從19 世紀後半葉一直到20 世紀初，中國歷經了鴉片戰爭、甲午戰爭到八國聯軍等一連串面臨存亡的戰亂，當時的知識分子一方面努力對抗西方，同時也想辦法學習西方；而1895 年對日戰爭的失敗，更轉變了中國人對日本的看法，尤其是對於明治維新後的日本強烈嚮往，1898 年後變法失敗逃到日本的康梁及其追隨者，更以日本做為救亡圖存的啟蒙聖地。而在這頁中日交流史中，黃遵憲堪為重要前鋒。1877 年黃遵憲隨何如璋出使日本，1879 年至1887 年間，不但出版且重印了《日本雜事詩》，同時也完成《日本國志》，可以說是當時最熟悉日本的晚清知識分子。除了介紹日本史料與各種近代知識，黃遵憲還是梁啟超口中「詩界革命」的第一人。如何以舊體詩面對新世界與新事物，黃遵憲有最深刻的體驗與表現。而同時在日本漢詩壇足為領導者的森春濤，則於黃遵憲使日之前即編輯有《東京才人絕句》，並主編每月出刊的漢詩文雜誌—《新文詩》，同樣面對維新後的西洋學術、觀念、語詞的傳入，黃遵憲與森春濤兩人及其週遭友人如何透過漢詩「遇見」西方所謂「文明開化」的風潮，尤其是當時的「博覽會」經驗面對漢詩所代表的「博物知識」，如何在新舊語詞的挪借或錯置中，如何在新舊思想框架的類比與協調中，成為舊傳統與新知識彼此交流與對談的場域，這應該是討論世紀之交文化越界與回應或抗拒的極佳事例。

From the second half of the nineteenth century through the beginning of the twentieth, as China experienced a series of struggles for its survival, from the Opium Wars to the Sino-JapaneseWar, the Eight-Nation Alliance and others, the intellectuals of the time at once energetically resisted theWest, yet at the same time found ways to study it. In 1895, upon the defeat of China by Japan, the Chinese view of Japan changed dramatically. Post – Meiji Restoration Japan became the object of strong yearning, and after the failure of the Hundred Days’ Reform in 1898, for those who fled to Japan such as Kang Liang and his followers, Japan truly became the shrine of enlightenment. In this historical moment of Sino-Japanese exchange, Huang Zunxian was an important vanguard. In 1877, Huang Zunxian accompanied He Ruzhang on a diplomatic mission to Japan, and between 1879 and 1887, he published and reprinted his collection Poems on Miscellaneous Events in Japan, completed his Treatises on Japan, and among late Qing intellectuals he could be considered the most knowledgeable about Japan. In addition to providing an introduction to Japanese historical materials and all areas of contemporary knowledge, Huang Zunxian also was the first representative of Liang Qichao’s “Poetry revolution.” He was the most experienced in employing old-style poetry to confront the new world and new events. Meanwhile, prior to Huang Zunxian’s envoy to Japan, the leader of the kanshi forum, Mori Syunto, had edited Tokyo Talents Quatrain Collection, and had also edited a monthly kanshi literary journal, Shinbunshi, that similarly confronted the post-Restoration importation of Western ideas, academics, and lexicon. Huang Zunxian, Mori Syunto, and their cohort of friends formed a space in which to “meet” the tide of the West’s so-called “opening of civilization” though Chinese-style poetry, and especially to confront the “Correlative Thinking” that Chinese-style poetry represented in the experience of the period’s World Exposition. In so doing, in the midst of provisional borrowing and re-situating from among new and old phraseology; in the midst of analogizing and harmonizing the new and the old theoretical frameworks, they constructed a place of exchange and dialogue between the old tradition and the new knowledge. Indeed, they stand as a fine example of the discussion at the edge of the century on whether to answer or defy the cultural border crossing.