by Ha Jin
Chang-hao’s words rang in Li Bai’s mind. They reminded him that he was not just a poet—he was skilled with the sword and well versed in military strategies, knowing The Art of War by heart. He should be able to go into military service. Why not drop the brush and pick up the sword? It might not be too late to join the army and accomplish something extraordinary. He was not yet fifty-one. It would be silly to stay home, live to a ripe old age, and die like an everyman. He shouldn’t lead a long quiet life that might turn out to be meaningless. Again his political aspirations overrode his Daoist detachment, and he couldn’t stop imagining a military career.
In addition to his desire to serve the country, which had always formed a partial justification for his political ambition, there was another motivation now: he wanted to deserve his bride. Miss Zong was young and pretty and from a renowned family; he was a vagrant without prospects. “My hair is mostly white / But I have accomplished nothing,” he reproaches himself in a poem (“Goodbye to Magistrate Liu in Xihe”). This sense of unworthiness had tormented him ever since he had resigned from court. Now he hoped he could do something that would restore his reputation and make him worthy of his young wife. This might be his last endeavor, he reasoned. He would become an old man soon.
Li Bai knew that You Prefecture (northeast of modern Beijing), where Chang-hao was stationed, was under An Lushan’s control and might not be safe to visit. An Lushan (703–757) was a foreigner, of Sogdian and Göktürk extraction, and his parents died when he was a young boy. Later his tribe broke up and he became a vagrant. He wandered to the region inhabited by the Chinese. He was clever and bold and strong, and was adopted by a general, whose family name was An. In time An Lushan rose through the ranks to become a general himself. He was nearly illiterate but extremely insolent and calculating and perceptive. The emperor liked him and gave him important military commands—three major circuits were under his control, which was unprecedented in China. He had a complicated and intimate relationship with Lady Yang. At one point he became her sworn brother, at another her adopted son, even though he was sixteen years her senior. It was whispered that they had been lovers. The emperor even made him a prince, which meant he belonged to the royal family and could enjoy all its privileges.
Li Bai had heard so much of this notorious man that he felt uneasy entering his territory. On the other hand, he reasoned, An Lushan must be very capable, a linchpin of the empire, loyal to the emperor and court. Otherwise he wouldn’t have been made a prince, the very first foreign man in the dynasty to achieve such a position. It was reported that An knew six foreign languages and was able to deal with the northeastern tribes. He weighed over 350 pounds but could dance “like a swift wind.” A massive tree tends to attract more lightning bolts, Bai reassured himself. Many people must have been jealous of An Lushan. It would not hurt if Bai went northeast and took a look at the place with his own eyes.
Intuitively he knew this might be his last chance to join the military. He had no option but to try his luck with An Lushan’s army: An commanded half of the Tang forces. The other half, under Marshal Geshu’s charge, stayed in the western regions, where they engaged the tribes from Central Asia. That was where Li Bai’s family had come from, and Bai could not imagine fighting those peoples. So the only place he could pursue military service was the northeast. Once he was clear about this, he wrote his reply to his friend He Chang-hao. The letter is a poem that expresses his depressed state of mind and his desire to come to the northeastern frontier:
有时忽惆怅 匡坐至夜分
平明空啸咤 思欲解世纷
心随长风去 吹散万里云
羞作济南生 九十诵古文
不然拂剑起 沙漠收奇勋
老死阡陌间 何因扬清芬
夫子今管乐 英才冠三军
终与同出处 岂将沮溺群
《赠何七判官昌浩》
Sometimes suddenly I feel sad for no reason,
Sitting up alone deep into midnight.
In daylight I shout uselessly to the sky,
Unable to sort out the world’s mess.
My heart would like to fly away with the long wind
To scatter the clouds of a thousand miles.
I’ll be ashamed of becoming another Jinan,
Who at age ninety still pored over classics.
It will be better to rise with my sword
And fight in the desert to do miraculous feats.
If I died in my homestead and fields,
How could I earn and spread my name?
You are as capable as those statesmen of old,
Your talent towering over the army you serve.
I would like to fight together with you
To avoid an end like the ancient hermits.
“FOR JUDGE HE CHANG-HAO”
Without telling Danqiu, Bai sent the letter to Chang-hao. He then took leave of his friend and returned to Liang Park. When he told his wife about his plan, she was vehemently against it. Miss Zong abhorred politics and wanted her husband to stay clear of the army in the northeast. She had heard a great deal about An Lushan and believed he was an evil man who could bring trouble and even destruction to the country. If Li Bai went to the northeast, he could be in danger. She knew that her husband tended to act impulsively regardless of consequences. What she desired was a peaceful, ordinary life that Bai and she could share together, every day similar to the one before.
Bai, who had not expected such a strong objection from his wife, fell into silence. But Miss Zong, knowing that her husband wouldn’t change his mind so easily, continued to talk about An Lushan as a dangerous man and the northeast as a potential battleground if the tribal forces came to attack. However, the more she warned Bai, the more intrigued he became. He emphasized that because of the potential trouble brewing there, he felt all the more called upon to investigate and find out the truth. He didn’t want to stay home like a coward; he was thinking of the country and the fate of common people.
Husband and wife argued for months, until she caved in. The next summer she prepared winter clothes for Bai and saw him off with tears in her eyes.
Li Bai chronologies all place his departure in the early summer of 752. Riding a sturdy horse, he planned to cover the four hundred miles to the northeast in less than a month. But once on the road, he could not suppress his agitation. At a ferry on the Yellow River, he even shed a few tears, as though he was on a mission that might decide his fate. After crossing the river, he traveled at his leisure but hesitantly, often stopping along the way. From time to time he would be given a welcome party, thrown by admirers of his poetry and legendary personality. If he ran into a friend, he would stay a few days to enjoy the hospitality. As a result, his original plan was completely altered. Not until early October did he finally arrive at the city of Ji, where the military headquarters of Youzhou were located.
He Chang-hao was ecstatic at his arrival. He put him up in the barracks and took him to dinner, at which roast venison and pheasant and fat, juicy mushrooms were served. But Chang-hao also looked a little ill at ease. He explained to Bai that Commander An Lushan had just left with a group of top officers for the capital and, as usual, might not return until the next spring. For Bai, this was bad timing indeed. His disappointment, however, was minimal, and he even felt a bit relieved, considering he wouldn’t have to meet the top commander in person right away; he accepted his friend’s advice to stay for the time being and tour the region. He would simply enjoy himself for now; he could not decide yet whether to wait for Commander An to return.
It was already deep in the fall, chilly in the evenings. In the morning, hoarfrost glazed the boundless yellow grassland. It was customary at this time of year to gather fuel and prepare foods for the winter, but An Lushan’s troops were still active in trainin
g and battle exercises, as though about to engage hostile forces on the front. The smoke of beacon fires continued to rise from hilltops in the distance. Bai often saw messengers galloping to the staff at the headquarters, as if the chief commander were still there. He was impressed and thought that An Lushan must be a very capable general, his army well disciplined and ready to fight invaders.
Inspired by the sight of the military activities, Bai began to practice swordsmanship on his own, reasoning that he should make himself useful in case he might take part in a battle. He would also ride out with He Chang-hao to hunt in the wilderness. Bai was a good archer and once shot down a hawk in flight. The soldiers were impressed, and he told them that the great general Li Guang had been his ancestor. His claim implied that both arms and letters ran in his blood, for there had been highly literary men in the royal clan as well. The sight of the valiant troops moved him, and he wrote poems praising the soldiers and the power of the frontier army. In one of them, he even imagined the victory these men were to win: “They will sweep away the chieftains’ troops / And scatter the wild tribes. / Then the news of victory will reach His Majesty / So these triumphant men can return to the capital” (“Out of ‘Song of North Ji’ ”). Clearly, his attitudes toward the northeastern tribes and the western tribes were markedly different.
One day, at noon, Bai passed by a large tailor shop. At its front door stood two guards holding wolf-tooth clubs, combat weapons with a long handle and steel spikes on the top end. Perhaps this shop made military uniforms, he guessed. But as he passed the entrance, he saw piles of silk and brocade gowns within, and on a long table hundreds of official hats were stacked up in lines. There were also bundles of colored sashes, like those worn by civilian officials. Bai wondered why the shop was producing official garments at this time of the year—it was already early winter, the rivers almost iced over. He asked a worker who happened to step out into the street. The man shook his head and said he didn’t know, though a shadow of a smile crossed his face. Bai left and gave no more thought to the encounter.
One morning as Bai was perusing a volume of military maps loaned to him by Chang-hao, a junior officer named Cui Du came to see him. The husky young man was in a way an old friend of Bai’s. His father was Cui Zongzhi, the elegant man “like a jade tree in the breeze,” who had been banished. A decade back when Bai had been in Chang’an and visited the Cuis, he had met Cui Du, then a boy in his early teens. Bai had taught him how to play chess and strum the lute, how to kick a feathered shuttlecock, and how to inscribe a few characters in cursive script, a fluid style of calligraphy. Now Bai was delighted to recognize Cui Du, calling him “my nephew.” Who could have imagined such an encounter on the front! They were both amazed. The young man called him Uncle Bai.
Bai complimented Cui Du on his uniform and his position in the army, but at this the young man’s face clouded over. He explained that after he had failed the civil-service examination three times, he had decided to give up his books and join the army instead. He had been in this region for nearly four years, serving as a junior staff officer in the headquarters of Ying Prefecture, which was also under An Lushan’s command. Bai praised him again, saying he had made the right choice and would have a brilliant career. Besides, he looked so strapping and handsome like his father. But Cui Du shook his head and whispered with a wink that they should go somewhere else so they could speak more freely.
Together they rode out of town and toward an ancient terrace built of granite. Once there, they sat on a stone step and talked some more. The young man said that An Lushan was a complete fraud and had been the cause of numerous military clashes with the tribal forces beyond the border. An provoked hostility without hesitation and, under the guise of friendship, had blatantly betrayed China’s foreign neighbors time and again. He had once invited several heads of tribes to dine with him, but after enough wine was consumed, An had the chieftains arrested and sent to the capital so that he could claim rewards and promotions from court. That was how he had become the military commander of three key circuits and gotten half of China’s army in his clutches. Cui Du had been observing An Lushan for a long time. He had concluded that the man was loyal only to himself and was preparing to invade the central land to seize the throne. All the incessant drill and training here was a façade—the army was still recruiting men and had to get them ready for battle. In short, An Lushan would march inland sooner or later.
Bai was shocked, and a gust of fear seized him. Now he understood why the tailor shop in town was making official garments. A new government was in the offing, and there would be numerous official appointments in need of gowns and caps. Bai told this to Cui Du, who only shook his head and smiled, saying everyone here knew that. Bai wondered if he should go to Chang’an and report An Lushan’s plot to court. No, no, that couldn’t be done, Cui Du told him. Over the years there had been some brave, loyal men who had gone to the capital to expose An Lushan, but without exception they had been sent back to An with their hands and feet in irons. The emperor trusted An Lushan so deeply that he wouldn’t hear any words against him—he’d had the informers dispatched back to be handled by An Lushan himself. Those poor souls had all been executed publicly. Two had even been tied to stakes and skinned alive. There was no way to make the emperor see the truth.
The more Li Bai and Cui Du talked, the more heartbroken they became. In the end they embraced each other and fell on the stone steps weeping. Bai realized that the emperor was too dense and stubborn to redress the dire situation. If An Lushan’s army marched inland, the dynasty would be finished.
Bai and Cui Du decided to leave as soon as possible, but knew they must not go together. Within a few days the young man obtained a home-visiting leave, which enabled him to flee the dangerous region for good. Bai happened to receive a letter from his wife, informing him that she was ill, so he said farewell to He Chang-hao and headed home without delay.
MOVING TO THE SOUTH
As he journeyed homeward, Li Bai often ran into friends, some of whom were officials with connections to court. From them he learned more about the political intrigues in the palace and the dire prospects facing the country. Chancellor Li Linfu had recently died, and Yang Guozhong, a distant cousin of Lady Yang’s, had been appointed to the position of chief chancellor. In spite of his duplicity and cruelty, Li Linfu had been a capable man—good at maintaining discipline, balancing the power of factions, and managing royal affairs—so An Lushan had been obedient to him. But Yang Guozhong was more like An himself: coarse and nearly illiterate. He and An had never gotten along. Moreover, An was now the most powerful man outside the capital; he would not regard Yang as his equal, though Yang stayed at court and could easily disparage him in front of the emperor.
Worse still, An suspected that Yang Guozhong had only claimed to be a cousin of Lady Yang’s and that there might be no blood relationship between them at all. So, following Yang Guozhong’s own trick, An Lushan had shamelessly knelt in front of Lady Yang, calling her Mother (she was only in her twenties). Though astounded and flummoxed, she was persuaded by the emperor to accept such a son. “Just for the fun of it,” His Majesty was reported to tell her. Thereafter, An Lushan began doing everything he could to win Lady Yang’s favor. Whenever he returned to the capital, he would bring rare products and treasures from the northeast. In his own words, he was simply doing his best to fulfill his filial duty to her. Despite being a big fat man with his belly touching his knees, An Lushan was extremely nimble when he danced, and his jigs often thrilled Lady Yang. Gradually he became as close to the royal couple as if he were a member of the family. Once Lady Yang even bathed him personally, calling him “my big son.” These intimate incidents, of course, displeased Yang Guozhong, who attempted to disparage An Lushan at every opportunity. As a result, hostility continued to mount between the two men; surely great trouble lay ahead.
The more Bai heard about the maneuvers and plots at court, th
e more depressed he became. When he was drunk, he would lament loudly that he was useless, unable to deter An Lushan. His ravings unsettled his friends, who feared that Bai’s words might reach An’s ears. An had always been ruthless in annihilating his rivals and opponents; the devious man had agents throughout the country gathering intelligence for him. Nonetheless, whenever Bai encountered people from the capital, he would urge them not to associate with An Lushan. Some officials followed his advice and began to avoid the man so as to protect themselves. By chance, in Kaifeng City Bai ran into Zhang Ji, the man who had once deceived him by sending him to Princess Yuzhen’s villa in Zhongnan Mountain. He urged Ji to have no further dealings with An Lushan. Though a deceitful man himself, Zhang Ji was astonished by what Bai told him about the events in the northeast, and promised to avoid An Lushan. Bai calculated that Ji might pass the message on to his wife, a princess, who in turn might tell the emperor, or at least some members of the royal family, about the impending coup. We are unsure if the information ever reached His Majesty, but we know that Ji listened to Bai and managed to distance himself from the general.
To Bai’s relief, he found his wife recovered when he returned home. He told her his discoveries in the northeast. Husband and wife talked at length about the catastrophic prospects ahead. If war broke out, what would they do to survive? The rebels would surely come this way to attack Luoyang, the East Capital, and capture it as a major victory in their invasion of the central land. Bai and his wife realized they should avoid the major cities. They would be safer secluding themselves in a remote town or mountain. In a poem, Li Bai speculates on this imminent predicament: “People in Qin ask one another: / Where should we go? / Go to the Peach Blossom Garden, / Where a thousand years pass without being noticed” (“Guest Zheng Enters the West Gorge”). The lines refer to the fable by Tao Yuanming, in which a utopian village has been insulated from the outside world and its inhabitants, unaware of the dynastic changes, are protected from the destruction of historical violence. Bai and his wife longed for such a haven.
