Abstract:

 Since the Southern Song Dynasty, Ci had witnessed stricter norms, better aesthetic elegance and changing morals in the field. Until the late Song Dynasty, the study of Ci had experienced a gradual change from revering actual facts and grand allusions to advocating pureness and elegance. Zhang Yan’s theory of “pureness” (qingkong) was the consummation of the transformation and became a shared ideal and theoretical basis to the ci poets of late Song Dynasty. Against a time of dramatic reform in politics and culture, “pureness” was a style of art based on thought and content, and its normative significance was all the more valued for its lofty and profound meaning, smooth and fair lyric style and exquisite layout. The combined collection of ci poems and ci study Collection of Clouds in the Mountain was a typical and significant exemplar of ci creation embodying the dimension of normative study, a practice carried by Zhang Yan and his fellows in late Song Dynasty.

Key words: theory of “pureness”, study of ci in late Song Dynasty, normative study of ci;Collection of Clouds in the Mountain