Words Well Put
Page 39
杜獨坐南行。瞪目注視。引滿三卮。問李云。聞有紫雲者孰是。李指示
之。杜凝睇良久曰。名不虛得。宜以見惠。李俯而笑。諸奴亦皆回首破
顏。杜又自飲三嚼。朗吟而起。曰。
華堂今日綺筵開
誰喚分司御史來
忽發狂言驚滿座
兩行紅粉一時迴
意氣閑逸。傍若無人。
Even as the narrative carefully indicates Du Mu’s position and
power in the political hierarchy, it casts him in the role of the
drunken poet “drinking alone before the flowers” when the invita-
tion to the banquet arrives. His excessive drinking and ogling of the
singing girls at the party already push the bounds of decorum, but
when he makes a blatant request for Li’s prized girl, the impropriety
is enough to make Li look sheepish and to turn the heads of the
singing girls.
It is at this point—when things threaten to become uncomforta-
bly embarrassing—that Du Mu rescues the evening with his mas-
terful display of poetic competence. In four lines, he skillfully sums
up the evening: the elegant setting of a banquet is disrupted by the
arrival of a high official who invited himself and then proceeds to so
—————
64. Taiping reads 爵 for 嚼.
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Placing the Poem
unsettle everyone with his impertinent behavior that even the
performers take notice. Because Du Mu performs this summation
by rising to intone it with a clear voice, he successfully transmutes
his boorish behavior into the stuff of poetry. The host and other
guests can excuse Du Mu’s impertinence because he is playing a role:
the flamboyant drunken poet who ignores social conventions. The
closing line—“Du Mu had a very relaxed demeanor and acted as if
there were no one else around”—indicates that he has successfully
occupied the role. The impetus for the poem is deeply rooted in the
effect of his behavior on other people in a social setting, but his
performance of the poem puts him in a state of mind that transcends
that setting. The role of the carefree drunken poet has its roots in
Tao Qian and was perfected by Li Bai. Tao Qian asserts the role
with such insistence that it undermines his claims of successfully
occupying it. Li Bai often seems to have forgotten that he was
playing a role. Du Mu is in complete control of it, stepping in and
out of the role as it suits him. The competent deployment of poetic
discourse is the main vehicle by which Du Mu plays the role of the
hedonistic poet and is the means by which he displays it to others.
In all of these anecdotes that unfold in what may be called the
“literary” arena, poetic discourse is used to achieve ends less tangible than in the political arena: attracting the recognition of the emperor
or satisfying his wishes, expressing gratitude for appreciation, esta-
blishing camaraderie, engaging in raillery, winning a game, playing
a role. Poetry of the political arena is necessarily outward-
looking, as the one who utters it attempts to maximize its efficacy by
taking the circumstances of production and reception into account.
Such poetry carries expectations attendant upon poetic discourse
into a preexisting situation and lives or dies by the parameters of
that situation. Poetry of the literary arena is more inward-looking.
It emerges from circumstances arranged expressly for the produc-
tion and reception of poetry—literary debates, command per-
formances, polite correspondence, informal gatherings of friends
and colleagues—and is more self-referential as a result. Under these
sorts of conditions, poetry easily slips from a mode of discourse to
an object of discourse—many of the anecdotes cited above narrate
instances of talking about poetry rather than performing it (and, in
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Placing the Poem
257
one case, doing both). Poetic production in the literary arena is
concerned less with responding to a set of preexisting circumstances
than with constituting its own circumstances: forging a literary
moment that is set apart from political concerns. Failure or success
in such a moment does not depend on obtaining an ensuing out-
come or tangible reward. Rather, it hinges on displaying the com-
petence required to seize the moment and master it. The immediate
outcome, the intangible reward, is the respect and solidarity of your
peers; and it is won or lost in the moment.
IV
Tang anecdotes about poetry are rife with a theme that is all but
effaced in pre-Tang narratives on poetry: love. It is only natural that
the Tang would witness an explosion of poems about love, and,
consequently, of narratives about those poems. At the time, poetic
discourse was increasingly used to negotiate social relationships
among members of the official class; meanwhile, metropolitan
centers experienced a proliferation of entertainment quarters that
made a business of selling the illusion of romance to these same of-
ficials. When the first activity is brought into the second locale, an
endless stream of poetic and narrative discourse on the romantic
ideal results. The elements of the love story are surprisingly con-
sistent: the man is a low to mid-level official in government service;
the woman is a singing girl or concubine; they are kept apart by an
authority figure superior to the man; poetic discourse is used to
express the pain of the lovers’ separation; finally, the resulting poem
finds its way to the authority figure, who may or may not react
favorably to it. The variations on this standard story stake out pos-
sibilities as they were desired by men who would employ poetry to
negotiate affairs of the heart.
Even though the culture of romance grew out of the entertain-
ment quarters of Chang’an and other metropolitan centers, the
values formed there were constantly read back into the court and
palace—the center of political power in the immediate vicinity of
the emperor. The palace was home to hosts of wives and concubines,
a large portion of whom rarely enjoyed the “favors” of the emperor
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Placing the Poem
and thus provided the perfect vessels for the poetry of romantic
longing.
During the Kaiyuan era, the padded clothing that was sent to the armies on the frontier was made by the women in the palace. There was a soldier who found a poem in his coat that read:
The frontier soldier guarding the sandy wastes,
Suffering the cold, how can you sleep?
This war coat passed through my hands in the making,
I wonder at whose side it has fallen?
From my secr
et thoughts I have added extra threads, 65
From my hidden feelings I have given it more padding. 66
In this life it is already too late,
We will fulfill our fate in the next. 67
The soldier showed the poem to his commander, who then submitted it to
the capital. Emperor Xuanzong ordered the poem to be circulated among
the Six Palaces of the harem and said, “If one of you should be the author, do not conceal yourself and I will not hold you guilty of a crime.” One of the palace women came forward and said that she deserved ten thousand
deaths. Xuanzong pitied her deeply; so he gave her in marriage to the man who had found the poem. She then said to him, “You and I have fulfilled
our fate in this life.” 68 All those in attendance were moved to tears. (1.4) 開元中。頒賜邊軍纊衣。製於宮中。有兵士於短袍中得詩曰。
沙場征戍客
寒苦若為眠
戰袍經手作
知落阿誰邊
畜意多添線
含情更著綿
今生已過也
重結後身緣
—————
65. “Thread” calls to mind “silken thread” ( si 絲), which is a pun for thoughts of
“longing” ( si 思).
66. “Padding” ( mian 綿) evokes the reduplicative term mianmian 綿綿, with its sense of endless yearning.
67. Shihua and Tangshi jishi (hereafter Tangshi ) read 重結後生緣.
68. Tangshi reads 吾與汝結今生緣.
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Placing the Poem
259
兵士以詩白於帥。帥進之。玄宗命以詩遍示六宮曰。有作者勿隱。吾不
罪汝。有一宮人。自言萬死。玄宗深憫之。遂以嫁得詩人。仍謂之曰。
我與汝結今身緣。邊人皆感泣。
As with the ghost-mother’s poem cited earlier, the poem in this
anecdote behaves as a literal extension of Confucius’s maxim “An
utterance without patterned language will not travel far.” The pal-
ace woman’s poem in written form traverses not only the great
physical distance between the center of the realm and its furthest
edge, but it also crosses the formidable social barriers between a lady
of the palace and a frontier soldier. The poem leaves the palace as a
secret utterance of private thoughts and returns to it as a publicly
circulated document, resulting in an openly sanctioned marriage at
which all those in attendance weep. It also travels far in terms of
making a deep impression on the emperor; a palace lady could never
have made a direct appeal to the emperor to leave the harem and
wed a soldier. If Emperor Xuanzong is to be portrayed in this nar-
rative as competent in his reception of poetry, however, he must be
moved by the patterned language of a heartfelt poem.
The poetry of Storied Poems often operates in this fashion. It begins as a disclosure of private thoughts, but once it becomes known
to a figure with enough power to alter the circumstances of the
author, change rapidly ensues—sometimes for the better, sometimes
for the worse. In this case, the poem had to circulate back along a
chain of military command before it found an audience equipped
with both the literary sensibilities to appreciate it and the power to
effectively respond to it. The extremes in this particular story—
between the social status of the palace lady, the soldier, and the
emperor, and between the intensely private utterance and its public
result—coupled with its lack of specific detail, suggest that it is pure fabrication. This is the perfect anecdote, either found or fashioned
by Meng Qi, to demonstrate the principles of poetry he outlines in
his preface. It is a passionate appeal with lyrical force that touches
the emotions of its audience. The affective power of the poem is
unleashed when it is literally uncovered and allowed to move out
into the world. There is a danger that the poem could be seen as an
exploitation of literary talent for gain rather than as a spontaneous
expression of the heart, but this view is countered by the conceal-
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Placing the Poem
ment of the missive in a jacket and the palace woman’s complete
indifference as to who might receive it. She does place her poem out
into the world, but not in a calculated fashion. This entry consti-
tutes the purest example of the literary imagination envisioning
poetry as it was meant to operate.
Sometimes communion between hearts and minds can constitute
a love affair in the absence of a physical union.
Gu Kuang [ca. 726–ca. 808] was enjoying some free time69 in Luoyang by strolling in the gardens with a few fellow poets. 70 They found a large wutong leaf floating in a stream. 71 It had a poem inscribed upon it that read:72
Ever since I entered deep within the palace,
I have not seen spring for many a year.
I will just write upon this single leaf,
And send it off to someone with feeling.
The next day Kuang strolled upstream where he, in turn, wrote upon a leaf and dropped it amidst the ripples. The poem read:
Blossoms fall, deep within the palace even the oriole is sad, 73
This is when the hearts of Shangyang palace ladies break. 74
Imperial walls do not forbid the stream’s eastward course,
I write a poem on a leaf, but to whom am I sending it?
Just over ten days later, a guest of Kuang’s had come to enjoy the spring scenery in the gardens when he found yet another poem on a leaf, which he showed to Kuang. The poem read:
A single poem written upon a leaf left this Forbidden City,
Who answered it with such singular hidden feelings?
I sigh to myself for I can never be a leaf upon the ripples,
Tossing and twirling, going wherever spring takes me. (1.6)
—————
69. Taiping and Shihua read 閒 for 門.
70. Taiping reads 一二 instead of 三.
71. Taiping omits the 坐 character, which is probably an interpolation, according to Wang Meng-ou. Shihua omits 坐流.
72. Taiping reads 上題詩曰. Shihua reads 有詩曰.
73. The oriole was known for its joyful music and was a common figure for courtesans and singing girls.
74. Shangyang palace was built in Luoyang during the reign of Gaozong
(r. 650–683). It lay southwest of the imperial palace and east of the gardens.
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Placing the Poem
261
顧況在洛乘門。與三詩友遊於苑中。坐流水上。得大梧葉。題詩上曰。
一入深宮裡
年年不見春
聊題一片葉
寄與有人情
況明日於上游亦題葉上。放於波中。詩曰。
花落深宮鶯亦悲
上陽宮女斷腸時
帝城不禁東流水
葉上題詩欲寄誰
後十餘日。有客來苑中尋春。又於葉上得詩以示況。詩曰。
一葉題詩出禁城
誰人酬和獨含情
自嗟�
�及波中葉
蕩漾乘春取次行
In this anecdote, an intimate emotional bond is formed between
strangers through an exchange of their interior feelings expressed in
a concrete form, a form that is able to transcend physical and social
barriers. Variations of this anecdote appear in Friendly Discussions at Misty Brook 雲溪友議 by Fan Shu 範攄 of the Tang and Lofty Discussions Under the Green Window 青瑣高議 by Liu Fu 劉斧 of the
Song, a testament to the enduring popularity of this story. Just as
with the previous anecdote about the palace woman and the soldier,
this seems to be another fabricated account demonstrating the ideal
operation of poetry. In this case, however, instead of a person ar-
riving at the palace in response to a poem, it is another poem that
arrives. The poems, even as they accentuate their anonymity, serve
to capture a sympathetic state of mind in both parties. The palace
woman laments that she is not a leaf that can float beyond the walls
as her poem did, but there is some compensatory value in having her
poem answered by “someone with feeling.” As the fifth of the
“Nineteen Old Poems” says, “I do not regret that the singer is in
pain, / I am only hurt that few understand her music” 不惜歌者苦
/ 但傷知音希. In both of these anecdotes, the palace women are
portrayed as taking the initiative in sending out their poetic missives
to see what might happen. They are the speaking subjects of poetic
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Placing the Poem
discourse on love rather than its objects, enjoying a freedom of ex-
pression if not of movement.
Most of the remaining narratives about love fall into a category
that can be termed “stolen love.” In these stories, an established re-
lationship between a man and a woman is torn asunder by a more
powerful figure, who then becomes the audience for the poetry
expressing the suffering that he has wrought. In these stories, the
women are more likely to appear as objects: first as physical objects
that are stolen by other men, and then as the figurative objects of