These two major case histories display Dr Li's own critical acumen and insight into new experiments with form and image-ry and poetic imagination. They demonstrate the deeply indi-vidual variations to be found in response to a wider cultural challenge. They give to the experience of reading and tracing the evolution of New Chinese Poetry a distinctive poetical as-pect: this is not a general cultural history with add-on poetic flavor, but is deeply committed to understanding the implicit forms of poetic imagination during a very rapid succession of major shifts and changes. Poetry is made by poets and consists of poems, made from the language that poets make from the it- self contested native stock of speech and writing in the world a- round them; and Dr Li brings a strong sense of these aspects to the argument of this study.
Acknowledgement Part One: The Hlstorlcal Backgrounds tor tho Ger-mlnotlon ot New Chinese Poetry Chapter One: The Social Background Chaptar Two: The Poetical Background Chapter hree: Westem Modemism as an Origin for New Chi Ⅰ. To Define Western Modernism Ⅱ. A Brief View of the Modern Background of Modernism in the WeSt Ⅲ. Some Main Characteristics of Western Modernism Port Two: Westem Pootlcol CharacterIstIcs of New Chinese Poetry Chapter Four; The Formation and Development of New Chi-nese Poetry under the Influence of Westem Poetics Ⅰ. The Formation Period from the 1910s to the 1940s Ⅱ. The Misty Poetry Period from 1978 to 1989 Ⅲ. The Individual Creation Period of 1990s--into the Chinese Language-poetry Group Chapter Five: Western Poetical Characteristics of Xu Zhfmo (1897~1931) -A Poet of Freedom and Love Ⅰ. The Approach Ⅱ. Xu and Cambridge Ⅲ. Xu's Freedom and Individualism Ⅳ. Xu's Love for Beauty.and Music V. Xu's Purity and Immaturity Ⅵ. Some Comments Chapter Six: Western Poetical Characteristics of Gu Cheng (1956~1993)-A Poet of Fairy Tales Ⅰ. Finding and Entering Another World Ⅱ. East, or West Ⅲ. Gu in Two Worlds Ⅳ. The Difference of Western Poetics Between Xu and Gu Chapter Seven: Comparison of the Poetical Characters Between New Chinese Poetry and Western ModernistPoetry Ⅰ. Main Characters of New Chinese Poetry Ⅱ. The Main Similarities and Differences Between Western Modernist Poetry and New Chinese Poetry Part Three: Sense of Nativeness and the Influence of Chinese Poetics on Western Poetry …… Part Four:Investigations of the Current Situations of Poetry in Both China and the West Part Five:Problems of and Suggestions for New Chinese Poetry