Prelude: The Changing World in Eighty-Century China

Intellectual Culture in the Mid-Tang Mainstream
Defining the Mid-Tang Mainstream
Politics and Social Change in the Mid-Tang
The Confucian Revival
The Plan of This Study

1. The Literary Response to the Mid-Tang Crisis

Literary Decline and the Roots of Disorder
The Continuing Promise of Literary Pursuits
The Nature of the Literary Man
Completeness and Balance in Mainstream Thought
The Evolution of the Literary Mainstream
Conclusion

2. Literary Education in the Mid-Tang Mainstream

Educational Assumptions in Medieval China
Mid-Tang Literary Learning and the Tradition
The Guiding Tradition
Learning Broadly in the Mid-Tang
Alternative Visions
Conclusion

3. Literary Politics in the Mid-Tang

The Elements of Mainstream Political Thought
Bai Juyi and His Celin
Liu Yuxi's Accomodative Political Philosophy
Conclusion

4. Moral Choices in the Literary Mainstream

Literature and the Self
Models for the Moral Man
Desire and Morality in Quan Deyu's Thought
A Remedy for Desires
Conclusion

5. The Guwen Alternative

Guwen Literary Theory
Guwen
Approaches to Learning
The Basis of Morality in Guwen
Ideology
The Politics of Individual Responsibility
Conclusion

Final Considerations

The Vitality of Tang Literary Conservatism
The Legacy of the Mainstream

Notes

Bibliography

Index