by C. T. Hsia
30. Ancient Masters and Willow Branch: Shaojun’s speech is longer. He quotes the Classic of Poetry (Mao 57): “Her dainty smile is lovely, / Her beautiful eyes gaze at me.” He also compares her to the immortal Xu Feiqiong and the Moon Goddess.
31. “Red waves churning the coverlet” (beifan honglang 被翻紅浪) is a standard expression for sexual ardor.
32. “Ground as mat, heaven as curtain” (xidi mutian 席地幕天) describes revelry in the open.
33. On the story of Liu Chen, Ruan Zhao, and their encounter with goddesses, see chap. 7, this volume, n. 90.
34. Mount Heavenly Terrace (Tiantai Shan) is where Liu Chen and Ruan Zhao get lost; “sesame rice” is what the goddesses regale them with. See Liu Yiqing, Youming lu, 697–98.
35. In Ancient Masters and Willow Branch, act 1 ends with this line. There is no verse following.
36. On the Han official Zhang Chang, see n. 19, this chap.
37. On Pan Yue, see chap. 7, this volume, n. 82.
38. This is derived from Li He’s line “If heaven had feelings, it too would grow old” (Tian ruo youqing tian yi lao 天若有情天亦老); see Li He shige jizhu, 94.
39. Between 3:00 P.M. and 5:00 P.M.
40. Legend has it that a divine toad lives on the moon.
41. Literally, “the three thousand worlds,” a Buddhist term referring to myriad possible worlds.
42. On the cold jade terraces of the immortals, see chap. 5, this volume, n. 72.
43. The term fangbian 方便, here translated as “give us leave to be,” is often rendered as “expediency.” “Having no obstacles (to enlightenment)” is our translation of wu’ai 無礙; both are common terms in Buddhist sutras.
44. This line appears in the poem Yingying sends to her lover in The Western Chamber.
45. The compound “wind and moon” (fengyue 風月) also means “amorous exploits.”
46. Qianjin is still playing with the associations of wind and moon. The wind will be the messenger of love, while the moon, tactfully hidden, will protect the lovers from exposure.
47. The text has “Zhao Gao sending off Zeng Ai.” Most commentators agree that Zhao Gao is a variant of Zhao Qiao (Zhao the Clever), a conceited disciple of the master craftsman Lu Ban. Song Zeng Ai 送曾哀 (sending off Zeng Ai) is derived from song dengtai 送燈臺 (sending the candle stand). Sent by Lu Ban to the dragon king of the seas with a candle stand designed to awe the dragon king into submission, Zhao Qiao ruins the mission by showing off the candle stand that he himself made. Thus the saying goes, “When Zhao Gao sent the candle stand, / He went and did not come back” (Zhao Gao song dengtai yiqu buhuilai 趙皋送燈臺, 一去不回來).
48. This is derived from a line in a poem by Cui Jiao 崔郊 (ninth century), “The house of the lord, once you enter it, is unfathomable as the sea” (Houmen yiru shen ruhai 侯門一入深如海); see Taiping guangji 177.1316–17.
49. Romantic dalliance can be open in a house of pleasure; here it involves considerable risk.
50. The house has nothing of the clamor of urban houses of entertainment. It is hard to find one’s way there.
51. The “kingfisher ornament” (cuiye 翠靨) seems to be a flower-shaped ornament that women stuck on their forehead.
52. The original has Yingzhou, Fangzhang, and Penglai, all bywords for the Immortal Realm. Li Qianjin is saying that Pei Shaojun is all too human.
53. Zhang Chang painting his wife’s eyebrows becomes the symbol of conjugal bliss (see n. 19, this chap.). Zhang is also disdainful of social expectations and covers his face as he rides down Zhangtai Street. From the Tang on, Zhangtai is also associated with the pleasure quarters. Here Qianjin is boasting about how Shaojun surpasses Zhang Chang in panache as he races down Zhangtai Street.
54. Ancient Masters and Willow Branch: “What need is there to interrogate her or shame her?”
55. Legend says that the scholar Liu Xiang, moved by the beautiful statue of the goddess of the Western Peak in a temple devoted to her, inscribes poems on the temple wall. The goddess is furious and at first wants to kill him but falls in love with him instead. The adventures of the son from their union, Prince Chenxiang, is the subject of at least two thirteenth- or fourteenth-century plays, but they are no longer extant. The story is also told in The Ballad of Prince Chenxiang (Shuochang Chenxiang taizi quanzhuan 說唱沈香太子全傳), printed during the Daoguang era (1821–1850).
56. See chap. 10, this volume.
57. In the story of the Double Seventh festival, sympathetic magpies form a bridge so that the Weaving Maid and the Herd Boy can cross the Heavenly River.
58. The name in the original, Douniu 斗牛, refers to the Dipper and Altair asterisms. Niu (Altair), which also means “bovine,” adds associations with the Herd Boy Star.
59. “To cover everything with a brocade coverlet as big as the bed” (yichuang jinbei zhegai 一牀錦被遮蓋) is a common idiom meaning a cover-up or the acceptance of face-saving compromise.
60. This line referring to the final battle in the Chu-Han struggle also appears in Tricking Kuai Tong, act 4.
61. The “dress knife” (qundao 裙刀) is a kind of weight used to keep clothes in place. Qianjin is threatening to hang or stab herself.
62. Qianjin is implicitly comparing herself to a foundling child who can be dropped with impunity. This must be all the more cutting, considering Nurse was probably the one who took care of her as a child.
63. What we translate as “undone” is, literally, “to melt like ice and to collapse like tiles.”
64. A common idiom in Yuan drama, meaning “where will it all go?” or “what will remain?”
65. Literally, the “ready wit to compose a poem in seven steps”; see n. 7, this chap.
66. “To pluck a cassia branch (on the moon)” designates success in the civil service examination.
67. Ancient Masters: “It’s not that I turned my error into a public threat (?) / But you can manipulate things, you are clever. / You can quickly resolve my problem, / You dare to take this on, you dare to accommodate.” Willow Branch: “It’s not that I dare to be wanton and wicked, / But I am only thinking of the future, making big plans; / That’s why I ended up with this scandal. / How to tell? / No way to explain. / Thank you for giving us a happy ending, for taking this on.” Meng Chengshun comments, “Xiangru disdains the world, and Wenjun recognizes him for what he is. This is where the author is defending them. It is also the real feelings of a clever girl” (Xin juan gujin mingju liuzhi ji, Qiangtou mashang, 13b).
68. Meng Chengshun comments, “The emotions and wording of acts 3 and 4 are comparable to Bowing to the Moon Pavilion [Baiyue Ting], but the musicality and resonance are more lingering” (ibid., 14a).
69. Ancient Masters and Willow Branch: “Shaojun has not yet succeeded in the examinations. To my mind he has the aspirations of Yan Yuan and Liuxia Hui.” Yan Yuan 顏淵, the disciple of Confucius, is famous for his lofty moral principles and indifference to poverty. Liuxia Hui 柳下惠 is known for his obliviousness to sensual temptations.
70. See chap. 1, this volume, p. 17.
71. Li Mi 李密 (early seventh century) and Wang Bodang 王伯當 died together when their rebellion against the Tang failed; see Liu Xu, Jiu Tangshu 53.2224.
72. For Kuai Tong, see, this volume, chap. 2. Li Zuoche was another persuader from the period of the Qin-Han transition.
73. See Zhuangzi jishi 2.112, chap. 2, “On Making Things Equal” (Qiwu lun 齊物論).
74. Ancient Masters and Willow Branch: “It will be better than taking the Picture of Felicity to the city gate.”
75. Qianjin is saying that their illicit union is better than a proper marriage.
76. Ancient Masters: “When you should bar them, don’t let them go.”
77. A stick with artificial flowers made from ribbons. The children may be planning to welcome their father with these flowers and a flagon.
78. The early Han official Ji Bu was known for keeping promises and
for his eloquence. Sima Qian cites a contemporary saying, “Getting a hundred catties of gold is not as good as getting a promise from Ji Bu” (Shiji 71.2731–32).
79. Ancient Masters and Willow Branch: “The more I am pure as ice and jade, the more I suffer torment. / I refuse to take the deviant way.”
80. Tongxin jie 同心結, “the knot of one heart,” is also a way to tie a knot on the sash. “Shared fate” is our way of rendering “two trees that with intertwining trunks become one” (lianli 連理).
81. The Duke of Zhou (twelfth century B.C.E.) was the son of King Wen and the brother of King Wu. He is credited with establishing foundational rituals and institutions for the Zhou dynasty. The mother of Mencius is said to have moved house three times to find the best environment for educating her son (Liu Xiang, Lienü zhuan jiaozhu 1.19–22).
82. Ibid. 6.130–33, Wuyan (Zhongli Chun) goes to the Qi king’s court and offers herself as his mate. In the Yuan play based on this story, however, the king does encounter her in the mulberry grove. See Zhongli Chun Brings Peace to Qi Through Her Wisdom and Courage (Zhongli Chun zhiyong ding Qi 鍾離春智勇定齊) by Zheng Guangzu 鄭光祖, in Wang Jilie, Guben Yuan Ming zaju.
83. These lines from the primer “Thousand-Character Essay” (Qianzi wen 千字文) by Zhou Xingsi (d. 521) are also quoted in chap. 8, this volume, p. 323.
84. Liji zhushu 28.539.
85. On the legend of the woman who turns into a rock pining for her absent husband, see chap. 7, this volume, n. 52.
86. The story of Chaste Woman Zhao (Zhao Zhennü 趙貞女), popular during the Song and Yuan, tells how she suffers the direst poverty while her husband is away and of her digging a grave for her father-and mother-in-law with her bare hands after they die. These plot details are incorporated into The Story of the Lute (Pipa ji 琵琶記) by Gao Ming (ca. 1306–1359).
87. This is glue made from the beak of the mythical luan 鸞 bird (a kind of phoenix). Its adhesive power is so great that it is said to be able to successfully reconnect strings in bows and musical instruments. The traditional euphemism for a widower’s remarriage is “reconnect the string with phoenix glue” (luanjiao zai xu 鸞膠再續).
88. On the shen and chen stars, see chap. 7, this volume, n. 66. Qianjin seems to be saying that, despite the woeful separation, at least she had spent years with Shaojun and her children, unlike the heavenly bodies that never meet.
89. This alludes to Su Shi’s (1037–1101) famous song lyric on Red Cliff: “Startling waves hit the banks, / Churning a thousand heaps of snow” (Jingtao pailang juanqi qiandui xue 驚濤拍浪, 捲起千堆雪); Su Shi quanji, 598.
90. Pei Xingjian has a wispy thread (yousi 遊絲) tied to the pitcher. Here Qianjin changes it to “icy string” (bingxian 冰弦) because the string symbolizes the conjugal bond.
91. The analogy is a woman with two husbands.
92. If a woman is “unable to bear a son, licentious, unfilial toward her parents-in-law, improper in speech, guilty of theft, jealous, or afflicted with a vile illness,” her husband can divorce her. These “seven grounds for divorce” (qi chu zhi tiao 七出之條), first mentioned in Da Dai liji, were written into law in later legal codes; see Da Dai liji jinzhu jinyi 80.510 (“Benming” 本命).
93. On the three compliances, see chap. 7, this volume, n. 31.
94. Meng Chengshun comments, “Words of extreme pain, every line shows natural color [bense 本色]” (Xin juan gujin mingzhu liuzhi ji, Qiangtou mashang, 21b).
95. That is, a biological mother will ensure that the stepfather still behaves like a father. Some scholars suggest that “a real mother” is a mistake for “a stepmother.” “A stepmother will give you a stepfather”—that is, a stepmother will alienate the father’s affections so that he will become no more than a stepfather.
96. Ancient Masters and Willow Branch: “Hold no rancor, bear no grudge against me as if I were a whore with pinned flowers.”
97. According to an entry in Chang Qu’s 常璩 (third century) Huayang guozhi 華陽國志 (cited in Taiping yulan 73.472), the Han poet Sima Xiangru inscribed his vow on the pillar of a bridge, claiming that he would not pass it again unless he did so with four handsome steeds drawing a tall carriage. The story of how Zhuo Wenjun becomes a vendor of wine after eloping with Sima Xiangru is told in Shiji; see n. 5, this chap. Qianjin is saying that despite surface similarities, their story does not compare with that of Sima Xiangru and Zhuo Wenjun.
98. In Ancient Masters, act 3 ends here. There is no mention of Shaojun’s escorting Qianjin back to her home. Willow Branch has the same ending for act 3 as Anthology.
99. These lines are taken, with slight modifications, from Bai Juyi’s ballad “Drawing a Silver Pitcher from the Bottom of the Well.”
100. Guage 瓜葛, literally “melon and vine,” is an expression that usually refers to romantic entanglement or social-familial connections. An example comes from Cao Rui (204–239): “From the time we were newly married, / our lives are intertwined, like melon and vine” (Yu jun xin weihun guage xiang jielian 與君新爲婚, 瓜葛相結連); see Lu Qinli, Xian Qin Han Wei Jin Nanbeichao shi 1:417.
101. Xiasu 蝦鬚, literally “shrimp antennae,” refers to curtain fringes and functions as a kenning for curtains.
102. The line “sons and daughters are golden cangues and jade locks” (ernü shi jinjia yusuo 兒女是金枷玉鎖) appears in a number of Yuan plays, including Young Butcher Zhang Burns His Child to Save His Mother (Xiao Zhangtu fen’er jiumu 小張屠焚兒救母) and Zhongli of Han Led Lan Caihe to Enlightenment (Han Zhongli dutuo Lan Caihe 漢鐘離度脫藍采和), both anonymous. The latter play is translated in Idema and West, Monks, 283–313. Here the metaphor acquires a literal meaning because of the virtual imprisonment Qianjin suffered when she was in Pei Shaojun’s household.
103. Ba and Shu were ancient kingdoms in present-day Sichuan. Duyu 杜宇, or Wangdi 望帝, ancient king of Shu, is said to have turned into a cuckoo bird (dujuan 杜鵑 or zigui 子規) after death. The heartbreaking cries of the bird are rendered as buru guiqu 不如歸去, meaning, “You’d better go home”; see chap. 8, this volume, n. 41.
104. The cuckoo bird is of course a transparent analogy for Qianjin herself.
105. The longing for her family so consumes her that she feels suspended between dreaming and waking, as in Zhuang Zhou’s famous dream of the butterfly.
106. The verse is different in Ancient Masters: “Dragon towers and phoenix chambers in the imperial city: / The minister strolls on the newly built sand embankment. / For all my glory and honor, don’t envy me: / Ten years ago I was but an insignificant scholar.”
107. Throughout this scene, Pei Shaojun refers to and addresses his wife as “Miss” or “Young Mistress” (xiaojie 小姐), speaking like a man courting a young woman.
108. A licentiate was a scholar who had passed the lowest level of the examination. Pei Shaojun is wearing the clothes he had before becoming a top graduate.
109. Tantian 談天, “heaven spinning,” literally, “speaking extravagantly of the heavens,” is how Sima Qian describes Zou Yan’s extravagant discourse of a vast world, of which China constitutes one part out of eighty-one (Shiji 74.2348).
110. The term here is sanmei 三昧, or samādhi, the ultimate understanding reached by the mind in a state of quiescence. It also comes to mean perfect mastery of an art or a craft. Li Qianjin may also be alluding to the phrase meixin 昧心, “going against one’s conscience.”
111. Qianjin is referring to the fingerprints on the statement of divorce.
112. The ancient philosopher Hui Shi is said to have read five cartloads of books (Zhuangzi jishi 33.1102). Although the praise is ironic in the original context, it becomes idiomatic to praise a person’s learning as “filling five cartloads of books” (xue fu wuju 學富五車).
113. Scholars who failed to become top graduates in the examination often took up positions as “masters of the study” (zhaizhang 齋長) in the Song imperial academy. Qianjin is
mocking Shaojun for failing to achieve success in the examination. On Sima Xiangru’s inscribing the pillar, see n. 97, this chap.
114. Liuxia Hui was a Lu official famous for being unmoved even when a woman sat on his lap (zuohuai buluan 坐懷不亂); see also n. 69, this chap. Qianjin is ironically contrasting Pei Shaojun’s eager response at their first meeting with Liuxia Hui’s imperturbability.
115. Pei Xingjian had dictated his views without allowing his son or anybody else to argue for alternatives.
116. Qianjin refers to Shaojun as “official of the third rank” (here translated as “high-ranking official”), although as prefect he has a much lower rank. The spiral-shaped ornaments, literally “a pattern with eight peppers” (bajiao tu 八椒圖), designate a design that resembles entwining spirals. They are also mentioned in chap. 2, this volume, act 1.
117. An official leaving office was given a nominal official position. Here Li Qianjin is caustically saying that instead of being given a meaningless title, Pei Xingjian should have followed his calling as the one managing the Marriage Registrar.
118. That is, the pupils.
119. Ancient Masters: “Shaojun: You lack good judgment [literally, “there are no pearls (pupils) in your eyes”]. Qianjin: My eyes may lack pearls of wisdom, / But I can distinguish the worthy and the foolish.”
120. Liji zhushu 27.521, “Neize” 內則.
121. Ancient Masters and Willow Branch: “Your father has jealousy that lasts three lifetimes.” “Jealousy” in this case seems to mean “a total lack of empathy.”
122. Tao Kan’s mother sells her hair in order to entertain her son’s guest. See the introductory remarks in chap. 5, this volume. Some commentators suggest that Li Qianjin is comparing Pei Shaojun’s mother to Tao Kan’s mother, implicitly expressing gratitude to Pei’s mother for taking care of her children.
123. Qianjin is comparing Shaojun to Zeng Shen, Confucius’s disciple who is wrongly accused of murder.
