Mid-Yuán 元 Hànlín poet and theoretician of poetic-method; second member of the mid-Yuán four-master quartet (YúYángFànJiē): Yú Jí 虞集 (1272–1348), Yáng Zài, Fàn Pèng KR4d0496 (1272–1330), Jiē Xīsī KR4d0497 (1274–1344). Zì Zhònghóng 仲弘. Native of Pǔchéng 浦城 (Fújiàn). 1271–1323.
Note on naming. The catalog meta for KR4d0495 writes the author as 楊戴 Yáng Dài — a typographical miswriting of 楊載 Yáng Zài (the characters 戴 / 載 differ). The standard SBCK title Hànlín Yáng Zhònghóng shījí confirms the actual identity is Yáng Zài.
Career. Hànlín xiūzhuàn 翰林修撰.
Poetic theory. The principal Yuán-period inheritor of the Southern-Sòng Yán Yǔ Cānglàng 嚴羽滄浪 school of poetic criticism — Yáng’s foundational doctrine:
“Tángshī zhǔ yú dá xìngqíng, gù yú Sānbǎipiān wèi jìn; Sòngshī zhǔ yú lì yìlùn, gù yú Sānbǎipiān wèi yuǎn.”
“Táng poetry principally aims at expressing nature-and-feeling, therefore is near to the Three-Hundred-Pieces (Shījīng); Sòng poetry principally aims at establishing argument, therefore is far from the Three-Hundred-Pieces.”
Method. Self-reported “Yòng gōng èrshí yú nián, shǐ néng huì zhūfǎ ér dé qí yī èr” (engaged in dedicated study twenty-plus years, finally able to harmonize the various-methods and obtain one or two of them). His Shīfǎ jiāshù 詩法家數 became canonical for late-Yuán and early-Míng poetic instruction.
Reception. Péi Yǔ 裴庾’s Zhìdà 2 (1309) preface to the collection establishes Yáng Zài as the principal contemporary representative of the Cānglàng school of poetic criticism — the Sòng-poetic-reform-via-Táng-restoration doctrine that becomes canonical YuánMíng poetic-theoretical orthodoxy through Yáng’s mediation.
Within the Kanripo corpus. KR4d0495 Yáng Zhònghóng jí 楊仲弘集 (撰; catalog typographically gives 楊戴).
Reference. Yuánshǐ j. 190.