There are various characteristic elements to Yuan poetry, as known today, which are important to understanding this poetic phenomenon. These include: Jurchen influence; the influence of Buddhism, Daoism, and Confucianism; over-all artistic processes, such as painting and calligraphy; fixed-tone verse forms; Yuan poetry of death and destruction (sangluan); Yuan opera; and, increased use of the vernacular.
Jurchen influence The Jurchens were a
Tungusic people who inhabited the region of Manchuria (present-day Northeast China) until the 17th century, when they adopted the name Manchu. Certainly, the rhythms of Jurchen music, at least as moderated through the Yuan opera, greatly influenced the fixed-rhythm types of Yuan poetry.
Buddhism, Daoism, and Confucianism The three major religious influences in Yuan China also appear in Yuan poetry, in various ways.
Painting and calligraphy To what had become by this point, the traditional linkage between poetry, painting, and calligraphy, continued through the Yuan dynasty. An example of an artist in this respect is
Gao Kegong (1248–1310), a poet, though more known for his ink-paintings of bamboos.
Fixed-tone verse forms Development of various fixed-tone verse forms are particularly associated with Yuan poetry.
Ci,
qu, and
sanqu were all popular during the Yuan poetry period. They were a fixed-tone and length meter type of verse, often with variable length lines linked to musical melodies now generally no longer extant. Many of these tunes were introduced into China from the north or west.
Ci The origins of cí ()type of
lyric poetry are obscure, but seem to begin to appear in literature beginning in the
poetry of the
Liang dynasty, with minor subsequent development in the Tang dynasty. The
Song dynasty then became renowned for its
cí. The
cí form were lyrics which developed from anonymous popular songs into a sophisticated literary genre, which actually followed the tradition encountered in the
Shi Jing and the
yuefu. The
cí form involved lyrics written to set patterns, usually with lines of irregular length, and, generally many
cí would be written in the fixed verse forms derived from popular musical measures. Many of the
cí form fixed-rhythm patterns have an origin in
Central Asia.
Cí use a set of
poetic meters derived from a base set of certain patterns, in fixed-rhythm, fixed-tone, and variable line-length formal types, or model examples. The rhythmic and tonal pattern of the
ci are based upon certain, definitive musical song tunes. The
Cí form of poetry had a roll during the Yuan, but the
Qu form is more characteristic.
Qu The
Qu () form of poetry from Yuan dynasty may be called
Yuanqu (元曲 P:
Yuánqǔ, W:
Yüan-chü) form of poetry is a type of
Classical Chinese poetry form, consisting of words written in one of a number of certain, set
tone patterns, based upon the tunes of various songs. Thus
Qu poems are lyrics with lines of varying longer and shorter lengths, set according to the certain and specific, fixed patterns of rhyme and tone of conventional musical pieces upon which they are based and after which these matched variations in lyrics (or individual
Qu poems) generally take their name.
Sanqu When
qu derive from
Chinese opera, such as the
Zaju (雜劇), in these cases these
qu may be referred to as
sanqu (散曲). The
San in
Sanqu refers to the detached status of the
Qu lyrics of this verse form: in other words, rather than being embedded as part of an opera performance the lyrics stand separately on their own. Since the
Qu became popular during the late
Southern Song dynasty, and reached a special height of popularity in the poetry of the
Yuan dynasty, therefore it is often called
Yuanqu (元曲), specifying the type of
Qu found in
Chinese opera typical of the
Yuan dynasty era. Both
Sanqu and
Ci are lyrics written to fit a different melodies, but
Sanqu differs from
Ci in that it is more colloquial, and is allowed to contain
Chenzi (襯字 "filler words" which are additional words to make a more complete meaning).
Sanqu can be further divided into
Xiaoling (小令) and
Santao (散套), with the latter containing more than one melody.
Yuan poetry of death and destruction (sangluan) A certain genre of Classical Chinese poetry is known as
sangluan (). This type of verse has to do with the death and destruction of war, especially that which lead up to and was involved in the initial establishment of the Yuan dynasty and the consolidation of its power. In fact, according to one student of Yuan drama in this period, J. I. Crump: :Much poetry written during this period is called
sang-luan verse, or "poetry of death and destruction," and
sang-luan verse in many ways is a far more accurate measure of the emotional battering the Chinese underwent at the hands of the Mongols than any amount of historical documentation. Practitioners include
Yuan Haowen.
Yuan opera Surviving knowledge of the Yuan opera, such as through written scripts, allows some insight. Yuan opera was a type of
opera, or more specifically
Chinese opera, which as a theatrical art form allowed for a large amount of poetic material to be integrated into it, in various ways; although, as the tradition no longer exists in its historical form, most of the knowledge thereof relies upon literary sources: however, this sourcing has indeed favored the survival of the incorporated poetry involved in these performances. During the Yuan dynasty the prestige of both theater and of the use of vernacular language in art and literature were probably related to the fact that the new Mongol dominated regime less understood the older, classical language and forms. Rather, the new Mongol elite appreciated the theater and the use of vernacular language. Compared to the traditional Chinese
shì, or
scholar-officials or emperors, the newcomers were not so literarily erudite or oriented, much less were they appreciative of the ancient forms, expressions, and allusions, legacy of more than a millennium. The Zaju theater took much of its characteristics from both this emphasis on the vernacular speech, as well as the lowered prestige of traditional scholarly literature. Also, founding emperor Khubilai Khan suspended the traditional
civil service tests, which emphasized learning of the ancient classical tradition, thus both lowering the prestige of this course of learning and also reducing the opportunities for scholar-officials to engage in traditional career paths. This resulted in opportunities for aspiring playwrights to write for
zaju, both for those playwrights relatively new to literature and for those members of the traditional
shi class who could no longer succeed as poets and essayists, and were willing to embrace the
zaju. The long-term legacy of the
zaju theater was thus not only regarding the development of Chinese opera over subsequent centuries into the present day; but, also, despite the ensuing Ming dynasty restoration of prestige to legacy literary forms, the
zaju form contributed to the increased prestige and popularity of vernacular forms such as the novel which ensued in the
Ming dynasty literature some of which also embed poetry. A new emphasis on the use of the then current, vernacular Chinese appears during the period of Yuan dynasty poetry. much of the poetry of the Yuan period is in the form of the
qu poetry verse, which basically became an independent form of art, removed from its original theatrical and orchestral context: written after the model of the cadences, or set tone patterns, known from the arias of the zaju theater, the
Chinese Sanqu poetry eventually became a separate tradition, in the category of poetic literature, rather than in the category of the performing arts. ==Cultural legacy==