The modern imagination of classical Chinese thought has long been dominated by Confucius, Mozi, Mencius, and other so-called “Masters” of the Warring States period. Michael Hunter argues that this approach neglects the far more central role of poetry, and the
Shijing
(
Classic of Poetry
) in particular, in the formation of the philosophical tradition.
Through a new reading of its ideology and poetics, Hunter reestablishes the
as a work of major intellectual-historical significance.
The Poetics of Early Chinese Thought
demonstrates how
Shi
poetry weaves a vision of society united at every level by the innate and universal impulse to come home. The
immersed early thinkers in a world of movement and flow in order to teach them that the most powerful current of all was the gravitational pull of a virtuous king, without whom people can never truly feel at home. Hunter traces the profound influence of the
ideology across numerous sources of classical Chinese thought, which he recasts as a network centered on the
. Reframing the tradition in this way reveals how poetry shaped ancient Chinese thinkers’ conception of the world and their place within it.
This book offers both a sweeping critique of how classical Chinese thought is commonly understood and a powerful new way of studying it.