Liang Zongdai and Symbolist Poetics

Liang Zongdai’s outstanding contribution to deepening the understanding of symbolism has not been fully recognized yet in China. As a poet, literary critic and translator, Liang has demonstrated his great competence in French. When it comes to his supreme belief in art and beauty, ideal and ' pure poetry”, and the poetry relationship between thoughts and feelings, individuality and commonness, ego and the universe, tradition and modernity, it was really interpreted in the spirit of Valery. He defended the form and structure of poetry, the deliberate exploration behind the poetry, the rubbing of ideas, and the hard work of repeated deliberation and the meticulous polishing, which contrasted sharply with the creation of romanticism, which favors accomplishing with one breath and out of inspiration. Liang’s main theoretical writings inspired the ' new-moon-school” poets to advocate the revolution in the form of new poetry and exerted a great influence on Bian Zhilin, one of the most talented poets in the 1930s. More than forty years later, the ' Five Poets in Sichuan” – namely Bai Hua, Zhong Ming, Zhang Zao, Ouyang Jianghe and Zhai Yongming, were deeply convinced and encouraged to start their own experiment in ' post-misty-poetry”.