| Summary: | 碩士 === 國立政治大學 === 中國文學研究所 === 96 === Through the variety of texts and genres from Tang to Sung, the narration of “Milou” had projected the figure of pleasure and exquisite craftwork. The inquisitions of this essay consist of two layers. First, to addresses the relation of the desire and the discursive phenomena at the time of Tang to Sung, especially on the binary aspect of temperance and pleasure, frugality and luxury, nature and craftsmanship. Secondly, to mate the dazzling craftwork of Milou correspondent with the desire and pleasure of the attentive craftwork in literary world, in which the dialectical relation between the Nature and craftsmanship was deeply concerned.
Neither the official nor the private historical texts have any record on Milou. However, the allusion and narration of Milou was found in variety of texts including poets, rhapsodies, lyrics, novels, geographical documents and notes. According to the novel “The Tales of Milou”(Milou Ji, 迷樓記), Milou was a labyrinthine palace built by Shui Yang Ti, a space loaded with the imagination of “utmost enjoyment”(Ji Le, 極樂). The utmost enjoyment had been known as a forbidden state in the discourse on regimen, it was also considered as a dangerous force which threatening to the nation. The inquisition of “utmost enjoyment” has been linked to the “technique of waste”, which provoke the exhaustion of the King’s body, and also the waste of accumulative wealth of the kingdom, and brought huge chaos and doom to the dynasty. My argument of the “technique of waste” has extended to the discussion of creative technique involved in literary writing, which had been gaining a lot of attention in late-Tang and Sung, poets were aware of the poor efficacy of “critical allegory” (feng yu諷喻) due to the paradox of flourish and fading which had been seen as nature mechanism, as has been pointed out by Stephen Owen. Poetry had gained its own sovereignty; poetic commentators had discussed the technique of creation enthusiastically and pursued for the perfect poetic scene(境).
There are two layers of discussion which closely interrelated with each other: 1. Milou was a symbol of pleasure and crafty achievement, and thus contradictory to the Nature. 2. This essay has further elaborated the relation of the crafty image of Milou with the “clever technique” (巧工) in the poetic notion from Tang to Sung. However, to achieve perfect work for poetry that look like the work of nature(天工), it definitely had to be created through superb technique that can smooth away any crafty traces.
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