“Waiting for the Unicorn” | Open Indiana

Chao Yi (Yün-sung; OU-PEI), a native of Yang-hu, Kiangsu, was a noted historian and—along with Yüan Mei and Chiang Shih-ch’üan (qq.v.)—one of the most acclaimed poets of the Ch’ien-lung era. Son of an impoverished scholar who made his living as a tutor in private families, he was known to be a precocious child. When he was fourteen, his father died and Chao Yi was invited to succeed to his father’s tutoring post, thus becoming tutor to all his former schoolmates. He continued tutoring and secretarial work until he passed the chin-shih examination with highest honors, as chuang-yüan or optimus; but because the emperor noticed that the candidate in third place was from the province of Shensi (which had not produced a chuang-yüan during the entire Ch’ing era), he ordered that the two names be interchanged and that Chao be given third-place honors, as t’an-hua. After Chao achieved fame as a poet and his name was frequently mentioned along with Yüan Mei and Chiang Shih-ch’uan, he constantly chafed at his failure to emerge as the leading member in a trio of preeminences.

Chao Yi’s reputation as a scholar and historian rests largely on a well-known and highly respected critical study of the twenty-two dynastic histories (Nien-erh shih cha-chi), a large work in 36 chüan which he completed in 1796 and which was printed three years later. His poetic output consists of fifty-three chüan of poems published under the title Ou-pei chi; he also left a volume of discourses on poetry entitled Ou-pei shih-hua, in which he made a critical study of ten earlier poets. His choice of subjects for examination was exemplary in that the list included two of his near-contemporaries (Wu Wei-yeh and Cha Shen-hsing—qq.v.) along with four T’ang poets (Li Po, Tu Fu, Han Yü, and

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1. Lien-che Tu, ECCP, 1:75–76.

Knowing full well the tragic and comic are bits of stagecraft,

Still I can’t bear the singing when the arias are sad.

Make-believe weeping has caused real tears to flow,

So people laugh and call me a silly, credulous old man.

(OPSC, p. 478)

(Tr. Shirleen S. Wong)

The Red Cliff⁴

Even today this natural barrier commands the Ching-hsiang region;⁵

Before Red Cliff Mountain, ancient ramparts stretch on and on.

But where “the magpie flies south” is no longer the land of Wei;

And where “the Great River flows east” we think of the young Lord Chou—

A man for a thousand ages, from a tripartite kingdom;

An expanse of hills and rivers, the field of a hundred battles.

Now, passing by, we see only the vestiges of the past;

Under a bright moon, a fisherman sings the song “Blue Waves.”⁶

(OPSC, p. 306)

(Tr. Shirleen S. Wong)

Responding to a Poem on T’ai-po Pavilion
at Colored Stone [Jetty]⁷

By Aloeswood Pavilion, you once walked in your stocking feet;⁸

This place now bears witness to your sailing away under a bright moon.

Into the chalky waves of the river have dissolved an inspired immortal’s bones,

But as high as the green mountain, for ten thousand ages, rears a poet’s name.

Your brocaded gown was the envy of thousands those days;

But when can the Golden Grain Tathāgata⁹ be brought back to this world again?

From a hundred-foot tower, looking down into an abyss,

Let me sing a song to your proud spirit’s everlasting praise!

(OPSC, p. 307)

(Tr. Irving Lo)

NOTES

1. The Shih-ching and the Ch’u Tz’u, the two oldest anthologies of Chinese poetry.

2. Alluding to a famous parable in the Meng-tzu, in which Mencius points out that when two delicacies, fish and bears’ paw, are placed before a person and he can only have one of the two to eat he has to make a difficult choice.

3. The Unicorn Pavilion (Lin-ko) was first built on the order of Emperor Wu of the Han dynasty to celebrate the capture of the mythical, auspicious ch’i-lin, the unicorn. Later, portraits of meritorious ministers and military heroes were painted on its walls.

4. Ch’ih-pi, the Red Cliff, situated along the middle reaches of the Yangtze in modern Hupeh province, was commonly believed to be the scene of a decisive battle fought in the winter of A.D. 208. At this battle, the power of Ts’ao Ts’ao in the north (later known as the Wei Kingdom) was crushed by the naval forces of Wu under the command of Chou Yü, a young aristocrat related by marriage to the ruling house of Wu. The first half of line 3 is a direct quote from a poem by Ts’ao Ts’ao, “A Short Song”) “Tuan ko hsing”), and line 4 contains a quotation from a famous lyric by the Sung poet Su Shih on the subject.

5. The modern provinces of Hupeh and Hunan, where Ching-chou and Hsiang-yang are the principal cities.

6. The song of the “Blue Waves” (“Ts’ang-lang”) identifies an ancient folk song quoted both in the Meng-tzu and in the “Fisherman” poem in the Ch’u Tz’u. The text reads, “When the waters of the Ts’ang-lang are clear, I wash my tassels in them;/When the waters of the Ts’ang-lang are muddy, I wash my feet in them.” This song is generally taken to mean that one must choose between public office (tasseled hat strings symbolizing official ranks) when there is good government, and a life of reclusion when times are corrupt.

7. Ts’ai-shih chi (Colored Stone Jetty), located northwest of Tang-t’u, Anhwei, is where, according to legend, the T’ang poet Li Po died and was last seen riding away on a whale. Li Po, whose courtesy name was T’ai-po, often referred to himself as a “banished immortal,” from a sobriquet given him by his contemporary poets.

8. This alludes to the legend that, when summoned to the Aloeswood Pavilion in the palace of the emperor (Hsüan-tsung) to compose poems, he would have his boots pulled off by Consort Yang’s favorite attendant Kao Li-shih.

9. Chin-su ju-lai, or Golden Grain Tathāgata, in Buddhist terminology, refers to the Buddha of the Future. It was also said that the Indian monk Vimalakīrti (who came to China in the Han dynasty) was his reincarnation. In a poem by Li Po, entitled “Replying to the Question, ‘Who Is [Li] Po?’ Asked by Magistrate Chia-yeh [Chi] of Hu-chou,” the poet himself wrote: “Why must the Magistrate of Hu-chou ask [such a question]?/Golden Grain Tathīgata is my previous reincarnation.” Chin-su is also the name of a hill, northwest of P’u-ch’eng, Shensi, where the tomb of Hsüan-tsung was situated. Kao Li-shih was said to have been buried there also (as a companion to the dead emperor).

Waiting for the Unicorn