China and the West

Lu, Weiping. Thomas Hardy and Xu Zhimo : a study of poetic influence [ID D27731].
Thomas Hardy's fiction has had a remarkably strong appeal for general readers for decades, and draws increasingly provocative attention from academic readers. His poetry more recently has come to acclaim as among the most influential of the twentieth century. Hardy wrote poetry for nearly sixty years. Xu Zhimo never thought of being a poet before he went abroad to study. When attending history classes in America, he was gradually shaping a specific picture about the industry of the nineteenth century and the workers' suffering life. He abandoned his former idea of "saving the nation by industry development," but began to hate the industrialized civilization. His life experience in Cambridge University cultivated him as a poet, a pioneer in Chinese modern poetry movement.Though lots of research has been done on Thomas Hardy and Xu Zhimo respectively, scholars usually focus their study on one of them instead of bringing them together to make a comparative study, or a few of them do make the comparison between Hardy and Xu, but mainly study Xu and use Hardy as a comparison other to make Chinese readers learn Xu more specifically. Hardy influenced Xu's creation and how he influenced Chinese modern new poetry creation through exerting influence on Xu's poetic career.