Ancient Chinese Poetry A Story Of Li Bai’s Self-Abandonment
December 6, 2009
Self Abandonment by Li Bai
Hey everyone, welcome back to the ancient Chinese stories blog, today I am in a more poetic mood and thought I would introduce you to Li Bai to those new to Chinese Poetry. Now Li Bai was and still is one of China’s most famous poets from the Tang Dynasty (as well as all Chinese history for that matter). He is known for writing very Buddhist style Chinese poetry and did not really seem to enjoy Confucianism. It is said that Li Bai tried his hand at the civil service exams and failed, so he gave up and went on to write poetry based on the individual more so than the Confucian methods of poets like Dufu. He was considered the rogue poet of his time and also was a bit of an alcoholic which seems to hold some truth if you look at his poetry. With that said, today’s Chinese Poem is titled Self-Abandonment; I will not be the one who translated this poem, but it is our excellent scholar Arthur Waley’s translation.
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I sat drinking and did not notice the dusk,
Till falling petals filled the folds of my dress.
Drunken I rose and walked to the moonlit stream;
the Birds were gone, and men also few.
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A note about drinking that I should mention in Chinese culture in those times: drinking was socially acceptable when you were with a group of people. In most of the Chinese poems written by Li Bai he drinks alone and that was considered very anti-social. the result being that this is why many say that Li Bai was the renegade poet of his time and an alcoholic; interestingly enough it is said he drank too much one night, passed out and fell into the lake and drowned. Mind you however it is not really for certain known how this poet died. To this day his poetry is some the best known not only in China, but throughout the world. Till the next Ancient Chinese Story post everyone. Feel free to comment as always if you need the Ancient Chinese Story Owner Joseph Ahdoot.
Ancient Chinese Poetry: A Chinese Poem By A Tartar
August 16, 2009
家
Hey everyone, welcome back to the ancient Chinese story blog. Today I will be showing a poem from the times of disunity after the fall of the Han dynasty. The poem is by a Tartar named Altun who lived from 486-566 A.D. His poem is a song he sang about his home. Today, I will not be using my own translation since I do not have the original Chinese text so I will be using Arthur Waley’s translation of this poem. It is known as Tchirek Song. Enjoy todays Chinese Poetry.
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Tchirek River
Lies under the Dark Mountains:
Where the sky is like the sides of a tent
Stretched down over the Great Steppe.
The sky is gray, gray:
And the steppe wide, wide:
Over grass that the wins has battered low
Sheep and oxen roam.
——-
Altun is interesting because he sang this song since he could not read or write. For anyone interested his name is Gold in Chinese. He is one of many groups of nomads along the northern Chinese frontier of those days. Men like him were often recruited by Chinese military officials to train soldiers in how to fight other Nomadic tribes. This was quite common actually throughout Chinese history when fighting off foreign groups; they would hire another foreign group that was similar to fight and train their soldiers to more efficiently handle the situations. So while the ancient Chinese Poem is Chinese in the sense of how it was recorded, it is more of minority writing. I think that’s whyI probably first got drawn to this particular poetry.
Today’s word of the day is the Chinese word for home and is also used for family. Feel free to comment and anyone who like to contribute is free to. Till the next ancient Chinese story post everyone. Best of wishes to any who have suffered due to the recent typhoon in Taiwan and southeast China.
Taken in Xi An at her old bathing grounds
So todays ancient Chinese story is really a poem. I had recently bought a book by Arthur waley containing all sorts of ancient Chinese tales and poetry. This is the sad truth of ancient Chinese women and their lives. So today before I write the translation form Arthur Waley I will give a brief history of the women in China. So during the ancient times, women in the world generally (not always though depending which society you speak of) were not so highly respected. In China, where Confucianism eventually would become the dominant Chinese philosophy, women in ancient Chinese society would gradually degrade women seeing them as far inferior to men. They were there essentially just to treat the men well and be the typical housewife. When a woman was born, there was no joy to be found and women were placed under the bed for the first few days (mind you I researched this and thought it was a lie until I read of it in actual Chinese texts still in Chinese) in order to humble the ancient girls. This ancient Chinese poem will tell you the rest. Now on todays on Chinese Tales and stories post I will only change some words from wade-giles into ping yin. The title of the poem is called Woman original written by the Chinese poet Fu Xuan.
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How sad it is to be a woman!
Nothing on earth is held so cheap.
Boys stand leaning at the door
Like Gods Fallen out of Heaven.
Their hearts brave the Four Oceans,
The wind and dust of a thousand miles.
No one is glad when a girl is born:
By her the family sets no store.
When she grows up, she hides in her room
Afraid to look a man in the face.
No one cries when she leaves her home-
Sudden as clouds when the rain stops.
She bows her head and composes her face,
Her teeth are pressed on her red lips:
She bows and kneels countless times.
She must humble herself even to the servants.
His love is distant as the stars in Heaven,
Yet the sunflower bends toward the sun.
Their hearts more sundered than water and fire-
A hundred evils are heaped upon her.
Her face will follow the years’ changes:
Her lord will find new pleasures.
They that were once like substance and shadow
Are now as far as Hu from Qin
Yet Hu and Qin shall sooner meet
Than they whose parting is like Can and Chen
———–
While this is usually the case, there were some exceptionally powerful women in China. Todays ancient Chinese Stories’ picture actually is from the time of Empress Wu, known as one of the harshest leaders in the Tang, but she also did help it develop as well. She also helped to really bring Buddhism into China since she herself was a very advent Buddhist. I could go on for quite a while about her, but perhaps I will reserve that for another post. Before I end off todays tale, the picture I took in the summer of 2007 and the water was still so warm from the fountains, this woman really knew how to live for the times. Thanks again for reading everyone, till the next post.
Yu Gong wished to move a whole mountain...insane!!
Welcome back to the ancient Chinese story blog everybody. Todays old Chinese story is very famous and I will be translating myself from Chinese Bai Hua into English. It is a rather old story that shows us something about Chinese culture; the emphasis of hard work. It shows us that the ancient Chinese as people still do today work very hard, but there is a moral to this tale; work on something that is feasible, be passionate in your field, and it is possible. Today’s ancient Chinese stories’ story is 愚公移山 (yu gong yi shan)。When translated from Chinese to English, the story title is The Foolish Old Man Moves The Mountain. I will leave his name is Yu Gong for my translation of the tale today. I wish I could give you some more background on the story but sadly I never found the history of this ancient tale. Just a note, I will be translating only a part of today’s ancient Chinese tale because I found out unfortunately that the textbook I have only has part of it in it.
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Once upon a time there was an old man named Yugong, and he was almost 90 years old. In front of the entrance to his home was two big mountains, for his family, it was very inconvenient for his family to come and go. One day, Yu Gong said to his family, “These two mountains in front of the entrance, they are just too inconvenient. Why not get rid of these mountains?”
His son and grandson heard this and then said right after, “What you say is true, tommorow we shall start to do it!”
His wife felt it was too difficult to move a mountain and said, “Do you guys see how tall those mountains are? How can you guys move such large mountains? And where will you put so many rocks and stones?”
They all replied, “We only need to work hard, and then we most certainly shall be able to move those mountains. We can take all the stones on the mountains and put them into the sea.” On the second day, Yu Gong and his family began to move the mountain. His neighbor had children; they heard they wanted to move the mountain, and together happily they went to move the mountain with them together. They weren’t scared of strong winds, if it was raining, in summer they feared not heat, in winter they feared not the cold, and everyday they worked nonstop. There was an old man named Zhisou (智叟；the wise old man) who saw Yu Gong and his family at work moving the mountain.
He thought that this was ridiculous and said to Yu gong, “Now you are so old, and you are near the end of the road, is it really possible to move the mountains?”
Yugong replied, “You still don’t have a young intelligent grandson. Even though I will die soon, I still have a so, when my son dies, I still shall have a grandson. We will move the stones on the mountain little by little and it shall become smaller. If we work everyday nonstop, why should we not be able to move this mountain?” Zhisou heard this, and was speechless.
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On a sadder note, I believe this is only part of the text, from what my Chinese friends tell me. A cursed textbook, this time you have let me down and so I apologize to all ancient Chinese Story blog readers. The tale does end on a happy note for our dear Yu Gong. The heavenly emperor heard about how hard Yu Gong was working and asked the mountain gods to move the mountains away. Yu Gong in the end, proved that anything with determination could be done and embarrassed ZhiSou, quite the ancient story indeed.
As I mentioned before, today’s ancient story has a nice moral to the story; work hard, and anything is possible. It also shows how determined the people of Old China, the ancient Chinese and even today will work hard. In a way, for the time this was written, that was pretty bold for any Chinese or anyone in the world at that time to say they could move a mountain. Yet, I still do get a good laugh out of these ancient Chinese stories and tales.
On a note, the picture used in the Ancient Chinese Stories blog was taken in Xi An, and was at Empress Wu’s old bathing grounds. If anyone has any nice pictures of Ancient Chinese sites, feel free to post them up. Thank you to all the people also who comment and read my blog, glad to see there are still some interested in ancient cultures of any sort. A big thanks to my friends also for seeing that the story was incomplete.
Ancient Chinese Poem: A Woman’s Writing Zen Style
January 29, 2009
Me in Xi An posing by the Buddha of good fortune.
Hey everybody I think this post round I would do a poem, and I figured a nice Zen poem was due, after all not all of ancient Chinese writings for me necessarily need to be ancient Chinese stories to be enjoyable.. Now I already had a zen poem (aka Chan Buddhism) but I found one written by a woman and it’s always pleasing to see ancient poetry of any sort from anyone. I figured though since I really never mentioned a woman from ancient China (and there a quite a few famous ones from ancient Chinese times as well as modern ) in any of my stories, so this one I post up from the book “The Poetry of Zen,” by Same Hammill and J.P. Seaton. We know not who this Chinese Woman was but all we know was that she was a zen monk in the Song Dynasty which was really (at least from what I know) was the last time Chan or Zen Buddhism really had strong influence in China.
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Searching for spring all day, I never saw it,
straw sandals treading everywhere
among the clouds, among the bank.
Coming home, I laughed, catching
the plum blossom’s scent:
spring at each branch tip, already perfect.
—
Now the Song dynasty is not so ancient but was still of significance because it still was a full dynasty which followed the Tang after the time of the five dynasties which was about 60 years sometime in the 10th century. Chinese Buddhism had significantly declined after the Tang because the Tang had blamed the Buddhists for their difficulties. As a result, Song China made a return to Confucianism and made Neo-Confucian ideas. However, Zen in it’s time and even now in other areas of the world greatly affected poetry and aesthetic writing in general. I know this isn’t Ancient China per say, but I am still working on those ancient Chinese woman’s stories.
I don’t if I should try to interpret this particular poem, but it is kind of like enlightenment. If you try to look for it, you will not find it and it will come suddenly. I guess this Nun came from the school of sudden enlightenment.
I put up this photo simply because Zen is a form of Mhayana here I am next to one of the most famous of Mahayana Boddhissatvas (none exist in Theravada), the Buddha of wealth and good fortune. Hope everyone enjoyed this Chinese Poem from old China, I still find it interesting. Next time I will have a more ancient Chinese tale to add to our Chinese story list. Till the next ancient Chinese Tale.
Ancient Chinese Stories, and A Brief Introduction
November 27, 2008
Hi everyone, my name is Joseph Ahdoot and this is my blog on ancient Chinese stories. Every week we will have a new Chinese poem, Chinese story and a brief comment on the ancient Chinese or the time period which it was written so people could understand the context of the article. These Chinese poems, and Chinese stories I find rather interesting and often find myself pondering upon them after reading them. As for me; I myself am an East Asian specialist but also have a joy in writing. Feel free to comment on anything or ask any questions.
Today, I wish to introduce to a poem I found interesting which was originally a letter to a magistrate during the Tang dynasty written by Wang Wei. The translation I have is from the book The Poetry Of Zen. The Title is, “To Magistrate Chang.”
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Late, I love but quietness:
things of this are no more my concern.
Looking back, I’ve known no better plan
than this: returning to the grove.
Pine breezes loosen my robe.
Mountain moonbeams play my lute.
What, you ask, is Final Truth?
The fisherman’s song strikes deep into the bank.
—-
Just a brief note: this is a Zen story; originally, Zen reached Japan via China and during Wang Wei’s time in the Tang dynasty, it was at it’s peak. I find this particular Chinese poem of interest simply because it is an excellent Koan (written in Chinese and Japanese is written as 公案) which explains the ultimate truth or as it is more commonly known; enlightenment. To the common reader, this seems strange and confusing, yet to the Zen master, this makes perfect sense. Enlightenment in the eyes of Zen can be achieved by pushing away from logic. If one is too logical, then enlightenment can’t arise. This is my understanding and this is why I find it so fascinating. Till next time everyone.
