Guo Moruo

Modern Chinese literature was born with the May 4th Movement (1919). In 1917 Hu Shi (1879-1942) took the lead in publishing eight poems incorporating the rhythms and vocabulary of common speech in New Youth (a magazine), and strived to reform the style of the poem. He upheld that poetry should not confine itself to gelv (rules and forms of classical poetic composition with respect to tonal pattern, rhyme, and so on) as well as level, oblique tones, and length, and called this kind of poetry "Hu Shi style." Liu Bannong, Liu Dabai, Kang Baiqing, and Yu Pingbo made enormous contributions to the formation of a new poetry.

Through these poets' efforts, modern poetry established its characteristics: no fixed gelv, no confining rhythm, no particularities about wording and phrasing, and written in simple common language. The earliest anthology of new poetry included Hu Shi's Tentitive Poems, Yu Pingbo's "Winter Night," Kang Baiqing-s "Grass," and Guo Moruo's "Goddess."

After the initial stage of development, new poetry developed a relatively perfected form: giving priority to free style and adopting the techniques of new metrical patterns and symbolism.

Writers of the Society of Literary Research wrote a large number of free-style verse, which mostly expressed, in a lyrical tone, the pursuits and anguish of an awakened bourgeoisie.

In the latter half of the 1940s, new poetry in the style of folksongs flourished in the liberated areas of the countryside. The most exemplary were the narrative poems written by Li ji and Ruan Zhangjing.

Poetry entered a new stage of development after the founding of the People's Republic of China in 1949. New subject matter and material ensued as required of a new life.

A fresh group of poets growing up after liberation created a variety of new works including Shao Yanxiang's "Singing Beijing" and "Going to Remote Areas"; the forest poet Fu Chou's "The Woodchopper"; Yan Zhen's "Lao Zhang's Hands"; Wei Yang's "I've Come Back, Motherland"; Li Ying's "Eyes under the Army Cap"; Gong Liu's "Short Songs of Remote City" and "City at Dawn"; and Gu Gong's "At the Foot of the Himalayas." As well, new forms of poetry also were written under the influence of folksongs and poetry from other countries.

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