“Waiting for the Unicorn”
(23 OCTOBER 1852–14 SEPTEMBER
1937)1
Ch’en San-li (Po-yen, or Po-yin; SAN-YÜAN LAO-JEN), was a native of Yi-ning (modern-day Hsiu-shui), Kiangsi province. He grew up in a scholar’s family, his father being the governor-general of Hunan, Ch’en Pao-chen (1831–1900), a leader of the Reformist faction and an associate of T’an Ssu-t’ung and K’ang Yu-wei (qq.v.), who planned on turning Hunan into a model, progressive province. Ch’en passed his chin-shih examination in 1886 and served as a second-class secretary in the Board of Civil Appointments. But the failure of the 1898 Reform Movement brought down on father and son the ire of the Empress Dowager Tz’u-hsi, who dismissed both of them from office. They took up residence in Nanchang after their dismissal, but after the death of his father, the poet moved to Nanking where he built for himself the San-yüan Studio and devoted himself to scholarship and the writing of poetry.
Along with Cheng Hsiao-hsü (q.v.) and Fan Tang-shih (1854–1904), Ch’en San-li was a leading exponent and advocate of the Sung school of poetry and especially that of Huang T’ing-chien. He also admired the poetry of Han Yü and, like him, he wished to effect a revolution in the poetic style of his time by demanding greater vigor. The attention he paid to craftsmanship and diction, avoiding both the elegant and the vulgar and familiar, was unrivaled—thus achieving an intensity of emotion without perhaps the quaintness or “tartness,” that is sometimes identified with Huang T’ing-chien’s verse. Ch’en San-li’s poetic writings are found in the San-yüan ching-she shih (Poems from San-yüan’s Studio), which has a modern edition published in 1922. Ch’en San-li was survived by several sons who distinguished themselves as scholars; the most prominent of them was Ch’en Yin-k’o, who enjoyed an international reputation as a Buddhist scholar and an authority on the institutional history of T’ang China.
(Irving Lo)
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1. BDRC, 1:225–238.
Bald trees neatly stand row upon row,
A deserted slope quietly beckons me.
Deepening the chill—the occasional sounds of a stone chime;
The moon in a haze—cliffsides seem to float in the air.
Rats gnaw at boulders at the base of a wall;
Crows’ cries trail off near a boat on the creek.
Softly chanting poems beneath a faint moon,
This completes the picture of one night’s grief.
(SYCSCHC, 3:6a)
(Tr. Irving Lo)
View from the Pavilion on a Moonlit Night
Just now, when frost flies and the moon wears a halo,
Ten thousand hills stand still, and one pavilion, miraculous.
Pine branches shading roof tiles: a dragon leaving its claw marks;
Bamboo’s rustle, sounding at the window: a mouse playing with its whiskers.
A melancholy landscape—tall grave mounds here and there;
The eternal principle of things—perceived in unstrained brew.
An idle night, my hair has been combed through by wind and dew,
Though fitting still for the howling pack of nature’s demons to spy upon.
(SYCSS, 2:15b)
(Tr. Irving Lo)
Spring covers the mountains like the sea,
Every flight, every sound unconscious of itself.
Mixed flowers warmed by the sun’s shadow.
Budding willows draw out skeins of mist.
By flooded paddy fields I hear the urgent croakings of frogs,
Wild geese fly past a poet’s pavilion, crying mournfully.
The path where I come and go, staff in hand,
Inch by inch is fraught with traces of my tears.
(SYCSS, 1:12b)
(Tr. Irving Lo)
Croaking, crying, the frogs form a kingdom;
Diving, bombing, mosquitos share my bed.
Desolate hills still disturb my thoughts,
A single candle faces the vast unknown.
My house eaves link up with the influence of the stars,
From beyond the bamboo blind are wafted the fragrances of plants.
This dying night, I listen as in a dream—
On the valley wind, the music of pipes and strings.
(SYCSSHC, 1:41b)
(Tr. Irving Lo)
The dewy vapors are like tiny insects;
The waves’ power is like a recumbent bull.
The bright moon is like a white silk cocoon,
Enveloping my boat on the river.
(No. 2 from a series of 4; SYCSS, 1:58a)
(Tr. Irving Lo)
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