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Drifting Among Rivers and Lakes: Southern Song Dynasty Poetry and the Problem of Literary History
 0674073223, 9780674073227

Table of contents :
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Contents
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Abbreviations
CHAPTER ONE The Other Shore: China and the Early History of the Literaty
The Classical Order of Languageand Aesthetic Experience
1) DIFFICULTIES WITH LANGUAGE, REFERENCE, AND IDENTITY
Crossings: The Role of the Aestheticin the Articulation of Encounter
CHAPTER TWO The Source and Streams Flou/ingfrom It
Huang Tingjian and the Redefinition of Poetry
CHAPTER THREE West of the River: The Jiangxi Poets
Streams and Tributaries: Variations inJiangxi Poetic Practice
CHAPTER FOURThe Jiangxi Style in the Field of CulturalProduction

Citation preview

Drifting among Rivers and Lakes

Southern Song Dynasty Poetry and the Problem of Literary History

MICHAEL A. FULLER

Published b y the Harvard U n i v e r s i t y Asia C e n t e r Distributed b y Harvard U n i v e r s i t y Press C a m b r i d g e (Massachusetts) and L o n d o n 2013



2013 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College

Printed in the United States of America The Harvard-Yenching Institute, founded in 1928 and headquartered at Harvard University, is a foundation dedicated to the advancement of higher education in the humanities and social sciences in East and Southeast Asia. The Institute supports advanced research at Harvard by faculty members of certain Asian universities and doctoral studies at Harvard and other universities by junior faculty at the same universities. It also supports East Asian studies at Harvard through contributions to the Harvard-Yenching Library and publication of the HarvardJournal of Asiatic Studies and books on premodern East Asian history and literature. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Fuller, Michael Anthony. Drifting among rivers and lakes : Southern Song dynasty poetry and the problem of literary history/Michael A. Fuller, pages cm. — (Harvard-Yenching Institute Monograph Series�; 86) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 978-0-674-07322-7 (acid-free paper) 1. Chinese poetry—Song dynasty, 960-1279-History and criticism. 2. Chinese literature—History and criticism—Theory, etc. I. Title. PL2323.F86 2013 895.1'14209—dc23 2012047017 Index by the author @

Printed on acid-free paper

Last figure below indicates year of this printing 19 18 17 16 15 14 13

Drifting among Rivers and Lakes

HARVARD-YENCHING INSTITUTE MONOGRAPH SERIES 8 6

To Kathy

Contents Acknowledgments Casting Off: A Theoretical Introduction 1.

ix l

The Other Shore: China and the Early History of the Literary

29

2.

The Source and Streams Flowing from It

50

3.

"West of the River": The Jiangxi Poets

85

4.

The Jiangxi Style in the Field of Cultural Production

123

5.

Sounding Bottom: Yang Wanli and the Dynamics of Poetic Encounter

182

Reading the Wind: Lu You and the Poetics of Experience

240

Head Winds: Displacing the Aesthetic in Daoxue Discourse from the Northern Song to Z h u Xi

299

Changing Course: The Discourse of the Way in Mid-Southern Song China

349

Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes: Poetry in the Early Thirteenth Century

405

6. 7. 8. 9. 10.

An Inner Compass: The Poetry of Experience at Dynasty's End

458

Bibliography

495

Index

517

Acknowledgments

I

n writing this long book, I have accumulated many debts.

Some are institutional and some professional, but the greatest are personal. In 1995 when I embarked on this project, I received the first o f two University of California President's Fellowships in the Humanities. In 2004—5,during the second of these award periods, I spent the year at Harvard University and had the opportunity both to discuss my work with colleagues there and to use the Harvard-Yenching and Widener Libraries. In 2009 both the A C L S and the National Endowment for the Humanities awarded me grants to allow me to complete the manuscript. I am deeply grateful for this support. Along the way, I received crucial assistance from the librarians at the Gest Library at Princeton and in the Asian Reading Room o f the Library of Congress. I also must express my gratitude to Bill Wong and Ying Zhang, the East Asian librarians at U C I w h o worked tirelessly to build the collection of Song and Yuan dynasty materials I needed for this project. Also at U C I I wish to thank the Center for Asian Studies and Dr. Claire Li. T h e Center provided funds for Dr. Li to develop a database of late Northern Song and early Southern Song dynasty poets that helped me sort out the complex literary and social dynamics of the time. Another form o f institutional support during the past fifteen years that I must acknowledge as crucial to this monograph is the intense effort of scholars in China to organize, edit, and publish materials on the Song and Yuan dynasties. When I started reading Liu Kezhuang

X

Acknowledgments

in 1995,for example, I,like everyone else, had to work with the old photocopy of his collection in the Sibucongkan. By the time I returned to his writings at the end of my research, Wang Ronggui and Xiang Yixian had published a collated, punctuated, typeset edition. I am greatly indebted to them. During this period, we also have seen the publication of the Complete Song Dynasty Prose and the Complete Yuan Dynasty Prose. N e w editions of Huang Tingjian and Yang Wanli~~both central to my study~have been published. The list of valuable new scholarly editions of primary texts is very long. Equally important, however, is the online access to Chinese secondary scholarship made possible through the China Academic Journals Full-Text Database: for the past decade U.S. scholars have been able to explore a wide range of recent and current Chinese scholarship. While reading articles that cannot be found in libraries in the United States is important, however, much more rewarding have been the direct conversations with scholars from China, Taiwan, Japan, and Korea made possible by the efforts of Wang Shuizhao, Zeng Zaozhuang, and the other conveners of the biennial conferences on Song dynasty literature organized in China. Since I began attending in 2000,these meetings have been an invaluable opportunity to discuss shared concerns and exchange ideas. Finally, I would like to thank the Nelson-Atkins Museum for permission to use a scene from Xia Gui's Twelve Views of Landscape on the dust jacket of this book. I also am grateful for conversations with colleagues here in the United States. I have subjected the Western Branch of the American Oriental Society to yearly doses of my work in progress for many years, and my friends there have tolerated my more theoretical flights with patience and a willingness to hear me out. I also must thank Catherine Liu at the U C I Humanities Center for creating opportunities for me to present my work to a larger community of scholars of world literature at U C I . Among my colleagues at U C I , my late friend Richard Kroll saw commonalities with his own work at the intersection of English literary and intellectual history and supported my project with wise advice and sharp questions from the very beginning. I also owe debts of gratitude to Carrie Noland and James Steintrager for their support and their careful reading of draft chapters. M y thanks as well to Roberta Bickford, whose advice I have

Acknowledgments

XI

sought over the years on art-historical matters, for recommending the wonderful Xia Gui painting for the cover. M y east coast colleagues Peter K. Bol and Anna M. Shields patiently read through the manuscript as it evolved over the years and offered invaluable scholarly suggestions and sound editorial advice from which the book has benefitted greatly. Anthony DeBlasi tried to get me to make the first chapter less dense, so I have only myself to blame. I also must profusely thank Kristen Wanner at the Asia Center for her determined effort to bring order and consistency to the book and for her excellent editorial ear and ability to amend infelicities of expression and untangle my more convoluted constructions. The mistakes that remain are entirely mine. In the end, my personal debts are weightiest of all. M y wonderful children James and Alice grew up while I was writing this book, and I thank them for their patience with their scholarly father. During the long, quiet hours at my desk, I also was deeply grateful that, from the beginning, our cat Polterklaus kept me company in my necessarily solitary work. But almost as I wrote the last words of the final chapter, we discovered that he, having grown old, had developed the cancer that brought his end two months later. M y greatest debt of love and gratitude is to my wife Kathryn Ragsdale, who unflaggingly supported me through the writing of this book. Kathy took over many burdens, both those of practical day-to-day life and more complex and substantial burdens. She provided the support James and Alice needed during their adolescence and kept me at least minimally part of the human community. Kathy also has read every word in this book at least three or four times; throughout the project, she persevered in being a better editor than I deserved, since I was less than gracious in accepting her crucial emendations. Without her judgment, determination, and love, this book would not have been possible, and I humbly dedicate it to her. M.A.F.

Casting Off: A Theoretical Introduction

There is no progress, no development, no history o f art except a history o f writers, institutions, and techniques.

~Rene Wellek

The Uncertain Shore: Chinese Literary History

L

et me begin with a foundational story. In 960 the general Zhao Kuangyin�趙匡堉L (d. 976) deposed the young emperor o f the

Later Z h o u ~ o n e o f the small states that maintained local order after the collapse o f the great but long-moribund Tang dynasty~and

gradually reunited most o f former Tang domain into the new Song dynasty. Partly to prevent his own children from meeting the Later Z h o u emperor's fate, Z h a o established a policy o f "weakening the military and strengthening the civil bureaucracy•,,In order to staff the bureaucracy that would run the far-flung new empire, however, he quickly had to recruit competent men committed to the success o f the dynasty. This was a problem. T h e earlier Tang model had been to draw upon the sons o f the aristocratic lineages of the medieval great clans, w h o understood that it was both their duty and in their interest to serve. Unfortunately, large-scale socioeconomic and demographic shifts had broken the great clans, so Zhao had to find a new source o f personnel. T h e Tang had used a system o f examinations to confirm the suitability o f young men seeking access to official positions. T h e early Song emperors greatly expanded this examination system and, in casting their net widely, created a stratum o f scholarofficials w h o primarily~if i m p e r f e c t l y a t t a i n e d their positions through genuine merit.

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In the early Song, the government availed itself o f the new technology of wood-block printing to distribute broadly the canonical texts that were the basis of the examinations to schools throughout the empire. Participation in the exams expanded rapidly and remained open to families outside the circles of power. Literacy’ learning, and culture flourished. With a stable and responsive government, the society prospered. As large cities developed, a monetarized economy expanded into the surrounding rural areas that provided the materials for the ever more vibrant urban centers. However, the story does not end there: while the populace enjoyed decades o f peace, problems grew both at home and abroad. T h e Song dynasty from its beginning committed itself to buying peace on the northern border in order to avoid the need for a large standing army, but this policy put a strain on fiscal resources. Debates within the government about how to raise the required funds grew increasingly fierce because the question of how to intervene in the economy forced the scholar-official stratum to confront basic questions about the nature o f the state. Although policy throughout the Song had been guided by interpreting the Confucian classics and canonical histories, the literati discovered that these texts did not speak with a single voice, and that indeed they could be cited to support mutually contradictory positions. With faith in fundamental intellectual and moral unity collapsing, factions became increasingly strident and brutal. In the midst o f this partisan strife, the northern Jurchen state o f Jin discovered exactly how hollow Song dynasty strength had become, attacked, and in 1126 conquered the north o f China. T h e reigning emperor as well as the heir apparent was captured and taken north. Those w h o fled south rallied around another son w h o was installed as the emperor Gaozong (r. 1127-62), first ruler o f the Southern Song dynasty. Is this history o f the rise and fall o f the Northern Song dynasty (960-1127) a specifically Chinese history? What does it mean to be a Chinese history? T h e central actors (emperors, generals, officials), the large-scale transformations that frame the story (urbanization, monetarization, and demographic shifts), the cultural components (canon-formation, literacy,the rise o f print), and the arc o f action (unification, prosperity, internal strife, and collapse) all are familiar

3 Casting Off to Western readers, and yet they derive from traditional Chinese historiography. Certainly there are elements of the story that do not translate well. What it means to be a eft�帝,an emperor, for example, draws on religious, cultural, and institutional systems that have no direct counterpart in the West. Approximation to broad categories inevitably brings loss, and one confronts the conundrum: to the extent that something may be uniquely Chinese, it by definition will be hermeneutically opaque to the contemporary Western reader. Yet how could a uniquely Chinese system of meaning arise? A long history with little contact with the West surely guarantees deep differences between the cultures, but is there fundamental incommensurability? The question of radical otherness is of no small moment. Indeed the larger political events of our time have compelled scholars to see that the seemingly theoretical question of whether cultures are by nature closed and mutually incommunicable has ethical and political dimensions that require carefully considered and clear answers, even if nuanced by historical complexities.1 Scholars of literature and culture have come to acknowledge the value of some form of minimal humanistic universalism to navigate our intercultural l. The fatwa announced against Salman Rushdie as well as the writings that provoked it in particular seems to have challenged scholars. Was Rushdie wrong in the first place, and if the fatwa was wrong as a response, on what basis except some idea of universal human rights could one reject it as a deeply felt judgment by a culture not one's own? One of the best recent discussions of theoretical issues in cross-cultural judgments that I have found is Satya P. Mohanty's "Can Our Values Be Objective? O n Ethics, Aesthetics, and Progressive Politics” (New Literary History 32 (2001): 803-33). He argues: I propose that many of our deepest evaluative concepts, whether ethical ones or aesthetic, refer not only to the cultures and social contexts in which they were produced but also, as it were, “outward”: they refer both to genuine properties of human nature and to what we know about our social and political possibilities. (814) Reflecting on the problem of all perspective necessarily being historically shaped, Mohanty concludes: Since our deeper ethical and aesthetic concepts are necessarily theory-laden, ideological, and culturally inflected, the realist can argue that the best form of inquiry into the nature of value, aesthetic or ethical, will need to be comparative and cross-cultural. (828-29)

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encounters: if one postulates that systems o f meaning are not radically other, then, in the end, they must be accessible through adequate effort. Tzvetan Todorov,for example, argues, [W]e are not only separated by cultural differences; we are also united by a common human identity, and it is this which renders possible communication, dialogue, and in the final analysis, the comprehension of Otherness一it is possible precisely because Otherness is never radical.2 Yet the minimal “human identity" that makes communication possible here is a formal, critical postulate—a challenge to our understanding~rather than a reassurance that w e can continue as w e are because w e already know what it is to be "human." 3 Whatever will prove to be the appropriate level o f abstraction through which to set out the correspondences between different cultural systems, w e can expect that it will be at a level of description o f significantly higher order than that available to us now. As Mario J. Valdes ruefully notes, [W]e ought to have known that categories and concepts are intellectual abstractions used heuristically and cannot be drawn from one literature to describe the articulations of another. The case is made against falsification of non-western European literatures into imperfect imitations or colorful primitives.4

2. Tzvetan Todorov, “‘Race,’ Writing, and Culture," in Henry Louis Gates, Jr., ed., 'Race/ Writing and Difference (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1986), p. 374,cited in Ulker Gokberk, "Understanding Alterity: Auslandliteratur between Relativism and Universalism," in David Perkins, Theoretical Issues in Literary History, Harvard English Series 16 (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1991), p. 164. 3. Indeed, as Mohanty makes very clear in "Can Our Values Be Objective," we can be fairly sure that the concepts to be used in approaching other literary and aesthetic traditions will not be those we have at present: [SJince it is overwhelmingly likely that the dominant views about literary and aesthetic value in most American universities (to take one example) are for the most part informed by mainly the Western traditions, discussion of the objectivity of value will tend to be ethnocentric and ideological even with the best of intentions. One way out of this problem, if you take the realist view seriously, is to make every such course on aesthetic value into one where the primary emphasis is comparative and cross-cultural. (829) 4. Mario J. Valdes, "Why Comparative Literary History?" in Mario J. Valdes, Daniel Javitch, and A. Owen Aldridge, eds., Comparative Literary History as Discourse: In Honor of Anna Balakian (Bern: Peter Lang, 1992), p. 7.

5 Casting Off The “Chinese,,in "Chinese literary history" presents an urgent problem because it is not a hopeless task that therefore can be ignored. The two thousand years of Chinese literature stand as an open and accessible challenge to the adequacy of our understanding of literary history. Stephen Greenblatt, reflecting on the history of "literature," argues: [T]he proper history of literature must not only be cross-disciplinary~with poetic inventions taking their place in relation to all other forms of discoursebut also cross-cultural; there is nothing to be gained by staying within one's own national boundaries because a culture's fitness for a particular discursive practice can only be grasped by setting it against another's.5 We cannot begin to claim to understand literary history without accounting for the Chinese tradition (among others), but to attempt to understand the history of Chinese literature requires a casting off, a shedding of certainties and reflex habits of interpretation. This negative gesture, however, is merely a preparatory ascesis. We also need to engage the particularities of the Chinese traditions. As Patrick Hogan with perhaps intentionally deadpan blandness suggests: [T]he study of universals and the study of cultural and historical particularity are mutually necessary. Like laws of nature, cultural universals are instantiated variously, particularized in specific circumstances (see Ngugi 1993:26). Thus, to isolate and test universal patterns, we often require a good deal of cultural and historical knowledge.6 5. Stephen Greenblatt, "What Is the History of Literature?” Critical Inquiry 23 (Spring 1997), p. 472. 6. Patrick C o l m Hogan, "Literary Universals," Poetics Today 18,no. 2 (Summer 1997),p. 226. Herbert Grabes seconds the view that any hope of getting earlier systems of meaning right~within the very real limits of our historical otherness— will take a lot of work: What follows from this regarding the construction of past meanings from the mere arrangements of signifiers in the documents that are left to us is that we will have to read a lot of these documents一at least as many from each of the various domains of discourse that the law of diminishing returns takes effect. Without this, it will be utterly impossible to make out the recurrent patterns of collocations, combinations and oppositions that alone allow us to make half-way probable guesses about the then dominant relations between signifiers that determine their meaning. There is no way around quantity if we want to arrive at a fairly reliable notion of what meanings, consensual assumptions

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Hogan's project for literary universals, however, leaves nothing unchanged: it is not enough simply to make room for Chinese conceptual terms in a form of broad-minded theoretical catholicity, because traditional Chinese theories of the literary are as shaped by their specific histories as are their Western counterparts. They, too, must be respected, reflected upon, understood through engagement with the texts, and then seen as particular instances of more universal patterns of aesthetic experience.7 This is a challenging, disorienting project.8

and contentious issues, and contending, dominant or marginalized hierarchies of values were like at any given time~~all the more so if we are to have access to the diversity of common culture and to counter the myth of its uniformity. Grabes, “Literary History and Cultural History: Relations and Difference,” introduction to Yearbook of Research in English and American Literature (REAL) 17 (2001), special volume on Cultural History: Force-Fields and Tensions, p. 12. 7. “Grand narratives,” and especially grand narratives of national literatures, are rightly viewed with caution. Gerald Gillespie, for example, warns not only that Western categories are inadequate in the face of non-Western traditions, but t h a t ~ East or West—totalized “traditions” in general elide greater particularities of time and place: Prior to more recent cultural convergences, great non-European literary worlds generated their own habits, preferences, and views that over many centuries conditioned the formation of distinct literary conglomerates with important effects lasting down to the present. Not only do our Western categories not match up with or apply to other major literary systems, but there are big gaps in every major grand tradition, so that we cannot properly evaluate works born in specific territories without studying their distinct values. Gillespie, "Comparative Literary History as an Elitist Metanarrative’” Neohelicon 30 (2003),p. 61. 8. The dangers, at least at the procedural level, are well understood and formidable. Quentin Skinner, for example, underscores the problem of unarticulated expectations that can misdirect inquiry: We must classify in order to understand, and we can only classify the unfamiliar in terms of the familiar. The perpetual danger, in our attempts to enlarge our historical understanding, is thus that our expectations about what someone must be saying or doing will themselves determine that we understand the agent to be doing something which he would not~~or even could not~himself have accepted as an account of what he was doing.

17 Casting Off

At Sea As a literary scholar, I find the categories of political history that frame my brief account of the Northern Song dynasty to be more or less adequate because they direct attention to the problem of how to organize and legitimate coercive force (the army, the state's policing power) used in the extraction and social distribution of resources, a basic aspect of human experience that is the domain of the political. Political history, that is, is not about its surface manifestation in the minute particulars of political life, but about the evolution of solutions to a specific domain of "permanent problems” in human organization.9 With the withering away of the state unlikely anytime

Skinner, "Meaning and Understanding in the History of Ideas,” in History and Theory 8.1 (1969),p. 6. The very idea of literary or any other cultural universals also raises the threat of premature conclusions leading to ideologically motivated essentialization. Giles Gunn cites Mohanty in arguing that, even in the face of such danger, we have little choice but to proceed: This leads Mohanty back in the direction of Kant in the belief that the only way that we can secure the lessons that aesthetics, among other disciplines, teaches us about cultural diversity is by grounding them in a limited kind of moral or humanistic universalism. Yet such a move is not without its difficulties. The problem is not that such a moral universal inevitably leads to an idealization of Enlightenment reason or freedom一to my mind, Mohanty successfully shows that it does not, and, in any case, belief in the dignity of reason and an autonomous human agent capable of a measure of free choice is not, as Amartya Sen has recently demonstrated with great eloquence, either an invention of French Enlightenment or a Western bias (Sen, 33-40)—but rather that it raises a specter of one of the more invidious forms of essentialism, one where the definition of humanity in all its inconceivable variety is reduced to a set of shared and sharable traits. Gunn, "The Pragmatics of the Aesthetic’” in Emory Elliott, Louis Freitas Caton, and Jeffrey Rhyne, Aesthetics in a Multicultural Age (Oxford, 2002),p. 74. Despite the danger, Gunn, who is interested in the ethical role of the aesthetic, concludes: It is also difficult to believe that any theory of aesthetics or ethics grounded on something very much less general, or, at any rate, less widespread than this kind of humanism can provide a sufficiently convincing explanation either for how aesthetics can render diversity educative or for how consciousness can thereby be altered. (75) 9. For more on "permanent problems,” see the discussion below.

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Casting Off

soon, coercive force will always be part of the state, and the justification and control of force are issues that every generation must confront and renegotiate. There are, on the whole, only a handful of basic plot lines here. The power to control coercion can come from birthright, for example, or from divine intervention, or from sheer force, or through ownership of the resources to be extracted and distributed, through a social contract, or through some other form of evolved consensus. That is, social organization defines actors who participate in the structuring of power, and the possibilities for the organizing of coercive force change as new groups emerge. This is a slow process, and even with new actors, key parts of the plot line (resources and coercive force) cannot change simply because the fundamental issues do not.10 It is something of a tautology to argue, then, that political history, like all special histories, is about something that remains constant throughout historical change: change becomes intelligible only if we have categories to compare former and later states of affairs. That events are emplotted as part of a story line within political history is, I think, simply a necessary aspect of the process of generalization needed to make the intellectual project w o r k The further fact that events are multivalent, parts of many simultaneous emergent patterns, is not so much a problem as constitutive of historical understanding. Maurice Mandelbaum writes: [A] special historian is not dealing with materials which have no connections with other aspects of societal life. Consequently, he will often have to draw upon a wide variety of facts in order to account for the changes which occurred in that strand of human activity whose course he seeks to follow.11 The question is what events of a period and what plot lines best capture the “strand of human activity" that one seeks to trace. Political history, from this perspective, has complementary internal and 10. What constitutes a resource to be controlled of course can change as technologies develop. Similarly, coercive force can take less obvious forms as mechanisms for social control grow more sophisticated. However, the categories, in contrast to their specific content, continue to define the domain of the political. 11. Maurice Mandelbaum, “The History of Ideas, Intellectual History, and the History of Philosophy," History and Theory, vol. 5, suppl. 5: The Historiography of the History of Philosophy (1965), p. 47.

9 Casting Off external aspects that are concomitants of the polyvocal nature of events and of the embeddedness of fundamental political issues in larger social processes. O n the one hand, the story of the internal transformation of political institutions creates a focus on the particular details of the structuring and legitimating coercive force that allow political history to be distinguished as a special history in the first place. O n the other, treating political institutions in isolation from other modes of organization within the society inevitably conceals the deeper dynamics that drive political change. T h e question is whether literary history, as a special history, is different. Rene Wellek, in "The Fall of Literary History," suggests in a backhanded way that literary history does indeed follow the same logic as all the other special histories. He laments: I discovered, by experience, that there is no evolution in the history of critical argument, that the history of criticism is rather a series of debates on recurrent topics, on "essentially contested concepts," on permanent problems in the sense that they are with us even today. Possibly, a similar conclusion is required for the history of poetry itself. "Art," said Schopenhauer, "has always reached its goals.,,Croce and Ker are right. There is no progress, no development, no history of art except a history of writers, institutions, and techniques. This is, at least for me, the end of an illusion, the fall of literary history.12 Does literary history refer to a specific domain of permanent problems in human experience that is analogous to the central issues that inform political, social, and intellectual history? For many scholars following in the wake of deconstruction and postmodern theory, the "literary" is an empty term of dubious value that does not refer to any quality inhering in texts and at best points instead to social practices. Pierre Bourdieu's account of the field of cultural production in nineteenth-century France undeniably shows the power of an essentially sociological model in which specifically aesthetic issues have no place except to mark out positions in a social system o f literary production. "High literature" as a form of cultural capital that circulates in a cultural economy most certainly is part of the story o f

12. Rene Wellek, "The Fall of Literary History," in Wellek, The Attack on Literature and Other Essays (Chapel Hill: Univ. of North Carolina, 1982), p. 77.

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literature. Is it, however, a central story? The social history of literature essentially makes Bentham's argument that from the perspective of social utility, poetry and pushpins have little to distinguish them: fancy language develops as a more highly valued form out of plain language just as fancy clothing evolves out of plain clothing. Both help mark social distinctions, and if the literary pleases the ear as fine clothing pleases the eye, so much the better, but neither is of much lasting importance. Such arguments have been made throughout the centuries in China as well as in the West, so they cannot simply be waved away. Nonetheless, I believe they are wrong: they do not adequately account for the empirical record of human experience. Yet the burden of proof quite reasonably falls on those who want to argue that a deeper logic shapes the surface transformations of literary forms and genres. The question, then, is whether "the literary" is a quality of the human engagement with the world that in turn participates in the larger processes of human experience. The literary can have a history only if it points to a domain of permanent human problems. Let me suggest a deceptively simple formulation: the literary is the aesthetic organizing of language. However, now we have three opaque terms rather than one. Each of these terms—"aesthetic," "organize," and “language,,一has been the subject of intense debate over the past half century. The aesthetic, for example, largely has been framed within Kant's account of the beautiful as having "purposiveness without a purpose."13 This quality entails disinterestedness and provides justification for describing the aesthetic dimension as “for itself." These concepts in turn have been attacked and defended in a variety of reformulations throughout the last fifty years. The problem of organization is part of this debate because, as Kant further explains, “[T]here can be a purposiveness without a purpose, insofar as we do not posit the causes of this form in a will, and yet can grasp the explanation of its possibility only by deriving it from a will." 14 The doubled vision that Kant demands creates confusion and contention. Is a refusal to posit an organizing will—as a corollary to the disinterestedness of art~merely a form of delusion 13. Immanuel Kant, Critique ofJudgment, trans. Werner S. Pluhar (Indianapolis: Hackett, 1987),p. 65. 14. Kant, Critique of Judgment, p. 65.

21 Casting Off or bad faith? If w e are to think of art as organized by a will, whose will is it: the artist's, the viewer's, the art object's, or something else? T h e problems surrounding language are separate from the aesthetic, although they inevitably intersect. T h e central problem in language is how to account for reference~that which anchors words to the w o r l d ~ a n d meaning, an exceedingly elusive term. T h e current debates have grown out o f the structuralist shift in the early twentieth century when Ferdinand de Saussure explained both phonological and semantic features o f words as deriving from a system o f differences within the structures o f which they are a part. This structuralist account provided an elegant solution to a host o f difficulties with earlier approaches but then generated its o w n set o f problems. First, the set o f differences through which language structured meaning are neither neutral nor inevitable: instead, they give form to hierarchies o f power within a society. Second, difference itself is a troublesome concept since comparison relies on underlying common features: the radically different are incommensurable and fall outside o f any systemic structure. Thus all three terms一the aesthetic, organizing, and language一are deeply embedded in active debates, but I shall offer my own approach to each, not in the hope o f ending those debates but o f at least clarifying my position in order to set out what I believe to be a useful way o f thinking about the literary and literary history. "Organizing," the middle term in defining the literary, is perhaps the easiest to deal with. After Roland Barthes,privileging o f a "writerly" over a "readerly" approach to reading, theorists have distinguished between writings (and oral compositions) as texts and as works. Mark Bevir usefully defines a “work”:� If we want to know about an intentional meaning or an abstraction based on intentional meanings, we will consider an utterance as a work, that is, a set of words written, or spoken, or understood in a particular way on a particular occasion.15 A text, in contrast, is not constrained by any shadows o f intentionality since the intentions and historical contingencies behind the creation o f the text now are absent from the sequence o f signifiers 15. Mark Bevir, "Meaning and Intention: A Defense of Procedural Individualism," New Literary History (hereafter NLH) 31 (2000),p. 389.

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that remains: readers are free to explore whatever patterns o f connection they find interesting in the play of signifiers. Literary experience is about works, texts encountered in a particular manner at a particular time. It is important, however, that Bevir's formulation of work neatly encompasses the organizing efforts of both the author and the reader. Who it is (author or reader) w h o finds aesthetic coherence in a text is, I think, not particularly important; but it is useful provisionally to deem "literary" any text, for example, that an author believes to have aesthetic organization even when no one else does. Those texts that~from the available evidence~were composed with no glimmer o f aesthetic intention but in which readers discover aesthetic order, as well as those in which author and audience have entirely different views about the nature o f the aesthetic experience embodied in the text, also should be included. Since conditions change, some texts that at one time were esteemed for their aesthetic qualities are no longer compelling: they too are part of the long history o f human literary experience. In sum, the "organizing" of the "aesthetic organizing of language" should be broadly conceived: as long as some linguistic utterance is a work that is (or has been) the object of aesthetic experience, it is part ofliterary history. T h e obvious next question, then, is how a linguistic utterance can be the object of aesthetic experience. Unfortunately, language itself proves to be a problem: if we cannot develop a compelling account o f meaning in language, then the aesthetic organization of language will be but a play of shadows. Yet the defense o f meaning in language has not fared well in the last thirty years. The assaults on meaning have taken many forms and are perhaps well known. As noted, however, the story usually begins with Saussure's argument that spoken or written words as signifiers gain their ability to signify at all by being in a system of such signifiers, all o f which differ from one another and attain meaning through their differences as set out by the structure o f mutual differentiation. Subsequently, poststructuralists took up various aspects of this account to point to deep problems in assumptions about meaning. First, for example, the system of differentiations that define the possibilities for meaning is neither random nor innocent. Instead, it reflects the distribution of power in a culture. Secondly, the signifiers~words一are easily grasped, but where are the signified meanings? Texts present words, not

13 Casting Off meanings. Moreover, words have their place in the linguistic structure only through their repeatability, so how can words一signifiers unbound from objects in the world一actually present meanings that apply to particular and unique events and objects? T h e y cannot. Meaning derived from reference to the world retreats and finally vanishes. In its place critics propose various forms of social construction, the idea that the system of mutual differentiations that determine meaning is a collective social enterprise that encompasses language, the self, and all the institutions of the culture. Social constructionism has been a pervasive model throughout the humanities as well as some o f the social sciences. In examining the development of anthropology, Adam Kuper sees a confluence of poststructuralist paradigms and cultural determinist strains in the anthropological tradition itself T h e result is a self-enclosed world o f human meanings: The assumption remains that people live in a world of symbols. Actors are driven and history is shaped by (perhaps unconscious) ideas. Mainstream American cultural anthropology, in short, is still in the grip of pervasive idealism. Idealism has been in the ascendant more widely in recent decades, together with its handmaiden, relativism. Each culture was founded on unique premises. Generalization was impossible, comparison extremely problematic.16 Recently scholars have begun to be increasingly critical of social constructive perspectives precisely for the reason Kuper suggests: such formulations in fact are one more version of idealism, the view that our ideas are adequate to and reflect what is. For example, one critic complains that: The consequence of prioritizing language inevitably entails a form of linguistic idealism in the interpretation of history~e.g. Edward Said's claim.. .that texts are just as important as, say, military force for understanding the history of Empire. If you believe that, you will believe anything; I don't think it would make much sense to the dispossessed peasants of colonial invasion and occupation.17 16. Adam Kuper, Culture: The Anthropologists' Account (Harvard University Press, 1999),pp. 19-20. 17. Christopher Prendergast, "Circulating Representations: N e w Historicism and the Poetics of Culture” SubStance 88 (1999), p. 99.

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Over the last twenty years in particular, theorists increasingly have argued that although we can find no certainty in our contact with the world, we still must include the very problematics of our encounter in our accounts of experiences. Nicolae Babuts, for example, centers on the problem of reference and on the need to formulate an account to explain everyday lived experience: In our times those who believe that language questions and reflects itself often have grave ontological doubts about its referential power and about the viability of a mimetic theory of art. Structuralists, poststructuralist semioticians, and deconstructive critics strengthened, or tried to strengthen, these doubts. And they concentrated their assault at two traditional ramparts they considered vulnerable: the text's origins and its referential links to the world I argue that a contact with some aspect of the real is vital. The creative impulse originates in a mnemonic economy that, having reached critical mass, is ready to aim for a new degree of productivity. Sustained by previous readings—the link with tradition and language—and by the wealth of perceptions, words, associations, and feelings coming from everyday experience, this economy bears no resemblance to a void Babuts, like others who seek a formulation that restores the encounter with the world as part of the story of language and experience, proposes a "cognitive turn" in thinking about language. Cognitive scientists seek empirically to delineate the factors involved in how people process perceptions as parts of higher cognitive systems (like attention, memory, consciousness, etc.). Cognitive neuroscience turns its particular focus to the biological structures and processes that underlie what we think of as perception and cognition. Language in this context is just one more aspect of how the brain sorts out, encodes, processes, stores, and recalls what is significant in experience. The relations of language to the world of environmental inputs are a given, even if those relations are highly mediated. Babuts finds that cognitive models have grown in sophistication both in terms of the models themselves and in terms of the limits to the claims that are made about the models. He argues~with no small irony for humanists—that cognitive science is more flexible than literary theory: In the cognitive light, formalist theories, though not necessarily wrong, are incomplete because of the crippling limitations they impose on language and individual interpretations.

15 Casting Off Babuts moreover stresses that the "cognitive turn” does not require the naively realist assumption that the perceived world is the world "as it is": In the cognitive perspective the "referent" undergoes a radical fission, becoming things-in-themselves (in their material aloofness) and things in their perceptually coded identity. Imagine that the "referent" has two faces, like a coin. On the reverse, things remain forever alien to the mind that cannot open itself to absorb the world; on the obverse, things assume a tractable symbolic form and allow memory to grasp them. The events of what we call the past were inaugurated not in their material identity but in their symbolic (coded) form.18 The cognitive model, then, preserves much of what theorists in the humanities have stressed about the constructedness of linguistic signifiers and acknowledges the epistemological constraints in the human condition, but it recasts both bounding conditions through its concern to glean what can be learned about the systematic features of phenomenal experience. Much can be learned and has been learned. As a result, the empirical research of cognitive psychologists and neuroscientists has produced ways of approaching language that increasingly have informed thinking about how it works in everyday human experience, and scholars in the humanities have begun to appreciate the power of paradigms that, in their subtlety, offer biologically based but not mechanistic approaches to meaning.19 Neat poststructuralist and Lacanian notions have given way to a sense

18. Nicolae Babuts, "Text: Origins and Reference," PMLA quotations from pp. 66-67, 66,and 68,respectively.

107.1 (Jan. 1992),

19. The past decade, for example, has witnessed the growth of the field of"cognitive cultural studies” that synthesizes the critical contextualizing analyses o f cultural studies with approaches taken from cognitive science. It focuses in particular on mainstream topics like "theory of mind” and on Lakoflf and Johnson's writings about the embodied origins of metaphorical language. For an overview, see Lisa Zunshine, ed., Introduction to Cognitive Cultural Studies (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2010). Also see the often ambivalent essays in the special issue The Literary Mind of REAL: Yearbook of Research in English and American Literature 24 (2008),edited by Jurgen Schlaeger and Gesa Stedman. This volume also draws almost exclusively on cognitivist rather than connectionist neuroscientific models for meaning in language.

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that much processing of meaning occurs below the surface, beyond access by self-reflection, and that the closed self-referentiality of much literary theory is simply not the fact of the matter: language as a biological process in the brain just does not behave that way. Horst Ruthrof, building on the growing awareness of cognitive models, makes a compelling case for rethinking meaning in language. His work demonstrates the usefulness of contemporary neuroscience in resolving long-standing problems in literary theory. Ruthrof strongly argues for "corporeal semantics," i.e., that meaning in language is not to be found at the level of the signifier but in the brain's mappings of corporeal experience that stand at the end of the signifying chain articulated through language: What I am saying is that language as a set of linguistic expressions does not mean at all. There is no meaning in language, no meaning in the dictionary. Language in this sense is as arbitrary as any set of symbolic signs.20 This is a simple, elegant, and radical recasting of contemporary literary theory. For Ruthrof, the usual arguments about the emptiness of the mirror world of signifiers are true, but theorists in the humanities prematurely come to rest in the purity of self-enclosed meaninglessness. Theorists in the humanities have kept the empirical sciences at bay and preserved the integrity of their own discipline. They have retained the centrality and self-transparency of consciousness, which situating language within larger processes of meaning fundamentally threatens. Ruthrof argues that it is time to move on. We need a very different story. If language is empty, it is so in an altogether different sense. Language is empty, it remains without meaning, if it is not associated with its Other, the nonverbal. If we had not learned from earliest childhood, perhaps to some extent even prenatally,how to associate linguistic sounds with nonverbal materials, we would have no meaning. The question is in what form this Other of language functions in the process of the activation of empty linguistic schemata.21

20. Horst Ruthrof, The Body in Language (London and N e w York: Cassell, 2000), p. 22. 21. Ruthrof, The Body in Language,p. 30.

17 Casting Off From Ruthrof's perspective, corporeality is at the same time like a Kantian transcendental condition for experience一in that w e cannot know the reality of either the world or body through which w e encounter the world一and a heuristic schema that provides a rich source for empirical investigation: Coherence phobia and the elimination of the signified are the result of our forgetting the somatic ground of language, an amnesia that prevents us from addressing the relationship language has with our culturally overdetermined perceptual and emotional semiotic systems. In this sense, in natural language use, we are dealing with neither formal, nor positivist, nor merely neurobiological signifiers, but with existential signifiers and their synaesthetic signifieds. The fact that we live in a body cannot be eliminated by syntactic substitutional chains. We can play chess, even with English, but this particular language game is fundamentally different from using a natural language, for it lacks the epistemic foundation of human cognition: our allpervasive corporeality. [•. •] Instead of subjecting Heidegger's ontological conviction that “Being speaks through language; everywhere and always” to the critique of difference, as does Derrida, we could say more modestly “the way we touch the world speaks through every language; everywhere and always.” Neither metaphysics, nor its “overcoming,” but our corporeality remains the hidden ground of interpretation.22 T h e mediation of corporeality offers a powerful approach to language.23 It restores the problem of reference, both as proximate reference (i.e., referents presented through the systems o f human perceptual, cognitive, and affective mappings) and as the unreachable but postulated objects in the world. Stressing corporeal semantics does not solve the problem of reference, and indeed it proclaims that at the ontological or noumenal level w e cannot know the world or justify our use o f language. At the same time, however, it allows 22. Horst Ruthrof’ “The Fourth Critique," N L H 35 (2004), p. 255. 23. People who prefer a modular approach to language in the brain can quibble that the brain's particular strategies for processing language contribute their own formal constraints that mediate the activation of the perceptual and cognitive maps comprising the nonverbal substratum of meaning. The brain's structures for language processing, however, present just one more layer in the empirical articulation of the manner in which corporeality shapes meaning: they complicate but do not change the basic story at either the empirical or the transcendental level.

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scholars in the humanities to integrate their own approaches with empirical research in neurobiology and cognitive science. Although the details are beyond the scope of this book, I believe that contemporary connectionist models in particular will prove congenial to humanists. We can learn the ways in which the brain encodes experience, structures memory, creates the self, and presents these for conscious and linguistic access; as we learn more, these findings surely will have a powerful impact on how we understand literary experience. The twofold nature (empirical and transcendental) of embodied language also allows us to see the ambivalence of meaning as no longer the self-enclosed property of language but as a direct result of language's larger systemic relationships. Meaning in language is outside the linguistic domain: this pointing elsewhere, as an aspect of phenomenal experience, is a promise of meaning that is subject to exploration and participates in creating empirical knowledge of the phenomenal realm. In pointing to a world outside the possibility of human contact, however, it marks the limit to phenomenal experience as such. The problem, then, is in two complementary parts: first, how do we reconcile the emptiness of linguistic signifiers as such with the lived experience of linguistic meaning? Second, how do we continue to affirm the adequacy of language and of linguistically presented meaning in the face of their constant failure to correspond to their putative reference in the world? To see the implications of these ever-recurring rifts, we need to turn at last to the third component ofliterary experience, to the aesthetic.

The Art of Judgment: Plotting a Course through the Phenomenal Aesthetic experience has been a suspect category in much modern theory. However, it has in recent scholarship encountered renewed interest, particularly in the Kantian form that escapes a narrow concern for the beautiful. Kant's account~which is central to my own approach~focuses on the general problem of how we discern categories of meaning within the particularity of experience. Because his account of the aesthetic differs from stereotypical versions and

19 Casting Off requires a significant shift in thinking, I present Kant's arguments in some detail.24 Kant's most important discussion of the aesthetic is in the Critique of Judgment, the last of the three major treatises that set out his critical (or transcendental) philosophy.25 The Critique of Judgment returns to unresolved issues in the first two works, the Critique of Pure Reason and the Critique of Practical Reason. Kant confronts in particular the problem that the a priori principles he discovers to ground the possibility of cognition in general address the formal constraints on all possible experience but do not deal with how we make sense of experience in its particularity. He notes: For it is quite conceivable that, regardless of all the uniformity of natural things in terms of universal laws, without which the form of an empirical cognition in general would not occur at all, the specific differences in the empirical laws of nature, along with their effects, might still be so great that it would be impossible for our understanding to discover in nature an order it could grasp~i.e., impossible to divide nature's products into genera and species, so as to use the principles by which we explain and understand one product in order to explain and grasp another as well, thereby making coherent experience out of material that is so full of confusion.26 Kant defines the act of seeing a particular object or event as grounded in a more universal concept~the act that is central to our making sense of the world—as a judgment. He identifies two major types of judgments: 24. For an excellent recent study that explores what I believe are Kant's central concerns in the Critique ofJudgment from a perspective at the intersection of comparative literature and philosophy, see Rodolphe Gasche, The Idea ofForm: Rethinking Kan^s Aesthetics (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2003). Gasche presents Kant's arguments and examines their implications at a level of detail I cannot hope to match here. From within the tradition of analytic philosophy, Henry E. Allison, Kant's Theory of Taste (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2001) offers an excellent discussion of the Critique ofJudgment that focuses extensively on the same epistemological issues surrounding judgment that Gasche and I stress. 25. As Kant (Critique ofJudgment, p. 20) explains, “A transcendental principle is one by which we think the universal a priori condition under which alone things can become objects of our cognition in general." 26. Kant, Critique of Judgment, p. 25. This passage comes from the second, published Introduction, but the first is worth consulting as well. For the analogous argument in the First Introduction, see p. 392.

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Judgment in general is the ability to think the particular as contained under the universal. If the universal (the rule, principle, law) is given, then judgment, which subsumes the particular under it, is determinative (even though [in its role] as transcendental judgment it states a priori conditions that must be met for subsumption under that universal to be possible). But if only the particular is given and judgment has to find the universal for it, then this power is merely reflective.27 Aesthetic judgments are a particular type o f reflective judgment: When pleasure is connected with mere apprehension (apprehensio) of the form of an object of intuition, and we do not refer the apprehension to a concept so as to give rise to a determinate cognition, then we refer the presentation not to the object but solely to the subject; and the pleasure cannot express anything other than the object's being commensurate with the cognitive powers that are, and insofar as they are, brought into play when we judge reflectively, and hence [expresses] merely a subjective formal purposiveness of the object. For this apprehension of forms by the imagination could never occur if reflective judgment did not compare them, even if unintentionally, at least with its ability [in general] to refer intuitions to concepts. Now if in this comparison, a given representation unintentionally brings the imagination (the power of a priori intuitions) into harmony with understanding (the power of concepts), and this harmony arouses a feeling of pleasure, then the object must thereupon be regarded as purposeful for the reflective power ofjudgment. A judgment of this sort is an aesthetic judgment about the object's purposiveness; it is not based on any concept we have of the object, nor does it provide such a concept.28 Aesthetic judgment is a difficult concept. It is an intuition o f order about a particular object, yet it does not give us information about that object. Instead, it allows us to reflect that the disparate elements w e perceive as forming the thing are the sorts o f elements that, given human sensibilities, w e judge to comprise a unified entity, even if w e do not derive any conclusions about what that object is. Although such judgments are part of our daily experience, it is crucial to 27. Kant, Critique ofjudgment, pp. 18-19. 28. Kant, Critique ofJudgment,pp. 29-30. Kant's use of the term “aesthetic” here derives from the Greek term aisthesis, which refers to sense perception as a category, rather than to a particular concern for the beautiful. See, for example, Grabes, “Ethics, Aesthetics, and Alterity,” p. 14.

21 Casting Off understand that they are a peculiar way to approach the world and are not logically necessary. A counterexample may help: in Buddhist thought, all objects come into being and disperse again through participation in a vast cycle of cause and effect. Objects一including humans—have no essential being. If one examines the constituent atoms that make up a horse or an apple, for example, there simply is no fundamental horseness or appleness in the nitrogen, oxygen, carbon, and so on that gather to take on these forms. Thus Buddhist meditative practice encourages viewing the flow o f perceptions as empty o f actual objects worthy of individuated attention. A world without aesthetic judgments would appear much like this Buddhist ideal of an unshaped flow of sensory impressions. A few other terms need clarification. "Purposiveness" is especially foreign. It refers (more or less) to there being a reason w h y an object exists (its purpose) and to the way in which its appearance accords with the existence of that purpose. Hence a judgment of purposiveness without knowledge of the purpose would be a judgment that the appearance of the object surely matches whatever might be the reason for the object's existence. Kant concludes that the fundamental assumption required to ground judgments of the coherence o f any particular object is a belief in principle that we can make sense o f the totality of all that appears before us: Now insofar as the concept of an object also contains the basis for the object's actuality, the concept is called the thing's purpose, and the thing's harmony with that character of things which is possible through purposes is called the purposiveness of its form. Accordingly, judgment's principle concerning the form that things in nature have in terms of empirical laws in general is the purposiveness of nature in its diversity. In other words, through this concept we present nature as if an understanding contained the basis of the unity of what is diverse in nature's empirical laws.29 Kant stresses that the purposiveness of nature (the conformity of its appearance with the idea of there being a reason for its existence) is a transcendental principle—a principle required to ground the possibility o f judgments in general~that does not actually guarantee or assume anything about what “nature,,really is: 29. Kant, Critique of Judgmenty p. 20.

22

Casting Off Now this transcendental concept of the purposiveness of nature is neither a concept of nature nor a concept of freedom, since it attributes nothing whatsoever to the object (nature), but [through] this transcendental concept [we] only think of the one and only way in which we must proceed when reflecting on objects of nature with the aim of having thoroughly coherent experience.30

Kant further stresses the centrality o f aesthetic judgments in particular. As judgments that these particular data o f experience are held together~at least for the human manner o f approaching the w o r l d 一� by a higher order concept despite the absence o f such a concept, aesthetic judgments are at the very root o f our capacity to make sense o f the empirical realm: In a critique of judgment,the part that deals with aesthetic judgment belongs to it essentially. For this power alone contains a principle that judgment lays completely a priori at the basis of its reflection on nature: the principle of a formal purposiveness of nature, in terms of its particular (empirical laws), for our cognitive power, without which principle the understanding could not find its way about in nature.31 Although Kant presents the formal purposiveness o f nature in its totality as a transcendental principle, it surely would not be viable if empirical research designed to articulate the concepts whose existence in principle is affirmed in aesthetic judgments constantly led nowhere, if nature as w e experienced it proved itself random. W h y our experience o f nature is not random is not clear, and whether nature “in itself,,is random is unknowable, but the aesthetic always puts our ability to encounter the world to the test. It is an always-open door, even if w e never quite see through to the other side.

30. Kant, Critique ofjudgment, p. 23. The paragraph concludes with an observation relevant to the above comments on the circumscribed claims possible for biology as an empirical science: “This is also why we rejoice (actually we are relieved of a need) when, just as if it were a lucky chance favoring our aim, we do find such systematic unity among merely empirical laws, even though we necessarily had to assume that there is such a unity even though we had no insight into this unity and cannot prove it” (pp. 23-24). 31. Kant, Critique of Judgment, pp. 33-34.

23 Casting Off If the aesthetic for Kant relies on the principle of the formal purposiveness of nature, where does the human fit in? How can there even be meaningful aesthetic judgments about art, which as a human artifact is outside the domain of the natural? That is, how can the human partake of the transcendental principle that grounds aesthetic judgments in nature? Kant's elegant answer begins with the proposition that we treat art as if it were the product of nature: In [dealing with] a product of fine art we must become conscious that it is art rather than nature, and yet the purposiveness of its form must seem as free from all constraint of chosen rules as if it were a product of mere nature. It is this feeling of freedom in the play of our cognitive powers, a play that yet must also be purposive, which underlies that pleasure which alone is universally communicable although not based on concepts. Nature, we say,is beautiful [schon] if it looks like art; and art can be called fine [schon] only if we are conscious that it is art while yet it looks to us like nature.32 In order to explain this doubled status of fine art~its appearance as both artifact and natural—Kant invokes the concept of genius, which he defines as "the innate mental predisposition (ingenium) through which nature gives the rule to art."33 However, since aesthetic judgments provide no determinate categories and because the actual character of nature remains unknown, the operations of genius as well as the rules that it provides partake of the same radical epistemological constraints. Still, works of genius, like aesthetic judgments of objects in nature, must be open to productive empirical examination after the fact: (l) Genius is a talent for producing something for which no determinate rule can be given, not a predisposition consisting of a skill for something that can be learned by following some rule or other; hence the foremost property of genius must be originality. (2) Since nonsense too can be original, the products of genius must also be models, i.e., they must be exemplary; hence, though they themselves do not arise through imitation, still they must serve others for this, i.e., as a standard or rule by which to judge. (3) Genius itself cannot describe or indicate scientifically how it brings about its products, and it is 32. Kant, Critique of Judgmenty pp. 173-74. The translator has added the German terms for clarification. For a good discussion of the issues here, see Gasche, The Idea ofForm, pp. 179-201. 33. Kant, Critique of Judgment, p. 174. (Emphasis in the original.)

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Casting Off 34 (4) Nature, through genius, rather as nature that it gives the rule prescribes the rule not to science but to art, and this also only insofar as the art is to be fine art.35

Genius, then, is an extraordinary if inscrutable talent by which the human can come to partake of the coherent particularity that we grant to objects in nature, and the objects produced by genius follow the same deep rules that underlie coherence in nature.

Crosscurrents: Kant Made Modern, or Dialectical Aesthetics Kant's use of "nature" perhaps has a slightly quaint Enlightenment ring to it, but his approach to art has proven highly adaptable to theorizing in more anxious and distrustful times. Theodor Adorno in particular built upon the dialectical implications of Kant's model for aesthetic judgment as a whole and especially upon the doubled vision in Kant's observation, for example, that "art can be called fine only if we are conscious that it is art while yet it looks to us like nature." Adorno approached artworks as irresolvably dialectical: the work's appearance of a self-sufficient unity outside the claims of historical necessity (even in its negative mode of a coherent presentation of unity refused) was only semblance, but that semblance pointed to real human possibilities that were not yet (and could not be) realized in the work but must be honored in their real Utopian denial of the claims of present categories of understanding and being: Semblance, which heralds the ineffable, does not literally make artworks epiphanies, however difficult it may be for genuine aesthetic experience not to trust that the absolute is present in authentic 34. The omitted text reads: “That is why if an author owes a product to his genius, he himself does not know how he came by the ideas for it; nor is it in his power [Gewalt] to devise such products at his pleasure, or by following a plan, and to communicate [his procedure] to others in precepts that would enable them to bring about like products. (Indeed, that is presumably why the word genius is derived from [Latin] genius, [which means] the guardian and guiding spirit that each person is given as his own at birth, and to whose inspiration [Eingebung] those original ideas are due.)” The similarity here to the standard Chinese example of Wheelwright Bian is obvious. 35. Kant, Critique of Judgment, pp. 175-76.

25 Casting Off artworks. It inheres in the grandeur of art to awaken this trust. That whereby art becomes the unfolding of truth is at the same time its cardinal sin, from which it cannot absolve itself. Art drags this sin along with it because it acts as if absolution had been bestowed on it. The Kantian categories linger in the background. "Semblance" preserves Kant's insistence that aesthetic judgments do not give us objective knowledge. The “ineffable,,speaks to the formal purposiveness of nature that is without conceptual content. The same dialectic of the materially formed (with all the determinate categories it drags in tow) conjoined with the appearance of a unity that is simply other than the empirically given and seemingly binding categories reappears throughout Adorno's Aesthetic Theory. Neither aspect of the artwork can be free of the other: Through the completion of the work, by setting unformed nature at a distance, the natural element returns as what has yet to be formed, as the nonarticulated. When artworks are viewed under the closest scrutiny, the most objectivated paintings metamorphose into a swarming mass and texts splinter into words. As soon as one imagines having a firm grasp on the details of an artwork, it dissolves into the indeterminate and undifferentiated, so mediated is it. This is the manifestation of aesthetic semblance in the structure of artworks. Under micrological study, the particular~~the artworks vital elem e n t i s volatilized; its concretion vanishes. The process, which in each work takes objective shape, is opposed to its fixation as something to point to, and dissolves back from whence it came. Artworks themselves destroy the claim to objectivation that they raise. This is a measure of the profundity with which illusion suffuses artworks, even the non-representational ones. Art, for Adorno, offered a complex resistance to the conceptual order of the culture, but not just as the self-sufficiency of intuited form. As with Kant, intuition of the nonconceptual order that hovers over artworks was but one moment in experience: the intuited order remained susceptible to after-the-fact empirical examination from which substantive knowledge could arise. Whereas the norm of intuitability accentuates the opposition of art to discursive thinking, it suppresses nonconceptual mediation, suppresses the nonsensuous in the sensuous structure, which by constituting the structure already fractures it and puts it beyond the intuitability in which it appears. The norm of intuitability, which denies what is implicitly categorial in artworks, reifies intuitability

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Casting Off itself as opaque and impenetrable, makes it in terms of its pure form into a copy of the petrified world, always alert for anything that might disturb the harmony the work purportedly reflects. In actuality, the concretion of artworks, in the apparition that ripples disconcertingly through them, goes far beyond the intuitability that is habitually held up against the universality of the concept and that stands in accord with the ever-same.

In a similar manner Adorno objected to the Romantic appropriation o f the idea o f genius in which art was gutted both o f its doubled character (Kant's "art can be called fine only if w e are conscious that it is art while yet it looks to us like nature") and o f its nomothetic moment (i.e., Kant's "nature, through genius, prescribes the rule not to science but to art,,):� Genius is purported to be the individual whose spontaneity coincides with the action of the absolute spirit. This is correct insofar as the individuation of artworks, mediated by spontaneity, is that in them by which they are objectivated. Yet the concept of genius is false because works are not creations and humans are not creators. This defines the untruth of any genius aesthetics that suppresses the element of finite making, the T8%vr| in artworks, in favor of their absolute originality, virtually their natura naturans; it thus spawns the ideology of the organic and unconscious artwork, which flows into the murky current of irrationalism. For Adorno, the work-like character presented a material particularity that was in dialectical tension with its appearance o f nonconceptual, self-sufficient unity. This materiality returned art to history, but history inhered not only in the techniques through which the work was created but also in the play o f categories through which the artwork attained its appearance of unity and its status as art: The artwork is a process essentially in the relation of its whole and parts. Without being reducible to one side or the other, it is the relation itself that is a process of becoming. Whatever may in the artwork be called totality is not a structure that integrates the sum of its parts. Even objectified the work remains a developing process by virtue of the propensities active in it. Conversely, the parts are not something given, as which analysis almost inevitably mistakes them: Rather, they are centers of energy that strain toward the whole on the basis of a necessity that they equally perform. The vortex of this dialectic ultimately consumes the concept of meaning. When according to

27 Casting Off history's verdict the unity of process and result no longer succeeds; when, above all, the individual elements refuse to mold themselves to the ever latently preconceived totality, the gaping divergence tears meaning apart. If the artwork is nothing fixed and definitive in itself, but something in motion, then its immanent temporality is communicated to its part and whole in such a fashion that their relation develops in time and that they are capable of canceling this relation. If artworks are alive in history by virtue of their own processual character, they are also able to perish in it.36 Aesthetic experience became historical, then, through the myriad contingencies~both in thinking and seeing~that informed the artists' and audiences' intuitions about nonconceptual coherence. With this thought, w e at last can return to the sorts o f permanent problems in human experience that might ground literary history.

Tracing the Domain of Literary History Words spoken or written may start out as signs, but they arrive as signifiers. T h e y are marks, not things, even though in their physical presence they ineluctably are things as well. We believe一indeed experience teaches us一that they tell us about the world. Yet, as Horst Ruthrof stresses through the example o f Helen Keller's awakening to language, this ability to mean remains remarkable. 37 Connecting language to the world requires a leap o f the imagination, an intuition o f coherence outside o f what is given in the medium itself, an aesthetic intuition that is part o f our human makeup. Exploring the manner in which the marks that are the substrate o f language come to mean and~equally importantly~negotiating the role o f this coming-into-meaning are the domain o f the literary in human social experience. In shaping meaning, literary experience (whether spoken or written) has a two fold problem. First it must demonstrate that words can indeed extend the reach o f human 36. Theodor Adorno, Aesthetic Theory, trans. Robert Hullot-Kentor (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1997), quotations from pp. 104,101,95,170, and 178, respectively. 37. Ruthrof, The Body in Language. Ruthrof reflects on Helen Keller's account throughout the book, but pages 63-64 discuss perhaps the most famous incident of "water" and the pump.

28

Casting Off

meaning. Second, however, it must confront the complexities of aesthetic experience as such: it must deal with the way aesthetic judgments destabilize given meanings through their specifically non conceptual nature, and it must deal with the pressure for aesthetically given meaning to stand outside o f i n d e e d independent of~other structures of meaning. The literary, as a form of aesthetic experience, draws on implicit commitments to a transcendental order (the framing structure for Adorno's “ever latently preconceived totality"): it has no choice but, by its very nature, reaches beyond itself to the intellectual order of its moment. In this engagement, the literary is deeply time-bound and functions against a backdrop of structures of order that shift. Every aesthetically organized text drags with it a system of beliefs that makes its intuitions of categories compelling. It is possible for a poem written in one system to live powerfully within another, but the nature of the aesthetic experience~the work of intuiting coherence—alters with the shifting background. The literary lives in tension with intellectual culture. The literary denies the epistemological certainty of the order that it aesthetically affirms. An intellectual order that leaves no room for the simultaneous denial and affirmation of the aesthetic cuts itself off from the roots of epistemological growth and must wither or change. Yet the intellectual order~if it does not spiral into obscurantism~must seek its authority outside of the merely aesthetic, even as it accommodates the aesthetic within its own explanatory structures. The literary, therefore, is where the relationships between modes of meaning are negotiated and conventionalized. Literary history is in part an internal history of strategies to formalize aesthetic experience in language, a history of tropes and genres. It also is another form of internal history: a history of those who produced and those who received texts deemed to be literary and of the manner in which those texts circulated in the society. Yet in any culture what gives life to the literary as such, and what drives literary history, is the constant reshaping of the relationship between literary and other forms of textual practice that determines the role of aesthetic experience in its dialectic with the culture's ever-changing symbolic ordering of power and authority.

CHAPTER

ONE

The Other Shore: China and the Early History of the Literaty

T

he period that is the focus of this study, roughly one hundred eighty years starting in the late Northern Song and ending with the fall of the Southern Song dynasty (1127-1279), is an important time of transition in Chinese culture. By the time the first Song emperor seized power, the old Tang (618-907) aristocratic order was in tatters: many of the old lineages had lost their economic preeminence and social prestige, and faith in their legitimacy to serve as the basis of the bureaucratic order had vanished. The Song emperors vastly expanded the reach of the examination system to recruit men for office. Although the precise mix of skills sought by those administering the exams shifted over time, the imperial clan, the bureaucracy, and the stratum of educated families all agreed on the general framework of the examinations. These groups concurred that mastery of the Confucian canon and the historical tradition was fundamental but that the examinations must demand more than just rote learning: only candidates who were able to apply the normative perspectives toward society, self, and state embodied in those canonical texts were deemed worthy to be granted positions of authority. In this process, the newly reestablished imperial order of the Song dynasty nurtured the revival of Confucian humanism, a philosophical and political framework that validated the open, meritocratic procedures the dynasty had developed to recruit its officials. In the halcyon days of the Northern Song, it seemed possible to establish a model of governance derived from a shared commitment to the Confucian canon in which proper realization of

30

The Other Shore

ritual relations and humane regulations could serve the common good and unite the ruler, his officials,and the populace. In this Confucian state, each group benefitted from its commitment to an effective and unified government. In particular, the elite stratum, still very much in transition and without a firm economic and social base in local land holding, derived its authority through participation in national institutions rather than through any tradition o f local authority. This sense of coherence mirrored a consensus understanding that the Confucian canon, which served as the basis for the system, also cohered without major internal conflicts. In time, each aspect of this early Northern Song consensus fell apart. T h e elite stratum split into competing factions that used ever-harsher means to suppress opposing groups. All factions cited Confucian canonical texts to demonstrate the validity o f their mutually contradictory positions and, in doing so, proved that the putative internal coherence of the Confucian tradition was chimerical. These factional disputes also demonstrated that parties put their own interests first, above those of the imperial order and the populace. By the late Northern Song, important cultural figures in the elite stratum either withdrew or were barred from the center o f power. They returned to local estates that were established sufficiently well as to give them both economic resources and a local authority independent from the state. This period from the late Northern Song through the end of the Southern Song marked the beginning of the transformation o f the emerging elite stratum into the local landed elites that were characteristic of China throughout the M i n g and Q i n g dynasties. T h e broad shifts in society that occurred in the late Northern and Southern Song included changes in the elite's relationship to imperial and local institutions and a deep, underlying transformation in elite understanding of the nature of experience and o f the literati's identities as individuals and as a group. With this change in the episteme, the world by the end of the Southern Song in 1280 was fundamentally different from what it was in 1100. Scholars o f Song culture usually study the intellectual dimension o f this reconfiguration in terms o f the rise o£Daoxue TM^, the "Learning of the Way." Daoxue began in the discussions of a small coterie o f conservative Confucian thinkers in the mid-Northern Song w h o were concerned that

31 The Other Shore conventional scholarship had lost its bearings and its authenticity. These thinkers focused on the central problem o f how to rediscover within oneself the mind of the great sages of Confucian antiquity. Their stress on moral autonomy and on the regrounding o f learning in the immediacy o f the encounter with the sage mind brought to them an increasing number o f adherents w h o were both disenchanted with state service as the source o f moral authority and disheartened by the abuse o f textual scholarship in the search for certainty. T h e role o f Daoxue scholars as the voice of principled opposition to a succession o f regimes o f autocratic chief counselors during the Southern Song, paired with the models they provided for morally informed action at the local level, gave them a cultural authority that, in the end, the state could not ignore. As their influence expanded, the Daoxue advocates strove to make the ontological and epistemological underpinnings o f their moral program accessible through their personal teaching and, in the case o f Z h u X i� 朱 熹 ( l 130-1200) in particular, through the creation o f a structured curriculum of texts. For the Daoxue project to succeed, the central terms of Chinese philosophical psychology and anthropology~terms like “Nature,,,"inherent pattern," "feelings," and "phenomenal objects"—needed not only to be reconceived but reimagined. 1 T h e Daoxue reinterpretation o f 1. "Nature" is the standard translation of xing�性’ the innate propensities of an object that define its behavior over time. Angus C. Graham's discussion of the term in Disputers of the Tao: Philosophical Argument in Ancient China (LaSalle, IL: Open

Court, 1989),pp. 117-32, gives a good account of the debates over it in early China. Peter K Bol presents the early Tang understanding o£xing in "This Culture of Ours": Intellectual Transitions in Tfang and Sung China (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1992), pp. 98-104, and Graham sets out the views of the brothers Cheng Yi� 程 頓� (1033-1107) and Cheng Hao�程顥(1032-85), the central Northern Song Daoxue thinkers, in Two Chinese Philosophers: the Metaphysics of the Brothers Ch'eng, reprint (LaSalle, IL: Open Court, 1992), pp. 44-60 and 131-37. Graham returns to the question of the distinctiveness of the Daoxue account of Nature in "What Was New in the Ch'eng-Chu Theory of Human Nature" in Wing-tsit Chan, Chu Hsi and Neo-Confucianism (Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 1986), pp. 138-57. Throughout this study, I refer to xing as "the Nature": I capitalize it and add the admittedly awkward “the” where I believe I must in order to make clear that xing is an attribute of individual objects and to distinguish it from “Nature” in the Western sense and in the modern Chinese sense of daziran�大自然 that refers to the "natural world.”

32

The Other Shore

the foundational categories of "Nature" and “inherent pattern" (reconceived as "principle") were specifically meta-physical (xing er shang, "above form") and thus outside the immediacy o f direct experience. Nevertheless, Daoxue proponents argued that these abstract categories guaranteed the intelligibility of both the sage writings of the past as well as present experience. Daoxue writers therefore needed to demonstrate how these terms inhered in the world, in the self, and in texts; they needed people to be able to grasp intuitively how such transcendent structures could be apprehended in experience. Daoxue, in a word, needed poetry. By the Southern Song, poetry also needed Daoxue. T h e model of meaning underlying the episteme of the Northern Song~its accounts o f the self, of the world of objects, of Heaven, society, history, and historical process一supported the flowering of poetry in the midNorthern Song embodied most famously in the writings of the great polymath Su Shi�蘇拭(1037-1101). In turn, this poetry gave immediacy and particularity to those underlying accounts of the structuring of experience. As the culture of the Northern Song frayed, however, writers came to reject Su Shi's approach to poetry and poetics and, concomitantly, found the view of the self and the world behind his poetry increasingly untenable. Huang Tingjian 黄 庭 堅 ( 1 0 4 5 - 1 1 0 5 ) , the second great poet of the Northern Song, offered a different, inward-turning model that writers explored for the fifty years after the deaths of Su Shi and Huang Tingjian. In the end, this poetics, in its inwardness, did not develop a compelling transcendental ground~either implicit or explicit~that linked aesthetic experience to a broader model for the ordering of knowledge. The key tenets o f Z h u X i ' s synthesis o£Daoxue t h o u g h t ~ his proposals that principle is above form, that “nature is principle" and that “the mind binds together nature and feelings"—provided these missing terms and ground, but the process of mutual supplementation and accommodation between poetry and Daoxue nonetheless was slow. As Daoxue evolved while broadening its base during the last seventy years of the Southern Song, writers learned to see the world through its terms just as they learned to live their lives through its moral, political, and social dicta. By the end of the dynasty, a new episteme largely had consolidated, poetry had found its place within it, and the old world and its structures of aesthetic experience had given way to the new order.

33 The Other Shore

The Classical Order ofLanguage and Aesthetic Experience The nexus of relations that shaped the transformations of poetry in the Southern Song dynasty had deep roots in the Chinese elite cultural tradition that coalesced in the Han dynasty (206 BC-AD 220).2 The story of the synthesis that provided the basic terms defining the connections between language, self, and the world in the Northern Song begins in Warring States China (ca. 403-222 BC), when thinkers grappled with the problem of words and things and came to conclusions deeply different from those of the Greeks. Their different approaches to language reveal corresponding differences in the early Chinese matrix of large-scale cultural categories~ontology, epistemology, metaphysics, and psychology~within which literary aesthetics negotiated how language presents meaning. This Warring States cultural system certainly continued to evolve, first as the early pre-Han feudal system shifted to more complex aristocratic imperial socioeconomic structures during the Han, and then as the Han empire collapsed into cycles of unity and division. However, I believe the elite culture's central commitments about language, textual authority, and the aesthetic remained remarkably stable until the end of the Northern Song dynasty, when the shifts I describe in this book began to manifest themselves. DIFFICULTIES WITH LANGUAGE, REFERENCE, AND IDENTITY

Thinkers in Warring States China, like the Greeks at roughly the same time, confronted the problems of how words relate to things and of how we can know those relationships. The Platonic solution, that knowledge is a form of remembering of essential relations that is stimulated by the play of shadows we call the world of experience, is certainly ingenious and self-consistent. It is not, however, the solution that the Chinese tradition developed. 2. T h e Han completed the process of creating a unified empire after replacing the short-lived Q i n dynasty (221—207 BC) that had united the independent kingdoms o f Warring States China. O n e aspect o f this unification was an intense— if slightly belated~effort to organize the textual legacy and synthesize the pre-imperial cultural traditions under Han Wudi (“The Martial Emperor”).

The Other Shore

34

In the late fourth century BC, Zhuang Z h o u�莊周,A proto-Daoist thinker, launched a scathing attack on language and reference. 3 H e was trained in a style of argument that focused on absurdities arising from efforts to mark clear distinctions in phenomena where the transitions were spatially or temporally continuous (e.g., high/low, life/death, and today/tomorrow). Zhuang Z h o u broadened the critique o f distinctions to include any sorting into categories. In Qium lun� 齊 物 論 , “ T h e Sorting Which Evens Things Out,,,his most systematic account, Zhuang Z h o u begins one sequence o f arguments with a general question: Saying is not blowing breath, saying says something; the only trouble is that what it says is never fixed. Do we really say something? Or have we never said anything? If you think it different from the twittering of fledglings, is there any proof of the distinction?4

夫言非吹也,言者有言。其所言者特未定也。果有言邪。其未嘗� 有言邪。其以爲異于鷇音,亦有辯乎。� Zhuang Z h o u then approaches his critique o f division into categories from many angles: The men of old, their knowledge had arrived at something: at what had it arrived? There were some who thought there had not yet begun to be things~the utmost, the exhaustive, there was nothing more to add. The next thought there were things, but there had not yet begun to be borders. The next thought there were borders to them but there had not yet begun to be "That's it, that's not."5

古之人,其知有所至矣。惡乎至。有以爲未始有物者,至矣,盡� 矣,不可以加矣。其次以爲有物矣,而未始有封也。其次以爲有� 封焉,而未始有是非也。�

3. Recent Western scholarship on Zhuang Zi has devoted considerable attention to his approach to language. In particular, see the essays in Paul I^ellberg and Philip J. Ivanhoe, eds., Essays on Skepticism, Relativism, and Ethics in the Zhuangzi (Albany: S U N Y Press, 1996). 4. Zhuang Zhou, Zhuang Zi jishi� 莊子集釋,Guo Qingfan� 郭慶藩,comp. (Beijing: Zhonghua, 1961), I.1B.63; Zhuang Zi, “The Sorting Which Evens Things O u t ” � * ^ J M � Angus in C. Graham, trans., Chuang-tzuf the Inner Chapters (Indianapolis: Hackett, 2001),reprint of the 1981 Allen & Unwin edition, p. 52. 5. Zhuang Zhou, Zhuang Zijishi 1. 1B.74; Graham, Chuang-tzu, the Inner Chapters, P- 54-

35 The Other Shore N o n e o f these potentially enlightened positions that attack the normal affirmative use o f distinctions in language ("That's it.") proves to be radical enough. Any possible categorical distinction that can be put into words is hopelessly futile: Now suppose that I speak of something, and do not know whether it is of a kind with the "it" in question, or not of a kind. If what is of a kind and what is not are deemed of a kind with one another, there is no longer any difference from an "other.”6

今且有言於此,不知其與是類乎。其與是不類乎。類與不類,相� 與爲類,則與彼無以異矣。� T h e fundamental problem is that all distinctions are both artificial and unstable: The Way has never had borders, saying has never had norms. It is by a "That's it" which deems that a boundary is marked.7

夫道未始有封,言未始有常,爲是而有畛也。� T h e Way to which Zhuang Z h o u refers is not a metaphysical entity distinct from what is encountered in daily life. T h e Way has no borders because the entire phenomenal world is part o f a constant flux o f sedimentation and dispersal, so that particular entities have only temporary identities before being swept up again into transformation. Soon master Lai fell ill and lay panting on the verge of death. His wife and children stood in a circle bewailing him. Master Li went to ask after him. "Shoo, out of the way,,,he said, "Don't startle him while he transforms!" He lolled against Lai's door and talked with him. 'Wonderful, the process which fashions and transforms us! What is it going to turn you into, in what direction will it use you to go? Will it make you into a rat's liver? Or afly'sleg?,,8

俄而子來有病,喘喘然將死。其妻子環而泣之。子犁往問之,曰� 「叱。避。無怛化。」倚其戶與之語曰「偉哉造化。又將奚以汝� 爲。將奚以汝適。以汝爲鼠肝乎。以汝爲蟲臂乎。」� 6. Zhuang Zhou, Zhuang Zijishi l. l B.79; Graham, Chuang-tzu, the Inner Chapters, P- 55. 7. Graham, Chuang-tzu, the Inner Chapters, p. 57. 8. Zhuang Zhou, "The Teacher Who Is the Ultimate Ancestor”《大宗師》,� Zhuang Zijishi 1.3A.261; Graham, Chuang-tzu, the Inner Chapters, p. 88.

36

The Other Shore

This view reappears in an account o f Zhuang Zhou's refusal to mourn the death o f his wife: When Master Zhuang's wife died, Hui Shi came to condole. As for Master Zhuang, he was squatting with his knees out, drumming on a pot and singing. "When you have lived with someone," said Hui Shi, “and brought up children, and grown old together, to refuse to bewail her death would be bad enough, but to drum on a pot and sing~could there be anything more shameful?,,� “Not so. When she first died, do you suppose that I was able not to feel the loss? I peered back into her beginnings; there was a time before there was a life. Not only was there no life, there was a time before there was a shape. Not only was there no shape, there was a time before there was energy. Mingled together in the amorphous, something altered, and there was the energy; by alteration in the energy, there was the shape, by alteration of the shape there was the life. Now once more altered she has gone over to death. This is to be companion with spring and autumn, summer and winter, in the procession of the four seasons. When someone was about to lie down and sleep in the greatest of mansions, I with my sobbing knew no better than to bewail her. The thought came to me that I was uncomprehending towards destiny, so I stopped.,,9 莊 子 妻 死 , 惠 子 吊 之 , 莊 子 則 方 箕 踞 鼓 盆 而 歌 。 惠 子 曰 「 與 人� 居,長子、老身,死不哭亦足矣,又鼓盆而歌,不亦甚乎。」莊� 子曰「不然。是其始死也,我獨何能無槪然。察其始而本無生,� 非 徒 無 生 也 , 而 本 無 形 , 非 徒 無 形 也 , 而 本 無 氣 。 雜 乎 芒 芴 之� 間,變而有氣’氣變而有形,形變而有生。今又變而之死。是相� 與爲春秋冬夏四時行也。人且偃然寢于巨室,而我皦嗷然隨而哭� 之,自以爲不通乎命,故止也。」� X u n Kuang�荀 況 ( c a . 310 BC -ca. 220 BC), the Confucian philosopher w h o confronts Zhuang Zhou's attack, does not so m u c h argue that it is wrong as that it simply misses the point. X u n Kuang's approach to language and reference returns to the positions rather tersely presented in the Zuozhuan� 左傳:“Confucius said, ‘[Previous] records have it that 'Speaking is to adequately [convey] one's intent. Aesthetic pattern is to adequately [convey] one's speech. If you don't

9. Zhuang Zhou, "Ultimate Joy”《至樂》,Zhucmg Zi jishi 3.6B.614-15; Graham, Chuang-tzii, the Inner Chapters, pp. 123-24.

37 The Other Shore speak, w h o will know your intent? If the speaking is without aesthetic pattern, it will not carry f a r . ' " 仲 尼 曰 : 「 志 有 之 • 『 言 以 足� 1()

志,文以足言。』不言,誰知其志?言之無文,行而不遠。」 X u n Kuang argues that words are human devices to accomplish human ends. T h e ultimate status of the objects referred to through these words does not matter so long as the intention behind the pointing out o f objects is fulfilled. Hence he claims that Zhuang Z h o u was looking for meaning in the wrong place: he “was blocked by [obsession with] Heaven and didn't know h u m a n k i n d " 蔽 於 天� 而不知人.11 X u n Kuang, seeing names as accomplishing social ends, looks to the king to establish the proper system o f words: Therefore in the establishing of names by the one who is king, when the name is fixed and the substance discriminated, the Way is put into practice, and his intentions are communicated: thus he takes great care to lead the populace and be consistent and unified.12 故王者之制名,名定而實辨’道行而志通,貝!J慎率民而一焉。� It is noteworthy that X u n Kuang, immediately prior to this explanation, gives a taxonomy o f the self that he treats as the "the fully formed names o f the Later K i n g s " 後 王 之 成 名 : 1 3 That by which a living thing is as it is, we call its Nature The likes and dislikes, delight and anger, joys and sorrows of the Nature, we call feelings. When feelings are thus and the mind selects for them, this is called reckoning That within by which one knows, we call [the faculty of] knowing. When there is that which accords with knowing, we call it knowledge. That within one by which knowledge is possible, we call [innate] ability. When there is that with which 10. D u Yu� 杜預,comp.,Chunqiu jingzhuan jijie� 春 秋 經 傳 禁 解 ( S h a n g h a i : Shanghai guji, 1978), 2.17.1036. This entry is from the 25th year o f Duke Xiang's reign. 11. Xun Kuang�荀況,"Removing O b s t r u c t i o n s ” 《 解 蔽 》 , Z i j i j i e�荀子集解,� annot. WangXianqian�王先謙(Beijing: Zhonghua, 1988), 2.15.393. This section is translated in John Knoblock, Xunzi: A Translation and Study of the Complete Works (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1994), vol. 3,p. 102. 12. Xun Kuang, "Rectifying Names"《正名》’ Xtm Zijijie 2.16.414; Cf. Knoblock, Xunzi,vol. 3,p. 128. 13. For a discussion o f X u n Kuang's use of the term "Later Kings," i.e., the sage rulers o f more recent antiquity as opposed to those who shade into mere mythology, cf. Knoblock, Xunzi, vol. 2,pp. 28-31.

38

The Other Shore ability accords, we call it capability. •.. These are the assorted names that pertain to the human; these are the fully formed names of the Later Kings.14

生之所以然者謂之性…性之好惡喜怒哀樂謂之情。情然而心爲之� 擇謂之慮…所以知之在人者謂之知,知有所合謂之智。所以能之� 在人者謂之能,能有所合謂之能。…是散名之在人者也,是後王� 之成名也。� That is, although X u n Kuang considers words to be conventional designations, the world pointed to by these words is not so much inaccessible as merely mediated by the human faculties. H e asserts that the conventional terminology for describing these faculties一� terminology that Zhuang Z h o u uses as well一is useful, and thus it was established through the wisdom of the early kings. X u n Kuang's writings set out a system of relations between the self, language, and the world that is theoretically constrained but pragmatically powerful and grounded in a sense o f the larger, ultimately unfathomable coherence o f the world to which he gives the name Heaven. Heaven creates people with a particular human Nature, just as it creates the specific qualities o f all other phenomenal objects. What humans know is through their Heaven-endowed senses and their mind's ability to call upon the senses: Upon what do we rely to distinguish identity and difference? We rely upon the Heavenly sense organs. Things that are of the same category [同類]and same characteristics [同情]are equated [ 同 ] b y the Heavenly senses' forming an intention [意]toward the object Form, structure, appearance, and pattern are distinguished by the eye [Here he discusses the five senses in turn.] Explanations, circumstances, delight, anger, sorrow, joy, love, hate, and desire are distinguished by the mind. In the mind there is a verificational awareness [of the five external senses] • As for this verifying awareness, it relies on the ears, and then knowledge of sound is possible; relying on the eyes, then knowledge of form is possible. However, this verifying awareness must wait upon the Heavenly senses to register the category, and only then is it possible.15 14. X u n Kuang, "RectifyingNames"《正名》,XtmZ(/�Ye 2.16.412; Cf! Knoblock Xunzi, vol. 3,pp. 127-28. 15. X u n Kuang, Xun Zijijie 2.16.415-16. There are debates about what exactly the technical terminology in this passage means. See Knoblock's discussion in notes 30 and 3l,Xunzi, vol. 3,pp. 337_38.

39 The Other Shore

何緣而以同異?曰:緣天官。凡同類、同情者,其天官之意物也� 同,…形體、色理以目異,…說故、喜怒、哀樂、愛惡欲以心� 異。心有徵知。徵知則緣耳而知聲可也,緣目而知形可也。然而� 徵知必將待天官之當簿其類,然後可也。� Knowledge proceeds by what Xun Kuang perceives as the normal rules of the phenomenal realm: humans do not rise above it, and so knowledge is constrained to the phenomenal and to what we can abstract from the regularities in the phenomenal. He stresses, however, that being firmly part of this world is not bad: our senses, our capacity for response and for knowledge, and even our desires are endowed by Heaven and are worthy of respect.

Crossings: The Role of the Aesthetic in the Articulation ofEncounter The relations that Xun Kuang proposes for language, knowing, the self, and the objects of the phenomenal realm remained at the core of mainstream Chinese elite culture for the next thousand years. These relations, needless to say,were not without their problems and unanswered—and unanswerable~questions. Thus the formulations shifted and, in the late Southern Song dynasty, collapsed when they no longer proved adequate to the needs of the culture and were largely superseded by a new vision of the self and its relationship to the world. A central issue in the sense of the self as one object among the many objects of the world is the manner in which insides and outsides correspond to one another. The mind is on the inside and depends on the sense organs both to capture the patterns of the world and to find external expression for its internal responses to what it encounters. There is a fundamental heterogeneity here. Because the mind and the world are formed of the same material, the logic of "things of the same category respond to one another" (tonglei ociangying�同類牛目應)can justify the most basic level of inner responses to outer events. However, the more complex categories of the world~objects (um�物)and events (shi�事)一are clearly different from the terms that articulate the inner structure of the mind: resolve (zhi�志),intentions (yi�意),feelings (qing '隱),thinking (si�思),and desire (yu�欲).Translation from one set of terms into another in

40

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crossing the border between inner and outer inevitably involves a moment beyond intelligibility. T h e accessible content o f our awareness already is the result o f the interaction, and there is no way to go further upstream. In the Chinese tradition, the act o f crossing boundaries is the moment of aesthetic experience. T h e early Han dynasty text that sets out the role o f poetry in the movement between inside and out is the “Great Preface” to the canonical M a o commentary to the Canon ofPoetry. It begins: Poetry is where the resolve goes. While in the heart, it is resolve; manifested in words, it is a poem. Feelings move within and take shape in words. Words are not enough, and so one sighs it. Sighing it is not enough, and so one extends it in song. Extending it in song is not enough, and without knowing, one's hands dance it and one's feet tread it.16

詩者,志之所之也。在心爲志,發言爲詩。情動於中而形於言。� 言之不足,故嗟嘆之,嗟嘆之不足,故永歌之,永歌之不足,不� 知手之舞之,足之蹈之也。� T h e argument o f the preface is not tightly organized since it j u m p s from term to term. First, poetry is the external manifestation o f resolve. It is important to note that poems in this view are not statements o f resolve, but its embodiment in language. T h e n the preface shifts from resolve to the feelings, qing '[青• T h e issues here are complex, but the "feelings" as a whole a r e ~ b y definition~the particular characteristic responses to things and events by which the Nature becomes manifest: all objects have qing '清,manifest characteristic qualities that delineate their Nature. 17 In humans, given the inwardness o f Nature, the qing 1�青 acquire the more particular meaning o f the feelings but still preserve the broader notion o f the a^regate structure o f responsiveness. Thus w h e n “the feelings move within,,,� the preface shifts to a more instrumental account o f h o w the resolve takes shape in words: it does so through the mediating structure o f

16. This translation is a modification of Steven Van Zoeren, Poetry and Personality: Reading, Exegesis, and Hermeneutics in Traditional China (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1991),pp. 95-96. 17. Discussions of this issue abound. For example, see Zhang Hao�張 晤 ’ Zhongguo meixue fanchou yu chuantong wenhua�中國美學叙^與傳統文化(Wuhan: Hubei jiaoyu chubanshe, 1996), pp. 171-76.

41 The Other Shore the feelings. H o w can one, however, adequately give external expression to the particularity o f response? Expression shifts from speaking to singing and finally to dance performance (all associated with the ritual presentation o f the poems of the Canon of Poetry). Since the poems o f the Classic are exemplary, they all are taken to be perfect representations o f the resolve and feelings o f the poets, and the feelings themselves are both morally proper and entirely appropriate to the events that occasioned them. They are both proof o f this possibility (since otherwise Confucius would not have approved o f them) and a very high standard for later writers to meet. Chinese writers were aware that adequate representation is a serious problem. In the early Confucian textual tradition, the primary concern was less with the sage's ability adequately to understand the world than with the adequacy o f the texts to embody that understanding: The Master [i.e., Confucius] said, "Writing does not exhaust speech, and speech does not exhaust intent." If this is so, then can the intentions of the sage not be seen? The Master said, "The sage established Images to exhaust the intent, set out the hexagrams to exhaust the circumstances, and appended phrases to exhaust his speech.,,18

子曰書不盡言•言不盡意•然則聖人之意•其不可見乎•子曰• 聖人立象以盡意•設卦以盡情僞•繫辭以盡其言• T h e canonical tradition that emerged in the Han privileged the sages as both readers o f the world and writers of texts. T h e writers o f the Han and later dynasties knew they were not so gifted but preserved the ideal and the goal. As Lu Ji�陸 機 ( 2 6 1 - 3 0 3 ) wrote in the preface to his "Rhyme-Prose on Wen�文[Composition],,:�

18. “Appended Phrases,’《繫辭傳上》,Li Daoping�李道平,comp.,Zhou Yi jijie zuanshu�周易禁解纂疏(Beijing: Zhonghua, 1994), pp. 609-10. Edward Shaughnessy treats qingwei 1�青僞,which I translate as "circumstances," as a pair of opposites: the real and the artificial. Perhaps a better approach for present purposes is to take the pair as simply the complementary aspects to consider in each of the sixty-four normative situations represented by the hexagrams. The details presented in the six lines of the hexagrams present both that which spontaneously arises (qing) and that which comes through endeavor (wei). See Shaughnessy, I Ching: the Classic of Changes (New York: Ballantine Books, 1996), p. 201.

42

The Other Shore Whenever I observe that which was created by men of talent, I presume to believe I have that by which to attain their movement of mind. Now although in the releasing of words and sending forth of phrases, there truly are many transformations, the alluring and ugly, pleasing and displeasing can be spoken of. Whenever I compose, I especially see these matters [情].I always am worried that my intent will not match the object and the composition will not reach the intent. It is not, I think, a difficulty of knowing, but a difficulty in being able.19

余每觀才士之所作,竊有以得其用心。夫其放言遣辭,良多變� 矣。妍蚩好惡,可得而言。每自屬文,尤見其情。恆患意不稱� 物,文不逮意,蓋非知之難,能之難也。� Lu Ji sees two phases to writing: first getting the mind to conceive an appropriate intention concerning an object or event, and then putting that intention into adequate language. At the outset o f the rhyme-prose, Lu Ji expresses optimism that he actually knows h o w the process works, but in concluding, he admits failure to fathom the operations o f "opening and blockage.” As this phrase suggests and the passage below amply illustrates, the language o f boundary crossing is central to L u j i ' s account o f the processes o f composition:

若夫 應感之會, 通塞之紀�

Now, The meeting of response and stimulus, The arrangement of penetration and blockage:

來不可遏, 去不可止

0

藏若景滅, 行猶響起 ° 方天機之駿禾(J, 夫何紛而不理�

Their coming cannot be stopped; Their leaving cannot be prevented. Their hiding is like shadow vanishing; Their traveling forth is like echoes rising. Just when the Heavenly incipience is swift and sure,

How profuse and unordered it is.

19. Lu Ji, "Rhyme-Prose on Wen《文賦》.The standard edition is Zhang Shaokang�張少康,ed., Wenjujishi�文賦篥釋(Shanghai: Shanghai guji, 1984). Cf. the translations in Xiao Tong, Wen xuan, or Selections of Refined Literature, trans, and annot. David R. Knechtges (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1996), vol. 3,pp. 2 1 1 13; and Stephen Owen, Readings in Chinese Literary Thought (Cambridge: Harvard Council on East Asian Studies, 1992), pp. 76-84.

43 The Other Shore 思風發於胸臆’

The winds of thought come forth from the breast;

言泉流於唇齒。�

The fountain of words flows from the lips and teeth. The profusion so abundant and so burgeoning: This is what brush and paper will assay. The pattern is splendid and floods the eyes;

紛葳蕤以馭遝’ 唯毫素之所擬。� 文 膽 以 溢 目 ,� 音泠泠而盈耳。� 及其� 六情底滯’ 志往神留,� 兀若枯木,� 豁若涸流。� 攬營魂以探赜,� 頓精爽而自求° 理翳翳而愈伏,� 思軋軋其若抽。� 是以� 或竭情而多悔,� 或率意而寡尤o

The sound is pure and clear and fills the ears. When The six feelings stagnate, The resolve goes and the spirit lingers: Blank like a withered tree, Emptied like a dried-up current. One pulls on the active soul to explore the depths, Stopping the refined essence to seek within oneself. The pattern is blocked and increasingly hidden; Thought, holding back, is as if being pulled. Through this, Sometimes one exhausts the feelings and has many regrets, Sometimes one follows one's intent with few faults.

雖茲物之在我,� 非余力之所勠。� 故時撫空懷而自惋�

Although this thing is within me,

吾未識夫開塞之� 所由也。�

I still do not know the processes of opening and blockage.20

It is not something my strength compels. Thus at times I stroke my empty breast and regret:

In this passage Lu Ji incorporates most o f the technical vocabulary developed during the period to discuss the various stages o f experience and representation in writing and the difficulties o f "getting

20. Cf. Knechtges, Wen xuan, pp. 229-31, and Owen, Readings in Chinese Literary Thought, pp. 173-78.

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it right" encountered at each stage. T h e entities that actually effect movement across the boundary of self and world are finally inscrutable: the “meeting of [inner] response and [outer] stimulus" is the moment o f “incitement,,(xing�興 ) t h a t starts the process. It occurs not by chance but also not through conscious control. It is associated with the logic of temporality~the arising o f events through Heaven's transformations一referred to in the term "Heavenly incipience." T h e process by which one knows the contours o f the objects o f the world rather than merely reacting to them requires a form o f direct contact. This contact comes w h e n the spirit (shen�神)� leaves the body and “travels with objects" (shen yu wu you�神 與 物 遊 ) : here Lu Ji presents the stagnation when the spirit does not leave but the resolve (zhi�志)一the commitments shaping one's response— drifts off. 21 Spirit, like incitement and incipience, cannot be fathomed. 22 T h e terms for the processes and content o f encounter~stimulus and response, incitement, Heavenly incipience, pattern, spirit, feelings, thought, resolve, and intention—and the underlying model defined through them remained largely constant for the next nine hundred years. Su Shi uses different wording but clearly draws on the model o f “spirit wandering" in his account o f his writing: My writing is like a spring of ten thousand gallons: it does not select the ground out of which it comes forth. On level land, it flows smoothly and quickly, and even a thousand li in a day is not hard. When it bends and breaks over mountain stones, it follows the object in taking its form and cannot be known. What can be known is that it always travels where it ought to travel and always stops where it cannot but stop. It is like this, and that is all. As for the rest, even I cannot know.23 21. For a discussion of these issues of two-way movement in the Wenfu and other texts of the period, see Zheng Yuyu�鄭毓瑜,“Shensi yu zhiyin”〈神思與知音〉� ["Numinous thought and knowing the tone”], in Liuchao qingjing meixue zonglun 六朝情境美學综論(Taibei: Xuesheng shuju, 1996), pp. 1-60. 22. For an excellent study of the centrality of the model of “spirit traveling with objects" in the Chinese aesthetic tradition, see Cheng Fuwang�成復旺,Shen yu wu you: lun Zhongguo chuantongshenmeifangshi�神 與 物 遊 I�論 中 國 傳 統 審 美 方 式� (Beijing: Renmin daxue, 1989). 23. Su Shi, Ziping wen《自評文》[A comment on my writing], Su Shi wenji 蘇軾文集,ed. Kong Fanli�孑L凡—(Beijing: Zhonghua, 1986), 5.66.2069.

45 The Other Shore 吾 文 如 萬 斛 泉 源 ’ 不 擇 地 皆 可 出 。 在 平 地 滔 滔 汩 汩 , 雖 一 曰 千� 里無難。及其與山石曲折’隨物賦形而不可知也。所可知者,常� 行 於 所 當 行 , 常 止 於 不 可 不 止 , 如 是 而 已 矣 。 其 他 雖 吾 亦 不 能� 。� 知也 Somehow he makes contact with the contours of experience and, through suppleness o f response, manages to translate that encounter into a written text. Moreover, Su Shi explicitly rejects the possibility o f further insight into how these complementary processes happen. A hundred years later, YangWanli�楊 萬 里 ( l 127-1206) equally looks beyond himself for the source of poetry in the language o f incitement, Heaven, and timeliness: On the whole, in the making of poetry, inspiration [i.e., incitement 興]is the best and recitation second, while social verse is for when one has no choice. I at first have no intent to write this particular poem, but this thing, this event happens to strike me. My intention also happens to be moved by this thing or this event. The encounter is first, the response follows, and this poem comes out. How is it my creation? It is Heaven's. This is called inspiration.24 大抵詩之作也,興,上也。賦,次也。賡和,不得已也。我初無� 意於作是詩,而是物是事適然觸乎我。我之意亦適然感乎是物是� 事 。 觸 先 焉 , 感 隨 焉 , 而 是 詩 出 焉 。 我 何 與 哉 。 天 也 。 斯 之� 謂 興 。� T h e terms used to discuss the writing o f wen 文(patterned language, i.e., literature) are those used to discuss experiential knowledge in general. Both are made possible by the mind's specific mechanisms o f response. Both draw in particular on qing '清,both as "feelings" and as the broader category of characteristic features by which Nature can be made manifest and known. And specifically human knowledge and literature both find their inner form as an intention (y/�意)toward the object (i.e., X u n Kuang's "Things that are o f the same category and same characteristics (qing�情)are equated by the Heavenly senses' forming an intention (yi� 意)toward the o b j e c t . . a n d Lu Ji's "Whenever I compose, I especially see these 24. Yang Wanli, "Answering the letter of Xu Da, Military Commander of the Arsenal at Jiankang Superior Prefecture,,《答—康府大*庫軍門徐達書》� (Chengzhaiji 67.6b), cited in ZhangJian�張健,Nan Song wenxue piping ziliao huibian 南宋文學批評資料彙編(Taibei: Chengwen, 1978), pp. 244-45. I return to Yang Wanli and this issue in chapter 5.

46

The Other Shore

matters (qing�情)• I always am worried that my intent will not match the object and the composition will not reach the intent.”)� Moreover, from very early in the tradition, it was agreed that unadorned words were inadequate to convey either feelings or intentions. T h e accounts o£wen�文 invariably include their disjunctive moments一moments when the tracing o f the process fails~both in the encounter with objects and in the composition o f texts, and it seems that wen�文,the patterning o f words, becomes the privileged medium to allow outward form implicitly to present inner categories. Wen conveys both feelings and intentions as the visible traces o f intentionality that is made manifest in the act o f ordering the language. This privileged view o f the patterned is inchoate in the “Appended ressions,” account of Images (“the sage established Images to lust the intent") but takes clearer form in such pronouncements as Tao Qian's�陶潛(369-427) "now, in leading and conveying o f intention and [one's distinctive] vital breath, surely only wen文[can accomplish t h i s ] ! ” 「 夫 導 達 意 氣 , 其 惟 文 乎 」 2 5 Su Shi echoes the view more than six hundred years later, although his terms for knowledge include the more complex concept of//�理,� “inherent pattern": Confucius said, “The wording conveys [the intention] and that's all.” Things certainly have this inherent pattern [li 理]:not knowing it is the problem. If one knows it, the problem is not being able to convey it through one's mouth and hands. What I refer to as patterned language [wen�文]is what can convey this, and that is all.26

孔子曰辭達而已矣。物固有是理,患不知之,知之患不能達之於� 口與手。所謂文者,能達是而已。� It is both interesting and significant that Kant's caveat about aesthetic judgments (i.e., that they reflect the particular constraints o f the human faculties for experience rather than give direct knowledge) seems built into the Chinese model. It is precisely the particular 25. Tao Qian 陶潛,Preface to the "Rhyme-prose on being moved by the Gentleman not encountering his time”《感士不遇賦序》in Tao Yuanming jijiaojian� 陶淵� 明集校箋,ed. and annot. Gong Bin�龔斌(Shanghai: Shanghai guji, 1996), 5.365. 26. Su Shi, "Answering Yu Gua, Assistant Prefect of Qian”《答虔悴余括》,� Su Shi wenji 4.59.1793. Peter Bol discusses both passages in “This Culture of Ours" PP- 293-95.

47 The Other Shore internal mechanisms mediating experience (especially qing�情 and yi�意)that lead to the primacy of wen�文 in the representation of what is humanly significant in experience. If wen�文 is so crucial for adequate expression, what exactly is it? I s u r e s t that the most general definition is the best for drawing together the many aspects of its role in early Chinese culture. Wen�文� is simply manifest patterning. To judge that something has wen�文 is to say that the object reveals a pattern. To create wen�文 is to arrange materials into a pattern. Thus the attribution of wen 文 does not say anything about the content of the pattern, but it does carry two important implications that inform the particular content. The first echoes the transcendental postulate that Kant saw as grounding the possibility of forming any aesthetic judgments at all, that is, the commitment to the purposiveness of Nature as a whole. 27 In the Chinese case, such large categories as tianwen�天 文 ( t h e manifest patterns of the Heavens), dili�地 理 ( t h e inherent patterns of the Earth), renwen�人 文 ( t h e manifest patterns of humankind), and wanwu zhi li�萬 物 之 理 ( t h e inherent patterns of the myriad phenomena) all rest on the ineffable but still causal system of the Way. It is, I think, entirely uncontroversial to assert that the intelligibility of the particular in the early Chinese system is predicated on the continuity and pervasiveness of the underlying Way. However, at the level of particular objects, when one affirms the existence of wen�文,one affirms a unity (the wen�文 itself) that hovers over the heterogeneous elements that form the pattern. The wen�文� is not in the elements themselves but in our judgment about their arrangement. Yet this judgment not only affirms the particular case of a unity formed out of diversity but implicitly asserts the possibility of such a particular, concrete unity that transcends the heterogeneity of the parts out of which it is formed. As discussed in the introduction, Theodor Adorno compellingly argues both that this unity is not an achieved fact but a mere semblance, and that the prospect of this unity being fulfilled presents—but never realizes—the possibility

27. " N o w insofar as the concept of an object also contains the basis for the object's actuality, the concept is called the thing's purpose, and the thing's harmony with that character of things which is possible through purposes is called the purposiveness of its form.” See above, p. 21.

48

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of achieving a self-subsisting unity that transcends the material conditions out of which it arose.28 The Chinese aesthetic traditions, and the literary tradition in particular, reflect these two aspects of the very positing of wen�文 as a material possibility. O n the one hand, the insubstantial quality of wen�文 makes it less than trustworthy: it promises a substance that it can never quite realize. This slippage is crystallized in the Confucian injunction� 文 質 彬 彬 , 然 凌 舍 子 : "Only when the adornment and the substance match harmoniously, then one is a noble man•”29 O n the other hand, the suspended pulling-into-unity of the aesthetic object does create another form of slippage, a never-completed transformative reframing and distancing of the aesthetic structure from the particular elements brought into it.30

Plotting a New Course: What Changes in Literary History At the height of the Northern Song dynasty, literary experience in both the writing and reading of texts operated within a matrix of commitments surrounding the concept of wen�文 that were very different from the sorts of commitments underlying literary culture in the West, even though both shared the fundamental problematic

28. Adorno explores this theme throughout his Aesthetic Theory. The following passage gives some sense of his argument: In fact, every penetrating analysis of an artwork turns up fictions in its claim to aesthetic unity, whether on the grounds that its parts do not spontaneously cohere and that unity is simply imposed on them, or that the elements are prefabricated to fit this unity and are not truly elements. The plurality in artworks is not what it was empirically but rather what it becomes as soon as it enters their domain; this condemns aesthetic reconciliation as aesthetically specious. The artwork is semblance not only as the antithesis to existence but also in its own terms. Theodor Adorno, Aesthetic Theory, p. 105. 29. Lunyu 6.18. 30. The modern Chinese aesthetic theorist Zhu Guangqian�朱 光 潛 has explored this issue in depth. Zheng Yuyu also compellingly uses the concept of aesthetic distance in her discussion of the complementary dynamics of creation and interpretation. See “Shensi yu zhiyin” in Liuchao qingjing meixue zonglun.

49 The Other Shore of the destabilizing doubleness of aesthetic experience. The Northern Song commitments ranged broadly. They began with ideas about the structure of the world and the self that shape the relation between sensory perception and stable knowledge. They also involved the manner in which language indirectly referred to the phenomenal world (words present intentions, and intentions are about objects). How canonical writings captured and conveyed the invariant in experience was part of this nexus of meaning informing wen, as was what it meant to be "cultured" (wen 文)and to be able to draw productively on the canonical texts.31 These commitments and contemporaneous literary practice supported one another: acknowledged creative work affirmed the efficacy of the relationship between the self, language, and the world embodied in wen�文,and the texts became sites for the production and reproduction of the aesthetic experience made possible and shaped by the larger cultural commitments upon which they drew. The writings of the major cultural figures of the Northern S o n g ~ OuyangXiu�歐陽修(1007-72),WangAnshi�王安石(1021-86),and especially Su Shi—present a form of culmination of the traditional understanding of wen�文.After Su Shi's death, complex pressures began to shape a deep reconfiguration of the role of the aesthetic and the literary in Chinese culture. Poetry~because it was the preeminent literary form~continued to be written during the Southern Song dynasty. Indeed, the writing of poetry spread as a mark of cultivation and flourished. Nor did poetry die at the end of the Southern Song dynasty: it continued to be a focus of elite literary practice for the next six hundred years. Yet by the end of the Southern Song, wen�文,� poetry, and how both were understood had changed. I introduce the perhaps cumbersome theoretical machinery of these first two chapters not only because I believe that we need to change the conceptual vocabulary we in the West bring to the study of literature ifwe are to see what is compelling about the Chinese poetic tradition, and contextualize the literary within larger social and cultural processes if we are to be able to articulate what exactly had changed by the end of the Southern Song. 31. The term siwen�斯 文 refers to the long tradition of inherited Chinese culture. See Bol, "This Culture of Ours,n pp. 1-3.

CHAPTER

TWO

The Source and Streams Flou/ingfrom It

Prologue: ,Neimenggu shehuikexueHanwenban内蒙古社會科學漢文 版 23,no. 4 (July 2002): 71 -75. 55. "Account of the Hall of the Greater Yan《大雅堂記》,HTJQJ 2.437. Huang Tingjian wrote the account in 1100 (Yuanfu 3). See Zheng^Yongxiao, Huang Tingjian nianpu ocinbian, pp. 325-26.

The Source and Streams

73

Huang argues here that for D u Fu, intentionality is not directed toward the act of writing itself but toward the occasion for writing. Du Fu's intentions, however, lie deeper than a rebus created by merely stringing together hackneyed allegorical uses of the imagery of the poem, and Huang warns visitors to the hall that learning to understand those complex intentions takes time, effort,and insight. Crucially, understanding takes both breadth and depth of reading rather than of experience in the world. Huang offers three reasons for this focus on reading in the art of articulating intentions. The first is simply pragmatic and technical: writing requires a mastery of tools: T h e inspired import o f the p o e m s y o u sent m e is lofty and distant, b u t the w o r d i n g is raw,stiff, and does not accord w i t h prosodic rules. O n occasion y o u r language does not reach y o u r initial intention. T h i s p r o b l e m is j u s t because y o u r reading is not yet refined or broad. “ O n e w i t h l o n g sleeves is g o o d at dance; one w i t h m u c h m o n e y is g o o d at commerce,,is not an e m p t y statement. 56

所送新詩,皆興寄高遠,但語生硬,不諧律呂,或詞氣不逮初造� 意時。此病只是讀書未精博耳。長袖善舞,多錢善賈,不虛� 語也。� Experience with texts gives one a way to articulate the subtle movements of the mind with ease and felicity of expression. The second reason is more difficult but points to an important aspect of Huang Tingjian's turning inward: he seems to have believed that one's own inner resources, tested against the best writings of the past, are a better guide than chance experience in the phenomenal realm. T h e force o f [ H o n g ] G u i f u ' s brush can lift a cauldron. In future days he w i l l n o t be w i t h o u t writings transmitted by [later] generations. W h a t he m u s t d o is devote his m i n d to " s u b d u i n g himself." 5 7 N o t seeing w h e t h e r others are g o o d or bad, he should entirely use his insight to illumine his basic mind. I f he learns diligently and in his spare time carefully reads a thousand v o l u m e s , then he can completely attain mastery. 58 56. "Letter written to Wang Guanfu"《與王觀復書》,H77Q/2.470. 57. This important phrase is the first half of “subduing oneself and returning to the rites”� 克己復禮,one of Confucius' definitions of the central virtue of humaneness. Sec Analects 12.1. 58. "Colophon to an old poem presented to Hong G u i f u ” 《 書 舊 詩 與 洪 龜 父 跋� 其後》,H77Q/2.703.

74

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龜父筆力可扛鼎,他日不無文章垂世。要須盡心於克己,不見人� 物臧否,全用其輝光以照本心。力學有暇,更精讀千卷書,乃可� 畢兹能事。� Huang here stresses the relationship of the mind to texts: selfcultivation lies in clarifying the mind and reading texts. The third reason to focus on reading rather than on the world follows from the second: if one is to read well, one must come to know one's own mind as a precondition. Huang asserts, “If one has not come to know one's mind yet claims to understand the Analects, I do not believe i t . ” 5 9 不 識 心 而 云 解 《 論 語 》 章 句 , 吾 不 信 也 � B e c a u s e clarity of self-understanding is so crucial, one should not let the world of experience divert one's attention and cloud one's perception: N o w i f the m i n d is not pulled b y external objects, t h e n it maintains its H e a v e n - g r a n t e d completeness: the myriad objects w e l l f o r t h [as if] c o m i n g f r o m a mirror. 60

夫心不牽於外物則其守天全,萬物森然,[如]出於一鏡� Huang Tingjian's focus on the representation of intention in his discussions of poetry reveals the deep connection between his stress on the centrality of fixed moral commitments and on the need to master the textual tradition. Intentions are not neutral: as dispositions towards the world, they are ineluctably morally valenced. Yet the moral understanding attained by the sages and great writers is complex because it reflects the complexity of human nature and its interactions with the myriad patterns of the world. For Huang, the canonical textual tradition embodies this complexity of manifestation while preserving the "one that binds them together." I suggest that in the sage's instructing people, he w a s g o o d at c o m p l e t e l y [realizing] their capacity. O b s e r v i n g the failings in their learning and the biases in their habitual practices, h e achieved d e e p

59. From "Colophon on the ‘Shuanglin Xinwang ming,”《跋雙林心王銘》,� e to the Ink Bamboo paintings o f Master D a o z h e n ” 《 道 _ 師 畫 墨 竹� 序 》 ( H T J Q J 1:15.416),cited in Qian Zhixi�錢志熙,Huang Tingjian shixue tixi yanjiu 黄庭堅祷學體系研究(Beijing: Beijing daxue chubanshe, 2003),p. 220. T h e poem was written in 1100; see Zheng Yongxiao, Huang Tingjian nianpu xinbian, p. 336. T h e HYJQJ text omits the ru�如 character.

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accomplishment in repairing the damage.61 Those who spoke in ancient times walked different paths in the realm but returned together, and they had a hundred [different] concerns but [their commitments] converged. If one who learns is not good at apprehension, I am afraid that he will not get close to the moral principles. Among the scholars of recent generations, those who know to value this book [the Analects] are many. Yet those who have long cultivated learning will fully commit their minds and therefore will attain much. Those who come late to learning rely on [other] people and thus mostly do not fully commit their minds [to the task] • Not fully committing their minds, therefore, even if they were to discern the stanzas, understand the sentences, and clearly analyze the commentary, they would not be able to reach through nor their Natures arrive [at true understanding]. Xun Qing said, "Those good at learning connect modes and categories.”621 suppose that hearing one thing and [coming to] know one thing is the [defining] fault of one who comes late to learning. One who hears one and comes to know two surely can be called good at learning.63 Proceeding from this, those who are wise

61. T h e phrase xiqing buyi�肩、騌補創 refers to repairing the damage done by the punishments o f tattooing the face and cutting o f f the end o f the nose and c o m e s f r o m “ T h e Teacher W h o Is the Ultimate A n c e s t o r ” 《 大 宗 師 》 i n Zhuang

Zi.

62. H u a n g here does not quote X u n Z i exactly but gives a condensed version o f a longer argument. J o h n K n o b l o c k translates the passage thus: “ O n e w h o does not fully grasp the appropriate connection between modes o f behaviour and the various categories o f things and w h o does not see the oneness between the requirements o f the principle o f humanity and the moral obligations that inhere in it does not deserve to be called expert in learning. T h e truly learned are those w h o make sure that their studies keep this unity. T h o s e w h o leave w i t h one principle and return w i t h another are m e n o f the streets and alleys. T h e y are expert in f e w things and inexpert in many, like [evil rulers] Jie, Z h o u X i n , and Robber Z h i . Be complete and w h o l e in it, and then y o u will be truly l e a r n e d . ” 「 倫 類 不 通 ’ 仁 義 不 一

’ 不 足 謂�

善 學 。 學 也 者 ’ 固 學 一 之 也 。 一 出 焉 ’ 一 入 焉 , 涂 巷 之 人 也 。 其 善 者 少 ’ 不 善� 者多,桀紂盜跖也。全之盡之,然後學者也。」Zi

jijie

1.1.18. Knoblock,

trans., Xun Zi, p. 142. H u a n g Tingjian appears to assume that the reader k n o w s the complete passage. ( T h e phrase "evil rulers" is m y interpolation.) 63. Analects 5.9: “ T h e Master said to Zigong, t W h o is the better man, y o u or H u i ? ’ ‘ H o w dare I compare myself w i t h Hui? W h e n he is told one thing he understands ten. W h e n I am told one thing I understand only two.' T h e Master said, 'You are not as good as he is. N e i t h e r o f us is as good as he

is.,” (Lau, p. 7 7 . ) 「 子 謂 子 貢 EI

'

『 女 與 回 也 , 孰 愈 。 』 對 曰 ’ 『 賜 也 ’ 何 敢 望 回 。 回 也 , 聞 一 以 知 十 。 賜 也 ,� 聞 一 知 二 。 』 子 曰 ’ 『 弗 如 也 。 吾 與 女 ’ 弗 如 也 ° 』 」 Y a n H u i was Confucius,� best student.

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The Source and Streams 76 can reach the point where they hear one and know ten. Proceeding from this, those who are wise can reach the point where there is “one [thread] that binds it together."64 Having one that binds it together is a matter for a sage. Starting from the gateway of one who learns and reaching the deep chambers of the sage is a long and great road. And yet it is also nothing more than turning to seek it within oneself in every matter, being loyal, trustworthy, serious, and stalwart, not daring to deceive oneself. What one practices dares not lag behind what one has heard; what one says dares not exceed what one practices; on all occasions whipping oneself forward, one accumulates the merit one has attained oneself.65 蓋聖人之於教人,善盡其材,視其學術之弊,性習之偏,息黥補� 劓之功深矣。古之言者’天下殊塗而同歸,百慮而一致。學者儻� 不善於領會,恐於義理終不近也。近世學士大夫,知好此書者已� 眾,然宿學者盡心,故多自得。晚學者因人,故多不盡心。不盡� 心 ’ 故 使 章 分 句 解 , 曉 析 詁 訓 , 不 能 心 通 性 達 , 終 無 所 得 o 荀 卿� 曰「善學者通倫類。」蓋聞一而知一,此晚學者之病也。聞一以� 知二,固可以謂之善學。由此以進,智可至於聞一知十。由此以� 進 , 智 可 至 於 一 以 貫 之 。 一 以 貫 之 , 聖 人 之 事 也 。 由 學 者 之 門� 地,至聖人之奧室,其塗雖長大,然亦不過事事反求諸己,忠信� 篤實,不敢自欺,所行不敢後其所聞,所言不敢過其所行,每鞭� 其後,積自得之功也。�

Huang's initial argument in this passage is that one w h o is good at learning what the Analects has to teach must be good at apprehension

64. " O n e that binds it together” is one o f the most famous phrases in tht Analects, appearing twice in the collection. T h e first is: " T h e Master said, ‘Shen,there is one single thread binding m y way together.' Z e n g Z i assented. A f t e r the Master had gone out, the disciples asked,"What did he mean?' Z e n g Z i said, T h e w a y o f the master consists in doing one's best and in using oneself as a measure to gauge others. T h a t is a l l . , ” 「 子 曰 , 『 參 乎 ’ g a — 以 貫 之 。 』 曾 子 曰 , 『 唯 。 』� 子 出 。 門 人 問 曰 , 『 何 謂 也 。 』 曾 子 曰 , 『 夫 子 之 道 , 忠 恕 而 已 矣 。 』 」� (Analects 4 . 1 5 : 1 use Lau's translation with changes to the romanization, p. 74.) T h e second is slightly more relevant to the problem o f m o v i n g f r o m multiplicity to spontaneous mastery in learning: " T h e master said, ‘ C i , d o y o u think that I am the kind o f man w h o learns widely and retains what he has learned in his mind?,Yes, I do. Is it not so?’ ‘ N o , I have a single thread binding it all together.,”「子日,『賜� 也 , 女 以 予 爲 多 學 而 識 之 者 與 。 』 對 曰 ’ 『 然 ’ 非 與 。 』 曰 , 『 非 也 。 予 一 以� 貫之。』」(Analects 15.3, Lau, p. 132.) For convenient discussions o f the passages, see Edward Slingerland, trans., Confacius: Analects with Selections from Traditional Commentaries (Indianapolis: Hackett, 2003), pp. 3 3 - 3 4 and 1 7 4 - 1 7 5 . 65. uLunyu duanpian"《論語斷篇》,H77Q| 2.505-6.

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and must move from seeing just one point in the passages to seeing two, then seeing ten, then grasping the unity that binds the text together as a totality. Yet in the concluding section, he shifts the locus of learning away from the text to a constant, deeply personal, interior struggle. T h e task is not only to bring the intentions discovered in the Analects to bear on the events of one's daily life but to constantly check if one's thoughts, as well as speech and action, correspond to what one's understanding of the Analects deems appropriate. Gradually, in this process o f self-discovery and self-cultivation, with the challenge of the text always present, one learns to see how the movement o f mind implicit in the text applies to an ever broader range o f circumstances until, with complete mastery o f the "technique of the mind" (xinshu�心術),one can creatively deploy the "one [thread] that binds it together." O n e o f Huang Tingjian's most famous formulations一although complicated by its secondhand source一focuses on the problem of the complexity o f the intentions in canonical texts and the manner in which those intentions can be appropriated in new contexts. Just as an adept reader of the Analects will see ten implications in a single pronouncement, so the adept reader of great poetry will see the wider range o f applications behind the intention embodied in a single poetic line. T h e poet-monk Huihong cites Huang Tingjian: [Huang] Shan'gu said, "Poetic intentions are inexhaustible, but h u m a n talent has its limits. To use limited talent to pursue inexhaustible intentions, even [Tao] Y u a n m i n g or [ D u ] S h a d i n g could not get skillful results. H o w e v e r , to not change the intent but create [new] phrasing is called the method o f changing the bones; to probe deeply into the intention and give f o r m to it is the method o f snatching the embryo." 6 6

66. There is some reason to doubt that Huang Tingjian actually spoke these words attributed to him. For a debate on the question, see Zhou Yukai� 周裕鍇,� "Huihong and the method of ‘exchanging bones and snatching the embryo,’,� 〈惠洪與換骨奪胎法〉,Wenxue yichan�文學遗產 2003.6:8I~98,and M o Lifeng 莫 礦 鋒 , " ^ a i n discussing who first created the theory of ‘snatching the embryo and exchanging the bones"'〈再論奪胎換骨說的首創者〉,Wenxue yichan文學遗產 2003.6:99-109- Since Huang espoused views consistent with the general argument, the real question seems to be who is to blame for propagating the term "exchanging the bones and snatching the embryo” and the sort of obscure, plagiaristic poems

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山谷云詩意無窮而人才有限。以有限之才追無窮之意,雖淵明、� 少陵,不得工也。然不易其意而造其語,謂之換骨法。窺入其意� 而形容之,謂之奪胎法。� Huang argues that the specific context of a past poem cannot fully exhaust the implications of the intentions revealed in the particular moment: there always is an excess that escapes the limits of the poem. Since the intentions embodied in but not exhaustively realized through great poetry are normative, creatively deploying them— intuiting their relevance to new occasions~becomes a form of poetic practice that parallels the challenge of realizing the intentions in the Analects in daily practice. Huang Tingjian sees the poetic tradition as continuous with the canonical Confucian tradition. His sense of the nature of meaning in poetry, its inwardness and complexity of ramification, makes the prior poets' intentions~rather than simply the language presenting them~the locus of reflection, practice, and mastery. For Huang Tingjian~if Huang actually used the phrases一� "snatching the embryo" and "changing the bones” therefore speak of two modes of creative transformation of the nexus of language and intention offered by the poetic tradition. The origins of “snatching the embryo" and "changing the bones" remain rather obscure, but they surely derive from Daoist religious practices or, ifZhouYukai is correct, from Chan Buddhist usage.67 In either case, they point to,

that later were written under its aegis. For discussions o f the terms, see A d e l e Alan Rickett, “ M e t h o d and Intuition, w pp. 109-15, and David Palumbo-Liu, The Poetics of Appropriation, pp. 156-72. Richard John Lynn also translates and discusses this passage in “ T h e Sudden and the Gradual in Chinese Poetry Criticism," pp. 386-87. 67. In early Daoist self-cultivation practice, the “embryo” refers to the practice o f embryonic breathing (i.e., breathing as does an embryo w i t h o u t using the lungs): proper cultivation allows the adept to "exchange the regular e m b r y o for the sage” and to cease normal breathing. T h e two terms, changing the bones (huangu�換 骨 )� and snatching the embryo (tuotai�脫胎),came to function as a single phrase that refers to sloughing o f f the earthly body to become an immortal (xiatt�仙)• However, Z h o u Yukai, following the su路estion o f H u a n g Jingjin, argues that although the terms d o appear in Daoist texts, in fact the Daoist usage is largely irrelevant. Z h o u notes that in contrast to the Daoist conflation, H u i h o n g uses the terms to describe t w o separate approaches to earlier texts. Moreover, the Daoist usage refers to a selftransformation, while H u i h o n g describes the transformation o f the earlier intention as the poet appropriates it. Z h o u also shows N o r t h e r n S o n g C h a n Buddhist uses o f

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and provide names for, moments of transformation beyond language and knowledge that leave traces embodied in the literary text. That is, "snatching the embryo" and “changing the bones" refer to the spontaneous, specifically aesthetic structuring of the language of intentionality provided by the earlier poets. Giving a name to such moments, however, generates its own difficulties. As Kant noted, aesthetic judgments must be exemplary, but while the traces of exemplary judgments can be studied and rules derived from those examples can become part of the technical tools of artistic effort,� exactly when and how to apply the resulting rules remain elusive and part of the liminal realm of the aesthetic. Problems of Interpretation: The Drifting Common Mass Huang Tingjian approached poetic texts and the writing of poetry through the same hermeneutic as he did the canonical texts and decisions about moral action. In both cases one must read attentively, look within, and be "good at apprehension.,,Although this view of poetry grounded it in the Confucian moral tradition, it also made moral understanding subject to aesthetic insights. Huang's essay on the Analects makes moral acuity difficult and thus has the virtue of explaining the widespread moral failures of his age. How, for example, could the conservative partisans vilify Wang Anshi, a man of refined and serious moral sensibility? And how could the N e w Policies partisans relentlessly drive Su Shi into ever more remote exile? Both groups had entirely competent mastery of the canonical tradition, so the meaning of the texts, not being self-evident, clearly required appropriate interpretive procedures that the contending groups had failed to find. Huang concluded that meaning must be sought within the mind through a constant testing of the nexus of textual understanding, the patterns of external circumstances, and honest appraisal of inner responses. Texts had stable meanings, but most people were unwilling to undertake the rigorous process of self-discovery needed to elucidate meaning.

the t w o terms to propose that H u a n g Tingjian in fact was taking the terminology f r o m Buddhist rather than Daoist sources. See Z h o u Yukai�周 裕 鍇 , “ T h e origin o f S o n g Dynasty terms in poetics in C h a n v o c a b u l a r y " � 宋 代 術 語 的 禪 學 語 源 〉 ,� Wenyi lilun yanjiu�文 藝 理 論 研 究 1998.6:70-76.

8o

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Huang labeled the sensibility that fails to seek beyond the simple surface as “common,,(su�俗).He constantly called upon his students to avoid the "common manner" (su qi�俗氣)• He praised both Su Shi and Liu Jisun� 季 孫 ( f l . 1065) for "having ten thousand volumes in their breast and, in applying the brush, for [showing] not a speck 68 of the common manner"胸中有萬卷書,筆下無一點俗氣. In concluding his account ofWang Zhizai, Huang lamented, "Alas that he was destined to a short life and never got to manifest [his inner worth] through his record of action that would have allowed what I have said to be taken as trustworthy by the drifting common mass (liusu�流俗)• Still, is not being without expectations concerning the common mass what makes one a noble man (junzi� 君子)?,,69 He praised Yu Zilin�俞 紫 琳 ( f l . 1088) for "not being bound by the cares and worries of common people." 70 「不倉旨受流俗人拘忌束縛者� 也 0 」 I n contrast, he lamented thatXie Lingyun andYiiXin, two of the best writers of the Southern Dynasties, could never attain the level of the preeminent poet Tao Qian because they were constrained by their concern for the opinion of the common crowd, while Tao just set brush to paper. 7 1 「二子有意於俗人贊毀其工拙,淵明直寄� 焉 耳 °」Returning to the contrast between Tao Qian and Yu Xin, Huang gave yet another formulation of the nexus of problems behind the failure of understanding that spans the literary and the ethical and centers on the mind constrained by "common" concerns: Preferring that the prosody not be proper y e t n o t letting the line be w e a k , preferring that the use o f w o r d s not be skillful y e t n o t letting the language be c o m m o n : this w a s the strong p o i n t o f Y u X i n . H o w e v e r , h e had the intent to write p o e m s . A s f o r [Tao] Y u a n m i n g , he, as the saying goes, “did not trouble w i t h the [inked] string and paring knife and accorded spontaneously." 7 2 E v e n so, m a n y o f those w h o are g o o d at w i e l d i n g the ax suspect that Tao is clumsy, and those

68. "Written after Liujingwen's Poetry”《書劉景文詩後》,HTJQJ2.662. 69. See p. 71. 70. "Colophon to the Poetry of Eminent Talent Yu Q i n g l a o " 《 跋 俞 秀 才 清 老 詩� 頌》,H7JQ/2. 7 22. 71. “Discussing Poetry”《論詩》,HTJQ/3.1428. 72. The phrase comes from Han Yu,“Tomb Inscription for Fan Shaoshu [Zongshi] w 《樊紹述墓志銘》,and refers to carpenter's tools for straightening wood and, metaphorically, to editing texts.

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The Source and Streams w h o are c o n s t r a i n e d b y r u l e s f a u l t h i s l a c k o f restraint. 7 3 C o n f u c i u s said, " T h e w i s d o m o f N i n g W u z i c a n b e r e a c h e d ; h i s s t u p i d i t y c a n n o t b e r e a c h e d . ” 7 4 H o w c a n o n e s p e a k o f [Tao] Y u a n m i n g ' s c l u m s i n e s s and lack o f restraint to those w h o d o n o t k n o w ? T h e m e n o f the W a y say, "As I g e s t u r e w i t h m y fingers, t h e o c e a n i c m u d r a [ a n d its c o s m i c v i s i o n ] s h i n e s f o r t h , b u t y o u raise u p m e n t a l activity, a n d d u s t y e f f o r t arises first.”75 O n e e x p l i c a t o r says, " I f o n e o b s e r v e s w i t h t h e d h a r m a e y e , t h e n t h e r e is n o t h i n g c o m m o n that is n o t t r u e , b u t i f o n e o b s e r v e s w i t h a w o r l d l y e y e , t h e r e is n o t h i n g t r u e that is n o t c o m m o n . " 7 6 O n e m u s t s h a r e [ T a o ] Yuanming,s p o e t r y w i t h o n e w h o h a s " o n e h i l l a n d o n e vale,,[in h i s b r e a s t ] . 7 7

寧律不諧而不使句弱,用字不工不使語俗,此庾開府之所長也。� 然有意於爲詩也,至於淵明,則所謂「不煩繩削而自合」。雖� 然,巧於斧斤者多疑其拙’窘於撿括者輒病其放。孔子曰「甯武� 子其智可及也,其愚不可及也。」淵明之拙與放,豈可爲不知者� 道哉。道人曰「如我按指,海印發光,汝暫舉心,塵勞先起。」� 說者曰,若以法眼觀,無俗不真。若以世眼觀,無真不俗。淵明� 之詩,要當與一丘一壑者共之耳。� In approaching poetry, governance, and insight into the world, the ‘‘common,,people all were trapped in a realm of surfaces governed

73. T h e phrase “rules”

(檢括)is more literally "picking and binding” but

acquired

a broader meaning o f adhering closely to regulations.(撿括 is considered the same as�檢 括 ’ w i t h the same meaning.) 74. Analects 5.21. N i n g W u z i served in high office in the state o f W e i and proved effective w h e n the ruler was effective but managed to b e c o m e irrelevant w h e n the state fell into chaos. C o n f u c i u s here praises his ability to appear incompetent. See Slingerland, Conjucius, p. 48. 75. T h e citation is f r o m the important Mahayana Buddhist text, the Lankavatara Sutra. In context, the Buddha is explaining that in fact all sentient beings already completely and perfectly possess the "true mind” o f storehouse consciousness (dldyavijndna)^ but that desires, delusion, etc., keep them f r o m seeing it. T h e b u d dhas manifest objects f r o m their fingers as a way to teach. Mudras are gestures w i t h the fingers and manifest different aspects o f the dharmas behind the phenomenal realm. T h e "oceanic mudra o f concentration" (samadhi) creates a particularly p o w e r f u l vision o f the totality o f the phenomenal realm. 76. T h e phrase appears to be that o f Li Tongxuan�李 通 玄 ( 6 3 5 - 7 3 0 ) in the " X i n Huayan j i n g

lun”《新華嚴經論》,a commentary

on the Huayan sutra. See C B E T A

(http://tripitaka.cbeta.org/T36ni739_00i) [07262125]. 77. H u a n g uses variations o f the phrase “one hill and one vale” to describe people aloof f r o m the concern o f the c o m m o n crowd. T h i s text comes f r o m a “ C o l o p h o n to poems by Y i k e ” 《 題 意 可 詩 後 》 , H T J Q f 2.665.

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by formal rules that never reached the heart of the matter: the mind as it engaged the world. The interpretive framework within which Huang Tingjian read, wrote, and taught poetry is both consistent and complex. It derived from commitments about the moral value of the canonical tradition and a shared human nature at the center of that tradition. Its hermeneutic for engaging those texts applied equally well to the reading of great poetry and to the discipline of writing poetry in his time. What mattered were the intentions behind the words and the mind behind the intentions. This framework for confronting texts and the world simultaneously required, drew from, and sustained a withdrawal from the partisan fray and the blunt, unreflecting cast of mind that fed the blinkered intensity of its arguments. Huang was a writer of talent sufficient to craft a compelling poetry around these multifaceted commitments. His poetry, however, is difficult, and his legacy to the next several generations of Song dynasty writers was fraught with literary, intellectual, and social tensions when the later writers' commitments differed from those informing the model they sought to emulate. The ways in which successive generations of writers— living through the fall of the north and the restructuring of the empire and society in the south—reworked the various parts of Huang Tingjian's precarious synthesis shaped the history of poetry until the end of the dynasty. Yet because Huang Tingjian used poetry as part of a larger project to find a stable inner world of meaning that connected the culture's past to the self in the present moment, writing poetry continued to be an important part of the process of rethinking meaning in the Southern Song. The abstract character of the model of literary history developed in the introduction of this study arises in large measure out of the challenge that Huang Tingjian presents. Huang draws together problems of language, experience, intentionality, ethics, and a very broadly conceived cultural inheritance in which poetry as a practice demonstrates the possibility of an ongoing structuring of meaning outside of fixed norms.78 Focusing on the two aspects of aesthetic 78. H u a n g Tingian attempted to persuade his students to set aside the n o r m s o f c o m p o s i t i o n once they had demonstrated mastery o f t h e m . C o p y i n g s o m e p o e m s b y the Tang writer L i u Z o n g y u a n for his student W a n g G u a n f u , H u a n g explains,

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judgments that shape literary h i s t o r y t h e problem of the a priori totality within which the intuition of ordered linguistic meaning is possible and the relationship of that mode of apprehension to fixed norms~provides a framework within which to reflect both on the complex coherence of Huang Tingjian's own approach and on the evolving debates surrounding what people understood of his approach in the successive generations after his death. In a radical turn inward, the domain to which Huang Tingjian granted purposiveness as a totality was neither the phenomenal realm of experience nor the individuated mind but the canonical textual tradition. The signifieds to which words as signifiers referred in poetry were not things in the world as such, nor did they point to an undifferentiated Nature (性);instead they referred to the densely articulated intermediate realm of human affective responses (情)and intentions (意) that delineated the patterns of the human response to the world. In particular, the intentions behind the writing of the canonical texts— the sages' and great poets' morally normative responses to the world they encountered—accounted a priori for the textual tradition's existence, since these writers embodied their understanding in their texts to serve as models for later generations, who crucially shared the same human nature. Aesthetic intuitions in language were of and about this level of the human ordering of experience. The writers who followed Huang Tingjian thus had to confront the various aspects of his aesthetic vision. They had to decide whether

" M y friend and student Wang G u a n f u has the manner o f the ancient writers in composing poetry. However, although his style already has left the c o m m o n lot behind, he still cannot unconstrainedly hit the sound o f the jade pendant. To the left are the level and rope, to the right the compass and the carpenter's square. I surmise that he has not yet read ten thousand volumes and, in observing the writings o f the ancients, has not yet been able to completely get their model and grasp w h a t they entirely mastered but only knows to enjoy h o w their embroidered mountains and dragons and cross-hatch ceremonial designs form patterns. T h u s I write several poems by Liu Z o n g y u a n to give to him: if he comes to k n o w h o w Liu learned f r o m Tao Q i a n in this manner, then he can come c l o s e r . ” 「 予 友 生 王 觀 復 作 詩 有 古 人� 態 度 , 雖 氣 格 已 超 俗 , 但 未 能 從 容 中 玉 佩 之 音 ’ 左 準 繩 、 右 規 矩 爾 。 意 者 讀 書� 未 破 萬 卷 , 觀 古 人 之 文 章 未 能 盡 得 其 規 摹 及 所 總 覽 籠 絡 , 但 知 玩 其 山 龍 黼 黻 成� 章 耶 。 故 手 書 柳 子 厚 數 篇 遺 之 , 欲 知 子 厚 如 此 學 陶 淵 明 , 乃 爲 能 近 之 耳 。 」� " C o l o p h o n after writing Liu Zihou's p o e m s ” 《 跋 書 柳 子 厚 詩 》 , H T J Q J 2.656,� quoted in SSHQB,

pp. 945-46.

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they were willing to give up on the coherence of the world of experience; they had to decide whether the textual tradition was sufficiently coherent and meaningful to serve as the system within which to make aesthetic judgments. If they affirmed the a priori order of the tradition, they had to decide which texts belonged to that tradition and which did not. They also had to struggle with the question of their own ability to use language to embody intuitions of order, once they decided what the proper domain for such intuitions was. All of these questions come into play in later writers' transformations of Huang Tingjian's legacy.

CHAPTER aWest

THREE

of the River,,: TheJiangxi Poets

I

n either 1103 or n i l , Lu Benzhong� 呂本中(1084-1145), the young scion of a major elite clan, wrote a "Chart of the Lineage of the Jiangxi Poetry Society"《江西詩社宗派圖》to celebrate a group of writers who composed poetry together and were largely associated with Huang Tingjian. 1 The conflicting accounts of the date of the chart's composition present merely the first of many questions surrounding the text, the "Jiangxi school" it proclaimed, and the larger struggle to define Huang Tingjian's legacy in shaping the role of poetry during the cultural transitions of the early Southern Song. To begin with, although Lii Benzhong became an important literary figure after the flight south following the fall of the Northern Song, the text of the chart survives in only fragmentary form. Moreover, even Southern Song writers were mystified why Lii selected some writers and excluded others. Additionally, some of the writers on the list wanted off. Other debates at the time centered on questions of whether the list had an implicit ranking and whether it defined a single, coherent set of poetic practices. Certainly by the time the chart achieved broad dissemination in the early years of Gaozong's (r. 1127-62) rule, Lii had distanced himself from the style and values represented by the chart and proposed practices to correct 1. S o m e scholars suggest a third, m u c h later date o f around 1133, but I agree w i t h

W u X i a o m a n that the sources supporting this late date probably confused the print王绮珍,Huang Tingjian yu Jiangxi shipai 黄 庭 堅 與 江 西 詩 派 ( N a n c h a n g : Jiangxi gaoxiao chubanshe, 2006),pp. 6 1 - 6 3 for arguments in favor o f 1133 and W u Xiaoman,ywn^v/ zongpai yanjiu, p. 11 for the counterargument.

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their deficiencies. Even the name “Jiangxi,,,which refers to a specific region in Song China, was disputed, since not all those listed on the chart were from the region. Finally, no Jiangxi Poetry Society ever existed, even by the very loose understanding of such societies (社) in the Song.2 Yet despite these questions, the writings of the major poets of the next several generations as well as the discussions by the major critics of poetry unambiguously show that the “Jiangxi Poetry Society" and its aesthetic values were at the center of poetic culture in early Southern Song China. Because of the cultural significance of the "Jiangxi school," modern Chinese scholarship has attempted to fill in the gaps and sort out the difficulties that surround Lii Benzhong's chart.3 Wu Xiaoman in particular makes an important contribution in distinguishing between a "lineage school" (zongpai�宗派)and a “poetic school" (shipai�詩派):she essentially brackets the question of what the "poetic school" may have been and focuses instead on simply reconstructing the network of connections that held together the group that Lii listed in his chart. This distinction between the chart, the writers on the chart, and the appropriation of the Jiangxi style in the early years of the Southern Song is, I think, vital in understanding the impact of Jiangxi poetics on the cultural debates in the late twelfth and thirteenth centuries. Separating the “lineage school" from the “lesser practitioners" (mo liu�末 流 ) o f the "poetic school" also helps clarify the social dynamics within which writers studied 2. O u y a n g Guang's�歐 陽 光 meticulous account o f poetry groups in the S o n g and Yuan makes clear that during the Song, such "societies" were largely ephemeral and created to honor a particular occasion o f group composition, quite different f r o m the more formal societies o f the Yuan. See O u y a n g G u a n g , Song Yuan shishe yanjiu congkao 宋 元 詩 社 研 究 叢 考 ( G u a n g z h o u : G u a n g d o n g G a o d e n g j i a o y u , 1996).

3. Four important monographs have been written on the problem. Gong Pengcheng� 龔鵬程,Jiangxi shishe zongpai yanjiu� 江 西 詩 社 宗 派 研 究 ( T a i b e i : Wenshizhe chubanshe, 1983) and M o Lifeng Jiangxi shipai yanjiu 江 西 詩 派 研究(Jinan: Qilu shushe, 1986) began the renewed scholarly interest in the topic. Wu Xiaoman, Jiangxi zongpai yanjiu and Wang Qizhen, Huang Tingjian yu Jiangxi shipai are the two most recent important reconsiderations of the general issues. Wei Haiying Jiangoci shipai zhujia kaolun 江 西 詩 派 諸 家 考 論 ( B e i j i n g : Beijing University Press, 2005) is a compilation of biographical studies o f the people listed on the chart: the essays first appeared in Japanese journals and are an important resource in reconstructing social and institutional factors that shaped the reception of the Jiangxi style.

87“Westof the River” and debated the Jiangxi style. While most studies of the Jiangxi style focus exclusively on the small group of writers who either were listed on the chart, could have been listed on it, or were added to the group by later commentators, these three groups still represent but a small fraction of the writers active in the late Northern and early Southern Song.4 To focus narrowly on the writers of the “Jiangxi chart" obscures the context of cultural competition that shaped the significance of the “Jiangxi school." Many occasions in polite society called for writing poetry, and the ability to compose passable if not brilliant verse was simply part of elite culture. The broad literati elite~writers of such social p o e t r y ~ created an audience for new poetry fed by the expansion of the woodblock printing industry in the Southern Song, which encouraged the rapid and broad circulation of poems. Given the avid interest nurtured by ready access to the most recent writings, a striking couplet could attract the notice of powerful patrons and create a reputation for a writer. In a society where too many well-educated young men pursued too few official positions, poetry became a means of distinguishing oneself and a site of cultural competition. The elite society of early Southern Song China presented a Bourdieusian world of many, many agents staking out positions in a highly structured field of cultural production. Poetry itself was only one aspect of this larger field, which must also include the cultural claims of the emerging Daoxue movement as well as the continuing importance of Buddhist arguments. Indeed, it is necessary to see poetry situated within the larger matrix to account for the power of Jiangxi poetics. The logic of distinction within the late twelfth century cultural system was not arbitrary but articulated central debates about the nature of the phenomenal realm, the self, and the textual tradition in redefining the locus of meaning. Although I will wait to explore the major Daoxue positions until later chapters, I will include some of their writings here, as they contributed to the large corpus of 4. For example, the eighteen volumes o f the Quan Song shi� 全 宋 詩 [ C o m p l e t e S o n g poetry] beginning w i t h C h a o Y u e z h i�晁 說 之 ( 1 0 5 9 - 1 1 2 9 ) and ending w i t h Lii Benzhong's student Z e n g Jili�曾 季 貍 ( f l . 1173) (vols. 2 1 - 3 8 ) list p o e m s b y 2,103 writers, at least half o f w h o m lived into the Southern Song. See F u X u a n c o n g� 傅 璇 琮� et al,eds., Quan Song shi [hereafter Q S 5 ] (Beijing: Beijing University Press, 1991).

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"discussions of poetry" (shihua�詩話).These discussions are a major source of insight into the system of cultural positions created in early Southern Song elite society, a system whose key oppositions reworked the innovations of Huang Tingjian's poetry and poetics that came to be known as the "Jiangxi style."

The Lineage of theJiangxi Poetry Society and Late Northern Song Literary Culture Hope for reconciliation between the N e w Policies and anti-reform factions after Huizong came to the throne died quickly. In early 1102,the first full year of his rule, Huizong changed the name of the reign period to Chongning�崇寧,“Honoring pCi]ning," that is, the Xining reign period of his father Shenzong, who had supported Wang Anshi in the creation of the N e w Policies. By the end of the Sixth Month of 1102,Huizong had fired the two grand councilors who had worked to reconcile the two factions and appointed C a i j i n g�蔡京(1047-1126), a member of the N e w Policies group, to the position. In the Ninth Month, 117 anti-reform officials were declared ineligible for office; in the Eleventh Month, 27 anti-reform partisans were sent into exile and yet more were declared ineligible for service. Late the next year the court ordered that a list of 93 members of the "Yuanyou faction" (referring to the anti-reform government during the Yuanyou reign period of Huizong's brother Zhezong) be carved on stone stelae throughout the empire. In 1104 the list of proscribed faction members grew to 309. Not only were those on the list who were still alive not allowed to serve but they were prohibited from entering the capital; their family members and descendents were also banned from capital service and prohibited from entering the capital. Their writings were banned, and the printing blocks used to publish their works were ordered destroyed. Many were sent into distant exile.5 After the purge of his 5. For discussions o f the purge o f the anti-reform group, see J o h n W

Chafee,

" H u i z o n g , C a i j i n g , and the Politics o f R e f o r m , " pp. 31-44; and A r i Daniel Levine, “Terms o f Estrangement: Factional Discourse in the Early H u i z o n g Reign, 1 1 0 0 1104,” pp. 1 4 1 - 6 3 . B o t h essays are in Ebrey and Bickford, eds., Emperor Huizong and Late Northern Song China: the Politics of Culture and the Culture of Politics (Cambridge: Harvard University Asia Center, 2006).

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enemies, Cai Jing served as grand councilor until 1120 with only brief periods out of office. The impact of the proscriptions against the t£Yuanyou faction" members and the N e w Policies faction's control of government during Huizong's reign was complex and multifaceted.

Local Lineages and Literati Claims to Cultural Authority The barring of anti-reform families from the capital appears to have given momentum to the shift in literati identity away from the court and state that Robert Hymes describes for the Southern Song and spurred the development of literati claims to independent moral and cultural authority in opposition to the court.6 By the end of the eleventh century, the Song dynasty had existed long enough that the clans of successful officials had become prominent members of local elite society and had developed the skills and resources needed to ensure that later generations could pass the crucialjinshi examination and maintain family status as officials. Wang Qizhen notes, for example, that Huang Tingjian's clan in Shuangjing (Fenning County, Hongzhou Prefecture) was a well-established lineage that produced twenty-nine jinshi degree-holders between 1008 and 1122,� four of them in Huang Tingjian's generation.7 The Huang clan's social network was at the core of the milieu out of which the Jiangxi Lineage Chart grew.8 They had the family resources and prestige to provide a viable social and cultural alternative to the world of the capital from which the proscriptions had largely banished them, an "outsider" milieu that nurtured philosophical, ethical, and aesthetic values that resisted the claims of the court. It is important to recall that Huang Tingjian, especially in his later years, insisted on the centrality of ethics in writing: he proposed reading and writing as 6. For example, see the discussion o f local shrines in the N o r t h e r n and S o u t h e r n S o n g in R o b e r t P H y m e s , Statesmen and Gentlemen: The Elite of Fu-chou,

Chiang-hsi

in Northern and Southern Sung (Cambridge: C a m b r i d g e U n i v e r s i t y Press, 1986), PP 1 2 9 - 3 2 . 7. W a n g Q i z h e n , Huang Tingjian yu Jiangxi shipai, p. 120. 8. O f the twenty-five people listed b y Lii B e n z h o n g , three are H u a n g Tingjian's cousins f r o m nearby Jianchang C o u n t y ( N a n k a n g Military Prefecture), w h i l e a f o u r t h w a s the son o f a cousin f r o m the X u clan in F e n n i n g C o u n t y .

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a moral as well as aesthetic endeavor. Huang's moral commitment in writing serves as a reminder that the social milieu of the Jiangxi Lineage poets included both Buddhist monks and many of the prominent Daoxue advocates of the day. For example, a second group of four writers who came to be listed in the Jiangxi Lineage were students of the elder statesman and Daoxue adherent Lii Xizhe 呂 希 哲 ( f l . l l 10), who was Lii Benzhong's grandfather.9 Writing poetry and asserting that it had moral significance may seem a rather pallid form of opposition, but part of their oppositional power came from developments at court. Wang Anshi had removed poetry from the jinshi examination during his time in power. The anti-reform Yuanyou government restored it, but C a i j i n g banned it yet again. Wang Anshi also changed the list of Confucian classics used for the examination. In particular, he replaced the Spring and Autumn Annals 春秋—a terse record of events in the early state of Lu through which Confucius was believed to have recorded his moral judgment on those events~with the Rites ofZhou, believed to be an account of the early Zhou political institutions. More radically, Cai Jing reduced the role of the examination system and redefined the curriculum of the Imperial University (Taixue�太學),which he made the central institution for recruiting officials. Peter K. Bol describes the changes in policy at the Imperial University: [T]he court made clear what students should not study. The one classic that used the judgments of historical events as a means of guiding government in the present, the Spring and Autumn Annals, was dropped from the examinations. Under Huizong the moral philosophy of the Cheng brothers was forbidden. Literary models were not to be taken from Su Shi�蘇輯(1037-1101) and his group. At various moments the antipathy toward other areas of scholarship was especially pronounced—as when students in the Imperial University burned Ouyang Xiu's�歐 ( 1 0 0 7 - 7 2 ) writings—but generally it was forbidden to teach historical and literary works as well as the teachings and writings of the anti-New Policies officials who dominated the 9. See, for example, Zhou Jianhua�周建華,“The spiritual kernel of the Jiangxi poetic school was Song Ming Learning of Principle: Discussing Song Ming Learning of Principle as ‘Jiangxi Learning’”〈江西詩派的精神內核是宋明理學: 二論宋明理學是“江西之學” >,Nanchang Daxue xuebao南昌大學學報(人社版) 34,no. 2 (Mar. 2003),p. 92-

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court during the Yuanyou�元祐 era (1085-93). Criticism ("slander") of the court was considered a top infraction of school rules and might result in exile.10 The various networks out of which the Jiangxi Lineage group developed went their own way and insisted on the importance of Su Shi, Ouyang Xiu, the Cheng brothers, history, and poetry. The generation of writers who were directly involved in the Yuanyou government had their status as opponents of Cai Jing's regime imposed upon them by the proscriptions, but for their followers, participation in oppositional communities was a matter of choice. Meeting to write poetry in a manner that acknowledged and honored Su Shi and Huang Tingjian, debating philosophical issues with students of the Cheng brothers like Yang Shi�楊時(1053-1130) and Lii Xizhe, and even discussing what could be learned from historical writings all marked a willed commitment to cultural values that resisted the models promulgated by state institutions. The Jiangxi Lineage Chart thus in an important sense celebrated the forming of a communal literati ethos outside of and independent of the claims of the state. I suspect that part of the reason for the attention paid to the Jiangxi Lineage Chart in the early Southern Song was because it presented a countercultural model to repudiate the values of Cai Jing's and Huizong's court.

Dramatis Personce Hu Zi's�胡 仔 ( l l 10-70) Collected Discussions ofthe Fisher-Recluse ofTiao Creek preserves one section of Lii Benzhong's preface to the "Jiangxi Lineage Chart": The fisher-recluse of Tiao Creek states: Lii Juren [Benzhong] in recent times has attained a reputation for poetry. He says of himself that he has "transmitted the robe” of Jiangxi, having once made the “Lineage Chart." Starting from [Huang] Yuzhang, he lists Chen Shidao, Pan Dalin, Xie Yi, Hong Chu, Rao Jie, the monk Zuke, Xu Fu, Hong Peng, Lin Minxiu, Hong Yan,Wang Ge, Li Chun, Han 10. Peter K. B o l , “Emperors C a n C l a i m Antiquity Too: Emperorship

and

Autocracy under the N e w Policies,” in Ebrey and Bickford, Emperor Huizong and Late Northern Song China, p. 182.

92

“West of the River” Ju, Li Peng, Chao Chongzhi, Jiang Duanben, Yang Fu, Xie Ke, Xia Gui, Lin Mingong, Pan Daguan, He Yi, Wang Zhifang, the monk Shanquan, and Gao He, all together twenty-five people who are dharma successors. He asserts that the source and its downstream currents all come from [Huang] Yuzhang. His preface to the Lineage Chart is several hundred characters. In brief, it says: In the Tang, Li [Bai] and Du [Fu] made their age resplendent, and those later who spoke of poetry could not reach them. When we come to Han [Yu], Liu [Zongyuan], Mengjiao, and Zhang Ji, although they exerted great effort,in the end they could not stand together with the former authors. From the Yuanhe reign period [806-20] until our dynasty, among those poems that were transmitted, most imitated earlier writings and never fully exhausted that towards which they inclined. It was [Huang] Yuzhang who began to greatly rise above and forcefully set [poetry] in motion. [His writing] rising and falling, moving back and forward, he entirely mastered the multitude of forms. Later students then composed alike and responded together. Although the forms were in some cases different,still crucially what they transmitted was one. I therefore record their names to leave to those who come.11 苕溪漁隱曰,呂居仁近時以詩得名,自言傳衣江西,嘗作《宗派� 圖》,自豫章以降,列陳師道、潘大臨、謝逸、洪芻、僥節、僧� 祖可、徐俯、洪朋、林敏修、洪炎、汪革、李錚、韓駒、李彭、� 晁沖之、江端本、楊符、謝蘊、夏傀、林敏功、潘大觀、何覬、� 王直方、僧善權、高荷’合二十五人以爲法嗣,謂其源流皆出豫� 章也。其《宗派圖序》數百言,大略云,『唐自李杜之出,焜耀� 一世,後之言詩者’皆莫能及。至韓、柳、孟郊、張籍諸人,激� 昂 奮 厲 , 終 不 能 與 前 作 者 並 。 元 和 以 後 至 國 朝 , 歌 詩 之 作 或 傳� 者 , 多 依 效 舊 文 , 未 盡 所 趣 。 惟 豫 章 始 大 出 而 力 振 之 , 抑 揚 反� 復 , 盡 兼 眾 體 , 而 後 學 者 同 作 並 和 , 雖 體 制 或 異 , 要 皆 所 傳 者� 一,予故錄其名字,以遺來者。』�

T h e Collected Discussion of the Fisher-Recluse of Tiao Creek, the Yunlu manlu�雲麓漫鈔,and Liu Kezhuang's short prefaces to his compilation ofJiangxi Lineage poets have small differences in their lists, but the main sets of poets are clear: 11. H u Z i 胡仔,Tiaoxiyuyin conghua 苕 溪 漁 隱 叢 話 ( T a i b e i : C h a n g a n chubanshe, 1978), qianji 前 集 48.327-28. Another portion o f the preface survives in Z h a o Yanwei's 趋 彥 衛 Yunlu manlu 雲麓》*曼鈔(preface dated 1206), but Zhao's version seems rather garbled and appears to have incorporated some o f H u Zi,s comments into Lii's preface.

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A. Nephews of Huang Tingjian from Nanchang�南昌 in Hongzhou Prefecture, Jiangnan West Circuit 1. Xu Fu�徐俯(1075-1141; 34 extant poems) 2. Hong Peng�洪朋(1065?-1102?; 178 poems)12 3. Hong Chu�洪舞(io66?-after 1132; 186 poems) 4. Hong Yan�洪炎(1067-1134; 130 poems) B. Students of Lii Xizhe from Linchuan�臨川 in Fuzhou, Jiangnan West Circuit 5. Xie Yi�謝逸(1068-1112; 234 poems) 6. Xie Ke�謝蓮(1074-1116; 272 poems) 7. Rao Jie�饒節(1065-1129; 374 poems) 8. Wang Ge�汪章(1071-1110; 7 extant poems) C. A group from Nankang Military Prefecture�南康(east of Hongzhou, north of Linchuan) 9. Li Peng�李彭(fl. 1128; 727 poems) 10. the monk Zuke�祖可(20 poems) 11. the monk Shanquan�善權(9 poems) D. Writers from Kaifeng�開封(the capital) and elsewhere: 12. Chen Shidao�陳師道(1053-1101; 462 poems in Ren Yuan edition, 701 in QSS) 13. Chao Chongzhi�晃沖之(i68 poems) 14. Jiang Duanben�江端本(4 poems) 15. Wang Zhifang�王直方(1069-1109; 4 extant poems) 16. Li Chun�李鎮(fl. 1130; 3 extant poems) 17. Xia Ni�夏愧(d. 1127; 16 poems) 18. Yang Fu�楊 符 ( l poem) 19. Gao He�高荷(4 poems), from Jiangling in modern Hubei E. A group of poets associated with Huangzhou: 20. Pan Dalin�潘大臨(1060-1107; 24 poems) 21. Pan Daguan�潘大觀(no extant poems) 22. He Yong�何顒 or He Yi�何顗(1073-1141?; no extant poems) 23. Lin Mingong�林敏功(8 extant poems) 24. Lin Minxiu�林敏修(9 extant poems) F. Sichuan 25. Han Ju�韓駒(io8o~l 135; 407 poems)

12. For a discussion o f the years o f H o n g Peng's birth and death, see W e i H a i y i n g , Jiangxi shipai zhujia kaolun, pp. 5 4 - 5 5 .

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Much ink has been spilled to explain why these writers in the Jiangxi Lineage Chart are in fact followers of Huang Tingjian. So few poems survive for many of these poets, and those poems represent such a small percentage of the writers' oeuvres that the project seems rather hopeless. However, the effort is probably beside the point. More crucially, if we believe comments Lii Benzhong made late in his life, the chart was just a spur-of-the-moment composition of his youth. Fan Jisui, a student of Han Ju,for example, wrote: My father once prepared a meal and invited [Han Ju] and Director Lii Eleven [Benzhong] and his brother. Director Lii arrived first and, passing by my study, took a book from my desk and discovered it was the “Jiangxi Lineage Chart." He asked, "How did you get this? Take care not to show it to people; it is just a trifle from my youth." Another day, I spoke of this before [Han Ju], who said, “[Lii] Juren indeed spoke like this!” The Lineage Chart originally was in one juan and listed the people's names in succession. Later the city official of Fengcheng, when carving it in stone, made it like the lineage charts of the Chan Buddhists where the superior and inferior were divided into several categories. Initially, [the text] was not like this.13 家父嘗具飯,招公與呂十一郎中昆仲。呂郎中先至,過僕書室,� 取案間書讀,乃《江西宗派圖》也。呂云,安得此書。切勿示� 人 , 乃 少 時 戲 作 耳 。 他 日 , 公 前 道 此 語 , 公 日 , 居 仁 卻 如 此� 說。”曾季股《艇斋诗话》也称:“予尝见东莱自言少时率意而� 作,不知流传人间,甚悔其少作也。《宗派》本作一卷,連書諸� 人 姓 字 。 後 豐 城 邑 官 開 石 , 遂 如 禪 門 宗 派 , 高 下 分 爲 數 等 。� 初不爾也° M o Lifeng dates the text to 1103,when Lii was just nineteen and Huizong's suppression of the anti-reform partisans had just started. Wu Xiaoman argues that the groups listed in the chart had not begun to coalesce into a network until around 1110, which was just at the

13. Fan Jisui� 范季隨,Lingyang Xiansheng shizhong yu《陵陽先生室中語》in Cheng Yizhong 程毅中,ed., Song ren shihua u/aibian 宋人詩話夕卜編(Beijing: Guoji wenhua chubanshe, 1996) p. 278. The phrase�開石,literally “open stone,” appears to refer to a text being carved on rock, as in one passage in Zhu Xi’s Zhu Zi yulei 朱子語類,comp. Lijingde�黎靖德(Beijing: Zhonghua, 1994), p. 1045. Fengcheng 豐城 was in Hongzhou Prefecture; for an official to inscribe such a text there was a w a y o f h o n o r i n g important cultural figures ( H u a n g T i n g j i a n , the H o n g brothers,

and Xu Fu) from the prefecture.

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time that Cai Jing was forced to step down and the proscriptions against the Yuanyou faction were lightened. In either case, if Lii simply was commemorating the circles of people who composed poems together at the time and found Huang Tingjian's poetic model compelling, the chart cannot bear the weight of scrutiny to which it has been subjected. Even in 1148, three years after Lii Benzhong's death, when the first part of the Collected Discussions was published, Hu Z i was willing to conclude that the Lineage Chart was not very good. After reporting on its content and citing part of it, Hu Z i finishes by largely dismissing the chart: I dare to assert that Yuzhang, "exceeded the [common] loom and shuttle and developed a style of his own.”14 Pure, fresh, striking, and crafted: these are his strengths. If one says “Rising and falling, moving back and forward, he entirely mastered the multitude of forms," then this is not so. From the Yuanhe until now,the generations have not lacked masters of ink and lyric: When one observes their brilliant phrasing and masterly couplets, they truly have been able to reveal what men of old had not reached. Those who grandly established themselves are many. If one says that "most imitated earlier writings and never fully exhausted that towards which they inclined,” this also is not so. Among the twenty-five men listed, some are men of reputation and have poetic lines transmitted to our generation. Those praised by the times, however, are just a few, no more. Of the rest, nothing has been heard, and yet they have been added superfluously to the list. In making this chart, Juren's selection has not been refined nor his discussion fair [i.e., worthy of universal assent], and I have critiqued it for this reason.

余竊謂豫章自出機杼,別成一家,清新奇巧,是其所長,若言� 『抑揚反復,盡兼眾體』,則非也。元和至今,騷翁墨客,代不� 乏人,觀其英詞傑句,真能發明古人不到處,卓然成立者甚眾,� 若言『多依效舊文,未盡所趣』,又非也。所列二十五人,其間� 知名之士,有詩句傳於世,爲時所稱道者,止數人而已,其餘無� 聞焉,亦濫登其列。居仁此圖之作,選擇弗精,議論不公,余是� 以辨之。�

14. T h e expression c o m e s f r o m the Wei shu 魏 書 biography o f Z u Y i n g 祖 璧 (fl. 525): “In compositions, o n e o u g h t to exceed the [ c o m m o n ] l o o m and shuttle and develop a style o f one's o w n . H o w can one share the same life w i t h others?" 「 文 章 須 自 出 機 杼 , 成 一 家 風 骨 , 何 能 共 人 同 生 活 也 。 」�

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If both the list of names and the account o f the poetry in the Lineage Chart are negligible, then how did the Jiangxi Poetry Society become so important during the early years of the Southern Song? T h e Daoxue scholar Lu Jiuyuan�陸 九 淵 ( 1 1 3 9 - 9 2 ) gives a good account in a letter he wrote to C h e n g Shuck M M M (1120-97) to thank C h e n g for a copy o f the collected works o f the poets in the Jiangxi Lineage Chart, which C h e n g had had compiled and printed. 15 Lu marches through a standard account of the decline of poetry from its ancient roots until the appearance of D u Fu and then reaches the topic at hand. H e perhaps is being polite in his praise o f Huang Tingjian and the Jiangxi poets, but his account o f the history and o f the important poets captures contemporary judgment: When [Du Fu] Duling appeared, in his love of his lord and lament for his time, he pursued the traces back to the Li sao and the Canon of Poetry. His talent and strength were broad and substantial and imposingly sufficed to suppress the merely florid. Poetry was revived through him. Since then writers have appeared in succession. When we get to [Huang] Yuzhang, he yet more was successor to [Du Fu's] strength: there was nothing outside of what he could contain, nothing hidden from his probing. His formal mastery linked the ancient and the present; his careful thought reached the ends of the subtle and hidden. He penetrated all and galloped forth; his artful strength arrived with refinement. At the time, those like Chen [Shidao], Xu [Fu], Han [Ju], Lii [Benzhong], the three Hongs and two Xies alike all revered him. From this, Jiangxi became renowned throughout the realm for its Poetry Society. Although they did not fully reach the ancient source, yet what they established was above the common. This was a remarkable event in the cosmos.16

15. C h e n g at the time was the military commissioner for Jiangnan West Circuit and had the compilation made partly to honor the major poets o f the region and partly to preserve the texts o f those poets that w e r e rapidly disappearing. See H u a n g Baohua� 黄 寶 華 ’ " T h e writing o f the Jiangxi School chart and the printing o f a ‘Jiang^ School'

A n t h o l o g y ” 〈 《 江 西 詩 社 宗 派 圖 》 的 寫 定 與 《 江 西 詩 派 》 總 集�

的干!J行〉,Wenxue yichan 文 學 遗 產 1999-6:7116. L u ends b y praising C h e n g for adding the poems o f Z e n g Ji� 曾 幾 ( 1 0 8 5 1166) that also w e r e rapidly disappearing and by noting that he himself was f r o m Jiangxi and was grateful for the effort C h e n g had made. "Letter to C h e n g Shuai,, 帥 書 》 i n L u Jiuyuan, Lu Xiangshan quanji 陸 象 山 全 集 ( B e i j i n g : Z h o n g g u o shudian, 1992), p. 67.

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杜 陵 之 出 , 愛 君 悼 時 , 追 躡 騷 雅 , 而 才 力 宏 厚 , 偉 然 足 以 鎭 浮� 靡 , 詩 家 爲 之 中 興 。 自 此 以 來 , 作 者 相 望 。 至 豫 章 而 益 大 肆 其� 力,包含欲無外,搜抉欲無秘,體制通古今’致思極幽眇,貫穿� 馳 騁 , 工 力 精 到 ’�一時如陳、徐、韓、吕、三洪、二謝之流,翕� 然宗之,由是江西遂以詩社名天下,雖未極古之源委,而其植立� 不凡,斯亦宇宙之奇詭也。� T h e poets that Lu Jiuyuan lists are the major poets o f the group. They are the poets most discussed in the shihua literature who, in relation to Huang Tingjian's poetics, define many of the most important positions debated in the early Southern Song. Before turning to the Southern Song debates that establish the meaning o f "Jiangxi poetry," however, I first want briefly to introduce the distinctive features o f the poetic styles of the major poets from the Lineage Chart that Lu lists: C h e n Shidao, the three Hongs, X u Fu, and Han Ju. 17

Streams and Tributaries: Variations in Jiangxi Poetic Practice L. C H E N SHIDAO

C h e n Shidao is a significant poet whose reputation does not rely on his being part o f the Jiangxi Lineage. Chen first met Huang Tingjian in 1084,when C h e n was already thirty-one years old and a mature poet. Liu Kezhuang, the late Southern Songwriter, argues that C h e n Shidao publicly acknowledged Huang T i n g j i a n ~ w h o was only eight years older~~as his teacher because he understood that he and his "mentor" were close in poetic ability but that Huang was better: Liu asserts that their “positions were not far distant, and therefore he was able to treat [Huang] as a teacher."18 17. I leave out the cousins Xie Yi and Xie Ke, who died in the 1110s. Lujiuyuan's inclusion of them in the group is important because it shows that he understood the Jiangxi Poetry Society to be the group of poets in the early years of Huizong's reign. The Xies are worthy of separate treatment, but they probably are redundant for the purposes of the discussion in this chapter. 18. M o Lifeng, Wu Xiaoman, and the other writers on the Jiangxi Poetry Society all have good discussions of Chen Shidao. I also have found very useful Yokoyama I s e o ' s 橫 山 伊 勢 雄 “ C h e n Shidao's Poetry and Poetics”〈陳師道的詩與詩論〉,� trans. Zhang Ympeng� 張寅彭,Ytnshan xuekan 陰山學刊(li着禾4^威)1997.2: 17-23.

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Chen Shidao was from a clan that appears to have been well established in his native Pengcheng. His father Chen Q i� 陳琪(1017-76) married the daughter of Pang Ji�龐籍(988-1063), who served as chief councilor under the emperor Renzong (r. 1022-63). Chen Shidao himself seems to have married well since his wife was the daughter of Guo Gai�郭槪,who served as a judicial commissioner in Chengdu. Chen at an early age became a protege of Zeng Gong�曾 鞏� (1019-83)~an important cultural figure and colleague of Su S h i ~ but declined to take the examination for office during the N e w Policies regime of the Xining (1068-77) and Yuanfeng (1078-85) reign periods. During the anti-reform partisans' ascendancy in the Yuanyou reign period, Su Shi and others put his name forward for a variety of positions. He held various minor posts in the capital but fared better as a prefectural teacher. Like Huang Tingjian, Chen Shidao took D u Fu as his model, but what he took from Du Fu was rather different. First was a catholicity of style and cautiousness about self-consciously seeking a particular effect that does not derive from the occasion itself: "In writing poems, if one wants them to be [exceptionally] good, then they cannot be good. Wangjiefu [Anshi] [sought it] in crafting; Su Zizhan [Shi] [sought it] in originality; Huang Luzhi [Tingjian] [sought it] in the striking; but Du Fu's poetry~striking or commonplace, crafted or easy, new or hackneyed—in all [styles] was good." 19 「詩�

欲 其 好 , 則 不 能 好 矣 。 王 介 甫 以 工 , 苏 子 瞻 以 新 , 黄 鲁 直 以� 奇。王介甫以工,蘇子瞻以新,黃魯直以奇。而子美之诗,奇� 常、工易、新陈莫不好也。而子美之詩,奇常、工易、新陳莫� 不 好 也 � 」 C h e nreturns to this theme when he again criticizes Huang Tingjian's fondness for a striking line: "[Huang] excessively brings forth the striking, but this [approach] is not so good as D u Fu's encountering objects and becoming striking. The three rivers

19. Houshan shihua 後 山 詩 話 in H e Wenhuan 何文煥,Lidai shihua

歷代詩話

(Beijing: Z h o n g h u a , 1981), p. 306. Because the authenticity o f the Houshan shihua has been doubted since the Southern Song, citation o f the text must proceed w i t h caution. Wei Yan�魏 衍 , w h o compiled Chen's collection, also compiled a shihua, but the extant version includes interpolations. T h o s e I cite seem to m e to at least plausibly reflect Chen's views. See G u o Shaoyu�郭紹虞,Song shihua kao 宋 詩 話 考 (Beijing: Z h o n g h u a , 1979), pp. 15-20.

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and five lakes spread vast and level for a thousand li and become striking when they meet wind and r o c k s . " 2 0 「 過 於 出 奇 , 不 如 杜 之�

遇 物 而 奇 也 。 三 江 五 湖 , 平 漫 千 里 , 因 风 石 而 奇 尔 。 三 江 五� 湖 , 平 漫 千 里 , 因 風 石 而 奇 爾 � � T h uC h s e n appears to offer D u Fu as a model for finding the source of aesthetic structure in the world o f phenomena rather than in the human representations o f the world. M u c h o f C h e n Shidao's poetry affirms this sense that C h e n seeks to capture what he encounters. “Climbing Joyous Pavilion" is a representative example: 登快哉亭

Climbingjoyous Pavilion2X

城與清江曲,

The city wall curves with the clear river,

泉流亂石間�

The springhead flows out amidst chaotic boulders.

夕陽初隱地,

When dusk first darkens the land,

暮靄已依山�

Sunset mists already rest on the mountains.

度鳥欲何向,

Birds crossing over: where do they head?

奔雲亦自閑�

The dashing clouds also are leisurely.

登臨興不盡 ’

The inspiration in climbing and standing [here] has not exhausted itself,

稚子故須還 °

But my children [are waiting], so I must go home.

T h e poem is written in a very self-disciplined regulated verse with no noteworthy allusions or recondite language. Commentaries agree that the first three couplets sound like D u Fu without explicitly echoing any specific lines, while the Q i n g dynasty critic JiYun points out that the last couplet has a distinctly “Song” self-consciousness. C h e n here sets out a landscape in motion. Water flows; the sun sets; mists gather; birds and clouds fly by. Even the city wall takes an active verb: it curves to follow the river. Yet all this activity is natural, spontaneous and calm, as C h e n stresses with the oxymoronically

20. Houshati shihua, p. 307. T h e specific references o f "three rivers" and "five lakes” are not clear, since the t w o phrases have referred to a variety o f different waterways. D u Fu used the t w o phrases but not together. “Five lakes” could refer to the five m a j o r lakes o f Jiangnan or specifically to Lake Dongting. 21. T h e pavilion is in X u z h o u , w h e r e C h e n lived. H e wrote the p o e m in 1098. See Houshan

shi zhubujian

後山詩注補箋,comp.

R e n Yuan 任 淵

G u a n g s h e n g 冒 廣 生 ( B e i j i n g : Z h o n g h u a , 1995),pp. 247-48.

and

Mao

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leisurely dashing clouds. The effect is to recast his own movement in the final couplet~his hastening to return to his waiting family~as o f a piece with the movement of the birds and the clouds. C h e n here is reading and ordering the landscape and finding his place within it. T h e simplicity and seeming transparency o f C h e n Shidao's style and manner o f engaging the world in poems nonetheless cannot escape problems o f self-consciousness and the inwardness of rhetorical manipulation. O n e o f C h e n Shidao's most affecting and personal poems, for example, seems to be a simple and immediate reading o f experience, but in fact D u Fu's poetry looms very large: 别三子

Partingfrom My Three Children22

夫婦死同穴 ’

When a husband and wife die, they share the same grave,23 And a father and children are parted by poverty:24 How could this be in the realm?25 Formerly I had heard of it; now I see it. Mother is in front, the three children behind. I thoroughly look at them but cannot chase after. Alas, how can [fate] be so inhumane, Causing me to come to this? There is my daughter, just of age to bind her hair; She already knows the sorrow of parting in life.26

父子貧賤離� 天下寧有此, 昔聞今見之� 母前三子後, 熟視不得追 ° 嗟乎胡不仁, 使我至於斯� 有女初束髮, 已知生離悲 0

22. Houshan shi zhubujian, pp. 13-15. 23. From “Great Carriage”《大車》(Mio 73), in the Canon of Poetry: “In life, you will have a separate chamber; / In death we will share a g r a v e , � i l l ! ] 異 室 ,� 死貝!J同穴 ° � I n“Great Carriage," the man is promising the woman that she will have a separate chamber, as is fitting for a wife. 24. Ren Yuan's commentary suggests that the phrase echoes a couplet quoted in the Jin shu: "When rich and esteemed, other people gather to you; / Poor and lowly, close kin separate•”「富貴他人合’貧賤親戚離。�Jinshu�晉書(Beijing: Zhonghua, 1974) 7 7 . 2 � 4 7 . 25. Ren Yuan argues that this is a very specific reference to Emperor Xian of the Han's (r. 189-220) remark when Cao Cao was forcing him to replace his empress. Turning to a court official, the emperor lamented, “How could this be in the realm?” 「 天 下 ^ ^ 是 邪 o � R e nnotes that in both cases, men are being separated from their wives. 26. The phrase "parting in life” comes from the first of the "Nineteen Old Poems,” perhaps the most famous of all old-style verse: “On and on, traveling on and on, / Living parted from y o u . ” 「 行 行 重 行 行 ’ 與 君 生 別 離 � �isI ta commonplace of poems of separation.

West of the River” 枕我不肯起, 畏我從此辭� 大兒學語言,

101

She rested her head on me, unwilling to rise, Fearing that after this I would leave.27 My older son is learning to speak,28

拜 揖 未 勝 衣 � And in his greeting bow, he cannot support his clothes. 喚爺我欲去, As he calls “Daddy,I want to leave": 此語那可思、� How can I think on these words?29 小兒襁梅間, My younger son is in swaddling: 抱 負 有 母 慈 � Embracing him is his mother's kindness.30 汝哭猶在耳, Your crying is still in my ears. 我懷人得知 ° My thoughts, who can know them? T h e poem is a compilation of snippets o f commonplace phrases, words from earlier sources, and linking lines o f simple prose syntax. Yet Chen's poem is very powerful and distinctive: although earlier precedents existed, no other Song author wrote a poem quite like this. T h e difficulty remains, however, that the locus o f meaning in the poem is uncertain: does it derive from the textual tradition or from human experience in the world? For Huang Tingjian, the realm o f primary experience lacked significant order, which was to be found instead in the texts o f a broadly conceived canonical tradition. Does C h e n Shidao here take the meaningfulness o f his anguish from the verities o f human nature or from the secondary structures o f the poetic tradition? C h e n Shidao's fairly explicit reworking o f D u 27. C o m m e n t a r i e s point o u t that C h e n takes this couplet f r o m D u Fu's "Jiang Village”: "Late in life, I a m pressed to live by u n w o r t h y means; / R e t u r n i n g h o m e , I find little joy. / M y pampered son does not leave m y side: / H e fears that I w i l l leave

again."「晚歲迫偷生’還家少觀。嬌兒不離膝’畏我復卻去。」DuFuwrote the p o e m in 7 5 7 o n returning to his family in Jiang U l l a g e after having failed to advance h i m s e l f in e m p e r o r Suzong's (r. 7 5 6 - 6 2 ) court. 28. T h i s derives perhaps f r o m D u Fu's "Expressing Stirred E m o t i o n s " : "Jizi is a fine boy: / In earlier years w h e n learning to speak, / H e asked the names o f the guests, / A n d chanted his father's

verse."《遣興》「驥子好男兒,前年學語時。�

問知人客姓,誦得老夫詩。」Jizi

is the same son referred to in note 27. 29. T h e w o r d i n g here echoes W a n g Can's "Seven Laments,,’ the m o s t f a m o u s

p o e m depicting the forced parting o f parent and child in the C h i n e s e tradition. A f t e r describing his overhearing the w e e p i n g m o t h e r tell the w a i l i n g infant she has n o choice b u t to abandon it b y the road, W a n g writes, “I gallop m y horse, leaving her behind; / 1 cannot bear to hear these

words.”「驅馬棄之去,不忍聽此言 °」�

30. T h e D u F u p o e m "Expressing Stirred E m o t i o n s " m e n t i o n e d in note 28 has the couplet “ T h e age is chaotic: I feel pity he is so small. / M y h o u s e h o l d is poor: I l o o k to his mother's

kindness."「世亂憐渠小,家貧仰母慈。」�

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Fu's couplet in lines 1 1 - 1 2 of the poem reveals the strong mediation of the prior tradition in even the specific details of "Parting from M y Three Children." The borrowing also suggests the power of the temptation to withdraw into the realm of master texts that made Huang Tingjian's poetics so compelling: there is permanence and grandeur even in the sorrow and destitution conveyed in D u Fu's poetry. Poems for Chen Shidao were texts~objects of ordered language~at a remove from the immediacy of experience, and he was famous for the difficult labor he invested in their writing. He worked over his experiences in seclusion before transforming them into verse: The people of the time said that when Chen Wuji [Shidao] climbed on high to look about and came up with a line, he then hurried home, lay down on a couch, and covered his head with a quilt. This was called “chanting on a couch." His family knew this, and so they drove the cats and dogs out, took the babies and young children to stay at a neighbor's, and waited for him to rise and go to his brush and inkstone. Only when the poem was finished did they dare resume their normal routine.31

世言陳無己每登覽得句,即急歸,臥一榻,以被蒙首,謂之吟� 榻。家人知之,即猫犬皆逐去’嬰兒稚子,亦皆持寄鄰家。徐待� 其起’就筆硯,即詩已成,乃敢復常。� This Yuan dynasty version of Chen's mode of writing may be a story well-polished by frequent repetition, but even Chen's contemporaries referred to his habit of hiding away to write his lines. Huang Tingjian, for example, contrasted Chen to their much more fluent friend Q i n Guan _ 觀 ( 1 0 4 9 - 1 1 0 0 ) : 閉門覓句陳無己,Closing the door to search for lines, Chen Wuji; 對客揮毫秦少游 o Facing guests brandishing a brush, Qin Shaoyou.32 31. M a Duanlin�馬 端 臨 ( 1 2 5 4 - 1 3 2 3 ) , Wenxian tongkao 文獻通考,cited in Yang

Poetics”〈試論陳師道的文學� 思想〉,Chengdu Daxuexuebao成都大學學報(社科版)2004-3:37-

Y u h u a�楊玉華,“A Discussion o f C h e n Shidao's

32. “Rising f r o m Illness at Jingjiang Pavilion, A b o u t Events,” 8th o f 10 poems,

《病起荊江即事十首第八》,Huang Tingjian shi jizhu

2.14.520. A l t h o u g h

the

couplet might seem humorous, in fact H u a n g k n e w that Q i n G u a n had j u s t died and that C h e n , like both H u a n g and Q i n , had suffered in exile during the recently deceased Zhezong’s reign.

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"Climbing Joyous Pavilion" easily could be one o f the poems C h e n wrote while lying in bed, but the question remains: was he trying to create a specifically textual order in writing the poem, or was he seeking to aesthetically represent intuitions o f order in the world outside language? Chen's rhetorical efforts in "Climbing Joyous Pavilion" appear to be directed at catching and conveying the specific qualities and immanent order perceived in an afternoon spent at a riverside pavilion, an order in the world o f which the poet is but a part. T h e poem creates a mimesis o f immediate experience through its simplicity and directness, with aesthetic values very different from the distancing effects o f Huang Tingjian's style. Yet simplicity and directness are a style rather than a rejection o f style: C h e n Shidao famously argued, "Better to be clumsy and avoid cleverness; better simple and avoid the florid; better crude and avoid weakness; better obscure and avoid the commonplace: poetry and prose are both like this."33� 寧 拙 毋� 巧 , 寧 樸 毋 華 , 寧 粗 毋 弱 , 寧 僻 毋 俗 , 詩 文 皆 然 � A r t l e s s n e s s ,� that is, is a self-consciously chosen position, or style, that contrasts with the genuine absence o f art in Tao Qian's writing o f poetry: In learning poetry, one should take [Du] Zimei as one's teacher: he has formal standards and thus can be studied. [Han] Tuizhi in his poetry at bottom has no point of entry: he is good because he has great talent. [Tao] Yuanming does not create poems: he just depicts [in words] the marvels within his bosom. If one's learning from Du is not complete, one does not fail in skill. Learning from [Han's or Tao's] poetry without Han's talent or Tao's marvelousness, however, one ends up as just a [Bai] Letian.34

33. Houshan shihua, p. 3 1 1 . G u o Shaoyu finds these lines suspect (Song shihua kao, P. 19). 34. Houshan shihua’ p. 304. Tao Q i a n was the "father o f agrarian poetry" and the m o d e l poet o f natural ease and spontaneity. H a n Y u was a major Tang dynasty writer and official w h o s e strenuous advocacy o f "old-style" prose and o f renewed C o n fucian values made h i m a crucial model for S o n g dynasty literati. In poetry, H a n Y u w r o t e in m a n y styles, but for H u a n g Tingjian, C h e n Shidao, and their generation in particular, his l o n g p o e m s in difficult rhyme groups presented a technical challenge. B a i j u y i�白 居 易 ( 7 7 2 - 8 4 6 ) was a contemporary o f H a n Y u w h o m S o n g w r i t e r s often criticized for overly simple verse.

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學詩當以子美爲師,有規矩故可學。退之於詩,本無解處,以才� 高而好爾。淵明不爲詩,寫其胸中之妙爾。學杜不成,不失爲� 工。無韓之才與陶之妙,而學其詩,終爲樂天爾。� C h e n Shidao treats a poem as an intensely shaped verbal construct that erases its own crafting rather than as the spontaneous imprint o f experience, but he makes no clear commitment about what the verbal artifice seeks to represent. Crafting by itself does not point to a turning away from the world but simply to the challenges in finding language adequate to convey aesthetic intuitions, whatever their domain. Writers o f the early Southern Song, however, came to assess—fairly or not—Chen's manner o f composing as one central feature o f Jiangxi poetics, the retreat from experience. Yang Wanli proclaimed: “‘Closing the door to search for lines' is not the method for poetry; / O n l y in traveling are there poems.,,「閉門覚句非詩� 法 , 只 是 征 行 自 有 詩 � � 3C5h e n Shidao with his self-conscious simplicity came to embody the question o f the relationship o f poetry to experience for the next generation o f writers. 2 . T H E H O N G BROTHERS: H O N G PENG, H O N G C H U , A N D HONG^VAN

M o Lifeng argues that C h e n Shidao is important in defining the Jiangxi Poetry Society because he was a student whose style did not resemble that o f Huang Tingjian. T h e place o f the three H o n g brothers is much simpler: they carefully learned from and imitated Huang Tingjian, w h o was their uncle. They also were at the center o f the social networks that brought the poets listed in the Lineage Chart together. T h e intersecting lives o f the H o n g brothers and their contemporaries X u Fu and Han Ju reveal the gradual forming o f key social-cultural-literary networks during the decades o f Huizong's rule as well as the rapid changes in cultural politics early in Gaozong's reign that made capital culture receptive to the Jiangxi style. Thus, sketching out a short group biography o f all five writers provides the

35. "Descending the Rapids at Hengshan, G a z i n g at Jinhua Mountain," second o f f o u r 《 下 橫 山 灘 頭 望 金 華 山 》 , Y a n g W a n l i , Yang Wanli ji

jianjiao楊萬里集箋校,�

annot. X i n G e n g r u�辛 更 儒 ( B e i j i n g : Z h o n g h u a , 2007),3.26.1356.

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background o f social networks, partisan strife, and constant movement that informed the Hong brothers' lives as poets and shaped the collaborative practice of poetry through the end of the Northern Song that came to define the Jiangxi style. The Hong brothers, born in the late 1060s, came of age during the ascendancy o f the anti-reform partisans. Early during the Yuanyou regime, Hong C h u appears to have relied on the privilege granted by his father's official rank to enter office (the yin privilege) and served in Huangzhou, where he met the Huangzhou group o f the Lineage Chart. X u Fu, born in 1075, played no public role in the Yuanyou political world and, despite factional ties formed in his private life, managed to distance himself from partisan struggles. His father X u X i ~ w h o had married Huang Tingjian's cousin一had greatly impressed Wang Anshi and Lii Huiqing�呂 惠 卿 ( 1 0 3 2 - 1 1 1 1 ) during the N e w Policies period but died in battle in an ill-conceived campaign against the Xi Xia kingdom in the northwest in 1082. In 1090 X u Fu was married to the daughter ofLiiWenqing�呂 溫 卿 ( d . 1099),� younger brother of Lii Huiqing. Han Ju was born in 1080 in Sichuan, far away from the capital, and had no connection with the others or with Yuanyou factionalism until early in Huizong's reign. In 1094 Hong C h u and Hong Yan passed the jinshi examination~ which held far greater prestige for an official career than yin privilege一and were assigned to entry-level posts. During the period of preparing for the examinations, they came to know the members o f the Lineage Chart associated with the capital and the Yuanyou reign period, especially Wang Zhifang. 36 In contrast, X u Fu seems to have not sought an official post and remained in the countryside. T h e year 1094 marked the end of the anti-reform regime, for Zhezong began to rule on his own and restored his father's N e w Policies officials to power. The Hongs were not important enough to punish, and so they continued in their positions, but in 1100 H o n g C h u responded to Zhezong's call for memorials frankly criticizing his policies. As a result, in 1102,after Huizong had come to the throne and committed himself to continuing his father's and brother's policies, Hong C h u was censured and demoted as a 36. Wei Haiying's account of the Hong brothers in Jiangxi shipai zhujia kaolun, PP. 53-90, provides what can be known of their biographies.

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Yuanyou factional partisan. In the spring o f that year, before the demotion, H o n g C h u visited Linchuan and met with various people from Linchuan listed in the Jiangxi Lineage Chart. H o n g Peng and a fourth brother, H o n g Yu�洪羽,for w h o m no poems survive, died during this period, but the remaining two brothers—Hong C h u and H o n g Yan~appear to have continued to hold minor offices throughout Cai Jing's rule. Early in Huizong's reign, other members o f the Lineage Chart met one another. In 1102 X u Fu visited Taizhou and met H a n j u . In 1103 X u Fu visited the capital and met Pan Dalin and others. In 1106,� two years after the promulgation o f the Yuanyou factional proscriptions, H a n j u went to study under Su Shi's younger brother Su Che. Because Su C h e had been one of the faction members, the act o f choosing to study with him seems to have b e e n ~ a n d later was taken to b e — a n overt act o f defiance o f Cai Jing's government, but for the moment it had little political import: in the next year H a n j u entered the Imperial University in the capital. In either 1110 or 1111,when H o n g Yan was a county magistrate and H o n g C h u perhaps held the sinecure o f a temple guardianship, they met in their home town o f Nanchang with X u Fu, Lii Benzhong, and others and formed the poetry society that may have been the inspiration for Lii's Lineage Chart. A t that time, Han Ju in the capital submitted his writings, was summoned to an examination, and was appointed as proofreader in the Palace Library. However, the next year, with Cai Jing's return as minister, H a n j u ' s affiliation with Su C h e caused him to be appointed to only a minor post in Huazhou (in modern Shaanxi). Perhaps through the sponsorship o f the important official Zhang Gang� 張綱(1083-1166),� Han was allowed to return to the capital in 1116 and was appointed as an editorial director (zhuzuolang�著作良P) in 1117. T h e next year, w h e n Zhang Gang was outmaneuvered and driven from office by Cai Jing, H a n j u also was sent away from the capital to serve as a local magistrate. In 1120 Cai Jing retired, and the political fortunes o f men associated with the anti-reform faction improved. That year H a n j u returned to the capital once more and was reappointed as an editorial director. H o n g C h u became the vice-prefect o f Xinzhou� 信 州� (modern Shangrao in Jiangxi). In 1123 X u Fu was appointed vice-prefect o f j i z h o u , H o n g \ a n became an editorial director in the

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capital, and Han Ju became the vice director of the Palace Library. In 1124 Han Ju was promoted to the position of secretariat drafter (中書舍人)’ and Hong Yan became the vice director of the Palace Library. However, the next year both were forced from office for their anti-reformist associations. Hong Yan remained out of office throughout the Jin conquest of the north, while Han Ju served briefly as prefect of Hezhou (in modern Anhui), was summoned to the capital again as a secretariat drafter, appointed prefect of the southern capital (modern Shangqiu in Henan), and then shifted yet again to prefect of Huangzhou. In contrast, Hong C h u negotiated partisan conflict successfully and in 1126 rose to become grand master of remonstrance of the left (左諫議大夫),an important policy position close to the emperor. In that year, X u Fu was appointed vice director of the Department of State Affairs (尙書員�

外郎)• In the next year, after the Jin forces conquered Kaifeng and captured the emperor Huizong, Xu Fu quit in protest after officials in the capital agreed to the Jin demand to name a new puppet emperor not from the Song imperial line. Hong Chu, in stark contrast, was accused of abusing his position for personal gain and of advising the emperor to try to placate the Jin ruler by ceding territory. He was exiled to Shamen�沙 門 island, off the coast of Zhejiang, where he died. Han Ju in 1127 was summoned by Gaozong to serve as prefect of Jiangzhou, but he refused and announced his retirement, after which he never served again. He seems to have led a rather peripatetic life and died in 1135. In contrast and despite Hong Chu's disgrace, Hong Yan in 1132 accepted the summons of the reconstituted court in Hangzhou to serve in his former position of vice director of the Palace Library, and the next year he was promoted to secretariat drafter but had to retire due to illness; he died soon thereafter. In 1132 Xu Fu also was recalled and appointed the grand master of remonstrance of the right (右諫議大夫).He rose in rank over the next two years to reach the exalted office of vice grand councilor (參知政事)• However, he soon came into conflict with other imperial advisors and was appointed to a sinecure. He became the prefect ofXinzhou (where Hong Chu had served as vice-prefect) in 1139 but put so little effort into his duties that he was relieved of the post and given another sinecure. He died in 1141.

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T h e biographies o f this group o f writer-officials s u r e s t that although associates and relatives o f those declared to be members o f the Yuanyou faction were kept out o f the capital and denied positions o f power, they still were appointed to posts that allowed them to maintain their official status and membership in the elite stratum. These writers played no significant role in capital culture until Cai Jing retired near the end o f Huizong's reign. Even then, their status in the capital was precarious. O n l y after the fall o f the north and Gaozong's reestablishment o f the court in the south did H o n g Yan and X u Fu in particular become important figures. T h e early years o f Gaozong's reign (the 113OS-114OS) also was the period during w h i c h writers described a vogue for the Jiangxi Lineage Chart and the Jiangxi style became a topic o f debate. T h e terms in w h i c h writers argued about the Jiangxi style, however, did not derive from the then-current poetic practice o f the surviving members o f the “lineage”一Hong \an, X u Fu, H a n J u 一 n o r f r o m the chart's author Lii Benzhong but f r o m the styles modeled on H u a n g Tingjian during the period around 1 1 1 0 that Lii sought to commemorate. Indeed, by the early Southern Song, these surviving poets developed styles that largely rejected Huang's radical inwardness, and their poetic pronouncements revealed great wariness about the sorts o f methods that H u a n g was held to advocate. T h e s e n e w positions became important counter-positions to "Jiangxi poetics." T h e early w o r k o f the H o n g brothers perhaps is the most representative version o f the “Jiangxi style" as it was conceived o f in the early Southern Song. A good example is H o n g C h u ' s "Following the R h y m e s o f [Liu] Yuanli,,:� 次韻和元禮

Following the Rhymes of[Liu] Yuanli37

湖 海 沙 鷗 性 , T h e nature of a sandbank gull of the lakes and seas,38

37. QSS 22.1280.14482. Liu Anshang, zi Yuanli, was from Yongjia (in modern Zhejiang), passed the jinshi examination in 1097, and served in such posts as attendant censor (#^1史)and supervisory secretary (給事中).Liu's father apparently followed his own father's orders, stayed home, managed the estate, and accumulated wealth. Liu's generation then went into official service. For annotation, see Chen Yongzheng,Jiangoci pai shi ocuanzhu, pp. 134-35. 38. The quality of seagulls most important here is revealed in a story about a man who sought to violate their nature. The Lie Zi�歹!J子 tells of a man who would go down to the beach day after day to play with the gulls. One day his father asked him

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山 林 霧 豹 文 � T h emarkings of a mist-dwelling leopard of a mountain forest.39 龍 她 争 起 陸 , W h e n dragons and serpent vie in rising from the land,40 恙雁看成羣 °

Lambs and geese, as you watch, become throngs.41

玉 石 無 總 磷 , I n jade and rock there is no blackening or thinning,42 芝蘭自芯芬 °

Angelica and orchid are fragrant by their nature.43

to catch one so that he could play with it. After that, the gulls refused to come near him. 39. In the Biographies of Virtuous Women, a woman trying to warn her husband of the folly of his heedless ways as an official praises the wisdom of the leopard that stays in the mountain mists for seven days without coming out to hunt because it wishes to make its coat sleek and its markings lustrous. It hides itself and keeps far away from danger. 40. The phrase comes from the Daoist text seemingly of Tang dynasty provenance, the Scripture ofHidden Contracts (陰符經):"When the earth sends forth killing incipience, dragons, and serpents rise from the l a n d . ” 「 地 發 殺 機 , 龍 蛇 起 陸 。 」� Hong C h u created his line by inserting one character,爭"vie," into the second line of the scripture's couplet. 41. The phrase comes from the biography of Chen Shi�陳 蹇 and his sons in the History of the Latter Han 後 漢 書 . C h e n was a virtuous official who knew when to serve and when to withdraw. His reputation was such that many officials came to pay their respects. When they visited, customary ritual prescribed that they bring a lamb or a goose. As the History notes, "Lamb and geese became a t h r o n g " 恙 雁 成 羣� (Hou Han shu 62.2069). Hong Chu created the line by inserting the character�看,� “[as one] looks” in the middle of the phrase. 42. The line alludes to a story in the Analects of Confucius. As translated by Edward Slingerland, “Bi Xi summoned Confucius, and the Master was inclined to go. Zilu [a disciple] said, ‘In the past, Master, I have heard you say,"The gentleman does not enter into association with someone who treats badly those who are close to him.” Bi Xi is using the city ofZhongmou to stage a rebellion against his superior. H o w can it be acceptable for you, Master, to go to him?,The Master replied, Yes, I have said that. But have I also not said, “[A gentleman is] so hard that grinding will not wear him down; so pure that dyeing will not stain him black"? Do you take me to be a bitter gourd, content to merely hang on a string without ever being eaten?,” (Slingerland, trans., Confucius, pp. 202-3.) The story is entirely apposite, since the topic is service and the danger of defilement. 43. The first relevant pairing of angelica and orchid is in the "Regulations of a King" chapter of the early Confucian text Xun Zi: "To launch such an expedition he would have to use his own people. But in that event his own people would have affection for me as though I were their own parent and would be as fond of me as they are of the fragrances of angelica and orchid,「彼其戶斤與至者’必其民也 ° 其民之親我’歡若父母,好我芳如芝蘭。」(Translation, slightly modified, from John Knoblock, Xunzi, vol. 2, p. 109.) In this passage Master Xun is arguing that Confucian virtues triumph in the end because tyrants alienate their people while the Confucian ruler naturally draws people~even his enemies,armies~to him. Two

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韓 康 不 二 價 , H a n Kang never changed his price: 女 子 會 知 君 � T h ewoman could recognize you.44 As the proliferation of notes reveals, "Following the Rhymes o f Yuanli" is a very bookish poem. Early Southern Song writers reacted strongly against what they saw as the Jiangxi poets' t e n d e n c y ~ s h o w n h e r e ~ t o build poems from a pile of allusions. T h e y particularly rejected the use o f obscure allusions, as perhaps is represented by H o n g Chu's reference to the Scripture ofHidden Contracts. T h e poem, however, in fact is very well crafted: H o n g C h u develops his theme o f reflecting on the possibility of service without compromising one's principles through a judicious progression of citations about recognition, service, and purity. T h e movement in the poem echoes Huang Tingjian's tendency toward sharp turns: the first couplet describes what w e should take as Liu Anshang's basically retiring nature, but the second couplet then throws him into worthy, acknowledged activity. T h e second couplet, with its pair o f fourcharacter expressions taken from books augmented by verbs in the other relevant citations come from the School Sayings of Conjucius (孑L子家語),seemingly a very late Han dynasty mix of authentic early material and later invention: "Thus it is said, cWhen one lives with a good person, it is like entering a room [redolent of] angelica and orchid. After a long time, when one no longer smells their fragrance, one has been transformed with them.,”「故曰與善人居,如入芝� 蘭之室,久而不聞其香,即與之化矣。」(於喂Zijia yu [Zhengzhou: Zhongzhou guji, 1991], p. 77). "Now to encounter [a ruler who recognizes one's worth] or not is a matter of the times. Being worthy or not is a matter of one's substance. There have been many gentlemen of broad learning and deep planning who have not met with their time: how could it be Confucius alone? N o w angelica and orchid growing in a deep forest are not without fragrance just because there are no people [to smell them]; the gentleman cultivates the Way and establishes his virtue and does not change his behavior because he is s t r a i t e n e d . � 夫 遇 不 遇 者 ’ 時 也 ’ 賢 不�

肖者,才也。君子博學深謀而不遇時者’眾矣’何獨丘哉。且芝蘭生於深林,� 不以無人而不芳,君子修道立德,不爲窮困而改節。」(K^Z/>y«,p. 99). 44. The story of the virtuous recluse Han Kang comes from the History of the Latter Han. Han, originally from an important capital family, sold medicinal herbs in the market of the capital for thirty years, and having set the price for his goods, he never h a i l e d over it. One day a woman tried to buy medicine from him, but he refused to lower his price. Angered, she asked, “Are you Han Kang, that you never give a second price?” He lamented, “I initially sought to disappear into anonymity, but now even women and children all know about me, so what's the use of selling medicine?" He then fled once more into reclusion. (Hou Han shu 83.2770-71.)

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middle position, also is a very clever parallel couplet. T h e third couplet marshals images o f virtue unaffected by its surroundings, while the final allusion to Han Kang leaves the question o f whether fame for refusing to change will create difficulties, or whether fleeing is hopeless, since his virtue will be recognized whatever he does. T h e exact tone o f the poem is difficult to pinpoint: H o n g C h u might be serious, but he also could be jesting. T h e bravura nature o f the poem as performance suggests humor but does not exclude the more serious undertones. "Following the Rhymes ofYuanli" is bookish not just in its use o f citation. T h e poem draws on the world of texts to frame and articulate the issues it explores. T h e aesthetic imagination in the poem continues Huang Tingjian's turning to the textual tradition as the locus o f meaning and represents one important aspect o f what Southern Song people saw in the Jiangxi style. A short poem by H o n g Peng presents another important feature o f the prototypical Jiangxi manner: 題胡潜風雨山水圖

PPh•從《 on Hu Qian's Painting of a Landscape of Wind and Rain45

胡生好山水,

Master Hu is good at [painting] mountains and rivers.

煙雨山更好 °

In misty rain the mountains are yet better.

鴻雁書遠空,

The swans and geese inscribe the distant void;

馬牛風塞草 °

Horses and oxen breeze the frontier grasses.

Wang Zhifang's "Comments on Poems,,records that Pan Dalin liked the second line and Wang himself liked the third line; X u Fu liked the third and fourth lines, while Huang Tingjian liked the fourth line.46 All these writers are considered part o f the Jiangxi lineage. In contrast, Wu Z e n g�吳 曾 ( f l . 1157) wrote that the last line was incomprehensible. T h e point of interest and contention in the 45. See the discussion of this poem in Qiu Shaohua�邱少華,JT^xt' shipai xuanji 江西詩派選禁(Beijing: Beijing shifan xueyuan, 1993), pp. 168-69. 46. See "Wang Zhifang shihua” in Guo Shaoyu�郭紹虞,Song shihua jiyi 宋詩話 輯佚[Collation of rare Song comments on poetry] (Beijing: Zhonghua, 1980), p. 35. The version of the poem in the shihua has three variants~® for�好 in the first line,汀 for�空 in the third, and�雨 for�塞 in the fourth—although Wang notes that Hong Peng later changed�汀 for 空.

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quatrain is the use of two words in the middle positions of the third and fourth lines. In the third line, the swans and geese "write" (shu 書)the distant void. The verb describes the physical act of writing out characters: Hong Peng presents the birds flying in a V formation as forming the character "person"人.In the fourth line, the horses and oxen "wind (breeze)" (feng�風)the frontier grasses. The language appears to come from the "Oath of Bi" in the Canon of Documents, which has the line “horses and oxen ‘wind,,,馬牛其風;the commentary glosses "wind" as "to run in an unrestrained manner" 走逸. 47 The reference, however, is obscure, and using the character makes the line difficult even if one knows the citation. Wu Zeng, as noted, found line 4 impenetrable although he cited both the Canon of Documents passage as well as a related one from the Zuo zhuan and their relevant commentary.48 The wording of the second couplet strongly reveals the sort of search for novel language and striking (qi�奇)effects that came to be associated with the Jiangxi style. Indeed, Chen Shidao already had criticized Huang Tingjian for looking for the "striking" in the wording itself rather than in the encounter to be conveyed through the language. Hong Peng here follows Huang Tingjian's lead in making the poem about the language rather than about the ostensible topic of the poem, the landscape painting by Hu Qian. A third aspect of the Jiangxi compositional style is a systematic violation of the organization of tones within regulated verse couplets. The Chinese dialects have been tonal languages since at least the Han dynasty, and the system of four pitch-contour tones remained part of the spoken language through the Song dynasty, when the fourth tone (with a -p, -t, or - k final stop) began to disappear from the northern dialects. Conventions concerning euphony in the arrangement of tones in couplets began to develop in the fifth century and grew into the so-called "regulated" forms (律詩)in the Tang, in which tones divided into two groups (level and deflected) follow one another in balanced patterns. With regularized forms came the aesthetic possibilities opened up by distorting the expected

47. Sun Xingyan�孫星衍,Shang Shu jinguwen zhushu 尚書今古文注疏(Beijing: Zhonghua, 1986), vol. 2,p. 513. 48. Wu Zeng�吳曾,Nenggaizhai man lu 能改齋漫錄 I0.l9ab (SKQS).

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patterns, and D u Fu, pushing the limits of regulated verse, wrote poems in what came to be known as "distorted style,,(aoti f幼體). Huang Tingjian more than any earlier Song poet returned to D u Fu's distorted style: while only 19 of Du Fu's 159 seven-character regulated verse poems are in aoti, over half of Huang's 311 poems in that form use aoti.49 His nephews and the writers associated with them all used the technique, which came to be seen as a part of the Jiangxi style. As an example, consider the final couplet of Hong Peng's “In the Afternoon, Climbing Autumn Screen Pavilion, Written to Show to the Du Brothers":50

富貴功名付公等



Wealth, honor and a meritorious reputation I leave to you.

嗟予老矣負平生

°

Alas, I am old and have wasted the chances o f m y life.

T h e tones go:

/ /

——/

/

/

— /

( / = a deflected tone, — = a level tone)

/——

The first line of the couplet should look like a mirror image of the second, but Hong Peng has switched the tone-classes of the fifth and sixth characters. The reversing of the order of the two tone-classes is a form of self-correction within the deviation but still is "distorted" prosody.51 For modern readers who largely are not also writers of regulated verse, the effect has been lost, but readers in the Southern Song had a keen sense of the violations of prosody of the aoti. Again, it is useful to recall that this is a strictly language-based manipulation that looks to the formal, technical order for meaning rather than to the world beyond the poem. 49. See M o Lifeng, Jiangxi shipai yanjiu, p. 37. Xiao Fazhu�蕭 法 珠 also provides an interesting discussion in "A preliminary investigation into why Du Fu became the model for the Jiangxi School of poetry"〈杜甫成爲江西詩派之祖原因淺探〉,� JVan Shizhuan xuebao 吉 安 師 專 學 報 ( 哲 學 社 # ? 4 § ) 21, no. 2 (April 2000): 24. 50. Hong Peng�洪朋,"In the Afternoon, Climbing Autumn Screen Pavilion, Written to Show to the Du Brothers”《晚登秋屏閣作示杜氏兄弟》,QSS 22.1279.14462. 51. For a discussion of this pattern, see Ouyangjiong 歐陽炯,Lii Benzhong yanjiu 呂本中研究(Taibei: Wenshizhe, 1992), p. 242. For a more general discussion of the topic, see Wang Li 王力,Hanyu shilibcue 漢語詩律學(Shanghai: Shanghai jiaoyu chubanshe, 1962).

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3.XUFU

X u Fu won praise as a proud and principled official,and these qualities appear in his poetry and poetics as well. Although he also was Huang Tingjian's nephew, he asserted his own independent judgment. Lii Benzhong records one anecdote in which X u contradicts his uncle: [Huang] Shangu once said to the Hongs, "When you compose poems, they need not be many, about the 300 poems [i.e., the number in the Canon ofPoetry] will suffice. The poems written throughout my life are very many; I wanted to save only 300,but I could never decide about the rest.” The Hongs accepted this. Xu Shichuan alone laughed and said, "Why discuss the number of poems: one only needs to completely convey the interest of the scene before one's eyes.” Shangu looked over and replied, "What I said was just to tell the Hongs that if they write too many poems, they will not be able to attain refinement.,’52

山谷嘗謂諸洪,言「作詩不必多,如三百篇足矣。某平生詩甚� 多,意欲止留三百篇,餘者不能認得。」諸洪皆以爲然。徐師川� 獨笑曰,「詩豈論多少’祇要道盡眼前景致耳。」山谷回顧曰’ 「某所•謂諸洪作詩太多’不能精緻耳。」� After Huang Tingjian died in 1105,Xu Fu became a dominant presence among the writers who formed the core of the Jiangxi Lineage.53 In a brief comment on a gathering in Nanchang, Zhang Yuangan�張 元 幹 ( 1 0 9 1 - 1 1 6 1 ) mentions both that he went to study poetry with X u Fu and that the people there formed a "society." X u Fu appears to have been their leader. Formerly in Yuzhang [Nanchang] I inquired of poetic technique from Master East Lake, Xu Shichuan. At this time Hong Chu, his younger brother Hong Yan, Su Jianbo, his son Su Xiang, Pan Chun, Lii Benzhong, Wang Zao, and Xiang Ziyin enjoyed the pleasures of poetry and wine as members of the society. I was just capped at the time, and had the chance to bestir myself amongst them. This was in

52. Lii shi mengtong shun《呂氏蒙童訓》,cited in SSHQB 3.3858. 53. See Yzo Dayong�姚大勇,“On the significance of Xu Fu in the field of poetry shortly before and after the Song retreat to the south”〈論徐俯在宋南渡前後# 場得意義〉,Shizhuan xuebao九江師專學報(哲學社會科學版)2000.1: 44一48,for a discussion of Xu Fu's role in the poetic culture of the period.

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the fourth year of the Daguan reign period [l 110] and the first year of Zhenghe [nil]. 54 往在豫章,問句法於東湖先生徐師川,是時洪芻駒文,弟炎玉� 文,蘇堅伯固’子庠養直,潘淳子真,呂本中居仁,汪藻彥章,� 向子湮伯恭,爲同社詩酒之樂。予既冠矣,亦獲得攘臂其間,� 大觀庚寅、辛卯歲也。� Xu Fu's concern for conveying the interest of what one encounters appears to have been a central topic in his early thinking about poetry One shihua records the testimony ofWang Zao�汪藻� (1079-1154): When Wang Yanzhang served on the staff at Yuzhang [Nanchang], he met Xu Shichuan at the South Tower and asked, "How ought one enter the "dharma gate,,of writing poetry?” Shichuan replied, "The cup, the bowls, the fruit and vegetables by this sitting-mat and whatever the eye can see all are poetry. One just must trim them with one's intent, let loose and rein in, expand through encountering [corresponding] categories: all should match one's intent. One definitely cannot shut the gate, close one's eyes, and engage in imaginings that carve the void and forget the substantial.” Yanzhang nodded at this, and after a month he again asked Shichuan, "After receiving your instruction, I took this as my standard and have not been able to produce a single word.” Shichuan, delighted, said, "After this, you'll be able to write poetry." Therefore Yanzhang always says to people, "I got my technique in writing poetry from Shichuan.”55 汪彥章爲豫章幕官。一曰,會徐師川於南樓,問師川曰,「作詩� 法門當如何入。」師川答曰,「即此席間杯棬果蔬使令以至目力� 所及,皆詩也。但以意剪裁之,馳驟約束,觸類而長,皆當如人� 意,切不可閉門合目,作鐫空忘實之想也。」彥章頷之。逾月,� 54. Zhang Yuangan�張元幹,"Six Colophons Written at the End of Poems by Su Yangzhi [ X i a n g ] ” 《 蘇 養 直 詩 帖 跋 尾 六 篇 》 炉 � 蘆 川 歸 來 集 9 . l 5 b ~ l 6 a (SKQS). The term "society" here is vague in that it could refer to a "poetry society” but more probably refers to the gatherings that occurred at the spring and fall community sacrifices (i.e., the�春社 and�秋社).The text is cited in Yao Dayong, P. 45.� 一� 55. Zeng Minxing,曾敏行’ Duxing zazhi《獨醒雜志》,cited in Wu Xiaoman, Jiangxi zongpai yanjiu, p. 254. At the time Wang was the Supervisor for Education for the Jiangnan West Circuit with his office at Nanchang. See Jin Jianfeng�金建鋒’ "An examination ofWang Zao and his social relations with the Jiangxi poetic school” 〈汪藻MI西詩派交游考>,Shangrao Shifanxueyuan xuebao上饒師範學院學報27,� no. 2 (April 2007): 39.

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復見師川曰,「自受教後,準此程度,一字亦道不成。」師川� 喜’謂之曰’�「君此後當能詩矣。」故彥章每謂人曰,「某作詩� 句法得之師川。」� This account is more complex than it seems and returns to the problem of the relation of self, world, and text. Intention is very important in Xu Fu's account, but it is prior to rather than deriving from the material to be transformed into poetry. Like Huang Tingjian, Xu Fu thought of intention as an internal moral disposition in assessing the significance of objects rather than a more immediate form of response. Huang Tingjian, for example, had instructed Xu Fu to nurture his moral disposition on the Confucian classics until they became second nature: You must devote yourself to the Canon and search out their basis for yourself. In action and stillness, speech and silence, every time you [must] model yourself on the ancient men. When in speaking you do not select your words, in your person you do not select your action, only then can you take your mind as teacher and act spontaneously.56 須治經,自探其本,行止語默一一規摹古人。至於口無擇言,� 身無擇行’乃可師心自行耳。� Huang Tingjian's advice echoes the view ofYang Shi, the important disciple of Cheng Hao�程顥(1032-85) and Cheng Yi�程頤(10331107) w h o is considered X u Fu's teacher in the Song Yuan xue'an.57

In a letter, Yang Shi explains that the Way of Yao and Shun is right before us and attainable by all in our daily actions. He then deals with the question of the nature of the knowledge one needs to learn from encountering objects in order to fulfill the "Great Learning" injunction to make one's intentions sincere by attaining knowledge and to attain knowledge by approaching objects. To enact this Way, one mustfirstbe clear about the good, and only then can one know that through which one enacts the Way. Being clear about the good is in attaining knowledge, and attaining knowledge is in approaching objects. Yet since the number of what one calls 56. "Letter to Xu Shichuan”《與徐師川書》#i, HTJQJ 3.1868,QSW 105.2288.107. 57. Huang Zongxi�黄宗羲,Song Yuan ocue'an�宋元學索 25.i6b~i7a. The evidence for the teacher-student relationship is flimsy, but it is clear in any case that they knew and respected one another.

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objects is in the myriads, then there are more objects than can be investigated. If one turns within the self and finds sincerity, then all the objects of the realm are within me. The Canon of Poetry says, "Heaven bore the teeming populace; where there are objects, there are rules.” Among the [types of] form and appearance that are fully there within my self, none are not objects, and each has its rule. If one seeks it within, then one attains the patterns [li] of the realm. From here, in encompassing the resolve of the realm, categorizing the specific features [qing] of the myriad objects, and participating in the transformation of Heaven and Earth, the rules are not far.58 爲是道者,必先乎明善,然後知所以爲道也。明善在致知,致知� 在格物。號物之多至於萬,則物將有不可勝窮者。反身而誠,則� 舉天下之物在我矣。詩曰「天生蒸民,有物有則」。凡形色具於� 吾身者’無非物也’而各有則焉。反而求之’則天下之理得矣。� 由是而通天下之志,類萬物之情,參天地之化,其則不逶矣。� Because the number of objects surpasses what the mind can hope to encompass, the particularity of the objects is less important than knowing how to respond based on inner categories through which one structures one's engagement with phenomena.59 Xu Fu speaks Yang Shi's Daoxue language when he tells Wang Zao to "expand [the objects before him] through encountering [corresponding] categories"�觸類而長 and when he sets the goal that “all should match one's intent"皆當如人意.Xu Fu's insistence on the priority of intention~with all that this entails一is perhaps his most significant contribution in shaping how people understood the term "Jiangxi style."60

58. Yang Shi�楊時(1053-1135), "Answering Li Hang”《答李杭》,Guishan ji 龜山集 18.7b (SKQS). 59. For an excellent account of this passage, see He Jun�何俊,“On theories of ‘investigating things’ and their internal contradictions in the Southern transmission of the Way"〈道南一脉的格物思想及其內在衝突〉,Zhexue men哲學門1, no. 2 (2000). The online PDF version of the article does not include page numbers. 60. Wang Zao, like all the writers listed in the Lineage Chart who survived into the Southern Song, turned away from the Jiangxi manner of composition. Specifically rejecting the intervention of intentions outside of those immediately invoked by the poetic occasion, he wrote, “The creators of old had no intention to write: the inherent pattern (li) arrived and the manifest pattern (wen) followed it. The [writings] were like a seal leaving its impression and like wind traveling on water:

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Despite Xu Fu's importance among the writers during Huizong's reign and his rise to political prominence in Gaozong's, only thirtyfour of his poems survive. Modern anthologies invariably include his quatrain, "Spring, Wandering by the Lake”:� 春 遊 湖�

Spring, Wandering by the Lake61

Pairs offlyingswallows: when did they return? Lining the banks, peach blossoms, soaked by the water, open. 春雨斷橋人不度� Spring rains have broken the bridge: no one crosses; 小船撑出柳陰來� A small boat comes poling out of the willows' shade.

雙飛燕子幾時回� 夾岸桃花蘸水開�

The poem successively unfolds patterns of motion and stasis as it shifts from the natural to the human realm. However, it has no specific intention, no moral project, and instead, as the poet walks around a rain-misted lake in mid-spring, the poem “completely conveys the interest of the scene before his eyes.” The poet's isolated sensibility grounds this interest, but at least in this one quatrain Xu Fu crafted that sensibility well enough into language to attain the assent of the later tradition. 4. H A N J U

Hanju's role in the Jiangxi Lineage is difficult to explain. He metXu Fu very early and seems occasionally to have exchanged poems with him and with some of the more peripheral members of the Lineage. From 1118-20, moreover, he served as the magistrate of Fenning County, the Huang clan home. However, he did not participate in any of the important gatherings between 1103 and n i l that seemingly led to the creation of the Lineage Chart. During that period, he pointedly committed himself as a student of Su Che—rather than of Huang Tingjian, Chen Shidao, Lii Xizhe, or Xu Fu—and paid for interlacing this way and that, they formed luminously. How could they have waited for trimming using the carpenter's string before they accorded? w 「古之作者’無意� 于文也,理至而文則隨之。如印印泥,如風行水上’縱橫錯綜,燦然而成者’ 夫 豈 誦 削 而 後 _ 。 」 ( F r o m “Preface to the Collection of Bao Libu [You]” 《鮑吏部集序》,QSW 157.3384.229, quoted in SSHQB 3.2767). 61. See Qian Zhongshu, Song shi xuanzhu; Qiu Shaohua, Jiangxi shipai ocuanji, pp. 209-10; Chen Yongzheng, Jiangxi pai shi xuanzhu, p. 230.

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that act throughout Huizong's reign. Wu Xiaoman, who usefully distinguishes the social networks of the Jiangxi Lineage from the putative Jiangxi poetic school, reviews Han Ju's role during the period and concludes that it is not clear whether he really belongs in the Lineage.62 Turning to questions of poetics, modern scholars have approached Han Ju as a bridge between the early Jiangxi style represented by Huang Tingjian, the Hong brothers, and Xu Fu, and the early Southern Song revised, moderated version of Lii Benzhong and Zeng Ji 曾幾(1085-1166). Asserting a continuum of transformation between the two styles thus places Han Ju within the poetic school and eliminates the problem of Lii Benzhong's role in both the Lineage Chart and in a poetics countering it. Although this effort to stretch the Jiangxi style started in the Southern Song with Yang Wanli's preface to the combined edition of all the poets' writings, it obscures rather than clarifies the poetic issues debated at the time. I believe it is better simply to take Han Ju as a poet concerned with the issues of the period~craft, allusion, intention, etc.一but a separate voice that Lii Benzhong swept up with the others into his Lineage Chart. Han Ju's poetry was intensely crafted, and he was famous for continuing to revise his compositions years after he had completed them and sent them off.63 Yet his engagement with the literary tradition was very different from that of Huang Tingjian. Han Ju considered anxiety in competing with the ancient writers and striving for originality as damaging to poetry: From ancient times until now’ I don't know how many men have spoken of the scene before their eyes. Men now’ when they set to writing, consider it important to not tread upon [earlier texts], so there are some pieces that to the very end have not one character that is comprehensible. They want it to be fresh, but it is only unintelligible.64 62. Wu Xiaoman,yww^xt zongpai yanjiu, p. 403. 63. Wu Xiaoman (Jiangxi zongpai yanjiu, p. 403) cites comments by Lu You�陸游’ and Wang Qizhen (Huang Tingjian yu Jiangxi shipai, p. 159) cites similar comments by Liu Kezhuang�劉克莊. 64. Wei Qingzhi ^ J S 之 ’ ed” Shiren yuxie�詩人玉屑(Shanghai: Shanghai guji, 1959), 1.8.190,cited in Huang Jingjin黃景進"Han Ju's poetics, including a discussion of ‘exchanging the bones,’ ‘hitting the target,’ ‘living method,,and ‘fully engaging’”「韓駒詩論一兼論換骨、中的、活法、飽參」Son—i wenxue yanjiu congkan宋代文學研究叢刊2 (Sept. 1996): 289.

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目前景物,自古及今,不知凡經幾人道。今人下筆,要不蹈襲,� 故有終篇無一字可解者。蓋欲新而反不可曉耳o Like both Xu Fu and Huang Tingjian, Hanju considered intentions that guide the writing of the text to be central to composition, but his motive was to assure intelligibility rather than to underscore the ethical basis for poetry: In writing a poem, one needs to first determine the intention of the entire piece and take great care not to first get one line or one couplet and then complete the stanza from there. If it's like this, then the intention rarely fits [the text]. 凡作詩須命終篇之意,切勿以先得一句一聯,因而成章。如此則� 意不多屬。� In writing a poem, one must first determine the intention. If the intention is correct, then the thoughts come, and after that, one selects a rhyme to use, like giving an order to a slave. This is using rhyme to develop the intent, and thus from beginning to end there is sequence. [However,] people now, if they are not matching the rhyme, then they are adjusting the intent to arrive at a rhyme. They use the rhyme to search for allusions and end up exhaustively searching books of informal anecdotes and Buddhist writings, so that those who read it are stupefied and do not know what was the point. Truly [this incomprehensibity] arises from [the initial weakness of intention].65 作詩必先命意’意正則思生,然後擇韻而用’如驅奴線。此乃以� 韻承意,故首尾有序。今人非次韻詩,則遷意就韻,因韻求事’ 至於捜求小說佛書殆盡,使讀之者惘然不知其所以,良有自也。� Hanju here attributes the obscure allusions and difficult structuring characteristic of the Jiangxi style not to a desire to be striking or original but to a desperate effort to fill out the rhyme scheme of a 65. Wei Qingzhi, Shiren ytme 1.6.127, quoted in SSHQB 9.9015. L u % u , writing

a colophon to a manuscript collection of Han Ju,s poetry, pointed out that Han appended annotation to explain the sources of his allusions. Lu\ou considered this an exemplary practice. "Colophon to the Master ofLingyang's Draft Poetry”《跋陵� 陽先丢詩草》,Weittan wenji《渭南@》27,in Lu You�陸游,Lu Fangweng quanji 陸放翁全禁(Beijing: Zhongguo shudian, 1986), p. 161. Qian Zhongshu refers to this colophon but interprets it as saying that H a n j u was punctilious about showing that his language all had its sources. See Qian Zhongshu�錢鍾書,Song shi xuanzhu 宋詩選註(Beijing: Renmin wenxue chubanshe, 1958), p. 128.

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poem without first deciding what the poem should be attempting to convey. His consistent rejection of “difficult” poetry appears to confirm Wu Xiaoman's su^estion that Han had a rather conservative sensibility. Han's concern for coherence in poetry at times takes a rather extreme form: In writing poetry, one should allow the person, on reading the first line, to know the second line, on reading the second line to know the third, in succession to the end of the piece, and only then is it the most marvelous.66 凡作詩使人讀第一句知有第二句,讀第二句知有第三句,次第終� 作詩使. 篇,方爲至妙。� ,方爲: Most modern scholars follow Qian Zhongshu in selecting "Mooring for the Night at Ningling" as representative of Han Ju's best poetry: 夜 泊 寧 陵�

汴水曰馳三百里� 扁舟東下便開帆� 旦辭杞國風微北� 夜泊寧陵月政南� 老樹挾霜鳴窣窣�

Mooringfor the Night at Ningling7

The Bian Canal's waters rush 300 li in a day: The skiff, going east downstream, adds sail.68 At dawn leaving the realm of Qi, the wind was slightly northward.69 At night, mooring at Ningling, the moon is directly south.70 Old trees, holding frost on their limbs, coldly rustle.71

66. Wei Qingzhi, Shiren yuxie 1.5.121. 67. QSS 25.16615-16. Also see Qian Zhongshu, Song shi ocuanzhu, p. 129; Qiu Sh2Lohu3L,Jiangxi shipai xuanji, pp. 198-99; Chen Yongzheng, Jiangxipai shi xuanzhu, pp. 233-35; Wang Qizhen, Huang Tingjian yu Jiangxi shipai, p. 161; Mo Lifeng, Jiangxi shipai yanjiu,p. 90; and Wu X i a o m a n , z o n g p a i yanjiu, pp. 399-400. 68. The QSS edition accepts�便,“then,” rather than the textual variant�更,� “additionally. Many of the editions use�更:the situation described is the same, but 更 makes it very explicit. 69. Qi actually was just a county in what is now Henan Province. 70. Ningling, another small town in present-day Henan, was about 120 li from Qi. 71. In Tang usage, the final descriptive compound describes ghostly sounds, but Su Shi in an early poem writes, “Sheared banks sing coldly. / Suspended creepers are streamers of green."「墜崖鳴窣窣’垂蔓綠毵毵。」See Fuller,及(wd/o�丑烛� p. 49. Note that both compounds in Han Ju's couplet appear in Su Shi's couplet.

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寒花垂露落耗耗� Coldflowers,hanging dewdrops, fall gently.72 茫然不悟身何處 ’ Dazed, I do not realize where I am: 水色天光共° The color of the water and the gleam of the sky both are deep azure. The first half of the poem is active, purposeful, and oriented. Han indicates time and direction on land and in the sky. Focusing narrowly on active parts of the landscape that mark the shift into autumn, Han ends with a moment of disorientation separated neatly into an initial, interior line of abstracted reflection followed by a cause or symptom: the fusing of the sky and reflection in the now calm canal water. Critics praise the clear structure of the poem leading to the last line, which conveys a sense of estrangement shared by travelers forced to stop at some “in between" place. The modern critics also note that the poem does not embody typically "Jiangxi" aesthetic values or concerns and instead points to the transformation of those values in the early Southern Song. The poetry and discussions of poetics left by the major writers listed in the Jiangxi Lineage Chart present a complex of issues about crafting, prior intentions, and the role of the textual tradition in shaping meaning. The positions implicit in the works of Chen Shidao, the Hong brothers, Xu Fu, and Han Ju are not mutually consistent. Instead, their distinctive approaches collectively structured the initial set of poetic possibilities through which later writers understood the Jiangxi style.

72. The final descriptive compound initially was used for "long feathers," then for long hanging leaves like the willow, but by the early Southern Song it appears regularly for falling autumn flowers, as in Ge Lifang's "Until now, flowers [in the] rain fall g e n t l y . " 「 至 今 花 雨 • 毵 。 」�

CHAPTER

FOUR

TheJiangxi Style in the Field of Cultural Production

C

hen Yanxiao� 陳嚴肖(fl. 1151) offers a representative early Southern Song critique of the poets writing in the Jiangxi style of his day: The poets of our dynasty and those of the Tang have vied with one another, and what each has attained is different. Each has wondrous points, and they need not encroach on one another. Arriving at the poems of [Huang] Shan'gu, they are pure, new, and extraordinary: they have created what former writers have not yet said. They form a distinct lineage, and this is what is wondrous in them. In his old-style poems, he is not constrained by prosody, occasionally includes partial allusions, and also attains the extreme limit of the pure, new, and extraordinary. However, in recent times some of those who study his poems have not yet attained what is wondrous, and each time they compose, they invariably distort the prosody and use obscure and difficult vocabulary. They say, "This is the Jiangxi style." What does this accomplish! Lii Juren [Benzhong] made the “Lineage Chart of the Jiangxi Poetry Society” with Shan'gu as the founder, and it was fitting that they pattern every footstep on him and must follow at his heels.1 本朝詩人與唐世相亢,其所得各不同,而俱自有妙處,不必相蹈� 襲也。至山谷之詩,清新奇峭,頗造前人未嘗道處,自爲一家,� 此其妙也。至古體詩,不拘聲律,間有歇後語,亦清新奇峭之極�

l. Chan Yanxiao�陳厳肖,Gengpci shihua�庚溪詩話,in Ding Fubao�丁福保,Lidai shihua xubian�歷代詩話續編(Beijing: Zhonghua, 1983), p. 182, quoted in SSHQB 3.2804.

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也。然近時學其詩者,或未得其妙處,每有所作,必使聲韻拗� 捩’詞語艱澀,曰「江西格」也。此何爲哉。呂居仁作《江西詩� 社宗派圖》以山谷爲祖,宜其規行矩步’必踵其跡。� Chen complains that the "Jiangxi" poets "distort prosody and use obscure and difficult vocabulary" in lockstep and without originality. He also blames Lii Benzhong for setting the pattern and creating the vogue. Lii Benzhong, however, in the 1130s sought to distance himself from the Lineage Chart and presented a counter-position that explicitly rejected the narrowness and fixity of the methods to be learned from Huang Tingjian, criticized poetry driven by prior intentions, and returned to Huang's concern for the moral nature of poetry: Those who study poetry ought to come to know the "living method." The so-called living method is when one has the compass and square at the ready but can go beyond them, transforming in unpredictable ways and yet not violating [the norms of] the compass and square. In this practice, there is a definable method that is without definition, there is an indefinable method that is definable. If one knows this, I can speak with him about the living method. As Xie Yuanhui [Tiao] said, “A good poem flows and turns with fullness and allure like a sling-shot pellet”: this is truly the living method. In recent times Master Huang [Tingjian] ofYuzhang was the first to transform the faults of former writings, and later students knew the direction he set out. With complete refinement and exhaustive knowledge, with compass and square in hand, they hoped to arrive at unpredictable transformations. However, in my petty, shallow view, these all are the methods of those since the Han and Wei dynasties who set their intentions upon composing and not the methods of those who do not compose through intention. The Master said [one is] “inspired through poetry" [and] “through poetry one can inspire, can observe, can shape group [solidarity], and can express grievance. Nearby, one serves one's father, and afar one serves one's lord, and one can largely learn the names of birds, animals, and plants."2 Of the poems currently being written, can reading them in fact inspire one's thinking of doing good? Can they bring one to know to serve one's father and one's lord and make one able to learn the patterns behind the naming of birds, animals, and plants? 2. Analects 8.8 and 17.9.

125 TheJiangxi Style If one writes, and the poem does not bring others to this, then it is as if one had not written.3

學詩當識活法。所謂活法者’規矩備具,而能出於規矩之外,變� 化不測,而亦不背於規矩也。是道也,蓋有定法而無定法,無定� 法而有定法。知是者,則可以與語活法矣。謝元暉有言「好詩� [流]轉圓美如彈九。」此真活法也。近世惟豫章黃公,首變前作� 之弊,而後學者知所趣向,畢精盡知,左規右矩,庶幾至於變化� 不測。然余區區淺末之論,皆漢魏以來有意於文者之法而非無意� 於文者之法也。子曰「興於詩,詩可以興,可以觀,可以群,可� 以怨。邇之事父,遠之事君,多識於鳥獸草木之名。」今之爲詩� 者,讀之果可使人興起其爲善之心乎,果可使人興觀群怨乎,果� 可使人知事父、事君而能識鳥獸草木之名之理乎。爲之而不能使� 人如是,則如勿作。� Although the "living method" surely was a corrective that Lii proposed to counter the practice of those who mechanically applied the few rules of "distorted prosody" and "obscure reference" in writing poetry, it also staked out a position in the cultural milieu that clearly distinguished Lii from writers in the "Jiangxi style." The lively written record of discussions of poetry in Gaozong's reign, which includes shihua, prefaces, letters, and poems, establishes a range of positions taken in response to late Northern Song practices. These texts constantly return to key issues about the role of earlier poetry and of technique, about individual genius, intention, and the claims of the encountered world, and about the moral status of poetry. The world of poetry and poetics revealed by these texts is the real starting point for the project of tracing the transformation ofliterary values within the larger cultural shifts of Southern Song China. Su Shi, Huang Tingjian, and the writings of the authors listed in the Lineage Chart provided the material through which members of the literati elite defined their commitments. However, these early Southern Song writers created a shared discourse that focused on the needs of their own time as they regrouped after the 3. “Preface to Xia Junfuji”《夏均父集序》,as quoted by Liu Kezhuang,s preface to Lii Benzhong, "Jiangxi shipai, Lii Ziwei”《江西詩派•呂紫微》,Houcun xiansheng daquanji�後 村 先 生 大 全 集 ( C h e n g d u : Sichuan University Press, 2008) 5.95.2462. This preface, which Wu Xiaoman (Jiangxi zongpai yanjiu, p. 420) dates to 1133,is to the works of Xia Ni, one of the authors listed in the Lineage Chart. Also see Guo Shaoyu, Zhongguo lidai wenlun xuan, 2:367-69. Richard John Lynn translates and discusses the first paragraph in "The Sudden and the Gradual in Chinese Poetry Criticism," p. 392.

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fall of the north. The manner in which they arrayed themselves through the positions they took created a specific set of possibilities structured through the sort of field of cultural production analyzed by Pierre Bourdieu. This set of positions in turn shaped the development of poetic practice and theory throughout the rest of the dynasty. The current chapter explores the structure of the field of poetic discourse that defines this starting point.

Cultural Capital and the Field of Cultural Production Writers in Song China struggled to be heard. Using one's writings to acquire a reputation for literary talent, moral seriousness, or political insight helped a man build contacts with literati who held power and influence. Such contacts could lead to a staff or official position. For those eschewing government service, the circulation of one's name and writings led to invitations to lecture in the flourishing network of academies and to acquiring students. In order to give their children the means to develop their talent and, most crucially, to pass the examinations for office,families acquired libraries, and as printing became ever more widespread throughout the Song, building an adequate library became increasingly possible. By the beginning of the Southern Song, the institutions of local culture, printing, and the circulation of texts created the conditions for the consolidation of an "intellectual field,,similar to that which Pierre Bourdieu noted for western Europe at the end of the seventeenth century: It is possible to see, from the history of Western intellectual and artistic life, how the intellectual field (and at the same time the intellectual, as distinct from the scholar, for instance) gradually came into being in a particular type of historical society. As the areas of human activity became more clearly differentiated, an intellectual order in the true sense, dominated by a particular type of legitimacy, began to define itself in opposition to the economic, political and religious powers, that is, all the authorities who could claim therightto legislate on cultural matters in the name of a power or authority which was not properly speaking intellectual.4 4. Pierrre Bourdieu, "Intellectual Field and Creative Project,” in M.F.D. Young, ed., Knowledge and Control: New Directions for the Sociology of Education (London: Collier-Macmillan, 1971), p. 162, as cited in Derek Robbins, Bourdieu & Culture (London: Sage Publications, 2000),p. 55.

127 TheJiangxi Style In this system in which the cultural, the political, and the economic have become separate if still intermingled fields, Bourdieu developed numerous analyses of problems of taste, class reproduction, and literary change. He proposed a broad rethinking of the nature of symbolic circulation and authority in a society by introducing cultural and social “economies” with their own modes of production, accumulation, and circulation. In a society with these three forms of circulation of goods, one can exchange economic capital for cultural capital by buying books, and one can use one's store of cultural capital—in the form of mastery of w r i t i n g b o t h to accumulate more cultural capital and to acquire the social capital of a network of important social connections (including marriage). Bourdieu makes a key assumption about the system within which cultural goods circulate: the goods (objects of art, literature, etc.) do not have absolute values but attain both value and identity in relation to other goods in the system. Bourdieu, as a sociologist, moreover emphasizes the role of the people (social agents) who create, circulate, and use the objects in the cultural system and stresses that the relations between people as producers in the system are specifically structural, defined through mutual difference: Few areas more clearly demonstrate the heuristic efficacy of relational thinking than that of art and literature. Constructing an object such as the literary field requires and enables us to make a radical break with the substantialist mode of thought (as Ernest Cassirer calls it) which tends to foreground the individual, or the visible interactions between individuals, at the expense of the structural relations一invisible, or visible only through their effects—between social positions that are both occupied and manipulated by social agents which may be isolated individuals, groups, or institutions.5

The field, the system of differentiations, at any point defines the meaningful positions that a person can take, but Bourdieu also stresses that the field is not simply a given but reflects the history of people defining positions that successfully insert new possibilities into the structure.6 Defining positions in the cultural field, since it 5. Pierre Bourdieu, The Field of Cultural Production (New York: Columbia University Press, 1993), p. 29. 6. See Robbins, Bourdieu & Culture, p. 37.

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always forces the field as a whole to shift, is a matter of straggle, power, and authority: It goes without saying that... change in the space ofliterary or artistic possibles is the result of change in the power relation which constitutes the space of positions. When a new literary or artistic group makes its presence felt in the field of literary or artistic production, the whole problem is transformed, since its coming into being, i.e. into difference, modifies and displaces the universe of possible options; the previously dominant production may, for example, be pushed into the status either of outmoded [declasse] or of classic works.7

More than at any time in the Northern Song, during the early years of the Southern Song literati society found ways to implicitly challenge the claims of the state and its authorized culture. Those local elites who simply withdrew to regional concerns were beginning to find a new model for social action and were defining a form of social capital only loosely connected to the state. With the fall of the north, both the imperial institutions and the literati elite abandoned the intellectual system associated with Wang Anshi and his successors and gave the increasingly well-known and sophisticated Daoxue positions a new and receptive audience. The students and children of the men included in the Yuanyou proscription—men who had been the most important cultural figures of their d a y returned to the new capital and added many new voices (and social groupings) to the ferment of Gaozong's court. Both social status and cultural authority were in flux during this period, and Bourdieu's sociological model of cultural competition helps clarify the dynamics by focusing attention on literati positions and position-taking as defining a field of cultural production built upon mutual differentiation in a struggle to claim cultural authority.

Contesting the Field of Cultural Production in the Early Southern Song Huang Tingjian, turning poetry inward and shifting away from Su Shi's poetry of participation in immanent pattern, introduced issues of meaning and method that perplexed the writers of the next 7. Bourdieu, The Field of Cultural Production, p. 32.

129 TheJiangxi Style generation and came to be embodied in the Jiangxi style. The problems of inwardness and Huang's effort to reconnect the otherwise isolated self with the textual tradition provided the categories for the system of positions that writers asserted in the early Southern Song. Did the intuitions represented in the specific language of a poem, for example, refer to an order in the world, as Su Shi saw it, in the textual tradition, as Huang's poetic practice suggested, or in the moral structure of the self, as he argued in his letters? Correspondingly, did the language of poetry structure the ordering of objects in the world, or references in the textual tradition, or objects somehow assimilated and transformed as part of the self? Did the genius of a poet like Du Fu—and analogously, the creative achievements of the contemporary poet~derive from apprehension of a world of pattern outside the self, from insight and appropriation of the textual tradition, or from the unique constellation of properties that define the individuated self and that therefore were outside the possibility of imitation? Finally, why write poetry at all? The Jiangxi style, standing at the intersection of these issues, offering answers, and presenting positions that became the target of debate, serves as a crystallization of the structure of the field that grew around it. L u BENZHONG: LEARNING FROM BOOKS

Lii Benzhong's letters to his student, the talented poet Zeng Ji,reveal the complex mutual implications of his positions on the central issues of composition. Lii begins in his first note with the assertion that writing is not a mere game: As for your praise of my [ability to speak of] the process of poetic composition, I have not addressed this endeavor in a long time: how is one such as I adequate to understand it? Sometimes, despite spurring one's spirit and much depth of thought, one cannot easily set brush to paper; sometimes one encounters events, is moved by them, and at that moment brings forth [a poem]: in each case, the effort is the same. The writers of old were like this. One cannot work just in a vacuum and force oneself to compose, drawing out the poem like a child doing schoolwork.8 8. "First and second notes discussing poetry with Zeng J i f u ” 《 與 曾 吉 甫 論 詩 第� 一帖’第一帖》,cited in Hu Zi�胡仔,Tiaooci yuyin conghua�苕溪漁隱叢話(Taibei: Changan chubanshe, 1978), qianji�前禁 49.332-33.

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寵諭作詩次第,此道不講久矣,如本中何足以知之。或勵精潛� 思,不便下筆’或遇事因感,時時舉揚’工夫一也。古之作者’ 正如是耳。惟不可鑿空彊作’出於牽強,如小兒就學,俯就課程� 耳。� Poetry would seem to be about something, yet to learn to write, Lii says to follow the great poets. He continues his letter: The Lyric ofChu, Du [Fu],and Huang [Tingjian] are certainly sources of proper method [fadu], but it is better to broadly investigate and discerningly select, and make all available for your use. Many styles will pour forth, and you will not be constrained to one note. Although poems like those of [Su] Dongpo and [Li] Taibo are so vast in their scale that they give the learner little to rely upon, still, reading them allows one to dare to attempt [the difficult] • In washing away stagnant thought and being without difficult, perplexed situations, it is a help. In sum, in this matter, one must enter into it through moments of awakening, and then one spontaneously can transcend the [models of] the poets. 《楚辭》、杜、黃固法度所在,然不若徧考精取,悉爲吾用,則� 姿態橫出,不窘一律矣。如東坡、太白詩,雖規摹廣大,學者無� 依,然讀之使人敢道,澡雪滯思,無窮苦艱難之狀,亦一助也。� 要之’此事須令有所厝入’則自然越度諸子。� This section of the letter reveals Lii's focus on texts: all that one needs to find is in the broad expanse of the written tradition. However, the problem lies in knowing how to find one's way within that tradition. Here, he turns outward, but with the half-distracted gaze of an obsessive writer for whom things of the world have meaning only as analogies to provide insights into artistic problems: The pattern for awakening is precisely between effort and indolence. It is like Aide Zhang [Xu] seeing Mistress Gongsun perform the Sword Dance and suddenly awakening to brush technique.9 One like Zhang gave his attention completely to this matter and never forgot about it for even a moment, and thus he could encounter the event 9. Lii gives a similar account of the role of commitment in Zhang Xu,s awakening to mastery of draft script calligraphy in the Ziwei Miscellany, cited in Ouyang Jiong, Lti Benzhong yanjiu, p. 265. In the passage, Lii stresses the idea that the "myriad objects [all are part of] one pattern”�萬物一理.See Lii Benzhong, Ziwei zashuo�紫微� 雜説,in Quart Song biji�全宋筆記,3RD series, vol. 6 (Zhengzhou: Daxiang chubanshe, 2008),p. 43.

131 TheJiangxi Style and attain [awakening] so that he could create the miraculous. Have someone else observe the sword dance, and what impact would it have? It is not just composing and learning calligraphy that is like this. 悟入之理,正在工夫勤惰間耳。如張長史見公孫大娘舞劍,頓悟� 筆法。如張者,專意此事,未嘗少忘胸中,故能遇事有得,遂造� 神妙,使它人觀舞劍,有何干涉。非獨作文學書而然也。� It is interesting that Lii here thinks he has found the key to the problem of how to "awaken" to method. The many writers of the period who rejected the idea of easily mastered, universally applicable rules for composition stressed the need to "awaken" to technique, based on an analogy with Chan Buddhist practice. Awakening, however, tended to be an ineffable, inexplicable event, so that students were thrown back on their own resources with an admonition to continue their earnest study.10 Here Lii suggests a solution similar to the Daoxue warning that "the mind should not forget [right action and expansive qi], yet one should not help them grow"心勿忘,勿助� 長 . n The sword dance was like calligraphy, but there is no indication here that either Zhang Xu or Lii saw the two activities as part of some yet larger category of aesthetic movement and control of force: meaning remains centered in calligraphy and in poetry. At the end of his first letter, Lii begins a theme he continues in his second, that although Zeng Ji's poetry is good, it lacks invention, even if invention is particularly difficult in poetry where one must follow the rhymes of an earlier composition: Your matching stanzas certainly are fine, but I still think they lack new conceptions [yi]. In recent times, among the marvelous poems matching rhymes, none surpass Su [Shi] and Huang [Tingjian]: although they have lost the basic intent of the answering poems of the ancients, still in their skilled use of rhyme and refined employment of allusion, they cannot be matched. 和章固佳,然本中猶竊以爲少新意也。近世次韻之妙,無出蘇、� 黃,雖失古人唱酬之本意,然用韻之工,使事之精,有不可及者。� 10. Lii himself makes such pronouncements. In the Tong meng shi xun�童蒙詩"t川,� for example, he writes, “Composing requires an entrance through awakening, and awakening must come from effort. It is not something one can stumble upon. Both Old Su in prose and [Huang] Luzhi in poetry were surely of this pattern.”「作文必�

要悟入處’悟入必自工夫中來,非僥倖可得也。如老蘇之於文,魯直之於詩,� 蓋盡此理也 °」(See Guo Shaoyu, Zhongguo lidai wenlun xuari, 2:371.) 11. Mencius 6A.2.

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In the second letter, Lii tries to nudge Zeng Ji to be a bit more adventurous in his writing. He begins with a nod to Huang Tingjian's concern that poetry be rooted in a well-developed moral disposition but soon leaves that topic to turn to his central theme: I have thoroughly read your volume of poems. They have greatly consoled me in my solitude. In the diligence of your inquiry, I particularly see the keenness of your delighting in the good, so I congratulate you not just for your poems. Among these, on the whole they all are good. However, as I see it, although your effort in selection and control already is successful, the billows still are not broad. You need to make the scale larger, and this is possible only after you nourish your qi. When the scale is large, the billows spontaneously will broaden; if you add a bit more control and selectivity, the results will be twice what they were. 詩卷熟讀,深慰寂寞。蒙問加勤,尤見樂善之切,不獨爲詩賀� 也。其間大槪皆好,然以本中觀之,治擇工夫已勝,而波瀾尙未� 闊’須於規摹令大,涵養吾氣而後可。規摹既大,波瀾自闊’少� 加治擇,功已倍於古矣。� “Nourishing one's qi,,is an important component of Daoxue cultivation, and it would have been possible that Lii here was developing a connection between moral substance and effective writing~a theme that Zhu Xi would stress later. But instead, Lii keeps his focus entirely on textual practice: Try selecting poems that Su Shi wrote after [his banishment to] Huangzhou, like "Planting Pine” or "The Eye Doctor,” and Du Fu's ballads and long regulated verse poems, and [the issue] will be clear.12 If [your qi] is not like [that in] these poems and you work at control and selection, then I'm afraid it will be easy to write a poem but hard to give it much reach. Han Yu writes, "Qi is water, while words are floating objects: if the water is substantial, then objects big and small all willfloat.Qi in relation to speech is like this: ifqi is abundant, then speech, whether long or short, and sound, whether high or low, all will be appropriate."13 When [writing] is like this, one knows the basis of composition. 12. Lii refers to "Planting Pine, Composed in J e s t ” 《 戲 作 ® S � i nSu Shi shiji 4:20.1027, and "Presented to Eye Doctor Wang Yanruo''《贈眼醫王彥若》in Su Shi shiji 4.25.1^1. 13. Han Yu, "Letter Answering Li Yi”《答李翊書》,Han Yu quanji jiaozhu�韓愈� 全集校注(Chengdu: Sichuan daxue chubanshe, 1996), 3:1455.

133 TheJiangxi Style 試取東坡黃州以後詩,如《種松》、《醫眼》之類,及杜子美歌� 行及長韻近體詩看,便可見。若未如此而事治擇,恐易就而難遠� 也。退之云『氣,水也。言,浮物也。水大則物之浮者大小畢� 浮。氣之於言猶是也,氣盛則言之長短與聲之高下皆宜。』如� 此,則知所以爲文矣。� Having stressed to Zeng Ji the importance of reading poems to increase his scope, Lii finishes, however, by pointing to poetry beyond the reach of self-conscious composition because the writer's focus had moved beyond language itself: Poems like Cao Zijian [Zhi],s "Seven Laments,,are broad, vast, deep, and distant and are not something we composers of poetry can attain. This is because they never directed their intention toward their language. Although the Jiangxi scholars of recent times take compass in one hand and right-angle in the other and expend all their effort, they mostly do not know [that they should] go beyond this. They have climbed a hundred-foot pole but cannot advance another step and have failed to understand [Huang] Shan'gu's intent.

曹子建《七哀詩》之類’宏大深遠,非復作詩者所能及,此蓋未� 始有意於語言之間也。近世江西之學者,雖左規右矩,不遺餘� 力,而往往不知出此,故百尺竿頭,不能更進一步,亦失山谷之� 旨也 。� The implications of this final section are less than clear. Lii's general discussions of poetry focus on questions of composition. The argument here seems to suggest that all late-born are condemned to be "composers of poetry"作詩者 for whom the very act of composing keeps them from attaining the level of early poets in the tradition like Cao Zhi. Still, Lii states that one must go beyond fixation on the tools of writing. Lii seems to say that Zengji should set as his goal the unreachable vanishing point where concern for language disappears. What Lii cites as the failure of the Jiangxi poets in allowing themselves to get caught in a dead end oddly mirrors the noble inevitability of failure in the project of self-aware writing itself.14

14. Richard John Lynn ("The Sudden and the Gradual in Chinese Poetry Criticism," pp. 390-92) discusses Lii Benzhong's poetics in terms of rules and the transcending of rules through enlightenment. His account also stresses the central role of learning from earlier poets.

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SCHOLARSHIP: TEXTUAL ORIGIN AS MEANING

Lti Benzhong remained committed to the world of texts even though he rejected the search for a small handful of master techniques. As an important poet, he understood the constraints imposed by focusing on language, but he also was highly ambivalent about styles of poetry less anchored in technique, like those of Cao Zhi, Li Bai�李白(701— 62), and Su Shi that were "so vast in their scale that they give the learner little to rely upon.” However, other writers who discussed poetry in the mid-twelfth century seemed to be without ambivalence: they focused on the history of words and phrases as the key to meaning. One rather historically complicated initial example is from Cai Tao�蔡絛(d. 1126),who wrote: Du Shading said, “In the use of allusion in composing poetry, the essence is like the Buddhist saying, ‘Adding salt to water, on drinking the water, you know the taste of salt."'15 The explanation is the secret scripture for poets. For example, in ‘‘at the fifth watch, the sound of the drum and horn is sad and stalwart; midst the Three Gorges, the reflection of the Milky Way sways,,,people only see how his spirit triumphs over Creative Transformation and do not know that there are allusions. The "Biography of Ni Heng,,[has] “Beating out the Tuyang Drum Song,; the sound was sad and stalwart." "Stories of Han Wu[di]w [has the line] “when the stars and constellations wavered, Dongfang Shuo said that it was a response to the toils of the populace.,,Thus being good at using allusion is like binding the wind or catching a shadow: how could it leave a trace? This principle cannot admit being given voice: in my explicitly speaking of it, it already falls to a secondary status.16 杜少陵云「作詩用事,要如釋氏語,水中著鹽,飲水乃知鹽味。� 」此說詩家密藏也。如「五更鼓角聲悲壯,三峽星河影動搖。」� 人徒見凌鑠造化之氣,不知乃用事也。《禰衡傳》「撾漁陽摻’ 聲悲壯。」《漢武故事》「星辰動搖,東方朔謂民勞之應。」則� 善用故事者,如係風捕影,豈有跡耶。此理迨不容聲’余乃顯言� 之,已落第二矣。� 15. In the original Buddhist context of the Xin wang ming� 王 銘 t h e image was to convey how one can know the mind without being able to see it. See Puji 普濟,ed., Wudeng huiyuan�五 燈 會 元 ( B e i j i n g : Zhonghua shuju, 1984) 1.2.118. Qian Zhongshu discusses this comment by D u Fu in the Tanyi lu. 16. SSHQB 3.2493-94.

135 TheJiangxi Style Cai Tao was the son of Cai Jing. When his father, old and infirm, returned to power one last time late in Huizong's reign, Cao Tao reputedly issued orders in his father's name and abused his position to gain access to wealth and palace women. However, in 1123,after his father's initial retirement but before his recall, Cai Tao was demoted and exiled for having written the shihua from which the above quote comes. He was accused of relying excessively on Su Shi and Huang Tingjian as sources for his material. Thus the son of the minister who had Su's and Huang's writings banned and the woodblocks destroyed was using these writings, when the political tide turned, to demonstrate his own "true colors." Most of the passages in the extant version of the shihua report on anecdotes involving the poets of the Northern Song, but some are acts of sensibility like Cai Tao's comment on Du Fu's couplet. The comment makes several claims. First, the overt meaning of the lines is not the real meaning. Understanding their deeper meaning depends on a mastery of allusion that is, in itself, an ineffable knack This assertion has two further implications: Cai Tao has the breadth of learning to know the texts from which the allusions come and the required, mysterious refinement of sensibility to recognize the texts as relevant. The particular example here is extraordinary because the allusions Cai Tao cites are so deeply irrelevant that they become something of a perverse triumph. The couplet is from Du Fu's "Night in the Pavilion," a famous example of Du Fu's intense late style. Su Shi, for example, singles out the couplet as “magnificent”�七言之偉麗者. 17 The poem "Night in the Pavilion" is one of a group of extraordinary regulated verse poems that Du Fu wrote late in his life in which he drew upon all the resources of the regulated verse form to read a stoically persisting order into the desolate landscape in which he found himself. Although not received with much comprehension or enthusiasm in his own lifetime, Du Fu's late poetry during the three hundred years from the Mid-Tang through the end of the Northern Song provided the model of a writer who situated his own small circumstances within the vast patterns of the cosmos through technical mastery and imaginative reach. Cai acknowledges Du Fu's

17. Hu Zi, Ttaooci yuyin conghua, qianji 10.66.

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imaginative power in the statement, "People only see how his spirit triumphs over Creative Transformation," yet at the same time he pushes it aside to insist that the subtle allusions unlock the deep import of the couplet. For Cai and many others in his generation, Huang Tingjian's assertion that “not a single phrase in Du Fu did not have its source” gave voice to a turning away from the phenomenal world as the site for the creative ordering of meaning. Instead, Cai and other shihua writers saw the labor of poetic crafting as forging relations to the textual tradition, drawing on and recycling the cultural capital created by the great men of the unreachable past. There are many examples of shihua writers who cite the origins of lines or couplets in the earlier textual tradition where the "discovered" allusion seems to be extremely willful and who use the asserted allusion to dismiss the alternative that the poet's imagination was drawing upon the immediate world of experience. Wu Zeng's Nenggaizhai manlu 能改齋漫綠 is a large and rich source of information on poetry, but it also has some odd assertions. Wu notes, for example: Du Zimei's poem says “[My] old wife draws on paper to make a Go board.,,18 This comes from Eastern Jin [317-420] writer Li Xiu's “Fu on Four-Rule, which says “The game of four-rule was created by Chamberlain of the Palace Garrison Marquis Zhi. One draws on paper to make a board and slices bits of wood for markers,19 [Du Fu] also says, “[My] boys bang on needles to makefishinghooks,,,which comes from the Lyrics of Chu, “Taking a straight needle to make a hook, whatfishcan you catch?"20 杜子美詩云「老妻畫紙爲棋局」出東晉李秀《四維賦》曰「四維� 戲者,衛尉摯侯所造也。畫紙爲局’截木爲棋。」又曰「稚子敲� 針作釣鉤」出《楚辭》「以直針而爲鉤,維何魚之能得。」�

18. The couplet Wu Zeng cites here comes from "River Village”《江村》’ which Du Fu wrote while he and his family lived in the “Thatched Hall"(草堂).For a translation and discussion, see David R. McCraw, Du Fufs Lamentsfromthe South (Honolulu: University ofHawai'i Press, 1992), p. 25. 19. This Ju is preserved in the early Tang encyclopedia Yiwen leiju�藝文類聚� (Kyoto: Chubun shuppansha, 1980) 74.1281, compiled by Ouyang Xun�歐陽詢. 20. From "Lamenting Fate”《哀命》,one of the "Seven Admonitions,” said to have been written by Dongfang Shuo�東方朔(154 BC-94 BC). SSHQB 3.3067.

137 TheJiangxi Style Du Fu surely would have been familiar with both texts Wu Zeng cites: the Lyrics of Chu was a foundational anthology, and the Yiwen leiju, which preserves Li Xiu's�李秀(n.d.) fu, was a much-consulted source for lore on topics of all sorts. However, the references are irrelevant as allusions: the only purpose they can serve is to demonstrate both the breadth of Wu Zeng's learning and the acuity of his poetic judgment, and to displace Du Fu's homey scene of rustic contentment out of the immediate and into the textual universe. A second example by Wu Zeng is more aggressive in its discounting of poetic originality through citing textual "borrowings": The former generation liked to praise the monk Wuqing's "Birds return; the shadows of flowers move. / Fish submerge; the traces of the waves are round.,’ They took both the phrasing and conception to be new. However, I read the Liang [dynasty writer] Shen Junyou's "Overlooking the Water": "Flowers fall: round streaks come out. / The wind is brisk; fine waves overturn."21 Then I knew the origin of "Fish submerge; the traces of the waves are round.,,22

前輩好稱僧悟清「鳥歸花影動,魚沒浪痕圓」以爲句意皆新。然� 余讀梁沈君攸《臨水》詩云「花落圓紋出,風急細波翻」,乃知� 「魚沒浪痕圓」所自。� This type of argument is the revenge of the scholiast. Wu energetically declares that those with expertise in texts can participate in the field of cultural production by asserting that prior usage trumps claims to originality and that the textual expert therefore has authority to judge the "new." Huang Tingjian had called for his students to become thoroughly familiar with the canonical traditions and had created a poetry that spoke through the language of the tradition. Early Southern Song scholars discovered that Huang had opened a viable space for the project of demonstrating that his claim of "not one phrase without a source" was at the heart of all great poetry. From the Bourdieusian perspective, this position allowed those who 21. Shen Junyou� 沈 君 攸 died in 573. This poem, "For Composing, I Get ‘Overlooking Water,,,《賦得臨水詩》,is preserved in the Tang dynasty encyclopedia Chuxueji�初學記(Beijing: Jinghua, 2000)’ 1.6.180-81, compiled by Xu Jian�徐 堅� et al. In the Chuxueji,the second line is, "The wind is brisk; the fine current overturns."「風急細流翻」• 22. SSHQB 3.3087.

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had acquired "objectivated" cultural capital in the form of a substantial library to transform it into an "incorporated" state of memory and trained sensibility to produce their own form of new cultural capital in writings by claiming authority over the poetry of the past.23 Moreover, the sensibility that creatively recognized poetry as a transformation of earlier texts paralleled the poetic process of appropriation that the sensibility claimed to discover. This hermetic, self-authorizing position allowed men with little poetic talent but a strong memory and many books to participate in cultural discussions and sanctioned such dubious analyses as Wu Zeng's of Du Fu's and Wuqing's couplets. The reduction of creativity to skill in using earlier texts created aporetic moments when commentators could not cite sources and were left mystified by the powers behind a writer's creativity. Zhang Biaochen�張表臣(fl. 1146), for example, strongly asserted textual antecedents for famous compositions: Among the prominent writers of the Tang, only Han Yu in prose and Li Bai in poetry labored to remove cliches and produced many new conceptions However, Han Yu,s "South Mountain" is like Du Fu's "Northern Journey"�; his "Explanation of the Presentation of Learning" is the same as [Vang] Ziyun's "Explanation of Mockery,,...,� thus we know that he had that upon which he based [his writings]. In recent times, Ou[yangXiu]'s "Account of the Old Tippler's Pavilion" takes its sequencing from the “Fu on the Epang Palace," and the discourse in his “Account of the Hall of Daylight Brocade” resembles [Han Yu's "Sending Off Li Yuan to Return to] Winding Valley Preface." The energy of [Su] Dongpo's uFu on Yellow Tower” is the same as [Liu Zongyuan's] "Questions about Jin;" the transcendence of the “Fu on Red Cliff,,approaches the “bold wind” [of Song Yu's “Fu on the Wind,,],and thus we know that they have origins.24

23. See Robbins, Bourdieu & Culture, p. 34. Song dynasty writers also noted the connection between having a library and attaining skill in allusive reference. Ye Mengde�葉夢得(1077-1148), for example, mentioned a Liu Jisun: “He was capable at composing seven-character verse. His family had a library of several thousand volumes, and he was good at using allusions." Shilin shihua�石林詩話 in He Wenhuan, Lidai shihua 1.417. 24. Zhang Biaochen, Shanhugou shihua�珊瑚鉤詩話,SSHQB 3.2598-99.

139 TheJiangxi Style 李唐群英,惟韓文公之文,李太白之詩,務去陳言,多出新� 意。…然退之《南山詩》,乃類杜甫之《北征》,《進學解》乃� 同於子雲之《解嘲》…,則知其有所本矣。近代歐公《醉翁亭� 記》步驟類《阿房宮賦》,《晝錦堂記》議論似《盤谷序》。東� 坡《黃樓賦》氣力同乎《晉問》,《赤壁賦》卓絕近於雄風,則� 知有自來o The compositions by Han Yu, Ouyang Xiu, and Su Shi that Zhang lists are bold and highly distinctive works: claiming that each has its antecedents brings them all safely back within a world of texts. When Zhang cannot master a text through this sort of filiation, however, he is left confronting the incomprehensible within the human: [Han] Tuizhi, in composing the “Tablet for the Temple of the Spirit of the Southern Sea," set out the grandeur of the sacrificial rites and the nobility of the dwelling of the spirit. Reading this causes one to be of a reverent mind His creating phrases and using words attained this [level]: I do not know what manner of thing makes up his innards, what manner of thing is his mind.25

退之作《南海神廟碑》,序祀事之大,神次之尊,固已讀之令人� 生肅恭之心。…其造語用字,一至如此,不知何物爲五臟,何物� 爲心胸耶。� Zhang Biaochen's seemingly offhand sense of wonder becomes important when thinking of the field of positions as mutually defining. Zhang, looking for sources in the textual tradition, contrasts sharply with those commentators who found poetry to be grounded in the constancy of the human mind, the very thing that Zhang cannot fathom. LOOKING TO THE M I N D : POETS AND MORALISTS

Those who looked to human Nature (xing�性)and the human mind to ground the orderings of poetry fall into two mutually differentiating groups. For one group, poetry reveals the contours of the human interaction with the world of myriad objects, which is both subtle and largely constant across the ages. For the other group, poetry articulates the moral structure of the mind in its encounter with objects. Both groups turn meaning inward and make poetry the 25. Zhang Biaochen, Shanhugou shihua,SSHQB 3.2603-4.

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means for revealing this inner realm of structure, but for poets of sensibility, the Nature tends to be fragmentary, particular, and acutely tuned to real patterns in the external world. For moralists, the Nature is unitary and in the end owes little to the ephemera of the external world, which tend to inspire untoward responses that obscure the truly central. The important official and shihua writer Ye Mengde� 葉 夢 得� (1077-1148) is representative of the group that sees poetry as an articulation of human interaction with a substantial world. He writes: Poetry fundamentally is encountering objects to lodge an inspiration; it is chanting of feelings and the Nature. If only one can give external semblance to what in one's breast one wants to say, there will be fine [poetry]. In our age many have labored at embroidering and carving, and thus although the language is skillful, it is insipid,flavorless,and has no connection with human intention. I once contemplated the "Exposition for my Children: Yan. • • ” : this is [Tao Qian's] true disposition toward his life.26 When I read his poems一such as his "Early summer, the vegetation grows tall, / surrounding my roof, the trees are dense. / The flock of birds are delighted with their lodging,/And I also love my hut. / Having already plowed and planted, / I often return to read my books"; and "A light rain comes from the east; / A breeze accompanies it”一they all truly convey what he takes to heart.27 Having his book at hand, he at first was unaware that they were words and compositions. This is wherein he cannot be approached. Who does not have a dwelling of three bays, a summer moon, reading books after plenty of sleep, relying on the shade of trees to listen to the calling of birds? Only Yuanming knew to delight in this. Thus we know that there are countless fine events in life which we all have equally but which we cannot put to use.28 詩本觸物寓興,吟詠情性,但能輸寫胸所欲言,無有不佳。而世� 多役於組織雕鏤,故語言雖工,而淡然無味’與人意了不相關。� 嘗觀陶淵明《告儼》等疏,云「少學琴書,偶愛閑靜,開卷有�

26. See Tao Qian, "Exposition for my Children Yan et al.,,《與子儼等疏》,Tao Yuanmingjijiaojian 7:441. 27. Both citations are from Tao Qian, "Reading the Canon of Mountains and Rivers” � M l ± | _ ® � n1,Tao o. Yuanmingjijiaojian 4-334-3528. Yujian zashu�玉澗雜書,in Quan Song biji�全宋筆記(Zhengzhou: Daxian chubanshe, 2005), 2ND ser., vol. 9,p. 364, quoted in SSHQB 3.2726-27.

141 TheJiangxi Style 得,便忻然忘食。見樹木交蔭,時鳥變聲,亦復懼然有喜。嘗言� 五六月中,北窗下臥’遇涼風至’自謂羲皇上人」,此皆其平生� 真意。及讀其詩,所謂「孟夏草木長,繞屋樹扶疏。眾鳥欣有� 托,吾亦愛吾廬。既耕亦已種,時還讀我書。」又「微雨從東� 來,好風與之俱。」,真是傾倒所有備書於手,初不自知爲語言� 文字也。此其所以不可及。誰無三間屋,夏月飽睡讀書’藉木蔭� 聽鳥聲,而惟淵明獨知爲樂,則知世間好事,人所均有,而不能� 受用者,何可勝數。� On the one hand, poetry expresses inner responses. On the other, Tao Qian was a great poet because he noted and transformed into poetry the many patterns of daily life that are worthy of celebration but that escape the awareness of less refined sensibilities. Although at times Ye's criticism seems focused on skill in representing the patterns of the world, what he presents is a world mediated by human faculties of response: In the wording of poetry, one certainly avoids using too much crafting, yet when one “follows the feelings to articulate objects,” there is the wonder of a natural skill: although it is crafted, one does not see the traces of the carving and scraping. In Old Du's “In the fine rain, the newly hatched fish come out; / In the breeze, the young swallows fly aslant," these ten characters are without a single character used to no effect.29 When a light rain covers the surface of the water, it forms bubbles, and fish always rise and then scatter. If it is a heavy rain, then they hide and do not come out. A swallow's frame is light and weak: if the wind is strong, it cannot prevail. Only in a breeze can it master [the breeze], thus there is the phrasing, “In the breeze, the young swallows fly aslant."30

詩語固忌用巧太過,然緣情體物,自有天然工妙,雖巧而不見刻� 削之痕。老杜「細雨魚兒出’微風燕子斜。」此十字殆無一字虛� 設。雨細著水面爲滙,魚常上浮而谂,若大雨則伏而不出矣。燕� 體輕弱,風猛則不能勝,惟微風乃受以爲勢,故又有「輕燕受風� 斜」之語。� Even in depicting subtle regularities in the world, Ye does not forget that the couplet is built upon skill and frames the account with the

29. Du Fu, “Dispelling my thoughts at a railing by the water”《水濫遣心》’ first of two poems, QTS 7.227.2455. 30. Ye Mengde, Shilin shihua in He Wenhuan, Lidai shihua 1.431.

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ancient model of "following the feelings to articulate objects.”31 A final citation makes Ye's view of the mediation of intention in shaping the world in poetry explicit: The prosody of the poetry of the Duke of Jing Wang [Anshi] was exceptionally refined and rigorous. In creating phrases and using words, he did not leave a hair's breadth of [loose] space. Yet when his intent met with the wording, the wording followed the intent and formed a natural whole so that one could not see any places that were contrived.32

王荊公晚年詩律尤精嚴,造語用字,間不容髮。然意與言會,� 言隨意遣,渾然天成,殆不見有牽率排比處。� Ye Mengde repeatedly invokes a form of "natural" (literally “Heaven,” tian�天)synthesis here to move between human intention and its realization in poetic structure. Ye was an older writer who, like the "Jiangxi" writers Han Ju, Xu Fu, and Hong Yan, rose to political prominence at the end of Huizong's reign; he was not swayed by the new popularity of Jiangxi poetics and instead revealed a different form of inwardness in approaching the same issues Huang Tingjian confronted. Huang and the Jiangxi writers juxtaposed “method,,(fa�法)derived from texts, a withdrawal from the constant pull of the phenomenal realm, with an inner “awakening” (wu�悟),a sudden, discontinuous leap that achieved the synthesis but was beyond method. In contrast, Ye encouraged an engaged inwardness— an awareness of intentions and responses to the world in its minute particulars—and saw the moment of synthesis beyond method as a form of natural maturation. Many writers in the early Southern Song shared Ye Mengde's sense of the inwardness of meaning that looks to human intentions in response to a world of substantial patterns. Wang Zhi� 王絰� (fl. 1132) made a distinction between the textual enterprise of developing a repertoire of strategies to represent intentions through books and the effort to capture the human character through 31. Lu Ji in his “Fu on Writing" presents the four characters as parts of two separate phrases: "following the feelings” was the virtue of poetry while "articulating objects" was the metier of the fu. By the Tang, the four characters were used as a single phrase to describe composition engaged in tracing responses to the phenomenal world. 32. Ye Mengde, Shilin shihua in He Wenhuan, Lidai shihua 1.406.

143 TheJiangxi Style representation of experience in the world.33 Both approaches look to the human for meaningful order, but Wang preferred direct observation to gleaning from texts: He Fanghui [Zhu] broadly read the remaining collections of Tang authors and selected their intentions to compose poems and lyrics. However, what he attained was excellence at selecting the remnant intentions of Tang authors, which is not so good as Yan Shuyuan [JidaoJ's exhaustively observing the manifestations of a period of peace. What he attained were the feelings of people and the manner of objects. Wherein [Yan] Shuyuan was marvelous was in getting people [right]; wherein [He] Fanghui was marvelous was in attaining the remnant intentions of authors.34

賀方回遍讀唐人遺集,取其意以爲詩詞’然所得在善取唐人遺意� 也,不如晏叔原盡見昇平氣象,所得者人情物態。叔原妙在得� 人,方回妙在得詞人遺意。� Writers of the time were very alive to the array of aesthetic positions being presented, and they had the conceptual vocabulary to articulate the distinctions. Wang here provides a clear alternative between the sort of recycling of intentions presented in Huihong's account of Huang Tingjian "exchanging the bones and snatching the embryo"一the quintessential Jiangxi position一and the direct observing of human processes in the world. In his account ofYan Jidao,Wang's attention quickly turns to the external world ("the manifestations of a period of peace”),and the role of the mind is mentioned merely in passing and easily overlooked. Yet Wang notes, "Wherein [Yan] Shuyuan was marvelous was in getting people [right] .,,People, and the "feelings of people,,in particular, remained central. Zhang Yuangan presents another good example of this focus on the external when he strongly affirms the substantial nature of the world:35 33. Wang Zhi served as an editor in the Bureau of Military Affairs early in Gaozong's reign and gained a reputation as a historian. He thus lived in the capital and belonged to its literati stratum in the early Southern Song. 34. SSHQB 3.2255. He Zhu�賀鑄(1052-1125) and Yan Jidao�晏幾道(fl. 1090) were contemporaries and famous as writers of ci�詞’ song lyrics. 35. Zhang Yuangan, from Fuzhou in Fujian, graduated from the Imperial University during Huizong's reign. Early in Gaozong's reign, he retired over policy disagreements but later was stripped of official rank for writing a farewell poem for Hu Quan, who was being sent into exile. Zhang was a friend of Lii Benzhong and the Hong brothers.

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Composition comes from the crucible of Creative Transformation (zaohua), and the primal joins together within the breast. From ancient times this has been called the “living method”; it is that by which the blood circulates, and beginning and end respond to one another like the stance of the snake of Changshan.36 It also is like wind traveling across water and spontaneously forming patterns. It also is like an actor performing in a play: when coming on stage, he should tarry with laughter and, on withdrawing, cause one to reflect. Not only writing is like this; any matter one [seeks] to put forward to the world shares the same key. My friend [Su] ^ngzhi during his life attained the Chan lineage's untrammeled concentration:37 every phrase and every word was without a single spot of dust. The cosmos, mountains and rivers, mists and clouds, trees and grasses, through a thousand transformations and in ten thousand aspects, all were at his brush tip. When did he ever feel constrained?38

文章蓋自造化窟中來,元氣融結胸次。古今謂之活法,所以血脈� 貫穿,首尾俱應,如常山蛇勢,又如風行水上,自然成文,又如� 優人作戲出場,要須留笑退思有味。非獨爲文,凡涉世建立,同� 一關鍵。吾友養直,平生得禪家自在三昧。片言隻字,無一點塵� g。宇宙、山川,煙雲、草木,千變萬態,盡在筆端,何曾� 氣索° The image here is of the mind as a capacious crucible that can incorporate all the myriad objects of the world. Then, in a reverse process—for which Zhang appropriates Lii Benzhong's term "living method"—the mind brings these images forth as the occasion demands. Written twenty years after Gaozong's reestablishment of the dynasty in the south, the colophon reveals a reworking of positions. Lii Benzhong conceived of the "living method" as part of a poet's engagement with the textual tradition. Later writers like Zhang Yuangan, however, used the term to describe a form of spontaneous 36. The legendary snake of Changshan could attack with the tail if the head was hit and attack with both head and tail if hit in the middle. See "Nine Types of Terrain”《九地》in Sun Wu�孫武,Shiyijia zhu Sun Zi� 十一家注孫子,trans. Guo Huaruo�郭化若(Beijing: Zhonghua, 1962), p. 197. 37. I have emended the text from�衣 “clothing” to�友 “friend” based on SKQS. Yangzhi�養 直 was the courtesy name of Su Xiang�蘇庠(1065-1147), who associated withXu Fu, Zhang Yuangan, and others in the broader Jiangxi social network. 38. " b i t t e n after the Poem ‘Summoned Scholar Su Presented to Daoist Master Wang,”《蘇詔君贈SI士詩後》,Zhuxuan zazhu竹軒雜著,quoted in SSHQB 3.2322 as attributed to Lin Jizhong� 仲 ( f l . 1139). The colophon is dated 1157. See QSW 182.406.41819.

145 TheJiangxi Style creativity freed from the constraints of textual self-consciousness. Zhang offers a very positive view.39 In contrast, Zhou Fu�周 学 ( 1 1 3 5 77),in the next generation, tried to return to Lii Benzhong's emphasis on texts and was critical of the idea of easy spontaneity that had attained popular currency: The overall conception of the poem to Han Zishi that you sent me seems [fine], but you have not yet exerted very much effort. This fault is just that you have not yet attained the essential in reading the writings of the ancients. Take care not to believe what those who speak of poetry explain about the "living method.” Now what the former generation called the “living method” was that, having read broadly and exerted great effort, they did not know why [their successful writings] were thus, and yet they were thus, so [they argued that] the "living method,,must be reached through awakening and through effort. Yet people now write a type of unskilled and flavorless phrasing and say,"My poem is without difficulty and obscurity: this is the living method.” If it were like this, then one could burn up the Canon ofPoetry and the “Li sao."40 所寄上韓子師詩,大意似矣,而工夫未甚至。此病亦只是讀古人� 書未造要耳,切勿信言詩者說「活法」。夫前輩所謂活法,蓋讀� 書博,用功深,不自知其所以然而然,故「活法」當自悟中入,� 自工夫中入。而今人乃作一等不工無味之辭’而曰「吾詩無艱澀� 氣,此活法也。」苟如此,則三百六篇并離騷可焚去矣。� 39. This understanding of the "living method” is echoed in an essay Zhang wrote three years earlier (1154): The former generation once stated that in poetry one should take the method from [Du] Zimei, and in other works one should not go beyond [Han] Tuizhi. The gateway of Han [Yu] and Du [Fu] [opens on to] wind traveling across water, spontaneously forming patterns, and both [can be] named the "living method”: with the sound of metal and the striking of jade, they are just like the grand synthesis of my master [Confucius]. This surely is a solid argument. 前輩嘗云詩句當法子美,其他述作,無出退之。韓、杜門庭,風行水上,� 自然成文,俱名活法,金聲玉振,正如吾夫子集大成。蓋確論也。� Zhang Yuangan here connects creativity to the forces of the cosmos. In both essays Zhang refers to Su Xun's “wind traveling across water” to describe the spontaneous patterns produced when one attains the "living method.” See Zhang Yuangan, “Preface to the Yilejushi wenji”《亦樂居士文集序》,QSM^ 1824005403-4,quoted in SSHQB 3.3295. 40. Zhou Fu, "Note sent to Zhou Rixin”�《寄周日新簡》in Tuozhai qiandao bian 蠹#鉛刀編,QSM^259.5820.25-26, quoted in SSHQB 3.3393.

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Zhou Fu presents a vulgar “modern,,position of insipid ease that arrogates to itself the catch word of the "living method" and justifies itself in explicit contrast with the Jiangxi style of "difficulty and obscurity•” Zhou, dismissing the failure of the easy spontaneity in recording unmediated experience, turns once again to Huang Tingjian's model of training the sensibility through strenuous engagement with great writing. However, in making this argument, he does not stake a new position so much as simply affirm the claims of an old one. In contrast to both the positions of finding order in texts and finding it in the human interaction with a substantial world of patterns, a third way of defining the locus of meaning grew in refinement, complexity, and acceptance during the transition from the Northern to the Southern Song. This third locus was the normative and capacious character of human nature itself. Huang Tingjian, as part of his justification for turning to inner ordering for poetry, had cautioned his nephews to avoid being perturbed by mere objects and stressed finding one's basis in one's moral nature. This strongly ethical sense of the normative character of human Nature (xing�性)was a part of what Huang bequeathed to the next generation, but it did not become a central aspect of the Jiangxi style, which remained fixed within the textual realm and formal issues. Still, the shift of meaning toward an inward moral order, also embodied in growing interest in Daoxue teachings, continued to develop and evolve into positions that set out the human mind as containing a heterocosm, an inner world that provided the unchanging patterns for knowing what mattered in the external world of phenomena. In these positions, the poet becomes increasingly self-complete and the external world merely impinges to draw forth the inner ordering. Zhou Zizhi� 周紫芝(1083-1155) raises interesting questions about this process of withdrawing meaningful ordering away from the world to locate it within the inner realm. He writes: Now in objects there certainly is that which can delight the eyes and ears, but it must be the excellence of their sound, appearance, smell or taste, or their possessing a prospect offering the strange and remarkable. Yet bamboo, as an object, is just one type of vegetation. At the beginning, how could it have moved people's hearts? However, seeing

147 TheJiangxi Style its visage, one is delighted, and living with it, one never tires [of it]. Thus it has received the deep acquaintance of lofty recluses, and a legion of poets has captured its form in its chanting.41

夫物固有可以娛人之耳目者,必其聲色臭味之美,瑰奇偉異之� 觀,而竹之爲物,特草木中一種類耳,初豈有感于人心哉。然而� 見其面則輒喜,與之居而無厭’故其受知於高人逸士爲甚深,而� 形於詩人之嘯詠者亦甚眾。� Are the qualities in bamboo that poets praise inherent, or do people project their own values onto the plant and discover this projected correspondence? In stepping back to ask in Zhong Caijun, op. cit” pp. 1177-1211.

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writing away from drawing upon and representing the immanence of meaning in the moment of composition towards a controlled expression of an already-grasped order. Literary Pattern as a Manifestation of Principle Zhu Xi argued that the relationship between the Way and the "pattern" in texts was that of root to branch, in other words, they are continuous, and "pattern" grows out of the Way: [Chen] Caiqing [Wenwei] asked, “The first sentence of Li Han's preface to Han Yu's collection is very good." [Zhu Xi] replied, "You, sir, say it is good. I see it as having a fault." Chen said, "'Aesthetically ordered writing, wen�文,is a tool to hold together the Way.'85 Now, since the Six Canons are wen, and all that they convey is the principle of the Way,how is there a fault?" [Zhu Xi] answered, “This is not so. This wen all flows out from within the Way. How could there be such a principle as wen being able to hold together the Way? Wen is wen and the Way is the Way: wen is just like condiments when one eats. If one takes wen as holding together the Way, this is taking the branch as the root and the root as the branch. Is this acceptable?"86

才卿問:「韓文〈李漢序〉頭一句甚好。」曰:「公道好,某看� 來有病。」陳曰:「『文者,貫道之器。』且如《六經》是文,� 其中所道皆是這道理,如何有病?」曰:「不然。這文皆是從道� 中流出,豈有文反能貫道之理?文是文,道是道,文只如喫飯時� 下飯耳。若以文貫道’卻是把本爲末。以末爲本,可乎?」� Since aesthetic patterning grows out of the Way, if one has properly cultivated one's Nature, the inner order will shine through. All of the actions of the sages~as well as their writings~were the great exemplars of this logic of self-manifestation: N o w the wen of the sages and worthies of old can be called flourishing. However, from the beginning how could they have had the intent to learn to compose patterned texts like this? There was this

85. The verb guan�貫 more literally means to "thread through," as in Analects 4.15, "In my Way, one threads through it all”�吾道一以貫之」• 86. Zhu Zi yulei 8:139.3305-6. The translation is from Michael A. Fuller, "Aesthetics and Meaning in Experience: A Theoretical Perspective on Zhu Xi's Revision of Song Dynasty ^iews of Poetry," Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 65,� NO. 2 (Dec. 2005),pp. 343-44.

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substance within, so there must have been this patterning without. It is like Heaven having this qi: there must be the brilliance of the sun, moon, stars, and constellations. The earth having this shape, there must be the arrays of mountains and rivers, plants, and trees. Since the minds of the sages and worthies had a pure, refined, luminous substance that expansively filled all within, then its manifestation on the outside must spontaneously have been ordered, distinct, and brilliant, and could not be hidden: I surest that it did not need to be entrusted to speech or written on slips and scrolls and only then be deemed patterned. The [sages and worthies] only needed to encounter the myriad affairs: every speech or silence, action or stillness, everything that people could see, wherever they went, all was of [exemplary] pattern.87 夫 古 之 聖 賢 , 其 文 可 謂 盛 矣 。 然 初 豈 有 意 學 爲 如 是 之 文 哉 。 有 是� 實 於 中 , 則 必 有 是 文 於 外 。 如 天 有 是 氣 , 則 必 有 日 月 星 辰 之 光� 耀 。 地 有 是 形 , 則 必 有 山 川 草 木 之 行 列 。 聖 賢 之 心 既 有 精 明 純 粹� 之 實 以 旁 薄 充 塞 乎 其 內 , 則 其 著 見 於 外 者 , 亦 必 自 然 條 理 分 明 ,� 光 輝 發 越 而 不 可 搶 , 蓋 不 必 託 於 言 語 、 著 於 簡 冊 而 後 謂 之 文 。 但� 自 一 身 接 於 萬 事 , 凡 其 語 默 動 靜 , 人 所 可 得 而 見 者 , 無 所 適 而 非� 文也。� Z h u Xi's argument here largely expands C h e n g Yi's account o f people's misapprehension o f the nature o f the sages' writings. In broadening the scope o f actions to which the sages brought their activity o f presenting exemplary patterns, however, Z h u X i devalued specific claims for writing as a privileged medium for the manifestation o f the sage's inner order. Shifting the focus o f wen, Z h u X i accordingly reassured his students that they should emulate the sages and that they need not fret over mere style: Have people learning to write today ever written an [exemplary] composition? They mistakenly have expended great effort: they should focus on learning and inquiry to elucidate principle, and then it spontaneously will manifest itself as good prose. Poetry is the same. 今 人 學 文 者 , 何 曾 作 得 一 篇 。 枉 費 了 許 多 氣 力 。 大 意 主 乎 學 問 以� 明理,則自然發爲好文章。詩亦然。� And again:

87. “Reading the Treatise [on Rites and Music] in the [New] Tang [History]”

讀唐志》,Zhu Xiji 6.70.3653-54.

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One day he spoke of composition: “One need not focus on learning how to write in this manner. One must just become clear about principle. Once one's grasp of principle is refined, then one's writing of its own accord will become elegant and substantial.88

一日說作文’曰:「不必著意學如此文章,但須明理。理精後,� 文字自典實。」� Zhu Xi here does not dismiss the value of aesthetic ordering in texts and even grants the legitimacy of his students' desire to write with ease and elegance: these are values well established in elite culture, positions in the late twelfth-century field of cultural production that Zhu Xi must acknowledge and to which he has little choice but to respond if he is to participate in that larger discourse. His response here is to accept the value of the literary but to strictly subordinate it to the inwardness and priority of mastery of principle.

Transforming Literary Process: Contra Su Shi and the Immanence of Order Zhu Xi, in assigning to the aesthetic ordering of texts the role of representing principle, brings his commitments about how one comes to understand principle to the process of composition. One is to reflect on the world with a self-mastered mind quieted of all private desires, and one is to grasp the principle and then write. In particular Zhu Xi rejected the manner in which Su Shi, as the greatest prose writer of the Northern Song, made his ideas arise as though they flowed from the experience in the process of writing rather from a well-ordered anterior understanding: The Way is the roots and trunk of wen. Wen is the branches and leaves of the Way. Being rooted in the Way,what is expressed in wen therefore also is the Way. The compositions of the sages and worthies of the Three Dynasties all came forth from this way of thinking. Wen is thus the Way. Now, [Su] Dongpo says, "What I call wen must be together with the Way.” Thus wen is independently wen, and the Way is independently the Way. He waits until he is composing, then goes to look for a Way to stick in. This is his greatest fault. It is just that each time [he writes], the wording is so floridly marvelous that he captures the surface meaning,89 but at this point he lets it slip unawares. 88. Zhu Zi yulei 139. 89. Zhu Xi uses the phrase�包籠 several times in the Zhu Zi yulei with the seemingly colloquial meaning of "capture the surface meaning.”

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Explaining the source of his basic fault, it's because when he writes, he gradually presents the principle rather than first understanding the principle and then writing. For this reason the great basis is inadequate.90 道 者 , 文 之 根 本 ; 文 者 , 道 之 枝 葉 。 惟 其 根 本 乎 道 , 所 以 發 之 於� 文 , 皆 道 也 。 三 代 聖 賢 文 章 , 皆 從 此 心 寫 出 , 文 便 是 道 。 今 東 坡� 之 言 曰 : 「 吾 所 謂 文 , 必 與 道 俱 。 」 則 是 文 自 文 而 道 自 道 , 待 作� 文 時 , 旋 去 討 箇 道 來 入 放 裏 面 , 此 是 它 大 病 處 。 只 是 它 每 常 文 字� 華 妙 , 包 籠 將 去 , 到 此 不 覺 漏 逗 。 說 出 他 本 根 病 痛 所 以 然 處 , 緣� 他 都 是 因 作 文 , 卻 漸 漸 說 上 道 理 來 ; 不 是 先 理 會 得 道 理 了 , 方 作� 文 , 所 以 大 本 都 差 。� Z h u X i takes Su Shi seriously as more than a mere stylist. S u Shi's understanding o f h o w meaning emerges in the phenomenal realm differed profoundly f r o m Z h u Xi's, and Su Shi's writings embodied this difference in their logic o f organization. Z h u X i finds Su Shi's writings to be poorly organized: Dongpo's "Preface to the Collection of Duke Ouyang” is an entirely fine piece of writing, except that when he wants to speak of principles of the Way, then it becomes unclear: the beginning and the end do not match one another.91 東 坡 〈 歐 陽 公 文 集 敘 〉 只 恁 地 文 章 儘 好 。 但 要 說 道 理 , 便 看 不� 得 , 首 尾 皆 不 相 應 。� [Speaking of Su Shi's tomb path inscription for Sima Guang, Z h u Xi] said, “This looks like it was written as though without pause, and from the beginning it has no organization. In this sort of writing, when he first introduces a topic, you have no idea what he is going to say later." He pointed to a passage with his finger, "Arriving here, he has said everything, with nothing more to be said, yet suddenly he starts speaking again. Pieces like [Han] Tuizhi's and [Zeng] Nanfeng's compositions have organization.92 I formerly looked at these two writers' work and then looked again at Dongpo and realized that every section is missing a sentence, and every sentence is missing a word." 93 90. Zhu Zi yulei 8:139.3319. Cf. the translation by Richard John Lynn in “Chu Hsi as a Literary Theorist and Critic,” in Wmg-tsit Chan, ed., Chu Hsi and Neo-Confucianism, p. 338. 91. Zhu Zi yulei 139. 92. That is, Han Yu and Zeng Gong. 93. Zhu Zi yulei 139.

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曰:「看他也只是據他一直恁地說將去,初無布置。如此等文� 字,方其說起頭時,自未知後面說甚麼在。」以手指中間曰:� 「到這裏,自說盡,無可說了,卻忽然說起來。如退之南豐之� 文,卻是布置。某舊看二家之文,復看坡文,覺得一段中欠了� 句,一句中欠了字。」� That is, Su Shi appealed to the reader's aesthetic judgments to provide a structure of meanings immanent in the text, judgments that link seeming ruptures in the flow from word to word, sentence to sentence. This manner of writing, with its surprising leaps and turns, mirrored and embodied Su Shi's sense of the apprehension of meaning in the world. Zhu Xi rejected both the style and its implicit model for understanding experience. Zhu Xi confronted the theoretical basis for Su Shi's style一and the role of aesthetic judgment as completing the manifest content—in his attack on Su Shi's commentary to the Canon of Changes. Su Shi in his commentary consistently distinguished between the objects and events of the phenomenal realm and the inaccessible processes behind the phenomena. Knowledge therefore was partial and limited in its scope: what we see are semblances that give us intuitions concerning the nature of the otherwise inaccessible grounding structures. Zhu Xi, however, refused to be limited to semblances: Su says: “The gentleman of ancient times was concerned that Nature is hard to see, so he used what can be seen to talk of Nature. Using what can be seen to talk about Nature is entirely Nature's semblance."

蘇曰,古之君子患性之難見也,故以可見者言性。以可見者言� 性,皆性之似也。� I say: The gentleman of ancient times completely realized his mind and thus knew his Nature. He never was concerned that it was hard to see. When speaking of the Nature, he also always directly referred to it: it was not a case of just speaking of its semblance. Now, how can there be any phenomenal object that resembles the Nature that can be taken to stand in for it? Thus what Mr. Su saw probably was just its semblance, and he never knew that there has never been anything that resembles the Nature.94

94. Zhu Xiji 7:72.3758. The translation is from Fuller, “Aesthetics and Meaning in Experience," pp. 334-35.

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愚謂古之君子盡其心則知其性矣,未嘗患其難見也。其言性也’ 亦未嘗不指而言之,言其似而已也。且夫性者,又豈有一物� 似之,而可取此以況彼耶。然則蘇氏所見,殆徒見其似者,而未� 知夫性之未嘗有所似也。� Zhu Xi in his own ontology stressed that Nature was above form and therefore not directly accessible. He also stressed the limits of knowledge derived from hearing and seeing. Yet, even though the Nature as he explained it presented Zhu Xi with an epistemological challenge, Su Shi's way of stating the problem and his solution~ embodied in the luminous surfaces of his texts~denied the possibility of certainty and totality of comprehension that were among the goals of Learning of the Way. Hence Zhu Xi was clear and adamant in rejecting both the style and the content. Transforming Literary Process: Contra the Immanence of Incitement Yang Wanli praised the rhetorical trope of xing, "incitement," as a mode of writing in which the dynamics of encounter and response behind the moment of composition derived from Heaven rather than from the author. This understanding ofxing as the embodiment of an intense response to the world had a long history in the tradition,95 but Yang, in stressing the claims of Heaven, underscored his turn to patterns in the world to ground poetry, in contradistinction to the Jiangxi focus on texts with which he had begun his career. However, as Zhu Xi shifted the ground for manifest pattern away from texts and the world to the fullness of principle attained through disciplined self-cultivation, he severed the link between the self and the onward flow of the encountered world captured through the immediacy of response in xing.96 For Zhu Xi, xing was just a textual technique, one of the three classical modes set out in the Canon of Poetry: 95. Wang Yanshou�王延壽(ca. 124-ca. 148), for example, wrote: "The xing of the Shi jing poets is created upon being moved by phenomena.”「詩人之興’感物� 而 作 ° � ( “ P r e f a c eto the Lu Lin^uangdian fu”《魯靈光殿賦序》in Wenxuan 2.11.509 [Shanghai: Shanghai guji, 1986]). 96. For other discussions of Zhu Xi's use of xing, see Yang Yuhua, “Cong Zhu Xi lun ‘xing’ kan qi wenxue guannian," p. 31, and Mo Lifeng, Zhu Xi wenxue yanjiu, pp. 243-55 passim and p. 283.

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To directly describe the matter is fu. When you want to speak of the matter and first use two sentences as just hooks, and then proceed, this is xing. To adduce objects for comparison is bi.97

直敘其事者,賦也;本要言其事,而虛用兩句釣起’因而接續去� 者’興也;引物爲況者’比也。� That is, Zhu viewed xing as a device to lead into the theme one wanted to explore: Someone asked, "In explaining the Six Principles [yi] in your commentary to the Canon of Poetry, you take ‘relying on an object to give rise to wording' as xing. This is different from old explanations." [Zhu Xi] said, “The old explanations expended much effort and missed the basic purport. The ocing mode is not unified [in its use]: sometimes they borrow a thing before their eyes to start speaking, and sometimes they find some other object to start. In general, it is just three or four sentences to start the theme. In the Tang they still had this mode, as in ‘Green,green are the grasses on the riverbank' and 'Green, green are the rushes in the water': these are all borrowing this object to start the wording, and it is not that they were moved and saw this object. There are cases where they took what was not present to start writing about what was there and cases where they took what was present to start writing about what they lacked. The previous generation was unclear about this, and so how could they explain the basic purport of the poems? Even Cheng ^ did not see this, and you will see that his explanation has some very expansive points, but if you look carefully, this was not the basic purport.”

問「詩傳說六義,以『託物興辭』爲興,與舊說不同。」曰:� 「覺舊說費力’失本指。如興體不一,或借眼前物事說將起,或� 別自將一物說起,大抵只是將三四句引起,如唐時尙有此等詩� 體。如『青青河畔草』,『青青水中蒲』’皆是別借此物,興起� 其辭’非必有感而見於此物也。有將物之無’興起自家之所有;� 將物之有,興起自家之所無。前輩都理會這箇不分明,如何說得� 詩本指。只伊川也自未見得。看所說有甚廣大處’子細看’本指� 卻不如此。� For Zhu Xi, the particular images used as xing in the Canon of Poetry had no significance beyond their role in allowing a theme to be introduced:

97. Zhu Zi yulei 6:80.2067.

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Xing in the Poetry is entirely without meaning, and in later people's poetry there also is this mode, like ‘Green, green are the cypress on the mound, / piled high are the rocks in the ravine. / A person's life between Heaven and Earth / is as swiftly passing as a long-faring traveler.'98 詩之興,全無巴鼻。後人詩猶有此體,如「青青陵上柏,磊磊澗� 中石。人生天地間,忽如遠行客。」� H e extended this analysis of xing to the language o f the Lyrics of Chu: In exposition (fu), there is, for example, the beginning of the Li sao. The fragrant grasses and numinous creatures are examples of simile (bi). Xing borrows objects to start the wording, and from the beginning has no normative meaning, as for example when "the Yuan angelica and Li orchids” in the "Nine Songs,,leads to “I long for my lord but do not yet dare speak.,,99 其爲賦,則如騷經首章之云也。比則香草靈物之類也。興則托物� 興詞,初不取義,如九歌「沅芷漓蘭」以興「思公子而未敢言」� 之屬也。� Z h u X i denies that xing in the Canon of Poetry necessarily arose from what the poets encountered and shifts the center o f the poetic act to the revelation o f inner commitments. Still, he had to confront the authority o f the “Great Preface” to the Canon of Poetry, which combines the role o f prior commitments with the power o f specific encounters in the world. T h e "Great Preface” begins: Poetry is where the resolve goes. While in the heart, it is the resolve, manifested in words, it is a poem. Feelings move within and take shape in words. Words are not enough, and so one sighs it. Sighing it is not enough, and so one draws it out in song. Drawing it out in song is not enough, and so all unawares one's hands dance it and one's feet tap it out.100

98. Zhu Zi yulei 6:80.2070. The poem is the third of the "Nineteen Old Poems” in the Wenxuan. 99. The allusion is to the “The Lady of the Xiang River”《湘夫人》.See M o Lifeng's discussion in Zhu Xi wenxue yanjiu, p. 283. 100. This translation is a slightly modified version of one by Steven Van Zoeren, Poetry and Personality: Reading, Exegesis, and Hermeneutics in Traditional China (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1991), pp. 95-96. Also see Mo Lifeng's discussion of Zhu Xi's comments on the "Great Preface”(p. 212).

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In the preface to his commentary to the Canon

of Poetry, Z h u X i

rewrites this famous text: Someone asked me, “For what reason was the Poetry written?" I replied, “‘That people are born quiescent is their Heaven[-endowed] Nature; that they respond to objects and become active are the desires of the Nature.' Now, since one has desires, one cannot be without longings. Since one has longings, one cannot be without speech. Since there is speech, the remnants of that which speaking cannot bring to completion are expressed in sighs that must necessarily have a natural resonance and rhythm and cannot be cut short. This is that by which the Poetry was made."101 或 問 於 余 曰 : 詩 何 爲 而 作 也 。 曰 , 「 人 生 而 靜 , 天 之 性 也 O 感 於� 物 而 動 , 性 之 欲 也 。 」 夫 既 有 欲 矣 , 則 不 能 無 思 。 既 有 思 矣 , 則� 不 能 無 言 。 既 有 言 矣 , 貝 ! J 言 之 所 不 能 盡 而 發 於 咨 嗟 詠 嘆 之 餘 者 ,� 必 有 自 然 之 音 響 節 奏 而 不 能 已 焉 , 此 詩 之 所 以 作 也 。� Z h u X i replaces the immediacy o f feeling evoked b y objects and events w i t h "longings," emotion mediated by memory. H e also explicitly inserts the term "remnants," some lingering tag-end o f desire about w h i c h , to rid oneself o f this surplus o f longing, one might write a poem. T h i s differs significantly f r o m the uncontrollable welling-up o f response described in the “Great Preface." 102 Z h u proposed the more controlled, mediated version o f writing poetry he set out in his rewriting o f the “Great Preface" o f the Canon of Poetry as a general model for composition: It is not unacceptable to write a few lines of poetry occasionally, but there is no point in writing a lot, because that would be just getting mired in it. When one is not dealing with matters, is calm and selfcomposed, what could be better than to think over some lines of poetry? At such a time the true flavor issues forth: this is different from those normally considered good poets.103

101. "Preface to the Collected Commentaries on the Canon of Poetry”《詩集傳序》, Zhu Zi wenji 8:76.3801. 102. Huangjingjin (“Zhu Xi's discussion of poetry,” p. 1181) persuasively argues that Zhu Xi uses the “Record of Music” in Record ofRites to reframe the dynamics of response described in the “Great Preface" and cites Zhu Xi's essay, "Explanation of Movement and Stillness in ‘Record of Music,” (Zhu Xiji 6.67.3523), which strongly asserts the need for self-mastery. 103. Zhu Zi yulei 8:140.3333.

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作詩間以數句適懷亦不妨。但不用多作,蓋便是陷溺爾。當其不� 應事時,平淡自攝,豈不勝如思量詩句?至如真味發溢,又卻與� 尋常好吟者不同。� Z h u X i here in fact understands the danger o f becoming mired in poetry. W h e n still a relatively young man, he and Zhang Shi wrote a series o f poems as they traveled together through the Hengshan mountain range in Hunan, and, on reflection, both came to regret their enthusiasm for writing at the time. Z h u Xi wrote a postface to the collection o f those poems they had circulated: It is not that there inherently is bad in writing poetry, but why good people deeply resent and reject it is because they fear it will lead to drift and cause harm. But how is this initially the fault of poetry...? Poetry basically is the speaking of one's resolve, and thus it is appropriate for one to disperse hidden sorrows and "be at ease, calm, and centered,"104 but its drifting almost approaches a loss of resolve. When living with others, it aids in the "nurturing of humaneness,,,and thus it is appropriate that its moral discernment be refined and that it move moral concerns within, and still some cannot avoid drifting.105 How much more so when one has come “to live alone and apart,” when things change without end?106 In the smallest interval, in a moment's time, how can one control "that which throws eyes and ears into confusion and shakes one's mind and intent?"107

104. Zhou Dunyi: "To be at ease, calm and centered [implies] an abundance of virtue.,’「優柔平中’德之盛也 0」(Tbngshu, sec. 17; Tan and Ym, Zhou Dunyi jiy P. 38). 105. Analects 12.24: "Master Zeng said, ‘A gentleman meets his friends with cultural forms and nurtures humaneness through his friends.,”「曾子曰『君子以� 文會友‘以友輔仁0 j j 106. Confucius,disciple Zixia, having been upbraided by Zeng Zi for moral failings, acknowledges his guilt and concludes, by way of explanation, "It has been a long time that I have lived alone and a p a r t . ” � 吾 離 群 而 索 居 , 亦 已 久 矣° 」 ( L i j i , TERN

GONG《禮記•檀弓.上》)�

107. Z h u Xi, "Nanyue youshan houji"《南嶽遊山後記》(Zhu Zi wenji 8:77.3862—63),cited in M o Lifeng, p. 38. M o does not follow the emendation of "good people”(善人)to “our people”(吾人)in the Zhu Zi wenji. M o notes that Z h u wrote the poems in 1167, when he was thirty-seven. The final phrase comes from the biography of Liu Xiang in the Han shu: "That which throws eyes and ears into confusion and shakes one's mind and intent is more than can be recorded, 《 漢 書 • 楚 元 王 傳 》 「 所 以 營 或 耳 目 , 感 移 心 意 ’ 不 可 勝 載 � � B aGu, n Han shu 5:36.1941 (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1962).

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詩之作,本非有不善也。而善人之所以深怨而痛絕之者,懼其流� 而生患耳。初亦豈有啓于詩哉。…詩本言志,則宜其宣暢湮憂,� 优柔平中,而其流乃幾至於喪志。群居有輔仁之益’則宜其義精� 理得,動中倫慮’而猶或不免於流。況乎離群索居之後,事物之� 變無窮,幾微之間,毫忽之際,其可以營惑耳目,感移心意者,� 又將何以御之哉。� Writing poetry tempts one to submit to the claims of the phenomenal realm, which for Zhu Xi are illusory and reflect a failure of self-control and a misunderstanding of meaning.108 Later thinkers and writers had to confront Zhu Xi's distrust of intuitions of meaning in the phenomenal realm. Not just the status of poetry was at stake here, but also the possibility of intuiting moral patterns underlying action in the world of experience beyond the secure order of the sage texts.

108. M y examination of Zhu Xi's poetics necessarily is focused on the problem of the status of the representation of the phenomenal realm. It leaves aside much of Zhu Xi's writings on poetry, which warrant fuller treatment elsewhere. Interested readers should turn to Richard Lynn's article or to the large Chinese bibliography discussed above in note 64.

CHAPTER

EIGHT

Changing Course: The Discourse of the Way in Mid-Southern Song China

hen Zhu Xi died in 1200,Daoxue was under proscription as a heterodox, self-promoting movement. Forty-one years later, the interpretations in his Four Books had become the norm for the examination system, and his tablet was placed in the Confucian temple as an acknowledgement of his status as a true inheritor and transmitter of the Confucian tradition. In the intervening years, significant strata within literati society increasingly drew from his political and moral stances and from his writings the means to address their own pressing concerns. This process of interpretation, adaptation, and appropriation was complex and part of the very active conversations facilitated by a growing system of academies, by an active publishing industry, and by a large population of literati on the periphery of official culture who sought ways to understand their own moral authority outside the claims of dynastic service. Zhu Xi's was not the only strong and compelling voice in these conversations, and those who spoke for him found that they needed to address other contending explanations for the basis of literati identity and authority. Extending over forty years, these conversations~the discourse of the Way~significantly recast and contextualized Zhu Xi's positions in ways that made them amenable to the examination culture Zhu Xi himself had resisted, and to aesthetic engagement with the phenomenal realm. Over several generations of debates, the assimilation of literary experience into the Daoxue matrix of beliefs and values changed both

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literature and Daoxue. Literary practice gave adherents of Daoxue a way to link the particulars of experience to Daoxue,s grand but largely abstract and inaccessible categories of coherence. Conversely, accepting the sources of meaning presented by the Learning of the Way legitimated the literary anew as part of the emerging cultural order. This chapter reconstructs parts of the discourse of the Way that reshaped both Daoxue and literary experience. It begins by presenting other important voices within the Daoxue movement in Zhu Xi's own day and then moves beyond Daoxue circles to consider the Yongjia scholars of the period who strongly asserted the philosophical value of historical scholarship and warned against the dangers of Zhu Xi's abstraction and alienation from the claims of phenomenal experience. The chapter concludes by examining how Zhen Dexiu and Wei Liaoweng�魏了翁(1178-1237)—key figures in asserting Daoxue claims of moral and political authority in the 1220s and 1230s~reframed Zhu Xi's positions to address the Yongjia critique.

Daoxue Voices in the Late Twelfth Century Among those in his generation, Zhu Xi, although ultimately the most famous, was not the only prominent advocate of the Learning of the Way. Other writers, especially Zhang Shi and Lii Zuqian�呂祖� 謙(1137-81), participated in defining Daoxue through their active discussions with Zhu Xi and within the larger elite community, and their voices remained important in shaping the discourse of the Way for succeeding generations. Zhang and Lii were perhaps closest to Zhu Xi in formulating the core of the Learning of the Way, although their views differed in significant ways. These differences, particularly on ontological and epistemological issues, introduced new stances~new positions in the Bourdieusian cultural field~into debates about the claims for experience in the phenomenal realm. As later adopted by Zhen Dexiu and Wei Liaoweng, these new positions came to dominate elite discourse and shaped a new understanding of the role of the literary that provided a place for poetry. ZHANG SHI AND THE IMMANENCE OF MEANING IN THE PHENOMENAL REALM

Zhang Shi's status as the son of the stalwart, long-exiled revanchist general Zhang Jun surely gave him a certain moral authority, but his

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own earnestness, effective writings, and clarity of approach earned him prominence as a Daoxue advocate. The many letters between him and Zhu Xi reveal the importance of his role in challenging and sharpening Zhu Xi's arguments. Zhang's letters to Zhu Xi and other contemporaries show many shared commitments but also spoke with a distinctive voice as he set out key differences. One difference appears at first to be just a minor shift in interpreting Zhou Dunyi's “Great Ultimate." On closer inspection, however, this shift reflects a quite different view of the status of objects and events in the world "below form.” In a letter to Wu Huishu, for example, Zhang writes: I errantly believe that the Great Ultimate is that which gives form to the wondrousness of the Nature. The Nature cannot but move, and the Great Ultimate is that by which to clarify the gathering of movement and stillness. "Ultimate" has the meaning of "the pole star." The sage in the Canon of Changes especially used the two-word name to show people the basis. The meaning was subtle. If one just said "Nature" and not "Great Ultimate," then one would only acknowledge the state before manifestation and not see its use. In saying “Great Ultimate," then all the wonder of the Nature can be seen. Structure (ti) and function flow from one source; the manifest and the subtle are without division: is this not the gathering in of the Great Ultimate? 1

某妄意以爲太極所以形性之妙也,性不能不動,太極所以明動靜� 之蕴也。極乃樞極之義,聖人於《易》特名太極二字,蓋示人以� 根柢,其義微矣。若只曰性而不曰太極,則只去未發上認之,不� 見功用,曰太極則性之妙都見矣。體用一源,顯微無間,其太極� 之蕴歟!� Although Zhu Xi at least in theory acknowledged the unity of structure and function in the phenomenal realm through the embodiment of principle within qi, Zhang Shi strongly depicted the immanence of the Great Ultimate as the deep substructure within the world of particular objects and events. He writes to Zhu Xi about “humaneness,,in similar language:

1. Zhang Shi, "Answering Wu Huishu"《答吴晦叔》#1,QS阶255.5723.52-53. "Gathering in” (yun�蕴)points to a collecting together for use. It shares qualities with “coalescing” (tting�凝)and "having in readiness” (bei�備)•

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N o w that by w h i c h [we] are o f one structure [ti] w i t h H e a v e n and Earth, that w i t h i n w h i c h the mind o f H e a v e n and Earth persists is the gathering in o f the bringing forth o f life: w e and all objects alike possess it, and it is the principle o f concern [ai]. T h u s i f one explores its roots, [one finds that] before manifestation, the principle o f c o n cern persists in the Nature. T h i s is

thcform o f humaneness. 2

Examin-

ing its m o v e m e n t at the verge o f manifestation, w h e n concern is applied to objects, this then is the

functioning

of

humaneness.

Structure and function flow f r o m one source, and inside and outside are consistent: this is that through w h i c h humaneness is wondrous. 3 [my emphasis] 夫 其 所 以 與 天 地 一 體 者 , 以 夫 天 地 之 心 之 所 存 , 是 乃 生 生 之 蕴 ,� 人 與 物 所 公 共 , 所 謂 愛 之 理 者 也 。 故 探 其 本 則 未 發 之 前 ’ 愛 之 理� 存 乎 性 , 是 乃 仁 之 體 者 也 。 察 其 動 則 已 發 之 際 , 愛 之 施 被 乎 物 ,� 是 乃 仁 之 用 者 也 。 體 用 一 源 , 內 外 一 致 , 此 仁 之 所 以 爲 _ 。� O n c e a g a i n Z h a n g stresses a t r a n s c e n d e n t q u a l i t y s h a r e d b y h u m a n s a n d all p h e n o m e n a ~ i n d e e d , l i n k i n g t h e h u m a n w i t h all p h e n o m e n a ~ a n d points to a single source that binds together the i n n e r self and the exterior world. T h e " w o n d r o u s " character o f the Great U l t i m a t e and o f h u m a n e n e s s points to a quality that can b e intuited b u t t h a t e s c a p e s c o n c e p t u a l grasp. 4 Z h a n g Shi explicitly discusses mistaken apprehensions about the metaphysical emptiness o f the p h e n o m e n a l realm in his c o m m e n t s o n the Great Ultimate:

2. “Structure,,(ti�體)is a coherent articulated form. Most studies in English translate the term as "substance" when it is used as a pair with “function” (yong�用),� but this rendering does not convey the ordered nature implicit in the term. For a discussion of the ti/yong pair in Daoxue discourse, see Wing-tsit Chan, "Substance and Function," in Chu Hsi: New Studies (Honolulu: University of Hawai'i Press, 1989), pp. 222-34. "Concern" (ai�愛)usually is translated as “love’” which certainly is part of the term's range, but it has a somewhat broader meaning than what we associate with “love” in English. For an extended discussion of the debates with Zhang Shi on the nature of humaneness,see Wing-tsit Chan, "Chu Hsi's ‘Jen-shuo,� (Treatise on Humanity)," in Chu Hsi: New Studies, pp. 151-83. 3. Zhang Shi, "Answering Zhu Yuanhui [Xi] of the Palace Library”《答朱元晦� 秘書》#9,QS阶2 5 5 .5724.67. 4. The ambivalence about the “wondrous” (miao�妙)that Zhu Xi reveals in the Zhu Zi yulei, for example, consistently derives from the epistemological opaqueness that he finds both in “wondrous” objects and in discourses that stress the “wondrous” qualities of the Way.

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The explanation of the Gentleman of Yichuan clarified the overall structure [ti] of the Nature, which is all-pervading. “The Heavenly allotment [ming] is called Nature," and "great indeed is the origin of Qiann: this is “the beginning of the support for people and things.”5 "Following the Nature is called the Way”: in people, it is the Nature of people, in things it is the Nature of things; and when each has rectified its Nature and allotment without fail, this is the Way.6 Although the portion of qi in things is partial, the basic structure of their Nature is without partiality. Observing the things under Heaven, looking within their material shape, how has their principle of life [shengli] proved insufficient by even a hair...? When someone says that only people possess the Heavenly allotment, and things do not share this, he knows just that things' portion of qi is partial but does not know that the basic structure of their Nature from the beginning is without partiality; he knows that the Great Ultimate possesses unity but does not know that each thing has the Great Ultimate within. Thus when the Way and particular things are divided and there are no categorical connections among the myriad phenomena between Heaven and Earth, this damages the structure of humaneness. Can this be called knowing the Great Ultimate? One cannot but inspect this.7 伊 川 先 生 之 說 , 蓋 明 性 之 統 體 , 無 乎 不 在 也 。 「 天 命 之 謂 性 」� 者 , 「 大 哉 乾 元 」 , 人 與 物 所 資 始 也 。 「 率 性 之 謂 道 」 者 , 在 人� 爲 人 之 性 , 在 物 爲 物 之 性 , 各 正 性 命 而 不 失 , 所 謂 道 也 。 蓋 物 之� 氣 禀 雖 有 偏 , 而 性 之 本 體 則 無 偏 也 。 觀 天 下 之 物 , 就 其 形 氣 中 ,� 其 生 理 何 嘗 有 一 毫 不 足 者 乎 。 … 或 曰 天 命 獨 人 有 之 , 而 物 不 與� 焉 。 爲 是 說 者 ’ 但 知 萬 物 氣 禀 之 有 偏 , 而 不 知 天 性 之 初 無 偏 也 ,� 知 太 極 之 有 一 , 而 不 知 物 物 各 具 太 極 也 。 故 道 與 器 離 析 , 而 天 地� 萬物不相管屬,有害謝二體矣’謂之識施可乎°不聊察也° Z h a n g Shi strongly asserts the a priori connection between all phenomena and the perfection within all phenomena, despite the particularity (and therefore incompleteness) o f their manifest forms. T h i s affirmation o f the status o f phenomena broadens Z h a n g Shi's approach to learning and makes him distrust a narrow focus on interiority: 5. The first quote is from the Mean, while the second two are from the “Tuan” commentary to Qian, the first hexagram in the Canon of Changes. 6. "Following the Nature is called the Way" is the next line in the Mean after "the Heavenly allotment is called Nature.” 7. "Answering Hu Bofeng [Dayuan]"《答胡伯逢》,QSW 255.5730.195.

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The gentlemen from Henan of our dynasty [i.e., the Cheng brothers] began to reveal fathoming of principle and residing in reverent attention as the method for those who sought to learn, and gave [learners] an object to seek in order to enter the Way of Yao and Shun. At this point, the transmission of the Learning of the Way again became clear after a thousand years. However, in recent years, learners again have lost [the Chengs'] intent and say, “I seek just knowledge” and ignore personal practice. Thus what they know comes from their own subjective surmises and is without personal applicability; those who understand worry about this. This is because the learners do not know that attaining knowledge and expending effort in application clarify one another.8 本 朝 河 南 君 子 始 以 窮 理 居 敬 之 方 開 示 學 者 , 使 之 有 所 循 求 , 以 入� 堯 舜 之 道 。 於 是 道 學 之 傳 , 復 明 於 千 載 之 下 。 然 近 歲 以 來 , 學 者� 又 失 其 旨 , 曰 吾 惟 求 所 謂 知 而 已 , 而 於 躬 行 則 忽 焉 。 故 其 所 知 特� 出 於 臆 度 之 見 , 而 無 以 有 諸 其 躬 , 識 者 蓋 憂 之 。 此 特 未 知 致 知 力� 行 互 相 發 之 故 也 。� Z h a n g argues that application does not simply f o l l o w but also produces k n o w l e d g e in a manner that Z h u X i w o u l d not have allowed. 9 Based o n the dispersion o f the Great Ultimate throughout the processes o f the phenomenal realm, Z h a n g goes even further in arguing about the nature o f h u m a n duties as the locus o f self-realization. In a commemorative essay o n the f o u n d i n g o f a school, for example, Z h a n g Shi tells students to take a broad v i e w o f learning: I have wondered why in fact men of old worked at learning. Heaven, in giving birth to our people, endowed us with a constant Nature. People in taking their place between Heaven and Earth have constant tasks. For our selves, we have tasks of the self; in the clan, we have tasks of the clan; in a state, we have tasks of the state. These tasks are not something people could create; they are inherent in the Nature. If one does not prevail in a task, then one negates having that Nature. If one negates having that Nature, then one cannot resemble Heaven. Being able to preserve the Nature and not rebel against these tasks is how one follows Heaven. If this is so, then if one forgoes discussions 8. "Preface to Explanations of the Amlectsn《論語說序》,QSP^ 255.5733.255. 9. Zhang explains in a letter that “as one exerts oneself more in enactment, one's knowledge advances, and as one's knowledge deepens, one's actions are more effective.”「行之力則知愈進,知之深則行愈達」From "Answering Lu Zishou [Jmling]”《答陸子壽》,QS所255.153-5小�

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355

of learning, how can one [preserve the Nature]? All the tasks under Heaven are what people should perform: between ruler and minister, father and son, brother and brother, husband and wife, friend and friend一these present the major tasks. But as for seeing and hearing, moving, eating and breathing~even at their most trivial, which of these is still not a task?10 In not penetrating one task, the Heavenly Nature becomes trapped. Thus how can one not be anxiously diligent about discussing learning? One learns in order to clarify the myriad affairs and uphold the Heavenly duty.11 某 惟 古 人 所 以 從 事 於 學 者 其 果 何 所 爲 而 然 哉 。 天 之 生 斯 人 也 , 則� 有 常 性 。 人 之 立 於 天 地 之 間 也 , 則 有 常 事 。 在 身 有 一 身 之 事 , 在� 家 有 一 家 之 事 , 在 國 有 一 國 之 事 。 其 事 也 , 非 人 之 所 能 爲 也 , 性� 之 所 有 也 。 弗 勝 其 事 則 爲 弗 有 其 性 , 弗 有 其 性 則 爲 弗 克 若 天 矣 。� 克 保 其 性 而 不 悖 其 事 , 所 以 順 乎 天 也 。 然 則 捨 講 學 其 能 之 哉 。 凡� 天 下 之 事 皆 人 之 所 當 爲 , 君 臣 、 父 子 、 兄 弟 、 夫 婦 、 朋 友 之 際 ,� 人 事 之 大 者 也 , 以 至 於 視 聽 言 動 、 周 旋 食 息 , 至 纖 至 悉 , 何 莫 非� 事 者 。 一 事 之 不 貫 , 則 天 性 以 之 陷 溺 也 。 然 則 講 學 其 可 不 汲 汲� 乎。學所以明萬事而奉天職也O Learning for Z h a n g Shi certainly includes the lecturing and discussions o f the classroom, but it also includes all possible actions, no matter h o w small, that are worthy o f human concern. T h e r e is something w o n d r o u s 一 n o t fully fathomable一about this process: In the midst of daily application, what one meets in events, encounters in objects, arises in thoughts, as well as in reading books and examining the ancient, if one knows wherein to use effort,then everything is part of the wondrousness of my "investigating things.”12 曰 用 之 間 , 事 之 所 遇 , 物 之 所 觸 , 思 之 所 起 , 以 至 於 讀 書 考 古 ,� 苟知所用力’貝!1莫非吾格物之_ O

10. “Moving”� 周旋 is more literally "turning in circles,” which may refer specifically to social activity. 11. "Heavenly duty" comes from Xun Zi, but it is not clear whether the arguments Xun Zi invokes in using the term are relevant here. Zhang Shi, "Account oftheJingjiangPrefectural School”《静江府學記》,QS阶255.5739.354-55. 12. "Investigating things” comes from the "Great Learning”: "Investigating things is to extend knowledge." Zhang Shi, "Answering Lu Zishou [Jiuling]” 《答陸子壽》,QS^255.153-54.

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For Zhang Shi the phenomenal realm is alive with Heaven-granted meaning that enters human awareness through the wondrous process of learning. It is in the "investigation of things," then, that one cultivates intuitions about the larger coherence found within the particulars of experience. Art, the willed construction of surface patterns in language or any other medium, has nothing to do with this process of learning. Zhang Shi had little to say about literature and even less that was good. He wrote to Zhu Xi complaining about an anthology of literary texts that Lii Zuqian had compiled: He loves to exhaust his spirit on idle texts and is pointlessly diminishing himself: what is the gain? Like his compiling the “Ocean of Literature": how does it help in regulating the Way; how does it help those coming to learning? It just causes one to vex the spirit in flipping the pages and is to be lamented.13

渠愛敝精神於閑文字中,徒自揖,何益。如編《文海》,何補於� 治道。何補於後學。徒使精力困於翻閱’亦可憐耳。� Even when Zhang praises writings, it is for their not being merely literary. In his preface to the collected works of the important Daoxue scholar Hu Hong�胡宏(1106-62), Zhang writes: In recent years the Gentleman's oldest son Dashi again compiled the Gentleman's prose and poetry into a collection of five juan, which he showed me. I read and reread it. The Gentleman was not one who had the intention to compose. What he expressed in the chanting and singing of a moment was in order to express his Nature and feelings. His other writings, answers to questions and letters sent back and forth, all were to illuminate the meanings of the Way and to verify sameness and difference [in debates] and were not like the works of those writers of this age who pointlessly labor just at wording. 14

近歲先生季子大時復裒輯先生所爲詩文之屬凡五卷,以示某。某� 反復而讀之’惟先生非有意於爲文者也,其一時詠歌之所發,蓋� 所以舒寫其性情’而其他述作與夫答問往來之書,又皆所以明道� 義而參異同,非若世之爲文者徒從事於言語之間而已也。�

13. Zhang Shi, “Answering Zhu Yuanhui [Xi]”《答朱元晦》#41,QSW 2555726.122. 14. Zhang Shi, "Preface to the Wufengjin《五峰集序》,QS^F 255.5734.262.

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Zhang Shi shared Zhu Xi's views of the literary. In the end, what mattered in shaping the later writers' understanding of the nature of literary experience, however, were not Zhang's explicit discussions of wen but his arguments about action in the world. These introduced important new formulations for grounding and engaging the meaningfulness of the particularity of experience. L u ZUQIAN, THE ACCOMMODATING TEACHER

Hoyt Tillman observes that while Zhu Xi may have had forty-nine students during the period 1167-81 (the year of Lii Zuqian's death), Lii “had as many as 300 at one time.”15 Lii played a vital role in shaping the presence of Daoxue in the elite discourse of the late twelfth century. He did so through his social and cultural prestige as well as through a breadth of sensibility~largely unencumbered by speculative impulses—that was still committed to the Learning of the Way.16 Later generations called Zhu Xi, Zhang Shi, and Lii Zuqian the “three worthies of the southeast” to reflect their centrality to the Daoxue movement of their time. However, while Lii Zuqian accepted the terms through which Zhu Xi and Zhang Shi discussed Daoxue, his understanding of it was far broader, and they objected to his less rigorous standards.17 Lu Zuqian helped in the publishing of Zhang 15. Tillman, Conjucian Discourse and Chu Hs^s Ascendency, p. 92. "Three hundred" is perhaps a conventional number for “many” here. 16. Lii Benzhong was Lii Zuqian's great-uncle, and his grandfather Lii Pengzhong�呂彌中(d. 1146) and father Lii Daqi�呂大器(d. 1172) had been important court officials. Although he began official service through yin privilege granted on his grandfather's retirement, in 1163 he passed the highly prestigious "Erudite Literatus"(博學鴻言司)examination, after which he served in a series of posts in the capital, punctuated by periods of mourning. Throughout his career, Lii Zuqian was very active in writing and teaching, and he associated not only with Zhu Xi and Zhang Shi but also with the most important political figures of the period like Zhou Fuliang of Yongjia, Chen Liang, and Lu Jiuyuan. During his final retirement in Jinhua�金華(inWiizhou�娶州)where one branch of the Lii clan had settled after the fall of the north, he continued to teach large numbers of students until his death in 1181. See Tillman's account of Lii's life in Conjucian Discourse, pp. 89-90. 17. The Zhu Zi yulei, for example, devotes juan 122 to discussing Lii Zuqian. Many of the comments criticize his approaches. Also see Zhang Shi's letter to Lii

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Zai's writings and Cheng Yi's commentary on the Canon of Changes and, together with Zhu Xi, compiled Reflections on Things at Hand (近思錄),a topically arranged anthology of the writings of the Northern Song Daoxue advocates. However, at the request of the emperor Xiaozong, he also revised the Mirror ofWritings ofOur Dynasty (皇朝文鑑),a large compilation of exemplary writings from the Northern Song in 150 juan that included works by Su Shi and Wang Anshi.18 Zhang Shi, when he objected to Lii's anthologizing as useless, was aiming at the Mirror of Writing (initially entitled Ocean of Writing until Xiaozong bestowed the more elevated name). More generally, Zhu Xi lamented to Zhang Shi that Lu had lost his way by focusing in his writings and teaching on the mastery of prose suitable for the examinations: He also has been concerned about examination writing for a long time, and he plunged into the swirls of the writings of the Su clan, father and sons, seeking new and crafted [effects] to top new and crafted [effects], damaging the direction of his mind. Thus he has never condemned the learning of the Su clan: he seems to both screen and obstruct, ostensibly pushing aside but covertly aiding [them]. This leaves one unsatisfied.19

渠又留意科舉文字之久,出入蘇氏父子波瀾,新巧之外更求新� 巧’壞了心路,遂一向不以蘇學爲非,左遮右攔,陽擠陰助,此� 尤使人不滿意。� Similarly, Lii Zuqian was said to have authored several books exploring the moral underpinnings of historical process, including the Detailed Explanations ofInstitutions throughout the Ages ( 歷 代 度 詳 説 ) and Extensive Deliberations on Master Zuo (左氏博議). 20 Zhu Xi, that su^ests that Lii in general suffered from a lack of resolve and lured students with the hope of examination success (QSJ^255.5726.126). C h u Ping-tzu (Tradition Building and Cultural Competition, p. 234) proposes that on intellectual grounds Lii should not be considered a core member of the Daoxue group. 18. For a good account of this collection, see D u Haijun�杜海軍,Lii Zuqian wenxue yanjiu�呂祖謙文學研究(Beijing: Xueyuan, 2003), pp. 125-53. 19. “Letter to Zhangjingfu [ S h i ] ” 《 與 張 敬 夫 書 》 , 3 . 3 1 . 1 3 1 1 . 20. Hilde De Weerdt discusses the problems with the attribution of the Detailed Explanation to Lii in Competition over Content,pp. 393-94. She also discusses various writings of Lii's that were important in preparing for the jinshi examination (and Zhu Xi's objections to them) on pp. 141-50.

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who had no love for the Zuo zhuan, advised Lii to focus on more promising material: I once noted that [Lii] Bogong loved to explain the Zuo zhuan to students, and I warned him, "You do not explain the many principles in the Analects, Mencius, and the six canons, and just limit yourself to this. Even if there are a few scattered principles there, in handling what affairs do they apply?”21

某向嘗見呂伯恭愛與學者說左傳,某嘗戒之曰,『語孟六經許多� 道理不說’恰限說這箇。縱那上有些零碎道理,濟得甚事。』� In retrospect Quan Zuwang in the Song Yuan xue'an describes Lii as defining a third school within Daoxue, distinct from Zhu Xi's "Learning of the Nature" (xingxue�性學)and Lujiuyuan's "Learning of the Mind" (xinxue�心學)• At the time of Lii Zuqian's death, however, the disagreements between Lii and Zhu, although significant, did not seem to have occasioned a rupture. They both were strong advocates of the Learning of the Way, even if what each meant by the term differed. The writings preserved in Lii Zuqian's literary collection show that he largely accepted the terms of Zhu Xi's account of principle, Nature, the mind, and human desire. In a letter to Chen Fuliang, for example, Lii warns: If even the smallest root of selfish desire is overlooked and not removed, then on a later day,encountering an object or event will aid its expression and growth, and it will spread and be impossible to cut off. The harm will not be limited to one's own person. One must examine [oneself] with care for the substance of the matter, and it is good only after one has not allowed a single hair to remain.22

私意之根若尙有眇忽未去,異日遇事接物,助發滋養,便張皇不� 可剪截,其害非特一身也。要須著實省察,令毫髮不留乃善。� Still, Lii remains pragmatic about the value of vigilance in introspection: Only when one becomes aware of harsh anger does one need to find calm. Only when one becomes aware of stagnation does one need to open out. When sickness arrives, one takes medicine: there is no need 21. Zhu Xi yulei 8.121.2938. 22. "Letter to Chen Junju"《與陳君舉書》#5,QS所26!.5875.148.

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to plan beforehand. Cultivating moral principles is the basic way to complete the nurturing of one's thoughts. Because one fears that old ailments easily return, one goes from cultivating to self-examination and from self-examination to a seizing upon the self, which on occasion becomes a burden.23 覺 有 忿 戻 , 始 須 銷 平 , 覺 有 凝 滯 , 始 須 開 豁 。 病 至 則 服 藥 ’ 不 必� 預 安 排 也 。 涵 泳 義 理 , 本 所 以 完 養 思 慮 。 政 恐 舊 疾 易 作 , 自 涵 泳� 而 入 於 硏 索 , 自 硏 索 而 入 於 執 著 , 或 反 爲 累 耳 。� Lii Zuqian's writings do not show the speculative turn and enthusiasm for theoretical discussion seen in Z h u Xi's and Z h a n g Shi's collections. Even w h e n he defends the abstract arguments about metaphysics that begin Reflections on Things at Hand,

he concludes

with a word o f caution about empty theorizing: When the Reflections on Things at Hand was completed, some doubted that the first chapter on yin-yang, transformation, Nature, and mandate were, on the whole, matters [appropriate] for those just beginning to learn. I once addressed the intention behind the ordering: for those who come after and are late in advancing, although it will not do to speak too quickly concerning the origin of moral principles, if they are uncertain and do not know the general framework, then what basis will they have [for learning]? Setting [the framework] out at the beginning is particularly to introduce them to the names and meanings so that they will have an overview. As to the approach of the explanations in the remaining chapters, [addressing] the substance of daily use and personal practice, each has its category, and one follows it in progressing from the lowly to the lofty, from the near to the far, so that thereby one does not lose the intent of the compilation. If one wearies of the lowly and the near and leaps to the lofty and far, overstepping the gradations, one will drift into vacuity and reach a point where there is nothing to hold onto: how could this be "reflection on things at hand?” Those who peruse should have a detailed understanding of this.24 《近思錄》既成,或疑首卷陰陽變化性命之說,大氐非始學者之� 事 。 某 竊 嘗 與 聞 次 輯 之 意 , 後 出 晚 進 , 於 義 理 之 本 原 , 雖 未 容 驟� 語 , 苟 茫 然 不 識 其 梗 槪 ’ 則 亦 何 所 底 止 。 列 之 篇 端 , 特 使 之 知 其� 名 義 , 有 所 嚮 望 而 已 。 至 於 餘 卷 所 載 講 學 之 方 , 日 用 躬 行 之 實 ,� 23. "Letter Answering Pan Shudu

[Jingxian]"《答潘叔度書》#1,

261.5877-174. 24. "Inscribed on theJin si lun《題近思錄》,QSI^ 261.5882.273.

QSW

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具有科級,循是而進,自卑升高,自近及速,庶幾不失纂集之� 指。若乃厭卑近而騖高遠,躐等凌節,流於空虛,迄無所依據,� 則豈所謂近思者耶。覽者宜詳之。� Lii Zuqian's argument is not about the greatness of the theoretical framework itself but simply that students need a framework upon which to hang what they learn as they progress. He stresses the importance of orderly pedagogy, particularly when dealing with difficult topics; he keeps his audience and purpose firmly in mind here and shapes his text to those ends. He makes the claims of a teacher, not a theorist. Lii, using his social and official status and paying attention to the power of teaching, publishing, and training for the examination system, reached out to the early Southern Song elite, supported the rise of Daoxue advocates and sympathizers within the bureaucracy,� and helped expand the discourse of the Way in a manner that is easily overlooked if one focuses entirely on theoretical contributions. The 1170s was a period of development, lively discussion, and ferment rather than consolidation. As Lii Zuqian's letters show, the debates— mediated in part by Lii himself~reached beyond the immediate circle centered on Zhu Xi. The most famous example of Lii's role as intermediary in widening the discussion is his effort in 1175 to bring Zhu Xi and Lu Jiuyuan together at the Goose Lake Monastery to debate issues concerning mind, Nature, learning, and practice.25 Later Daoxue proponents looked back to the discussions both within the Daoxue community and in the larger bureaucratic elite during this period with the sense that this was an era of innovation that had been irrevocably lost.

The Wider Discourse of the Way Bourdieu saw systems for creating and circulating cultural capital to maintain and reproduce social status as having a structural logic, and he articulated this logic through the idea of fields of cultural production. During the Southern Song, elite social action—examination 25. Tillman stresses Lii Zuqian's leadership in this event and in the discourse of the Way more generally up to his death in 1181. See Tillman, Confucian Discourse, pp. 105-6 and 202-3.

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preparation, publication, official service, local charity, etc.~formed a large field with a wide dispersion of possible positions for the creation of the cultural capital used to define elite status. However, the particular forms of elite action within this overarching system of circulation functioned as interrelated subfields of cultural production. Hilde de Weerdt argues that examination culture was one such relatively autonomous if still interconnected subfield.26 It was relatively autonomous because the specificity of the forms of examination materials shaped the strategies for participation in the field. When Daoxue writings entered into the field of examination culture, they were transformed, cast by publishers into the familiar genres of commentaries, digests, and other compilations useful for students. Another subfield took the broader topics of learning, knowledge, and action as its focus: this was the discourse of the Way. Throughout the late twelfth century, all the writers whom we now deem the major intellectual figures of the day knew one another, wrote to one another, often criticized and belittled one another. They were not all Daoxue scholars, but they shared a common vocabulary of terms一� even if they strongly disagreed with each other about the meaning of those terms—and they examined the same range of questions and shared a commitment to moral self-cultivation as the basis for literati identity and authority. The field of examination culture interacted significantly with this discourse of the Way, which focused on learning as the means of self-cultivation. Indeed, the two subfields had largely fused by the middle of the thirteenth century, when Daoxue texts had become the center of the examination and the distinction between private academies and public schools had eroded. Zhu Xi's “ascendancy,,usually is indexed by the acts at court that granted his texts ever more complete authority in the examination: in 1212, the court decided to use Zhu Xi's commentaries on tht Analects and Mencius, and in 1227,� it added Zhu Xi's commentaries to the "Great Learning" and the Mean. In 1241, tablets for the major Northern and Southern Song Daoxue scholars were brought into the Confucian temple, and the court decreed that these Daoxue exemplars were to be honored at the Imperial University and all official schools. However, the court's 26. Hilde De Weerdt, Competition over Content, p. 16.

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honoring Daoxue in this manner stemmed not from an act of leadership in defining the field of cultural production but from its recognition that the Learning of the Way had come to dominate the larger literati discourse outside the capital. How this happened and what this “dominance,,entailed remain objects of investigation in social and intellectual history, but literati clearly found that the approaches to learning, action, and identity in the writings of Zhu Xi, Zhang Shi, and Lii Zuqian addressed the needs of non-cosmopolitan elites in defining their roles both at the local level and in relation to the court. Between the 1170s and 1240,the evolution of the discourse of the Way as a field of cultural production shows traces of the negotiations and transformations of positions needed to allow Daoxue to serve both as the center of examination learning and as a guide to moral authority at court and in the community. The hermeneutic problem of how to grasp the meaning of events and objects in their specificity, though seemingly abstract, is at the heart of this reshaping of Daoxue. In governance, decisions require judgment not of general principles but of how to situate particular circumstances within general principles, and the examination system needed to assess both the candidates' aptitude for judgment and their ability to defend those judgments through cogent analysis of the particular facts. This problem of grasping meaning in the details of events was equally central to activity at the local level, where the challenge was to bring the routines of daily life within the coherence of a moral order envisioned in the abstract through terms like "principle," "Nature," and the "Way, The thirteenth-century reshaping of Daoxue ontology and epistemology that allowed the development of a hermeneutics of the particular, however, also created a new space for the art of poetry, with its intuitions of order within the flux of encounter. As reconceived within the evolving discourse of the Way,the order underlying the intuitions of poetry was in the moral terms ofDaoxue discourse, but as poetic practice could demonstrate, these terms were indeed alive and immediately accessible in the human encounter with the world. While the details of this reimagining of poetry will be the topic of the final two chapters of the book, the concluding section of this chapter explores the larger recasting of experience. It considers the

Changing Course 364 dispersion of positions within the discourse of the Way that were related to the meaning inhering in objects and events encountered in the world. It traces how positions that contrasted strikingly with Zhu Xi were formulated and how successive restatements by key thinkers—Xue Jixuan�薛季宣(1134-73),Chen Fuliang, Ye Shi, Wei Liaoweng, and Zhen Dexiu~responded to opposing positions and to the needs of the overarching elite discourse of meaning. As the field evolved, Daoxue developed positions that effectively responded to its critics, while those who were chary of abstraction confronted an increasing need to ground their formulations in ontological terms, terms dominated by Daoxue in a way that led to the opposition's steady marginalization. Daoxue, in changing to meet its critics, prevailed.

The Social Context of the Discourse of the Way: The Transformation of the Southern Song Elite In the jinshi examination of 1172’ the year Lii Zuqian had been among the presiding officials and Chen Fuliang and Lu Jiuyuan passed, 389 candidates in total graduated.27 Assuming the ratio was set at l in 17,then approximately 6’6oo candidates participated.28 However, the real challenge in the Southern Song examination system was not the departmental or palace examination in the capital, but the qualifying examination held in the prefectures. There, the ratio was around l in 100. Even if one third of the candidates sitting for the departmental examination arrived there through

27. Nineteen percent of those who later were banned from official life in the suppression of Daoxue as "false learning” passed this jinshi examination. See Tillman, Confucian Discourse, p. 38. Lii Zuqian initially was one of the subordinate officials in the examination, but he had to withdraw before the final stages of the examination were completed when he received news that his father was gravely ill and hastened home to learn that he already had died. See Pan Fuen�潘 富 恩 and Xu Yuqing�徐余� 慶,Lii Zuqian pingzhuan�呂祖謙評傳(Nanjing: Nanjing University Press, 1992), pp. 26-27. For material related to the examination of 1172’ see Fu Xuanzong fl璇琮,GongYanming�龔延明,and Zu Hui�祖慧,eds.,SongDengkeji kao�宋登科記� 考(Nanjing: Jiangsu jiaoyu chubanshe, 2009),pp. 970-72. 28. The ratio comes from Chafee, Thorny Gates ofLearning,p. 106.

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alternative routes, this still would suggest that at least 400,000 men attempted the prefectural examinations in 1171.29 This vast pool of students preparing for the examinations constituted the largest market and most visible audience for a thriving network of commercial printers. Such students had a seemingly limitless thirst for materials that might give them an edge in the increasingly competitive examination: commentaries, anthologies, and digests of all the relevant texts, as well as cheap editions written in miniscule print that had the additional advantage of being small enough to smuggle into the examination hall.30 After Chen Fuliang passed the examination, commercial printers published his examination essays and had a huge market in the several hundred thousand students studying to take the next triennial exam. The examination material written by Lii Zuqian also found a broad and enthusiastic readership. Similarly, the essays Ye Shi wrote as he was preparing to take the departmental examination became very popular after he passed in 1178. The demand of students preparing for the examination also provided employment for teachers in government schools and in the private academies that flourished in the late twelfth and thirteenth centuries. The market-driven energy of commercial printers, fostered by the examination subculture, greatly increased the speed and reach of the circulation of discussions conducted in writing within elite 29. Chen Fuliang, for example, qualified for the departmental examination via an examination given in the Imperial University, where the passing rate was 20-25 percent. See Chafee, Thorny Gates ofLearning, p. 103. This was much better than the rate back in Wenzhou, where 8,000 candidates competed for seventeen positions in 1178. See Zhou Mengjiang�周夢江,Ye Shi yu Yongjia xuepai� 葉 適 i l 永 嘉 學 派� (Hangzhou: Zhejiang guji chubanshe, 2005),p. 161. Because qualification through the Imperial University was so much more promising than through the prefectural examination, the number of men attending the entrance examination for the university grew from 16,000 in 1175 to 28,000 in 1196 and reached 37,000 in 1202. See Chafee, p. 104. However, there also were other routes circumventing the prefectural examination. Zhou Bida, for example, helped Ye Shi (js 1178) enroll in an avoidance examination offered to relatives and associates of officials. For an explanation of this practice, see Chafee, Thorny Gates ofLearning, p. 101. 30. We are fortunate to have the work of Lucille Chia, Printing for Profit: the Commercial Publishers of Jianyang, Fujian (llth-ljth

Centuries), ( C a m b r i d g e : Harvard

University Asia Center, 2002). In particular, see pp. 118-19.

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culture, and the views and scholarship of men like Lii Zuqian, Chen Fuliang, and Ye Shi were quickly and widely disseminated. Thus, while Z h u Xi and Zhang Shi wrote letters to one another that circulated within the community of Daoxue advocates, all around them swirled a much larger world of debate with a broader focus on issues of statecraft, writing, history, and poetry that were part of—but also looked beyond~pragmatic strategies for getting ahead in the world associated with the examination system. As the competition in the examinations increased and the chance of attaining official status grew correspondingly remote for most participants, the ever-longer odds engendered new tensions and new questions within the larger literati discourse. Groups within elite culture began with renewed earnestness to explore modes of selfdefinition separate from service in office.31 These groups provided a growing audience for countervailing discourses focusing on moral values and moral authority that did not so much replace as complement elite concerns about participating in examination culture. While the pressure of decreasing odds of examination success provided an element of necessity in the growing discussions exploring literati self-understanding, a confluence of larger trends also contributed to the urgency of the topic and broadened participation in this search for a new self-definition. Earlier generations of prominent cultural figures already had confronted the task of shaping an identity outside of service to the state when they were driven from office in the political upheavals of the late Northern and early Southern Song, and their models provided some guidance. Men like Lu You saw themselves as inheritors of the oppositional stance of the victims of the Yuanyou proscription. Similarly, those who witnessed or were victims of the suppression of dissent under Qin Gui presented themselves as moral agents whose authority derived from 31. See, for example, Brian McKnight's discussion in “Chu Hsi and His World” in ^ n g - t s i t Chan, ed” Chu Hsi and Neo-Conjucianism, p. 418. John W. Chafee echoes this theme in “Chu Hsi in Nan-ICang: Tao-hsueh and the Politics ofEducation” in Wm. Theodore de Bary and John W Chafee, eds., Neo-Confucian Education: The Formative Years (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1989), p. 427. Robert R Hymes looks at responses to the tensions of examination culture among the Fuzhou elite in Statesmen and Gentlemen, pp. 29-34.

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sources outside the state. The teachings of the Cheng brothers persisted in this initial oppositional milieu in particular, since they offered theoretical underpinnings for a principled independence. Scholars like Zhu Xi and Zhang Shi also appealed to those who sought solid justification for their opposition to the state policies of their day. However, in addition to forces from the center (examinations and opposition), shifts in the countryside shaped the concerns and needs of those who turned to the discourse of the Way. As the Southern Song state withdrew from an active role in such key local issues as famine relief and water control, the elites took these responsibilities on themselves.32 What, however, was the nature of their authority to act? What responsibilities could not be shirked? What sorts of institutions should organize collective action?33 These questions gave particular shape to debates about a literati identity to be developed in relation to the culture and the society rather than in relation to the state. Zhu Xi and Zhang Shi, as advocates of the Learning of the Way, spoke to these concerns, but they were not the only, or even the major, participants, for while finding a metaphysical basis for action was important, the local elites also looked to history and to received practices and institutions for ways to understand the concrete particulars of experience as they encountered it.

The Yongjia Scholars: XueJixuan, Chen Fuliang,Ye Shi, and the Claims of Empirical Knowledge Yongjia was the prefectural seat of Wenzhou,a wealthy and cultured center of manufacturing and trade in what is now southern Zhejiang province. In the early Southern Song, Wenzhou produced so many 32. Hymes in Statesmen and Gentlemen examines the evidence for such a shift at the local level and, though cautious in stating his conclusions, in the end identifies a general trend of local activism that increased in the face of decreasing state intervention. 33. Hymes, for example, discusses Lu Jiuyuan's focus on clan activity in contradistinction to other forms of corporate activity mediating between the clan and the state, such as the community compact and community granary that Z h u Xi proposed. See Robert P Hymes, "Lu Chiu-yiian, Academies, and the Problem of the Local Community’” in de Bary and Chafee, eds., Neo-Confucian Education, PP. 433-56.

368

Changing Course 368

jinshi graduates that in 1156 the ratio of successful candidates for the prefectural examination was 1 in 200.34 Within this general reputation for mastering the type of learning needed to pass the civil service examination, Yongjia acquired a more specific fame for scholarship focused on historical and institutional knowledge. This ,Suzhou Daxue xuebao蘇州大學學報� (哲学社会科学版)2008.4 (July): 75-81. Xia Jing�夏靜 also has written a good general article on Zhen Dexiu, “On Zhen Dexiu's thought about literature”�真德� 秀文學思想论>,Beifang luncong北方論叢2007.2: 28-31. 112. From Zhen Dexiu, "Preface to Chanting Ancient Poemsn《詠古詩序》’ QSW 313.7169.149-50.

CHAPTER

NINE

Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes: Poetry in the Early Thirteenth Century

T

he gradual transformation of poetry and poetics during the first half of the thirteenth century traces a slow shift in Chinese culture. One key aspect of that shift was a change in the organization and dynamics of culture itself: a group of poets—the "Rivers and Lakes" writers~coalesced as a social and cultural network that spanned local and national cultural fields, bringing local concerns and values to the capital and in turn negotiating the accommodation of nationwide shifts at the local level. Poetry, as a field in which the meaning of the self and of action in the world were being rethought as part of the rise of Daoxue, served as a forum for the mutual accommodation of national and local modes of cultural production and elite distinction.

The Southern Song had lost the north China plain to the Jurchen but still encompassed wide regional differences within its large, if truncated, empire. In addition, the culture of the capital and other major urban centers differed from the ways of the rural populace, and, even within particular regions, practices among the various social strata were by no means unified. However, the writers considered in this chapter largely come from the "rivers and lakes," a world away from the trappings and demands of the central court. Their rise to prominence suggests that in the thirteenth century there was a significant substratum of shared elite culture. Although some of these writers were recluses who stayed home throughout their lives, most were peripatetic, always on the move between low-level

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Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes

positions or traveling to enjoy one another's company. While they marveled at new scenery, they always seemed at home with each other, with their local hosts, and with those among the local elites who came to converse with them as visitors from afar. They shared with the larger community and with one another a language of core values and assumptions about the world that allowed them to sustain an extensive, free-floating conversation that constantly evolved over the first half of the thirteenth century as participants came and went. The shared culture of the "Rivers and Lakes" poets was not that of the capital: these were the sons of local elites. The wealth and effort of their lineage groups made their educations possible, and they stood out within the status structure of the locality as men of learning and culture.1 Their roles in government~for those who did participate~often came with an ambivalence rooted in their ties to a local culture in which participation in the official examinations was a marker of status but the Confucian virtue of service to the state was a choice rather than a clear obligation. The social and cultural milieus that shaped these writers included Daoist practitioners and Buddhist priests, along with respected landowners and merchants. They constituted an array of fields of cultural production that defined the structures of social distinction at the local level and were focused on local concerns.2 These locally defined systems, of course, were not entirely autonomous and insular: not only did the sons of the local elite~or those with ambitions to enter the local elite~participate in the examination system, but the routinely transferred prefects and county magistrates also held places of distinction in local society during their tenure and brought with them the structure of values of the larger imperium. Since those who staffed the central bureaucracy 1. H u g h R . C l a r k in Portrait of a Community: Society, Culture, and the Structures of Kinship in the Mulan River Valley (Fujian) from the Late Tang through the Song ( H o n g

Kong: Chinese University Press, 2007) makes this point very effectively for the local elite in the region around Putian, the home of the most important early thirteenth-century poet, Liu Kezhuang. 2. E d w a r d L. Davis in Society and the Supernatural in Song China

(Honolulu:

University of Hawai'i Press, 2001) illustrates the significant point that Buddhists, Daoists, and other technicians of the supernatural realm participated in local elite culture, which cannot be reduced to the canonical Confucian probity embodied in examination culture.

407 Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes were drawn from the local elites, these systems of commitments in turn had an impact on the ethos of the bureaucracy as a whole. 3 During the first half of the thirteenth century, exchanges between a central field of cultural production and the cultural networks that shaped elite society in the localities gradually produced a mutual accommodation centering on the cultural values and ritual procedures advanced by the adherents of the Learning of the Way. The imperial institutions and the local elites discovered in Daoxue a shared conceptual language through which to articulate identity and authority and to guide action. This consolidation of conceptual language and the gradual emergence of institutions to embody it marked a major epistemic shift. Poetic practice similarly existed within the interplay of central and local cultural systems. The dominant role of the poets of the "Rivers and Lakes’” who drifted to the boundary between these two systems and helped to forge the emerging shared discourse, was a distinctive feature of the poetry of this period. Their poetry and poetics staked out positions in the larger cultural field that shared key values with the Learning of the Way as developed by Zhu Xi and transmitted by Zhen Dexiu and other Daoxue advocates: they accepted a universal and unchanging "Nature and its feelings” ('性1青)as the locus of meaning in poetry and experience, and like Zhu Xi, they prized an inner calm in response to the world. Yet they rejected Daoxue's dismissal of form and craft and its alienation from meaning immanent in the surface of experience. Their explorations of the nature of poetic meaning, its relationship to modes of writing and to the inwardness of the self, addressed the weaknesses that participants in the larger cultural field had found in Daoxue. Over the first fifty years of the thirteenth century, the poetic discourse of the "Rivers and Lakes" poets and the Learning of the Way gradually evolved a

3. In 1232 when Lizong took over direct rule, he complained of "the lofty men of the age who do not respond despite many summons”「當時高士累召不起者」• Cited in Wang Yu�王宇,Lfw Kezhuang yu Nan Song xueshu� 麥j克莊與南宋學術� (Beijing: Zhonghua, 2007),p. 26. Also see chapter 8’ pp. 393-94 for an account of how popular pressure led to Lizong's recalling the Daoxue exemplars Zhen Dexiu and Wei Liaoweng to the capital. Lizong was aware of and knew he could not afford to ignore the desires of the literati elites.

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complementarity within the overarching field of cultural production that provided ways to account for the enduring meaning of experience as the revelation of the self. This complementarity within the larger system was partial, and neither discourse absorbed the other, but what they shared crucially supported both and was central to the newly emergent epistemic order of late imperial China.

The “Rivers and Lakes” Poets When Ningzong died in 1224, the long-time chief councilor Shi Miyuan helped push aside the heir apparent and put a young imperial relative—Lizong~on the throne. The former heir apparent, given the title of Prince of Ji�濟王,soon was caught up in a rebellion to establish him as emperor. The rebellion quickly was suppressed and the Prince ofJi killed in captivity. Strong protests and a demand for at least a burial with proper honors for the Prince arose within the bureaucracy and larger elite stratum, which Shi tried to quell.4 In 1225 the Hangzhou book merchant Chen Q i� 陳 起 ( d . 1256?) uneventfully published the Rivers and Lakes Collection, an anthology of poems by contemporary writers. However, two years later supporters of Shi Miyuan, still encountering vociferous protests over the irregular succession and its aftermath, discovered poems in the collection that slandered the regime. They banned the writing of poetry in the capital and ordered the book, together with its printing blocks, destroyed. They also exiled Chen Qi and one of the two authors of the offending poems. The other author, Liu Kezhuang 劉 克 莊 ( 1 1 8 7 - 1 2 6 9 ) , had sufficient support among high officials that he simply returned to a sinecure in his hometown when his appointment came to an end.5 4. See Twitchett and Smith, eds., Cambridge History of China, Vol. 5 Part 1: The Sung Dynasty and Its Precursors, 907-1279, pp. 833-44. 5. Cheng Zhangcan� 程章燒,Liu Kezhuang nianpu� 翟!I克莊年譜(Guiyang: Guizhou renmin chubanshe, 1993), pp. 98-104, is an excellent source for the texts describing the attack on the anthology. Hu Qiguang�胡奇光,Zhongguo wenhuo shi 中國文禍史(Shanghai: Shanghai renmin chubanshe, 1993) gives a brief account (pp. 76-80). Zhang Hongsheng�張 宏 生 , s h i p a i yanjiu�江湖詩派研究(Beijing: Zhonghua, 1995), in a comprehensive study of the "Rivers and Lakes” poets, repeats the material provided by Cheng but concludes that the attack began in 1225,� almost immediately after the publication of the anthology (pp. 359-70).

409 Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes Although the term "rivers and lakes" long had been used to refer to regions of the realm far from the central government~and all of its turmoil, ambition, and power~the banning of Chen Qi's anthology came to identify the particular authors in that collection as a distinctive group with common poetic and political values.6 There are no extant copies of the Rivers and Lakes Collection, however, and other anthologies based on or modeled on Chen Qi's original provide an inconsistent list of authors to be deemed "Rivers and Lakes" poets.7 The happenstance character of Shi Miyuan's regime seizing upon Chen Qi's anthology to suppress dissent raises questions about what iconic weight the Rivers and Lakes Collection can bear. D o the authors whose names reappear in many of the extant anthologies in fact form the core of a self-consciously constructed and cohesive "poetic group" (shipai�詩派)? Conversely, are there other writers who maintained strong links to these authors yet do not appear in the extant collections? That is, was there a “Rivers and Lakes" group, or is it a mere historiographic artifact? If there was such a group that shared social and poetic values, do we know who was in it? The answers are not entirely straightforward. Through his publishing efforts and his active cultivation of promising poets, which resumed after the ban on poetry was lifted in 1233,Chen Q i drew many writers to Hangzhou, the capital of the Southern Song, where they exchanged poems, discussed writing, and borrowed books of verse from Chen's collection.8 The associations forged through 6. Tang poets used phrases like "an intent of the rivers and lakes"(江湖之意)and "a mind of the rivers and lakes” (江湖之丄、)to refer to a state of mind far removed from the concerns of the capital. For example, Wang Changling� 王昌齡(?-756), bidding farewell to a friend, wrote "My old friend recalls the rivers and lakes: wealth and prestige are like dirt [to him].”「故人念江湖,富貴如埃塵。」(“Seeing off Wei 12,on the staff of the War Section”《送韋十二兵曹》,QTS 4.140.1427.) 7. Zhang Hongsheng lists 138 authors and provides a table (pp. 272-94) to show the distribution of the names in the 23 texts related to the Rivers and Lakes Collection. 8. Li Chuanjun�李傳軍 stresses the role of Chen Qi as a publisher in the formation of the "Rivers and Lakes” group. See Li Chuanjun, "Management strategies of Southern Song printing firms and the dissemination of culture, centering on the Chen family bookstore in the Muqin district of Pengbei Road in Linan during the Southern Song”〈南宋出版業的經營策略與文化傳播一以南宋臨安棚北大街睦� 親坊陳宅書籍舖爲中心〉,Shandong Shifandaxue xuebao山東師範大學學報(人文�

社會禾版)54,no. 4 (2009): 47-51.

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Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes

Chen's efforts persisted when the writers inevitably went their separate ways. Leaving one's home region, traveling to the capital, and joining the group of writers who exchanged poems through Chen Qi,s mediation indicated an ambition for literary distinction in the larger world and reflected basic poetic values shared by the larger group. Chen's publishing, which helped circulate these texts, and the connections forged among the writers who passed through Hangzhou created a broad poetic discourse that circulated between the capital and the regional groups. If participating in this network delimits the "Rivers and Lakes" poets as a group, then surely there are writers who, for whatever reason, do not appear in the extant anthologies yet belong in this group.9 However, participation in this network probably did not create the sort of strong group identity nor evolve into the distinctive group style usually associated with the term shipai,sometimes translated as a ‘‘school of poetry•” There is also a temporal element here that works against defining a single, unified group ethos: the list of poets in the extant anthologies spans almost one hundred years, starting with Zhang Wei�張 偉 ( j s 1148) and ending with Song Qingzhi�宋 慶 之 ( j s 1265). Even if one narrows the scope to the period from 1209 to around 1250~from the death of Lu You to the death of the omnipresent “Rivers and Lakes" poet Dai Fugu�戴復古(1168-1250?)~there are distinct shifts in poetic value that can be obscured if one thinks of the poets as a single, continuous group.10 The initial arc of the rise of the “Rivers and Lakes" poets traces the increasing popularity of the Late Tang style, which Yang Wanli had welcomed and Lu You reviled. The Late Tang style became strongly associated with the Four Lings ofYongjia�永嘉四靈,who advocated it in their group compositions; these probably reached a peak of 9. Exploring the circulation of poems through a diligent analysis o f the Complete Song Poems probably would give a much clearer sense of the poetic networks o f the period, but this awaits future research. 10. Zhang Hongsheng suggests 1209 as a starting year for the group since the death o f Lu You, the last of the four major poets o f the early Southern Song to die, left an opening for new trends and new groups to gain the attention o f the literati elite. For an assessment of Dai Fugu's death year, see Zhang Jiding� 張 繼 定 , " A n examination of Dai Fugu's birth and death years”〈戴復古生幸年考辨、Wenxian jikan�文 獻 季 刊 2003,no. 1 (Jan. 2003): 87-94.

411 Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes activity in 1208,the second major period of group composition. 11 Although their poetry reached a wide audience beyond Yongjia, two of the four members of the group had died by 1214, and despite the power of printing to disseminate their writings, the Four Lings remained largely a local group. By 1224,however, much had changed. The network of poets that constituted the "Rivers and Lakes" group was increasingly active, and many writers began expressing dissatisfaction with the narrowness of Late Tang regulated verse forms. Over the next thirty years Late Tang verse continued to be important, but other styles modeled on earlier poets found forceful advocates and growing popularity. During this period, Liu Kezhuang, whom Yc Shi had identified as a promising young poet during the ascendancy of the Four Lings, became the most authoritative poet and theoretician among the “Rivers and Lakes" writers. By 1250, however, Liu Kezhuang, who by then had become an important court official, was lamenting that he had outlived many of his peers. Although new writers continued to participate in the “Rivers and Lakes,,network, which survived into the Yuan dynasty, the coming of war in the 1270s transformed the aesthetic concerns of the “Rivers and Lakes" poets into practices appropriate to the new order after the dynasty's fall. Underlying the shifts in styles during the different phases of the "Rivers and Lakes" group was a consolidation of core commitments about the nature and function of poetry, both for the poets in the network and for their broad audience among both capital and local elites, that complemented the growing acceptance of the Learning of the Way in the larger cultural milieu. The following discussion traces the evolution of these poetic commitments, which directly confronted key Daoxue questions concerning the nature of the self and its engagement with the world, the locus of meaning in that engagement, and how one was to understand and represent that meaning.

11. See Wu Qing�吳晶’ Siting: Xu Zhao, Xu Ji, Wengjuan, Zhao Shixiu zhuan永嘉四靈:徐照、徐璣、翁卷、趙師秀傳(Hangzhou: Zhejiang renmin chubanshe, 2008),p. 320.

412

Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes

Beginnings: The Four Lings ofYongjia The name "Four Lings" refers to the character ling�靈(“numinous,,) that appeared in the names o f X u Zhao�徐 照 ( d . 1210), Xu Ji�徐 璣� (1162-1214),Weng Juan�翁卷(fl. 1215),and Zhao Shixiu�趙師秀� (1170-1219), close friends from the town ofYongjia who formed a poetic circle at the beginning of the thirteenth century:12 1. XuZhao�徐照(d. 1210) Courtesy name Daohui�道暉;second courtesy name Ltnghui� 靈暉. Of the Four Lings, least is known about the ancestry of Xu Zhao: he appears to have been the descendent of a man who moved from Fujian to Yongjia in 941 during the turmoil of the Five Dynasties period (90760). His clan was on the margins of the local elite, and although it seems to have produced only a few men who attained national office, their efforts allowed Xu Zhao the opportunity to study at a local academy and befriend men from the more securely established elite, such as Xu Ji, Wengjuan, and Xue Shishi�薛師石(1178-1228), a relative ofXue Jixuan and an important patron of the arts in Yongjia.13 2. Xuji�徐璣(1162-1214) Courtesy name Wenyuan文淵;style name Liwgyuan�靈淵.14 Xuji's father, Xu Ding�徐 定 ( j s 1151, d. 1191), was from Quannan�泉南� in Fujian, where the Xu clan was long established. Having come to prominence in the Tang dynasty with Xu Hui�徐晦(760-838), it produced fifteen jinshi degree holders.15 Xu Ding, however, changed his registry to Yongjia, the residence of his wife's clan.

12. Niu Hongen�牛鴻,恩 in 1993 compiled an annotated anthology of poems by the Four Lings and the "Rivers and Lakes” poets, the Yongjia Siting yu Jianghu shipai xuanji�永嘉四靈與江湖詩派選集(Beijing: Shoudu Shifandaxue chubanshe, 1993). Zhang Hongsheng also discusses the Four Lings as part of his account of the "Rivers and Lakes” poets. In recent years two major monographs on the Four Lings have been published. The first is Zhao Ping�趙平,Yongjia Siting shipai yanjiu�永嘉四靈詩� 派研究(Hangzhou: Zhejiang daxue chubanshe, 2006) and the second, Wu Qing's Yongjia Siting. Among extant texts, the phrase “Four Lings” first appears in Ye Shi's "Colophon to Liu Kezhuang's Nanyue shigaon《題劉潛夫南嶽詩稿》(QSI^ 285.6474.199; YSJ 2.29.611), but Ye Shi apparently compiled an anthology of the Four Lings,poetry with the title Siting shixuan�四靈詩選(see Wu Qing, p. 5). 13. Wu Qing, Yongjia Siting, p. 12. For a brief account o f X u e Shishi, see Zhao Ping, Yongjia Siting shipai yanjiu9 pp. 190-91. 14. He also had a second courtesy name, Zhizhong�致中. 15. Wu Qing, Yongjia Siting, p. 136.

413 Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes 3. W e n g j u a n�翁卷(fl. 1215) Courtesy name X u g u�續 古 ; s e c o n d courtesy name Lingshu�靈 舒 . Weng Juan was from Leqing�樂 清 county, next to Yongjia. His clan's residence in Leqing apparently started with Weng Z h u� 翁郑,who was from Putian�营 田 in Fujian but served as magistrate o f Lecheng�樂 成 in the last years o f the Tang dynasty and then settled his family there. T h e clan continued to produce�力Wu. degree holders throughout the Song, including Weng Juan's brother, WengYongnian�翁永年,who passed the exam in 1226. 16 4. Z h a o Shixiu� 趙 師 秀 ( 1 1 7 0 - 1 2 1 9 ) Courtesy name Zizhi�紫 芝 ; s e c o n d courtesy name Li'wgxiu�靈 秀 . Z h a o Shixiu, in contrast to the other three, had connections to a national rather than merely local elite network: he was part o f the widespread lineage o f the Song imperial household, an eighth-generation descendent o f Z h a o Kuangyin� 趙匡焴L (927-76), the founder o f the Song. H e had f e w roots in Yongjia, where his father had moved after the fall o f the north. 17

The details of kinship for the Four Lings shift the focus from capital culture to local elite society, in which national prominence still mattered but was not all that mattered. The Four Lings, like the later "Rivers and Lakes" poets, understood themselves, their audience, and their poetry within the dual contexts of their home and the larger literati public in a way that differs from Yang Wanli or Lu You or the major poets of the Northern Song. The Four Lings garnered a national audience through the timeliness of their concerns, the patronage of Ye Shi, and the power of printing to disseminate their work. However, even a brief overview of their biographies reveals the role of the Yongjia cultural and social milieu in their development as a poetic group. In the 1170s Xu Ji and perhaps Wengjuan were students ofYe Shi in Yongjia. In 1190 Zhao Shixiu passed the jinshi examination, andXuJi's father retired, creating the opportunity for Xu to enter service through yin privilege. Unfortunately, since his father died soon thereafter, Xu did not receive his first appointment until 1193. Both he and Zhao Shixiu held minor positions away from Yongjia until 1198~the time of the

16. Wu Qing, Yongjia Siting, p. 208. 17. Wu Qing, Yongjia Siting, p. 261.

414

Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes

“false learning" proscriptionwhen they returned home, possibly because of their association with Ye Shi. The next four years were the first flowering of the Four Lings as a poetic group. By 1202,however, both Xu Ji and Zhao Shixiu had left again to continue their careers. X u Zhao at this time accompanied Xu Ji to his post in "Vongzhou 永州(modern Hunan�湖南)in order to see the scenery of this region rich with literary and historic associations. The next year Wengjuan also set out to serve in various staff positions. First he joined Xin Qiji's staff in Shaoxing, and then in 1206 he joined Ye Shi at the northern border as Han Tuozhou was preparing for his campaign against the Jin. In 1207,after the war effort had failed, both Ye Shi and Weng returned to \ongjia. They soon were joined by Xu Ji and Zhao Shixiu, and the second major period of group composition began, with many of the meetings sponsored by Xue Shishi. In 1210,� however, Xu Ji received the post of county magistrate, Weng Juan moved to a mountain retreat outside the city of Yongjia, and Xu Zhao fell ill. In 1211 Xu Zhao died, and Wengjuan left to travel. In 1212 Zhao Shixiu left for the capital to be reassigned, but he seemingly decided to take up permanent residence there. Xu Ji died in 1214,Zhao Shixiu in 1218,and Ye Shi in 1223,bringing the period of the Four Lings to an end. The Four Lings gained contemporary fame as advocates of a return to serious attention to crafting in poetry. In his funerary inscription forXuJi, written in 1215,Ye Shi presented their effort as a response to the slackness of poetry at the time: In the beginning, [Late] Tang poetry had been long abandoned, and [Xu Ji] discussed this with his friends X u Zhao, W e n g j u a n , and Z h a o Shixiu, saying, “People o f old used floating sound and precise resonance, a lone word, a single line to assess skill [in composition]: this was the greatest refinement in poetry. Recent generations have produced piece after piece, a flood without restraint: h o w can these achieve fame?” T h e wording o f these four then attained the utmost in skill, and, through this, Tang poetry once again was practiced. 18

18. “FuneraryInscriptionforXuWenming[Ji]”《徐文淵墓誌銘》,YSJ2.21.410; QSP^ 286.6509.321.

415 Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes 初 , 唐 詩 廢 久 , 君 難 友 徐 照 、 翁 卷 、 趙 師 秀 議 曰 ’ 「 昔 从 浮 聲� 切 響 單 字 隻 句 計 巧 拙 , 蓋 風 騷 之 至 精 也 o 近 世 乃 連 篇 累 牘 ’ 汗 漫� 而 無 禁 , 豈 能 名 家 哉 。 」 四 人 之 語 遂 極 其 工 , 而 唐 詩 由 此 復� 行矣

。�

Liu Kezhuang, reflecting in his old age, saw their poetry specifically as a response to the Daoxue distrust of poetic craft: In recent generations the Learning o f Principle [Lixue] flourished and poetic prosody fell into ruin. O n l y the Four Lings o f Yongjia, composing five-character verse, labored harder at their chanting than did [Meng] Jiao or [Jia] Dao. Their writings were few, but they had many striking lines. 19 近 世 理 學 興 而 詩 律 壞 , 惟 永 嘉 四 靈 復 爲 五 言 , 苦 吟 過 于 郊 、 島 ,� 篇 帙 少 而 警 策 多 。�

Both Yt Shi and Liu Kezhuang stress attention to craft and to prosody, and indeed the Four Lings devoted themselves to refined, carefully wrought regulated verse poems in the manner of the Late Tang poets Jia Dao�賈島(779-843) and Yao He�姚 合 ( j s 816). X u Zhao, for example, writes: jRe如rmVi/0

歸來 歸來長獨坐,

Returning, I sit long alone:

誰更伴吾行�

W h o else would accompany me in traveling?

不念爲生拙,

I do not reflect that my plans have been clumsy,

偏思得句清 °

A n d just desire to get lines that are limpid.

園晴秋菜少,

In the garden on a bright day the autumn vegetables

井涸夜泉生 °

T h e well is dry, but at night a spring comes forth.

grow few. 愛聽'燈前雨 ’

I love to listen to the rain before the lantern:

松聲相雜鳴 °

Its singing out mixes with the sound o f the pines.

The scene is small and the language simple and unadorned. The parallel middle couplets are crafted but not overly so. Xu Zhao here seeks and attains "lines that are limpid." This prized quality of purity applies to the scene, to its representation, and to the stance of the 19. "Preface to the poetry collection of Lin Zixian"《林子磊詩序》,Houcun xiansheng 20.

daquanji

QSS

[ h e r e a f t e r HCJ]

50.2670.31368.

5.98.2540-41; Q S W ^ 3 2 9 . 7 5 7 1 . 1 7 8 - 7 9 .

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Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes

poet and is a recurring theme Xu Zhao also writes: 和 翁 靈 舒�

the poetry of the Four Lings.

Matching Weng Lingshu,s ‘Writing of a Matter on

冬 曰 書 事 第 二�

a Winter Day," second o f three poems 21

秀 句 出 寒 餓 ,�

Outstanding lines come f r o m cold and hunger:

從 人 笑 過 清 。�

Let people laugh that I am overly pure. 22

步 溪 波 逐 影 ,�

As I walk along the creek, the ripples follow m y

吟竹鳥膺聲°

W h e n I chant among the bamboo, the birds

酒 裏 安 天 運 ,�

In ale I accord with the movement o f Heaven. 23

春 邊 見 物 情 。�

As spring nears, I watch the aspect o f phenomena.

耕 桑 猶 罄 樂 ,�

With plowing and mulberries I still [can find]

shadow. answer m y sound.

何事可營生O

complete joy: 24 By what matters can I plan m y life?

X u Zhao here advocates watching phenomena, standing back, observing, and not committing one's emotions to external transformations. He writes, for instance, that he "already has no plans about worldly matters, / an unhindered form beyond external phenomena."「世事已無營,鯈然物外形。」25

X u Ji echoes this theme of detachment in a lament that on a fall afternoon he cannot find the equilibrium and ease needed for poetry when his emotions do not match the ascesis of the autumnal world: 秋 行 二 首 , 其 二�

Autumn Travels, second o f two poems 26

紅 葉 枯 梨 一 兩 株�

Red leaves on one or two sere pear trees:

鯈 然 秋 思 滿 山 居�

Autumn longing swiftly fills the mountains.

21. QSS 50.2671.31390; Fang Hui� 方回,Yingkui lusui huiping�瀛奎律髓彙評� [hereafter YKLS], annot. Li Qingjia� 李慶甲(Shanghai: Shanghai guji, 1986) 1.13.484; Niu, Yongjia Siting yuJianghu shipai ocuanji, pp. 6-8. 22. The Yingkui liisui has�我’ “me,” for�過,“overly.” 2 3 . 安 an, which I translate as “accord,” means something like “to find a suitable place in ” "Heaven's movement,’ is its fated movement. The line alludes to Tao Qian, "Blaming My Children”《責子》:“If Heaven's movement is like this, / Then bring on the ‘thing in the cup,[ ale].”「天運苟如此,且進杯中物。」� 24. “Mulberries” refers to sericulture: the silkworms feed on mulberry leaves. The Yingkui liisui has quite a different reading: instead of qingle�罄樂,“complete [exhausted] joy’” it has qingtuo�聲橐,"exhausted sack." 25. “In the Mountains”《山中》,QSS 50.2670.31360. 26. QSS 53.2778.32885; Niu, Yongjia Siting yu Jianghu shipai ocuanji, pp. 23-24.

417 Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes 詩懷自歎多塵土,

I sigh that m y poetic thoughts are clouded by much dust,

不似秋來木葉疏 °

N o t like the spareness o f the trees w h e n autumn comes.

Cool, quiet, pure scenes appear throughout the poetry of the Four Lings, even if dissonance lingers in shadows. Zhao Shixiu, for example, sets out such a landscape and regrets that it does not accord with his life: 薛氏瓜廬

Mr. Xue's Melon

Huf1

不作封侯念, You do not think of being awarded a demesne, 悠然遠世紛 ° And are loftily far from the disturbances of the world. 惟應種瓜事 ’ It is perhaps that in your planting melons, 猶被讀書分 ° You still bear the lot of reading books.28 野水多於地 ’ The outland water is more than the land; 春山半是雲 ° Half the spring mountains are clouds.29 吾生嫌已老, My life, I regret, has reached old age, 學圃未女口君� And in learning gardening, I am not yet so good as you. 30

As Liu Kezhuang observed, within the limited range of materials and forms and their commitment to self-restrained emotion, the Four Lings still crafted striking poems.31 One of Zhao Shixiu's most famous poems is a seven-character quatrain:

27. QSS 54.2841.33845; Niu, Yongjia Siting yu Jianghu shipai xuanji’ pp. 45-46. The Melon Hut owned by Xue Shishi was a site for poetic gatherings. 28. As Niu points out, this couplet draws on the model of Tao Qian as the farmerscholar who wrote, "Having plowed and finished planting, I at [this] time return to read my books•”「既耕且已種,時還讀我書。」("Reading the Canon ofMountains and Seas-《讀山海經》#1). 29. This couplet was well known for its similarity to Bai Juyi's couplet, "Half the households are on boats: the outland water is more than the land.”「人家半^jtlfi ’ 野水多於地。」Fang Hui approved of Zhao's transformation of the couplet. Luo Dajing, however, suggested that the echo was accidental and that Bai and Zhao, having been struck by similar scenes, wrote the same line. See Niu’s discussion, P. 46. 30. Zhao echoes 13.4,in which a misguided student, Fan Chi�樊遲,asks about agriculture and gardening. Confucius replies that he was “not so good [a source] as an old gardener."「吾不$口老圃 ° � T h eallusion is tongue-in-cheek. 31. See note 19.

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Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes

約 客�

Appointment with a Guest52

黄 梅 時 節 家 家 雨�

In the season o f the yellowing plum, rain upon house after house. 33

青 草 池 塘 處 處 蛙�

In ponds o f green reeds, frogs in place after place.

有 約 不 來 過 夜 半�

We had an appointment, he did not come, past

閑 敲 棋 子 落 燈 花�

Idly I tap the Go stones, making the lamp [-wick] spark

midnight:

The scene is simple, common, understated yet fully realized. Since the poem occurs after midnight, Zhao hears the rain and imagines the houses, just as he hears the frogs and imagines the now-filling storage ponds with their green reeds. What he does not hear, for all his attentiveness, is the approach of his guest. Weng Juan's handling of another very common event in a sevencharacter quatrain also su路ests the level of attentiveness to the details of daily experience in the poems of the Four Lings: 山雨�

Rain in the Mountain^4

一 夜 滿 林 星 月 白�

All night filling the forest, the stars and m o o n

且 無 雲 氣 亦 無 雷�

There were neither wisps o f clouds nor thunder.

平 明 忽 見 溪 流 急�

As the sky grew bright, suddenly I saw the creek's

[glowed] white:

flow swiftly surge: 知 是 他 山 落 雨 來�

I knew that this came from rain that fell on another mountain.

The Yongjia writer Zhao Ruhui�趙 汝 回 ( j s 1214) captures the Four Lings' poems' quality of appreciative reflection on patterns in the world in a retrospective defense of the Late Tang style that he wrote in 1249. For Zhao, however, “patterns” in the world had firmly shifted to “principles” that were the objects of intention: T h o s e o f our generation w h o fault the [Late] Tang style say that its compactness and nearness [conveys] no more than scenery, with not

32. QSS 54.2841.33858; Niu, Yongjia Silingyu Jianghu shipai xuanji, p. 55. 33. The phrase "yellowing plum" seems to have derived from the homophonous “yellow mildew” (貧霉)as a form of euphemism, but by the Southern Song, “plum” may have been the primary association. 34. QSS 50.2673.31425; Niu, Yongjia Siting yu Jianghu shipai ocuanji, p. 35.

419 Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes one word touching on principle. This is decidedly not so. All poetry entrusts itself to phenomenal objects, and no principle exists outside objects. For the ancients, the couplets dwelt on [objects] and their intentions dwelt in [principle]. If one now observes the 300 Poems [of the Canon ofPoetry], they on the whole are about birds and beasts and grasses and trees but cannot be faulted for this.35

世之病唐詩者,謂其短近不過景物,無一言及理。此大不然。詩� 未有不托物,而理未有出於物之外。古人句在此而意在彼。今觀� 三百篇,大抵鳥獸草木之間,不可以是訾也。� Zhao, continuing the essay, moves from imagery in poetry that embodies intentions shaped by principle to poetry as a revelation of the self that can be judged by those intentions: Concerning people and their poems, whether their movement o f mind is deviant or correct, their aims high or low, their cultivation slight or substantial, all these follow what they create and are revealed.

而人之於詩,其心術之邪正,志趣之高下,氣習之厚薄,隨其所� 作’無不呈露° Although this shift of poetry toward the manifestation of the self appears in the Four Lings' verse, their central concern was the careful crafting of lines out of the material of daily experience, and their poetry seldom reflected on larger meanings.36 Their focus on line crafting was such that later critics starting with Fang Hui complained 35. "Preface to the Yunquan Poetry [Collectwnf《雲泉詩序》,(25所30小6941.126~ 27. The preface is to the poetry ofXueYu�薛 ( b . 1210). This argument appears to reflect the evolution of the Yongjia intellectual tradition in which normative principles attained greater prominence. More than fifty years earlier, Ye Shi had argued in his Presented Volumes: Now that which takes form between Heaven and Earth are phenomenal objects. That by which objects are one and possess differences are the “feelings” of objects. Relying on these differences and attending to them while not losing that by which they are one is the “principle” of objects. See chapter 8,p. 385. Zhao Ping discusses this text by Zhao Ruhui in Yongjia Siting shipai yanjiu, p. 33. 36. For example, in lamenting the death of Weng Chengzhi�翁 誠 之 ( j s 1178), a relative of Weng Juan, Xu Zhao began, "Relying on recognizing the Nature and its feelings in poetry,/As an official he also was p u r e . " � 因 識 詩 ‘爲官亦是清。」� 《哭翁誠乏》(QSS 50.2671.31380). The “poetry” here may refer more specifically to the [Canon ofl Poetry, with its normative emotional responses.

420

Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes

that their poems often did not hold together as fully integrated works.37 However, the Four Lings developed their poetic styles while Yang, Lu You, and Zhu Xi all were still alive and before Daoxue began to dominate elite discourse; their poetry reflected the effort to reassert the value of form~and the well-wrought couplet in particular~rather than a pressure to justify meaning in poetry.

The Poets of the Rivers and Lakes The Late Tang styles advocated by the Four Lings had an impact on contemporary practice, but it was not long before writers began to ask more of poetry than self-disciplined crafting. In 1211 Ye Shi, although a supporter of the Four Lings, lamented in his funerary inscription f o r X u Zhao thatXu had not progressed beyond the Late Tang style: To reveal incipient possibilities that people at present had not noticed, to restore the learning that had been abandoned one hundred years to cause people to again speak o f [Late] Tang poetry all started [Xu Zhao] and was a source o f satisfaction for writers. I regret that he did not attain more advanced years and reach the flourishing [styles of] the Kaiyuan and Yuanhe reign periods. 38 發 今 人 未 悟 之 機 , 回 百 年 已 廢 之 學 , 使 後 復 言 唐 詩 自 君 始 , 不 亦� 詞 人 墨 卿 之 一 快 也 。 惜 其 不 尙 以 年 , 不 及 臻 乎 開 元 、 元 和 之 盛 。�

In 1222 or 1223, Ye Shi was even clearer in expressing his discontent when he urged the young Liu Kezhuang to set high goals specifically to meet the challenge of the Daoxue scorn of poetry: N o w w e have lost three o f the Four Lings, and their imposing presence has vanished. In the profusion o f poetic composition, there is no [one] to bring order. [Liu] Qianfu's thought is increasingly fresh and 37. Discussing Zhao Shixiu's "Peach Blossom Temple”(桃花寺),for example, Fang Hui noted that although the Four Lings devoted great effort to the crafting of the parallel middle couplets in regulated verse, the results often did not particularly ending couplets (YKLS 2.47.1713). This complaint has become a critical commonplace. See Niu, Yongjia Siting yu Jianghu shipai xuanji, p. 2; Zhao Ping, Yongjia Siting yanjiu, pp. 99-101. 38. "Funerary Inscription for Xu Daohuai [Zhao]”《徐道暉墓誌銘》,QSW 286.6503.234; YSJ 2.17.322.

421 Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes his couplets ever more skillful. His encounter [with texts] is mature, and his arrangement is expansive. In setting up the flag and drum o f a great general, if not [Liu], then w h o is fit? Formerly Xie Xiandao [Liangzuo] stated, "Giving form to dust-mired longings and depicting the manner o f things is never so good as the poetry o f Y a n [Vanzhi],� Xie [Lingyun],Xu [Ling],and Yu [Xin] that tarries with the landscape." It is sad that since this saying has gone forth, poetry has been abandoned. If Q i a n f u reflects on what Mr. Xie has slighted and advances unceasingly on the ancients, then he can match the Ya and the Hymns and exceed the "Airs o f the States,,and "Encountering Sorrow": w h y must the Four Lings [be the standard]? 39 今 四 靈 喪 其 三 矣 , 冢 鉅 淪 沒 , 紛 唱 迭 吟 ’ 無 復 第 敘 。 而 潛 夫 思 益� 新 , 句 愈 工 , 涉 歷 老 練 , 布 置 闊 遠 , 建 大 將 旗 鼓 ’ 非 子 孰 當 。 昔� 謝 顯 道 謂 「 陶 冶 塵 思 , 模 寫 物 態 , 曾 不 如 顏 、 謝 、 徐 、 庾 留 連 光� 景 之 詩 」 。 此 論 既 行 , 而 詩 因 以 廢 矣 。 悲 夫 , 潛 夫 以 謝 公 所 薄 者� 自 鑑 , 而 進 於 古 人 不 已 , 參 《 雅 》 、 《 頌 》 , 軼 《 風 》 、 《 騷 》� 可也,何必四靈哉°

Ye Shi expressed his discontent with the limits of the goals of the Four Lings, but as Daoxue continued to expand its influence in the broader literati culture, revisionist accounts not of the value of the poetry of the Four Lings but of the poetry itself reflected a renewed seriousness within the “Rivers and Lakes,,group. Liu Kezhuang, writing in 1224,for example, recast Weng Juan's poetry: Presented to Wengjuan40 非 止 擅 唐 風 , You are not just a master of the [Late] Tang manner, 尤 於 選 體 工 � Y o uare especially skilled at the Anthology forms.41 有時千載事‘ At times the affairs of a thousand years 祇 在 一 聯 中 ° Are present in just a single couplet. 世自輕前輩, The world slights the former generation, 天 猶 活 此 翁 � Yet Heaven still keeps this old gent alive. 江湖不相見, We did not see one another midst rivers and lakes: 贈翁卷

纔見又西東 o

Having seen one another, w e again go east and west.

39. “Colophon to the Nanyue Draft Poetry [Collection] of Liu Qianfu [Kezhuang] 《題劉潛夫南嶽詩稿》,QSW285.6474.199; V5J 2.29.611. 40. HCJ 1.7.211; QSS 58.3039.36234. 41. In the usage of the time, Anthology (選)referred specifically to the Literary Anthology of the Zhaoming Heir Apparent (昭一文選),Xiao Tong's� 蕭 統 ( 5 0 1 - 3 1 ) famous anthology of Han, Wei, Jin, and Southern dynasties literature.

422

Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes

In 1232 in a further revision of the poetry of the Four Lings, Zhao Ruhui's preface to the poetry o f X u e Shishi, the \ongJia writer who had played host to many of the Four Lings' gatherings, gives an insider's understanding of the Four Lings that addresses Ye Shi's warning and brings the group in line with contemporary values: X u Zhao, W e n g j u a n , X u Ji, and Z h a o Shixiu o f Y o n g j i a started with an expectation o f [reaching the styles of] Kaiyuan and Yuanhe. In their discipline, selection, and refining, word upon word resounded like jade. If [their poems] were mixed with those o f Yao H e and Jia Dao, people would not be able to differentiate. After Master Shuixin [Ye Shi] approvingly sighed and praised them, no one in the realm had not heard o f them

T h e Four Lings thought the Late Tang

style vulgar and did not write in it: “if their wording did not startle people, they did not stop.,,42 Yet later students constantly take their pattern in [the Four Lings'] every action and enthusiastically boast o f the Late Tang to people, but people have not awakened to this [error]. 43 永 嘉 徐 照 、 翁 卷 、 徐 璣 、 趙 師 秀 , 乃 始 以 開 元 、 元 和 作 者 自 期 ,� 治 擇 萍 鍊 , 字 字 玉 響 , 雜 之 姚 、 賈 中 , 人 不 能 辨 也 。 7 j C 心 先 生 既� 嘖 嘖 嘆 賞 之 , 於 是 「 四 靈 」 之 名 天 下 莫 不 聞 。 … … 四 靈 陋 晚 唐 不� 爲 , 語 不 驚 人 不 止 , 而 後 生 常 則 其 步 趨 謦 欽 , 揚 揚 以 晚 唐 誇 人 ,� 此 人 所 不 悟 也 。�

Zhao then explains how Xue Shishi clearly sought the higher standards of the poetry of Tao Qian, Xie Lingyun, D u Fu, and Wei Yingwu and that his poetry reflected his moral attainments: “His emotions were true and his manner (qi) calm, as if surely he was one w h o had attained the W a y . " 「 情 真 氣 和 , 庶 幾 乎 有 道 者 」 4 4

42. This oft-repeated phrase derives from Du Fu's “If my words do not startle people, in death I will not cease”「語不驚人死不休 ° � ” O nthe River I Encounter Water Surging Like the Ocean and Attempt a Short Description”《江上値水女卩海� 勢聊短述》,QTS 7.226.2443. 43. "Preface to the Collection of the Melon H u t ” � i H K 詩 序 》 , Q S W 304.6941.125-26. The exact meaning of the phrase�常貝!I其步趨謦欽 is not clear. "Walking and chatting,,步趨謦欽 appears to be an extended equivalent of�步趨,� “[to imitate] one's walking and trotting.” 44. “Preface to the Collection of the Melon Hut,” QSW^ 304.6941.126.

423 Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes "RIVERS AND LAKES" POETICS: THREE PREFACES

The "Rivers and Lakes" writers often pointed to poetry's revealing the sort of specifically moral qualities that Zhao Ruhui discussed in his preface to Xue Yu's and Xue Shishi's collections. Others, however, simply looked to poetry as the manifestation of the self in its particularity. Song Boren�宋{白仁(b. 1199), for instance, explains his own poetry thus: People o f old used poetry to give shape to their Nature and feelings and just followed their proclivities. H o w could they unify the mind o f all under Heaven like the mind o f one person?... Boren,s learning o f poetry comes f r o m whatever comes out o f his mouth: high or low, refined or crude, wild without restraint, it resembles dried grass blowing in the wind or sere lotuses battered by rain. Rising or sinking, rapid or slow, it relies on the circumstances, and I could not compel it even i f l wanted. 45 古 人 以 詩 陶 寫 性 情 , 隨 其 所 長 而 已 , 安 能 一 天 下 之 心 如 一 人 之� 心 。 … … 伯 仁 學 詩 出 於 隨 口 應 聲 , 高 下 精 桷 , 狂 無 節 制 , 有 如 敗� 草 翻 風 , 枯 荷 鬧 雨 , 低 昂 疾 徐 , 因 勢 而 出 , 雖 欲 強 之 而 不 可 。�

Implicit in Song Boren's account is the idea that the Nature and feelings, in their particular instantiations, remain both good and intelligible. These assumptions are more clearly revealed in a pair of prefaces by Zhao Mengjian�趙孟堅(1199-1295): Poetry is not just an art: it is the emblem o f virtue and the sound o f the mind. W h e n set to verse, following a form and a style, it is like water following the land to take its shape. Still, there are the deep and the shallow, the large and the small: although they are different, they all take loyalty and commitment as key and alike return to the correct. 46 詩 非 一 藝 也 , 德 之 章 、 心 之 聲 也 。 其 寓 之 篇 什 , 隨 體 賦 格 , 亦 猶� 水 之 隨 地 賦 形 。 然 其 有 淺 有 深 , 有 大 有 小 , 槪 雖 不 同 , 要 之 同 主� 忠 厚 , 而 同 歸 於 正 。�

For Zhao, as long as poetry accurately reflects the mind, it will be correct. In the last line of the preface, the basic Mencian position of

45. "Preface to Draft Chantings of Snowy Cliff"《雪巖吟草序》,QSH^ 341.864.43. 46. "Preface to the Poetry Collection of Zhao Zhutan[Yong]w《趙竹潭詩集序》,� QSW 341.7876.245.

424

Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes

the goodness of the mind underlies the spontaneous correctness of response and is simply an uncontested assumption at this point. How, then, can one account for individual difference, given the universality of the Mencian "basic mind?” In a second preface Zhao argues: Poetry is h o w surpassing [ying] qi becomes manifest in people. T h e low and dissolute definitely are without poetry. T h e lofty and the elegant have poetry. Famous officials and grandees all have poetry. Encountering and being moved by objects and events, their surpassing spirit takes form as poetry. This is like there being surpassing qi in Heaven which becomes auspicious stars and felicitous clouds and there being surpassing qi in the Earth that becomes vermilion grass and purple fungus. 47 詩 者 , 英 氣 之 發 見 於 人 者 也 。 鄙 夫 猥 徒 定 無 詩 , 高 人 韻 士 有 詩 ,� 名 臣 鉅 公 皆 有 詩 。 感 遇 事 物 ’ 英 英 氣 槪 , 形 而 成 詩 。 亦 猶 天 有 英� 氣 ’ 景 星 慶 雲 , 地 有 英 氣 , 朱 草 紫 芝 是 也 。�

Both Song Boren and Zhao Mengjian here give accounts justifying poetry as the natural, spontaneous manifestation of inner substance. The sense of people made of qi in which the Nature inheres in a way that accounts both for identity and difference seems broadly accepted and mirrors Zhen Dexiu's simplification of the Daoxue account. Zhao Mengjian, in the next part of his preface, shows the way in which the "Rivers and Lakes" poets, at least in theory, rejected the limits of the Four Lings' model. Zhao draws the conclusion that poetry, as externalization, should take whatever form best suits the moment of manifestation: However, w h e n were these [manifestations] ever constrained in form? I consider it strange that among those n o w w h o talk about poetry, the partisans o f Jiangxi and Late Tang belittle one another: the second faults the excesses o f the first, and the first disparages the strictures o f the second. W h y not observe collectively the writings o f D u [Fu], Li [Bai], Yuan [Zhen], Bai [Juyi], O u [ y a n g X i u ] , Wang [Anshi], Su [Shi], and Huang [Tingjian]? These gentlemen had all forms at their disposal and were not restricted to one. If old-style worked, then it was old-style; if regulated, then regulated; ifyuefu or

47. “Preface to the Poetry of Sun Xuechuang”《孫雪窗詩序》,QSW 341.7876.246-47. The grass and the fungus have remarkable medicinal qualities.

425 Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes mixed form, then yuefu or mixed form. I have never heard of their selecting [only] one and setting [any] one aside.

然何嘗體製限哉。竊怪夫今之言詩者,江西、晚唐之交相詆也。� 彼病此冗,此訾彼拘。胡不合杜、李、元、白、歐、王、蘇、黃� 諸公而並觀。諸公眾體該具,弗拘一也。可古則古,可律則律,� 可樂府、雜言則樂府、雜言,初未聞舉一而廢一也。� Except for the more complex positions o f Liu Kezhuang, these prefaces largely encompass the theoretical stances o f “Rivers and Lakes,,� writers: poetry is about the Nature and its feelings~which at bottom are morally correct and shared by all but also are an endowment ofqi一and form is a tool for expression, which therefore should be used well. POETRY AMONG RIVERS AND LAKES

T h e poetry o f the "Rivers and Lakes,,writers reflects a commitment to express the morally grounded self in well-crafted verse, even if the variety o f forms does not quite match what theory suggests was possible. A m o n g the poems in the Anthology of Sixty Southern Song Poets ( 南 宋 六 十 家 小 集 ) , f o r example, Zhang Hongsheng records the following distribution by form: 48 Old-style

Regulated (8-line) Regulated (4-line)

Regulated (>8 lines)

four-character five-character six-character seven-character five-character seven-character five-character six-character seven-character five-character seven�一 ch aracter

That is, there are almost as many seven-character quatrains as there are regulated five- and seven-character poems combined, but the number o f old-style poems is also not small. T h e favored forms

48. Zhang Hongsheng, Jianghu shipai yanjiu, p. 90. The Sixty Poets is one of the most important extant collections of poems by "Rivers and Lakes" poets.

426

Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes

o f the Late Tang poets and the Four Lings continued to dominate "Rivers and Lakes” practice. T h e poems o f Gao Z h u�高 翥 ( 1 1 7 0 - 1 2 4 1 ) are fairly representative o f the early “Rivers and Lakes,,group.49 Consider, for example, a simple five-character regulated verse poem in the Late Tang manner: Moved by Spring0

感春

Human affairs grow daily more profuse: I did not know that the spring solstice already had arrived. 問梅成綠葉, When I inquired of the plums, they had sent out green leaves. 看杏落紅雲 ° When I looked at the apricots, they had shed their pink cloud [ofblossoms], 燕向晴空語 ’ The swallows twittered from the clear void. 蛙 從 ^ ^�聞。 Frogs were heard in the stillness of the night. 感時傷老大, Moved by the season, I grieve that I age: M ^ f ^ M 熏 ° I sit alone, facing the incense rising from the brazier. 人事曰紛紛, 不知春已分 °

“Moved by Spring” is a quiet, meditative poem where the movement o f the mind is in the reading o f the moment. T h e patterns and images are all well known and acquire their meaning as a reflection o f Gao's sensibility and as part o f his recognition o f his situation. Gao Z h u similarly composed a seven-character quatrain through the careful crafting o f stock images: 秋晚即事�

江頭風葉舞低回� 催得濃雲頃刻開, 萬里碧天紅曰晚� 數聲新臈送寒來1

Event on an Autumn Afternoon51 By the river wind-blown leaves dance high and low: They hasten the dark clouds to suddenly open. From ten thousand li of azure heaven the red sun grows late: Several sounds of the new geese send a coolness here.

49. Zhang Ruijun notes that only about fifty of the poets have enough extant writings to assess meaningfully. He also considers Gao representative. See Zhang R u i j u n , Nan

Song jianghu shipai yanjiu 南 宋 江 湖 詩 派 研 究 ( B e i j i n g :

wenlian chubanshe, 1999), p. 40. 50. QSS 55.2858.34123. 51. QSS 55.2858.34121.

Zhongguo

427 Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes T h e leaves, the long vistas of autumn, a setting sun, and newly arrived geese are commonplaces. T h e "hasten" (cui�催)in the second line and the "send" (song�送)in the fourth, however, are striking phrases that reflect well-honed effort. 52 In addition to the Late Tang style, “Rivers and Lakes" poets also explored earlier old-style forms identified with the Literary Anthology of the Zhaoming Heir Apparent�日3�明 文 選 . T h i s is the group o f styles with which Liu Kezhuang had associated Weng Juan. 53 Yao Yong's 姚 鏞 U s 1217) "Miscellaneous Poem" signals the style with its title and is a good example o f the "Rivers and Lakes" version o f old-style poetry: 雜詩

Miscellaneous Poem54

4匕風曰以勁, 古道無人行 o

The north wind is daily more fierce:55 There are no people traveling on the ancient road.

陽坡樹已黄, 陰崖草猶青� 四時相代謝, 誰爲此枯榮 ° 攬衣坐幽瞪,

On the sunny slope the trees already have yellowed. On the shady bank the grasses are still green.56 The four seasons replace one another: Who through this withers or flourishes? Gathering up my clothes, I sit on secluded rock steps:

下有流泉聲 °

Below is the sound of a flowing spring.

聽之不成調,

Listening to it, it forms no tune,

揺 之 有 餘 清 � [But] scooping it, it has more than ample purity. 悠悠京洛塵 ’ Far, far off, the dust of the capital, 污人頭上纓 0 Sullies the hatstring on one's head.57 52. Zhang Ruijun describes the poem~and the use of these verbs—as representing details in a fresh manner that reveals a sensitivity to nature (Nan Song jianghu shipai yanjiu, pp. 86-87).

53. Zhao Ruhui's preface to the poems of Xue Yu, cited above,begins: "Among those in recent generations who discuss poetry, there is the Anthology style and the

Tang style."「近世論詩有選體’有體。」� 54. QSS 59-3 1o8 -37090. 55- The north wind is a winter wind. 56. The “sunny” side of a mountain or hill is the south-facing side, and the shady is the north-facing side. If one is traveling between banks, then the shady side is to the south of the sunny side. 57. The line alludes to the song sung by the fisherman in the Lyrics ofChu: "When the waters of the Canglang are pure, /1 can wash my hatstring. // When the waters of the Canglang are turbid, /1 can wash my feet."「搶浪之水清兮’可以濯我纓’

滄 浪 之 水 齢 ’ 可 以 濯 我 足 ° 」�

428

Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes

T h e images, the cadences, and the sentiments all are appropriate to the old-style f o r m , or conversely, the f o r m fits w e l l the expressed m o o d o f discontent and distance. T h e landscape here m a y be real, but its significance is overdetermined and emblematic. O n e element that does stand out is Yao Yong's refusal to find a consoling natural music in the sound o f the stream b e l o w him, even t h o u g h he does find recompense in the purity o f the water, w h i c h he w i l l use to w a s h the dirt f r o m his hatstring. 58 DAI FUGU

D a i F u g u w a s perhaps the best poet a m o n g the "Rivers and Lakes" writers aside f r o m Liu Kezhuang. H e was f r o m a clan in H u a n g y a n 黃巖,in Taizhou�台州,whose founder, according to M i n g dynasty records, left Fujian during the turmoil o f the Five Dynasties period. 59 T h e clan began to achieve local prominence w i t h D a i Fugu's greatgrandfather, w h o attained

the jinshi degree

during the X u a n h e reign

period ( 1 1 1 9 - 2 5 ) at the end o f the N o r t h e r n Song. A l t h o u g h n o o n e in his grandfather's generation passed the examination, there w a s a record o f m i n o r service. T h e clan seemingly next produced a jinshi degree-holder w h e n Dai Fugu's grand-nephew passed in 1219,so it clearly maintained enough resources throughout Dai's life to support the education o f its younger generation. D a i Fugu's father made it a point o f pride to refuse to prepare for the examinations and instead devoted himself to poetry. Dai F u g u honored his father's resolve b y not seeking office,but he was o f a footloose disposition. H e traveled extensively and looked for patronage w h e r e he could. Fang H u i considered Dai Fugu's servile use o f poetry to earn a living reprehensible. 60 Dai Fugu's dignity did indeed seem to lapse at times: 58. Yao Yong, despite his expressed distaste for official life, attained the position of prefect, even if—in almost archetypal "Rivers and Lakes” manner~he subsequently offended his superiors and was demoted. In the preface to his poetry collection dated 1235, he explains that after being demoted, he spent his time reading canonical and philosophical texts and came to be ashamed of his earlier poetry, which he now was publishing to acknowledge his error. "Preface to xhtXuepenggao" 《雪蓬稿序》,QS阶334.7688.62. 59. My account comes from the genealogical study of the Dai clan in Dai Fugu, Shiping shici sanbaishou 石屏詩詞三百首,annot. Zhang Keqiu� 張可求 and Wu Maoyun�吳茂雲(Wenling: Jiangsu guji chubanshe, 1993), pp. 190-212. 60. See YKLS 2.20.840.

429 Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes 譚俊明雪中見訪� TanJunming Visits Me in the Snow, and I Ask Him 從而乞米� for Rice61 今日病方起’ Today I just now rise from illness: 君來喜可知。� My delight in your coming can be known. 驢燒搰拙’ In the earthen stove I burn kindling. 瓦釜煮犁祈。� In a crockery pot I boil tofu. 門外雪三尺’ Outside the gate there are three feet of snow. 窗前梅數枝° And before the window, several branches of [flowering] plum.

野夫饑欲死,� 誰與辦晨炊。�

The rustic is hungry and about to die: Who can help him with his morning meal?

Dai Fugu's family managed to persuade him to return home for a time by building a pleasant retreat for him, but he soon felt the urge to set off once more: 62 家居復有江湖之興� Living at Home, I Again Have an Enthusiasm for the Rivers and Lakes65 寒儒家舍只尋常,� The dwelling of this poor scholar is just as always: 破紙窗邊折竹床° Next to the window with ripped paper is a bed of split bamboo. 膽 罕 逢 人 可 語 ,� Engaging things, I rarely encounter people with whom to speak. _多被雨相妨° My seeking out spring mostly is blocked by rain. 庭垂竹葉因思酒’ [Seeing] bamboo leaves hanging in the courtyard,

室有蘭花不炷香。�

I long for ale.

In the room there are orchid blossoms: I do not light incense. 到底閉門非我事,� In the end, closing the gate is not for me: 白鷗心性五湖傍。� The mind and Nature of a white seagull by the Five Lakes.64 However, when Dai Fugu was traveling, he expressed contradictory longings: 61. QSS

54.2814.33490; Shiping shici, p. 60.

62. See "Returning, two poems: my children built a small tower to ease my old age"《歸來二首兒子創/J耀以安老者》,QSS 54.2814-33493; Shiping shici, p. 66. 63. QSS

54.2818.33586; Shiping shici, p. 92.

64. "Five Lakes" is a common phrase but can refer to several different sets of lakes. Perhaps the most likely here is Lake Dongting.

440

Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes

到南昌呈宋愿父伯� Arriving in Nanchang, Shown to Song Yuanfu and His Brothers, and Huang Zilu and Other 仲黄子魯諸丈� Gentlemen65 First of Two 其一� All autumn there has not been a chance to send a 一秋無便寄平安,� note that all is well.

新臈聲聲報早寒。� The new geese, sound after sound, announce the early cold.

昨夜檢衣開故篋’ Last night, gathering my clothes, I opened the old box,

去年家信把來看。� And held last year's letters from home to look at again. :Mr—“

Second of Two

扁舟幾度到南昌,� How many times has my skiff arrived in Nanchang? 東望家山道路長。� I gaze east toward the mountains of home: the road is long.

醉裏不知身是客,� Drunk, I am not aware that I am a traveler: 故人多處亦吾鄕° Where my old friends are many is also my home. These are both quintessential "Rivers and Lakes" sentiments: far from home, the pleasure of the company o f understanding friends counterbalances the loneliness of endless travel, and so one continues on for another season. O n this particular occasion Song Gong, as a jinshi degree-holder living in his hometown, may have been the host, but the rhetoric here is of equality o f status. Although Dai Fugu never participated in the examination system, he, like the other "Rivers and Lakes" poets during Shi Miyuan's long reign as chief councilor, regretted Shi's reluctance to take advantage o f the Jin dynasty's increasing difficulties with the Mongols to reclaim more territory. In contrast to Xiaozong's very open reign, Shi Miyuan tried to contain dissent. Dai Fugu, like others, protested Shi's maneuvers:

65. Huang Shican�黃 師 參 ( Z i l u , js 1220) was from Fujian. Song Gong� 宋 恭� (Yuanfu,j5 1211) was from Nanchang (in modern Jiangxi) and had three brothers. QSS 54.2819.33605.

431 Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes 都 中 次 韵 申 季 山�

車馬喧臨十二門� 樂從閑處度朝昏� 詩書豈爲功名重� 軒冕何如道誼尊� 志士不能行所學� 明君亦或諱忠言� 世間事事如人意� 未必商山有綺園�

In the Capital, Following the Rhymes of Shen Jishan66 The clamor of horses and carriages overlooks the twelve gates.67 It is a delight to pass one's days and nights in leisure. How are poetry and prose valued because of one's meritorious fame [as an official]?68 How are carriages and hats [of high office] more venerable than the Way and duty? A resolute man cannot enact what he has learned. Our enlightened lord also at times shuns loyal words.69 If in our age all affairs went with our intentions, What need would there be for Masters Jili Ji and Dongyuan on Mt. Shang?70

Dai Fugu, writing in the capital for a capital audience, here accuses Shi Miyuan o f preventing loyal protests from reaching the emperor and compares Shi to the First Emperor o f the Q i n dynasty (221 BC206 BC), the violent founder of a short-lived empire. These are highly impolitic lines, the sort of lines for which Shi Miyuan, using the "slanderous poems" in the Rivers and Lakes Collection as an excuse, eventually banned poetry in the capital.71

66. QSS

54.2818.33593; Shiping shici, p. 90.

67. "Twelve gates" is a standard reference to the capital; Chang'an, the Tang capital, had twelve gates. 68. Dai Fugu draws on the standard reading of the phrase�詩書 as the Canons of Poetry and Documents, but he seems to be using the term much more broadly in this context. 69. “Enlightened lord” is perhaps the topic here rather than the subject: "As for our enlightened lord, there also are times when [the high officials] ward off�諱 loyal words [to the lord].,,In either case, the high officials are at fault. 70. The Four Aged Venerables�四浩 retreated to Mt. Shang to cultivate their virtue and avoid the inevitable chaos in a world sullied by the rise of the First Emperor of the Qin dynasty. Jili Ji and Master Dongyuan [East Garden] were two of the four. 71. Dai wrote a similarly blunt "Zhang Duanyi, responding to a summons, submitted a letter [to the throne] and was banished to Qujiang: We met in Ganzhou on New Year's Day."《張端義應詔上書謫曲江正月一曰贛州相遇》,� QSS 54.2815.33517.

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Dai Fugu, like many o f the "Rivers and Lakes" poets, also wrote more nuanced poems expressing concern for the state and the populace that were modeled on Yang Wanli and Lu You and expanded the limits o f the Late Tang style. T h e seven-character quatrain was a popular form for such themes o f loss and grief: 淮 村 兵 後�

/ J i 無 主 自 開 花�

烟草茫茫带曉鴉� 幾處敗垣圍故井� 鄉來一一是人家� 江 陰 浮 遠 堂�

橫岡下瞰大江流�

浮遠堂前萬里愁� 最苦無山遮望眼� 淮南極目盡神州�

A Huai Village after Warfare72 Having no owners, the small peach trees bloom on their own. The broad expanse of mist-shrouded grasses harbors dawn crows.73 In how many places do broken walls encircle old wells? Formerly, one after another was a homestead. Hall ofDrifting into the Distance, inJiangyin74 Looking down from the broad ridge, the great river flows on. Before the Hall of Drifting into the Distance, ten thousand li of grief. Most bitter is that there are no mountains to block the gazing eye: South of the Huai, as far as the eye can see, all is our sacred land.75

72. QSS 54.2819.33596; Shiping shici, p. 127. 73. The verb dai�帶,literally "to encircle,” is difficult to translate and means something like "give them perch here and there.” Dai Fugu repeats the phrase�帶 曉� 嫣 in the line “The garden grove, stripped of leaves, bears dawn crows."「園林带� 曉—」(“FollowingtheRhymesofGuoZixiu,s ‘Traveling at Dawn,”《次—郭子禱� 曉行》),QSS 54.2819.33597. 74. Jiangyin is in modern Jiangsu. The hall was on Lord's Mountain�君山,which overlooks the "Vangzi River and served as a garrison encampment in the Southern Song to defend the northern border. The name of the hall derives from a line by Su Shi: "The river, growing distant, is about to drift to the h e a v e n s , 厂 江 遠 欲 浮 关 」� QSS 54.2819.33596; Shiping shici, p. 127; N i u , Yongjia Siting yu Jianghu shipai xuanji,

pp. 129-30. 75. Zhang Keqiu and Wu Maoyun speculate that the poem was written in 1206 when the Jin armies reached Zhenzhou�真州,on the north shore of the Yangzi River opposite Jiankang (modern Nanjing) after Han Tuozhou's failed northern campaign.

433 Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes Scholars have debated whether the Four Lings o u g h t to be c o n sidered as forerunners o f ~ o r members o f t h e "Rivers and Lakes" group. T h e fact that D a i Fugu was about the same age as the Four Lings and developed his broader style at the time they w e r e assiduously cultivating Late Tang regulated forms suggests not so m u c h that the t w o groups should be viewed separately but that such simple categorization is o f limited use. T h e perspective o f interlinked local and national cultural fields provides flexibility in situating both D a i F u g u and the Four Lings. D a i came f r o m a local elite milieu similar to that o f W e n g J u a n and X u Ji: all three w e r e f r o m clans well established in their localities, even i f \ o n g j i a was more o f a cultural center than H u a n g y a n . A l t h o u g h Late Tang verse already occupied a s o m e w h a t marginal position in the poetic field during the time o f Y a n g Wanli and L u Y o u , the collective style that the Four Lings developed w h e n they returned to Y o n g j i a came to dominate local practice. Ye Shi's arrangem e n t for the publication o f an anthology o f 500 o f their p o e m s then gave t h e m a national audience. 7 6 T h e enthusiastic reception o f their poetry, w i t h its combination o f simplicity, lucidity, and crafting, changed the field o f poetic practice. Dai Fugu, in contrast, left h o m e to find his place in the larger poetic field and apparently spent m u c h o f the 1210s in the capital. 77 L o u Yue�樓鑰(1137-1213),in his 1210 preface to D a i Fugu's first collection, noted that D a i had studied w i t h L u You. 7 8 Like the Four Lings, Dai sought out patrons: L o u Y u e was an elder cultural leader o f seventy-three w h e n he w r o t e his preface. B o t h G u Feng and Z h e n D e x i u then provided colophons for Dai's second collection in 1214,and Z h a o R u d a n g�趙 汝 讜 ( j s 1208) in 1 2 1 9 compiled an anthology o f D a i Fugu's p o e m s J u s t as Ye Shi had arranged the anthology o f poems b y the Four Lings. 79 Because D a i

76. See Wu Qing, Yongjia Siting, p. 6. 77. See Zhang Jiding�張繼定,"Examination of the editors and writers of prefaces for Shiping (part 1): Part 1 of an examination of Dai Fugu's social relations"〈石屏� 詩編選者及序跋作者考述(上)一戴復古交遊考之一〉,Zhejiang Shifandaxue xuebao 浙 江 師 範 大 學 學 報 ( 社 會 f 禪 版 ) 2 8 , no. 6 (2003): p. 15. 78. "Preface to the Shiping Poetry Collectwnn《石歲詩集序》,(35^^264.5951.142. 79. Wang Lan�王 嵐 also devotes a section (pp. 289-314) of Songren wenji bianke liuchuan congkao�宋 人 文 集 編 刻 流 傳 叢 考 ( N a n j i n g : Jiangsu guji chubanshe, 2003) to Dai Fugu's collections.

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Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes

Fugu did not advance a clear, polemical position aimed at shifting the poetic field, he did not have the impact on contemporary practice— at either the local or national level~that the Four Lings achieved, but he did outlive them. H e continued to write in styles that became increasingly important as discontent with Late Tang verse grew, and his prominence in the field o f poetry rose as the shifting dominant positions caught up with him. H e also continued to circulate his poems broadly, and he actively engaged in poetic debates throughout this period. For example, in 1232 w h e n he heard o f discussions in Shaowu� 召 賦 ( i n modern Fujian), Yan Yu's hometown, he went there to j o i n the group and wrote a famous series o f ten quatrains espousing his views. 80 T h e fourth poem in the sequence asserts Dai Fugu's independence:

意匠如神變化生� 筆端有力任縱橫' 須教自我胸中出� 切忌隨人腳後行|

The artisan of intent is like spirit as transformation comes forth: The tip of the brush has strength which I set loose. I must have it come from within my own breast: And stringently avoid following after another's footsteps.81

T h e formulation here is significant in light o f the debates surrounding the Learning o f the Way and poetry. His intentionality ("the artisan o f intent”)dominates, even if, “like spirit," it is not fully understood, and creation flows from within. 80. The series has a long title that explains the event: “The Magistrate of Shaowu, Wang Ziwen [Ye�楚],in the company of Li Jia and Yan Yu,daily observed the poetry of one or two poets from the former generation as well as Late Tang poetry. From this, there was a series o f t e n quatrains discussing poetry: when Ziwen saw them, he stated that they were not very elevated, but they could serve as what beginning students of poetry should know."《邵武太守王子文日與李賈嚴羽共觀前輩一� 兩家詩及•詩因有論詩十絕子文見之謂無甚高論亦可•家小學須知》,QSS 54-2819.33607-08. For details of this time in Shaowu, see Chen Bohai�陳f�白海,Yan Yu he Canglang shihua�嚴羽和涂良詩話(Taibei: Guowen tiandi, 1993, reprint of Shanghai guji ed., 1980), p. 30. Zhang Keqiu and Wu Maoyun provide extensive annotation for the series (pp. 133-35). 81. This stance is hardly original. Huang Tingjian, for example, proclaimed, “In writings I most strongly avoid following after another.”「文章最忌隨人� 後」"Presented to Xie Chang and Wang Boyu”《贈 ffiife王博喻》,HIJS/Z 5.1720,� QSS 17.1021.11677.

435 Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes T h e eighth poem in the series stresses that this process o f creation draws from nameless depths to encompass all external phenomena and is driven by an inner movement o f response that defies understanding: 詩本無形在窃冥,

Poetry at root formlessly resides in obscure depths.

網羅天地運吟清 °

Enmeshing Heaven and Earth, it stirs lyric feelings:

有時,忽得驚人句,

At times I suddenly get a line that startles people.

費盡尤、機做不成 °

[At others], I exhaust the workings of my mind with no success.

This sense o f the mystery o f creativity~the coming and going o f ease and difficulty~had been part o f the Chinese tradition since L u j i ' s “Fu on Literature"《文賦》.Still, Dai Fugu's idea o f the self as the locus o f creation~with all movement seemingly going outward, rather than the world impinging on the self—conforms to the Daoxue models o f the mind. T h e best-known quatrain in the series is the fifth, which affirms the moral status o f poetry as an expression o f the Nature within:

陶寫性if爲我事� 留連光景等兒嬉�

"Molding the Nature and its feelings" is my task. "Tarrying with the landscape" equals a child's amusement.

錦囊言語雖奇絕� 不是人間有用詩�

The phrases in your brocade bag may be extraordinary,82 But they are not poems useful in the human realm.

O n e final example, the sixth quatrain, shows the continuing status o f the “serious,,poets o f the High Tang. Yan Yu, w h o participated in the discussions out o f which Dai Fugu's series arose, famously argued that poetry after the High Tang was barely worthy o f consideration. However, his impact, like that o f the Four Lings, was in the narrowness and corresponding force with which he advanced his position: 82. "Brocade bag" draws from Li Shangyin's account of the Mid-Tang poet Li He—known for the craft and effort he devoted to poetry~~who had a servant accompany him with a brocade bag into which he would toss whatever scraps of poetic wording came to him. He would then revise these into complete poems when he returned home.

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Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes

the H i g h Tang already was very much in the background o f “Rivers and Lakes" poetry: 飄零憂國杜陵老 ’ Blown about, sorrowing for the state, the old man of Duling; 感寓傷時陳子昂 °

“Moved by what he encounters,,,lamenting the times, Chen Ziang.83

近日不聞秋鶴唳‘

In recent days one does not hear the cry of the autumn crane:

亂 蟬 無 斜 陽 。

Chaotic cicadas, countless, din in the declining sun.

A n opportunity to write on the state o f poetry invites a certain amount o f posturing, but Dai Fugu here chooses to align himself with the grand tradition o f D u Fu and C h e n Ziang� 陳 子 昂 ( 6 6 l 702),isolated poets lamenting the troubles o f their age, adrift amidst the rivers and lakes, ineffectual in their o w n day but honored in history. Dai Fugu in his poetry did not attempt to restore the difficult density o f D u Fu's late style or C h e n Ziang's militantly old-style verse. Nonetheless, in defining the place o f poetry in the larger field o f cultural production, Dai's affirmation o f D u Fu's seriousness— missing in the Late Tang style advocated by the Four Lings but expressed by Dai in poems like “A Huai Village after Warfare"一adds an important moral component to his w o r k and to that o f the other major “Rivers and Lakes” poets.

Liu Kezhuang After the publication o f Liu Kezhuang's first collection, Ye Shi presented Liu as the next leader in the field o f poetry. In the "account o f conduct" Lin Xiyi� 林希逸(1193-?)wrote after Liu Kezhuang's death, Lin describes Liu not only as the leader o f poetry in his time but also as the presiding master o f both parallel and old-style prose forms. 84 For most o f Liu's long life he was a central cultural figure, 83. The “old man of Duling” is D u Fu. Chen Ziang�陳子昂(661—702) wrote poems that became a series entitled “Moved by What I Encountered”《感遇》that looked back to the seriousness and simplicity of the early poetic tradition. 84. Lin Xiyi, “Song Longtugexueshi zeng yinqingguangludafu shidushangshu Houcun Liu gong z h u a n g " 《 宋 龍 圖 閣 學 士 贈 銀 青 光 祿 大 夫 侍 讀 尙 書 後 村 劉 公� 狀》,QS阶336.7739.32.

437 Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes first as a poet o f the "Rivers and Lakes" and then as an important official w h o held fast both to his earlier poetic values and to equally long-standing Daoxue commitments. 8 5 Moreover, Liu Kezhuang was the major theorist a m o n g the "Rivers and Lakes" writers. H e wrote not only a substantial corpus o f prefaces and colophons but also a long shihua: these texts collectively set out a coherent poetics in w h i c h Liu confronted the limitations o f the Learning o f the Way.86 Liu argued that Daoxue was not j u s t w r o n g in its assessment o f poetry but in its understanding o f the feelings, identity, language, and meaning that underlie the power o f poetry. H e believed his poetics offered alternative accounts consistent w i t h Daoxue ontology and ethics but truer to human experience. T h i s synthesis, transforming both poetry and the Learning o f the Way to make them mutually compatible, had great appeal to the larger world o f elite culture and contributed to his authority and centrality. FROM PUTIAN TO THE NATIONAL STAGE

Liu Kezhuang came from a local elite background in Putian�莆 田 in Fujian that was similar to that o f X u J i and W e n g j u a n in Yongjia and 85. The two major pioneering scholarly monographs on Liu Kezhuang are Cheng Zhangcan's�程 章 燒 excellent chronology of his life and works, Liu Kezhuang nianpu�赛1J�克莊年譜(Guiyang: Guizhou renmin chubanshe, 1993), and Xiang Yixian's�向以鮮 Chaoyue Jianghu de shiren~Liu Houcun�超 越 江 湖 的 詩 人 _ 後 村� (Chengdu: Bashu shushe, 1995). In the past decade, however, five other important monographs have appeared. Two focus primarily on Liu's poetics: Wang Mingjian 王明見,Liu Kezhuang yu Zhongguo shixie�劉克莊與中國詩學(Chengdu: Bashu shushe, 2004), and WangXijiu�王錫九,Liu Kezhuang shixue yanjiu�麥_J克莊詩學研究� (Hefei: Huangshan shushe, 2007). WangYu�王宇 in Liu Kezhuang yu Nansotig xueshu 劉克莊與南宋學術(Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 2007) has attempted to find out all that can be known about the early influences on Liu Kezhuang's thought and poetry to properly situate his oeuvre. Two other works take a broader approach to Liu's poetry and poetics: Jing Honglu�景紅錄,Liu Kezhuang shige yanjiu�劉克莊詩歌研究� (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 2007) and Wang Shuyao�王述堯,Liu Kezhuang yu Nansong houqi wenxue yanjiu�劉克莊與南宋後期文學研究(Shanghai: Dongfang chuban zhongxin, 2008). In 2008 Sichuan University also published a punctuated, collated edition of Liu Kezhuang's complete works edited by Wang Ron^ui�王 蓉 貴� and Xiang Yixian 向以鮮 titled Houcun xiansheng daquanji & (Chengdu: Sichuan daxue chubanshe, 2008). 86. Wang Xiumei� 王 秀 梅 produced an important edition of Liu Kezhuang's shihua in 1983: Houcun shihua�後村詩話(Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1983).

438

Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes

Dai Fugu in Huangyan. 87 Tracing Liu's clan in Putian before Liu Shigu�劉師古,who attained the jinshi in 1027,proves difficult. T h e clan began its rise to prominence with his great-grandfather Liu Bing�劉炳,who was awarded the post o f Court Gentleman o f Instruction. 88 His grandfather, Liu Su, passed the jinshi in 1150, was appointed an assistant editorial director, and rose to serve as prefect o f Q u z h o u� 衢州,while Liu Su's younger brother, Liu Shuo� 劉 朔� (1127—70),placed first in the jinshi examination o f 1160. Liu Kezhuang's father, Liu Mizheng� 劉 彌 正 ( 1 1 5 7 - 1 2 1 3 ) , passed the jinshi in 1181 • Even as successive generations achieved success in attaining national office, they still preserved strong local roots. Liu Su and Liu Shuo, for example, were students o f Lin Guangchao�林光朝(1114一� 78), a Daoxue scholar w h o had retired to Putian to teach.89 T h e legacy o f Lin's activities in Putian~his instruction o f local students and refusal to commit his teachings to print~gave Daoxue positions to the local cultural field that were distinct from those emerging elsewhere. Liu Kezhuang grew up in that tradition: as a child, he studied under both a nephew o f Lin Guangchao and under the son o f one o f Lin's primary students. Liu Kezhuang's friend Lin Xiyi was the last major inheritor of Lin Guangchao's scholarly tradition before it simply disappeared, displaced by Z h u Xi's efforts to establish his teachings in Fujian.90 Still, the difference between the local milieu and the national cultural field revealed in Liu Kezhuang's commitment to Lin Guangchao's lineage gave Liu a rooted intellectual independence when he subsequently studied with Z h e n Dexiu. 91

87. Clark, Portrait of a Community, pp. 142-47, discusses Liu Kezhuang and his clan in the context of the larger local elite network in the Mulan valley in Fujian. 88. The office of ocuanjiao lang�宣教良P indicates a rank of 8b in the 9-rank system (Hucker, p. 250). 89. WangYu, Liu Kezhuang yu Nansong xueshu, devotes an entire chapter to Lin, his scholarly tradition, and its relation to Liu Kezhuang (pp. 15-58). 90. See Clark's account, Portrait of a Community, pp. 248-54. 91. Liu Kezhuang has many texts that record his respect for the Putian tradition of Lin and his two primary students, Lin Yizhi� 之 ( 1 1 3 6 - 8 5 , style-name Gangshan�綱山)and Chen Zao�陳 藻 ( f l . 1185,style-name Lexuan�樂軒).See, for example, “The Account of the Shrine to the Three Masters of Rampart Mountain” 《城山三先生祠記》(HCJ 5.90.2332-34; QSW 330.7601.275-77); “Preface to

439 Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes Although he acknowledged Z h e n as a great scholar and moral exemplar, they could not agree about poetry and about the range o f emotional experience that could be encompassed by Daoxue. In 1202,after his initial schooling in Putian, Liu Kezhuang accompanied his father to Linchuan, where his father had been appointed the county magistrate. Two years later his father was transferred to the capital, and Liu entered the Directorate o f Education school (國子監)• Liu Kezhuang thus was in Hangzhou in 1206 during Han Tuozhou's campaign against the Jin, its failure, Han's execution, and the beginning o f the long era o f Shi Miyuan's control o f government. Liu Kezhuang remained in the capital until 1209 when, having failed the qualifying examination for the jinshi several times, he relied on yin privilege to attain appointment as registrar in Jing'an� 靖 安 ( i n modern Jiangxi), a typical first assignment. H e set out for his new post in 1210 and remained there until shortly before his father's death in 1213,upon which he returned to Putian to observe mourning. In 1215 he received another post, but by early 1217 he had joined the staff o f Li Jue� 李EE, the military commissioner (Jiang Huai zhizhishi� 江 淮 制 置 使 ) i n Jinling�金 陵 ( m o d e r n Nanjing). However, in 1219,after a Jin incursion, Liu received part o f the blame for failures in military preparedness and subsequently asked to be reassigned to a sinecure back in Putian. Liu Kezhuang received the nominal post of guardian at the Nanyue Temple and remained in Putian until early 1222, w h e n he reluctantly accepted a staff position in Guilin. In the meantime, his first volume o f poems, the Nanyue Draft Collection (南摄稿),was published and was extremely well received. Back in Putian by the end o f the year, he then made his way back to the capital for reassignment. In 1225 C h e n Q i included his poems in the Rivers and Lakes Collection, and Liu received the post of magistrate o f Jianyang. But the political turmoil attendant on Ningzong's death, Lizong's contested succession, and Shi Miyuan's effort to suppress dissent soon the Aixuan Collection”《艾軒集序》(HCJ 5.94.2430-31; QSW 329.7566.84-85);� "Preface to the Gangshan Collection”《綱[I|集序》(fICJ 5.95.2452-53; QSW 329.7567.105-6); “Preface to the Lexuan Collection”《凑軒集序 J (HCJ 5.95.245354; Q5329.7567.106-7)�; and a preface to Lin Xiyi's poetry, “Preface to Bamboo Creek's Poetry"《竹溪詩序》(HC/5.94.243B-39; QS职329.7566.92^93)•

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intervened in Liu's slow rise in the bureaucracy. In 1227, Shi and his supporters discovered the slanderous poems in the Rivers and Lakes Collection, including two by Liu Kezhuang. T h e book was banned, its printing blocks destroyed, and the offending author and C h e n Q i were banished. Liu, however, was protected by Z h e n g Qingzhi� 鄭 清� 之 ( 1 1 7 6 - 1 2 5 1 ) and other high officials: he received merely yet another sinecure temple guardianship at home w h e n he finished his tour as magistrate in Jianyang in 1228. H e remained there until early 1234. T h u s during the twenty-four years between 1210 and 1234, Liu spent thirteen years in Putian. This pattern, despite its seeming succession o f very particular mishaps, was not unusual. 92 In being demoted to a sinecure for political reasons, however, Liu blended Daoxue moral commitments with the “Rivers and Lakes” concern for personal purity and resolve either to not strive for power or, in his particular case, to let it go. In 1233, a new era began when Shi Miyuan died. Lizong took on direct responsibility for rule, and Z h e n g Qingzhi was appointed chief councilor. Z h e n Dexiu and Wei Liaoweng were recalled to the capital, and the ban on poetry was lifted. Liu Kezhuang, too, returned to the capital, but his Daoxue commitments continued to damage his career. After receiving a regional posting, he was promoted to a capital position in 1235 but wasted little time in using the opportunity to write a memorial that criticized the moral character o f high officialdom and sought justice for the Prince o fJi w h o m Lizong had displaced. B y the next spring, having thus made enemies, Liu found himself again the guardian o f a temple. In 1237 he was appointed prefect ofYuanzhou�袁 州 ’ but that autumn, having been impeached for stirring up public opinion against the current chief minister, he returned home once more. In late 1239 he received a regional

92. Describing the careers of two members of the Mulan Valley local elite among whom Liu Kezhuang grew up, for example, Clark observes, "Although [Fu] Qi and [Fu] Min had their own public careers, neither matched the successes of their fathers. In fact, they were probably far more typical of the men who filled the lowest ranks of the bureaucracy than either their fathers or the great figures whose biographies fill so many of the standard sources. Rather than lives of public service interrupted by brief periods between appointments, theirs were the lives of local gentry marked by brief periods of public service" (Portrait of a Community, p. 133).

441 Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes appointment as a supervisory official (提舉)in the Guangdong circuit, acquitted himself well, and was promoted to be a fiscal commissioner (轉運使)there, but in 1241 he was impeached again and found himself back in Putian. In 1244, with a Daoxue advocate serving as minister, Liu returned to service as a judicial commissioner (提刑)in the Jiangdong�江 東 circuit and in 1246 was recalled to the capital for a court appointment. O n c e again, however, he attacked moral failings at court and was demoted to a temple guardianship at home. W h e n Z h e n g Qingzhi returned as a chief councilor in 1247,Liu, now sixty years old, was called back and managed to stay in high o f f i c e ~ w i t h some time spent mourning his mother's death~through 1264. During this time, however, he largely served in yet another sinecure as supervisor of the Mingdao Temple ( 明 道� 宮提舉),a post granted to important but aging officials. 93 As this quick survey suggests, Liu Kezhuang during the last thirty years o f his career took on the role o f the unbending, unflinching Daoxue official and seemingly accomplished little through it. H o w ever, focusing on the interlinked fields of cultural production in which court officials like Liu Kezhuang participated offers a different locus o f action within which to assess his life. As the preeminent writer o f Lizong's reign, Liu Kezhuang brought his own particular synthesis o f local elite values, Daoxue integrity, and the writer's craft to a large national audience. H e provided his broad audience with a body o f work through which the literary, philosophical, and official fields o f culture could reposition themselves to reinforce one another. This was no small accomplishment. POETICS: NATURE, FEELINGS, AND FORM

For Liu Kezhuang, poetics was practical. It was an attempt to explain—and, for students, to guide一the process of writing poetry.

93. During his final years, Liu Kezhuang supported Jia Sidao�賈fljtifi (1213-75), who had become the chief minister in 1259. Since later writers blamed the surrender o f the Southern Song to the Mongols on Jia, they interpreted Liu's support for him as debased fawning before an unworthy and corrupt official. Thus Liu's biography was excluded from the Song History when it was compiled. For a discussion of the issues, see the appendix in Wang Shuyao, Liu Kezhuang yu Nan Song houqi wenxue yanjiu, pp. 304-7.

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Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes

His understanding o f poetry, however, changed significantly from his dissatisfied and restless youth to equally dissatisfied maturity. In part, his poetics sets out what he learned. In the preface to the collection o f W e n g D i n g�翁 定 ( n . d . ) , an early friend, Liu describes his own transformation as a poet: Among poets in recent years, only Zhao Zhangquan [Fan�蕃 ( 1 1 4 3 1229)] in his five-character verse has attained the intent of Tao [Qian] and Ruan [Ji], and only Zhao Tazhong [Rudang�汝讜]can compose in Wei [Yingwu's] style. Even if the writers ofYongjia exhausted their strength in running after them, they could barely see the hedge ofJia Dao and \ao He. My poetry was the same. Ten years ago I started to dislike it and was going to stop writing Tang regulated verse and strictly compose in old-style forms.94 Zhao Nantang [Rutan�汝談] asserted that this was wrong and explained, "Whether the wording or intent is deep or shallow resides in one's breast and is not bound to the verse form. If one's temperament is expansive, even Tang regulated verse will not harm one in producing the tones of the Huangzhong and Dalu.95 If not, then even if one plays [a zither] from Yunhe [Mountain], the startling whirlwind and thunder will remain hidden amidst the strings and plectrum.”961 was moved by his words and ceased [with my intent].97

94. Later in the preface, Liu speaks of having known Weng Ding for thirty years. Cheng Zhangcan, in Liu Kezhuang nianpu,calculates from another source that Liu first met Weng in 1204 (p. 15). Thus Liu's change of heart occurred around 1224, although both the “ten” and the “thirty” are perhaps general rather than precise numbers. 95. These are the first two pitches in the twelve-tone scale. Huangzhong is the first yang tone, and dalu the first yin. 96. The Rites ofZhou�周禮 mention that the zithers from Yunhe Mountain, when played on the winter solstice on a round mound on the ground, could bring the gods to accept ritual o f f e r i n g . 「 孤 竹 之 管 ’ 雲 和 之 琴 瑟 , 冬 曰 至 , 於 地 上 圜 丘� 奏 之 。 」 T h i s reference led scholars to connect the zither with the earliest ritual music. See, for example, the poem by Qian Q i�錢起(fl. 751): “The Xiang Spirit plays the Zither’,《湘靈鼓瑟》:"She played well the Yunhe zither, / having once heard the Thearch's daughters' spirits.”「善鼓雲和瑟’嘗聞帝子靈。」(QTS 8.238.2651). The Thearch (di) is the sage emperor Yao, whose two daughters married Shun and threw themselves into the Xiang River on Shun's death. “Thearch,, here attempts to capture the uncertainty whether Qian is referring to Yao,s status while alive or his god-like status after he joined the ancestors on high upon his death. 97. “Preface to the Melon Garden Collection"《瓜圃集序》,HCJ 5.94.2427-28; QSP^329.7565.8i-82.

443 Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes 近歲詩人惟趙章泉五言有陶、阮意,趙蹈中能爲韋體,如永嘉諸� 人極力馳驟〔一〕,纔望姚合之藩而已。余詩亦然。十年前始自� 厭之,欲息唐律,專造古體。趙南塘不謂然,其說曰,「言意深� 淺,存人胸懷,不繫體格。若氣象廣大,雖唐律不害爲黃鐘、大� 呂,否則手操雲和,而驚飇駭電隱隱絃撥間也。」余感其言而� 止。� In a much later preface for a revised and expanded anthology o f poems by Z h a o Gengfu�趙 庚 夫 ( 1 1 7 3 - 1 2 1 9 ) , another early friend, Liu continues to express regret at the narrowness o f his initial sensibility:98 At first I requested that Nantang [Zhao Rutan] select [Zhao] Zhongbo,s poems, but he turned the task over to me: I strenuously declined to no avail. Nantang's poetic criticism was habitually severe, and I was yet more bound by prosody. Each time I selected or rejected a piece, I went over it several times before deciding. If a piece as a whole was fine but a single word or half a line was a problem, I would not record it, and so the collection had only one hundred pieces." Ten years or more later Nantang's view had loosened somewhat, but I was bound by prosody as before.100

始余請南塘選仲白詩,南塘更以屬余,苦辭不獲。南塘詩評素� 嚴,而余尤縛律,每去取一篇常三往返然後定,有全篇皆善而爲� 一字半句所累者皆不錄,故集止百篇。後十餘年〔二〕,見南塘� 持論稍寬〔三〕,惟余縛律如故。� Liu explains in the next part of the preface that, after another twenty years, he was asked to look again at Zhao's poetry to compile a supplementary anthology. At that point, Liu suffered pangs o f guilt in realizing that, constrained by his own narrow sensibilities, he had not properly appreciated Zhao's poetry on his first effort: The "Airs of the States,,,‘‘Encountering Sorrow," and the Anthology did not set one single style. Only on reaching Shen [Yue]沈約� (441-513) and Xie [Tiao] did poetry start to be constrained by tonal 98. For an account of Liu Kezhuang's relation with Zhao, see Xiang Yixian, Chaoyue Jianghu de shiren, pp. 38-40.

99. At the end of the preface, Liu notes that he compiled the first anthology when he was thirty-twoi.e., in 1219~and the second when he was sixty-seven (1254). 100. "Preface to the Shanzhong bieji [Supplemental Collection],’《山中另!I集序》,� HCJ 5.96.2479; Q S P ^ 3 2 9 . 7 5 6 8 . 1 2 7 - 2 8 .

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Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes

value. The transformation of poetry was a decline in poetry. [Zhao] Zhongbo's aim was always to return to Qi and Liang dynasty [poetry] and then go back to Jian'an and Huangchu, to shed the Late Tang and pursue Kaiyuan and Dali, to lodge his elevated and far-reaching [feelings] in long pieces and express his refinement and breadth in short verse in order to exhaust the marvelous [within].

蓋《國風》、《騷》、《選》不主一體,至沈、謝始拘平厌,詩� 之變,詩之衰也。仲白之志,常欲歸齊、梁而返建安、黃初,蛻� 晚唐而追開元、大曆,於古體寓其高遠於大篇,發其精博於短� 章,窮其要眇。� T h e preface makes three closely related points that are at the heart o f Liu Kezhuang's mature poetics. First, poetry is to express substantial qualities o f the self. Second, these qualities ideally are o f sufficient diversity so as to not be encompassed by a single manner o f external representation. And finally, the wide range o f historically evolved forms can indeed express the myriad worthy facets o f the self. All three commitments distinguished Liu Kezhuang from his contemporaries, but the conflict he encountered concerning the first~poetry as expression of the self~did not center on the proposition itself but on the question o f what in the self was worthy o f expression. T h e debate about the range o f emotions and intentions suitable for poetry arose sharply and famously in Liu Kezhuang's disagreement with Z h e n Dexiu about the poems to include in the Orthodox Lineage ofWritings. In 1228 Z h e n Dexiu, in an act that demonstrated his continued support o f Liu after the impeachment for slander, asked Liu to take responsibility for the section on poetry in the Orthodox Lineage of Writings. This assignment did not turn out well. Liu included a letter explaining his selections to Z h e n Dexiu w h e n he sent the volume of poems he proposed, but Z h e n disagreed with many o f his choices. 101 Liu Kezhuang late in life explained: 102 When the Orthodox Lineage of Writings was in its inception, Master Xishan ("West Mountain") assigned to me the task of compiling the poetry and stipulated that ethical value and regulation of the populace 101. The letter is "Wuzi da Zhen shilang lun xuan shi shu"《戊子答真侍郎論選� 詩書》,HCJ 6.128.3361-64; Q5^328.7557.367-69. 102. Houcun shihua, former collection《後村詩話》,HCJ 8.173.4419-20. Liu Kezhuang wrote the "former collection” of the shihua between sixty and seventy sui (i.e., fifty-nine to sixty-nine years old).

445 Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes were primary. Categories like Daoist immortals, Buddhists, boudoir sentiments, and palace laments were not to be selected. I selected Han emperor Wu's “Song of the Autumn Wind," but Master Xishan said, "Master Wenzhong took these lyrics to be the sprouts of�卩ater] regret: how is he not right?"103 He intended to not accept it; he was that strict. However, the words “I hold the fair one by the hand, ho, and cannot forget" surely refer to his retinue of officials and seem not to have been set out for the [women of] the rear palace. O f all that I had selected, Master Xishan removed more than half. He also added many more poems by Tao [Qian] but accepted few by the three Xies.104

《文章正宗》初萌芽,西山先生以詩歌一門屬予編類’且約以世� 教民彝爲主,如仙釋閨情宫怨之類,皆勿取。予取漢武帝《秋風� 辭》,西山曰,文中子亦以此辭爲悔心之萌,豈其然乎。意不欲� 収,其嚴如此。然所謂『攜佳人兮不能忘』之語,蓋指公卿羣臣� 之扈從者,似非爲後宫設。凡予所取而西山去之者太半,又增入� 陶詩甚多,如三謝之類,多不入。� In spite o f Z h e n Dexiu's objections, Liu Kezhuang persisted through his life in maintaining the legitimacy o f intimate emotions in morally exemplary poetry. O n e important statement appears in the preface to an anthology o f Tang and Five Dynasties quatrains that Liu compiled: When my child first started school, I began to select five- and sevencharacter quatrains, 100 poems of each type, to teach him orally. I did not reject any poem that precisely captured the feeling and attained the principle, even if by a common fellow or a poor woman. If the poem failed, I would not record those of even important grandees and writers. Only Li [Bai] and Du [Fu] should be discussed separately. My child asked, "Formerly Du Mu criticized Yuan [Zhen] and Bai [Juyi] for teaching licentiousness, but now among what you have selected are many poems of frontier emotions, spring longings, and palace laments.105 Is this right?" I replied, "The ‘Great Preface' to the Canon of Poetry states, ‘[The poems] come from feelings and Nature and stop within the rites and duty,Poetry ancient and modern attains this and stops. Now Heavenly principle will not permit what comes from feelings and Nature to vanish, and the sage brush cannot excise

103. "Master Wenzhong” was Wang Tong�王通(580-617), an important Sui dynasty (581-618) Confucian scholar. 104. The three Xies were Xie Lingyun, Xie Huilian, and Xie Tiao. 105. Poems of "frontier emotions,’ are those written in the voice of conscripts sent to the border or their wives remaining back home.

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what stops within the rites and duty. My young one should remember this.”106

余家童子初入塾,始選五七言各百首口授之。切情詣理之作’匹� 士寒女不棄也,否則巨人作家不錄也。惟李、杜當別論。童子請� 曰,「昔杜牧譏元、白誨淫,今所取多邊情春思宮怨之什,然� 乎?」余曰,《詩》大序曰,「發乎情性,止乎禮義」,古今詩� 至是而止o夫發乎性情者,天理不容泯,止乎禮義者,聖筆不能� 刪也。小子識之。� H o w e v e r , even if Liu Kezhuang was not as strict a Daoxue

proponent

as Z h e n Dexiu, he remained committed to its fundamental tenets, including the proposition that the Nature in itself is good and universally shared by all people through all time. Liu Kezhuang, reflecting on all the pointless poetry o f his day, argues that if one cannot actually touch the realities o f human experience based o n the inner N a t u r e and its responses, one is not writing poetry: Since the time of the Four Lings, everyone in the realm is a poet, and it seems that poetry in fact is easy. Yet poets are many but good lines few, and thus [poetry] seems very difficult. Why? I once stated that taking the Nature and feelings, rites and duty as the basis, and birds and beasts, plants and trees as material is the poetry of the bard. Taking books as the basis and allusions as material is the poetry of the man of letters. In our age are men of seclusion and officials constrained by service who sing out in their hunger, and their wording is the wonder of the age. There also are great scholars and grand teachers who dominate the cultural realm but have no calling for poetry. Truly this matter cannot be compelled.107

自四靈後,天下皆詩人,詩若果易矣’然詩人多而佳句少,又若� 甚難’何歟。余嘗謂’以情性禮義爲本,以鳥獸草木爲料’風人� 之詩也。以書爲本,以事爲料’文人之詩也。世有幽人羈士,饑� 餓而鳴,語出妙一世’亦有碩師鴻儒宗主斯文而於詩無分者’信� 此事之不可勉強歟。� Liu Kezhuang, stepping back in the essay to consider the varieties o f poetry, then concludes that the universality o f N a t u r e in genuine poetry grounds the unity underlying all transformations o f form:

106. "Preface to [a Collection of] Tang Pentasyllabic and Heptasyllabic Quatrains”《唐五七言絕句序》,QSW329.7566.97-98; HCJ 5.94.2443-44. 107. “Colophon to the Poetry of He Qian"《跋何謙詩》’ HQf 5.106.2735; QSW 329.7582.365.

447 Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes Now, since the "Airs of the States,” "Encountering Sorrow, the Anthology, theJade Terrace, and the Barbarian [Music] Bureau, down to the Tang and Song, there have been many transformations.108 Yet the transformations have been in the form of the poem: what has not changed through the millennia are the Nature and feelings. How can your Nature and feelings differ from mine?

夫自《國風》、《騷》、《選》、《玉臺》、胡部至於唐、宋,� 其變多矣。然變者詩之體製也,歷千年萬世而不變者,人之情性� 也,君之情性豈與余異哉。� If one is to draw upon a Nature that all alike share to write poetry, what happens to the particularity of one's own identity? This question reflects the problem of the status of the self in Daoxue, and Liu Kezhuang proposes an answer that echoes post-Zhu X i Daoxue responses: Someone said, ‘‘The writings of the ancients came forth from the Nature and feelings, while the writings of later men were nothing more than overmastering one another with their strength of character [qili�氣力].” I replied, "It is not like this. Now the rocks of Great Lake and Lingbi are lovely in their luster, and Mount Lu and the Yandang Mountains soar upwards ten thousand feet and sweep the void with their aquamarine hues. The sweetleaf and narcissus are praised for their secluded tranquility, while the great pine and ancient cypress are entirely without allure yet become striking through their jutting and soaring. You should strive harder: the Nature and feeling are what we all share, but your strength of character is yours alone. What one possesses alone is hard to compel while what we all share is easy to reach."109

或曰,古人之作由性情而發,後人之作以氣力相雄而已。余曰,� 不然。夫太湖靈璧玲瓏可愛,而匡廬、雁蕩’拔起萬仞,紫翠掃� 空。山礬水僳,幽澹見賞,而喬松古柏絕無芳艷,直以槎牙突兀� 爲奇爾。君益勉之,性情人之所同,氣力君之所獨,獨者難彊而� 同者易至也。�

108. The Hubu was a Tang dynasty court bureau for learning and performing the music of the various non-Chinese cultures on the border with China. Northwestern seminomadic groups were the most important. 109. “Colophon to the Poems of Zhao Kui”《騰戣詩卷》,HCJ 5.101.261617; QSW^329.7576.248.

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Liu Kezhuang here not only sees no contradiction between particularity o f character and the universality o f Nature and feelings: he sees real value in conveying the distinctiveness o f the self For Liu Kezhuang, the challenges one confronts in composition are first to acknowledge the genuine responses arising from within and then to give them adequate representation. Like Su Shi in the Northern Song, Liu appropriates Confucius' phrase "have the wording convey it and that is all,,to stress the pragmatic difficulty and necessity o f finding the right words. He thus advises a young writer: Other people's writings simply have many words and few intentions, while your pieces, plain and reticent, do not reveal any dazzle. If one slowly savors them, they have depth and distance. Is it not that your wording is insufficient, while you have a surplus of intentions? Intent is the root and wording the branch, yet the saying of the tradition of the sage is that one should "have the wording convey it and that is all," and that “one is a rustic if the substance overwhelms the external pattern." How can wording be slighted?110 他 人 之 作 率 是 辭 多 意 少 ’ 惟 君 篇 什 簡 質 涵 蓄 , 不 現 光 怪 。 徐 玩 味� 之 , 悠 然 深 長 , 寧 不 足 於 辭 而 有 餘 於 意 。 意 , 本 也 。 辭 , 末 也 。� 然 聖 門 之 論 , 曰 「 辭 達 而 已 矣 」 , 又 曰 「 質 勝 文 則 野 」 , 辭 亦 豈� 可少哉

。�

Even though Liu Kezhuang in this colophon cajoles a morally committed student to take language seriously, he holds fast to his Daoxue commitments to affirm a core belief that "intention is the root and wording the branch." 111 Poetry is about intentions arising from the basis o f Nature, feelings, rites, and duty. Poetic meaning, that is, comes from the human order within the self, and the domain o f a priori coherence upon which the aesthetic intuitions o f poetry operate is that o f Nature. The external realm o f phenomena~"birds 110. "Colophon to the Poems of Zhang Wenxue"《跋張文學詩卷》,HCJ 5.111.2895; Q W 330.7591.95. Zhang Zhongjie�張 仲 節 was from Jian'an�建 安 in Fujian. 111. Most contemporary scholars of Liu Kezhuang's poetics deal at length with the topic of Liu's commitment to the Learning of the Way. See Wang Mingjian, Liu Kezhuang yu Zhongguo shixie, pp. 61-74; W a n g X i j i u , Liu Kezhuang shixue yanjiu,

PP. 39-44 and 135-62; WangYu, Liu Kezhuang yu Nan Song xueshu, pp. 15-58 and 121-55; Jing Honglu, Liu Kezhuang shige yanjiu, pp. 3-63; and Shi Mingqing, Lixue wenhua yu Nansong shixue, pp. 260-78.

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and beasts, plants and trees"—is the material for intuitions about particular qualities o f intention that reveal the self. Correspondingly, Yang Wanli's creative category of xing, by which Heaven intrudes into the human world, simply disappears. T h e term appears only once in 112 the 285 pages o f Liu Kezhuang's shihua. THE POETRY OF INTENTION

There were sixteen juan o f poetry in the edition o f Liu Kezhuang's work published in 1248 when he was sixty-one. T h e final version o f his collection published after his death in 1269 contained 4,385 poems in forty-eight juan: he wrote approximately two-thirds o f his poetry in his last twenty-one years and one-quarter o f his poetry in his last seven years in retirement. 113 O n the occasion o f his eightieth birthday, Liu wrote: 八十吟十絶其/V

A Chanting ofBeing Eighty, Ten Quatrains, no. 8114

誠翁僅有四千首,

[Yang] Chengzhai has just four thousand poems.

惟放翁幾滿萬篇�

It's [Lu] Fangweng who fills out almost ten thousand pieces. In this old man's breast there is remnant brocade: I ask Heaven, b e t i n g to be given Fangweng's years.

老子胸中有殘錦� 問天乞與放翁年�

Despite the heroic productivity of Liu Kezhuang's final years, however, the major developments in his poetry and his major impact as a poet both belong to his earlier w o r k 1 1 5 112. Liu praised Chen Zi'ang: “Reading him causes one to have the incitement (xing) in which one's vision empties out the four seas and one's spirit roams the eight directions.,,「讀之使人有眼空四海神遊八極之興」Even this usage is closer to the Daoxue sense of xing as an activation within the mind than to Yang Wanli's view o f xing as an unanticipated response to events (HCJ 8.173.4421). 113. See Wang Shuyao, Liu Kezhuang yu Nansong houqi wenxue yanjiu’ pp. 14 and 84,and Jing Honglu, Liu Kezhuang shige yanjiu, pp. 150-55. 114. QSS 58.3070.36625; HCJ 38.1016. Also see Xiang, Chaoyue Jianghu de shiren~Liu Houcun, p. 242. 115. A major theme in Wang Shuyao's study is the scholarly neglect of Liu Kezhuang's later poetry. He acknowledges that Liu's fifty-juan collection of 1248 had a far broader circulation than the posthumous collection but still urges scholars to devote more attention to the late work. I confess that I sympathize with Xiang Yixian, who laments Liu's determination to equal Lu You in quantity (p. 242).

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Although Liu Kezhuang lamented the narrowness o f the Late Tang style that dominated his early writings, the poems he preserved from his first collection, the Nanyue ji, extend beyond the themes and moods o f the Late Tang mode o f the Four Lings. Consider, for example: 早行

Traveling E“rlyU6

店媼明燈送,

The old woman of the inn sees me off with a bright lantern.

前村認未真 ° 山頭雲似雪, 陌上樹如人 0

I cannot yet clearly recognize the village ahead. On the mountain tops, the clouds are like snow. On the field paths, the trees resemble people.

漸覺高星少 ’

Gradually I realize the stars high above have grown few.

繞分遠燒新 ° 何煩看猴子,

I barely make out that the distant [cooking] fires are new. Why need I trouble to look at the road markers:

來往暗知津 °

In coming and going I "know the ford,,by heart.117

T h e poem is simple yet tightly constructed. At the center o f attention here are Liu's processes of interpretation as he encounters dimly seen elements o f the early morning landscape. T h e similes o f the second couplet, admired by Fang Hui, especially capture the inwardness, the mental meandering, o f walking alone in the countryside as dawn approaches. T h e meaning Liu Kezhuang discovers here is in the movement o f his mind. W h e n significance does inhere in the scene in Liu Kezhuang's poetry, it does so through the mediation o f human intentions: SmeW叹卿tt 1 1 8

冶城

遺鎗不可求'

The broken arrowheads and remnant spears cannot be sought,

116. HCJ 1.1.3; QSS 58.3033 36135; YKLS 1.14.518-19. 117. “By heart” (an�暗)is to have something completely memorized and internalized, but the word itself means “dark” Liu Kezhuang here revitalizes this literal level of meaning in a way for which there is no easy English equivalent. “Blindfolded” comes somewhat close. 118. “Smelting Wall" is a site near modern Nanjing that reputedly was the location of Fu Chai's forges for making weapons during the Spring and Autumn period. HCJ 1.1.22; QSS 58.3033.36143; N i u , Yongjia Silingyu Jianghu shipai xuanji,

pp. 167-68.

451 Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes 西風古意滿原頭�

With the west wind, the ancient mood fills the plain.

孫劉數子如春夢�

Those few men, Sun and Liu, are like a spring dream:119 [The sites] where Wang and Xie wandered a thousand years ago are still here.120

王謝千年有舊遊� 高塔不知何代作� 暮笳似說昔人愁� 神州只在闌干北� 度度來時怕上樓�

We do not know in what era the tall pagoda was built. The evening reed-pipes seem to explain the grief of men of former times. Our sacred land is just north of the balustrade: Each time I come here, I fear to climb the tower.

T h e human utterly dominates the landscape in every line o f the poem. Still, the poem is far more expansive than the small scenes typical o f the Late Tang style. Moreover, its themes o f anxiety for the state and the pain o f the conquest of north China reveal the sort o f political and social engagement of Dai Fugu's broader "Rivers and Lakes" poetry. Indeed, the poem "Falling Plum Blossoms,,,for which Liu Kezhuang was impeached, comes from his early poetry:

落梅其一� 一片能教一斷腸� 可堪平砌更堆牆� 飄如遷客來過嶺� 墜似騷人去赴湘� 亂點莓苔多莫數� 偶黏衣袖久猶香�

il21 Falling Plum Blossoms, no. One petal can cause one wrench of the innards. How can I bear that they cover the stone steps and form piles on the wall? They blow about like a banished traveler coming across the mountains. They fall like a poet of "Sorrows" leaving for the Xiang. Chaotically dotting the moss, so many they are beyond counting: By chance sticking to my sleeve, they long remain fragrant.

119. That is, Sun Quan�孫權(182-252) and Liu Bei�劉備(161-223), the two rulers in the south who successfully resisted Cao Cao's efforts to reunite China as the Han dynasty was collapsing. 120. This could refer specifically to Wang Xizhi and Xie An, as Niu suggests, or refer more generally to the great aristocratic clans of the Eastern Jin and early Southern Dynasties. 121. HCJ 1.3.82; QSS 58.3035.36170.

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Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes

東風謬掌花權柄�

The East Wmd in error holds authority over the flowers:

却忌孤高不主張�

Because he is jealous of their solitary loftiness, he does not take proper charge.

Since the composition is a poem “chanting about an object," a form that had a tradition o f use as political commentary, there is a chance that the impeachment was not a malicious over-interpretation o f the final couplet. However, as a poem, the language and couplet-crafting are unremarkable, the sort of constrained technique Liu Kezhuang later vowed to escape.122 A series o f old-style poems written in 1228 while Liu Kezhuang was waiting at home to learn the impact o f the impeachment marks a clear effort to broaden his technical range. T h e poems have titles like "Ballad o f Building the City Wall," "Ballad o f Digging the Moat," and “Ballad o f Suffering from the Cold." “Ballad o f Those W h o Died for the State” is a particularly striking example: 國殤行�

官 軍 半 M 戰 來� 平明軍中收遺骸� 埋時先剝身上甲� 標成叢塚高崔嵬� 姓名虛掛陣亡籍� 家寒無俸孤無澤� 烏摩諸將官曰穹� 豈知萬鬼號陰風�

Ballad ofThose Who Diedfor the State123 Our troops fought for half the night in bloody battle. In pre-dawn light the troops gather the corpses. Before burial, they strip the armor from the bodies: Marking the group grave mound, it grows high and steep. The names are recorded in the Registry of the Lost to no end: The families, poor, are without pension, the orphans without support. Alas, the generals' rank daily [ascends to] the empyrean: How would they know that ten thousand souls wail in the chill wind?

122. Fang Hui selected the poem for the Yingkui liisui but commented that pairing "banished traveler” with “poet of Sorrows” was uncompelling. Ji Yun agreed and complained that the poem was not worth including in the collection (YKLS 2.20.844). 123. HCJ

2.8.254; QSS

xuanji, pp. 177-78.

58.3040.36257; N i u , Yongjia Siting yu Jianghu

shipai

453 Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes Old-style verse on themes of the suffering of the populace both escape the emotional, imagistic, and formal constraints o f Late Tang verse and fully satisfy the Daoxue demand for moral seriousness. Still, the greater challenge is to use compellingly the formal features o f regulated verse to serve morally serious ends. In his mature style, Liu Kezhuang developed a language within the regulated verse form to preserve the breadth and energy he saw as essential to significant poetry. T h e following poem is a good example: 寒食清明二首,其一� The Cold Food and Qingming Festivals, no. l124 寂寂柴門村落裏’ In a quiet hamlet with brushwood gates, 也教插柳記年華° They also stick willow branches to mark the flourishing of the year. 禁煙不到粵人國,� Forbidding smoke has not reached the people of Yue.125 1 Climbing to the graves, they also bring Old Pang's 上冢亦携龐老家 family.126 漢寢唐陵無麥飯� The tombs of the Han and Tang emperor are without [offerings of] plain rice. [Here,] on mountain trails and outland paths 山蹊野徑有梨花� there [already] are pear blossoms. 一尊徑藉青苔卧� One pot [of ale]: just lie down on the green moss, 莫管城頭奏暮節’ And don't heed that on the city wall they play the sunset reed pipes. 124. HCJ 2.9.285; QSS 58.3041.36271; YKLS 2.16.627; Niu, Yongjia Siting yu Jianghu shipai xuanji, pp. 179-80. The Cold Food Festival, during which people customarily would extinguish their cooking fires, was held on the 105th day after the winter solstice. Qingmingf literally "pure and bright," is one of the twenty-four divisions of the yearly cycle of qi. It begins on the fifteenth day after the spring equinox. During the festival, people would clean the gravesites of their ancestors to celebrate the return of the qingming qi. 125. Although in later times Yue refers to the far southeastGuangdong and Guangxi~here it refers to Liu Kezhuang's home region in Fujian. 126. Pang Yun�龐 蘊 was a wealthy Tang dynasty Buddhist lay practitioner who put his family's possessions on a boat and sank it. Then, with his wife and children, he led the simple life of a Buddhist monk without ever taking the vows or the tonsure. Ji Yun takes the allusion to refer to young Buddhist novices who have not yet taken formal vows, while Niu takes it as simply referring to Buddhists more generally. In either case, Buddhists in theory should not have much to do with practices surrounding ancestor worship, but at the local level they clearly did, as Liu points out here.

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Fang H u i finds the uniform development o f a theme without any transformations to be a general fault in Liu Kezhuang's poetry. In contrast, he notes how this poem shifts its perspective from couplet to couplet rather than pursuing one fixed focus from beginning to end. Still, there is a certain distance: in the poem the scene does not demand Liu Kezhuang's attention as he comes upon it, and instead he remains a sympathetic observer. T h e poem works from the inside out, from the fully grasped intentions and feelings o f the poet out to their well-crafted representation. Finally, Liu Kezhuang was a master o f the quatrain form, which often serves to thematize the writer's intentional stance:127

芙蓉二絶其二� 池上秋開一兩叢� 未妨冷淡伴詩翁�

Lotus, second of two poems128

而今縱有看花意� 不愛深紅愛淺紅�

And now, had I the intent to look at flowers,

On the lake in autumn one or two clusters opened: There is nothing to stop their cool tranquility from keeping this old poet company. I would not cherish the deep red; I cherish the pale red.

"Looking at flowers" often refers to amorous pursuits most suited to the springtime. However, there is no need to look for veiled meaning in Liu Kezhuang's language, because he writes o f the sort o f yearning that brings him first to seek out the autumn blossoms and then o f the transformation of age that leads him to prefer the pale pink to the deeper red, a transformation that applies to much else in life. A specifically allegorical reading would merely narrow the import o f the poem. Liu Kezhuang was a thoughtful, talented, and deeply learned poet, yet in the end he neither wrote great poetry nor developed a distinctive style. H e had a firm grasp o f the received tradition, but he was committed to a poetry based on “Nature and feelings, and rites and

127. That is, as with Yang Wanli, who remained a strong influence for the "Rivers and Lakes” poets, the first couplet presents an observation of a scene from a particular angle, the third line raises a specific issue of interpretation, and the fourth provides a resolution. 128. HCJ 1.7.225; QSS 58.3039.36240.

455 Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes duty" and to a process o f writing in w h i c h well-formed intentions govern the text with no room in either theory or practice for the moments o f inspiration一and their attendant loss o f m a s t e r y ~ t h a t shape the unfolding o f the text. These commitments constrained his talent. T h e modern scholar Qian Z h o n g s h u complained that Liu Kezhuang's poems gave one the impression o f being "a bit mechanical in their smoothness, ready-made like a stock in trade o f yesterday's g o o d s . " 「 是 滑 溜 得 有 點 機 械 , 現 成 得 似 乎 店 底 的 宿� 貨 o 」 1 2 9 In his poetry and poetics, Liu shifted the domain within w h i c h aesthetic experience found its intuitions o f order f r o m the world beyond the self to the human realm o f intentions deriving f r o m the Nature in response to its encounters with that world. H e provided a viable poetry that w o n him the acclaim o f his peers, but he did not find a path leading him beyond the poetry o f the "Rivers and Lakes."

Drifting with the Current T h e "Rivers and Lakes" writers appear as little more than a footnote in the history o f Chinese literature. T h e y produced no truly major writers and, lacking any distinctive voices, marked no manifest change in poetic practice. ^Yet they give us insight into a crucial period o f consolidation in Chinese cultural history. T h e "Rivers and Lakes" poets participated in an unprecedented middle stratum between the capital bureaucrats and the local elites w h o were concerned with the management o f social organization in their h o m e regions. These poets largely came from the local elites: o f the 138 m e n listed by Z h a n g Hongsheng, 51 had passed either the jinshi or some other examination. Four others tried but failed. Four more entered office through yin privilege; fifteen more have a record o f service with no information about the examination. Yet they identified themselves as being from the "rivers and lakes," outside the world o f political ambition, and they developed a far-flung network o f friendship and conversation dependent neither on local nor on capital ties. T h e y ~ o r the poems they wrote一necessarily had to

129. Qian Zhongshu, Song shi ocuanzhu, pp. 278-79.

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travel far enough from home to attract the attention o f C h e n Q i , since their poetry was included in at least one o f his anthologies. T h u s they all had at least one foot outside their o w n respective locales. T h e flourishing o f commercial printing during this period had an influence beyond the actual printing o f the Rivers and Lakes Collection and its successors. Ye Shi compiled an anthology o f poems for the Four Lings. Zhao Rudang compiled an anthology o f Dai Fugu's poems, while Liu Kezhuang did the same for Zhao Gengfu. T h e printing o f these small anthologies, with prefaces and colophons by important figures, seems to have been a way o f establishing oneself within this growing cultural milieu. While the authors continued to write to one another, the new technology created the possibility of the quick dissemination and circulation o f their texts to a far larger audience. That audience grew explosively during the period, for, as Liu Kezhuang complained, “since the time o f the Four Lings, everyone in the realm [has become] a poet." Shi Miyuan's attack on the Rivers and Lakes Collection and the banning o f poetry demonstrate that this network o f writers had acquired a collective voice during Lizong's reign that had to be reckoned with. T h e "Rivers and Lakes" writers surely also contributed to the pressure o f advocacy in 1233 at the start o f Lizong's direct r u l e ~ w h e n C h e n g Qingzhi brought Z h e n Dexiu and Wei Liaoweng back into government~and in 1241,when tablets for the major Northern and Southern Song Daoxue scholars were brought into the Confucian temple and were to be honored at the Imperial University and all official schools. T h e poetry of the "Rivers and Lakes" writers shows the impact o f the Learning o f the Way in that these poets accepted the centrality o f a shared Nature and the claims of morality. Yet, this was not the Daoxue o f Z h u X i or Z h e n Dexiu: it accommodated greater diversity in individual response and greater crafting in the structuring o f that response. Behind Liu Kezhuang's poetry in particular was a coherent sense o f a world in which the Nature attained specific form through a distinctive individual disposition that was to become the stuff o f poetry, if one both had the courage to acknowledge the dictates o f Nature expressed through the self and had acquired the mastery

457 Drifting Amidst Rivers and Lakes o f form needed to “convey the intent." The "Rivers and Lakes" writers created a new ground for the aesthetic order o f poetry and, in doing so, reshaped the material drawn from Daoxue that they needed to support this order. T h e coalescing o f this new aesthetic order marked the end o f the old world of middle-period China and the beginning o f the episteme of late imperial China, but there was no single moment o f transition, no great poem or poet announcing a new beginning. Instead, through many voices and many texts, the poets o f the "Rivers and Lakes" slowly drifted with the emerging current, tracing it as they went along.

CHAPTER

TEN

An Inner Compass: The Poetry of Experience at Dynasty}s End

I

n early 1276 the Song court appointed Wen Tianxiang� 文 天 祥� (1236-83) chief councilor and commissioned h i m to negotiate

with the Yuan dynasty general Bayan, w h o was encamped w i t h a large army on the outskirts o f the capital. 1 Several weeks later, the Song empress dowager surrendered the city and the y o u n g emperor to the M o n g o l s to avoid a general slaughter. Bayan placed W e n under guard and planned to send him north along with the imperial family and other major court figures. However, W e n escaped captivity and made his way to the Fujian coast where he joined troops loyal to a newly enthroned infant emperor. H e organized inland resistance to the overwhelming Yuan forces but fell captive in early February 1279. T h e M o n g o l s brought him along for their final assault on the Song army's last encampment at Yaishan on the coast o f Guangdong, at the very southern edge o f the empire. In early March, before the attack, Wen presented his captors a poem:

1. For an account of the events leading to the fall ofLin'an, see Davis, "The Reign of Tu-tsung (1264-1274) and His Successors to 1279,” chapter 12 in the Cambridge History of China,

pp. 911-42.

Vol. 5 Part 1: The Sung Dynasty and Its Precursors,

907-1279,

An Inner Compass

459

過零丁洋

Visiting Bereft Bay2

辛苦遭逢起一經,

With difficulty I met advancement using a single classic.3

干戈落落四周星 °

Clashes o f arms, so many, through four circuits o f stars.4

山、河破碎風拋絮,

T h e mountains and rivers shattered: the wind

身世飄摇雨打萍。

M y life blown about: rain beats the duckweed.

皇恐灘頭說皇恐,

A t Terrifying Rapids, one speaks o f terror: 5

零丁洋裏歎零丁 o

In Bereft Bay, I sigh bereft.

tosses catkins.

人生自古誰無死,

From o f old, w h o living does not die?

留取丹心照汗青 °

I choose to leave a sincere heart to glow in the pages o f history.6

T h i s p o e m has b e c o m e f a m o u s in C h i n e s e h i s t o r y f o r its c o n t e x t in W e n T i a n x i a n g ' s Latter Record of the Compass.7 W e n explains i n his 2. QSS 68.3598.43025; Huang Lanpo�黃蘭波,Wen Tianxiang shi xuan� 文天祥詩� 選(Beijing: Renmin wenxue, 1979) [hereafter WTXSX], pp. 73-74; Wen Tianxiang quanji 文夫祥全禁(Beijing: Beijing Zhongguo shudian, 1985), p. 349. The bay is at the mouth of the Pearl River. The term lingding�零丁,which describes being "alone and in hardship” (guku�孤苦),comes from the biography ofLi Mi�李密 in theJin shu 晉書(Beijing: Zhonghua, 1974) 7.88.2274. 3. This line refers to Wen Tianxiang's entry into government service through the examination system. Throughout the Southern Song, candidates could write on a single classic of their choice as part of tht jinshi examination. 4. That is, it had been four years since Wen first responded to the empress dowager's call for aid. 5. Terrifying Rapids were in Wan^n�萬安 County in Ganzhou� 赣州(modern Jiangxi). Wen here alludes to a line by Su Shi: "The place named Terrifying' causes this lone official to weep”「地名惶恐泣孤臣」.From "The seventh day of the Eighth Month, I first enter Gan[zhou] and cross the Terrifying Rapids”《八月七曰� 初入贛過惶恐灘》,QSS 14.821.9501, Su Shi shiji�蘇軾詩禁,6.38.2052-53. Huang Lanpo notes that Wen was serving as prefect of Ganzhou when the imperial call for aid arrived. Thus, the terror here has the additional personal aspect ofWen's alarm for the state. 6. "Pages of history” is literally "sweated green"(汗青),bamboo strips, heated to drive out the water so they would be less vulnerable to insects, that were used as an early writing medium. 7. Wen Tianxiang quanji 14.349. The poem and its commentary, discussed below, are the first entries in the Latter Record of the Compass (指南後錄),in which Wen Tianxiang recorded poems detailing events that started after his capture, through his forced journey north to the capital,Dadu, and his period of incarceration, and that ended just before his execution in early 1283. I discuss his earlier Record of the Compass (指南錄)below.

460

An Inner Compass 460

commentary that he used the poem to express his determination to not betray his state and proudly notes that Z h a n g Hongfan praised both this steadfastness and the poem that revealed it:8 On the Fifteenth of the First Month, Commander Zhang [Hongfan] ordered Commander Li [Heng] to visit my boat and ask me to write a letter directing Junior Guardian Zhang [Shijie] to submit [to the Mongols]. 9 1 said, "Since I have not been able to save my Father and Mother [i.e., the Song state], would it thus be acceptable to instruct someone to betray my Father and Mother?” 10 1 then wrote this poem to leave for him, and Li was not able to compel me. He brought the poem to Zhang, who merely said, "Good man, good poem” and in the end could not press me to comply.

上巳曰’張元帥令李元帥過船,請作書招諭張少保投拜。遂與之� 言’我自救父母不得’乃教人背父母,可乎。書此詩遺之。李不� 能強°持詩以達張°但稱好人好詩‘竟不能逼° "Visiting Bereft Bay,” in the intensity o f its occasion and the burden o f meaning Wen Tianxiang imposed upon it, marks the completion o f the arc o f literary history traced in this study. Wen Tianxiang showed that the slowly evolving model o f a poetry o f the self could guide writing under extraordinarily difficult 8. Richard L. Davis discusses Wen Tianxiang,s role in the fight against the Mongols and offers a circumspect account of both his defiance of his Yuan captors and his intense self-dramatization of that defiance in Wind Against the Mountain (Cambridge: Council on East Asian Studies, 1996), pp. 133-76. 9. Zhang Hongfan�張弘範(1238-80) was an experienced Chinese general from north China who served the Yuan rulers. Li Heng�李恒(1236-85) was a general from northwest China. Zhang Shijie�張 世 傑 ( d . 1279) was from a Jin dynasty military family. His father had fled south for violating Jin law, and Zhang became a loyal general who stayed until the very end with the imperial children who were successively proclaimed emperors. Zhang Hongfan was his uncle (Davis, "Reign of Tu-tsung, w p. 955). T h e text o f the Latter Record of the Compass has shang si�上巳,the

first si�巳 day of the month (the ten "branches" each appear three times in a thirtyday month), but there is a tendency to treat shang si as meaning the third day of the Third Month in particular (derived from the shift of a lustration rite from the first si day of the Third Month to simply the third day). Hence Huang Lanpo suggests shang yuan�上元(the fifteenth of the First Month) for shang si. The first si day of the First Month in 1279 was the ninth day. 10. The phrase "Father and Mother state” (Jumu guo�父母國)comes from Mencius 10.1, in which Mencius has Confucius explain that when leaving his native state of Lu, "Tardy, tardy is my traveling: this is the way to leave my Father and Mother s t a t e , 「 遲 遲 吾 行 也 , 去 父 母 國 之 道 也 0 j

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circumstances. Wen Tianxiang's personality and strong convictions hold together the four rather disjointed couplets o f the poem in an aesthetic synthesis made possible by a poetics grounded in the "chanting o f the Nature and its feeling" {yinyong xingqing�吟 詠 性 情 ) . T h e self revealed by the poem was a discovery both for its a u t h o r ~ for w h o m the events o f war and captivity were an endless succession of tests o f inner strength—and for its audience, his captors. It was "a good poem,,and revealed "a good man.,,�

Looking Back,Reading the Horizon Aesthetic experience is endlessly dialectical: it opens experience to the possibility o f meaning, but it also u n d o e s ~ o r at least challenges一the preexisting conceptual frameworks surrounding the objects o f this experience. Language, floating on top o f a world o f things, marking off objects and sorting them into groups in the organizing o f experience, draws strongly on aesthetic intuitions to undergird the linking of words to the world, and it is correspondingly susceptible to the emptying out of the conceptual orders built around the mere intuitions of connection. T h e need to socially delimit the range and function of this aesthetic experience in language drives literary history. However, the arc o f the social and cultural shifts within which poetry evolved in the Southern Song suggests h o w historical specificity centrally informs this abstractly programmatic negotiation o f literary experience. T h e particular features o f a time and a place shape literary transformation through the historical nature o f the domain of meaning within which aesthetic experience must operate. Shifts in style trace the changes in this larger ground o f meaning. Aesthetic experience provides intuitions of meaning, but it does so within a historically evolved framework articulating an a priori order that inheres in the phenomenal realm and informs the nature o f the discovered meaning. This framework is a social and cultural matrix that extends far beyond the aesthetic realm: it includes the ontological, epistemological, and ethical commitments o f a culture, sedimented in the institutions and physical spaces o f a community, as well as the systems o f values structuring the social organization of a society. This framework, moreover, is not unitary and

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An Inner Compass 462

all-encompassing but related to the specific fields o f cultural production in the society. In Song dynasty China, the civil elite lived in an aesthetic universe different from that o f the Buddhist sangha, although the two intersected through links at many levels between the two communities. Similarly, local elites and the civil elite centered in the capital developed distinct but interacting frameworks o f commitments that articulated cultural and social values and served as the ground for aesthetic experience. T h e dynamics o f interaction between changes in p o e t r y ~ i n both practice and theory~and the shifts in the overarching cultural framework that I have presented simplify the more complex array o f actual differentiated fields o f production throughout the Song dynasty cultural universe. Nonetheless, the circulation o f members o f the elite~as well as their writings一through this array o f differentiated fields produced a level o f coherence within the larger milieu that justifies recourse to general language about a broad epistemic shift in Chinese society in the Southern Song and about poetry's role in that shift. This broad cultural transformation, associated with the growing acceptance o f the Learning o f the Way’ operated differently at different levels, but local and capital elites responded to one another in the process of mutual accommodation as they both assimilated Daoxue beliefs, values, and institutions. Literary history pivots on the transformations o f the a priori order that grounds meaning within the phenomenal realm. During the first half o f the Northern Song dynasty, this order was that o f the “inherent patterns of the myriad phenomena" {wamvu zhi li� 萬物� 之理)• T h e core o f the epistemic shift associated with the rise o f the Learning o f the W a y ~ i f not the changes in institutional structures and social practices that reflected, embodied, and articulated this shift~seems to have been complete by the 1240s with Z h u Xi's ascendancy as the central interpreter ofDaoxue learning. In this new intellectual regime, li�理,understood as “principle,,,provided the a priori coherence underlying the world of experience. Humans had access to li in its entirety because their Nature (xing�性 ) w a s identical to li. Both li and xing, however, were “above form," outside the realm o f phenomenal change. Despite arguments by Z h u Xi's adherents that he gave good theoretical accounts o f how one could come to know the moral order defined by li and xing and h o w to implement

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463

that order in personal life and in governance, critics both within the Daoxue movement and outside unrelentingly pointed to the failure o f proponents to translate theory into practice. By the 1240s, however, Daoxue advocates like Wei Liaoweng and Z h e n Dexiu embodied Z h u Xi's moral seriousness and steadfastness in their own lives and provided interpretations that brought the immanence of/t more closely into the world o f historical process in ways that served as models for moral self-cultivation and practical action. T h e discourse of//, turning to an order above form, shifted meaning from patterns in the world to a specifically moral order identified with moral principles (yili�義理)• By the 1240s, Nature, as the immanence o f the moral order o f li in the self, offered Southern Song elite culture a ground for the coherence of meaning in experience: above form, Nature transcended all particulars; conceived in moral terms, Nature promised, in principle, that there was a proper and coherent response to all events and objects o f the phenomenal realm, and this correct, coherent response defined meaning in experience. T h e challenge, then, was to know the right response. The intuition o f this normative moral response was the heart of aesthetic experience: poetry in particular was to "attain the correctness of Nature and its feelings"

(de xingqing zhi zheng�得性情之正).

11

Nature in the Daoxue schema, however, was not a purely formal category~the immanence of principle as s u c h ~ b u t had specific content: as an a priori principle, human nature possessed humaneness, a sense o f duty, ritual propriety, and wisdom. Moreover, feelings, as the manner in which the Nature responded to events and objects, were properly centered when quiet and harmonious w h e n stirred. T h e task of poetry, then, was to discover the harmonious quality o f response to events and objects in the world and to see the immanent logic o f humaneness, duty, propriety, and wisdom in the response. This did not make for very interesting poetry. Since the qualities to be discovered already were known, moreover, there was little room for the play o f aesthetic intuition. T h e war against the Mongols changed this narrow, settled character o f the work o f poetry 11. Wang Yinglin�王應麟(1223-96), a major late Southern Song cultural figure who presided over Wen Tianxiang's jinshi examination, wrote of using poetry to "move the moral mind and attain the correctness of Nature and its feelings”「感發� 善心’而得性情之正」(《詩地理考序》,QS所354.8199.253).

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and showed that writers, confronted with urgent questions o f their o w n moral stature, could draw on poetry conceived as a "chanting o f the Nature and its feelings” to capture the meaning o f their encounters, to reveal to themselves and to the world their innermost core. This appropriation of poetry proved powerful, and in its success it assured poetry's role as a compelling means o f grasping the meaning o f the writer's encounters with the world~encounters now understood in the Daoxue terms of the fundamental inwardness o f meaning centered on the revelation o f the manifestation o f the moral Nature in the experiential realm. T h e present chapter traces this final shift.

Shallows Following Lizong's introduction o f Z h u Xi's and the Northern Song Daoxue masters' tablets into the Confucian temple in 1241, the Learning o f the Way attained an increasingly prominent role in Southern Song elite culture. During the thirty-five year period from 1241 until the fall of Hangzhou, elite attitudes toward literature came to reflect Daoxue values. During the first half o f the century, the "Rivers and Lakes" poets assimilated the Learning o f the Way's stress on Nature as the locus o f meaning, but it became increasingly clear that Daoxue advocates had not yet accepted the claims of the literary. In the final decades of the dynasty, "the best and the brightest," w h o came to the capital to compete in an examination culture shaped by the texts ofDaoxue largely as defined by Z h u Xi, slighted poetry as both detrimental to moral self-cultivation and o f little practical use in the competition to get ahead in the world. O n l y w h e n the dynasty and its examination system collapsed did they turn to verse. Even then, however, they largely saw writing as one remaining field for gaining social distinction rather than as an activity with cultural, moral, or personal value. It took the examples o f Wen Tianxiang and other loyalist writers to show them the power that poetry could possess. By 1270, an entire generation of ambitious young men had devoted their studies to Z h u Xi's commentaries in order to pass the jinshi examination. Z h o u M i� 周密(1232-98) after the fall o f the Song recorded a dire prediction about the baleful influence of

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the Daoxue curriculum and ethos, which he saw realized in the catastrophe o f the final years o f the dynasty: I once heard the elder scholar Mister Shen Zhonggu ofWuxing say, “The name ‘Learning of the Way,appeared in the Yuanyou period and flourished in the Chunxi (1174-89) period. Among its followers are those who borrow the name to deceive the world: [their strategies] truly can breathe life into the dead and drain all vitality from the living. They look at those who manage state resources as taxmen. Those who maintain defenses and guard the border they look at as men of crude abilities. Those who read and compose they look at as trifling away their resolve. Those concerned with governance they look at as vulgar functionaries. They read only the Four Books, the Reflections on Things at Hand, the Tongshu, the 'Diagram of the Supreme Ultimate,' the Eastern and Western Inscriptions, and the recorded sayings. They proclaim that their learning is to 'rectify the mind, cultivate the person, order the family, regulate the state, and bring peace to all under heaven.,Thus they explain, ‘For the people we set firm the [August] Ultimate [huangji�皇極];for Heaven and Earth we set firm the mind; for the myriad generations we begin the Great Peace, and for the former sages we continue the interrupted learning.' As a prefect or circuit supervisor, one must establish academies, set up shrines to the worthies, print the Four Books, and elaborate the recorded sayings, and only then is one called worthy. Then one can angle for reputation and get plum sinecures. In the examination writings, one must draw on [Daoocue] texts, then one can receive a high ranking and become a famous literatus. If not, then even if one has the accomplishments of [Sima Guang,] Duke of Wen, or the writing style and moral stature of [Su] Dongpo, one still is not of the right sort. [When the situation reached] this point the realm vied in rushing to emulate them, but if someone had even the slightest argument with them, their clique would drive him out as a petty person. Even the ruler of the time could not dispute with them. Their fierceness is as intimidating as this. However, if one examines what they do, then their speech and their actions do not match, and in the end they do not come close to human actualities. Later they will bring about a catastrophe of unequaled size, which I fear will not be less than that of the "pure talk” of the Sima [Jin dynasty]."12 12. Zhou Mi, Quixin zashi�癸辛雜識(Beijing: Zhonghua, 1988) p. 169. Later writers blamed the Western Jin dynasty's loss of north China~which led to the long division of the Northern and Southern Dynasties—on the fecklessness of a self-absorbed elite that engaged in idle philosophical “pure talk.”

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嘗聞吳興老儒沈仲固先生云’「道學之名’起於元祐,盛於淳� 熙。其徒有假其名以欺世者,真可以噓枯吹生o凡治財賦者,則� 目爲聚斂。開閫扞邊者,則目爲麄材。讀書作文者,則目爲玩物� 喪志。留心政事者,則目爲俗吏。其所讀者’止四書、近思錄、� 通書、太極圖、東西銘、語錄之類,自詭其學爲正心、修身、齊� 家、治國、平天下。故爲之說曰:『爲生民立極,爲天地立心’ 爲萬世開太平,爲前聖繼絕學。』其爲太守,爲監司,必須建立� 書院,立諸賢之祠,或刊註四書’衍輯語錄。然後號爲賢者’則� 可以釣聲名,致撫仕,而士子場屋之文,必須引用以爲文,則可� 以擢窥科,爲名士。否則立身如溫國,文章氣節如坡仙,亦非本� 色也。於是天下競趨之’稍有議及,其黨必擠之爲小人,雖時君� 亦不得而辨之矣。其氣燄可畏如此。然,夷考其所行,貝[}言行了� 不相顧,卒皆不近人情之事。異時必將爲國家莫大之禍,恐不在� 典午清談之下也。」� Z h o u M i here musters great rhetorical flair and much animus in making his point about the failings o f the Learning o f the Way during its period of ascendancy, about its narrowness, pettiness, cliquishness, and deep ignorance about the real complexities o f human experience. While the picture he draws exonerates the behavior o f the advocates ofDaoxue, it does underscore the activities associated with furthering the movement, the tensions between Daoxue partisans and officials with a more pragmatic focus, and the success o f Daoxue in dominating examination learning. Shen Z h o n ^ u ' s diatribe against the Learning o f the Way recorded by Z h o u M i also reveals that the later advocates o f Daoxue inherited the early thinkers' suspicion of writing as frivolous. In one essay Dai Biaoyuan�戴 表 元 ( 1 2 4 4 - 1 3 1 1 ) recalls that serious students did not write poetry: When I was twenty-five, I entered the Imperial University.... At this time, all the most worthy talked of Nature and Fate, and the next tier did no more than chase after entertaining writings and fragments of examination hall prose in order to follow the vogue of the moment. There was not one who was willing to work at poetry. Only recluses in the mountains and itinerants among the rivers and lakes would perhaps strive at [poetry]. Those among the ministries with established reputations and accomplished craft also from time to time would turn their extra energy to this.13 13. Dai Biaoyuan, "Preface to the Poetry of Commissioner Fang [Hui]”《方使君詩� ff�’ Quan Yuan Wen t 元 文 [ h e r e a f t e r Q\W] (Nanjing: Jiangsu guji chubanshe,

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年二十六入太學,……當是時,諸賢高談性命,其次不過馳騖於� 竿牘俳諧、場屋破碎之文,以隨時悅俗,無有肯以詩爲事者。惟� 夫山林之退士,江湖之羈客,乃僅或能攻,而館閣名成藝達者,� 亦往往以餘力及之。� Dai Biaoyuan's teacher Shu Yuexiang� 舒 岳 祥 ( 1 2 1 9 - 9 8 ) more specifically noted that only those w h o could not compete in the examinations fell into the companionship of poets: Just at the time when the examinations were flourishing, those literati of outstanding talent all devoted their energy to the current writing style [of the examination hall], and if one were fortunate enough to pass, then he would attain personal glory and be of use to his time, and he would expect much of himself. Those who were of few resources in their writing and lacked the ability to compete to be best among the ten thousand would add themselves to the ranks of the poets. The examination candidates scorned them.14

方科舉盛行之時,士之資質秀敏者,皆自力於時文,幸取一第,� 則爲身榮,爲時用,自負遠甚。惟窘於筆下無以爭萬人之長者,� 乃自附於詩人之列。舉子蓋鄙之也。� This strong split between the poets of the Rivers and Lakes and the students in the Imperial University seems to be a development o f the late years o f the Southern Song when the Learning of the Way had become the center o f the curriculum. 15 However, with the fall o f the dynasty and the end o f the examination system, the situation changed drastically. Shu Yuexiang began the above essay by noting this change: 1997) 12.417.109. Stephen H. West translates a different preface by Dai Biaoyuan that makes the same point: see West, "Literature from the late Jin to the early Ming: ca. 1230-ca. 1375,” in Cambridge History of Chinese Literature, Vol. 1,p. 562.

14. Shu Yuexiang, "Colophon to the poetry of Wang Jusun"《践王榘孫詩》,� Q5PF 353.8162.16. The colophon is dated 1277, that is, after the surrender of the capital but before the final defeat of Song forces atYaishan. 15. Zhao Wen�趙文(1238-1314), who like Wen Tianxiang was from Luling, had reached the Upper Hall of the Imperial University before the Mongol conquest, then joined Wen in Fujian to assist the refugee court but became separated from the army during fighting in Dingzhou in inland Fujian and returned home. He reveals the depth and intensity of the split between the University and the Rivers and Lakes poets in a diatribe he wrote before the Mongol invasion. In it he depicts the poets of the Rivers and Lakes as shabby, petty men always on the look out for opportunities to advance themselves. See "Preface to Xiao Hanjie's Qingyuan Woodgatherer's Songs11

《蕭漢傑青原樵唱序》,QYW 10.332.64.

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those same ambitious students w h o scorned the poet took to composing verse. Since the surrender of the capital, the path of writing [as a means to advancement] has ended. The examination candidates, having no way to use their skill, often on the cliff of the farthest oceans and the tops of impenetrable mountains, transform their former rhymes and parallelism [derived from the examination's regulatedfu] into poetry. This is no more than to vent their sorrows and describe their difficulties and does not [convey] their [initial] resolve Now that the examinations have been abandoned, they have used that of which they formerly were proud to seek skill in that which they scorned: this is lamentable.

自京國傾覆,筆墨道絕,舉子無所用其巧,往往於極海之涯,窮� 山之巔,用其素所對偶聲韻者,變爲詩歌,聊以寫悲辛、敘危苦� 耳,非其志也。……今科舉既廢’而前日所自負者反求工於其所� 鄙,斯又可歎也已。� Elite culture learned, however, that “venting sorrow," when a response to national catastrophe, spoke to a shared commitment to preserve the cultural values of the lost dynasty that transformed the individual ambitions of the prewar world. T h e exemplar whose self-transformation, above all others, showed southern elite society h o w the historical moment o f war and resistance could reveal great moral fervor and w h o showed how poetry could embody unwavering resolve was Wen Tianxiang.

The Inner Compass: Wen

Tianxiang

Wen Tianxiang, w h o briefly studied under the well-known Daoxue scholar Ouyang Shoudao�歐 陽 守 道 ( 1 2 0 9 - 7 3 ) and ranked first in the jinshi examination of 1256,initially was one o f those young men w h o considered poetry merely a polite art. Wen's early poetry is almost entirely social verse and displays little that is aesthetically compelling. 16 Wen Tianxiang in his writings before the war found the craft o f poetry inadequate to bear much meaning at all. In a preface, he wrote: 16. Qian Zhongshu notes the slightness of Wen's prewar poetry in the Song shi xuanzhu, p.311. Huang Lanpo makes a similar assessment in his discussion ofWen's early poetry (WTXSX, pp. 9-11).

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Writing is a minor art, and poetry is an amusement within this minor art Formerly people asserted that Du Fu, in "reading ten thousand volumes,,,only used it to support his "wielding his brush as though divinely inspired.”17 While there certainly is a goal in reading, poetry need not be very divine.18

文章一小伎,詩又小伎之游戲者……。昔人謂杜子美讀書破萬� 卷,止用資下筆如有神耳,讀書固有爲,而詩不必甚神。� Despite his reservations, Wen Tianxiang in his early poems occasionally shows an effort to attain a broader scope, but the effect is limited by social contexts that cannot correspond to the ambition o f his rhetorical gestures. Although invoked, meaning does not powerfully inhabit the patterns o f the world he sets out in his poems. A poem written in Hengyang in 1273 while Wen Tianxiang was serving as judicial commissioner for Hunan suggests both the reach and the constraints o f his early poetry: 題楚觀樓 Written on the Wall of the Towerfor Observing Chu19 西風吹感慨, The blowing of the west wind stirs emotions. 曉氣薄登臨 ° The dawn vapors grow thin as I climb to look. 半 壁 楚 雲 立 , H a i f a wall of Chu clouds arise; 一J11�湘 雨 深 � On the entire river the Xiang rain is deep.20 乾坤橫笛影 ’ Between Qian and Kun, the shadow of a transverse flute: 江海倚樓心 °

On the rivers and seas, a mind leaning on tower [balustrade].

遺f艮飛鴻外,

A lingering regret [that passes] beyond the flying swan:

南來訪遠音 °

As it comes south, I inquire of news from afar.21

17. Wen quotes the couplet "I have read ten thousand volumes; setting down my brush is as if there were divinity (shen) present.”「讀書破萬卷,下筆如有神」. From "[A poem in] Twenty-Two Rhymes Presented to Assistant Director Wei"

《奉ItS左丞丈二十二韻》,QTS 7.216.2252. 18. "Colophon to the Draft Poetic Collection of Xiao Jingfu"《跋蕭敬夫詩藁》,� QW359.8316.117-18; WTXQJ 10.244. 19. WTXQJ 2.33; QSS 68.3596.42975. Hengyang is in the southern part of the region associated with Chu, so the tower looks northward. 20. Hengyang is on the Xiang River, which flows north into Lake Dongting. The image here could be either that previous heavy rains have caused the river to rise or that heavy rains fall on the river in the distance. Other instances of "rain is deep” 雨深 in the QSS support both readings. 21. Because it is autumn, the swan is migrating south from northern regions.

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T h e rhetorical gestures o f the p o e m convey the spaciousness o f the vista through symbolically resonant language derived f r o m Tang poetry and D u F u in particular. For example, D u F u frequently used the phrase " Q i a n Kun," the hexagrams for heaven and earth, respectively, to refer to the realm o f H e a v e n and Earth seen as the site o f u n e n d i n g cosmic processes, as in such lines as " Q i a n and K u n flow day and n i g h t " 睦 坤 日 夜 浮 3 W e n reaches for this effect in the fifth line, but the disjunction between the shadow o f the

flute

(the sound o f w h i c h is a frequently appearing element in Tang tower-climbing poems) and Q i a n and K u n makes the line awkward. Similarly, matching “transverse-flute-shadow,,with "leaning [ o n ] tower-mind"

(one that constantly seeks broader views) in the

parallel couplet structure is clever, but the pairing adds n o n e w depth to the reading o f the landscape. T h e final line may refer specifically to the situation in X i a n g y a n g ~ a l m o s t directly north and far o n the other side o f Lake D o n g t i n g ~ w h i c h had surrendered to the M o n g o l s in the T h i r d M o n t h o f the year, but the phrasing reveals j u s t general unease. In the end, the scene and the occasion cannot sustain the weight o f W e n ' s gestures toward expansive m e a n i n g that d o not find corresponding objects to anchor them. O n c e the w a r began, however, W e n Tianxiang cast aside doubts about poetry and left behind traditional rhetorical crafting. H e seized o n poetry as the m e d i u m by w h i c h to convey both the immediacy o f the events he encountered and the import o f his response to them. In the preface to a collection o f poems b y a f e l l o w official w h o j o i n e d the cause o f the refugee S o n g court, for example, W e n explains both the fault he initially found w i t h poetry and his n e w understanding: Since the time my friend [Deng Shan] was an examination candidate, he has expended great effort on poetry.23 He has attended to all the great writers and explored their sources. His basis is sound and his nurturing acute, and thus what he has attained is especially profound. I once evaluated his poems and noted that they were capacious and extraordinary, so refined in crafting as to appear natural. They were pretty, but still his intent unavoidably was on writing a poem. 22. Line 4 from "Climbing Yueyang Tower"《登岳陽樓》’ Q T S 7.233.2566. 23. Deng Shan�部 剣 ( j s 1262) also was from Luling. Like Wen, he was brought north after the end of the Song but was released to become a Daoist priest when the group reached Jiankang (modern Nanjing). He died sometime after 1297.

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During the time of chaos and loss, my friend, leading his family, fled as an official over the mountains to the sea, and his entire family was destroyed by the bandits. Alone, in straits and adrift, he was utterly exhausted. After this he was appointed vice-director of the Ministry of Rites atYaishan and a provisional auxiliary academician. It happened that the southern wind could not compete, and the imperial fleet was cast adrift. M y friend desperately [sought to] throw himself into the sea but was captured by the northern army and thus could not find death. Until now, through more than ten years, my friend has encountered all that is startling, hateful, sorrowful, enraging, painful, and disheartening. He gave release to the sorrow and anguish knotted up within through poetry: here, having been moved in his Nature and feeling, he could not but write poetry, just like the writings of D u Fu at Kuizhou and Liu Zongyuan once he reached 24 I have taken my friend's poems, copied them, and Liuzhou attached other relevant material so that those who read these poems later will see our resolve, and they surely will be moved by this.25

友人自爲舉子時,已大肆力於詩,於諸大家皆嘗登其門而涉其� 流,其本贍,其養銳,故所詣特深到。余嘗評其詩,渾涵有英� 氣,鍛鍊如自然,美則美矣,猶未免有意於爲詩也。自喪亂後,� 友人挈其家,避地遊官嶺海,而全家毀於盜,孤窮流落,困頓萬� 狀。然後崖山除禮部侍郎,中且權直學士矣。會南風不競,御舟� 漂散,友人倉卒蹈海者,再爲北軍所鉤致,遂不獲死,以至于� 今。凡十數年間,可驚可愕,可悲可憤,可痛可悶之事,友人備� 嘗,無所不至。其慘戚感慨之氣’結而不信,皆於詩乎發之。蓋� 至是動乎情性,自不能不詩,杜子美夔州、柳子厚柳州以後文字� 也。……乃取友人諸詩,筆之於書,與相關者并附焉。後之覽者� 因詩以見吾二人之志,其必有感慨於斯。� For W e n Tianxiang, war, suffering, loss, and noble resolve provided a cause for poetry to spontaneously c o m e forth in a manner entirely absent in the vicissitudes o f life during peace. A s that w h i c h gave voice to the m o v e m e n t s o f N a t u r e and its feelings in its encounter w i t h the challenges o f w a r and defeat, poetry was an effective and 24. It is interesting that Wen specifically points to Du Fu's poetry in Kuizhou, with its austere and at times highly complex style much admired by Huang Tingjian, rather than to the period of Du Fu's protest poems written soon after the start of the An Lushan Rebellion. 25. "Preface to the Eastern Sea Collection”《東海集序》,(31359.8315.99-100; WTXQJ, pp. 358-59. The "relevant material” may be Wen Tianxiang^ own responses and matching poems mentioned in a part of the preface I have omitted.

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perhaps even unique means to embody for posterity the commitments that gave meaning and substance to his unyielding resistance to the Mongols. T h e specifically aesthetic dimension mattered here because it extended the representational power o f poetry. However, while Liu Kezhuang and the poets o f the Rivers and Lakes sought to hone their craft to give adequate voice to the Nature within, for Wen Tianxiang, the aesthetic ordering came not from specific intentions but only from the moment o f being shaken to the depths w h e n "Nature gives the rule to art."26 While for Su Shi the poetry o f spontaneity sought to capture the patterns o f the world, Wen Tianxiang's poetry was to reveal the Nature and its feelings: poetry remained for him a means to an end, a tool in his fight, a way to articulate his unshakable resolve and, as in the last line o f "Visiting Bereft Bay/,� a means o f finding immortality in the historical record.

Record of the Compass T h e transformation o f Wen Tianxiang is justly famous. As a firstplace jinshi graduate, he had demonstrated the intelligence, tenacity, and learning needed to excel in the examinations. His early career, much like that o f Liu Kezhuang and many others before him, was marked by moral commitments that led to demotions and resignations and years spent at home. Neither the examination nor these early years, however, called for or gave hints o f the qualities o f resourcefulness, courage, leadership, and physical and mental toughness that Wen discovered within himself as he made his way from the Yangzi River down to Fujian where the refugee Song regime had regrouped. As a writer, Wen in his early career had demonstrated competence in a range o f poetic styles from the sort o f learned and crafted verse needed for formal occasions in the capital to various simpler regulated and old-style forms appropriate to a life o f reclusion. There was little, however, to presage Wen's creation o f the hybrid form o f the Record of the Compass, improvised during his flight south. T h e Record of the Compass describes Wen's initial service as envoy, his detention by the Mongols, and his escape and flight south until 26. Kant, Critique of Judgment, p. 174. See introduction, p. 23.

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he reached F u z h o u . It is a composite text o f long prefaces that provide the narrative contexts, followed by plain poems largely stripped o f rhetorical embellishment. 2 7 A s W e n Tianxiang describes t h e m in a postface written in 1276: In the midst of difficulties, on occasion I recorded what I had encountered in poems. N o w I have preserved the manuscripts and cannot bear to discard them and on the road copied them by hand I will store them at home to allow those to come to read them and be moved to sorrow by my resolve.28

予在患難中,間以詩記所遭。今存其本不忍廢,道中手自抄� 錄。……將藏之于家,使來者讀之,悲予志焉。� T w o examples w i l l suffice to suggest Wen's approach. A f t e r he made his w a y f r o m Z h e n z h o u to Yangzhou, W e n and his followers had to deal w i t h the suspicions o f Li Tingzhi, the military commissioner guarding Yangzhou, w h o thought that W e n could not possibly have escaped and that therefore the M o n g o l s had released h i m as some f o r m o f deceptive stratagem. In the series o f quatrains, "Arriving at Yangzhou, 20 poems,” W e n describes h o w events unfolded. T h e sixth in the series presents a debate: Jin Lufen [Ying] said, "As soon as we go out the gate, there are [Mongol] patrols. H o w can we possibly travel 500-600 li and reach Tongzhou? 29 Rather than undergo the hardships of that effort, it would be better to die at the foot of the walls of Yangzhou. This way we do not fail to die in [unoccupied] southern territory. And I still think there is a chance the commissioner will not kill us.,,�

金路分謂,出門便是哨,五六百里而後至通州,何以能達。與其� 爲此受苦而死,不如死於揚州城下,不失爲死於南。且猶意使臣� 之或不殺也。� 27. The collection is composed overwhelmingly of seven-character quatrains, which do not require the crafting of parallel couplets. It has 176 poems: 37 five-character regulated verse, 10 seven-character regulated verse, l five-character quatrain, 125 seven-character quatrains, 2 five-character old-style poems, and 1 irregular old-style poem. Stephen Owen has translated a portion of the Record of the Compass in An Anthology of Chinese Literature, pp. 704-20.

28. "Postface to the Record of the Compass”《指南錄後序》,QSW 359-8315 97;� WTXQf 13.313. The Quan Song wen editors accept the variant "resolve"志 for "arrive”�至. 29. Tongzhou was on a peninsula on the north bank of the Yangzi River. From there, Wen hoped to travel by boat down to the refugee Song regime in Fujian.

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至揚州�二 十 首 其 六 Arriving at Yangzhou, sixth of twenty poems30 海雲澉微楚天頭, The ocean clouds are far distant at the end of the Chu sky.31 On a road filled with Tartar dust we cannot freely 滿路胡塵不自由� [choose]. 若使一朝俘上去� If we are to be captured one morning and taken off,

不如制命死揚州�

It would be better to grasp hold of our fate and die atYangzhou.

T h e allusiveness and indirectness o f the first line preserves some crafting, but the following three are entirely straightforward. T h e second example, even plainer, explains the title o f the collection: One can get from Tongzhou to the mouth of the Yangzi River in two turns of the tide. In order to avoid the [occupied] islets, once we reached Xupu, giving thought to those traveling with us, we went around, out into the northern sea, and only then did we cross the Yangzi River.

自通州之揚子江口,兩潮可到。爲避渚沙’及許浦顧諸從行者,� 法,出北海,然後渡揚子江。� 揚子江�

幾日隨風北海游� 回 從 揚 子 大 画� 臣心一片磁針石� 不指南方不肯休�

The Yangzi River32 For several days, following the wind, we wandered the northern sea: We returned to cross the great mouth of the Yangzi River. This servant's heart is a lodestone needle: If not facing south, it is unwilling to rest.

T h e language, imagery, organization, and intention is utterly transparent. Here, as in the rest o f the Record of the Compass, Wen Tianxiang entrusts the transmission o f his resolve to poetry, but the poems cohere through the narrative context and the framing o f Wen's commitments rather than through any aesthetic intuition o f the poem as a unity. T h e poems o f the Latter Record of the Compass, in contrast, reveal how Wen Tianxiang began to draw on the power of the aesthetic 30. QSS 68.359743007; WTXSX, p. 43; WTXQJ 13.333. 31. Tongzhou, by the ocean, was at the far extreme of what had been considered Chu during the Warring States period. 32. QSS 68.359743020; WTXSX, p. 66; WTXQJ 13.343.

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dimension in p o e t r y ~ t h e intuition o f order structured within but beyond the surface o f the t e x t t o deepen and broaden the meaning embodied in the poems. T h i s second collection gathers together the poems that W e n Tianxiang wrote after his recapture by the M o n g o l s , on his j o u r n e y northward, and during his captivity in Dadu, ending j u s t before his death in early 1283. There are far fewer prefaces to poems in the Latter Record, so the poems must carry the full burden o f conveying the intent behind their writing. Wen Tianxiang during his imprisonment had the enforced leisure to reflect on poetry and to shape his poems with care. "Visiting Bereft Bay," the very first p o e m in the collection, reveals the broadening o f Wen's style. T h e other major example o f a crafted regulated verse p o e m f r o m this collection is also early, written in Jiankang, at very beginning o f the j o u r n e y north: 金 陵 驛 二 首 其 一�

Jinling Station, first o f two poems 33

草合離宮轉夕暉,� Grasses grow over the detached palace, shifting in the dusk gleam:34 孤雲飄泊復何依。� A lone cloud drifts and stops: on what can it depend? 山河風景元無異,� The scenery of mountains and rivers from the beginning has not changed,35 城郭人民半已非。� [But] the people within the city already are half gone.36 33. QSS 68.359743033; WTXSX, pp. 87-88; WTXQJ 14.355. 34. Gaozong built palace structures in Jiankang to stay in when he visited. 35. The line alludes to a story in Shishuo xinyu 2.31 about aristocrats who fled south during the collapse of the Western Jin dynasty. One lamented at a gathering that “the landscape is not different; it is just that there is a change in the mountains and

rivers."「風景不殊,正自有山河之異��See

Liu l-ching, A New Account of

the Tales of the World, trans, by Richard B. Mather (Minneapolis: Minnesota University Press, 1976),p. 45. The commentary in LiuYiqing�蕃[|義卿,Shishuo xinyu jianshu 世説新語笑疏,annot. Yujiaxi�余嘉錫(Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1993), p. 93, explains that the terrain surrounding Jiankang (Nanjing) is similar to that of Loyang, but the character of the mountains is different. 36. Here Wen draws on a story about the Han dynasty Daoist adept Dingling Wei in Tao Qian's Latter Record of Searching for the Divine (搜神後記)• He became an immortal, turned into a crane, and returned to his native land of Liao. He sang as he flew over his old home: “The city is as of old, but the people [I knew] are gone.,,�

「城郭如故人民非。」�

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滿地蘆花和我老’ Filling the land, the reed flowers grow old with me.

舊家燕子傍誰飛。� The swallows of my former home: into whose house have they flown?37 從今別却江南日,� From this day I now depart Jiangnan:38 化作啼鵑带細。� I shall become a crying cuckoo and return streaming [tears] of blood.39 T h e poem is an intense vision o f the land Wen Tianxiang, a captive, is about to depart forever. It is far more rhetorically crafted than the poems of the Record of the Compass and than most o f those in the Latter Record as well. T h e poem is replete with allusions, but the references in fact are largely commonplace. 40 More important is the way in which Wen assimilates the allusions to the landscape and, more generally, constructs human meanings out o f a world o f natural processes. These meanings inhere in the scene before him. In the very first line, for example, the image o f the old Song palaces in Jiankang, already encroached upon by nature and fading in the sunset, resonates with their fate in the human order as the Yuan dynasty displaces the Song. Yet the natural scene remains primary

37. The line draws on a couplet from Liu Yuxi's�劉禹錫(772-842) famous quatrain “Black-Cloat Lane”《烏衣巷》:“The swallows in former times before the halls of the Wangs and Xies, / Have flown into the homes of the ordinary commoners."「舊時王謝堂前燕,飛入尋常百姓家。」(QTS 11.365.4n7). The Wangs and the Xies were great clans of the Southern Dynasties. 38. Qian Zhongshu, in the Song shi xuanzhu, accepts a variant of�路’ “road,” for 日,aday,” but Huang Lanpo, the QSS editors, and the editors of the WTXQJ all keep “day•” 39- According to the Huayang guozhi� 華陽國志,Du Yu�杜宇,a king of Shu (Sichuan) in the Warring States, taught the populace agriculture and then, following the model ofYao, ceded the throne to an able minister. Because he retired in the Second Month, the people of Shu, sad to lose him, associated him with the sad call of the cuckoo. In later versions, Du Yu turned into a cuckoo when he died, and filled with regret, wept tears of blood. Various accounts accrued to explain this sadness. The image, at the very least, entails regret for expectations unfulfilled. 40. Lin Jingxi�林景熙(1240-1310), for example, combines the cuckoo and the crane in a couplet, “A pure cry in the autumn wilds: the crane of the Liao sea; / An ancient soul in the cold of spring: the cuckoo of the mountains of Shu.”「清喫秋荒� 遼 ‘ 古 魂 春 冷 蜀 山 鵑 。 」 F r o m “Sent on Hearing That Vice Grand Councilor Jia Zetang [Xuanweng] Has Returned from the North”《聞家貝(J堂大參歸自� 北寄呈》,QSS 69.363143486; L/?g pp. 63-64.

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here, and its human corollary merely echoes in the background. Certainly, in the second line, Wen casts himself as like the drifting clouds, but one still sees the clouds themselves. T h i s pattern continues throughout the poem: the city walls are real elements o f the scene, as are the mountains and river, the reeds and the swallows. T h e human meanings he presents for these images through allusive reference do not turn them into mere symbols, projected icons for internal commitments. T h e patterns o f constancy and change set within the cyclical order o f nature make the final transformation, Wen Tianxiang's v o w to return to the south as a cuckoo always singing its song o f loss, a fitting, integrated, and strong conclusion to a poem about departure. In the poem, Wen Tianxiang finds meanings based not on the inherent patterns o f the world with which he identifies his o w n situation but on inward qualities o f commitment and character revealed through his structuring o f elements drawn from the phenomenal realm. T h i s reading o f experience in intentional terms is o f no small moment: without an intuition that the world is adequate to the meanings deriving from the Nature and its feelings, the world remains alienated. In the preface to the collection o f t w o hundred quatrains he created out o f lines from D u Fu's poems, Wen Tianxiang strikingly reveals his sense o f poetry's recuperation o f moral meanings immanent in the phenomenal realm: As I sat in seclusion in the prison in Yan [Dadu], I had nothing to do and chanted Du Fu's poems. Having become somewhat familiar with those that particularly moved me, I compiled the five-character lines into quatrains. After a long time, I came up with two hundred poems. Whatever intentions I wanted to express, Du Fu already had said them for me. Daily engaging them, never putting them aside, I was aware only that they were my poems and forgot that they were Du Fu's poems. Then I understood that Du Fu was not able to create these poems himself: the lines are speech from within human feelings and Nature, which Du Fu took the trouble to say. Du Fu and I are several hundred years apart, and yet I use his speech: surely our feelings and Nature are the same!41 41. "Preface to Poems Compiledfrom Du 101; WTXQf

16.3,97.

Fun《集杜詩自序》,QSH^359.83l5.lOO~

478

An Inner Compass 478

余坐幽燕獄中’無所爲,誦杜詩’稍習諸所感興,因其五言,集� 爲絕句。久之,得二百首。凡吾意所欲言者,子美先爲代言之。� 曰玩之不置,但覺爲吾詩,忘其爲子美詩也。乃知子美非能自爲� 詩,詩句自是人情性中語’煩子美道耳。子美於吾,隔數百年,� 而其言語爲吾用,非情性同哉。� Wen Tianxiang develops this analysis to explain his appropriation o f D u Fu's poems. Yet this sort of making poems out o f D u Fu's lines was hardly new and needed little justification: Wen's shifting the origin o f poetry inward to the normative, universal Nature here reaches beyond being simply an excuse for his collection. While Yang Wanli and Lu You saw poetry immanent in the world, Wen sees it in the Nature and in the feeling that the Nature produces w h e n stirred by events in the world. Poetry~and especially D u Fu's p o e t r y ~ becomes fragments o f Nature and its proper feelings articulated through the imagery o f the experiential realm. In appropriating D u Fu's language, in recognizing its intentions as his own, Wen Tianxiang demonstrates that he too has seen into the abiding moral Nature from which D u Fu had the genius to extract his lines. In Kantian terms, for Wen Tianxiang, Nature and its feelings have become the transcendental g r o u n d ~ t h e coherent source for lawfulness and m e a n i n g ~ f r o m which poetry derives, if, like D u Fu, one has the talent to give voice to the unspoken inner language. 斯 t h i n this framework, the will of the individual shaping the texts in their particularity still matters. Wen continues the preface to Poems Compiledfrom Du Fu : In former times people evaluated Du Fu's poetry as a "poetic history.” This surely is because he used the phrases from his chanting to preserve the actual circumstances (shi) behind the historical record, and his moral judgments show through luminously. It is acceptable even to deem [Du Fu's poems] "historical writings." The changes in the world and the human events that I have encountered since my difficulties can be seen in the lines of Du Fu's poems that I have collected here, and this is not the result of an intent to compose poetry. I hope that later historians will investigate this. 昔人評杜詩爲詩史,蓋其以詠歌之辭,寓紀載之實’而抑揚褒貶� 之意燦然於其中,雖謂之史可也。予所集杜詩,自余顛沛以來,� 世變人事’槩見於此矣’是非有意於爲詩者也。後之良史’尙庶� 幾有考焉。�

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That is, although D u Fu's poetry speaks the language o f Nature and its feelings, its particular organization still reveals D u Fu's distinct morally informed intentions articulated through poetry. Similarly, Wen's own organization of D u Fu's lines serves the same purpose in conveying his sense o f the events he encountered since the start o f the war. Wen thus took great care to preserve his writing~including the Poems Compiled from Du Fu—and found solace in the fact that future generations would know him through his poetry. In a colophon to the first volume of the Latter Record of the Compass, Wen wrote: My younger brother, the Vice Director, for the present will take possession of the manuscript and keep it from being cast adrift in the world. If the realm gets to see even one couplet or half a line and comes to know how I was as a person, then I will die without regrets. How much more so if many pieces survive!42 侍郎弟姑據所存本,使不浪於世,一聯半句,使天下見之,識其� 爲人,即吾死無憾矣,況篇帙之多乎。� Poetry secure, Wen Tianxiang saw just one last duty demanded o f him, and the Mongols, having decided that he would never change in his commitments, granted him his execution on January 9,1283.43

Returning Home: The Poetry of Morally Informed Experience Other major loyalist poets besides Wen Tianxiang seem to have been late converts w h o discovered in war the power o f poetry to reveal their deep commitment to the Song cause. Although their corpora o f extant poems are small, it seems that Xie Bingde� 謝枋得(1226-89),

42. “Colophon at the End of the First Volume of the Latter Record of the Compass” 《指南後錄卷一下跋》,QS阶359.8315.98. Wen Tianxiang's younger brother was Wen Bi�文璧,to whom Wen gave both his writings and the responsibility to preserve the family line. I draw on genealogical information provided in Zhang Gongjian 張公鑑,Wen Tianxiang shengpingjiqi shici yanjiu� 文 天 祥 生 平 及 其 詩 詞 研 究 ( T a i b e i :

Taiwan Commercial Press, 1990), pp. 32-41. 43. The concise chronology in Xia Yanzhang�夏延章,ed” Wen Tianxiang shiwen shangxiji�文天祥詩文賞析集(Chengdu: Bashu shushe, 1994) gives the details of Wen Tianxiang's execution (p. 279).

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An Inner Compass 480

Z h e n g Sixiao� 鄭 思 肖 ( 1 2 4 1 - 1 3 1 8 ) , a n d X i e A o� 謝 翱 ( 1 2 4 9 - ^ 5 ) w r o t e poetry primarily after the beginning o f major hostilities. 44 Yet their use o f poetry stretched—under d u r e s s ~ t h e imaginative range o f a poetry o f "chanting o f the Nature and its feelings," allowing it to discover and e m b o d y meaningful responses to a far broader range o f events than those that had been the pallid, undemanding, and u n i n spiring topics o f the much-criticized Rivers and Lakes poets. W h e n peace returned, some writers remained committed to resisting the blandishments o f the Yuan to serve in the n e w dynasty and f o u n d themselves cast a m o n g the rivers and lakes. For them, the expansion o f imaginative range most forcefully voiced in W e n Tianxiang's poetry lingered and f o u n d expression in a quieter poetry that articulated resolve through seeing the moral dimension in scenes o f everyday life. Daoxue visions o f the manifestation o f moral order merged w i t h the w o r l d o f experience o f the Rivers and Lakes poets. N o t all literati acted heroically in the war against the M o n g o l s and in the peace that followed. N o t all writers changed their approach to poetry. Yet the examples offered both in life and art proved p o w e r f u l and enduring. 4 5 A t the end o f the Southern S o n g there w e r e patriots w h o attained reputations for heroic self-sacrifice approaching that o f W e n Tianxiang: L u X i u f u� 陸 秀 夫 ( 1 2 3 8 - 7 9 ) ,

for

example,

accompanied the infant S o n g emperors to the bitter end and carried

44. For Xie Bingde, who has 102 poems in the Quan Song shi, see the comments ofXiong Fei�貪_飛 in his forward to the very useful X/e Dieshan quanjijiaozhu�謝叠山� 全集校往(Shanghai: Huadong shifan daxue chubanshe, 1994), pp. 2-3. Zheng Sixiao, initially a student in the Imperial University, was a painter and calligrapher.

His actual personal name has been lost: "Sixiao ,思肯,” taken by him after the conquest, refers to “longing for the Zhao [Song Dynasty]" (si Zhao�思、趙).Among his 402 extant poems, some of the early compositions focus on the siege of Xiangyang that started in 1268 and ended in 1273. For an excellent if perplexed account of Zheng's activities, see Davis, Wind Against the Mountain, pp. 127-31. Xie Ao, only twenty-seven when Hangzhou surrendered, joined Wen Tianxiang in his effort to support the refugee Song regime and came to poetic maturity during and after the war. He has 294 extant poems in the Quan Songshi. 45. He Menggui's�何夢桂(1229-?) preface to Wen Tianxiang's poetry, that stirringly praises his ardent patriotism and unyielding resolve, makes clear that Wen's collection circulated during the early Yuan. “Preface to Wenshan's Poems”「《文山� 詩 序 》 , 3 5 8 . 8 2 9 2 . 7 0 , cited in Liu Wenyuan�劉文源,ed., Wen Tianxiang yanjiu ziliaoji�文天祥研究資料集(Beijing: Zhongguo shehuikexue chubanshe, 1991), pp. 320-21.

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t h e last r u l e r o n his s h o u l d e r s as b o t h d r o w n e d t o a v o i d h u m i l i a t i o n b y t h e M o n g o l s . M a n y w h o sacrificed t h e m s e l v e s are b e y o n d t h e historical r e c o r d : 100,000 n a m e l e s s loyal f o l l o w e r s t u r n e d t h e o c e a n i n t o a "vast sea o f r e d " in the last desperate battle at Yaishan. 4 6 T h e r e also w e r e s u i c i d e s 一 s o m e q u i t e s p e c t a c u l a r ~ a m o n g t h e loyalists. 4 7 F o r m o s t p e o p l e , h o w e v e r , the c o n q u e s t s o o n b e c a m e s i m p l y an a c c o m p l i s h e d fact, a n d t h e y g o t o n w i t h their lives. W a n g Y u a n l i a n g 汪 元 量 ( c a . 1 2 4 0 - c a . 1 3 1 8 ) , f o r e x a m p l e , describes a s c e n e w i t h i n m o n t h s o f the surrender o f H a n g z h o u : 醉歌十首第六

Drunken Song, sixth o f ten poems 48

衣 冠 不 改 只 如 先�

T h e clothes and caps have not changed, just as before.

關 會 通 行 滿 市 廛�

Paper currency circulates, filling the market district.

北 客 南 人 成 買 賣�

Northern travelers and southerners complete their commerce.

京 師 依 舊 使 銅 錢 � I nthe capital as o f old they use copper cash. T h e M o n g o l c o n q u e s t and t h e e n d o f t h e e x a m i n a t i o n s y s t e m , h o w e v e r , s i g n i f i c a n t l y c h a n g e d the lives o f t h e elite s t r a t u m b o t h i n 46. See Davis,account o f the battle in Wind Against the Mountain, pp. 2 - 5 .

47. Davis,goal in writing Wind Against the Mountain was to account for these suicides, which he lists in appendix C, pp. 211-18. 48. QSS

70.3664.43994; Wang Yuanliang ji jiaozhu�

汪元量集校注(Hangzhou:

Zhejiang guji chubanshe, 1999), annot. Hu Caifu�胡才夫,pp. 21-22. Although Wang apparently had attended the Imperial University, he became a qin�琴(zither) master in the palace. When the Mongols took the court north, Wang went with them, and even attended the young ex-emperor to the Mongol northern capital of Shangdu. He also accompanied several ritual missions that led him to the five sacred peaks and other parts of China. Eventually, the empress dowager died, the ex-emperor was sent to become a monk in Tibet, and the palace women were married off to artisans. Wang received permission to return south as a Daoist priest. The focus of this chapter does not permit me to explore Wang's touching and capital and while he attended the palace women on their journey north. Inagaki Hiroshi�稻垣裕史 has written a thoughtful analysis ofWang's ninety-eigjit quatrains in the "Songs of Huzhou"(〈汪元量刃「湖州歌」九十八首(CC^T〉,� bungaku ho�中國文學報 74 (April 2004): 58-97- Wang Cicheng,s�王 次 澄 chapter on Wang Yuanliang in Song Yuan yiminshi luncong�宋元遗民詩論叢(Taibei: Da'an chubanshe, 2001) provides a good account of his five major poem sequences. Also see Shuen-fu Lin, "North and South: The Twelfth and Thirteenth Centuries" in the Cambridge History of Chinese Literature, pp. 547-48.

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An Inner Compass 482

the capital and in local society. Passing the jinshi examination had been a key route to entering the national elite, and participating in the exams had been a sign o f elite standing at the local level. 49 With these means o f asserting and maintaining social distinction lost, ambitious men, both those newly arrived and those w h o had been in the capital in search o f advancement at the time o f the conquest, needed other ways to establish their names. A s S h u Yuexiang described, they soon discovered poetry. T h e loyalist poetry circles that grew up in major cultural centers follow very m u c h the model o f the circulation o f Rivers and Lakes writers o f the previous fifty years. 50 G r o u p s coalesced around local cultural figures like Z h o u M i in H a n g z h o u and willing patrons like W u Wei�吳 渭 in Puyang� 浦 陽� (in Jinhua). 51 Poets traveled between locales to write w i t h one another, to support one another, and to advance their individual reputations. A major difference f r o m the loose structure o f the earlier circulation o f writers, however, was the loyalist commitment: these groups sought not j u s t to support their members as writers but also to create solidarity in commemorating the fallen dynasty and resisting the lure o f service in the n e w Yuan empire. 52 O n e o f the best-known early 49. As Chafee stresses, however, by the end of the Southern Song, there were many alternative routes to entry into government service that avoided the intense competition of the regular examination process. Nonetheless, Clark's data for Fujian suggests that facilitated degrees largely helped old established families in decline, while the jinshi identified clans rising into elite status. 50. A vital resource for the study of loyalist groups in the early Yuan is Fang Yong 方勇,Nan Song yimin shiren qunti yanjiu�南宋遗民詩人群體研究(Beijing: Renmin chubanshe, 2000). Fang concludes that the greatest single determinant in the distribution of groups was not so much any standard measure of cultural level but simply economic prosperity (p. 101). 51. Fang describes the major loyalist poetry groups, their activities, and participants: see Nan Song yimin shiren, pp. 6 1 - 1 0 1 .

52. Several contemporary scholars have stressed the self-conscious construction of the loyalist groups. See, for example, Ouyang Guang�歐陽光,“From communities of literati to literati groups~A reexamination of the literati group in Wuzhou

in the Yuan dynasty"〈從文人群落到文人集團一元代婺州文人集團再硏究〉� in H u a n g Tlanji�黃 天 驢 , e d . , Zhongguogudai ociqu yu gudai wenxue yanjiu lunji� 中 國 古�

代戲曲與古代文學研究論集,(Beijing: Zhonghua, 2001): 529-47; Shen Wanli�申� 萬里,"Looking at the social networks of southern scholars during the Yuan dynasty from social communicationswith Dai Biaoyuan as an example"〈從社會交往看�

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groups gathered together under the initiative o f Tang Jue� 唐 H (b. 1247) o f Shanyin� 山 陰 in Shaoxing to rescue the bones o f the former Song emperors. In 1285,a Tibetan monk, Byan-sprin (Yanglian-zhenjia�楊键真伽),appointed by the Mongols to oversee the Buddhist establishment in the south, dug up the tombs o f the Southern Song emperors in Shaoxing to loot them o f their funerary objects, which he intended to use in building a new Buddhist shrine. Tang and other Song loyalists were so appalled by this planned desecration that they reportedly stole into the site beforehand, gathered most o f the remains, reburied them near Lantian, and planted holly (dongqing�冬青,"winter-green") trees to mark the new tombs. 53 Tang Jue's two poems to commemorate the deed are direct old-style verse. In the second, for example, he writes: 冬青行二首其二

Ballad of the Holly, second of two poems54

冬青花,

The holly flower

不可折,�

Cannot be broken;

The southern wind is cool on the heap of fragrant 南風吹凉積香雪丨� snow. Far, far away, the lustrous green covering of the ten-thousand-year branches: 上 有 鳳 巢 下 龍 穴 � Above is a phoenix nest, below, a dragon's cave.55

遥遥翠蓋萬年枝�

元代江南儒士的社會網IS~以戴表元爲例〉Wuhan Daxue xuebao (Humanities) 武漢大學學報(人文鄉版)56, no. 4 (July 2003): 402-7; and Shi Xin�施新,"An examination of the structure of the activities of the Moon Spring Poetry Society” 〈“月泉吟社”活動形式考〉,Zhejiang shehui kexue浙江社會科學2007.2 (March): 166-70,185. 53. There are differing accounts of this event, including the date. I largely follow Davis, "Tu-tsung and His Successors” in the Cambridge History of China, Vol. 5, Part 1,pp. 959-60. Shuen-fu Lin also discusses the group composition of ci song lyrics occasioned by the rescue of the imperial remains. See Lin, The Transformation of the Chinese Lyrical Tradition: Chiang K,uei and Southern Sung Tz'u Poetry (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1978), p. 191-93. Fang \ong, Nan Song yimin shiren, discusses the group's effort on pages 65-66. I follow the date suggested as most likely by Zhou "Vaner�周 燕 兒 in "An examination of the tablet [concerning] the Ming order to inter the skull of Lizong unearthed from the Six Song tumuli in Shaoxing"〈紹興宋六陵出土的明敕葬宋理宗頂骨碑考略〉,Dongfang bourn東方� 博 物 33 (2008): 24-27’ p. 26.

54. QSS 70.3685.44265. 55. The dragon refers to the emperor interred below the trees.

An Inner Compass 484

484

君 不 見 犬 之 年 羊 之 月 ’ D o you not see, in the year of the dog, the month of the ram,56 霹靂一聲天地裂 °

One peal of thunder rips through heaven and earth.

Another w e l l - k n o w n gathering was a m o u r n i n g rite for W e n Tianxiang held at the Angling Terrace in Yanzhou (near H a n g z h o u ) in early 1291. W u Siqi�吳思齊,one o f the leaders o f the Puyang group, and X i e A o , a follower o f Wen and also a m e m b e r o f the Puyang group, organized this event to commemorate the eighth anniversary o f Wen's execution. X i e A o composed several poems and the “Record o f W a i l i n g at the Western T e r r a c e " 《 西 臺 慟 哭 記 》 f o r the occasion. T h e most famous and largest scale loyalist literary event, however, was the " M o o n Spring Poetry Society" competition, organized by the Puyang group. 57 W u Wei announced to other poetic groups throughout the south that the society w o u l d give out the topic o n the fifteenth

day o f the Tenth M o n t h o f 1286; the replies一poems in

five- or seven-character regulated v e r s e ~ w e r e due the fifteenth day o f the First M o n t h o f 1287, and the society w o u l d post the results on the third day o f the Third M o n t h , the day o f ritual ablution o n w h i c h the famous Lanting gathering was held. Fang Feng� 方 鳳 ( 1 2 4 0 1321)’ X i e A o , and W u Siqi were invited to serve as judges. T h e y received 2,735 volumes and selected 280 individuals for rewards. T h e y then published a v o l u m e with the top sixty entries and the judges' evaluations. 58 T w o factors appear to have underlain the broad and enthusiastic response to competition in the major cultural centers o f the former Southern Song. First, ten years after the abolition o f the examination system, the poetry competition provided an 56. This ought to be the Eighth Month of 1286. This is consistent with Zhou's date. 57. See Shi Xin, "An Examination of the Structure of the Activities of the Moon Spring Poetry Society," for a good overview. Chapter 3 ofWang Cicheng, Song Yuan yiminshi luncong also has an excellent discussion. Stephen H. West discusses the competition in "Literature from the Late Jin to the Early Ming,” Cambridge History of Chinese Literature^ pp. 5 7 7 - 7 8 .

58. In fact, the volume contains seventy-four poems by fifty-three writers. Because the writers took pen names for their submissions, some writers appear twice under different names. See Wang Cicheng, Song Yuan yiminshi luncong, pp. 108-9.

An Inner Compass 495 opportunity for men to gain social recognition among their peers in a format that mirrored the old examinations. It answered a hunger for fame. T h e process started in the fall, and the results were publicly announced in the spring, as had been the examination results. Moreover, the submitters~or at least those in the extant published collection~used pen names. Although the announcements for the competition did not require this form of anonymity and the reason for this precaution is unclear, most contemporary scholars suggest that the hiding o f names also mirrored examination practices. T h e second component to the response to the competition was a particular urgency in the fall o f 1286 to create an opportunity to participate in a large-scale loyalist activity and thereby reaffirm collective identity. T h e Mongol policy makers that year increased pressure on southern scholars to participate in the Yuan government, and the recruitment campaign grew increasingly intense. 59 T h e poetry competition created a very timely mechanism for supporting solidarity within a wavering elite. T h e topic announced for the competition, “Inspirations (ocing) on a spring day amidst fields and gardens"(春曰田園雜興),derived from Fan Chengda's� 范 成 大 ( 1 1 2 6 - 9 3 ) famous sequence o f sixty seven-character quatrains on "inspirations amidst fields and gardens" throughout the four seasons, but the intent of the theme was to bring the war o f resistance back home. Wu Wei's explanation o f the judging did not make this political dimension explicit. However, its references to the Canon of Poetry and to D u Fu as the preeminent models for "inspiration" as a mode of writing surely suggested the relevance o f the political and moral dimensions of experience in the countryside. Wu Wei explained in his “Evaluation o f Poems,,:� In the Canon of Poetry there are the Six Modes: inspiration is one. Whenever shade and radiance, cold and heat, plants and animals,

59. For example, Xie Bingde, as a noted loyalist scholar, writer, and poet, was near the top of the list of targeted recruits in 1286. Although he managed to decline the request several times, in the end authorities in Dadu sent word in 1289 that he was to be escorted north. He then stopped eating and died of starvation after he reached the Yuan capital. (See Fang Yong, Nan Song yimin shiren, pp. 32-37.) Several contemporary scholars connect the recruitment drive to the creation of the poetry competition. In particular, see Fang Yong, Nan Song yimin shiren, p. 79.

486

An Inner Compass 486

mountains and rivers, and the broad scenery bring out a corresponding response and become poetry, this is “inspiration.” The “Airs” and the “Odes” frequently begin through inspiration, while the “Songs of Chu” largely use exposition and allegory. From the Han and Wei to the Tang, those extraordinary works like Old Du's eight "Autumn Inspirations” deeply penetrate the subtle recesses of the poets [of the Canon ofPoetry], and inspiration in the regulated form takes this as its ancestral f a t h e r . … I f there is a stirring of Nature and feelings that relies on elements of the scene of a spring day among the fields and gardens, the intention and the scene fuse, and the wording and the intention come together; once the chanting becomes lofty, and the moment clearly is an “inclusive (za) inspiration,,,this truly is an inclusive inspiration.60 詩有六義’興居其一。凡陰陽寒暑,草木鳥獸,山川風景,得於� 適然之感,而爲詩者皆興也。《風》《雅》多起興’而《楚騷》� 多 賦 與 比 , 漢 魏 至 唐 , 傑 然 如 老 杜 《 秋 興 》 八 首 , 深 詣 詩 人 閬� 奧,興之入律者宗焉……。有因春日田園閒景物,感動性情,意� 與 景 融 , 辭 與 意 會 。 一 吟 風 頃 悠 然 , 自 見 其 爲 雜 興 者 , 此 真 雜� 興也。� Wu Wei's intent here was to clarify that the judges did not want the allegorical use o f the landscape in the "Songs o f C h u " : the poets' intentions arising from the Nature and its feelings were to be presented as integral to the scene. T h e submission by Lian Wenfeng�連 文 鳳 ( 1 2 4 0 - ? ) , ranked first by the judges, reveals the qualities they sought: 春曰田園雜興�

Inspiration on a Spring Day amidst Fields and Gardens61

老我無心出市朝�

Old me, with no thought, leaves the market and court.62

東風林壑自逍遥�

The east wind wanders at ease amidst groves and ravines.

一 犁 好 雨 秧 初 種�

One plow-depth of good rain when the seedlings are first planted.

60.《詩評》(QVW 19.610.562), dated the third day of the Third Month, 1287. Zaxing�雜 興 literally means "miscellaneous inspiration,” but it refers to inspirations that draw from anything in the scene. 61 • QSS 69.3621.43365. 62. The phrasing here, literally "with no mind going out”�無心出,almost invariably applies in the QSS to clouds leaving mountains without any active intention.

An Inner Compass 幾 道 寒 泉 藥 旋 澆�

487

Several streams from cold springs: soon the medicinal herbs will be watered.

放 犢 曉 登 雲 外 壟�

Setting loose the calf, at dawn I climb to the fields beyond the clouds.

聽 鶯 時 立 柳 邊 橋�

I listen to the oriole, at times standing on the bridge

池 塘 見 說 生 新 草�

The pond, I hear, has sent forth new grass shoots:63

已 許 吟 魂 入 夢 招�

I already have permitted [my] chanting soul to be

by the willows.

summoned in dreams.64 T h e j u d g e s ' c o m m e n t s explain: “Among all the outstanding w o r k s , w h e n w e sought the most perfect one w i t h o u t flaws, extremely w e l l ordered and not constrained in its breadth, this p o e m was the best." 「眾傑作中,求其粹然無疵,•齊而不窘邊幅者,此爲冠。」65 A l l political concerns are explicitly tangential: the poet claims in the first line simply to have drifted away f r o m the h u b b u b o f the city, its c o m m e r c e , and its politics. T h e countryside signifies b y its diflference and its self-sufficiency. T h e second line indirectly introduces the elements o f the poem's topic: "spring" appears in the east (spring) w i n d , “fields and gardens" through “groves and ravines," and "inspiration" through the "wandering at ease.” 66 T h e inner couplets are w e l l crafted but d o not push beyond the ease and calm o f the Rivers and Lakes style. T h e

final

couplet elegantly appropriates

Xie

Lingyun's w e l l - w o r n couplet to return to the question o f m o v e m e n t introduced in the first line. A n d , o f course, the s u m m o n s to poetry 63. The line incorporates a famous couplet by Xie Lingyun, “The ponds send forth spring grasses; / The garden willows change their singing birds.”「池塘生春�

草,園柳變鳴禽。」from "Climbing the Tower by the Pond”《登池上樓》. Zhong Rong in his "Classifying Poetry" ("Shipin”�詩品)famously reports that Xie claimed that the couplet came to him in a dream through divine (shen) help while he was half-asleep. Stephen Owen translates the Xie's poem in An Anthology of Chinese Literature, p. 3 2 1 .

64. "Chanting soul” is a relatively common phrase in Song poetry. In its usual usage, it appears to refer to the spirit of the author himself who is to be summoned (made whole and at rest) by a return to the site of the summoning, here the rural spring scene of the poem. 65. Wu Wei�吳 才 胃 , y i n s h e shi� 月泉吟社詩(Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1985),P- 966. Li Jizu�李濟阻 makes this point in his discussion of the poem in Song shi jianshang cidian�宋詩黎賞辭典,Miao Yue�繆鉞 et al., eds. (Shanghai: Shanghai cishu chubanshe, 1987), p. 1425.

488

An Inner Compass 488

in the final line displaces the other by the Yuan court that lies beyond the edges o f the poem. T h e movement o f the poem from line to line一from its initial framing o f the scene to its final resolution integrating the middle couplets into the starting position~coheres not just in terms o f the explicit theme o f spring in the countryside but also through the abiding, unspoken intentionality through w h i c h the poet articulates his "Nature and its feelings.” T h e poems contributed to the M o o n Spring Chanting Society's competition inherently were rhetorical exercises written to meet the requirements set by Wu Wei and the judges. Still, they embody practice lessons about the scope o f and possibilities for poetry learned by writers w h o lived through the war. Even those w h o took poetry seriously before the conquest discovered in it n e w depths. L i n j i n g x i 林 景 熙 ( 1 2 4 0 - 1 3 1 0 ) , w h o participated in the reburial o f the Song emperors, wrote: Poetry arose with the “Song of the Highroad,,and expanded in the three hundred [poems of the Canon of Poetry],67 After the Odes were exhausted and the Hymns disappeared, the “Airs of the King,,and "Vines,,were bound to their times.68 Du Fu after the end of the Tianbao reign period was moved by the times as he encountered scenes: “flower's tears" and “birds startled" are no longer the sound of harmony that sings of flourishing [rule], and yet they still remain poems of the Tang.69 67. The song of "Kangqu" comes from a story in the late Han Daoist compilation, Lie Zi: the sage emperor \ao, traveling in disguise along the road in order to assess his rule, heard a child singing a song about his rule. See A. C. Graham's translation, The Book

of Lieh-tzu:

A

Classic of the Tao ( N e w \ o r k :

Columbia

University Press, i960, rpt. 1990), p. 90. 68. "Airs of the Kings" is one of the sections of the "Airs of the States” in the Canon ofPoetry. Chen Zengjie notes that Zhu Xi's commentary to the Canon of Poetry explains that the poems from the "Airs of the Kings” were written after King Ping moved the Zhou capital to Loyang in 770 BC, an event that marked the beginning of the Eastern Zhou (770 BC-256 BC) and the start of the long decline of the dynasty. Chen also su路ests that "Vines”《蔓草》refers to “In the "^llds are Vines,,《野有蔓� 草》in the "Airs of Zheng.” The "lesser preface”�小 序 to the poem states, "[The poet] longs to meet with a [propitious] t i m e ” � 思 遇 時 也° � S e eLin Jingpci shiji jiaozhu� 珠景熙詩集校注,collated and annotated by Chen Zengjie� 陳增傑� (Hangzhou: Zhejiang guji chubanshe, 1995), pp. 347-48. 69. "Preface to the poetry collection of Ma Jingshan"《馬靜山詩集序》,QYW 11.371.42. The phrases “flowers,tears” and "birds startled" are from the couplet “Moved by the times, flowers scatter tears; / Resenting parting, birds startle the

An Inner Compass

489

詩 起 於 《 康 衢 》 之 謠 而 暢 於 《 三 百 》 。 《 雅 》 歇 《 頌 》 沈 , 《 王� 風 》 《 蔓 草 》 , 繫 於 時 矣 。 杜 少 陵 自 天 寶 末 年 感 時 觸 景 , 花 淚 鳥� 驚 , 非 復 和 聲 , 以 鳴 其 盛 , 然 而 猶 有 唐 也 。� Z h u X i considered poetry appropriate for moments o f idleness and calm, and both the Four Lings and the Rivers and Lakes writers largely continued to stress such values as “calm and at ease,,(pingyi 平易)and “pure and n e w " (qingxin�清 新 ) . L i n Jingxi in this preface asserts canonical poetic values that reject calm and ease. H e explains that, like the exemplary poets o f antiquity, D u Fu responded to the circumstances o f his times and captured the significance o f an age o f turmoil in the anguish and sorrow he gave voice to in his poetry. Dai Biaoyuan, w h o had lamented that he was one o f the f e w w h o worked at poetry in the final years o f the Southern Song, also came to understand the richness o f poetry only after the experiences o f the war. H e explained in a colophon written after the war that he had not appreciated the full range o f poetry's possibilities until he had met sorrow and obstruction in the wider world and in his o w n family life: When Wang Zijian and I first knew each other, we lived near one another, and although we talked of poetry, we would [assist] one another in purifying [ourselves and our poems] through the learning of an established lineage in a time of peace, and [the poems] could be compared to fine foods at a feast, which we considered indispensable. But we did not yet know the ultimate, enduring flavor of poetry. We are now both graybeards and have known the sorrows of an age at war and of weary travel through heat and cold that have assailed us from without and the concerns of fields, marriage, and the passage of the days that obstruct us from within. N o w the sour, salty, bitter, and peppery flavors of poetry come boiling forth, like fatty porridge or the syrup from fruit: only after the juice is fully extracted does the sweetness appear.70

heart”「感時花濺淚,恨別鳥驚心」in Du Fu,s “Spring Vista,” written while he was in the Tang capital of Chang'an under occupation by An Lushan's rebel army (QTS 7.224.2404). Lin also uses the phrase in the "Preface to Zheng Zhongyin's Poetry Collection,,鄭中隱詩集序(QYW 11.371.44; Lin Jingxi shijijiaozhu, p. 352). 70. "Written at the end of Xiao Zixi's volume of poems”《齒蕭子西堯卷後》,� QYW 12.421.214; Dai Biaoyuan, Dai Biaoyuan ji fe•元集.Li Jun�李 軍 and Xin Mengxia�辛夢霞,eds. (Changchun: Jilin wenshi chubanshe, 2008) 18.250.

490

An Inner Compass 490

始 余 與 丞 公 往 還 時 , 居 相 鄰 , 雖 說 詩 , 大 抵 各 以 承 平 世 家 學 問 相� 蕩 滌 。 譬 如 飲 食 之 於 庶 羞 肴 饌 , 以 爲 不 可 闕 耳 , 未 知 詩 之 雋 永 極� 味 也 。 年 俱 老 蒼 , 加 之 以 世 故 兵 革 , 羈 旅 炎 涼 之 憂 , 攻 之 於 外 ,� 田 園 婚 嫁 朝 暮 之 迫 , 撓 之 於 內 。 於 是 詩 味 之 酸 鹹 苦 辣 , 煎 煮 百� 出 ’ 如 膏 糜 果 蜜 , 力 盡 津 竭 而 甘 生 焉 。� Dai Biaoyuan had worked his way through the Hall system o f the Imperial University and passed the jinshi

examination in 1271.

Before the war he received the post o f instructor in Jiankang, but after completing that tour o f office, he returned h o m e to Fenghua� 奉� 化 in Y i n� 鄞 C o u n t y in M i n g z h o u� 明 州 ( i n modern Zhejiang). 7 1 D u r i n g the M o n g o l conquest he fled to the safety o f the mountains. After the fighting ended, he returned h o m e to his family's lands and also received students. 72 In 1286 he w e n t to H a n g z h o u to teach and to participate in the gatherings led by Z h o u M i but returned to Fenghua once more in 1293. Two years later, he was back in H a n g z h o u with Fang Hui, Z h a o M e n g f u�趙 孟 頫 ( 1 2 5 4 - 1 3 2 2 ) , and Fang Feng. T h i s group, gathering almost twenty years after the surrender o f Hangzhou, points to a shift in southern elite culture towards loyalist accommodation o f those w h o decided that, given unpleasant choices, there was moral value in serving the Yuan state. W h e n war came, Fang H u i surrendered the important city o f j i a n d e�建德,to w h i c h he had been demoted for attacking Jia Sidao, and then agreed to serve one tour as a transitional route commander for the Jiande region before retiring permanently. 73 Some loyalists broke o f f relations with h i m for these actions. Z h a o M e n g f u , w h o became one o f the most important cultural figures o f the Yuan, was f r o m the Song imperial lineage but was one o f those recruited in 1286 and brought to the Yuan court. Fang Feng, in contrast, was one o f the judges o f the M o o n Spring poetry competition. B y 1295,the members o f the elite culture in the south seem to have acknowledged the complexity o f

71. For an excellent account of Dai Biaoyuan's life and poetry, see Liu Fei�劉飛, Dai Biaoyuan jiqi wenxue yanjiu�戴表元及其文學研究(Hefei: Anhui University Press, 2008). 72. The Dais were a well-established elite clan from Fenghua. See Liu Fei, Dai Biaoyuan, pp. 13-22. 73. Fang^ong, Nan Song yimin shiren,p. 128.

An Inner Compass

491

their situation and o f the meaning of loyalty.74 T h u s in 1302, twentysix years after the surrender of the capital, Chen, like many others, seems to have concluded that accepting the position o f an instructor, although in the employ of the Yuan, still served the goal o f preserving siwen�斯文,"this culture o f ours.,,75 Dai Biaoyuan was a loyalist but not an ideologue. His poetry after the Yuan conquest expresses regret, and the world takes on meaning through his nuanced reflection on what remains and what has been lost: 胡蝶� 春山處處客思家� 淡日村烟酒旆斜� 胡蝶不知人事別� 繞廇閒弄紫藤花�

Butterflies76 In place after place in the spring mountains, the traveler longs for home: In the mild sun and smoke from the village, an alehouse banner slants. The butterflies do not know that human affairs have changed: Circling the wall, they idly toy with wisteria flowers.

T h e asserted difference in “human affairs,,is not in the scene at hand: spring comes to the mountains, village life continues, the alehouses still operate, and nature follows its constant course. Dai himself preserves in his "Nature and feelings" what has been lost, and it informs the landscape. This shaping o f the scene happens at a more intimate and active level, w h e n the details of objects and activities take on meaning as a quiet form o f persistence: 山中

In the Mountains77

野水晴猶漲,

The outland waters swell even in clear skies:

春雷晚始鳴 °

Spring thunder first rumbles in late afternoon.

74. Although I have never seen contemporary arguments to this effect, Fang Hui, for example, prevented much useless death and destruction, and it was the people who, in the end, at least in theory, were the root of the state. 75. Fang Yong discusses this phenomenon (Nan Song yimin shiren,pp. 118-25). He examines the role o f those w h o accepted service as instructors in mediating the acceptance o f people like Fang Hui and Zhao Mengfu, w h o served as officials o f higher rank in the Yuan bureaucracy (p. 137). 76. QSS 69.3644.43713. 77. QSS 69.3643.43689; Dai Biaoyuan ji p. 438.

An Inner Compass 492

492 地閑無猴邏 ’

The land is at ease: there are no patrol stations.

山遠有蠶耕 °

While the mountains are distant, there are silkworms and plowing.

身世通寒暑,

My generation has been through hot and cold;

交遊半死生

0

Among my friends, half have died, half still live.

方知一杯酒,

Now I know that one cup of ale

真勝百年名 °

Truly bests fame for a hundred years.

T h e rhythms o f spring now support Dai and allow the selfsufficiency o f reclusion that lets him stand apart from the world outside the mountains. The significance even o f nature flows from within. Crucially, however, this act o f reading through the self and its commitments encompasses small details and finds them meaningful. T h e y have a moral weight absent in the poetry o f the Rivers and Lakes, which prided itself in its placid balance beyond the objects o f the phenomenal realm {wuwai�物夕f). T h e war, in the end, truly brought the poets home.

Endings and New Departures: The Yuan Synthesis T h e generation that encountered the Mongol invasion as young men in their prime was pushed into a new world. T h e next generation, coming o f age after the war, reflected on the works o f their elders as acclimated inhabitants. They assessed the synthesis of poetic intuition and Daoxue commitments that marked the emergent episteme. Liu Chenweng� 劉 辰 翁 ( 1 2 3 2 - 9 7 ) , like Wen Tianxiang, was from Luling; he had studied with Ouyang Shoudao and was an important cultural figure active in loyalist groups in the Jiangxi region. His son, Liu Jiangsun�劉將孫(b. 1256),presents a vision o f a world based on the Daoocue moral order immanent in the transformations o f the phenomenal realm, a world in which Nature and its feelings reveal themselves through poetry: The pure qi between heaven and earth forms the wind of the Sixth Month and the snow before the Twelfth. Among plants it becomes the plum and among people, the immortal. Over a thousand years it forms writings, and among writings, it becomes poetry. Ice and frost are not without lofty purity, but their brittle sharpness makes them unsuitable for savoring. Flowers and willows are not unalluring, but in the end they approach the effeminate. This pure qi seems not

An Inner Compass

493

necessary, but it surely cannot be lacking. Since the “Airs,,and the “Odes,” for three thousand years until now, there has not been a day without poetry nor a generation without poetry.. •. How can purity in qi be tugged at and learned, seized and stored? The eyes in seeing, the mouth in speaking, and the ears in listening present things about which we do not know whereby they are as they are (suoyi ran er ran). What we get from the Nature and its feelings is also like this. Now, what act of speaking is other than drifting phrases? Yet, when the authentic (zhen) comes forth, it does not disappear; when the encounter is with the divine (shen), it must be passed down. What loftily corresponds with the human heart must be passed down and will never decay. How far off course are those [poets who] seek it in objects and do not seek it in intentions and who refine their phrasing but do not refine their qi.ls 天地間清氣,爲六月風,爲獵前雪,於植物爲梅,於人爲仙,於� 千載爲文章,於文章爲詩。冰霜非不高潔,然刻厲不足翫。花柳� 豈 不 明 媚 , 而 終 近 婦 兒 。 茲 清 氣 者 , 若 不 必 有 而 必 不 可 無 。 自� 〈風〉、〈雅〉來,三千年於此,無日無詩,無世無詩,……。� 清 以 氣 ’ 氣 豈 可 揠 而 學 、 攬 而 蓄 哉 。 目 之 於 視 ’�口之於言,耳之� 於聽,類不知其所以然而然。有得於情性者,亦如是而已。夫言� 亦孰非浮辭哉。惟發之真者不泯,惟遇之神者必傳,惟悠然得於� 人心者必傳而不朽。彼求之物而不求之意,鍊於辭而不鍊於氣,� 何如其遠也o Liu Jiangsun became an important voice in the Yuan culture that emerged particularly after the revival of examinations in 1314. Yet he is on the other side of the divide, an inhabitant o f the world o f late imperial China in a way that his father and the other major figures o f the final years o f the Southern Song were not. In this preface, the qi is not Z h u Xi's qi but the primal qi into which li has been interfused. 79

78. "Preface to the Poetry [Collection] of Peng Hongji"《彭宏濟詩序》(Q1W 20.622. 168-69), cited in Zha Hongde�查洪德,“Discussions of Nature and feelings in Yuan dynasty p o e t i c s ” 〈 元 代 ^ ^ 性 情 W e n x u e pinglun�文 學 評 論 2007.2:� 177. This article has been translated by Wang Keyou�王 克 友 as “ O n the Conception ofXingqing in the Poetics of the Yuan Dynasty," Frontiers of Literary Studies in China 2009.3(4): 547-99. 79. Two recent monographs examine the relationship of literature and Daoxue in the early Yuan: Luo Ligang�羅立岡||,Song Yuan zhiji de zhexue yu wenxue�宋 元 之 除 的� 哲學與文學(Shanghai: Fudan University Press, 1999), and Zha Hongde� 查� Lixue Beijing xia de Yuandai wenlun yu shiwen ^S.^^'^t'T^JTt'Kyiiik^^X.

494

An Inner Compass 494

Liu Jiangsun affirms here that w e k n o w something o f N a t u r e and its feelings through poetry, but w e do not k n o w h o w w e know. H e argues that the purity

ofqi needed for poetry to reach within and give

proper f o r m to the mere flow o f language cannot be studied f r o m without. H e also asserts that this process called poetry never stops. H o w e v e r , aesthetic experience is endlessly dialectical: the synthesis that Liu Jiangsun set out created n e w issues about individual identity deriving f r o m the Nature and about the narrowness o f

Daoxue's

understanding o f moral character as manifested in poetry and in life. T h e s e questions, however, belong to the n e w age. H o w they evolved within the social, political, and economic milieus ofYuan,Ming, and Q i n g C h i n a are stories for another day.

(Beijing: Zhonghua, 2005). I reluctantly conclude that trends in intellectual culture in the years immediately following the Mongol conquest largely continued trends discussed in earlier chapters and that the new aspects were part of an emerging Yuan culture that is outside the scope of this chapter. However, Zha in particular gives an excellent account ofliterary and philosophical issues in the early Yuan.

Bibliography

Abbreviations Used in the Notes HCJ

Houcun xiansheng daquanji

HTJQJ

Huang Tingjian quanji

HTJSJZ

Huang Tingjian shiji zhu

JNSG

Jiannan shigao jiaozhu

NLH

New Literary History

QSW

Quan Song wen

QSS

Quan Song shi

QTS

Quan Tang shi

QYW

Quan Yuan wen

SGSJZ

Shangu shiji zhu

SSHQB

Song Shihua quanbiatt

WNWJ

Weinan wenji

WTXSX

Wen Tianxiang shi xuan

YKLS

Yingkui liisui huiping

YWLJ

Yang Wanli ji jianjiao

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Zhao Ping� 趙平.Yongjia Siting shipai yanjiu� 永嘉四靈詩派研究.Hangzhou: Zhejiang daxue chubanshe, 2006. Zheng Yongxiao� 胃.Huang Tingjian nianpu ocinbian Beijing: Shehui kexue wenxian chubanshe, 1997. Zheng Yuyu�鄭毓瑜• “Shensi yu zhiyin”�神思與知音.[“Numinous thought and knowing the tone”]. In Liuchao qingjing meixue zonglun�六朝情境美學综論.Taibei: Xuesheng shuju, 1996, pp. 1-60. Zhou Jianhua�周建華• "The spiritual kernel of the Jiangxi poetic school was Song Ming Learning of Principle: Discussing Song Ming Learning of Principle as ‘Jiangxi Learning-江西詩派的精神內核是宋明理學:二論宋明理學是“江西� & 學 ” .Nanchang Daxue xuebao�南昌大學學報(人社版)34,no. 2 (Mar. 2003):� 91-95Zhou Mengjiang�周夢江.Ye Shi yu Yongjia xuepai�葉適與永嘉學派.Hangzhou: Zhejiang guji chubanshe, 2005. Zhou Qicheng� 周啓成.Yang Wanli he Chen^haiti� 楊萬里和誠齋體.Taipei: Wanjuanlou, 1993. Reprint of Shanghai guji ed., 1980. Zhou Ruchang�周汝昌’ ed. Yang Wanli xuanji�楊萬里選集.Shanghai: Shanghai guji, 1962. Zhou Xifu�周 錫 , e d . and annot. Wang Anshi shixuan�王安石詩選.Hong Kong: Joint Publishing, 1983. Zhou'Vaner�周燕兒."An examination of the tablet [concerning] the Ming order to inter the skull of Lizong unearthed from the Six Song tumuli in Shaoxing"紹興� 宋六陵出土的明敕葬宋理宗頂骨碑考略.Dongfang bourn東方博物33 (2008): 24—27. Zhou \ukai� 周 裕 鍇 . " H u i h o n g and the method of ‘exchanging the bones and snatching the embryo’”�惠洪與換骨奪胎法.Wenxueyichan�文學遗產 2003.6: 81-98. . "The Origin of Song dynasty terms in poetics in Chan vocabulary,,宋代詩� 學術語的禪學語源.Wenyi lilun yanjiu文藝理論研究1998.6: 70-76. . Wenzi Chanyu Songdai shixue�文字襌與宋代詩學.Beijing: Gaodeng jiaoyu chubanshe, 1998. Zhu Dongrun�朱東潤• Lu You xuanji�陸游選禁.3rd printing. Shanghai: Shanghai guji, 1999. Zhu Shangshu�祝尙書.Songren biejiexulu�宋人别集敌錄• Beijing: Zhonghua, 1999. Zhu Xi. Learning to Be a Sage: Selectionsfromthe Conversations of Master Chu, Arranged Topically. Translation and commentary by Daniel K. Gardner. Berkeley: University of California Press, 1990. Zhu Xi and Lii Zuqian, eds. Reflections on Things at Hand: The Neo-Conjucian Anthology. Translated by Wing-tsit Chan. New York: Columbia University Press, 1967. Zhuang Zhou�莊周.Chuang-tzu, the Inner Chapters. Translated by Angus C. Graham. Indianapolis: Hackett, 2001. Reprint of the 1981 Allen & Unwin ed. Zunshine, Lisa, ed. Introduction to Cognitive Cultural Studies. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2010.

Index “above form”�形而上,325 "Account of Music”《樂記》,631129, 207,316-17,323,346ni02 Adorno, Theodor, 24-27, 47 aesthetic experience, 48-49,12,28,32, 181,301; domain of, 53-54, 71-72, 20, 153-55,101-2, 116, 129,162, 298,325,461-62; domain, Huang Tingjian on, 61; transcendental ground, 478; Zhu Xi on, 336-40 aesthetic judgment,22,47;� destabilization of meaning, 28; Kant on, 18-23; Su Shi on, 342;� transcendental postulate, 82-83 Analects�論語,55, 74—77, 320-22,335, 373,388; on poetry, 124

159-60; "true characteristics"實相,� 159-60; Yan Yu and, 166-67; YangWanli and, 2041140 Byan-sprin (Yanglian-zhenjia

楊璉真伽),483 Cai Jing�蔡京,90,135 Cai Tao�蔡絛,134-36 Canon of Changes�周易,63; “Appended Phrases"《繫辭傳》,41, 22l-2 3 , 308,� 325,370,40211104; Chen Fuliang, 380; "Great Ultimate”,351; Shao Yong, 310, 312; Wei Liaoweng, 397; YangWanli, 217-23, 215; Zhou Dunyi, 308,342; Zhu Xi on "Fu" f Return”), 328

Anthology of Sixty Southern Song Poets

Canon of Documents� 書經,63,112,

南宋六十家小禁,425-26 awakening�悟,162-63; analogies to Buddhism, 156,166; Lii Benzhong on, 130-31; Lu You and, 271,272;� YangWanli on, 201-2; Ye Mengde on, 142; Zeng Jili on, 162; Zhou Fu on, 145

3lOnl9; Z h u X i on, 334 Canon ofMusic�樂經,63 Canon of Poetry 62, 117, 206-7,

343-46, 485-86, 488; “flavor,’ in,

227-28, 232; “Great Preface” to the Mao Canon of Poetry《毛詩大序�,40, 59ni8,345-46,445; Lu You on, 246; Lu You on "Seventh Month” 七月,275; and principle, 418-19;� Babuts, Nicolae, 14-15 Ye Shi, 385 Bai Juyi�白居易,103 Cao Zhi�曹植,69,71,133-34,14^-49 Bevir, Mark, 11-12 Cen Shen�專參,257,26o-6l Bol, Peter KL, 90-91 Chafee, John W., 571115, 88115 Bourdieu, Pierre, 87,126-28 Chen Fuliang�陳傅良,374"«2; Buddhism, 21, 81,147,155-67, 462;� "Discussion of What a Noble Man and composing poetry, 131, 134,162,� Takes as Nature"'《君子戶jf14論》,� 271; Huang Tingjian and, 78-79, 378-79; "Discussion of the sage 161; lineage charts, 94; "living mind as the mirror of the myriad sentences,” 164-66; Su Shi and,

518

Index

Brothers, and Huang Zilu and phenomena”《聖心萬物之鏡論》,� Other Gentlemen”到南昌呈宋恿� 37B-82; "Letter answering Chen 父伯仲黄子魯諸丈,430; "Hall of Tongfu [Liang]"《答陳同父書》,� Drifting into the Distance, in 377 Jiangyin"江陰浮遠堂,432; “A Huai Chen Liang�陳亮,336, 377 Village after Warfare"淮村兵後,432;� Chen Ping�陳平,263 "In the Capital, Following the Chen Qi�陳起,408-10 Rhymes of Shen Jishan”�都中次韵申� Chen Shidao�陳師道,97-104’ 191—96; 季山,431; "Living at Home, I Again "Climbing Joyous Pavilion" Have an Enthusiasm for the Rivers 登快哉亭,99,103; "Parting from and Lakes”家居復有江湖之興,肸9; My Three Children”�别三子,loo poems discussing poetry, 434-36; Chen Yanxiao�陳巖肖,123-24 "Reading Master Fangweng'sJiannan Chen Yuyi�陳與義,i68-8l; "Climbing Poetic Drafts"讀放翁先生劍南詩草,� Yueyang Tower”�登岳陽樓,177;� 295-96; "Tan Junming Visits Me in "Composed at Night”�夜賦,179; as a the Snow; and I Ask Him for Rice" Jiangxi poet, 170-71; "On the Road 譚俊明雪中見訪從而乞米,429 Leaving the Mountains"出山道中,� Daoxue�道學,the "Learning of the 174,"The Rain Clears”�雨晴,173; Way,” 30-32,150-52, 239,281,407,� "Spring Day," first of two poems 480,492-94; in the late Southern 春曰二首第一,i 7 2 Song, 464-66 Chen Ziang�陳子昂,436,44911112 Davis, Edward L.,406112 Cheng Yi�程頤,150,3巧-25,300,� Davis, Richard L., 460118 303-4 Daxue《大學》.See "Great Learning" Chengdu�成都,250-51,257 De Weerdt, Hilde, 3581120,362,3911186 Chu, Ping-tsu, 3681135 "distorted style” (aoti 拗體),113 Chunqiu�春秋.See Spring and Autumn Du Fu�杜甫,66-67, 70-72,168-69, Annals 488; Cai Tao on Du Fu's language, Clark, Hugh R., 406111, 4401192 134-37; Chen Shidao and, 98-103^; "cognitive turn," 14-15 “Climbing Yueyang Tower” Confucian canon, 29-30, 57,232,304,� 登岳陽樓,175-76; Dai Fugu on, 436; “distorted style” prosody, 113;� 306 at the end of the Song, 485-86; Lu Confucian humanism, 29-30 Jiuyuan and, 96; Lu You and, 266-68; Confucian scholars: as ritualists�儒,62 "Weary Night"倦夜,178; and cultural capital, 136,138,361-62 Wen Tianxiang, 477-79, 470-71;� Dai Biaoyuan�戴表元,466-67;� Ye Mengde on, 141; Zhangjie on, "Butterflies"胡蝶,491; "In the 147-48’194 Mountains"山中,491^92; "Preface to the Poetry of Commissioner Fang examination culture, 36l~68ff’ 464-68^" [Hui]”《方使君詩序》’ 46^-67;� examinations, 1-2, 29,57, 89-90,126, "Written at the end of Xiao Zixi's 301-2,376,391,485; Lu You and, volume of poems”《題蕭子西詩卷� 243-44; Lii Zuqian and, 358; "Rivers 後》,489~92 and Lakes” poets, 406,455 Dai Fugu�戴復古,295-96,410,428-36,� 451,456; "Arriving in Nanchang, factionalism, 56-57, 88-89,30,105, Shown to Song Yuanfu and His 238,242

Index

519

“false learning," 375-76, 392 Fan Chengda�范成大,250,485 Fan Jisui�范季隨,94,口1,4^9-20, 454,� 490 Fang Yong 方勇,49川75 "feelings" (qing�情)and "Nature" (xing�性),40,83,407; chanting 吟詠性情,461,480; Dai Fugu on, 435; grounding poetry, 486-88, 478-79,493-94, 491; Liu Kezhuang on, 445-47; Song Boren on, 423;� Wen Tianxiang on, 471 field of cultural production, 87,126-29, 137-38,152-53, 283,462; and Buddhism, 156; Chen Yuyi and, 171;� and Daoxue, 306-7, 350,363; and examination culture, 365-66,362; at the local and national levels, 405-8,�

Han Yu�韓愈,66-67,川3,139,338 He Zhu�賀鑄,143 heterocosm, 146 High Tang poetry: and the "Rivers and Lakes” poets, 435-36 Hogan, Patrick, 5 Hong Brothers (Hong Chu�洪舞,� Hong Peng�洪朋,Hong Yan�洪炎),� 104-13 Hong Chu�洪芻,"Following the Rhymes of [Liu] Yuanli”�次韻和� 元禮,108-11. See also Hong brothers Hong Peng�洪朋,"Written on Hu Qian's Painting of a Landscape of Wind and Rain”題胡潜風雨山水圖,� 111-12. See also Hong brothers Hu Quan�胡銓,185,i86 Hu Zi�胡仔,Ttaooci yuyin conghua

433,441 “flavor,” 226-32 folk psychology, l56-6off Four Books, 465 Four Lings ofYongjia�永 嘉 四 露� 410-20,433-34,45�Ye Shi on, 420-21; Zhao Ruhui on, 422;� Liu Kezhuang on, 426

苕溪漁隱叢話,91-92,95 Huai River�淮河,235,432 Huangjingjin�黃景進,346ni02 Huang Tingjian�黃庭堅’ 32,58-84, 89, 94,96-97,101,no-2off, 124, 135-37年 146; 154; and Buddhism, 161; Chen Yuyi and, 171,180-81; on incitement�興,206,89-90,32,58; Lu You and, 245,276,289; YangWanli and, 189,193-94; Zhang jiucheng on, 151-52 Huang Tingjian�黃庭堅,works of; "Account of the Hall of the Greater 沁”《大雅堂記》,72; "Answering Wang Zhouyan”《答王周彥書》,� 62-64; "Colophon to an old poem presented to Hong Guifu”

Gao Zhu�高翥,426; "Event on an Autumn Afternoon"秋晚即事,426; "Moved by Spring”�感春,426 Gillespie, Gerald, 6nj Graham, Angus C., 31111,3211147 "Great Learning"《大學》,ll6,186-87, 318,396; Ye Shi on, 362,387 Great Ultimate�太極,308-9, 351,353, 398 Great Void�太虛,313-14 Greenblatt, Stephen, 5 Gunn, Giles, 7118 Halperin, Mark, 1551151 H a n j u�韓駒,64,ll8-22, 104-7;� "Mooring for the Night at Ningling” 夜泊寧陵,121-22 Han Tuozhou�韓伲胄,237-38, 285-86, 375,390-91

《書舊詩與洪龜父跋其後》,73-74; "Colophon to poems by\lke” 《題意可詩後》,8o-8l; "Commenting on characters I wrote during the Yuanyou period”《自評元祐間字》,� 161-62; “Discussing the Composition of Poetry”《論作詩文》,65; "Letter answering Hong Jufu” 《答洪駒父書》,66~67; "Letter written to the Hongs, My Four Nephews"《與洪氏四甥書》,62;�

520

Index

"Letter written to Wang Guanfu" duanpian”《論語斷篇》,74-76; "Wang Chongdao Sent Fifty Stems of Narcissus. I Was Delighted and ^•ote Him This Poem”�王充道送� 水仙花五十枝欣然會心爲之作詠,� 67-71; "Written after Wang Zhizai's ‘Qushan medley’”《書王知載朐山�

poets, 426,433-34; Yang Wanli and, 197,227,229 "Learning of the Way." See Daoxue Lee, Thomas H. C., 57m5 Levine, Ari Daniel, 571113,88115 li�理;as "coherence," 167; as “pattern,” 53-54,214,319; as "principle," 325-31,385-86,312,320,380,445, 462

雜詠後》,60

Liji� 禮 記 . S e e Record of the Rites

《與王觀復書》,73; “ L —

huofa�活法.See “living method” Hymes, Robert, 89 Imperial University�太學,90,362,� 3691129,466-67 "incitement" (xing�興),44-45,140-41, 401; Yang Wanli, 232-33,205-8,214; ZhuXi, 343-45 intentions (yi�意),493,45-46,3紙� 149-51,142-43, 120; as “conception,” 131-32,145; as disposition, 204; Huang Tingjian on, 7i-78flf, 83; Liu Kezhuang on, 449-55; of the sages, 333-34; and meaning in poetry, 477-79,486-88; Yang Wanli on, 226-32 Jia Dao�賈島,415,422 "Jiangxi school,” 85-87,162,170-71 "Jiangxi style," 108-13,120-21, 188-89, 245,424-25 Jingzhou�荆州,69 Juefan Huihong�覺範慧洪,77-78,� 165-66,168 Kant, Immanuel, 10,18-26,46-47,79,� 162,325,478; Critique of Judgment, 19-24; teleological judgments, 334 Kuizhou�夔州,250-52 Kuper, Adam, 13 language, 12-18,157,217-20,289,461 Lankavatara Sutra,

8ln75

Late Tang poetry, 296-98, 239,424-25;� and the Four Lings ofYongjia, 414-15,418-20; and Liu Kezhuang, 450-52; and the "Rivers and Lakes"

Lian Wenfeng�連文鳳,"Inspiration on a Spring Day amidst Fields and Gardens"春曰田園雜興,4B6-87 Lin Guangchao�林光朝,201,43^-39 Linjingxi�林景熙,“Preface to the poetry collection of Ma Jingshan” 《馬靜山詩集序》,48M9 Lin Xiyi�林希逸,43^-37 linguistic reference, 14-15,33-38 Literary Anthology of the Zhaoming

Heir

Apparent� 昭 明 文 選 , 4 2 1 , 4 2 7

literary history, 48-49, 82-83,460-62;� as "permanent problem,” 7,9; as negotiating aesthetic experience, 28; universals, 6 literati culture, 30, 57,125—28ff,� 238-39,366-67; and Buddhism, 155-61; and Daoxue, 304-7,350, 362-63,390-945; and poetic composition, 87,89-90,467 Liu Chenweng flj辰翁,492 Liu Jiangsun�劉將孫:“Preface to the Poetry [Collection] of Peng Hongji" 《彭宏濟詩序》,492-94 Liu Kezhuang�劉克莊,43^~55,408; on emotion in poetry, 445-47; and the Four Lings orVongjia, 420-21, 415’ 421; on Lu You,295,449 Liu Kezhuang�劉克莊,works of: "A Chanting of Being Eighty; Ten Quatrains”�八十吟十絶,449; "Ballad of Those Who Died for the State" 國場行,452; "Colophon to the Poems of Zhang Wenxue” 《跋張文學詩卷》’ 448; "Colophon to the Poetry of He Qian”

Index 《跋何謙詩》,446; "Colophon to the Poetry of Zhao Kui” 《跋趙载詩卷》,447; "Falling Plum Blossoms”�落梅,451-52; “Lotus” 芙蓉二絶,454; "Preface to [a Collection of] Tang Pentasyllabic and Heptasyllabic Quatrains”《唐五� 七言絕句序》,445-46; "Preface to the Melon Garden Collection”

《瓜圃集序》,442-43; "Preface to the Shanzhong bieji [Supplemental

Collection]”《山中別集序》,443~44;� “Presented to Wengjuan"贈翁卷,� 421; "Smelting Wall"冶城,450^51; “The Cold Food and Qingming Festivals”�寒食清明二首,453;� “Traveling Early”�早行,450; “living method”�舍法,144-46,124-25; and "living sentences"活句,163-67 local elite, 128,184, 239,242,367,� 406-7,433,438,462, 482; “Rivers and Lakes” poets, 455; late Northern Song, 30 Lou Yue�樓鍮,433 Lii Benzhong�呂本中,85-86,129-33, 123-25; "Chart of the Lineage of the Jiangxi Poetry Society”《江西詩社宗� 派圖》,85-86, 89,91-96; "First note discussing poetry with Zeng Jifu” 《與曾吉甫論詩第一帖》,129-31;� “Preface to Xiajunfuji" 《夏均父集序》’ 124-25; "Second note discussing poetry with Zeng Jifo”《與曾吉甫論詩第二帖》,�

132-33 Lu Ji�陸機,41-44; "Rhyme-Prose on Wen�文[Composition]”《文賦》,� 41-44 Lu Jiuyuan�陸九淵;"Letter to Military Commissioner Cheng [Shuda]” 《與程帥書》,96~97 LuXiufu�陸秀夫,48O-8I Lu You�陸游,182,184,366, 433; on Hanju, 1201165 Lu You�陸游,works of: “A Spring Day," fifth of six poems春日六首其五,�

521 279; "Account of the Eastern Hedge" 《—籬記》,288-89; "An Autumn Afternoon; Thinking of My Former Excursions in Liangzhou and Yizhou”秋晚思梁益舊遊三首其一,� 291; "Answering Recorder Liu” 《答劉主簿書》,244; “As I Rise in the Morning, by Chance a Five-Character Verse Comes to Me” 晨起偶得五字戲題稿後,293-94;� "At Longxing Temple, Lamenting where the Master from Shaoling Had Lodged”龍興寺弔少陵先生� 寓居,268; “At the Thatched Hall, Venerating a Remnant Image of [Du] Shaoling”草堂拜少陵遗像,� 266-67; "Autumn Night, Recording My Thoughts”秋夜紀懷三首其三,� 292; "Autumn Thoughts,” first of three poems�秋思三首其一,279; "Autumn Thoughts,” fourth of four poems秋懷四首其四,291; "Being Moved by the Recollection of Past Events,,追感往事五首,296; “Early Spring, Written by the Pond” 早春池上作,278; “Fisher's Landing” 漁浦二首其一,277-7B; "Funerary Inscription for Mr. He”《何君墓� 表》’ 271-72; “Gazing down the River”�望江道中,247; “Huangzhou” 黄州,252-53; "Midst Wind and Rain, Gazing at the Mountains at Gorgemouth"風雨中望峡口諸山, 253-54; “Moved while Visiting an Outland Household”過野人家有惑,� 265; “On the Boat to Lu Village" 魯墟舟中作’ 294; “On the First Day of the Ninth Month, Reading My Draft Poetic Collection at Night” 九月一日夜讀詩稿有惑走筆作歌,� 269-70; "On the Road to Sword Gate, Encountering Light Rain” 劍門道中遇微雨,256; "On the Sixteenth Day of the Ninth Month, I Dreamt That the Army Encamped Beyond the Yellow River and Sent

522

Index

Envoys Calling for the Submission of All the Cities”九月十六日夜夢駐� 軍河外遣使招降諸城,262-63;� "Preface seeing off Fan Xishu” 《送范西叔序》,259; "Preface to the poetry collection of Fang Deheng"

Mo Lifeng�莫礪鋒,94,104 Mohanty, Satya E, 3111, 7118 Moon Spring Chanting Society

月泉吟社’ 484-88

Nanzheng�南鄭,255-58,250-52,269 Nature, The (xing�性);translation, “Preface to the poetry of the Retired 31111,304,424-25; "Account of Gentleman of Placid Studio” Music,” 316; the Mean, 324; Chen 《澹齋居士詩序》,276; "Returning, Fuliang on, 378-79; Cheng Yi on, Staying the Night in the Region of 323; grounding poetry, 139,146,153; Hanzhong”歸次漢中境上,255-56; late Southern Song, 462-63; Mencius, "Shown to My Children”�示兒,� 323; Shao^ong on, 310-12; Xue 286-87; "Shown to Ziyu”�示子通,� Jixuan on, 373; Zhang Shi on, 272-73; "The Fourth Day of the 354-55; Zhang Zai on, 314; Zhen Tenth Month, Great Wind and Rain" Dexiu on, 399; Zhu Xi on, 326-32 十一月四日風雨大作二首其二,292;� “New Policies,” 56, 88 "Traveling in the Mountains, Passing a Monks' Retreat; I Don't Go In,,� ontology, 397-400,14,221,325-30, 山行過僧菴不入,297; "Walking in 302,313,320 the Wilds”�野步,290; "Wandering oppositional culture, 90,244,366-67, to a Village West of the Mountain" 25B, 259 遊山西村,248; "When I Was Posted Ouyang Guang�歐陽光,86n2 to Jiangxi, I Used a Poem to Request Ouyang Shoudao�歐陽守道,468 the Court to Allow Me to Transfer to Owen, Stephen: on^nYu, 166-67;on the Lakes Region”予使江西時以詩� Yan Yu and “awakening,” 1631167 投政府丐湖湘一麾,274; "AWinter

《方德亨詩集序》,276^77;

Night; Reading; Shown to Ziyu"

pattern, inherent. See li�理� pattern, manifest. See wen�文� aboard a Boat"舟中作,278; "Written Peterson, Willard, 3861171 at the End of a Volume of Poetry by phenomenal realm, 39 Candidate Xiao 'Vanyu of Luling” poetic crafting, 113,295,299; Chen 題廬陵蕭彦毓秀才詩卷後二首,274 Shidao and crafted simplicity, 103;� Lunyu�論語.See Analects Huang Tingjian on, 65-66; Lii Zuqian�呂祖謙,357-61; "Inscribed on theJin si lu”《題近思錄》,360;� Liu Kezhuang on, 448 poetics of encounter, 39-40, 44-45, 52, "Letter to Chen Junju”《與陳君舉� 140-41,208,258,269-80,284 書》,359 political poetry, 54, 261-64, 234; Chen Lynn, Richard John, 1331114,1561153’ Yuyi, 175-80; Dai Fugu, 430-31; 1631168’ 337n84 Liu Kezhuang, 451-52 Prince ofJi�濟王(Zhao Hong�趙竑)’ Mandelbaum, Maurice, 8 Mean, the《中庸》,219,323-24,353, 393,408 principle�理.See li 362,372,391,398; Ye Shi on, 386 printing, 2,87-88,126, 257,284, 365,� Mei Yaochen�梅堯臣,246,276 411,413,456 Mencius�孟子,215-16,320-23,388-90, Putian�莆田,437-41 314,329,333

冬夜讀書示子聿八首,275; "Written

Index

523

《自評文》,44-45; "AnsweringYu Gua; Assistant Prefect of Qian" 《答虔悴余括》,46; "Mountain Village"山村五絕第三,55-56;� "On the Second Day of the Tenth Month, First Arriving at Huizhou" 十月二曰初到惠州,53-54; "Preface "Record of Music,’《樂記》,207,� to Traveling in the South; Former 316-17,323,346ni02 Collection《南行前集敘》,50-51;� Record ofRites�禮記,621127,63 Zhu Xi's critique, 340-43 Reflections of Things at Hand�近思錄,360,�Su Xun�蘇洵,52; "Explanation of the 465 courtesy name "Wenfu' for my elder Ren Yuan�任淵,691147,71,1001125 brother,,《仲兄字文甫說》,52 reverent attentiveness (jing�敬),331-32 "substantive form”�實相,159-60 Rivers and Lakes Collection, 408-10 "Rivers and Lakes" poetry, 241, 405-57, Tang Jue�唐珏:"Ballad of the Holly" 464,466-467,480,483,489 冬青行,483-84 Rushdie, Salman, 3m Tao Qian�陶潛,8o^8i, 46,103; Ruthrof, Horst, 16-17, 27 Ye Mengde on, 140-41; Zhangjie Qian Zhongshu�錢鍾書,121,240-41, 249; on Liu Kezhuang, 455; on Wen Tianxiang, 4681116 Qin Gui�秦檜,243-44 qing�青.See "feelings and Nature" Qiu Minggao�邱鳴皋,245

on, 148-49 texts: as object of aesthetic experience, 12’ 61’ 301; composing, 42, 51,73,� 242-43 102,129,208,293-94,339-40; and Shao Yong�召 隨 309-12; "Preface to conveying meaning, 41-42, 46’ 49,� Striking the Earth,,《擊壤集序》,� 65,142, 215-20,222, 227,299-300, 310-n 331-36, 338; grounding the meaning Shi Miyuan�史彌遠,390~94氐 408-9, of, 57,74,82,142,331-36,404,435,� 430 442, 445-47; interpreting, 61, 79,� Shields, Anna M.,1921120,2671161 228-30,331-36,370-71; as source Shijing�詩經.See Canon ofPoetry for writing, 64, 78-79, 111, 130-32, Shirokauer, Conrad, 376 134-139,145,201-2,478-79; and Shu Yuexiang�舒岳祥;"Colophon the world, 44-45, 50-51,142-43, to the poetry of Wang Jusun” 194,208,258,272-74, 403,470-71, 《跋王榘孫詩》,467 492-93 Shujing�書經.See Canon ofDocuments Tillman, Hoyt C.,301115 Sichuan�四川,264-69, 250,257 Todorov, Tzvetan, 4 Skinner, Quentin, 6n8 "snatching the embryo” and "changing Valdes, Mario J., 4 the bones,” 78 Song Boren�宋伯仁,423 WangAnshi�王安石,90,196-97,142;� Song loyalists, 480-83 "Night Duty”�夜直,197 Southern folk songs, 238 Wang Chongdao�王充道,671140 special history, 8-10 Wang Qizhen�王琦珍,89 Spring and Autumn Annals H , 6 3 Wang Tinggui�王庭珪’ 184-85,188-89;� "Structure" (ti�體),352112 "Colophon to a poem by Liu Su Shi�蘇軾,50-585 32, 65,159-60, Boshan"《跋劉伯山詩》,i89 404; "A comment on my writing" Schmidt, J. D., 1551151,2041140 Shanyin County�山陰*,287-90,

524

Index

WangYu�王宇,3681135 Wang Yuanliang�汪元量:“Drunken Song”�醉歌,481 Wang Zao�汪藻,115, U7_l8 Wang Zhifang�王 直 方 , i l l Wang Zhiyong�王致涌’ 282-83 Wang Zhi�王絰,142-43 Warring States, 33 Wei Liaoweng�魏了翁,391; “Account of the Qianyang County School” 《黔陽縣學記》,396; "Account of the Zhenwentang in Dayi County” 《大邑縣學振文堂記》,403; "Preface to Yang Shaoyi's Buqiji” 《楊少逸不欺集序》,403-4 Wellek, Rene, 9 Wen Tianxiang�文天祥,458,468-79; "Arriving at Yangzhou”�至揚州,474; “Colophon at the end of the first v o l u m e o f the Latter Record of the

Compass”《指南後錄卷一下跋》,� 479; "Colophon to the draft poetic collection of Xiao Jingfu" 《跋蕭敬夫詩藁》,469; “Jinling Station”�金陵释,475; "Preface to Poems Compiledfrom Du Fu"

《集杜詩自序》,478-79; "Preface to the Eastern Sea Collection"

《東海集序》,470-71; "The Yangzi River,,揚子江,474; "Visiting Bereft Bay”�過零丁洋,459; "Written on the Wall of the Tower for Observing

Wu Xiaoman�伍曉蔓,85111, 94,119,� 121 Wu Zeng�吳曾,136-38 Xie Ao�謝翱,480, 484 Xie Bingde�謝枋得,479-80 Xie Tiao�謝眺,232 xing�性.See Nature xing er shang�形而上(“above form"), 325 Xu Fu�徐俯,114一 18,104-7; "Spring, Wandering by the Lake”�春遊湖,il8 Xu Ji�徐璣,412-14’ 416; "Autumn Travels”�秋行二首其二,416-17 Xu Wenjun�許文軍,251-52 Xu Zhao�徐照,412-14,415-16; "Matching Weng Lingshu's Writing of a Matter on a Winter Day,” 和翁靈舒冬日書事第二,416; ‘‘Returning”�歸來,4巧� Xu Zong�許總,293 Xue Jixuan�薛季宣,3^9-73; "Analysis of knowing the Nature, shown to [Chen] Junju"《知性辨示君舉》’ 373; "Letter answering [Chen] Junju"《答君舉書》,37l; ‘‘Letter answering Chen Tongfu (Liang)" 《答陳同父亮書》,371; “Letter answering He Shanlin [Pu]” 《答何商霖溥書》,371; "Letter replying to Gong xiucai”

《復龔秀才書》,372 Xun Kuang�荀況,36-39,75

C h u " 題 楚 觀 樓 , 4 6 9 ; Latter Record of

the Compass�指 南 後 4 7 4 - 7 9 , 4 5 9 ;� Record of the Compass�指南錄,472-74 Wen Tingyun ffig筠,i8o wen�文,299-300; as pattern, 45-48, 336-39 Wengjuan�翁卷,412-14,418,421;� “Rain in the Mountains"山雨,418 writings as texts or works, 11,26 Wu Lianqun�伍聯群,252 Wu Siqi�吳思齊,484 Wu Wei�吳渭:“Evaluation of Poems” 《詩評》,485-86

Yan Jidao�晏幾道,143 Yan Yu�嚴羽’ 434-35,166-67 Yang Shi�楊時,“Answering Li Hang” 《答李杭》,� Yang Wanli�楊萬里,45,104, 240-41,283-85ff, 33^-37,343,432,� 478 Yang Wanli�楊萬里,works of: "Afternoon Wind in a Cold Grove,” second of two poems�晚風寒林二首� 其二,209; "At Dawn on ‘People Day’ I Go out Visiting with Uncle

Index Changying”人日詰朝從昌英叔� 出竭,195-96, "Chengzhai Style”,� 208-9, 200; "Cold Sparrows”�寒 表� 204; "A colophon on Zhang Jun,s letters to Hu Quan”《跋張魏公� 答忠簡胡公書十二紙》,186; “Discourse on the Changes" 《易論》,217-20; "Explanation of ‘Asking Heaven, and 'Replies about Heaven/"《天問天贿》,236-37;� "Explanation of Meng Zi; part 1” 《孟子說•上》,215-17; “flavor,” 226-32, 232; “Four Quatrains on First Entering the Huai River” 初入淮河四絶句,235-36; “I Have Finished My Term as Aide in Lingling but My Replacement has not yet Arrived”負丞零陵更盡而代� 者未至,192-93; “Late Afternoon Chill; Three Poems on Narcissus, the Lake and the Mountains," third of three poems晚寒題水仙花并� 湖山三首其三,233, "Light Rain" 小雨,19B; "Moved by Autumn,” fourth of five poems感秋五首其四,� 213; "Night Rain; Mooring at Xinjin"夜雨泊新淦,191; "Night Rain"夜雨,2l0~ll; "Observingthe Roseleaf Raspberry from atop the Pavilion of Opening Immortality,w first of two p o e m s 披 倦 閣 上 觀 餘 _ 二首其一,212; “On a Boat Entering the Great River from the Small Creek of Zhixia"自値夏小溪泛舟出� 大江’ 198; “On South Creek, Sporting in the Water, Gazing Back for the Plum Blossoms in the Mountain Garden”南溪弄水回望山� 園梅花’ 238; "Passing by HundredFamily Ford"�過百家渡四絶句其四,� 197-98; “Passing Guazhou Garrison” 過瓜洲鎮,234; "Preface Seeing off Guo Caiju"《送郭才舉序》’ 22 3 ;

525

and Lakes Collection”《江湖集序》’ 187-88; "Preface to the Yian Poetry Collection”《頤庵詩集序》’ 227-28; "Reading Zhang Wenqian's Poetry’” first of two poems讀張文潜詩二首� 其一,239,"Summer Night in Search of Coolness"夏夜追凉,199;� "An Unbridled Song, Spending the Night on East Isle’” third of three poems夜宿東渚放歌三首其一,� 231; "Walking at Dawn on Juniper Path,” second of two poems�搶逕曉� 步二首其二,204 Yanglian-zhenjia�楊 键 真 彻� (Byan-sprin), 483 Yao He�姚合,415’ 422 Yao Yong�姚鏞,427-28; “Miscellaneous Poem” # # , 4 2 7 Ye Jiaying�葉嘉瑩,282-83 Ye Mengde�葉夢得,140-42 Ye Shi�葉適,382~90,303; "Colophon to the Nanyue Draft Poetry [Collection]

of Liu Qianfu [Kezhuang]《題劉潛� 夫南嶽詩稿》,420-21; and the Four Lings ofYongjia, 413-15, 420-21, 433; and Liu Kezhuang, 420-21;� "Submitted Volume; General Account"《進卷.總述》’ 303-5 Yeats, William Butler, 71 Yijing�易經.See Canon of Changes Yongjia�永嘉,3幻-73,38o, 385,412-13 YuXin�庾信,69,80 Yuanwu Keqin�圜悟克勤,164-65 Yuanyou proscription, 88-89, 56,� io6-8ff, 242,259 Yueji《樂記》.See “Record of Music”

Zengji�曾幾,129-33, 245 Zengjili�曾季貍,162 Zhang Biaochen�張表臣’ 138-39 Zhang Fuxun�張籀劎,281-82 Zhang Gang�張綱,“Classics Mat Lecture on the Canon ofPoetry” "Preface to the Chengzhai Yizhuan” 《經筵詩講義》,207 《易外傳序》,221; "Preface to the Zhang Hongsheng�張宏生,425 Jing Creek Collection"《荆溪集序》,� Zhangjie�張戒,147-50,193~94 201-3; "Preface to the Rivers Zhang}iucheng�張九成,150-52

526

Index

Zhang Jun�張浚,185-87 Huang Liang ofYuzhang"《跋豫章� Zhang Lei�張耒,239 黄量詩卷》,400; "Explanation of the Zhang Ruijun�張瑞君,191,2121158,� courtesy name of Zhan Jingchen" 238 《詹景辰字說》,401-2; "Inscribed Zhang Shi�張栻,l86,350-57; "Account on Mr. Quan's Study of Pacing the of the Jingjiang Prefectural School” Clouds"《題全氏步雲齋》,400;� 《静江府學記》,354-55; "Answering ‘‘For Liu Jiwen; a lecture on the Four Hu Bofeng [Dayuan]"《答胡伯逢� ^rtues and Four Sprouts in the 353; "Answering Lu Zishou Pucheng County School”《代劉季� [Jiuling]”《答陸子壽》,354-55; 文浦城縣庠四德四端講義》,397-98, "Answering Wu Huishu”《答吴晦� 401; and Liu Kezhuang, 444-45; 叔》,351; "Answering Zhu Yuanhui "Preface to Zhou Jingfu,s ‘Critique [Xi] of the Palace Library”《答朱元� of the Jin Dynasty'"《周敬甫晉評� 晦秘書》,352; "Answering Zhu 序》,395; uWenzhang zhengzong Yuanhui [Xi]”《答朱元晦》,356; gangmu^in《文章正宗鋼目序》,� "Preface to Explanations of the 403; Orthodox Lineage of Writing, Analects”《論語說序》,354; "Preface 444-45 to the Wufengjr ^五峰集序》,356 Zheng Qingzhi�鄭清之,44»"41 Zhang Yuangan�張元幹,143-45; Zheng Sixiao�鄭思肖,480 "Preface to the Yilejushi wenji” Zhongyong《中—》,the Mean, 323-24 《亦樂居士文集序》,I45n39; "Six Zhou Dunyi�周敦頤,299K300,308-9 colophons written at the end of Zhou Fu�周孚,“Note sent to Zhou poems by Su Yangzhi [Xiang]” Rixin”《寄周日新簡》,145-46 《蘇養直詩帖跋尾六篇》,114-15;� Zhou Mi�周密,464—65 "Written after the poem ‘Summoned Zhou Ruchang�鹵^:昌,235 Scholar Su Presented to Daoist Master W a n g " ' 《 蘇 詔 君 贈 B I 士 詩� Zhou Yukai�周裕鍇,78,155吧1,� i62n66 後》,144 Zhou Zizhi�周紫芝:"Account of the Zhang Zai�張載,313-15 Wind-Jade Pavilion”《風玉亭記》,� Zhao Kuangyin�趙E堉L (Song Taizu 146-47 宋太祖),i Z h u X i�朱熹,31-32,325-48,349;� Zhao Mengfu�趙;S®, 490 ""Letter to Zhangjingfu"《與張敬� Zhao Mengjian�趙孟堅,423-25 夫書》,358; "Nanyue youshan Zhao Rudang�趙汝讜,433,442 houji"《南嶽遊山後記》,347-48; Zhao Ruhui�趙汝回,418^19,422 "Preface to the Collected Commentaries Zhao Rutan�趙汝談,442 on the Canon ofPoetry”《詩集傳序》,� Zhao Shixiu�趙師秀’ 412-14, 417-20;� 346; A query for Zhang Jingfu" "Appointment with a Guest”�約客,� 《問張敬夫》,329-30; "Reading the 418; "Mr. Xue,s Melon Hut" Treatise [on Rites and Music],in the 鈕氏瓜廬,417 [New] Tang [History],n《讀唐志》,� Zhao Wen�趙女,4671114 33^-39; on studying history, 335-36 Zhen Dexiu� 秀,300-301,391;� Zhuang Zhou�莊 威 34-36 "Account of Master Mingdao's Zhuge Liang�諸葛亮,257,265 library"《明道先生書堂記》,399; Zuozhuan�左傳,36-37 "Colophon to a volume of poems by

Harvard-Yenching Institute Monograph Series (titles now in print) 24. 25. 26. 28. 30. 31. 33. 34. 35. 36. 37. 38. 39. 40. 41. 42. 43. 44. 45. 49. 50. 51. 52. 53. 55. 56. 57. 58. 59.

Population, Disease, and Land in EarlyJapan, 645-900’ by William Wayne Farris Shikitei Sanba and the Comic Tradition in Edo Fiction, by Robert W. Leutner Washing Silk: The Life and Selected Poetry ofWei Chuang (8347-910), by Robin D . S. Yates Tang Transformation Texts: A Study of the Buddhist Contribution to the Rise of Vernacular Fiction and Drama in China, by Victor H . Mair Readings in Chinese Literaty Thought, by Stephen O w e n Rememhering Paradise: Natiuism and Nostalgia in Eighteenth-Century Japan, by Peter Nosco Escape from the Wasteland: Romanticism and Realism in the Fiction of Mishima Yukio and Oe Kenzaburo, by Susan Jolliffe Napier Inside a Service Trade: Studies in Contemporary Chinese Prose,by R u d o l f G . Wagner The Willow in Autumn: Ryutei Tanehiko, 1783-1842, by A n d r e w Lawrence Markus The Confucian Transformation of Korea: A Study of Society and Ideology, by Martina Deuchler The Korean Singer of Tales, by Marshall R. Pihl Praying for Power: Buddhism and the Formation of Gentry Society in Late-Ming China, by Timothy B r o o k Word, Image, and Deed in the Life of Su Shi, by Ronald C . Egan The Chinese Virago: A Literary Theme, by Yenna W u Studies in the Comic Spirit in Modem Japanese Fiction, by Joel R. C o h n Wind Against the Mountain: The Crisis of Politics and Culture in Thirteenth-Century China,by Richard L. Davis Powerful Relations: Kinship, Status, and the State in Sung China (960-1279), by Beverly Bossier Limited Views: Essays on Ideas and Letters, by Qian Zhongshu; selected and translated by Ronald Egan Sugar and Society in China: Peasants, Technology, and the World Market, by Sucheta Mazumdar Precious Volumes: An Introduction to Chinese Sectarian Scriptures from the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries, by Daniel L. Overmyer Poetry and Painting in Song China: The Subtle Art of Dissent, by Alfreda M u r c k Evil and/or/as the Good: Omnicentrism, Intersubjectiuity, and Value Paradox in Ttantai Buddhist Thought,by Brook Ziporyn Chinese History: A Manual, Revised and Enlarged Edition, by E n d y m i o n Wilkinson Articulated Ladies: Gender and the Male Community in Early Chinese Texts,by Paul Rouzer Allegories of Desire: Esoteric Literary Commentaries of Medieval Japan, by Susan Blakeley Klein Printing for Profit: The Commercial Publishers ofJianyang, Fujian (ilth-ljth Centuries), by Lucille C h i a To Become a God: Cosmology, Sacrifice, and Self-Divinization in Early China, by Michael J. Puett Writing and Materiality in China: Essays in Honor of Patrick Hanan, edited by Judith T. Zeitlin and Lydia H . Liu Rutin waishi and Cultural Transformation in Late Imperial China, by Shang Wei

60. 61. 62.

Words Well Put: Visions of Poetic Competence in the Chinese Tradition, by Graham Sanders Householders: The Reizei Family inJapanese History, by Steven D . Carter The Divine Nature ofPower: Chinese Ritual Architecture at the Sacred Site ofjinci, by Tracy Miller 63. Beacon Fire and Shooting Star: The Literary Culture of the Liang (502-55J), by Xiaofei Tian 64. Lost Soul: "Confucianism" in Contemporary Chinese Academic Discourse, by John Makeham 65. The Sage Learning of Liu Zhi: Islamic Thought in Conjucian Terms, by Sachiko Murata, William C . Chittick, and T u W e i m i n g 66. Through a Forest of Chancellors: Fugitive Histories in Liu Yuan's Lingyan ge, an Illustrated Bookfrom Seventeenth-Century Suzhou,by Anne Burkus-Chasson 67. Empire of Texts in Motion: Chinese, Korean, and Taiwanese Transculturations ofJapanese Literature, by Karen Laura Thornber 68. Empire's Twilight: Northeast Asia Under the Mongols, by David M . Robinson 69. Ancestors, Virgins, and Friars: Christianity as a Local Religion in Late Imperial China, by Eugenio M e n e g o n 70. Manifest in Words, Written on Paper: Producing and Circulating Poetry in Tang Dynasty China,by Christopher M . B. N u g e n t 71. The Poetics of Sovereignty: On Emperor Taizong of the Tang Dynasty, by Jack W. C h e n 72. Ancestral Memory in Early China,by K E. Brashier 73. 'Dividing the Realm in Order to Govern*: The Spatial Organization of the Song State, by Ruth Mostern 74. 75. 76.

The Dynamics of Masters Literature: Early Chinese Thought from Conjucius to Han Feizi, by TJ^ebke Denecke Songs of Contentment and Transgression: Discharged Officials and Literati Communities in Sixteenth-Century North China,by TianYuan Tan Ten Thousand Scrolls: Reading and Writing in the Poetics of Huang Tingjian and the Late Northern Song, by Yugen Wang

77. A Northern Alternative: Xue Xuan (i389-1464) and the Hedong School,by Khee H e o n g Koh 78. Visionary Journeys: Travel Writings from Early Medieval and Nineteenth-Century China, by Xiaofei H a n 79. Making Personas: Transnational Film Stardom in Modern Japan, by Hideaki Fujiki 80. Strange Eventful Histories: Identity, Performance, and Xu Wei's Four Cries o f a Gibbon, by Shiamin K w a 81. Critics and Commentators: The B o o k o f Poems as Classic and Literature, by Bruce Rusk 82. Home and the World: Editing the Glorious Ming in Woodblock-Printed Books of the Sixteenth and Seventeenth Centuries, b y Y u m i n g H e S3- Courtesans, Concubines, and the Cult of Female Fidelity, by Beverly Bossier 84. Chinese History: A New Manual, by Endymion \^lkinson 85. A Comprehensive Manchu-English Dictionary, by Jerry N o r m a n 86. Drifting among Rivers and Lakes: Southern Song Dynasty Poetry and the Problem ofLiterary History, by Michael Fuller