The Columbia Anthology of Yuan Drama
Page 50
The curtains with their delicate fringes101 are rolled up,
How cold and forlorn are the green window and vermilion door.
How dreary is my lone existence!
Indeed I long for the children—my golden cangue
And jade lock
In that prison of romance.102
(The sound of a bird’s call outside.)
Who told you to fly away from Ba and Shu,103
Calling to the departed one, “Better go back!”104
[Intoxicating Spring Wind]
With home a thousand miles away, I dream of butterflies.
As the moon rises to third watch, I hear the cuckoo.105
A chance meeting on horseback and over the wall started the bliss—
How could I have known this would end in so much sorrow?
All this talk of a hundred charms, a thousand graces
Led us to be parted hither and thither,
With things mixed up this way and that.
SHAOJUN (enters and recites:)
Holding up the imperial edict, I left the palace gates.
Passers-by vied to make out my piebald steed.
I reckon such is the success that my writing creates—
Perchance the family may claim no merit for any good deed.106
I am Pei Shaojun. After I went to court to take the examinations and in one stroke achieved first place, I was appointed to the position of prefect at Luoyang and have come here to the city of Luoyang. Let me change my clothes and look for my Li Qianjin. … I’ve asked someone and this is the gate of Supervisor Li’s residence. Isn’t that Meixiang? Is your mistress at home?107
MEIXIANG (sees SHAOJUN:) I’ll pretend not to know. What mistress do we have here? This fellow doesn’t know what’s what. Just stand here and I’ll go back into the house. (MEIXIANG sees QIANJIN.) You’ll be pleased. Your husband is at the gate.
QIANJIN: This girl is raving again. Was it really him? Did you see what kind of clothes he was wearing?
MEIXIANG: He was wearing the clothes of a licentiate scholar.108 Really, Mistress, I’m not lying.
QIANJIN: Why would he be wearing the clothes of a licentiate? (Sings:)
[Fragrance Fills the Courtyard]
After he took the examination at Chang’an,
He was ashamed to return to his native place
And was reluctant to see his own hometown.
That heaven-spinning109 mouth of his spits out pearls and jades,
None but learned “thus,” “inasmuch,” “such and such.”
Those truth-attaining110 hands of his could fashion fingerprints,111
Having read five cartloads of books, he knew how to write a divorce bill.112
Tell the Master of the Study not to inscribe the pillars:113
I expect that others might have some complaints.
Wouldn’t this make Xiangru of Han die of laughter?
SHAOJUN: Meixiang went in but hasn’t come out yet. I’ll go in myself. (He greets QIANJIN.) I hope you have been well since we parted. Today I have come looking for you—let us renew our love as in time past and become man and wife again.
QIANJIN: Pei Shaojun, what are you saying? (Sings:)
[Joy All Over the World]
You want to bind intimacy and love,
But I fear being battered by the law in prison.
My all-too-human heart is like iron,
While the judge’s law burns like a furnace.
Your mother has none of a mother’s love for her children;
How could your father be willing to pity and care for me?
I have asked questions until Master Liuxia Hui is tongue-tied:114
Your father said I wasn’t virtuous or sensible and wrecked morals.
How he went on and on about how a family should not have two heads!115
How this was “like a man roaming through nine counties,
Like a woman marrying three husbands!”
SHAOJUN: Now I’ve received an official appointment. My father is living in retirement. I’ve come especially to take you back into the family. I am now the prefect of this place.
QIANJIN (sings:)
[Welcoming the Immortal]
You have been appointed a high-ranking official
And can display the ornate patterns of spiral-shaped ornaments.116
Your father has retired from office and left the capital city.
The Ministry of Appointments has determined his removal,
The Ministry of Revenue has cut off his emoluments.
In vain was he given the title of minister from afar—
He should have been put in charge of the Marriage Registrar!117
SHAOJUN: I’ll move my belongings here today.
QIANJIN: You can’t stay here. (Sings:)
[Pomegranate Blossoms]
As the saying goes, “A good guest is not as good as no guest.”
What if I throw you out?
How can I quell the rancor in my heart?
Just think for yourself:
How could you have betrayed one so blameless?
You are an official already, how can you be so shameless?
SHAOJUN: You and I have been husband and wife since our youth. How could you not accept me?
QIANJIN (sings:)
You said that I don’t distinguish between ties distant and close.
I say although the pearls of wisdom118 are missing from your eyes,
You should still be able to somewhat separate the worthy from the foolish.119
SHAOJUN: Those were my father’s orders. They had nothing to do with me.
QIANJIN (sings:)
[Fighting Partridges]
One is the Duke of Zhou with eight glorious achievements,
One is the mother of Mencius who moved thrice to educate her son.
I am the child of a good family,
Not a woman from a whorehouse.
I was but one who dallied with the spring breeze, looking to the summer rain.
But if we were to become man and wife,
It would “wreck Shaojun’s future in vain
And bring disgrace upon the Pei ancestors.”
SHAOJUN: You are intelligent and educated. Haven’t you heard, “Even when a son gets along well with his wife, if his parents don’t like her, then he should divorce her. Even if he doesn’t get along with his wife and his parents say, ‘She serves us well,’ then he should uphold the ritual propriety between husband and wife indefatigably for the rest of his life.”120
QIANJIN: Pei Shaojun, you are not one who understands. Listen and I’ll tell you. (Sings:)
[Ascending a Small Tower]
Your mother has always been vicious,
Your father, perversely jealous.121
In administering the realm he was loyal and upright,
In his personal conduct he was honest and capable.
How then could he act in such a benighted way?
Anyone would be grateful indeed for a mating of phoenixes
With zither and lute in harmony—
For husband and wife who are in happy accord.
None would be like your Minister Pei who, on his son’s behalf, rejects the wife.
(MINISTER PEI enters leading his wife, DUANDUAN, and CHONGYANG.)
MINISTER PEI: I am Minister Pei. I asked someone and they told me this was the residence of Supervisor Li. I heard that my son, Shaojun, has received an official position here as prefect and that my daughter-in-law won’t take him back. I’ve brought the two children and my wife. We are here already. Attendants, announce me saying that Minister Pei is at the gate.
(A servant announces him.)
SHAOJUN: Ah, my father is here. I’ll go to greet him. Father, your son has received an official post and has been appointed the prefect here. Your daughter-in-law won’t take me back, saying I had divorced her earlier.
MINISTER PEI: Where is my child? (Greets QIANJIN:) Child, who could have known that you were the d
aughter of Li Shijie? Previously I had discussed marriage with him. How could I have known that you secretly fulfilled a destined union? Why didn’t you tell me that you were Li Shijie’s daughter? You are his daughter, but I thought you were the daughter of a harlot or entertainer. Today I have brought the two children, carrying a lamb and some wine, to come straightway to beg your forgiveness. I was wrong. Attendants, bring in the wine. Drink this full cup.
QIANJIN (sings:)
[Same tune as above]
So just because he lifts the wine cup up high,
I am to agree to accept his son.
LADY PEI: Do it for my sake. See how big these children have grown under my care. Please acknowledge us.
DUANDUAN AND CHONGYANG: Please acknowledge us, Mother.
QIANJIN (sings:)
Truly have I endured hardship like Tao Kan’s mother;122
He was like Zeng Shen wrongly blamed.123
The grand patriarch made sure his will prevailed.124
A son,
A daughter,
Both are wailing at the same time. (Speaks:)
Oh, children, how much I have longed for you! (Sings:)
It must be that I can’t sever the bond between mother and child.
MINISTER PEI: Alas! You should acknowledge me!
QIANJIN: You had me divorced. I will absolutely not acknowledge you.
MINISTER PEI: Since you won’t acknowledge us, we’ll take the children back home.
(DUANDUAN and CHONGYANG wail.)
DUANDUAN AND CHONGYANG: Mother, you are so hard-hearted! You are killing us with the pain! If you won’t acknowledge us, why would we still want to live? We may as well die!
QIANJIN: I was about to refuse to acknowledge them … But it has nothing to do with you two … Oh, I give up! I give up! I’ll acknowledge you. Father, Mother, receive these bows from your daughter-in-law.
MINISTER PEI: Since the child accepts us, bring the wine and I’ll celebrate for you. Drink this full cup.
QIANJIN (makes obeisance and accepts the wine, sings:)
[Twelfth Month]
This is your daughter-in-law who had come unbidden;
Today she makes obeisance to her father- and mother-in-law.
What do you mean by lifting up the goblet and holding a cup?
I yet fear that you may be devising schemes.
All of a sudden I see the jade hairpin and the silver pitcher—
I cannot help but think of the past.125
[Song of Yao’s People]
Alas! I only fear that the hairpin will break, the pitcher will fall, and you will write another bill of divorcement.
MINISTER PEI: Child, let’s not bring up the past.
QIANJIN (sings:)
There he is, all humble solicitation, urging me to drink some fragrant wine;
Taking a cup and drinking it all, I let intoxication erase clarity.
SHAOJUN: You should be happy.
QIANJIN (sings:)
How can I have the heart to laugh and be happy?
Filled with hesitation,
Like a thief whose courage runs shallow too soon,
I still fear you will drive me out again.
MINISTER PEI: Child, wouldn’t it have been better if you had waited for me to seek your hand in marriage for my son? Instead, unbeknownst to me, you eloped and came into my house, and you didn’t say you were the daughter of Li Shijie.
QIANJIN: Father, has your daughter-in-law been the only one in history to have eloped? (Sings:)
[Teasing Children]
Mother and Father, let me explain:126
It’s not that I use our family disgrace to compare the past and the present,
But noble Zhuo had the grand spirit to sweep the rivers and the lakes,
And his daughter Zhuo Wenjun had a beauty beyond compare.127
For a moment she secretly listened to the song “Phoenix Seeking Mate,”
And the day came when she rode with him in a four-horse carriage.
That, too, was her blessing from predestined karma.
How then can you say that the love forged on horseback and over the wall
Is anything lesser than Zhuo Wenjun selling wine at the counter?
[Coda]
Today a five-colored noble edict indeed fulfills a promise,
And the seven-scented carriage is ours to take with laughter and gladness.
I wish that all those destined to marry in the world could come together:
Grateful to our illustrious ruler, may he reign myriad years!
MINISTER PEI: Today man and wife are reunited. Slaughter a lamb and bring wine. Let us have a celebratory feast.128 (Recites:)
It’s been said, “A grown-up daughter cannot long be kept.”
The courtship on horseback and over the wall is fair to accept.129
All it needs is for there to be a heaven-made match—
Why must we insist on a mate chosen from atop a decorated tower?130
Topic: Li Qianjin Under the Moon and Before the Flowers131
Title: Pei Shaojun on Horseback at the Garden Wall
NOTES
1. The full title of the play is Dong Xiuying by the Flowers and Under the Moon: The Story of the Eastern Wall (Dong Xiuying huayue dong qiangji 董秀英花月東牆記).
2. Whereas the male and female protagonists and the maid divide the arias in The Eastern Wall, Li Qianjin is the only singer in this play.
3. Bai Juyi, Bai Juyi ji, 1:85.
4. That is, she changes into the hairstyle of a married woman.
5. According to Shiji 117, the newly widowed Zhuo Wenjun is drawn by the qin (a kind of horizontal lute) playing of Sima Xiangru and elopes with him. The impoverished couple become wine vendors, and Zhuo Wenjun’s rich father is so embarrassed that he feels compelled to help them financially. Sima Xiangru eventually becomes a renowned court poet.
6. See Zang Maoxun, YQX, 2:968–1005; Zhao Qimei, Maiwang guan chaojiao gujin zaju no. 29; Meng Chengshun, Xin juan gujin mingju liuzhi ji, 346–59.
7. Literally, “I have the talent to compose poems as I walk seven paces.” The allusion is to the story of Cao Zhi (192–232), whose brother, Cao Pi, demands that Cao Zhi compose a poem while walking seven steps; Cao Zhi responds with a poem lamenting fraternal strife that moves Cao Pi to relent (Liu Yiqing, Shishuo xinyu jianshu 4.66).
8. This is the fragrance of the imperial incense burners. Pei is implicitly celebrating his august position at court.
9. The historical Pei Xingjian 裴行儉 (619–682) was a high official during the early Tang.
10. Gaozong reigned 676–679. The third year of the Yifeng era was 678.
11. There was a so-called fair market (heshi 和市) system during the Tang whereby the government purchased goods at a “fair,” or, in effect, lower price.
12. The name Shaojun means “young and handsome.”
13. On the famous Han general Li Guang (d. 119 B.C.E.), see Shiji 109. Li Guang hailed from Chengji in Longxi (present-day Tai’an county in Gansu province), as did the founding Tang emperor Li Yuan.
14. Ancient Masters and Willow Branch: Supervisor Li’s self-introduction begins with four lines of verse: “Drying my clothes on the flowers, I find the sun lacking in luster. / Washing my feet in the pond, I regret the smell of fish. / A scion of lords and officials, luxuriant as flowers in bloom, / A descendant of generals and ministers, a man of valor who takes his rightful place in court.”
15. Wu Zetian (624–705), popularly known as Empress Wu, became the wife of Emperor Gaozong in 665 and soon began influencing policy. Gaozong died in 683, and in 690 Wu Zetian declared herself empress of her own dynasty (Zhou).
16. In Ancient Masters, there is no hint that the match is called off because of Li’s demotion. Li ends his speech as follows: “They should take care to stay within the limits of the inner quarters. Their conduct is to be pure and irreproachable, and they should not provoke any idle chatter.”
17. This was a spring festi
val that involved rites of purgation by rivers and streams.
18. Literally, “Penglai,” a fairy mountain in the sea; see Yuan Ke, Shanhai jing jiaozhu 12.324.
19. Zhuo Wenjun, who eloped with the Han poet Sima Xiangru, was said to have eyebrows that evoke distant mountains (Xijing zaji, 88). Zhuo Wenjun’s story is a refrain throughout the play. The Han official Zhang Chang was famous for painting his wife’s eyebrows; see Hanshu 76.3222.
20. Li Qianjin’s name means “a thousand pieces of gold.”
21. In a late-Tang tale, “The Soul Leaves the Body” (Lihun ji 離魂記) by Chen Xuanyou 陳玄佑 (eighth century), the soul of a young woman, Qianniang, leaves her body to follow her lover (Taiping guangji 358.2831–32). Zheng Guangzu’s 鄭光祖 famous play, Dazed Behind the Green Ring Lattice, Qiannü’s Soul Leaves Her Body (Mi qingsuo qiannü lihun 迷青瑣倩女離魂) (thirteenth–fourteenth centuries), is based on this story. Wilt Idema and Stephen West give a translation of this play in Monks, 195–236.
22. The celestial lovers, Weaving Maid Star and the Herd Boy Star, meet on the seventh night of the seventh month (the so-called Double Seventh festival).
23. Xiangqun 湘裙, a skirt woven from the silk in the Xiang area, is also sometimes associated with the goddess of the River Xiang, as in the following lines by Li Qunyu (ninth century): “Her skirt sweeps six spans of the Xiang River, / Her chignon ties up a stretch of clouds over Mount Wu” (Qun tuo liufu Xiangjiangshui Ji wan Wushan yiduanyun 裙拖六幅湘江水, 髻挽巫山一段雲). See Li Qunyu, Li Qunyu shiji, 105.
24. Zhuangzi jishi 22.746, “Knowledge Wanders North” (Zhi bei you 知北游): “Human life between heaven and earth is like a white horse passing through a crack. It is but a sudden moment.”
25. See Li He 李賀 (790–816), “Peach blossoms flutter down furiously like red rain” (Taohua luanluo ru hongyu 桃花亂落如紅雨), in Li He shige jizhu, 313.
26. Willow leaves are compared to eyebrows; the moth’s fine and curved antennae become the standard kenning for a woman’s eyebrows.
27. The god of spring.
28. Luoyang was famous for its gardens; see Li Gefei 李格非 (d. 1101), “Postscript to The Famous Gardens of Luoyang” (Shu Luoyang mingyuan ji hou 書《洛陽名園記》後). Li Gefei’s essay is anthologized in Wu Chucai and Wu Diaogong, Guwen guanzhi 9.524–25.
29. Ancient Masters: “Apricot blossoms in one shade carry my thoughts a thousand miles; / His handsome face and airs put him high above the common run of men.” Willow Branch: “Indeed, apricot blossoms blaze pink for a thousand miles; / His handsome face and airs put him high above the common run of men.”