Elegant Rebellion—An Analysis of Feminism in Li Qingzhao’s Works

Li Qingzhao is one of the outstanding representative figures of the graceful and restrained school of poetess in Song Dynasty in China. Wang Zhuo said that she was “talented and close to her predecessors, and there were not many scholar-officials like her. Over the women of this dynasty, her writing can be the top.” Zhu Xi also praised that “only Li Yi’an and Mrs. Wei can write in this dynasty”. However, when it comes to graceful and restrained schools, there is always a stereotype that Li Qingzhao is the Northern Song Dynasty version of Lin Daiyu who is “thinner than yellow flowers”. In fact, this impression can be said to be a big misunderstanding of Li Qingzhao or at least one-sided. Born in an official family, she was influenced by the scholar style since childhood, and had considerable political opinions, patriotic feelings and worries about the country and the people, all of which were no different from the male of her contemporaries. In fact, from Li Qingzhao’s works, we can deeply feel that her poetry has unique personal charm in both ideological content and aesthetic consciousness, and it is also full of her own unique female consciousness. Under the social situation at that time, she carried out her unique “elegant rebellion”.