When mentioning Meng Haoran, the great poet of the Tang Dynasty, people will naturally think of his "Spring Dawn", "Staying on the Dejiang River", "Crossing the Old Friend's Village", "Wood on the River in the Early Cold", "With Friends" Famous works such as "The Son Climbs Xian Mountain". His poems are fresh, diluted, and natural. After thousands of years, they can still soothe our impetuous souls and give us unparalleled enjoyment of beauty. However, Master Meng, who created a large number of beautiful landscape and pastoral poems, was not an extraordinary and unconventional person. A happy hermit with fireworks in the world, but a painful poet who was somewhat unable to advance or retreat, wandering between becoming an official and retiring. In the end, he died of his ambition and ended up in his hometown, which makes people sigh with regret!
Xiangyang, Hubei Province, is a place with extraordinary scenery. Celebrities such as Pang Degong, Sima Hui, and Zhuge Liang once lived in seclusion here. Meng Haoran, who has lived in the atmosphere of ancient hermits since he was a child, is naturally deeply affected. In his early years, Meng Haoran had traced the traces of hermits while studying. The poem "Returning to Lumen Mountain at Night" expresses his deep yearning for a secluded life: The bells of the mountain temple are ringing and the day is already dark, and the fishermen are noisy at the ferry crossing. People followed the beach to Jiangcun, and I also took a boat back to Lumen. The moonlight at Lumen opened the smoke trees, and suddenly I came to Pang Gong's hiding place. The pine path in Yanfei is long and lonely, with only lonely people coming and going. ?The Pang Gong mentioned in the poem is the famous hermit Pang Degong in the Eastern Han Dynasty. At that time, Liu Biao, the governor of Jingzhou, asked him to serve as an official, but Pang and his wife went to Lumen Mountain to collect medicine and never returned. It was later passed down as a good story.
The Lumen Mountain described by Meng Haoran is so beautiful, and his envy of Pang Degong’s secluded life is beyond words; his early creation "Autumn Climbing Ten Thousand Mountains to Send a Five Pieces" is also a song that reflects the secluded life. The famous poem: "In the white clouds of the North Mountain, the hermit feels happy." When we look at each other, we climb high, and our hearts follow the wild geese. Worry arises in the dusk, happiness arises in the autumn. Sometimes I see people returning to the village, resting at the flat sand crossing. The trees on the horizon are like shepherd's purses, and the state beside the river is like the moon. Why should I bring you wine to get drunk on the Double Ninth Festival? ?Because paying close attention to landscapes can give Meng Haoran a truly otherworldly spiritual joy, so he loves it more, is happy, and forgets to return! His choice to live in seclusion in his early years was also related to his unfettered and natural nature.
His contemporary Mr. Wang Shiyuan from Hubei admired Meng Haoran's talent very much. He specially edited a collection of poems for him and wrote a "Preface to the Collection of Meng Haoran". In the preface, he said that Meng Haoran's appearance Shuqing, Fengshensanlang? It can be seen that Meng Haoran is a natural, free and honest person who does not fall into the secular world; it is also said that he does not travel for profit and hopes to let go of his nature, so he is often poor? After studying, Meng likes to rely on his It is his nature to make friends, but because he does not make friends for fame and fortune, he wanders around and becomes poorer and poorer, which is quite similar to how Li Bai spent all his gold in Yangzhou! Meng Haoran still had a spirit of chivalry when he was young. His poem "Send Zhu Da to Qin" (When a tourist goes to Wuling, the sword is worth a thousand pieces of gold. When we break up, we give it to each other, and our hearts will be the same throughout our lives). This poem confirms that he is a young man who is loyal and happy. People are in trouble? ("New Book of Tang Dynasty. Biography of Literature and Art").
Meng Haoran's secluded life and his rising poetry reputation made the rising star Li Bai come to Xiangyang to visit him. After the visit was unsuccessful, Li Bai immediately wrote the popular "Gift to Meng Haoran": "I He loved Master Meng and was famous all over the world. The beauty abandons the crown, and the white head lies in the pine clouds. The moon is drunk and the saint is in the sky, and the flowers are not in your way. The mountains are safe and you can look up to them, just to bow to the clear fragrance. ?Except for Meng, there is no other person in the world who can make the poet Li Bai regard him as a high mountain.
It is not difficult to see from Li Bai's poems that Meng Haoran did like a reclusive life when he was young, and it was not a pretense of high status, although it cannot be completely ruled out that he was "reclusive for the sake of reclusion". In his youth, Meng Haoran was ignorant of the world and had not yet accepted the baptism of life. He did not know how high and thick the sky was. He was immersed in the beautiful scenery of Lumen Mountain and the ancient customs of Xiangyang hermits. His mood of studying in seclusion was elegant and leisurely, which was very important to him. The future is also full of confidence and hope. In the poem "Xi Ran Di Zhu Pavilion" written to his younger brother Meng Seran ("My second and third sons and I have had close friendships throughout our lives. We both have great ambitions, and we all have the heart of a wagtail. We are relaxed and relaxed.") The breeze is blowing in the bamboo forest (the wind is blowing in the wine, and there is an occasional note on the piano), he said that he has great ambitions and is determined to do something grand; it can be seen that he is also working on something while living in seclusion. Make active preparations for going out in the future. At this time, Meng Haoran was in a happy mood. Because he was so heroic and energetic, he was not aware of the shortness of life and could not feel the various pressures from society and himself.
Meng Haoran was born in a scholarly family with Bo Youhengchan, and was born in 689 when Wu Zetian was in power. At that time, the ruthless official Zhou Xing and others were arresting people everywhere, and the city of Chang'an was overcrowded; when he was 16 years old to During the 24-year-old period, the Tang Dynasty was in political chaos, and many major political events occurred: Zhang and Cambodia forced Emperor Wu to retreat, Zhongzong ascended the throne, the prince launched an army to kill Wu Sansi, Empress Wei was in chaos, and Li Longji teamed up with Princess Taiping to launch a coup to annihilate Wei. In the latter party, Ruizong of the Tang Dynasty came to the throne; in August 712, Xuanzong of the Tang Dynasty came to the throne; in 713, Princess Taiping was executed, and the Kaiyuan era began. A rare "Kaiyuan prosperity" in Chinese history is about to come.
Meng Haoran was also ready to leave the country and began to travel abroad. However, until he was thirty years old, he still had no achievements in politics, so he was slightly frustrated with the poem "I still haven't met him in my thirties". and poverty. After that, Meng Haoran began to travel abroad, and visited Hunan, Jiangxi, Yangzhou and other places successively, making friends with eminent people, visiting officials and celebrities, eager to be recommended in order to get a chance to advance, and firmly believed that he could use his talents to get an official position. It shouldn't be difficult. In his poem "Pastoral Composition", he wrote: "Who can recommend "Ode to Sweet Spring" for Yang Xiong?"
This poem reflects the poet's different path to becoming an official than others envisaged: living in seclusion and writing, thereby gaining great social reputation, and then being appreciated and recommended by princes and ministers, then entering the court as an official, and finally realize his lofty political ideals. In fact, Meng Haoran lived in seclusion and wrote, and his reputation grew. He won the admiration of the poet Li Bai, and became close friends with some local politicians. He also wrote many harmonious works, but not many dignitaries appreciated him. The road has not been smooth.
In his youth, Meng Haoran loved to live in seclusion and love the mountains and rivers while studying hard. However, when he reached middle age, he went out to seek official positions, which is hard to understand. Not really. The young Meng Haoran was in a twilight period politically in the Tang Dynasty, and he could be described as "a country without moral principles". "The Analects of Confucius" says: "If a country is immoral, it would be shameful to be rich and noble." At the end of the Eastern Han Dynasty, the world was in chaos. Pang Degong would rather live in seclusion than serve as Liu Biao's official, so he decided to collect medicine and refused to return. In addition to actively improving himself, Meng Haoran's seclusion is also following the example of Pang De and escaping from troubled times. The early Kaiyuan period was the beginning of a great and prosperous age.
"The Analects of Confucius" also said: "If the state is in good order, it is a shame to be poor and humble." Meng Haoran, who has Confucian beliefs, certainly hopes to make a difference in the peaceful era of political clarity. The so-called "learning and excellence leads to officialdom", as his poem "Duanju Shengming" says, he must live up to what he has learned in his life with practical actions. , live up to the age of sage, otherwise it would be a shame to blindly live in seclusion in him! In addition, Haoran's family has seriously declined, and his mother is sick and old. Perhaps to support his family and get out of poverty, he needs a generous salary. Didn't Mencius also say: "Being an official is not a sign of poverty, but sometimes it is almost a sign of poverty."
Du Mu, an outstanding poet in the late Tang Dynasty, reported to the court many times and requested to be sent to Hangzhou to serve as an official in order to take care of his younger brother with severe eye disease and obtain a generous salary. In the end, the court granted his request. , and sent him to Huzhou; although Huzhou was not as wealthy as Hangzhou, it still gave Du Mu a solid financial support in trouble. It was precisely due to various reasons that forced Meng Haoran to leave Lumen Mountain and Xiangyang County, which was reclusive in ancient times.