A Study on the Manifestation and Deep Implications of the “Three Beauties” Theory in “Saying Goodbye to Cambridge Again”

DOI

10.2991/978-2-38476-400-6_16How to use a DOI?

Keywords

Saying Goodbye to Cambridge Again; Xu Zhimo; “Three Beauties” theory; Crescent Moon School; poetic formal beauty; Chinese-Western poetic integration

Abstract

In the view of the critics of Crescent Moon, “Saying Goodbye to Cambridge Again” indeed remains the best representative work in the pursuit of formal beauty of modern Chinese poetry. Analyzing this poem from the aspects of musical beauty, pictorial beauty, and architectural beauty, this paper tries to evaluate the achievement from an artistic point of view under the “Three Beauties” theory formulated by Wen Yiduo. The study finds that, in terms of musical beauty, the poem under study generates unique auditory aesthetics due to its prosodic patterns, tonal effects, and metrical constitution. Pictorial beauty would regard the dynamic visual effects brought forth by the work through sets of images and the richness in the chromatic atmosphere. Architectural beauty might be considered for the rigidly structured piece that has distinct layers reflecting the modernistic, innovative drive for form in poetry. This essay tries to strip the poem of its thick cultural overtones and emotional implications toward the poet’s endeavor to merge Chinese and Western poetic traditions. On that note, this paper describes a new understanding of what Crescent Moon School poetry is like in terms of artistic features and provides alternative ways of viewing formal beauty in modern poetry.

Copyright

© 2025 The Author(s)

Open Access

Open Access This chapter is licensed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License (http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-nc/4.0/), which permits any noncommercial use, sharing, adaptation, distribution and reproduction in any medium or format, as long as you give appropriate credit to the original author(s) and the source, provide a link to the Creative Commons license and indicate if changes were made.

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TY  - CONF
AU  - Qiuzi Lin
PY  - 2025
DA  - 2025/05/15
TI  - A Study on the Manifestation and Deep Implications of the “Three Beauties” Theory in “Saying Goodbye to Cambridge Again”
BT  - Proceedings of the 2nd International Conference on Educational Development and Social Sciences (EDSS 2025)
PB  - Atlantis Press
SP  - 131
EP  - 137
SN  - 2352-5398
UR  - https://doi.org/10.2991/978-2-38476-400-6_16
DO  - 10.2991/978-2-38476-400-6_16
ID  - Lin2025
ER  -