasty, such as “Song of the Four Seasons”, Wen Zhengming’s “Waterfall in the Shade of Pines”, the literary expression of poetry and the visual expression of painting in ancient China are mutually interdependent paradigms of creation. In the 16th Century, Cesare Ripa’s Iconologia, Alciatus’s Emblemata, and Valeriano’s Hieroglyphica traced the study of Western Iconography. During the middle and late Ming Dynasty, the phenomenon of intertextuality in ancient Chinese poetry was numerous. For example, in the Ming Dynasty, He Kai wrote the book Shijing Shiben Guyi (《诗经世本古义》), in which he used eight sentences and places of intertextuality.Michelangelo, the Renaissance poet and painter who spent his life composing more than 300 poems, adopted the contextual transformation of ekphrasis, which evolves from the text of language image to the modelling creation with specific themes and rich imagination. His poems and paintings contain the inner logic of artistic creation. The rhythms in Michelangelo’s poetry are similar to those of the Chinese poems and scripts. For example, his verses such as “I’amore a quello” and “I’obrigo strigne” express his hard feelings for his father and brother. John Frederick Nims and Anthony Mortimer’s English translation of Michelangelo’s poems use intertextual rhetoric to express his heartfelt sorrow.In 1511, Michelangelo composed the poem “Colui che fece”, painted “Creation of the Sun, the Moon and Plants” based on the conception of the poem, and illustrated the imagery of the poem in the painting. The painting and the poem mirror each other’s meaning, which could make the overall artistic creation better and better. His poems interpret the essence of art and exhibit his ideas and artistic plans, supporting the creative concepts and thoughts behind the artworks. His poetry and art creation are like body and soul at the same time, whether it is his poetry, painting or sculpture that could embody the same tone and melody, melting into a chord.In the 16th Century, intertextual poetics flourished in China with a long history, showing a rooted intertextuality between poetry and painting. During the same period, Western intertextual poetics was on the rise, as demonstrated in the works of Michelangelo. Intertextuality between poetry and painting has been deeply integrated with culture both in China and the West, but in China it has formed its complete system and transmission method earlier. The superiority of ekphrasis lies in the use of generic images to narrate the unexplained meaning of a poem or text, so that readers can resonate with each other between appreciating the poems and the paintings. For high-level creators, their ideas are endless, and they create in a state of “no boundaries”.Whenever a poet reaches the highest level of creativity, he or she is in a state of mind that makes him or her unconsciously wish to expand the boundaries of his or her “language” such as words and symbols. The creative space and thinking span of the poet is much larger than the rhetorical symbols, while the rhetorical symbols of the poem need to expand the breadth and strength of expression, fully express the creativity of the poet’s ideas and imagination, and perfectly show the picture and situation of the poet’s mind, and express the speechless “extra-poetic voice” in the quiet works. From ancient to modern times, especially in ancient societies where communication was not well developed, the poets’ desire to express their true feelings was shared. Poets’ in the intertextuality between poetry and painting have a common discursive image narrative, and are different in approach but equally satisfactory in result, each having its strong merits.
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Received: 06 December 2023
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2024, Vol. 54 
