Hong Zeng's Chinese language and culture

Hello everyone, the season 2 of “The Immortal Classical Chinese

poetry: Learn Chinese language and Culture series” is launched! Like its

predecessor season 1, this course will allow you to learn a wide range

of Chinese language (such as language describing Nature, emotion, basic

topics of human existence) by learning the breath-taking, immortal

beauty of the original works of other most famous classical Chinese

poets beyond Li Po, Wang Wei and Tu Fu, including Tang Dynasty poets

such as the landscape poet Meng Haoran, the defiant poet ghost Li Ho, Li

Shangyin, the obscure poet of passion and renunciation, Tao Yuanming

and Han-shan Te-Ching, two renowned Taoist hermit poets in Jin and Ming

Dynasty. These two seasons of Immortal Classical Chinese poetry will

give you a comprehensive as well as in-depth picture of the most famous

classical Chinese poets, especially the poets in the Tang Dynasty, the

Golden Age of China as well as classical Chinese poetry.

More than any other countries, classical Chinese poetry is given the most prominent and exalted status, which not only shapes Chinese language, literature, arts, philosophy and religion, but also Chinese history and politics. Chinese scholar-officials are invariably good poets who had passed Civic Entrance Exams with good grades and became high officials by composing excellent poetry and to a lesser extent, great essays. Moreover, the language of classical Chinese poetry is surprisingly similar to modern Chinese language, therefore it is very adaptable to the language use in daily life. To the very few vocabularies that changes their usage in time, the course will explain carefully and provide the modern equivalent.

Each poem is taught in three lectures: the first lecture teaches the language of the poem. Vocabulary lists are provided and taught to recite and to use in modern situation, the literal meaning of each poetic line is explained in great detail, and each poetic line is led to recite and memorize, because the vocabulary lists include vocabularies from the most basic to the advanced, any level of Chinese students can take the course, although it is advisable to take my College Mandarin Chinese on Your Own Beginning Level so that you are knowledgeable of the Chinese pinyin and writing system and basic Chinese vocabularies. The second lecture teaches in English the poetic implication, the relationship between its poetic form and meaning, composition method and philosophical influence of the poem, so that you understand and appreciate the cultural implication of the poem in greatest depth. The third lecture is a music recitation video made with my recitation (which you can read after), beautiful classical Chinese music and painting, so that you can further familiarize and memorize the language of the poem, and appreciate the immortal, living beauty of these poems.

Through learning these two seasons of Immortal Classical Chinese Poetry Course in combination you will be able to take greatest pride in yourself in being able to understand the major poets of classical Chinese poetry whose works have amazing homology with Chinese arts, philosophy and religion and shapes Chinese history for thousands of years. While you take the aesthetic flight, your Chinese skill will also improve drastically with the wide range of vocabularies and expression in human existence you acquired in these two courses.