The Play
Page 21
CH’EN YȔAN-LI: Soldiers, you needn’t play drums and make a hullabaloo: for now, go and settle down in your camp, while I memorialise our sage emperor, who will have his own decision to reach.
(Response of consent from backstage)
(Exit Ch’en Yȕan-li leading his soldiers. Re-sings the four final lines of the previous song)
(Enter emperor with Empress Yang both on horseback, leading Dame Ever-new, Dame Remember-me and Eunuch-chamberlain Kao, proceeding)
SHINING AUGUST-EMPEROR: (Sings)
As in great haste we abandon the imperial palace,
strewing pearl-tears,
And sigh at our so desolate and so cold single slim gold-bells imperial carriage,
Gazing at Ch’eng-tu,
we see it’s right on the horizon,
the edge of the skies.
As we gradually progress,
we steadily grow distant from the imperial capital,
And there are five or six left-over streams and remnant mountains,
And two or three deserted cottages and tumbled tiles.
EUNUCH-CHAMBERLAIN KAO: We’re now here at Ma Wei’s Slope. Please, Ten-thousand-years-grandfather-our-emperor, halt your gold-bells carriage for a while.
(Emperor and Empress Yang dismount, go in and sit down)
SHINING AUGUST-EMPEROR: I lacked common-sense, mistakenly doted on a disobedient minister, which brought about this flight, and it’s too late to go back on it now. My Most-prized-empress, I’ve just burdened you with toil and weariness, but, alas, what can we do!
EMPRESS YANG: Of course it’s proper that I should be accompanying you on your journey: how could I be so remiss as to decline the effort! I only pray that the rebels may soon be destroyed, and your great carriage return to the capital, and things be all right again.
VOICE BACKSTAGE: (Shouting) Yang Kuo-chung arrogated power, and led the state astray, and now furthermore he’s liaising with the Tufans.626 We’ve sworn not to stay alive while such a rogue’s in the land of the living. Those who want to kill Yang Kuo-chung, quickly follow us to him.
(Enter four soldiers bearing swords and chasing Yng Kuo-chung. They rush around the stage)
(Soldiers kill Yang Kuo-chung, shout war-cries and exeunt)
SHINING AUGUST-EMPEROR: (In alarm) Eunuch-chamberlain Kao, why’s there that hullabaloo and yelling outside? Quickly proclaim to Ch’en Yȕan-li he’s to come in here.
EUNUCH-CHAMBERLAIN KAO: Command received!
(He announces the command)
(Enter Ch’en Yȕan-li He meets emperor)
CH’EN YȔAN-LI: I, Ch’en Yȕan-li, come for audience with Your Majesty.
SHINING AUGUST-EMPEROR: Why are all the soldiers shouting war-cries?
CH’EN YȔAN-LI: I submit to Your Majesty: Yang Kuo-cung brought on rebellion by his autocratic ways, and also liaised in secret with the T’u-fans, which has annoyed our Six Armies, who’ve just now killed him.
SHINING AUGUST-EMPEROR: (In alarm) Oh dear me, that such things should happen!
(Empress Yang turns aside, and hides her tears with her sleeve)
SHINING AUGUST-EMPEROR: (Groaning) Let’s leave it at that, anyway. Convey my command that we move off.
CH’EN YȔAN-LI: (Going out and conveying the command) Our sage emperor’s command says that he pardons you for the crime of taking matters into your own hands and killing Yang Kuo-chung. Make haste and set off.
(Further warlike shouts from backstage)
VOICE BACKSTAGE: Though Yang Kuo-chung’s been executed, Empress Yang’s still alive. If your Most-prized-empress isn’t executed, we swear we won’t escort your carriage.
(Ch’en Yȕan-li meets emperor)
CH’EN YȔAN-LI: All the soldiers say that even though Yang Kuo-chung’s been executed, Most-prized-empress Yang’s still alive, and they refuse to carry on with the journey. They hope that Your Majesty will cut off your love for her, and execute her.
SHINING AUGUST-EMPEROR: (In great consternation) Oh no, how can you say such a thing!
(Empress Yang in a panic tugs at emperor’s robe)
SHINING AUGUST-EMPEROR: General,
(Sings)
Even if Yang Kuo-chung had committed crimes for which he had to be punished,
And he’s now been killed, suffered violation,
My Most-prized-empress,
in the depths of the imperial palace,
just complied with me her emperor,
What business have my Six Armies627 to suspect her and submit her to deprecation?
CH’EN YȔAN-LI: Your sage pronouncement’s most clear, but the army’s feelings have already undergone a huge change for the worse, so what on Earth can we do about it!
SHINING AUGUST-EMPEROR: (Sings)
My lord,
Speedily instruct them,
Such crazy suggestions have no slightest value.
(Further shouts from backstage)
CH’EN YȔAN-LI: Oh Your Majesty,
(Sings)
Listen to how among the soldiers they’re bawling and clamouring.
How am I, your insignificant subject,
them to subdue!
EMPRESS YANG: (Weeps) Oh Your Majesty,
(Sings)
The trouble issues from abnormal situations,
and comes as a shock,
I already ache that my elder cousin’s been slaughtered,
And now, alas,
I your subject maidservant suffer adversity.
It was determined by a previous existence,
That my meagre life should with punishment pay.
I hope that you, my sublime emperor,
will hastily throw me, your slave,
away and have done with it,
I’ve just a few words of grief to say.
SHINING AUGUST-EMPEROR: Calm yourself, won’t you, my Most-prized-empress.
(More shouts from backstage)
VOICE BACKSTAGE: If you don’t execute your Most-prized-empress, we’ll not for the life of us escort you!
CH’EN YȔAN-LI: I submit to Your Majesty: Even though/ if the Most-prized-empress has committed no crime, it’s a fact that Yang Kuio-chung was her own elder cousin, and, with her in your close company, the soldiers feel uneasy. If the soldiers feel secure, then Your Majesty will be secure. I pray and beg you that you think and think again about it.
SHINING AUGUST-EMPEROR: (Groans)
(Sings)
Wordless I groan,
My thoughts like jumbled hemp now.
(Empress Yang tugs at his robe and weeps)
EMPRESS YANG: (Sings)
Paining so rawly,
to abandon you, my emperor, I don’t know how,!
TOGETHER: (Sing)
Piteous that a pair of mandarin-duck and mandarin-drake,
Blown by wind and beaten by wave,
Meet with such violence grave!
(More shouts from backstage)
EMPRESS YANG: (Weeps) (Sings)
All the soldiers press me so hard I feel affrighted,
(Emperor thinks, stupefied, then suddenly embraces Empress Yang and weeps)
SHINING AUGUST-EMPEROR: (Sings)
My Most-prized-empress,
It really makes it impossible for me to withstand or fend!
(Enter soldiers shouting war-cries. They circle the stage, surrounding the posting-station, then exeunt)
EUNUCH-CHAMBERLAIN KAO: Ten-thousand-years-grandfather-our-emperor, the soldiers outside have surrounded the posting-station pavilion. If we delay things any further, I fear there’ll be another adverse upheaval, and how will we deal with that!
SHINING AUGUST-EMPEROR: Ch’en Yȕan-li, quickly go and pacify the Three Armies. I’ve got an idea of my own.
CH’EN YȔAN-LI: Command received!
(Exit)
(Emperor and Empress Yang embrace and weep)
EMPRESS YANG: (Sings)
My souls fly shivering,
My tears intermingle from me.
SHINING
AUGUST-EMPEROR: (Sings)
The grand and mighty Son of Heaven is honoured,
But not up to even Don’t-sorrow’s628 family.
(Emperor and Empress Yang weep together)
TOGETHER: (Sing)
Do you mean to say that love and honour
In a trice are cast away!
EMPRESS YANG. (Kneeling down) I your subject maidservant have received Your August Majesty’s deep loving-favours, which I can’t repay even by being killed. At present, the impetus of events is perilously critical, and I hope that you will confer upon me the chance to commit suicide, so as to calm the army. When you’ve managed safely and securely to reach Shu, even though I’ve died, I shall be as if still alive.
(Sings)
Deeming we’ve no plan will assuage the army’s bawling,
I pray I may gladly put an end to what’s of my life remaining,
I pray I may gladly put an end to what’s of my life remaining.
(She weeping collapses into the emperor’s bosom)
SHINING AUGUST-EMPEROR: What are you saying, my Most-prized-empress! If you give up your life, even though I have the honoured status of Ninth Layer emperor and the wealth of the whole world’s Four Seas, what would I want them for! I’d prefer for my state to be conquered and my family ruined, and adamantly refuse to cast you away and abandon you!
(Sings)
To such bellowing and clamour,
I feign utter deafness and dumbness,
Even though I prove in error.
I now have before me one pretty flower, -
How could I bear to see it destroyed,
ruined by a rainstorm,
And dispatched to the sky’s far border!
If they press me any further,
I’ll strive to plummet in your stead on the battlefield of sandy ochre.
EMPRESS YANG: Although Your Majesty you show such affection for me, since things have come to this pass, there’s no path I can find to seek survival. If you continue to hanker after me any further, should “jade and stone” both be burnt together, it will yet more worsen my crime. I hope that Your Majesty will cast away my person, so that your ancestral temple and altar to the god of the soil may be preserved.
(Eunuch Chamberlain Kao hides his tears with his sleeve, and kneels)
EUNUCH-CHAMBERLAIN KAO: Since you, milady, generously render up your life, I hope that Ten-thousand-years-grandfather-the-emperor will take his altars of soil and millet as the most important matter, and force himself to cut away his love for you, and have done with it.
(Further shouts from backstage)
SHINING AUGUST-EMPEROR: (Stamping his foot and weeping) Very well then, very well! Since you, my Most-prized-empress, are so stubborn, I can no longer keep control, and will simply have to just … just leave it up to you, milady.
(Chokes with sobs, and exits, covering up his face with his sleeve, and weeping.)
(Empress Yang faces towards the emperor and bows down)
EMPRESS YANG: Ten thousand years to you!
(Collapses weeping)
EUNUCH-CHAMBERLAIN KAO: (Facing backstage) Listen, soldiers all. Ten-thousand-years-grandfather-the-emperor has now issued his edict, conferring upon Empress Yang his permission for her to commit suicide.
VOICES BACKSTAGE: Ten thousand years to him! Ten thousand years to him! Ten thousand times ten thousand years to him!
EUNUCH-CHAMBERLAIN KAO: (Helping Empress Yang by her arm to her feet) Milady, please go to the rear.
(He takes her arm, and they walk)
EMPRESS YANG: (Weeping)
(Sings)
In the space of one brief moment for a hundred years we’ll part,
The fairest face of the whole age is for her ruler coming to naught.629
(Turns, arriving)
EUNUCH-CHAMBERLAIN KAO: There’s a Buddha Hall630 here, milady.
EMPRESS YANG: (Goes into it) Stop a while, while I worship Grandfather Buddha.631
(Does obeisance)
Grandfather Buddha! Grandfather Buddha! Think of Yang Jade-bangle!
(Sings)
My crimes and sins are deep and grave,
I hope that you our Buddha will carry me over, release and me save.
EUNUCH-CHAMBERLAIN KAO: (Making obeisance) I pray that Empress Yang may for her goodness’s live in Born-again Heaven.632
(Empress Yang stands up, weeping)
EMPRESS YANG: Eunuch-chamberlain Kao, our sage emperor is already elderly, and when I’m dead, there’ll only be you who’s one of his old people, and able to apprehend his thoughts, so you must respectfully attend upon him with care. In addition, pass on a memorial to our sage emperor for me that he from now on mustn’t think of me.
EUNUCH-CHAMBERLAIN KAO: (Agreeing to do so) I grasp your instruction and will carry it out, milady.
EMPRESS YANG: Eunuch-chamberlain Ko, I still have another suggestion.
(She removes her hairpins, and brings out the casket) This pair of hairpins and this gold-strip-flower-hairclasp casket were bestowed by our sage emperor upon me as tokens to secure our love. You may take them and place them in my grave. Whatever you do, you mustn’t forget that.
(Enuch-chamberlain Kao takes the hairpins and casket)
EUNUCH-CHAMBERLAIN KAO: Very well. I shall do as you say!
EMPRESS YANG. (Weeps)
(Sings)
Terribly grieving,
My bitter feelings like mass hemp,
beyond my full solving;
(Enter Ch’en Yȕan-li leading soldiers crowding around him)
CH’EN YȔAN-LI: Since Empress Yang received the emperor’s command bestowing on her the privilege of committing suicide, how can we tarry here, letting the imperial carriage dawdle!
(Soldiers shout war-cries)
(Eunuch-chamberlain Kao step forward and bars their way)
EUNUCH-CHAMBERLAIN KAO: You soldiers cannot come any nearer: Empress Yang is any minute now going to “return to Heaven”.
EMPRESS YANG: Ah me, Ch’en Yȕan-li, Ch’en Yȕan-li,
(Sings)
Your martial prestige isn’t against the rebels applied,
But presses me to commit suicide.
(Soldiers shout again)
EUNUCH-CHAMBERLAIN KAO: Things are looking worse. The soldiers are crowding in.
EMPRESS YANG: (Looking) Agh, right then, right then. The pear-tree is the place where I, Yang Jade-bangle, shall kill myself!633
(She unties a strip of soft white boiled-silk fabric from around her waist, and makes obeisance) I, your subject maidservant Yang Jade-bangle, kow-tow and thank you, my sage emperor, for your loving favour. From now on we’ll not be able to meet again.
(Eunuch-chamberlain Kao sobs)
EMPRESS YANG: (Weeping and hanging herself)
(Sings)
Even though my whole life is ended,
me dying and to the Yellow Springs634 below descending,
All my spirit just edges close under the emperor’s
Yellow Flag635 wending.
(She hangs and dies. Exit)
CH’EN YȔAN-LI: Now Empress Yang’s dead, all you soldiers swiftly withdraw.
(Soldiers respond with assent. Exeunt together)
(Eunuch-chamberlain Kao weeps)
EUNUCH-CHAMBERLAIN KAO: Oh, that lady of mine!
(Exit)
(Enter emperor)
SHINING AUGUST-EMPEROR: (Recites)
“My Six Armies won’t set forth”, what on Earth can I do, what choices! In graceful submission my moth-antennae eyebrowed636 one has died in front of their horses.”637
(Enter Eunuch-chamberlain Kao, holding in his hands the strip of white silk. Meets emperor)
EUNUCH-CHAMBERLAIN KAO: I submit to you Ten-thousand-years-grandfather-our-emperor: Empress Yang has gone home to Heaven.
(Dumbstruck, the emperor makes no reply)
(Eunuch-chamberlain Kao again addresses a submission to him)
EUNUCH-CHAMBERLAIN KAO: Empress Yang has “gone home to He
aven”, and here’s the white silk she hung herself with.
SHINING AUGUST-EMPEROR: (Looking, and weeping loudly) Oh, oh, my Most-prized-empress, my Most-prized-empress, how can it fail to kill me with grief!
(Collapses to the ground)
(Eunuch-chamberlain Kao takes him by the arm and helps him up)
SHINING AUGUST-EMPEROR: (Weeps) (Sings)
You were like unto a peach-blossom in those years past,
Like peach-blooms,
EUNUCH-CHAMBERLAIN KAO: (Sings)
This morning amid the pear-blossoms her life ceased,
Amid the pear-blooms.
(He produces the hairpins and gold-strip-flower hair-clasp casket) These hairpins and this gold-strip-flower casket are what Empress Yang instructed me to bury with her.
(Emperor looks at the hairpins and casket. Weeps)
SHINING AUGUST-EMPEROR: (Sings)
These hairpins and this casket,
Have been the root and sprouts of calamity.
Lasting-life Palace-hall,
Was such love-joy and harmony,
Ma Wei’s posting-station,
Was such a terminal finale.
EUNUCH-CHAMBERLAIN KAO: In the confusion of our haste, how are we to arrange for her inner and outer coffins?
SHINING AUGUST-EMPEROR: Leave it be. For now, wrap her up in her brocade mattress, when she’s been buried we must remember clearly where, so that in days to come we may re-bury her elsewhere. Tie these hairpins and this casket onto her dress, will you.
EUNUCH-CHAMBERLAIN KAO: As you command!
(Exit)
SHINING AUGUST-EMPEROR: (Weeps) (Sings)
Her warm perfume and gorgeous white-jade flesh are in a brief moment transmuted,
How can I meet with her in this life or this world!
(Enter Ch’en Yȕan-li. Kneels)
CH’EN YȔAN-LI: Please Your Majesty, set your carriage underway.