Subjectivity and innovation in contemporary Chinese poetry (part 2)

In the early 1980s Chinese poetry saw a transition from the menglong to the post-menglong period, with both conceptual and aesthetic changes in the presentation of selfhood. In the mid-1980s there was a 'second tide' of experimental poetry and poetic diversity flourished. This resulted in a grand collection of heterogeneous poems and declarations of poetic invention from 'over sixty experimental poetry schools' as was seen in Poetry Gazette and Shenzhen Youth Daily in 1986. However, only a few of the various advocacies became distinct trends, enduring through the last two decades of the twentieth century. 'Elitist poetry' and 'neo-realist poetry' were discussed in part 1 of this paper; another two, women's poetry and cosmopolitan poetry, will be focused on here because these trends not only represent significant poetic inventions but also relate closely to the concept of selfhood, which actually underpins aesthetic and thematic changes in contemporary Chinese poetry, and are thus helpful in examining the relationship between this concept and poetic development in China. My examination seeks to clarify the transformation of the 'selfexpression' initiated by the menglong poets as well as, to a certain degree, the interaction between ideology and literary discourse.