生平

谢灵运生于始宁（今嵊州和上虞交界），世居会稽（今浙江绍兴县）。他的祖父谢玄为东晋将领，曾参与淝水之战。谢玄认为谢灵运幼年即颖悟，谢灵运的父亲谢瑍却是不太聪明，谢玄觉得奇怪，曾说：「我乃生瑍，瑍那得生灵运！」其母亲是王羲之与郗璇的独女王孟姜的女儿。

谢灵运小时，在钱塘道士杜子恭的道馆中寄养，十五岁回建康，故小名客儿。谢灵运博览群书，写出来的文章被人称赞。十八岁袭封康乐公，世称谢康公、谢康乐。

406年，谢灵运出仕。义熙二年（407年），改从抚军将军、豫州刺史刘毅任记室参军。义熙八年（413年），刘毅反刘裕，兵败自杀，谢灵运返京任秘书丞。

义熙十一年（416年），转中书侍郎。义熙十四年（419年），刘裕在彭城建宋国，谢灵运任宋国黄门侍郎。420年，刘裕代东晋自立，创刘宋，是为宋武帝，谢灵运爵位由公降为侯，任太子左卫率。永初三年（422年），刘裕死，少帝继位，谢灵运出京任永嘉太守，在职一年，即称病返乡隐居。

元嘉三年（426年），文帝诛权臣徐羡之等，召谢灵运回朝任秘书监，谢灵运觉得自己不受重用，心有不平，多称疾不上朝而遨游。最后请病假东归，二次隐居故乡。因日夜游宴，谢灵运于元嘉五年（428年）被免职。

元嘉八年（431年），因决湖造田之事，被会稽太守孟顗告发，他上书申辩。宋文帝觉得他是被诬陷，未予追究，任其为临川内史。但他依然荒废政事，遨游山水。司徒刘义康派人逮捕，灵运派兵拒捕，结果犯下死罪。文帝爱其才，降死一等，流放广州。

元嘉十年（433年），有人告发谢灵运在广州参与谋反，文帝下诏，于广州行弃市的死刑。灵运颇信佛教，死前布施，捐出自己的胡须，装饰南海祗洹寺的维摩诘菩萨佛像。唐时，唐中宗之女安乐公主将维摩诘菩萨佛像之须，剪取一半，以备斗草之用。又恐他人所得，因剪弃其馀，遂绝。

家庭

父母

• 谢瑍，东晋秘书郎、康乐县公

• 南阳刘氏，刘畅与王孟姜之女，王献之外甥女

子女

• 谢凤

孙子

• 谢超宗，刘宋竟陵王征北谘议、领记室。

文学表现

诗风

谢灵运开山水诗派，以讽咏大自然景物、山水风景称著，开创「山水派」的诗歌创作道路。谢灵运在政治失意，对此感到痛苦旁徨的情感也融入其诗作之中。谢灵运诗歌极貌写物，刻划入微，客观写实，讲究字句，工整密丽，应用典故，名句多。

在政治上，谢灵运屡有沉浮，因此「常怀愤愤」，遂寄情山水。他开后世山水诗之先河，打破了东晋玄言诗占统治地位的局面。由于出身士族，政治上又不得意，更因玄言诗的影响，他有不少诗作，表现出没深沈苦痛的感情和以乐天安命自解的思想。

谢灵运沿著以山水景物来体悟玄理这条路，对玄言诗进行改造。把玄言诗中概括化、概念化的自然山水景物具体化、生活化：在诗作的标题上尽可能标明所游览之地与游览方式，尽可能忠实地描摹出所游览之地的山水景物的原本面貌，让人们欣赏。

他的诗注重字句的锻炼，「名章迥句，处处间起；曲丽新声，络绎奔发。」（锺嵘《诗品》）受西晋太康雕琢之风的影响，他的诗多骈偶、精炼章句，也进一步推展南朝与唐朝注重艺术修辞之风。

他曾说道：「天下才共一石，曹子建独得八斗，我得一斗，自古及今共用一斗。」可见他对曹植的欣赏与景仰，也展现出他骄傲的性情。此句是为成语「才高八斗」的出处。

作品

诗歌代表作有《登池上楼》。

《隋书·经籍志》所录谢灵运著作，除《晋书》而外（清人汤球辑本有武惠怀三个帝纪和一〈百官志〉，传名仅存〈止足传〉），尚有《谢灵运集》等14种。《谢灵运集》19卷（梁20卷，录 1卷），北宋以后就已散佚。明代李献吉等从《文选》、《乐府诗集》及类书中辑出谢灵运的作品，由焦竑刊刻为《谢康乐集》。

地位

谢灵运扭转东晋以来「理过其辞，淡乎寡味」的玄言诗风，开创了山水诗的道路，南朝的谢朓、何逊，唐朝的孟浩然、王维等许多山水诗人都受他的影响。在艺术上，谢灵运亦开辟了南朝诗歌崇尚修辞艺术的新局面。

锺嵘《诗品》列入上品，称他的诗「尚巧似，而逸荡过之。」又说：「然名章迥句，处处间起，丽典新声，络绎奔会。」唐朝大诗人李白，对谢灵运颇为推崇，曾有「吾人咏歌，独惭康乐」之句。

佛教

谢灵运参与翻译佛经，对梵文略有认识，曾润饰《大般涅盘经》，撰写《十四音训叙》以注解《大般涅盘经·文字品》。谢灵运曾托名僧肇，作《金刚般若波罗密经注》。

评价

谢灵运在六朝以来极富盛名，被《诗品》一书中誉为「永嘉之雄」，曾与颜延之并称为「颜谢」，与陶潜并称为「陶谢」，与鲍照并称为「鲍谢」等，在南朝、唐代皆享有极高声望地位，为山水诗必参考的典范。但明清以来，「南朝第一诗家」的地位渐被陶潜取代。而自新文化运动以后，因谢灵运用字典雅艰深，于文学界地位突直转而下，负评日多。

延伸阅读

Life

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Xie Lingyun was a descendant of two of the most important families of the later Eastern Jin times, the Xie and the Wang families. His paternal grandfather was the general Xie Xuan, a general who is best known for repelling the Former Qin army at the Battle of Fei River, thus preventing the Former Qin emperor Fu Jiān from destroying Jin, and thus allowing the continuation of the southern dynastic kingdoms. His maternal grandmother was Wang Mengjiang, the only daughter of calligrapher, writer and politician Wang Xizhi.

Birth and youth

Xie Lingyun was born in Yangxia County, Henan, but his father died early. Xie Lingyun was consequently brought up by a Buddhist monk, Du Ming, in what was then Qiantang but now Hangzhou, a cosmopolitan metropolis at the southern end of the Grand Canal, a market nexus for maritime trade and transport to and from the north, and an area widely famed for its scenery with surrounding hills and the spectacular West Lake.

Although, returning home from the monastery in 399, when he would have been in his mid-teens, Xie retained a lifelong Buddhist practice. Furthermore, the family estate itself was a scenic wonder. Located in Shining (modern Shangyu township, Shaoxing prefecture, Zhejiang province—but administered and named differently then), the estate had been carefully chosen by his grandfather, the successful general, both for esthetics of beauty and its seclusion, who then planned and laid it out according to his wishes. The estate included a significant hill to the north, upon which was the family homestead, and there was a matching hill to the south, each hill replete with its craggy cliffs and cascading streams: and, in between the two hills stood a lake. The family home on the northern hill had been terraced and developed with well-planned and situated orchards, gardens, walking paths, and ornate pavilions, all done with a mind to preserve and increase the viewer's pleasure: the southern hill during the youth of Xie Lingyun was left as somewhat of a wild preserve; but, between the two there was a whole range of fields and crops as well as wild plant and animal life.

Even the secluded family estate was not necessarily safe during these turbulent times; and, when a major rebellion broke out, the family abandoned their country living in favor of the relative safety of the capital city, Jiankang (modern Nanjing), for the four years of its course. The Xie family received official residence in a fancy mansion, where their entertainments were among the foremost for the luxury and display fashionable at that time: that the young duke (having inherited the title when his father died) was well off financially (having also inherited the three thousand household fiefdom which went with the ducal title) and was also skilled in the expected literary abilities; which, altogether, went towards placing him in the highlight of the capital's social scene, and (with the family connections) also thus appearing to be at the very beginning of a very successful official career.

Career

Xie Lingyun served as an official in the Eastern Jin, during which time the rebellion was quashed by general Liu Yu; however, this would turn out to be just a step in general Liu's career, later on he would overthrow the Eastern Jin dynasty and establish the Liu Song dynasty, as Emperor Wu. The Xie family backed an alternative general, and the factional intrigues went on for years, before and after the eventual triumph of the Liu as the Liu Song dynasty. Liu Yu gained more and more power, at the expense of the Xie and the other old families, but at first was content to have the services of Xie Lingyun, nominally as an official of Jin. However, in the year 420 Liu Yu declared the end of Jin and the beginning of his new dynasty, the Liu Song. At this point, as an official in the Liu Song government, Xie Lingyun received a demotion, to marquis, with only 500 households in fee. He then was demoted to a position in a remote area, and so effectively exiled, to Yongjia (永嘉, modern Wenzhou in Zhejiang). Yongjia was a coastal seaport surrounded by scenic hills, and the setting for Xie Lingyun's Yongjia poetic period, when he wrote some of his finest poems. After a year in office here, however, Xie claiming health problems, resigned and returned home to the family estate in Shangyu.

Retiring to South Hill

After returning home to the family estate in Shining (Shangyu), where he spent considerable time attending to the previously undeveloped or cultivated South Hill, which may also be known as "South Mountain". Here he went on long exploratory expeditions, accompanied by dozens of servants, who often had to hack a way through the more densely vegetated areas: Xie Lingyun is also famed for having invented and used a type of wooden boots with spikes which he could remove or adjust depending on whether he was on level ground or on an up or down slope. His poems from this period made it to the capital city where they were popularly read, and the poems from his Shining period remain among his long lasting accomplishments. Some of the descriptions of and names for the locations of poetic occasions on his estate can be seen to be directly influential on the forty poems of the Wangchuan ji (also known as the Wang or Wheel River Collection) written by Wang Wei and Pei Di, in regards to Wang Wei's Tang Dynasty retirement estate at Lantian, south of the contemporary capital Chang'an (modern Xi'an in Shaanxi province).

Back in office, exile, and death

Meanwhile, the political changes went on unabated, and Xie once again became enmeshed in them. In 426, the new sovereign summoned him to court, where he spent two years with no real duty or power, but rather as a token to display loyalty: he then left for two years, but came back in 430 to defend himself against charges placed by his local prefect. In 431, he was relegated to what is now Fuzhou in Jiangxi, then the next year further exiled to Guangzhou: Xie Lingyun was then sentenced to death on a pretext, in 433, at which point he wrote his final poem, lamenting that his death was not to be on one of his beloved hilltops; and, then was executed.

Poetry

Xie Lingyun has been considered a nature or landscape poet focusing on the "mountain and streams", in contrast to the "field and garden" landscape poetry. His poetry is allusive and complex, with possible Buddhist influence.

Formal technique

Xie was influenced by a tradition of fu-style poetry, or literature. The Fu tradition often included eloquent descriptions of the beauties of nature; indeed, Xie himself wrote his renowned "Fu on returning to the Mountains" in this style: however, Xie's breakthrough was to distill the essence of this type of Fu and adapt and compress it into the shi more purely poetic form.

Influence

Hailed as the progenitor of the Chinese landscape poetry genre (shanshui poetry), the reputation of Xie Lingyun as a great poet remains secure, as it has for over a thousand years. The Wangchuan ji by Wang Wei and Pei Di which describes the landscape features of Wang's estate near Chang'an particularly shows the influence of Xie Lingyun's poetry describing the landscape features of his estate near West Lake.