Manifisto posted:your post in general is fascinating, and each new translation seems to add something and take something away (in terms of how I view the poem). This is an extremely good reading of the poem. Thanks. I particularly like the point that she's still waiting for him before she will "commit." She wants a sign. I'm more inclined to read that as pathetic, in that her expectations have shrunken to the point that all she's hoping for is a letter from her husband. The title of Pound's translation is tricky because it moves the occasion of the poem from being something the girl is thinking or saying in apostrophe to something she's directly communicating to her husband (albeit tenuously and at a distance). Li Po's poems were generally meant to be sung so the most natural "poetic housing" (a term I'm borrowing from the poet Tony Hoagland) is that it's a song, not that it's a letter. The reason I mention this is I think it makes pathos a more likely tone; this is a pop song, in a way. The spiritual metaphor seems like a reasonable inference to me; it's a common enough trope in poetry of many cultures. A note about "look-for-husband terrace." One of the things that I'm learning about Li Po is that apparently he was a major sampler/aggregator. His poems are full of allusions, but in addition, he would outright snatch lines from popular songs, history books he happened to be reading, whatever. Apparently, he has poems that are almost entirely assembled from phrases and lines taken from other poems. In this case, Look-For-Husband-Tower, according to Waley, is a reference to a story in which a woman climbed a tower to wait for her husband to return and waited so long that she turned to stone. The bridge line which precedes it in Waley's version only is, again according to Waley, a reference to a similar story where a man waited at a bridge for his wife during a storm, and he drowned because the river rose and he wouldn't stop waiting for her. Waley argues that translators of Li Po's poetry often mistranslated these allusions, thinking that they were general terms rather than specific references: check the way the other translators handle the tower/terrace/look out line in their poems. cda fucked around with this message at 00:02 on Dec 10, 2017 ---------------- |
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hey, thanks for the kind words.cda posted:The spiritual metaphor seems like a reasonable inference to me; it's a common enough trope in poetry of many cultures. yeah. it sort of puts me in mind of donne's "batter my heart, three person'd god," which is pretty creepy on a certain level but is undoubtedly a genuine assertion of frustrated desire for spiritual unity. cda posted:Li Po's poems were generally meant to be sung so the most natural "poetic housing" (a term I'm borrowing from the poet Tony Hoagland) is that it's a song, not that it's a letter. The reason I mention this is I think it makes pathos a more likely tone; this is a pop song, in a way. it's really interesting you say this. I was actually thinking how the poem seems to share various themes with this song: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wx9L5z6WdXs like the poem, it features a female narrator who desires closeness with a lover but is "sitting here, waiting for you to come in." it deals with the tension between approach ("getting so close") and arrival / unity ("you're mine"), and the singer asks for something analogous to the "letter" in the poem: "tell me something, anything would be fine / just give me a sign." and I think there's a similar unsettling ambiguity about whether the narrator is in fact close to or distant from what she thinks she wants, which she describes in possessive terms: "in time, you're mine." as opposed to some other way of thinking about it. I'm not arguing that a spiritual metaphor is intended in the song, but I guess I'm not not saying that either. it's pretty hard to tell sometimes. however obviously a modern rock song is pretty distinct from a literary poem (even a sung poem), and doesn't necessarily share the complexity of allusion, tradition, and wordplay (although the reflexivity of the line "eyes look tired" is pretty clever and poetic imo*). on the other hand, I would say the "musical" component of a song is experiential in its own right, and sort of undermines language from a different direction. a sung word is a note as much as it is a word. *e: also, whether intentionally or not, it's an interesting example of a hintonian subjectless statement. it doesn't say whose eyes look tired. tangentially: imo the darling buds were criminally underrated, and their "erotica" is a masterpiece of a concept album. I'm beyond happy they released a new ep this year after a decades-long hiatus. but that's pretty far afield from chinese poetry! cda posted:A note about "look-for-husband terrace." One of the things that I'm learning about Li Po is that apparently he was a major sampler/aggregator. His poems are full of allusions, but in addition, he would outright snatch lines from popular songs, history books he happened to be reading, whatever. Apparently, he has poems that are almost entirely assembled from phrases and lines taken from other poems. In this case, Look-For-Husband-Tower, according to Waley, is a reference to a story in which a woman climbed a tower to wait for her husband to return and waited so long that she turned to stone. The bridge line which precedes it in Waley's version only is, again according to Waley, a reference to a similar story where a man waited at a bridge for his wife during a storm, and he drowned because the river rose and he wouldn't stop waiting for her. Waley argues that translators of Li Po's poetry often mistranslated these allusions, thinking that they were general terms rather than specific references: check the way the other translators handle the tower/terrace/look out line in their poems. ah, both of those explanations help in understanding the lines. so the narrator conceptually exchanged one tale for another pretty similar tale. I'm sure both tales had a fairly well-established allegorical interpretation. Manifisto fucked around with this message at 03:33 on Dec 10, 2017
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Dec 10, 2017 02:39
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Let's talk about regulated verse for a bit. I already mentioned it when I was talking about Li Po. Regulated verse dominated the Chinese literary world during the Tang, to the point that being able to write it became essentially a requirement for being a gentleman. Regulated verse was used during the Tang and in some subsequent dynasties as the basis of literary examinations which were, by far, the most prestigious form of examination a person could undergo in order to prove his worth to the government. J.P. Seaton writes: quote:While even lovers of Chinese poetry might be tempted to erupt in howls of derision at the thought of a high government position being granted to the best writers of greeting-card verses or “silly love songs,” in fact absolute technical perfection in the execution of the formal rules of versification was only the slightest of the demands of the examination poem. The topic of the poem generally required that thte examination candidate demonstrate perfect memorization of Confucian Classics, later historical and poetic works, and scholarly commentaries on all of them, as well as mastery of rhetoric and character etymology. An examination poem must “seem” like a silly love song while permitting a deep reading in which the “poet” candidate shows diplomatic skills in the presentation of delicate policy issues. Simply because we don’t have the resources to tie the poems to their topical issues, most examination poems from the T’ang are untranslatable. Since we spent some time discussing koans and their relation to Chinese poetry, I’d just like to point out both how similar in form this kind of examination is to “passing” a koan in Rinzai Zen, and how totally different in purpose. You could almost see the koan curriculum as a deliberate parody of this sort of literary examination. Seaton tells us that regulated verse was “invented” by a 5th century “Buddhist-inspired scholar-official” named Shen Yueh who was looking for a way of capturing, in Chinese, the supernaturally powerful Sanskrit mantras he studied as a Buddhist devotee. Yueh’s work focused on the magical power of the sounds in the mantras independent of their meaning, and this led him to consider the tonal qualities of the Chinese language and to formulate a theory of euphony based on those tonalities. This theory of euphony was superimposed on the already existing “Old Style” poetry form to create regulated verse. What this means for me, and probably for you, is that it’s actually impossible to appreciate the complexity of regulated verse because it means not only knowing how to read the Chinese, but also how to hear the sounds in Chinese, and, just as a native Chinese speaker might struggle to hear the difference between the L and R sounds in English, a native English speaker will miss all kinds of nuances of Chinese pronunciation. Compounding the difficulty: modern Chinese and classical Chinese utilize different tonalities. This is analogous to, but more complex than, what happened in English where certain words that used to rhyme no longer do (i.e. “good” and “food”). So the most important feature of regulated verse is one I can’t describe or show to you, and it’s a feature which is completely untranslatable in our language (much like the long and short syllables employed in ancient Greek). And that means that English-language translators haven’t even tried to capture that aspect of regulated verse. What’s more interesting is that they often don’t try to capture any of the other aspects either. The following features are common to typical poems in both old style and regulated verse. 1. They have five syllables per line. 2. They rhyme. 3. They have four couplets. 4. The second couplet and the third couplet are made of two grammatically and semantically parallel lines. The translator David Hawkes has done some really awesome exegeses of the poems of Tu Fu (except he uses Pinyin so he calls him Du Fu) which I’m basically going to steal here. Let’s look at how Hawkes presents a poem called Yue Ye (“Moonlit Night). Hawkes starts with the Chinese: Jinye Fuzhou yue Guizhong zhi du kan. Yoa lian xiao ernu, Wei jie yi Chang’an. Xiang wu yunhuan shi, Quing hui yubi han. Heshi yi xu huang, Shuang zhao leihen gan? As a note that demonstrates the difficulty of “hearing” regulated verse to someone not familiar with classical Chinese, Hawkes notes that, while in classical Chinese, “kan,” “Chang’an” “han” and “gan” are all “level-tone syllables,” in modern Chinese, “kan” and “han” are not, and so would not be considered rhymes (one of the rules of euphony in regulated verse is that all the rhymes must come on level-tone syllables). I this case our unfamiliarity with Chinese tonality actually makes it easier to “hear” the rhymes. Hawkes then provides a literal translation with explanation: To-night Fuzhou moon My-wife can-only alone watch Guizhong, literally “in the women’s apartments,” is a synonym for “wife.” According to the traditional Chinese way of thinking, a wife is the “person inside.”[cda’s note this reading of the metonymy is disputed. Check how it’s handled in the different translations] Distant sorry-for little sons-daughters Not-yet understand remember Chang’an Chang’an: used by metonymy for Du Fu himself: “me in Chang’an” Fragrant mists cloud-hair wet Clear light jade-arms cold Xiang wu: “fragrant mist” is, of course, a poetic conceit. It is the woman’s hair which is fragrant and which imparts some of its fragrance to the mist. Yun “cloudlike” and yu “jadelike” are stock epithets for women’s hair and arms. Notice the parallelism in this couplet: “fragrant mist” parallels “clear light,” “cloud hair” parallels “jade arms,” and “wet” parallels “cold.” What-time lean empty curtain Double-shine tear-marks dry Yi xu huang, literally “lean at the empty curtain,” presumably means lean on the open casement from which the curtains have been drawn back. The shuang zhao of line 8 contrasts with the du kan of line 2. The picture which this last couplet is meant to convey is of Du Fu and his wife leaning side by side at the open window and gazing up at the moon while the tears of happiness slowly dry on their cheeks. Note that in this poem the second couplet is not in parallel lines. Hawkes writes “one has at once to observe that great poets do not always bother about the rules quite so much as their admirers and imitators; and this poem is in fact a rare exception to the general Rule of Parallelism.” Hawkes’ prose translation: “Tonight in Fuzhou my wife will be watching this moon alone. I think with tenderness of my far-away little ones, too young to understand about their father in Chang’an. My wife’s soft hair must be wet from the scented night-mist, and her white arms chilled by the cold moonlight. When shall we lean on the open casement together and gaze at the moon until the tears on our cheeks are dry?” Here’s J.P Seaton’s translation: Moonlight Night Moon of this night, in Fu-Chou, alone in your chamber you gaze. Here, far away, I think of the children, too young to remember Longpeace… Fragrant mist, moist cloud of your hair. In that clear light, your arms jade cool. When, again to lean together, by your curtain there, alight alike, until our tears have dried. Here’s Vikram Seth Moonlit Night In Fuzhou, far away, my wife is watching The moon alone tonight, and my thoughts fill With sadness for my children, who can’t think Of me here in Changan: they’re too young still. Her cloud-soft hair is moist with fragrant mist. In the clear light her white arms sense the chill. When will we feel the moonlight dry our tears, Leaning together on the windowsill. And Burton Watson: Moonlit Night (Poem 20) From her room in Fuzhou tonight, all alone she watches the moon. Far away, I grieve that her children can’t understand why she thinks of Chang’an. Fragrant mist in her cloud hair damp, clear lucence on her jade arms cold – when will we lean by the chamber curtains and let it light the two of us, our tear stains dried? And David Young: Moonlight Night Tonight in this same moonlight my wife is alone at her window in Fuzhou I can hardly bear to think of my children too young to understand why I can’t come to them her hair must be damp from the mist her arms cold jade in the moonlight when will we stand together by those slack curtains while the moonlight dries the tear-streaks on our faces? cda fucked around with this message at 23:34 on Dec 15, 2017 ---------------- |
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Dec 15, 2017 23:30
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Wang the Zealot is a name associated with a large body of poems in Tang vernacular poetry. Nobody knows who this guy was, or if it was really a single guy or just a name used to write poems of this kind. "The Zealot" isn't a nickname, it's a title, a Chinese equivalent of the Sanskrit brahmacarin which indicates a lay Buddhist practitioner. Bumping on an rear end Other people ride great big horses I'm the only one bumping on an rear end But look! back there -- I feel a little better A pack of dry sticks riding on a man Get Blind Drunk All of us receive an empty body All of us take the universe's breath We die and still must live again come back to each all recollection lost Ai! no more than this? Think hard about it All things turn stale and flat on the tongue It comforts people? No Better now and again to get blind drunk on the floor alone The Ghosts Clap Hands Hundred-year men? None in the world But we slave to make thousand-year songs beating out iron to bar out death Seeing, the ghosts clap hands and laugh (C.H. Kwock and Vincent McHugh trans.) ---------------- |
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Dec 15, 2017 23:40
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And here's something completely different that's not classical Chinese poetry. It's older than that. In writing about this stuff I've become interested in how relational classical Chinese poetry seems to be: the regulated verse being used for literary exams, the linked-verse word-games, the grammatically parallel couplets and so on. In the West, most of our literature, even the lyric poems, could start with: "let me tell you a story" or "once upon a time." In Chinese literature, so much of it seems to start with an invitation, a question, or an examination (Chinese poems also, frequently, end with a question as well). Heavenly Questions is a questionnaire from the 2nd century B.C.E. It begins with questions about the sky but then moves to questions about the earth and then about mythology and ancient kings. David Hawkes, who is the translator of what I'm presenting here, believes it was written by Qu Yuan, and quotes the 2nd century C.E. commentator Wang Yi on its creation: Wang Yi posted:Qu Yuan wandered about in great distress of mind through mountains, marshes, and plains, lifting up his eyes and crying out to heaven as he went. Sometimes, exhausted by his wanderings, he would sink down to rest under the walls of the ancestral temples of former kings and ministers of the southern kingdom of Chu. Looking up and observing the pictures with which the walls were covered -- pictures representing the mysteries of heaven and earth and the acts of men of old, both wise and wicked -- he would write these questions on the walls "to ease his mind." After his death the people of Chu felt sorry for him, so they copied down and collected together what he had written. That is why the questions often appear in the wrong order. The result is something strange and pretty compelling, I think. The idea of telling a story entirely through questions is one that I think a good modern writer could exploit to great effect. The only other places I can think of seeing this device are in Ted Hughes' poem Examination at the Womb Door and in the Book of Job when God speaks out of the whirlwind (the early part of Heavenly Questions would fit right in Job, I think) Heavenly Questions 1. Who passed down the story of the far-off, ancient beginning of things? How can we be sure what it was like before the sky above and the earth below had taken shape? Since none could penetrate that murk when darkness and light were yet undivided, how do we know about the chaos of insubstantial forms? 2. What manner of things are the darkness and the light? How did Yin and Yang come together, and how could they originate and transform all things that are by their commingling? 3. Whose compass measured out the ninefold heavens? Whose work was this, and how did he accomplish it? Where were the circling cords fastened, and where was the sky's pole fixed? Where did the Eight Pillers meet the sky, and why were they too short for it in the southeast? 4. Where do the nine fields of heaven extend to and where do they join each other? The ins and outs of their edges must be very many: who knows their number? 5. How does heaven coordinate its motions? Where are there Twelve Houses divided? How do the sun and moon hold to their courses and the fixed stars keep to their places? 6. Setting out from the Gulf of Brightness and going to rest in the Vale of Murk, from the dawn until the time of darkness, how many miles is the journey? 7. What is the peculiar virtue of the moon, the Brightness of the Night, which causes it to grow once more after its death? Of what advantage is it to keep a toad in its belly? 8. How did the Mother Star get to her nine children without a union? Where is Lord Bluster, the Wind Star, and where does the warm wind live? 9. What is it whose closing causes the dark and whose opening causes the light? Where does the Bright God hide before the Horn proclaims the dawning of the day? 10. If Gun was not fit to allay the flood, why was he given this charge? All said, "Never fear! Try him out and see if he can do it." When the bird-turtles linked together, how did Gun follow their sign? And if he accomplished the work according to his will, why did the high lord punish him? Long he lay cast off on Feather Mountain: why for three whole years did he not rot? When Lord Gun brought forth Yu from his belly, how was he transformed? Yu inherited the same tradition and carried on the work of his father. If he continued the work already begun, in what way was his plan a different one? How did he fill the flood waters up where they were most deep? How did he set bound to the Nine Lands? What did the winged dragon trace on the ground? Where did the seas and rivers flow? 11. What did Gun plan and what did Yu accomplish? Why, when the Wicked One was enraged, did the earth sink down toward the southeast? Why are the lands of the earth dry and the river valleys wet? They flow eastwards without ever getting exhausted: who knows the cause of this? What are the distances from east to west and from south to north? From nor to south the earth is longer and narrower. What is the difference between its length and its breadth? Where is Kunlun with its Hanging Garden? How many miles high are its ninefold walls? Who goes through the gates in its four sides? When the northeast one opens, what wind is it that passes through? What land does the sun not shine on and how does the Torch Dragon light it? Why are the Ruo flowers bright before Xi He is stirring? What place is warm in winter? What place is cold in summer? Where is the stone forest? What beast can talk? Where are the hornless dragons which carry bears on their backs for sport? Where is the great serpent with nine heads and where is the Shu Hu? Where is it that people do not age? Where do giants live? Where is the nine-branched weed? Where is the flower of the Great Hemp? How does the snake that can swallow an elephant digest its bones? Where is the Black Water that dyes the feet, and where is the Mountain of Three Perils? The folk there put death off for many years: what is the limit of their age? Where does the man-fish live? Where is the Monster Bird? 12. When Lord Yi shot down the suns, why did the ravens shed their feathers? 13. Yu labored with all his might. He came down and looked on the earth below. How did he get that maid of Tushan and lie with her in Taisang? The lady became his made and her body had issue. How came they to have appetite for the same dish when they sated their hunger with the morning food of love? 14. Who build the ten-storeyed tower of jade? Who foresaw it all in the beginning, when the first signs appeared? 15. By what law was Nu Wa raised up to become high lord? By what means did she fasion the different creatures? 16. King Mu was a breeder of horses. For what reason did he roam about? What was he looking for when he made his circuit of the earth? 17. When the witches were tied up together, what was it that was crying in the marketplace? Whom was You of Zhou punishing when he got that Bao Si? 18. King Millet was his firstborn: why did the high lord treat him so cruelly? When he was left out on the ice, how did the bird keep him warm? Drawing his bow to the full and grasping the arrrow, how did he become a war-leader? After giving the high lord so great a shock, how did he come to have a glorious future? ---------------- |
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Dec 16, 2017 00:13
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Pengya Road Du Fu I remember when we fled the rebels heading north through danger and hardship starting out on foot in the middle of the night with the moon shining over White Water Mountain a very long journey all of it walking no one was headed in the opposite direction my silly little daughter bit me in her hunger afraid that her crying might attract tigers I held her mouth against my chest she wriggled free and cried louder my son kept trying to eat the green plums on the roadside trees ten days we went, half that time through thunderstorms struggling to help each other in the mud with no protection from the rain the road was too slippery our clothes were too thin some days we couldn’t cover more than a couple of miles our food was wild berries our shelter was low branches mornings we crossed wet, slippery rocks evenings we camped in mist at the sky’s edge my friend Sun Zai took us in his generosity reaches to the clouds we arrived in pitch‐dark they lit the lamps, opened the gates the servants brought warm water to bathe our feet they cut silhouettes and burned them to call back our frightened spirits when they saw how we looked they burst into tears my children, exhausted had fallen asleep (David Young) that's a god drat good poem ---------------- |
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Dec 16, 2017 00:35
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bumping on an rear end by lil wang |
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Dec 16, 2017 02:47
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cda posted:An examination poem must “seem” like a silly love song while permitting a deep reading in which the “poet” candidate shows diplomatic skills in the presentation of delicate policy issues. that's really neat. although it's a pity if this aspect of the genre is largely inaccessible to contemporary readers. are there at least some examples where the "deep reading" aspect is partially understood? cda posted:So the most important feature of regulated verse is one I can’t describe or show to you, and it’s a feature which is completely untranslatable in our language (much like the long and short syllables employed in ancient Greek). yeah, that's a pretty daunting task for a translator. when you can't convey either the "deep reading" aspect of the piece (because you simply don't know it) or the signature formal aspects of the material, you're really sort of stuck conveying the "greeting-card" level of meaning. which is I guess why it may be hard to appreciate the poetry in translation without a fairly substantial amount of context. it's sort of like someone reading an abridged version of shakespeare, and going "I don't really see the big deal"
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Dec 16, 2017 02:57
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Manifisto posted:yeah, that's a pretty daunting task for a translator. when you can't convey either the "deep reading" aspect of the piece (because you simply don't know it) or the signature formal aspects of the material, you're really sort of stuck conveying the "greeting-card" level of meaning. which is I guess why it may be hard to appreciate the poetry in translation without a fairly substantial amount of context. There's a "bad quarto" version of Hamlet, which as far as anyone can tell is basically a 17th c. bootleg of a performance, where some dude was sitting in the audience with a notebook trying to write as fast as he could while the play was being performed. The beginning of "To be or not to be" is: To be, or not to be, aye, there's the point, To die, to sleep, is that all? Aye, all: No, to sleep, to dream, aye, marry, there it goes. |
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Dec 16, 2017 03:46
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Gone Fashing posted:bumping on an rear end by lil wang |
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Dec 16, 2017 03:47
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cda posted:Wang the Zealot is a name associated with a large body of poems in Tang vernacular poetry. Nobody knows who this guy was, or if it was really a single guy or just a name used to write poems of this kind. "The Zealot" isn't a nickname, it's a title, a Chinese equivalent of the Sanskrit brahmacarin which indicates a lay Buddhist practitioner. I like these. What little I know about this topic comes completely from this thread. Thanks for that, cda!
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Dec 16, 2017 04:07
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This thread is challenging
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Dec 16, 2017 13:44
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Some historical context is probably helpful for understanding the culture that produced these poems, in part because it may illuminate why they became some important in the 19th and 20th centuries among Western, and particularly American, writers. For the purposes of classical Chinese literary context, the Zhou Dynasty (1050-256 B.C.E.) is a pivotal period, particularly the second half, which is broken into two periods known as “The Spring and Autumn” period (~770-475 B.C.E.) and the “Warring States” period. The “Spring and Autumn” period is particularly important. Its name itself is derived from a book, The Spring and Autumn Annals which chronicled the main events of the state of Lu during the period. The Annals are traditionally ascribed to Confucius, who lived during the latter part of this period (551-479 B.C.E.). “The Spring and Autumn” period is coincident with the “Contention of 100 Schools of Thought” (~600-221 B.C.E.), a flourishing of Chinese philosophy. It was during this period that the major movements which were to shape China – and much of East Asia - for the next two and a half millennia were developed: Confucianism and Taoism. On a basic and obvious level, the works produced by Confucius, Laozi, and their followers were formative for later Chinese literature because Chinese poets were largely of a class who would be expected to study these philosophies extensively and be intimately familiar with their foundational texts. But beyond this, some of the foundational texts were poetry or poetic in nature. Three of the works of this period, the Confucian Book of Songs and the Taoist Dao De Jing and I Ching provided examples not just of poetic thought, but of poetic practice. Chronologically earlier than either of the other two works is the I Ching, “The Book of Changes.” I wish I could say more about this, but it’s just about the most perplexing written work I’ve ever tried to understand and I just Really Don’t Get It. I understand its usage as an oracular system: you have 6 sticks, either broken or whole (“hexagrams”), arranged in two groups of three (“trigrams”). This means there are 64 possible hexagrams. The hexagrams are accompanied by an explanation by the supposed originator of the system, King Wen (~1100s B.C.E.), and then an explanation of what each line of the hexagram means, by the Duke of Zhou (also ~1100s B.C.E.). “Explanation” is a very generous term for what are exceedingly cryptic statements. Both Confucius and Laozi were evidently influenced by the I Ching – Confucius produced a commentary on it called “Ten Wings” – and it is still an important part of Chinese culture today. I am simply taking it on the report of actual scholars that the I Ching was influential in classical Chinese poetry – evidently much of the imagery it uses became standard tools in the Chinese poetic toolbox – but it’s so confusing to me that I can’t really substantiate that claim through anything that resembles understanding. Anyone who knows anything about the I Ching is invited to tell me about it. Moving on… The Book of Songs is one of the “Five Classics” -- texts traditionally ascribed to Confucius – and it’s the most directly poetic of the three: it is China’s earliest extant anthology of Chinese poetry, comprising 305 poems dating from between the 11th and 7th centuries B.C.E. and then compiled by Confucius or his disciples. As with most early anthologic works, the texts are taken largely from the oral tradition, so both dates of composition and authors are unknown or not given, and the versions in the book may represent only one of many available versions of the same basic song. The 305 works are divided into four categories: 1-160: Folk songs representing fifteen distinct geographical areas of China. 161-234: “Minor odes,” which share some characteristics of the folk songs, but also “occasional” poems performed for specific social occasions such as banquets and feasts. 235-265: “Major odes,” songs which are broader and more lofty in theme than the minor odes, includes poems extolling heroism and historical poems which paint a picture of the early Zhou dynasty. 266-305: Zhou, Lu, and Shang hymns for religious rituals of ancestor worship. While the poems cover a huge range of subject matter, Confucius claimed that the one thing that tied them together was that they expressed “no depraved thoughts.” The purpose of the Book of Songs was moral improvement through cultural appreciation, not simply aesthetic beauty or historical representativeness (though both of those were clearly present as well). The Dao De Jing, or “The Way and Its Power,” is also, probably, an anthology. It consists of 81 ancient maxims attributed to the mystic philosopher Laozi, who was reputedly a contemporary of Confucius. It is likely that the maxims themselves go back farther than Laozi, although his particular expressions of them may not. In addition to the maxims, there are interspersed commentaries on them in both prose and poetry. The maxims often rhyme, and the verse, Burton Watson says, “highly formal and parallelistic,” so we can see in the Dao De Jing how long the development of structural parallelism and antithesis was in Chinese classical literature. The “Warring States” period which followed the “Spring and Autumn”’ period saw the breaking up of the Zhou empire into seven major warring states, one of which, Qin would eventually emerge as the next dynasty after 250 years (!!) of conflict. The early part of the Qin Dynasty included a series of events that the Han dynasty historian Sima Qian, writing 100 years after the fact, dubbed “the burning of books and burying of scholars.” In 213 B.C.E. an edict was released that all books written prior to the Qin dynasty, particularly those of poetry, history (other than earlier histories of Qin) and philosophy, be burned to consolidate the cultural power of the Qin. In 210, 460 Confucian scholars were supposedly buried alive. While the exact specifics of this censorship are disputed (remember, Qian was writing a hundred years later, during the successor dynasty to the Qin, the Han), the basic outlines seem accurate. Under the totalitarian Qin dynasty, the writings of the Zhou were suppressed. The Qin dynasty is a kind of break from the cultural and literary traditions of China as a whole, and it is why most literary surveys start with the writings of the next dynasty, the Han Dynasty(206 B.C.E.-220 C.E.). ---------------- |
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Dec 17, 2017 02:44
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Robot Made of Meat posted:I like these. Yeah, they're really good, right? There's more zen poetry coming! ---------------- |
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Dec 17, 2017 02:46
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blaise rascal posted:This thread is challenging Lemme know if there's anything I can do to make it easier! If you just ignore my ramblings and read the poems, that's probably the best way to read it anyway. ---------------- |
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Dec 17, 2017 02:48
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Manifisto posted:that's really neat. although it's a pity if this aspect of the genre is largely inaccessible to contemporary readers. are there at least some examples where the "deep reading" aspect is partially understood? I have no idea! There aren't any examples in the books I own, but there's poo poo tons of books I don't own. ---------------- |
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Dec 17, 2017 02:49
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from the Book of Songs 41: Bei-feng Cold Is The North Wind Cold is the north wind, the snow falls thick. If you are kind and love me, take my hand and we'll go together. You are modest, you are slow, but oh, we must hurry! Fierce is the north wind, the snow falls fast. If you are kind and love me, take my hand and we'll go home together. You are modest, you are slow, but oh, we must hurry! Nothing redder than the fox, nothing blacker than the crow. If you are kind and love me, take my hand and we'll ride together. You are modest, you are slow, but oh, we must hurry! (Burton Watson) 59: Zhu-gan This Rod As soon could this rod Catch my native fish, As my homesick heart Have its secret wish! Where the brook meanders, Where the river trends, When I left these to marry, I lost my friends! The familiar river, The well-known brook, Where, in laughing girlhood, My walks I took! On that flowing river In my little boat, Where I, sailing, discovered Grief's antidote! ("V.W.X" - the pen name of an author who has never been identified, who published his (?) translations in the 1870s) 113: Shi-shu Rats RATS, stone-head rats lay off our grain, three years pain, enough, enough, plus enough again. More than enough from you, deaf you, we're about thru and ready to go where something will grow untaxed. Good earth, good sown, and come into our own. RATS, big rats, lay off our wheat, three years deceit, and now we're about ready to go to Lo Kuo, happy, happy land, Lo Kuo, good earth where we can earn our worth. RATS, stone-head rats, spare our new shoots, three years, no pay. We're about ready to move away to some decent border town. Good earth, good sown, and make an end to this endless moan. (Ezra Pound) 206: Wu-jiang da-hu Don't Walk Beside the Big Carriage Don't walk beside the big carriage, you'll only get yourself dusty. Don't brood on a hundred worries, you'll only make yourself sick. Don't walk beside the big carriage, the dust will blacken and blind you. Don't brood on a hundred worries, you'll never reach a brighter land. Don't walk beside the big carriage, the dust will swallow you up. Don't brood on a hundred worries, you'll only weigh yourself down. (Burton Watson) ---------------- |
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Dec 17, 2017 03:05
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The Fountain of Old Poems was another anthology of poetry from early Chinese history. The provenance of the poems is not known. They were compiled in the 18th century by Shen Deqian and translated by James Legge. From The Fountain of Old Poems Song of the Peasants at the Time of Yao We rise at sunrise, We rest at sunset, Dig wells and drink, Till our field and eat -- What is the strength of the emperor to us? Yao's Warning Be tremblingly fearful; Be careful night and day. Men trip not on mountains; They trip on anthills. Inscription on a Bathing Vessel Than to sink among men, It is better to sink in the deep. He who sinks in the deep May betake himself to swimming. For him who sinks among men There is no salvation. ---------------- |
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Dec 17, 2017 03:10
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From I Ching  (hexagrams are read from bottom to top) 52: Gen Gen/Keeping Still, Mountain King Wen's Explanation of the Figure Keeping still. Keeping his back still So that he no longer feels his body. He goes into his courtyard and does not see his people. No blame. Explanation of the separate lines by the Duke of Zhou The Image Mountains standing close together: The image of keeping still. Thus the superior man Does not permit his thoughts To go beyond his situation. The Lines Six at the beginning means: Keeping his toes still. No blame. Continued perseverance furthers. Six in the second place means: Keeping his calves still. He cannot rescue him whom he follows. His heart is not glad. Nine in the third place means: Keeping his hips still. Making his sacrum stiff. Dangerous. The heart suffocates. Six in the fourth place means: Keeping his trunk still. No blame. Six in the fifth place means: Keeping his jaws still. The words have order. Remorse disappears. Nine at the top means: Noblehearted keeping still. Good fortune. (Translated into German by Richard Wilhelm. English version by Cary F. Baynes) ---------------- |
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Dec 17, 2017 03:19
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from Dao De Jing Chapter 9 Stretch a bow to the very full, And you will wish you had stopped in time; Temper a sword-edge to its very sharpest, And you will find it soon grows dull. When bronze and jade fill your hall It can no longer be guarded. Wealth and place breed insolence That brings ruin in its train. When your work is done, then withdraw! Such is Heaven's Way. (Arthur Waley) ---------------- |
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Dec 17, 2017 03:21
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Lazy Man's Song Po Chu-i (Bo Juyi) I could have a job, but I am too lazy to choose it. I have got land, but I am too lazy to farm it. My house leaks; I am too lazy to mend it. My clothes are torn; I am too lazy to darn them. I have got wine, but I am too lazy to drink; So it's just the same as if my cup were empty. I have got a lute, but am too lazy to play; So it's just the same as if it had no strings. My family tells me there is no more steamed rice; I want to cook, but am too lazy to grind. My friends and relatives write me long letters; I should like to read them, but they're such a bother to open. I have always been told that Xi Shuye Passed his whole life in absolute idleness. But he played his lute and sometimes worked at his forge; So even he was not as lazy as I. (Arthur Waley) ---------------- |
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Dec 26, 2017 20:37
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Shout out to A Little Primer of Tu Fu by David Hawkes, which is a fascinating work that I already borrowed from a little further down the page; what I used already was an excerpt from an anthology of Chinese literature in translation, but I have since bought the book and it's really driving home for me how different from the originals these English-language translations are. To pick the very most obvious difference: the poems rhyme in Chinese, and follow a regular syllabic pattern, whereas English-language translations, however "faithful" they may be to the meaning, tend to not even attempt the regularity of the meter and rhyme. Considering that the great majority of classical Chinese poems were either: 1) meant to be sung along to pre-existing songs 2) meant to be sung/recited to new songs in pre-existing styles 3) meant to be understood as references to ancient song-forms even if they weren't meant to be sung to any particular song this is not a minor difference. For comparison, think about some of our most song-like poems. Dr. Seuss comes to mind. I ran the beginning of the Lorax through Google Translate from English to Chinese and then back, and this -- with some minor edits to re-introduce articles, conjunctions and forms of the verb "to be" which get stripped out in Chinese, and to fix the untranslatable "lifted Lorax" -- is what you get: At the end of the town, The Grickle-grass growing place, Where, when the wind blows, the flavor is slowly sour, And there are no birds except the old crows, Is the lifted Lorax's street. Some people say that in the depths of Grickle-grass, If you look deep enough, you can still see today, The Lorax once stood there As long as possible Before someone raised the Lorax. I think it's interesting how much of the mood and tone manages to be preserved, but the rhyme and rhythm are gone, and that produces a very different Dr. Seuss than the one we're used to in English. In particular, something playful has been lost, a sense that even when conveying difficult truths, the pleasures of language remain a constant source of renewal. It appears to me that the challenges of translation, and an appeal to the "authenticity" of non-metrical and non-rhyming translations (because they could claim greater fidelity to the meanings of the words) was a useful cover for poets and writers in the early 20th century who were trying to break away from the ossifying accentual-syllabic rhyming poetry which typified so much of the Victorian era. Pound's Chinese translations, beyond allowing him to justify his aesthetic by reference to a well-established philosophical and literary tradition, also allowed him to justify his technical choices on a grounds other than technique: we have to do it this way because to do otherwise would be translational malpractice. The modernists didn't necessarily want to rhyme or to use regular meters rather than rhythms drawn from everyday speech, but to be unable to do so in English would have been seen as a sign of incompetence; to do so in a translation from the Chinese would be seen as acceptable, and if the result was an incontrovertibly good poem in English, it could be used to prove that the structures weren't necessary in the first place. It may not be possible to capture the "true flavor" of the Chinese in translation; certainly, I don't know of any contemporary poets other than Vikram Seth who have even tried, but it's kind of fun to imagine what it might be like if the basic strictures of regulated verse were given an English structural basis. Regulated verse was typically pentasyllabic, so I think the natural English analogue would be iambic pentameter. It was arranged in four couplets which rhymed with each other in the teleuton of the second line (ab cb db eb). The second and third couplets contained lines which were syntactically parallel. Du Fu, who was a master of this style, often used to it comment either directly or obliquely on political events he witnessed during a turbulent period of the Tang dynasty when he was living in the capital city of Chang'an (which was taken over by rebel forces during the An Lushan rebellion). The following represents my attempt to write a poem in the style of Du Fu from an English-language perspective. I live near our nation's capital, so I decided to write about a fairly common occurrence around these parts: Presidental Motorcade At midday, sirens blare and traffic stops. The motorcade emerges in the streets. Behind the tinted windows, nothing shows. Before the blowing clouds, the sun retreats. Some startled tourists fumble for their phones. The blaring birds won't stop their dull-brained tweets. Great powers roar and roll and pass away. Real life resumes, undamaged by defeats. I know...lines 5 and 6 aren't entirely syntactically parallel, but I didn't feel like spending any more time and it's pretty close. cda fucked around with this message at 16:46 on Dec 27, 2017 ---------------- |
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Dec 27, 2017 16:42
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cda posted:I know...lines 5 and 6 aren't entirely syntactically parallel
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Dec 27, 2017 18:59
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good powum
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Dec 27, 2017 18:59
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Idle Song Po Chu-i After such painstaking study of empty-gate dharma, everything life plants in the mind has dissolved away: there's nothing left now but that old poetry demon. A little wind or moon, and I'm chanting an idle song. (David Hinton) |
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Dec 31, 2017 01:13
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