Place and Space of the Haichuang Temple in Qing Dynasty Poems

• In Event: Alternative Alliances: The Haichuang Temple in Guangzhou as a Local, Regional, and Transnational Platform of Cultural Exchange, 1650-1850

Abstract

The Haichuang Temple had a strong relation with local elites of Guangzhou in the Qing dynasty. Its location was not far from the Pearl River, and in the neighborhood of some eminent Hong Merchants’ residences. Thus the temple became a place of interest to both residents of the city and tourists. Hundreds of poems were written in the Qing period on poets’ experiences and impressions of the temple. This paper makes use of poems as historical materials, attempting to outline how poets expressed their senses of place and space by making use of poetic language. With the development of Honam Island as a suburban district of Guangzhou city, the Haichuang Temple assumed more and more functions as a social space. In this paper, the author argues that the accumulations of the Temple’s images among Qing literati reflect the urban development of Guangzhou. However, confined by poetic expressions, which rely too much on allusions and established styles of written language, it was difficult for poets to describe their renewed sense of urban daily living, including their sense of place and space. Thus, their writings on the Haichuang Temple thus become a model of understanding the gap between the content and the form.

Author

• Xiang Zhou, Sun Yat-sen University