Andrea Bangert, Winter '02
Notes on the Author
Li Qingzhao was born in A.D.1084 to an
aristocratic family in Shandong province. Her father Li Gefei was a
professor at the Imperial Academy in Kaifeng. As the daughter of an elite
and educated family, Qingzhao received an unusually liberal upbringing for
a woman. In 1101 she married Zhao Mingcheng, the scholarly son of the
prominent politician Zhao Dingji.
Li Qingzhao's subsequent life was to be
deeply affected by the politics of Song times. Her father was associated
with Su Dongpo and the faction which opposed the reforms of Wang Anshi.
Her father-in-law, on the other hand, was a political enemy of Su. In
1102 Qingzhao's father was exiled from the Song capital due to his
affiliations. Amnesty was later offered to Li Gefei, however Zhao Dingji
was dismissed from the office of prime minister in 1107 and died shortly
after. Members of the Zhao family were persecuted, and the political
aspirations of Qingzhao's husband Mingcheng were curtailed.
Li Qingzhao and Zhao Mingcheng spent the ten
years of his political exile researching their shared literary and
artistic interests. The two collected and wrote about bronze works of the
Shang and Zhou dynasties. Together they compiled the Jinshilu, the
"Catalogue of Inscriptions on Stone and Bone", a work documenting two
thousand ancient texts. Li Qingzhao and Zhao Mingcheng also shared a love
of poetry, and often wrote pieces for one another.
When the Jurchen occupied Kaifeng in 1126 and
forced the Northern Song to flee the capital, the couple became refugees.
After living in Nanjing for a year they resumed their journey. Zhao
Mingcheng died of illness in 1129; Li Qingzheng continued on alone to
Hangzhou in Zhejiang province. As a single woman and an author of
political satire, she was not subsequently accepted by either the court or
the literary world. She died in poverty in 1151.
Notes on the Poems
Li Qingzhao is one of the most famous
authors of ci. This form of lyric verse first became prevalent
during the Five Dynasties, and was widely used by the literati of the Song
dynasty. The ci arose as words to older melodies transmitted from
Central Asia. Each poem takes its title, its rhyme scheme, and the
pattern which determines the number of syllables per line from the piece
of music for which it was written. The ci thus feature lines of
irregular syllabic length combined in stanzas which adhere to a fixed
pattern. Such poetry offered fascinating new rhythmic opportunities to
Chinese authors.
Both of the following ci address the
theme of mourning for an absent husband. The first was written by Li
Qingzhao during the Mid-Autumn festival to a tune titled "Drunken under
the Shadows of Flowers". This piece was created for and sent to Zhao
Mingcheng while he served as an official in a distant province. The
second was written six years after his death to the tune of "Spring in
Wuling".
The mid-autumn or Chongyang festival takes
place on the ninth day of the ninth month. It was originally a harvest
celebration, the time of the autumn feast for the dead. This is a day for
picnics, for admiring scenery and places of natural beauty, for spending
time with lovers and family. The festival is a ritual intended to grant
long life to its participants; it elicits musings on longevity and
mortality.
The celebration of the Double Ninth was a
topic addressed several times by the wine-loving recluse Tao Ch'ien (AD
400). When she speaks of drinking wine in the eastern bamboo groves, Li
Qingzhao thus doubtless refers to a famous line from the earlier poet's
piece "Drinking Wine" (V): "I gather chrysanthemums under the eastern
hedge". The image of the chrysanthemum is associated with both long life
and the Zhongyang festival. Li Qingzhao refers to the golden blossoms
while mourning the absence of her husband during the mid-autumn fest.
The place-name Wuling is probably a
reference to Tao Chien's prose piece "Peach Blossom Spring". In another
poem ("Mourning the Flute in the Phoenix Pavilion"), Li Qingzhao calls her
husband her "Wuling friend", implying someone with whom she has shared
blissful days. Such beauteous, halcyon times will, like the land of peach
blossoms which Tao Chien describes, never again be experienced by mortals.
Both poems illustrate a unique awareness of
the progress of time. Tension is created between the conflicting images
of time as a cyclic and a linear phenomenon. "Double Nine" describes one
interminable day during which the poet mourns her absent husband. The
return of the mid-autumn festival indicates a repetitive aspect to time;
however, the onset of cold at midnight speaks of linear progression and
describes the poet's sharpening awareness of loss. The incense burner
wears away, the soul withers; Li Qingzhao imagines herself dwindling and
fading like a flower. "Wuling Spring" is set at the close of day, the end
of summer. The blossoms have fallen. The feeling of loss which entered
the reader's consciousness in the previous poem now overwhelms.
Elsewhere, other lives go on: spring returns to the town called Shuangxi,
but it passes the poet by.
Double Nine
To the tune of "Drunken under the Shadows of Flowers."
Faint mist, somber clouds; sorrow the
whole day. My incense wears thin its golden beast. It is again the
festive season of Mid-Autumn. At midnight the chill first penetrates my
gauze curtains and seeps into the headrest of precious jade.
After dusk I hold a cup of wine in the
eastern groves. A secret fragrance fills my sleeves: you cannot say that
this does not wither the soul. A wind from the west furls the curtain; I
dwindle, thin as a golden flower.
Tenuous mist, thick cloud overcast;
Sorrow the whole endless day.
Incense wears thin the brazen beast;
Again comes the time of the Mid-Autumn fest.
Through gauze curtains and pillow of jade
At midnight the cruel chill seeps.
After dusk I drink in the eastern grove.
A secret fragrance fills my sleeves:
Don't tell me this loss does not wither the soul.
The curtain rolls in the western breeze;
I dwindle, thin as a flower of gold.
Wuling Spring
To the tune of "Spring in Wuling."
The wind is stilled; the dust is
fragrant, the blossoms already fallen. As the day grows late I am too
weary to comb out my hair. His possessions are here, but his essence is
gone: everything has ceased. I long to speak, but the tears stream.
I have heard it said that springtime at
Shuangxi is yet lovely. i intend to sail there in a dainty boat. I fear
only that the featherweight Shuangxi boats would be unable to bear such a
burden of grief.
Wind is still, dust fragrant among blossoms fallen fair.
At close of day I am too worn to comb my silken hair.
Objects remain, but the essence is no longer there:
Everything has ceased. My speech is choked by tears.
Shuangxi in spring is still lovely, I hear.
I would sail there in a boat dainty as a leaf.
But the featherweight Shuangxi vessels, I fear,
Could not bear the mortal burden of my grief.
Bibliography:
1) As Though Dreaming,
Lenore Mayhew and William McNaughton,
c.1977, Mushinsha Limited
2) Li Ch'ing-Chao,
Kenneth Rexroth and Ling Chung,
c.1979, New Directions Publishing
3) Plum Blossom, James Cryer,
c. 1984, Carolina Wren Press
4) Li Ch'ing-chao, Hu Pin-ching,
c.1966, Twayne Publishers