The Impact of Taoism’s Interior Culture on Modern Chinese Poetic Thoughts

There are three aspects with respect to Taoism’s influence on modern Chinese poetic thoughts. Firstly, modern Chinese poetic theorists call for removing the restrictions of the old poetic forms, and strive for a free way to freely express the emotions of modern people, which is the natural, cultural extension of Taoism’s skepticism spirit of accustomed form or order, because Taoism endows Tao with a transcendental character and emphasizes the spiritual freedom of individuals. Secondly, modern Chinese poetic theorists are much concerned with the authenticity and naturalness of poets’ feelings, because meditation on people’ true and natural living conditions is known to be a basic trait of Taoism. Besides, priority given to the perfect state of natural sounds in modern Chinese poetics also stems from Taoism’s voluntary and unadorned aesthetic attitude. Thirdly, in Taoism’s opinion, the whole indefinite Tao includes everything. As such, pure beauty is a kind of beauty constituted by one integrated mass. Modern poetics shows its preference for pure poems, and there is a trend of going beyond or against utilitarianism in modern poems. In modern poetics, artistic conception is taken as the ultimate role of poetic composition, which is much similar to Taoism because of its upholding Tao to an ontological position in Taoism