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fwoopersongs · 2 years

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题西林壁 - Written On this Wall in Xilin

by 苏轼 (Su Shi, 1037 - 1101)

横看成岭侧成峰 héng kàn chéng lǐng cè chéng fēng Across, look - it’s a mountain range, sideways, a towering summit;

远近高低各不同 yuǎnjìn gāodī gè bù tóng from far to near, from high to low, every angle a world of its own.

不识庐山真面目 bù shí lúshān zhēn miànmù One does not perceive the true face of Mt. Lu,

只缘身在此山中 zhǐ yuán shēn zài cǐ shān zhōng only because they still stand amidst its valleys and peaks.

(Source)

This is a copy. Carved on a wall at the Xilin Temple of Mt. Lu and then moved to the Donglin Temple some time later, the original has been lost to time.

.........................................................................................................

Another homework poem! I should start tagging them xD

Did a quick translation with zero context while stuck in the washroom. It was very amusing! As was wolf whistling Mt Lulu with friends ~

Anyway, I also got the vibe that there was a story here somewhere and thought it would be fun to investigate as much as I am able to! When I’m done with these notes, I shall try for another translation which will be the face for this post xD But I’ll also keep the fun tl in at the end.

Notes

TRANSLATION

This is a very straightforward seven character quatrain with a rhymed second and fourth line. It was written in the Song Dynasty by the poet better known as Su Dongpo - yes I was surprised as well, such a famous line and from a Song Dynasty poem? They aren’t just known for their lyrics! I wonder which other everyday idiom has similar origins...

So the lines in this poem themselves don’t actually need clarification.

A visitor to the 庐山 Lu Mountain has covered quite a lot of ground, looking at it from end to end and seeing it as a mountain range. Then staring at it from one end, it looks like just one towering mountain. From when he approached he saw the range and the summit; when he was close, when he climbed up and then all along his descent, every vantage point rewarded him with a different, gorgeous view and field of vision. Puzzled though, he sat and wondered which is ‘real’? And then he realized, all of them and none of them at once. Because... I am still in the mountain.

For anyone who is wondering Mt. Lu... where is this again?

Recognize this picture? (You might if you watch cdrama) Yup! This is one of the scenic sights within Mt Lu xD

(Source)

I felt a little let down after reading the poem initially.

不识庐山真面目 // one does not perceive the true face of Mt. Lu

Like oh, so you mean this?

So easy?

But the truth is HAH! The person who most needs a better view often doesn’t know how much they need it. (Me, I’m talking about ME)

In the process of looking up details of the ‘background section’, and how to better illustrate it, I came across many photos of Mt. Lu.

This is 望江亭 // Riverwatch Pavilion

This is the same 望江亭 // Riverwatch Pavilion

Stone carvings by 黄龙潭 // Yellow River Springs

This is 如琴湖 // Ruqin Lake

Again 如琴湖 // Ruqin Lake, different season, different POV.

Some branches... mmmm...

My favourite pavilion is the 观云亭 // Cloudwatch Pavilion

Less ethereal but still enticing! 观云亭 // Cloudwatch Pavilion!

(Source)

Truly magical! 观云亭 // Cloudwatch Pavilion again.

Do you want another angle of 观云亭 // Cloudwatch Pavilion?

(Source)

Maybe enough with the pavilions.

There’s tea!

Jiangxi Mt. Lu Green Tea Field

Snow at 含鄱口 // Hanpokou

Another location? No! 含鄱口 // Hanpokou again :)

Random bridge!

状元桥 // Top Scholar’s Bridge... I wonder who visits? xD

A Mt Lu sunset at 含鄱亭 // Hanpo Pavilion

At some point, I was like wait a minute, just how big is this mountain?

(As below)

Google map

(Source)

Ah.

I don’t know how Mt Lu looks like. Every view is different - suddenly, that sentence made a world of sense. No matter where I am, it’s going to be different. Like if I look at a pavilion from below and compare that with how it looks from a nearby peak, or when standing right in front of it. And that’s just one spot!

Yes dear. And you are confused because you’re right smack in the middle of it all, trying to describe 25km x 10km of mountain with what you see in in two 24mm eyes. That’s impossible to achieve.

Maybe take a step back and reframe your question?

HISTORY

Relegation was a very common method of punishment for officials who had been convicted of crimes. This was a distinct punishment from exile, in which the criminal is sent to distant backwaters, often with harsh conditions. Officials sentenced to relegations did not lose their positions as officials, they were demoted and posted to locations distant from the central government and court. Besides a demotion, how far away they were sent was an indication of the severity of the crime. They could not resign and just live as commoners, instead, they may be given a title with no actual power and be thus forced to serve out their sentence there. [x]

The period of relegation that got Su Shi, of Song Dynasty, his name of Su Dongpo began in the year 1080, when he was convicted of insulting the Emperor for a poem he wrote criticizing political reforms. With a nominal official’s title that did not confer any power on him except to tie him down to the area, off he was sent to Huangzhou!

(Notes for basis of passing through Guangzhou, Kuang in wade giles) (Source)

The poem he wrote which very cleverly drags this situation made me smile. He was 45 at this time, and the faction that played a key role in his banishment was new. Do not doubt how big of a blow this relegation was. Hope for a pardon was so dim as to be almost nonexistent. And yet, he sees the humor in the situation and makes fun of it! (But also, my bro, I guess you never learnt to shut it, did you?)

His family came to him in the first year and they stayed together, living frugally. With the help of a poor scholar friend by the name of Ma Zhengqing, in the second year, he got a little plot of land, which was on an old army camp East of the city. We know this because he wrote some poems about his experiences on this Eastern Slope 东坡 (Dong Po) from which he got his nickname.

We remember Ma Zhengqing because of Su Dongpo. But maybe without Ma Zhengqing, there would not have been a Su Dongpo. Interesting how these things happen, isn’t it?

Fun fact: It was during this period that he wrote his Chibi poems!

In the fourth month of 1084, Su Shi was recalled from Huangzhou. With a new emperor and new government, he was still under the relegation sentence, but his new location became Ruzhou.

Which… please see for yourself below. I mapped it out on google maps based on present day locations, though I also eyeballed the distance on other Chinese maps of the Song Dynasty to confirm. This is just needed to show the walking distance for impact.

NOW I’m quite tired from scrolling through google maps*flops on the floor*.

Here’s the entirely water based route he could have taken… just following the blue lines (waterways) on google maps and joining them together. However, this does not account for the direction of the river’s flow, nor for any construction or whatnot that has happened over nearly a thousand years.

(Good gods, this trip looks exhausting. How long did he take to complete it? A year???)

Here’s the link to the map I made with latitude and longitudes indicated with a * below. If for whatever reason, you also want to stalk blue lines across google maps, you’re welcome to reference the full list. And if you know anything about the actual route, please contact me! I really want to know.

https://goo.gl/maps/uFKGrxTFZPqToFBX7

Huangzhou - 30.433872962245427, 114.88129769733013* Yangtze River - 30.377781819827735, 115.07101171640872 Lushan Maintain - 29.512493686853997, 115.97992335630641* Jiujiang - 29.655519332862937, 115.95199503510239 Yangtze River - 31.52268831477707, 118.3835515008836* joins - 32.25937931638017, 119.4709085685721 Jinghang Yunhe - 32.42372696795087, 119.48513109148513* Jinghang Yunhe - 33.56999997351908, 118.97126706569289 Huaishu River - 33.45610953325041, 118.94490546438135* Huaihe River - 32.54604115026407, 116.58836355764417* joins - 32.500902310509126, 116.52398860951106 Yinghe River - 33.63248728287315, 114.61038506349661* Shahe River - 33.69194084968913, 113.60587536388371 Ruhe River - 34.146226764936046, 112.8221271332927 Ruzhou - 34.16581654981741, 112.84447346106711*

Anyway, so this has all been to give a bit of background on how Su Shi found himself passing by Mt. Lu. From Huangzhou, he followed the Yangtze to Jiujiang, and from there he had the opportunity to visit Mt. Lu and went for it.

After the visit concluded, he enjoyed it so much that he eventually recorded it in 《东坡志林》 which can be read as Dongpo’s Forest of Records or Dongpo’s Records of Forests, both of which are very cute names for a travelogue.

The account can be found in Chapter 1 of the notes, under the name: 《记游·记游庐山》 , and the tone of it is so so charming!

(Source)

When he first got there, the scenery was fantastically beautiful. It was nothing like anything he had ever seen before, and overwhelmed by the beauty he had thought he would very likely not have the time for poetry. So he proceeded to declare he had no intention of writing any poetry.

(Like how we all say, no need to take photos, no photo can record the beauty that eyes can see xD but in much the same way, we all know what happens to that right?)

But afterwards, he met some monks who lived in the mountain who all exclaimed in excitement or surprise.

“Su Zizhan* has come!”

*子瞻, Su Shi’s courtesy name

And ‘involuntarily’, he composed a quatrain which he provided in his notes.

芒鞵青竹杖 | With rush shoes and green bamboo staff, 自挂百钱游 | upon it, a hundred coins hung, off I roam! 可怪深山里 | How very odd, deep in the mountains here 人人识故侯 | everyone recognizes some old official.

(Su Shi, probably: I’m popular! Hehe.)

And immediately, he smiled at the absurdity of his verse and wrote two more xD

(yjtc: bro, what happened to no poems today?)

青山若无素 | Green mountain, whom I have not met before, 偃蹇不相亲 | like a haughty stranger, not approachable at all. 要识庐山面 | Want to know Mt. Lu's face? 他年是故人 | Then become acquainted in the years to come.

自昔忆清赏 | From before, I recall admiring its grace in works, 神游杳蔼间 | in spirit, exploring amidst the moss and vine. 如今不是梦 | Now this is no dream, 真个是庐山 | it really is Mt Lu.

The next day, he was reading the book his friend Chen Lingju had handed to him, 《庐山记》 ~ Notes on Mt Lu as he walked. He saw poems from 李白 Li Bai and 徐凝 Xu Ning, and something about them amused him very much and he laughed. Later, his steps took him into Kaixian Temple where the monks requested a poem. For them, he wrote the following:

帝遣银河一派垂 | The Heavenly Emperor sends the Silver River [1] gushing down; 古来惟有谪仙辞 | in all of time, only one Immortal's [2] verse can be called thus. 飞流溅沫知多少 | The flying waters splash and foam, who knows how much? 不与徐凝洗恶诗 | It will not wash Xu Ning's terrible poem [3].

[1] Milky Way / Alludes to Li Bai's poem about Mt Lu's waterfall 《望庐山瀑布》, [2] 谪仙 is an deity sent to the mortal realm. Li Bai was known as the 诗仙 / poetry immortal [3] Xu Ning’s Mt. Lu waterfall poem《庐山瀑布》

He took about ten days or a little more to explore the Southern side of the mountain. Then concluded that there were too many gorgeous places to list and discuss, but of these, 漱玉亭 (Jade Pavilion) and 三峡桥 (Three Gorges Bridge) were the best to him. And thus he wrote two more poems about them, which you may read translated here.

漱玉亭 // Jade Wash Pavilion

(Source)

（Source）

三峡桥 // Three Gorges Bridge

(Source)

And here we have a Ming Dynasty illustration of the same place.

(Source)

Finally, finally, he paired up with a friend he calls Old Zong (this bears a little more research), to explore the West Forest together. During this time, he wrote his final Mt Lu poem, which is also his most well known one.

横看成岭侧成峰 | Across, look - it’s a mountain range, sideways, a towering summit, 远近高低各不同 | from far to near, from high to low, every angle a world of its own. 不识庐山真面目 | One does not perceive the true face of Mt. Lu. 只缘身在此山中 | because they still stand amidst its valleys and peaks.

And I feel like, having had this experience of trekking through the mountain, all the interesting encounters, reading about other people's thoughts, he also took the time to reflect on his own feelings and reactions. Maybe this philosophical view of the world was something he already was nursing, and this metaphor with Mt. Lu was a good way to express it. Maybe he didn't have the voice, and the little holiday inspired him?

Who knows!

But having had the tinest of peeks into some of the events that happened leading to and also on this trip, knowing that this was the closing of a paragraph in his life, no wonder it got famous!

.......................... —ฅ/ᐠ. ̫ .ᐟ\ฅ —..........................

cross section see as long, side become tall far near high low each got something more don't know lu mountain true face how to see only fate cos your body in mountain be

Your thoughts, your beliefs and even your questions limit you from seeing the true nature of things.

#题西林壁 #苏轼 #Su Dongpo #my favourite song has a line that goes #who knows which line will be sung and passed on forevermore #谁知道哪一句会千古吟传 #it's so TRUE #objectively simple but my brain sure tied itself in knots #it's not leaving the mountain physically to get a better look at it #it's the knowing of where you are and understanding the context #and then asking the right question #but to do that you have to take a step back and see your situation for what it is #Maybe where you stand does limit what you perceive...#but if you think that is a Problem then you have not seen Mt Lu's true face #commentary #poems

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kachoushi · 1 year

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各地句会報

花鳥誌　令和5年5月号

坊城俊樹選

栗林圭魚選　岡田順子選

………………………………………………………………

令和5年2月2日うづら三日の月花鳥句会坊城俊樹選　特選句

厨女も慣れたる手付き雪掻す　由季子闇夜中裏声しきり猫の恋　喜代子節分や内なる鬼にひそむ角　さとみ如月の雨に煙りし寺の塔　都風花やこの晴天の何処より　同