treatment of her husband’s concubines, as she systematically de-
stroys them through slander and murder. When she succeeds in
turning the prince against the hapless Wangqing, he chooses to
make his feelings known through a song performance at a drinking
party. After composing his song of accusation, he then has the
concubines themselves perform it, telling them that “one of you
should recognize yourself in this.” The accused are placed in the
uncomfortable position of accusing themselves; and Zhaoxin
takes her cue from this song to intensify her campaign against
Wangqing.
The situation becomes even more bizarre with the final song
performance. The concubines have been placed under house arrest
and are only allowed out to attend banquets. This causes Prince
Qu to pity them and, in classic outburst fashion, he vents his emo-
tions through composing a song. But the song does not speak of
his emotions; it is written in the voice of the imprisoned concu-
bines. The prince himself is responsible for the suffering that he
now presumes to vent on behalf of the concubines. To add insult to
injury, he then has Zhaoxin—the direct author of the concubines’
woes—provide the musical accompaniment; the imprisoned women
are released just long enough to perform a song written by another
person purporting to convey their own feelings. The outline of
the outburst song—spontaneous poetic production occasioned
by frustration—is still visible here, but in a strangely twisted
form. None of the unity of time, person, and voice is preserved
in this ventriloquist’s act. When Prince Qu commands his concu-
bines to sing a song that he wrote for them in their own voice, he
is simulating an outburst song. He becomes the narrator of
their story, placing himself in the role of the historian who pro-
vides the text for what his protagonists must be feeling at a given
point in time. The narrators of the Han History seem benevolent
in their motives, using songs to recuperate their subjects’ noble
intentions by giving them a voice that may not have been heard
otherwise. Prince Qu’s motives, however, are more suspect. His
composition appropriates the genuine voice of his concubines,
converting it into an aesthetic object for his consumption at a
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99
drinking party. 33 His command that they perform his song to musical accompaniment further objectifies the concubines as mere ve-
hicles for an expression of emotion that does not originate in them.
Prince Qu has perverted the idea of a genuine outburst song, re-
ducing his concubines from expressive human beings to singing
automatons.
What is the strategy in all of this? Is Prince Qu exploiting dis-
crepancies in time, person, and voice for a particular end? The
narrator mentions that he “pitied” the concubines, but there is never
any intimation that he feels responsible for their suffering; he bru-
tally tortured and murdered Rong Ai himself. If any of the concu-
bines were to complain directly, retribution would be swift and
severe. In composing the song himself and commanding Zhaoxin to
perform the musical accompaniment, Prince Qu’s aestheticization
of his concubines’ suffering effectively destroys any promise that
poetry can be a powerful means used by inferiors to criticize their
superiors.
After reading multiple narratives containing poetry in the Han
History, one gradually forms the impression that venting feelings through a Chusheng outburst song is simply the expected way for a member of the royal family to complain. The habit is followed even
when there is no expectation that one’s audience will understand the
song. Between 110 and 105 b.c.e., the imperial princess Xijun was
sent to be the bride of the elderly leader of the Wusun nomadic tribe
in the northwest.
When the princess arrived in their domain she took up residence in a palace under her own management. She met with the chieftain repeatedly
throughout the year, putting on banquets and bestowing coins and silks
upon his favored attendants. The chieftain was old and she could not
communicate with him in his language. The princess was struck with
sorrow and she composed the following song for herself:
—————
33. The difference is that the historians of the Han History are dealing with dead people, who survive only through their textual traces. Prince Qu is confronting the living, who could speak for themselves if they were allowed to do so. Even worse than silencing them, Prince Qu is putting words into their mouths, saying that they wish to die because of suffering that he himself has inflicted.
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Baring the Soul
My own family married me off to this distant corner
of the earth,
sent afar to this foreign land and its barbarian chieftain.
A yurt for my chamber banners for walls,
only meat for my meals kumiss for drink.
I brood in homesickness my heart aches within,
oh, that I were a yellow crane winging its way homeward.
When the emperor heard of this, he pitied the princess and dispatched
couriers at yearly intervals bearing gifts of fine tents and brocades for her. 34
公主至其國。自治宮室居。歲時一再與昆莫會。置酒飲食。以幣帛賜王
左右貴人。昆莫年老。語言不通。公主悲愁。自為作歌曰。
吾家嫁我兮天一方
遠託異國兮烏孫王
穹廬為室兮旃為牆
以肉為食兮酪為漿
居常土思兮心內傷
願為黃鵠兮歸故鄉
天子聞而憐之。間歲遣使者持帷帳錦繡給遺焉。
All the requisite elements of the outburst song are here: it takes
place at a banquet, during which the princess is “struck with sor-
row” over her lamentable situation. “She composed the following
song for herself,” the narrator reports, suggesting the striking spon-
taneity of the princess’s action at an event for which there would
have been designated performers. The text of her song tells how she
came to this foreign land, describes her particular rustic circum-
stances (which evoke within her painful thoughts of home), and
then closes with the figure of a “yellow crane” returning to its native
land. Not only does her performance adhere to the form of general
outburst song practice, but the song’s content also reiterates a fa-
miliar pattern in these sorts of songs. The opening couplet describes
the general situation of the performer, the middle couplet depicts
immediate and painful particulars, and the closing couplet articu-
lates an emotional reaction to those particulars. Precisely this tri-
partite form typifies the earlier outburst songs contained in the Han
—————
34. Ban, Han shu, juan 96b, p. 3903.
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101
History, including Xiang Yu’s “Song of Gaixia,” Lady Qi’s “Husk-
ing Song,” and Prince You’s “Captivity Song.” The pattern does
not really obtain in Liu Bang’s songs at Pei and at court, nor in
Prince Qu’s songs for his concubines. Regarding this admittedly
small sample of songs, one should note that the former group is
presented as being more spontaneous, with less consideration of
audience, while the latter group is portrayed as being more con-
trived or staged. This may have something to do with differences in
setting: Xiang Yu is on the battlefield, Lady Qi and Prince You are
imprisoned, and Princess Xijun is on the frontier. They are con-
fronting and reacting to the immediate cause of their suffering; the
shape of their emotional response becomes the shape of the song.
Liu Bang and Prince Qu, however, find themselves in more con-
trived circumstances at Pei and in court, where they summon the
audience and direct the variables of performance. They are not
confronting immediate and urgent situations so much as making
strategic moves in ongoing power plays. The more diffuse quality of
their songs may be a reflection of this difference in setting and
agenda. Prince Qu’s second song, in the voice of the concubines,
does retain more of the tripartite structure of a spontaneous song
(especially in the immediacy of its middle line, “I cannot see the sky
above”), but the sheer contrivance of its composition and per-
formance shows it for what it is: a simulation.
The composition and performance of Princess Xijun’s song
seems all the more spontaneous because her immediate audience,
her Wusun husband, is not even able to understand it. Indeed, his
inability to understand it is what allows the princess to so frankly
express her regret and sorrow. But after the narrator finishes
quoting the song, he immediately reports, “the emperor heard of it
and pitied her.” At the time of Xijun’s performance, her song may
have fallen upon deaf ears, but in the narrative the emperor becomes
her immediate audience. The proximity of words on the page is able
to erase the intervals of time and space that separated Princess Xi-
jun’s performance on the remote frontier and the emperor’s expo-
sure to it in the capital. The emperor responds to the song by
sending gifts of “fine tents and brocades” to replace the “yurt” in
which she must live. His response shows that he is a sympathetic
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Baring the Soul
audience, but his material gifts will never compensate her ade-
quately for the debt of sorrow owed her.
This narrative arouses suspicions in the reader that Princess Xijun
may not have been acting so spontaneously after all. Perhaps she
intended all along for her song to reach the ears of the emperor. This
ambivalence in reading is predicated on the song’s narrative context,
which raises the possibility that a poem may be shaped by two
“states of mind.” The first is the state of mind articulated in the
poem itself; the second is the state of mind manifested in the per-
formance of the poem. The first is what is promised by principles: a
direct and transparent sublimation from one state (mind) to another
(word). The second is what is possible in practice: a circuitous and
murky exploitation of intervals in person, voice, time, and place to
fashion a strategy of poetic performance. Thus it is in narrative that
the innocence of poetry is lost.
By the time one comes to the latest examples of song perfor-
mance in the Han History—songs performed by two princes on the
verge of death—the performances produce a palpable sense of banal
routine, despite the urgency of the circumstances.
In
80 b.c.e., Prince Dan 旦王 of Yan is plotting to usurp the
emperor’s throne, but his plans are exposed:
When Prince Dan heard of it, he summoned his Minister Ping and said,
“Our plot has been ruined; should we send out our troops?” Ping replied,
“The Senior General is already dead, the people all know about it—we
cannot send them out.” The prince was filled with dread so he arranged for a banquet in the Palace of Longevity and gathered together guests, officers, wives, and concubines to take part in the drinking. The prince himself
sang,
Returning to an empty city:
the dogs do not bark,
nor do the cocks crow.
How barren and empty are the avenues:
one surely knows the kingdom is deserted.
Lady Huarong rose to dance, and sang,
Hair lies strewn clogging the ditches,
bones pile up without a proper resting place.
Mothers look for dead sons,
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Baring the Soul
103
wives look for dead husbands.
Lingering between the ditches,
how can the lord abide in peace?
Everyone seated there wept.
An order of amnesty arrived and the prince read it, saying, “Alas! This
only pardons the officers and the people, but does not pardon me!” Then
he received his principal wife, concubines, and ladies into the Hall of
Shining Light, where he told them, “That bunch of decrepit slaves is
striking against my entire clan because of this.” He was about to commit suicide, but his attendants said, “With any luck you may be stripped
of your kingdom, but you will escape death.” His wife, concubines, and
ladies, all sobbing and weeping, stopped the prince from proceeding. 35
旦聞之。召相平曰。事敗。遂發兵乎。平曰。左將軍已死。百姓皆知之。
不可發也。王憂懣。置酒萬載宮。會賓客群臣妃妾坐飲。王自歌曰。
歸空城兮
狗不吠
雞不鳴
橫術何廣廣兮
固知國中之無人
華容夫人起舞曰。
髮紛紛兮寘渠
骨籍籍兮亡居
母求死子兮
妻求死夫
裴回兩渠間兮
君子獨安居
坐者皆泣。
有赦令到。王讀之。曰。嗟乎。獨赦吏民。不赦我。因迎后姬諸夫人
之明光殿。王曰。老虜曹為事當族。欲自殺。左右曰。黨得削國。幸不
死。后姬夫人共啼泣止王。
This narrative is striking for its similarity with the narrative con-
taining “Song of Gaixia.” In both cases, the protagonists reach an
impasse, which produces an emotional reaction in them; they set the
stage with drinking; they sings songs of despair; their concubines
sing songs in response; then all those in attendance weep. The dif-
—————
35. Ban, Han shu, juan 63, p. 2757–58.
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Baring the Soul
ference here is that the scene is set in the palace of a prince, not on a darkened battlefield. The epic proportions of tragedy have all but
vanished and the dramatic elements seem all too contrived, much
like the prince’s ensuing suicide attempt. The genuine quality found
in Xiang Yu’s outburst song is compromised here by the impression
that the prince is simply following accepted practice for the ex-
pression of sorrow at court.
While Prince Dan’s performance may be unremarkable, the
content of his and Huarong’s songs is noteworthy. Both provide
bleak but powerful images of desolation and death, followed by a
single line expressing the singer’s despair. The states of mind cap-
tured in these songs are not reactions to immediate circumstances,
but imaginative depictions of circumstances that will emerge only
after the deaths of the singers. 36 The narrative frame provides a time of composition and performance that can be compared with the
time frame suggested in the poem itself; only within such a narrative
frame does this sophisticated handling of time become apparent.
This may be an “outburst” in reaction to present circumstances, but
it is cast as a bleak vision of the future.
A similar story unfolds in 54 b.c.e. when Prince Xu 胥王 of
Guangling is exposed in his plot to place a curse upon the emperor.
The emperor sends officers to investigate, and Prince Xu admits his
crime to them. He then busies himself with setting the stage for his
farewell song and suicide.
Once Prince Xu saw the emissaries had returned, he arranged for wine in
the Hall of Brilliance. He summoned the heir apparent Ba, his daughters
Dongzi and Husheng, and others for a night of drinking. He bid his fa-
vorites, Consort Guo Zhaojun, Woman of the Household Zhao Zuojun,
and others to play the zither and sing and dance. The prince himself sang, We all want life to go on without ceasing,
but this eternal unhappiness will it ever end?
I received my Heaven-allotted span not an instant more,
the superior steed halts and waits in the road.
—————
36. Suzuki notes that both of these songs, in their envisioning of a scene after death, prefigure the “pall bearer’s song” 挽歌 in which the poet describes a posthumous scene ( Kan Gi shi no kenkyū, p. 35).
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