a_comparative_study_on_the_pastoral_poetry_between_wordsworth_and_tao_yuanming_英语专业毕业论文(编辑修改稿)

a_comparative_study_on_the_pastoral_poetry_between_wordsworth_and_tao_yuanming_英语专业毕业论文(编辑修改稿)内容摘要：

Tao Yuanming possessed great aspirations in their youthful days. When Wordsworth was prepared to dedicate himself to the struggle, his relatives recalled him to England to face the ugly specter of poverty. The rude shock came too suddenly upon his ardent aspirations, and, closely following it came the failure of the revolutionists — Girondins. Wordsworth was so depressed and disappointed. Back in England, he published his first two poems in 1793: An Evening Walk and Descriptive Sketches, which were conventional, picturesque descriptions of the Alps. His disillusionment with the French Revolution was reflected in his verse drama The Borderers. Tao Yuanming‟s official career lasted probably more than ten years from 393 to 405. During these years, he was so fed up with the officialdom that he resigned from the position of the magistrate of Pengze (彭泽令 ) which he had taken up for only over eighty days. This was the year when Tao Yuanming really embarked on his way to his recluse life. Tao Yuanming failed to achieve his ambitions in his official career, he inevitably longed for the tranquility of the rural life. It can be said safely that the irreconcilable conflicts between the harsh realities and the ideals cause Wordsworth and Tao Yuanming to retreat from the public life and to return to nature. The harsh realities frustrate the ambitions of both poets and hurt them deeply, and the experiences actually influence both poets‟ poetic writing all through their lives. Themes in Pastoral Poetry The number of poems about the beauty of nature is in the majority in both Wordsworth and Tao Yuanming‟s pastoral poetry. Wordsworth settles in the picturesque Lake District in the north of England, and Tao Yuanming lives in his beautiful hometown of Chaisang (presentday Jiangxi Province). They are attracted and shocked by the beauty of nature, and they cannot help singing praise of it. In Wordsworth‟s opinion, nature is worthy of being respected because she, just like the merciful “mater”, fosters men and all creatures in the world. Wordsworth‟s love of nature is vividly presented in such poems that sincerely praise the little beings, such as To the Daisy, To the Cuckoo, The Small Celandine, The Green Lin and the like. In the poem To the Daisy, Wordsworth writes: Bright Flower! Whose home is everywhere Bold in maternal Nature‟s care And all the long year through the heir Of joy or sorrow Wordsworth thinks that the Daisy‟s boldness and joy originate from the “maternal Nature‟s care”, and that nature can bring the little creature the vital force. In fact, the daisy has turned to be the embodiment of nature. In The Course of Nature, Tao Yuanming directly speaks out his feelings for nature. In the Preface to The Course of Nature, Tao says: “The Course of Nature is written when I am on an outing in late spring. In my newlymade spring clothes, I wander alone the thriving fields, with mixed feelings of weal and woe.” Along with nature‟s changing course A fair spring day displays its force In spring attire I leave my home And to the eastern fields I roam (The Course of Nature) This poem describes vividly the late spring sceneries and Tao‟s delight at the sight of the beauty of nature. All the clouds, hills, dim horizon, breezes and the seedlings in this poem convey the information of spring, and plete a flourishing picture of spring. It is not only the beauty of nature but also the rustic life that attracts Wordsworth and arouses his creative enthusiasm. The rural life strongly excites Wordsworth‟s feelings of loving. Wordsworth‟s motives to glorify the “low and rustic life” are that the rural life can provide “the essential passions of the heart” with “a better soil”, and that “a plainer and more emphatic language” can be spoken. The poems of We are Seven, Lucy Gray, She Dwelt Among the Untrodden Ways and The Solitary Reaper are typical of the theme of “low and rustic life”, in which Wordsworth praises the people who are close to nature. Tao Yuanming is a farmer as well as a pastoral poet. So he often writes about his own farming life in his pastoral poems, such as Exhortation to Farming, and the five poems of Back to Country Life. Tao Yuanming seems to exceed Wordsworth in writing about the rustic laboring, a theme that he is so familiar with. Wordsworth, on the contrary, is a standerby, who only uses abundant imagination to describe the rural life in his poems. What is in mon in Wordsworth and Tao Yuanming is thus evident in the lines of their poems, where the grand noble heroes and their glimmering achievements are replaced by the poor rustic people and their simple ordinary lie, for, in them, both poets find the primeval human joy and the beauty of life. Poetic Language When reading the pastoral poems of Wordsworth and Tao Yuanming, the readers can easily find another similarity, that is, both of them use the mon language to write their poems. The employment of the mon language in writing their poems is actually a great contribution to the development of pastoral poetry, and can be called a poetic revolution in the literary history. Wordsworth publishes the second edition of Lyrical Ballads. The most important thing about this edition is that Wordsworth adds a Preface to Lyrical Ballads. In the Preface, Wordsworth puts forward his two viewpoints about the poetic language, and both of the viewpoints are revolutionary in the English poetic history. Firstly, Wordsworth proposes poetry should be written in the real language of mon speech, rather than in the lofty and elaborate “poetic diction”. In the Preface, Wordsworth emphasizes his viewpoint about the poetic language for many times, such as “real language of men in a state of vivid sensation”, “language really used by men”. Secondly, Wordsworth argues “there neither is nor can b。