“Waiting for the Unicorn”
(16 JUNE 1692–17 OCTOBER 1752)1
Li E (T’ai-hung; FAN-HSIEH), a native of Ch’ien-t’ang (Hangchow), Chekiang province, was by contemporary acclaim the foremost landscape poet of his time, and particularly renowned for his pentasyllabic verse and his memorable sketches of the Chiang-Che region. A prolific author, he left behind eight titles, totaling close to 200 chüan, including twenty chüan of shih and tz’u poems. He was also known for his compilation Sung-shih chi-shih (anecdotes about Sung shih and their authors, in 100 chüan), and for the annotated edition of a collection of tz’u compiled by the Sung poet Chou Mi (1232–1298), known as the Chüeh-miao hao-tz’u (An Anthology of the Best Loved Lyrics), which Li edited with Cha Wei-jen (1694–1749).
Li E’s success as a poet and scholar is a classic case of personal industry and literary patronage. Coming from a very poor family and orphaned early in life, he was self-educated and had to pursue a vigorous course of study under the most difficult circumstances. His erudition and poetic talents eventually won him a large circle of literary friends and admirers, including the celebrated Ma brothers of Yangchow—two opulent salt merchants who were also bibliophiles and the most generous literary patrons. Li E enjoyed the hospitality of the Ma brothers on many occasions; and it was at the latters’ private library—the famous Ts’ung-shu lou at Yangchow—that he did the research and writing for his voluminous Sung-shih chi-shih (Records of Sung Poetry). There are indications that Li E sorely needed this patronage for, despite his growing fame as a man of letters and his receiving a chü-jen degree in 1720, he never seriously sought or ever received an official appointment.
Equally outstanding in the shih and in the tz’u, Li E had a creative career that spanned over four decades. His early poems are dominated by pure landscape themes and are at times suffused with an ambience quite reminiscent of Wang Wei and Meng Hao-jan (689–740), exhibiting the qualities known as p’ing-tan (tranquil and bland) and k’ung-ling (ethereal), which became the mode cherished by the Sung poets. His later poems, however, often blend landscape descriptions with contemplative references to personal experience. As a writer of lyrics, he was first inspired by Southern Sung poets like Chiang K’uei and Chang Yen (hence his reputation for belonging to the Che-hsi school), but eventually he returned to the hsiao-ling of earlier times, thereby showing a versatility and an awareness of tradition that characterizes a true master of that subgenre.
(Shirleen S. Wong)
____________________
1.Lien-che Tu, ECCP, 1:454- 455.
Spending the Night at Monk Ch’ao Yün’s Retreat
on Mount Lung-men1
A cliffside pavilion juts out from the treetops,
Where I lodge for one night amid ten thousand hills.
A tiger’s roar won’t startle a monk in his meditation;
The sound of bells must come from somewhere in the sky.
Facing away from the window, I see the shadows of roosting birds;
Blowing out the candle, I listen to the wind in the pines.
Tomorrow I’ll look for fresh water by the stone steps.
Surely it will fill up a dozen bamboo pipes.2
(FHSFC, 1:3b-4a)
(Tr. Shirleen S. Wong)
Blossoming peach trees among the bamboos: patches of moistened red.
Fish traps adrift in a rising tide, half hidden by the reeds.
Spring scenery at South Lake has nobody in charge,
Except for the slanting wind and fine rain everywhere.
(FHSFHC, 7:4a-b)
(Tr. Shirleen S. Wong)
Passing through South Lake Again
Approaching South Lake, I already begin to dread the journey,
A place of old memories, each corner reopens a wound.
Watching plum blossoms in a small courtyard could be but a dream fulfilled;
Listening to rain in a quiet room is like entering another life.
Autumn waters are bluer for reflecting my graying temples;
The evening bells sound crisper for breaking a sorrowful heart.
Lord of Emptiness, take pity on this homeless soul—
Out of this incense smoke make me the City of Refuge.4
(FHSFHC, 2:9a-b)
(Tr. Shirleen S. Wong)
A Cowherd’s Song: In Imitation of Chang Chi5
My master gave me a black cow to tend,
And I said to my master, “You have nothing to worry about.
Mornings I look for water and grass; at dusk I return home.
I won’t allow even a gadfly to trouble its eyes.”
I led the cow to the southern slope to have a good time;
I hardly knew if the cow was hungry or had a full stomach.
Should the cow get sick, I’ll run from my master’s whip,
For the master can always consult a vet.
(FHSFC,1:2a)
(Tr. Irving Lo)
Leaving Southern Screen Hill6 at Dawn and Crossing the [West]
Lake: A View from the Boat
Dawn spreads out its colors before my boat has barely left the shore;
Glancing back, I watch the abbot’s lodge recede, become smaller than a bird’s nest.
Now the full springtime lake may peep at the hill’s reflections
As the sun’s early rays, for ten li around, mount up the willow tips.
My unconventional, wild fame is known only to the hidden birds;
This old man’s toddling gait is the mockery of rural folks.
My wandering steps do not yet pursue the fragrant dust;
Far on the opposite shore, I hear a fisherman tapping on his boat.
(FHSFHC, 6:24a)
(Tr. Irving Lo)
3. Calligraphy by Li E: “Leaving Southern Screen Hill at Dawn.” Courtesy of the Shanghai Museum, People’s Republic of China.
She leans against the painted railing—
Autumn ablaze with colors after rain, but paler she looks.
Across the water the sunset clouds are still bright,
Against small hills, three or four.
When will we sail together on a boat, you and I?
Wait for the day we can break off the flowering lotus and look into our mirror.
Then, day after day, the green round plate and the lightly touchedup beauty—
No place for the west wind to dim its glory.
(FHSFHC, 10:11a)
(Tr. Shirleen S. Wong)
Tune: Pai-tzu ling
Title: Passing Seven-Mile Rapids7 on a Moonlit Night, I
Encountered This Marvelous Scenery and Composed This
Tune Which Almost Made the Many Hills Echo to My Song.
Fine autumn scenery tonight
Has led me to the T’ung River, to discourse on high exploits of long ago,
Where the wind and dew no longer belong to the human world.
I sit on the stern of my boat, blowing on my flute.
Myriad sounds of nature rise from the hills;
5
One star shines in the water.
I again imagine myself in a dream seeking immortality,
Until the oars’ sound drifts far away8
To where the fisherman from the Western Cliff lodged for the night.9
Recalling the somber days of the Evening Tide Society,10 | 10 |
Such high-minded spirit no longer to be seen
Has made me appear the more forlorn.
Silently, the cold light of three or four glowworms
Winding their way past a thatched hut near the bay in front.
Spotless, the forest garners the mist; | 15 |
Straight up stands the cliff obstructing the moon’s path.
My sail’s shadow, unsteady in the limpid green,
Bobs and drifts with the flowing current—
White clouds returning to their rest in the deep valley.
(FHSFC, 9:11b-12a)
(Tr. Irving Lo)
NOTES
1. Lung-men Shan is located to the southwest of Hangchow, nicknamed Hsiao-ho Shan. The monk’s name Ch’ao-yün means “Nestling-in-the-clouds.”
2. Constructed as a conduit for water.
3. Nan-hu, located south of Hangchow, consisting of an upper and a lower lake. These lakes, originally dug during the Han dynasty, were significantly improved and enlarged during the governorship of Fan Ch’eng-mo (1624–1676) during the K’ang-hsi reign.
4. Hua-ch’eng (City of Refuge) is the name of the illusory city depicted in the Lotus Sutra. It is a temporary resting place created for the comfort of seekers of nirvana.
5. Chang Chi (765?–830), a T’ang poet who won the praise of Po Chüyi as the best writer of yüeh-fu poetry.
6. Southern Screen (Nan-p’ing) Hill, so named for its resemblance to a decorative screen, located southwest of Hangchow, is a famous scenic spot in the West Lake region.
7. Located near T’ung-lu prefecture in Chekiang, west of Yen-lin Mountain; also known as the Fu-ch’un Islet. Between two precipitous cliffs, the water of this shallow is so swift that boatmen speak of the distance as “consisting of seven li when there is wind and seventy li when there is no wind”
8. Alluding to an apocryphal story in the Chuang-tzu which relates that once Confucius played on a lute and sang and a fisherman came to listen. When Confucius tried to seek him out and engage him in conversation, the fisherman took off in his boat, to the great disappointment of the sage, who waited on the bank until he could no longer hear the oars’ sound.
9. Echoing the poem “The Old Fisherman” by the T’ang poet Liu Tsung-yüan (773–819), written while Liu was an exile in Yangchow:
The old fisherman lodges for the night by the Western Cliff,
Mornings he drinks from the clear Hsiang River and burns the bamboo of Ch’u for fuel.
Mist dissolves, the sun rises, but there is nobody near;
At one sound of yiya, the hills and the water suddenly turn green.
Looking back at the horizon, he floats out into midstream;
On the cliff the carefree clouds chase each other.
[Liu Ho-tung chi, 43:25b-26a]
10. The Evening Tide Society, or Hsi She, refers to the meetings of a group of friends of the Sung lyric poet Hsieh Ao (1249–1295), a man especially admired for his integrity and high-mindedness. It was said that he was so driven by grief over the death of Wen T’ien-hsiang (1236–1283) that he took up the life of a recluse in the Chekiang region, and he once performed sacrifices to the spirit of Wen at the famous Yen Jetty (Yen Lin) on the banks of the Fuch’un River. Wen was known as the author of the “Song of Righteousness” (“Cheng-ch’i ko”), composed just before his death, after he had fought against the Mongols in a series of losing battles on the coast of Chekiang and Fukien provinces until his ultimate capture and execution by Kublai Khan (1215–1294).
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