“The orchid boat : women poets of China by Kenneth Rexroth : review” (Publication, 1973)
Year
1973
Text
Owen, Stephen. The orchid boat : women poets of China by Kenneth Rexroth : review. In : The journal of Asian studies ; vol. 33, no 1 (1973).
http://www.jstor.org/stable/2052890 (Rex10)
http://www.jstor.org/stable/2052890 (Rex10)
Type
Publication
Contributors (1)
Owen, Stephen
(St. Louis 1946-) : James Bryant Conant University Professor, Professor of Comparative Literature, Department of Comparative Literature, Harvard University
Mentioned People (1)
Rexroth, Kenneth
(South Bend, Ind. 1905-1982 Santa Barbara, Calif.) : Dichter, Literaturkritiker, Essayist
[The books of Rexroth are under copyright by New Directions. In the databse are all thr titles and authors of Chinese poems and online poems]..
[There are no translations from his poems in Chinese until 2014].
[The books of Rexroth are under copyright by New Directions. In the databse are all thr titles and authors of Chinese poems and online poems]..
[There are no translations from his poems in Chinese until 2014].
Subjects
Literature : Occident : United States of America
/
References / Sources
Chronology Entries (1)
| # | Year | Text | Linked Data |
|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1972 |
The orchid boat : women poets of China. Transl. and ed. by Kenneth Rexroth and Ling Chung [ID D32196]. Ho, Lady = He, Lady. (300 v. Chr.) A Song of Magpies. Chuo, Wen-chün = Zhuo, Wenjun (Han) A Song of White Hair Pan, Chieh-yü = Ban, Jieyu. (48 v. Chr.) A Song of Grief Ts'ai, Yen = Cai, Yan = Cai Wenji. (Qixian, Henan 177-250) From 18 Verses Sung to a Tatar Reed Whistle I, II, VII, XI, XIII, XVII I I was born in a time of peace, But later the mandate of Heaven Was withdrawn from the Han Dynasty. Heaven was pitiless. It sent down confusion and separation. Earth was pitiless. It brought me to birth in such a time. War was everywhere. Every road was dangerous. Soldiers and civilians everywhere Fleeing death and suffering. Smoke and dust clouds obscured the land Overrun by the ruthless Tatar bands. Our people lost their will power and integrity. I can never learn the ways of the barbarians. I am daily subject to violence and insult. I sing one stanza to my lute and a Tatar horn. But no one knows my agony and grief. II A Tatar chief forced me to become his wife, And took me far away to Heaven’s edge. Ten thousand clouds and mountains Bar my road home, And whirlwinds of dust and sand Blow for a thousand miles. Men here are as savage as giant vipers, And strut about in armor, snapping their bows. As I sing the second stanza I almost break the lutestrings. Will broken, heart broken, I sing to myself. VII The sun sets. The wind moans. The noise of the Tatar camp rises all around me. The sorrow of my heart is beyond expression, But who could I tell it to anyway? Far across the desert plains, The beacon fires of the Tatar garrisons Gleam for ten thousand miles. It is the custom here to kill the old and weak And adore the young and vigorous. They wander seeking new pasture, And camp for a while behind earth walls. Cattle and sheep cover the prairie, Swarming like bees or ants. When the grass and water are used up, They mount their horses and drive on their cattle. The seventh stanza sings of my wandering. How I hate to live this way! XI I have no desire to live, but I am afraid of death. I cannot kill my body, for my heart still has hope That I can live long enough To obtain my one and only desire — That someday I can see again The mulberry and catalpa trees of home. If I had consented to death, My bones would have been buried long ago. Days and months pile up in the Tatar camp. My Tatar husband loved me. I bore him two sons. I reared and nurtured them unashamed, Sorry only that they grew up in a desert outpost. The eleventh stanza — sorrow for my sons At the first notes pierces my heart’s core. XIII I never believed that in my broken life The day would come when Suddenly I could return home. I embrace and caress my Tatar sons. Tears wet our clothes. An envoy from the Han Court Has come to bring me back, With four stallions that can run without stopping. Who can measure the grief of my sons? They thought I would live and die with them. Now it is I who must depart. Sorrow for my boys dims the sun for me. If we had wings we could fly away together. I cannot move my feet. For each step is a step away from them. My soul is overwhelmed. As their figures vanish in the distance Only my love remains. The thirteenth stanza — I pick the strings rapidly But the melody is sad. No one can know The sorrow which tears my bowels. XVII The seventeenth stanza. My heart aches, my tears fall. Mountain passes rise before us, the way is hard. Before I missed my homeland So much my heart was disordered. Now I think again and again, over and over, Of the sons I have lost. The yellow sagebrush of the border, The bare branches and dry leaves, Desert battlefields, white bones Scarred with swords and arrows, Wind, frost, piercing cold, Cold springs and summers Men and horses hungry and exhausted, worn out — I will never know them again Once I have entered Chang An. I try to strangle my sobs But my tears stream down my face. Meng, Chu = Meng, Zhu (3. Jh.) Spring Song Tzu, Yeh = Zi, Ye. (4. Jh.) Five Tzu Yeh Songs Anonymous On the Slope of Hua Mountain Su Hsiao-hsaio [sic] = Su, Xiaoxiao = Su Xiaojun (geb. Hangzhou, Zhejiang ; gest. 501) A Song of Hsi-ling Lake Pao, Ling-hui = Bao Linghui. (Southern dynasties) After one of the 19 famous Han poems Wu, Tsê-tien = Wu, Zetian (Empress (ca. 625-705, reg. 690-705) A Love Song of the Empress Wu Kuan, P'an-p'an = Guan, Panpan (fl. 805-820, Concubine of Zhang Yin) Mourning Li, Yeh = Li, Ye (Taoist priestess, Da Li (766 - 779 A.D.) A Greeting to Lu Hung-chien Who Came to Visit me by the Lake in my Illness Yü, Hsüan-chi = Yu Xuanji (842-872, Courtesan) Advice to a Neighbor Girl Living in the Summer Mountains On a Visit to Chung chen Taoist Temple I See in the South Hall the List of Successful Candidates in the Imperial Examinations Sending Spring Love to Tzu-an Hsüeh, T'ao = Xue, Tao (770-832) The Autumn Brook An Old Poem to Yiian Chen Hsüeh, Ch'iung = Xue, Qiong (?) A Song of Cliin Men District Han, Ts'ui-p'in = Han, Cuipin (9. Jh.) A Poem Written on a Floating Red Leaf Chang, Wen-chi = Zhang, Wenji. (Tang) The Bamboo Shaded Pool Chao, Luan-luan = Zhao, Luanluan (9. Jh.) Slender Fingers Red Sandalwood Mouth Willow Eyebrows Cloud Hairdress Creamy Breasts Hua, Jui, Lady = Huaruifuren (um 935-964) The Emperor Asks Why My Husband Surrendered Life in the Palace Ch'ien, T'ao = Qian, Tao (Xunyang = Jiujiang, Jiangxi 365-427) Written at a Party Where My Lord Gave Away a Thousand Bolts of Silk Wei, Lady = Wei, Wan (Xiangfang, Hubei 1040-1103) To the tune “The Bodhisattva's "Barbaric Headdress" Li, Ching-chao = Li, Qingzhao (Licheng, Shandong 1084-1151) To the short tune "The Magnolias" To the tune "A Hilly Garden" Happy and Tipsy To the tune "A Dream Song" The Sorrow of Departure "Red lotus incense fades on The jeweled curtain. Autumn Comes again. Gently I open My silk dress and float alone On the orchid boat. Who can Take a letter beyond the clouds? Only the wild geese come back And write their ideograms On the sky under the full Moon that floods the West Chamber. Flowers, after their kind, flutter And scatter. Water after Its nature, when spilt, at last Gathers again in one place. Creatures of the same species Long for each other. But we Are far apart and I have Grown learned in sorrow. Nothing can make it dissolve And go away. One moment, It is on my eyebrows. The next, it weighs on my heart." To the tune “Butterflies Love Flowers” Spring Ends To the tune "Spring in Wu-ling" To the tune "The Honor of a Fisherman" To the tune "Eternal Happiness" Anonymous (attributed to Li Qingzhao) To the tune "I Paint My Lips Red" To the tune "Picking Mulberries" Chu, Shuchen = Zhu, Shuzhen (1095-1131 od. 1063-1106) Spring Joy Spring Night To the tune "Panning Gold" Plum Blossoms Playing All a Summer's Day by the Lake To the tune "Clear Bright Joy" Nieh, Sheng-ch'iung = Nie, Shengqiong (12. Jh., Courtesan) Farewell to Li To the tune "A Partridge Sky" T'ang, Wan = Tang Wan (um 1144) To the tune "The Phoenix Hairpin" Sun, Tao-hsuan = Sun, Daoxuan = Chongxu Jushi (geb. Jian'ou, Fujian um 1100-1150) To the tune "A Dream Song" Wang, Ch'ing-hui = Wang Qinghui (um 1264-1288) To the tune "The River Is Red" Kuang, Tao-sheng = Guang, Daosheng (Huzhou 1262-1319) Married Love "You and I Have so much love, That it Burns like a fire, In which we bake a lump of clay Molded into a figure of you And a figure of me. Then we take both of them, And break them into pieces, And mix the pieces with water, And mold again a figure of you, And a figure of me. I am in your clay. You are in my clay. In life we share a single quilt. In death we will share one coffin." Anonymous Courtesan's Songs To the tune "Red Embroidered Shoes" Chu, Chung-hsien = Zhu, Zhongxian = Zhu, Jing'an = Zhu, Lingwen (Haining, Hangzhou 1422-1506) To the tune "A Branch of Bamboo" Anonymous A Song of the Dice Huang, O = Huang, E (1498-1569). To the tune "The Fall of a Little Wild Goose" "Once upon a time I was Beautiful and seductive, Wavering to and fro in Our orchid scented bedroom. You and me together tangled In our incense filled gauze Bed curtains. I trembled, Held in your hands. You carried Me in your heart wherever You went. Suddenly A bullet struck down the female Mandarin duck. The music Of the jade zither was forgotten. The phoenixes were driven apart. I sit alone in a room Filled with Spring, and you are off, Making love with someone else, Happy as two fish in the water. That insufferable little bitch With her coy tricks! She’d better not forget — This old witch can still Make a furious scene!" A Farewell to a Southern Melody To the tune "A Floating Cloud Crosses Enchanted Mountain" To the tune "Soaring Clouds" "You held my lotus blossom In your lips and played with the Pistil. We took one piece of Magic rhinoceros horn And could not sleep all night long. All night the cock's gorgeous crest Stood erect. All night the bee Clung trembling to the flower Stamens. Oh my sweet perfumed Jewel! I will allow only My lord to possess my sacred Lotus pond, and every night You can make blossom in me Flowers of fire." To the tune "Red Embroidered Shoes" Ma Hsiang-lan = Ma, Xianglan = Ma, Shouzhen (1548-1604) Waterlilies Shao, Fei-fei = Shao, Feifei (geb. Hangzhou, 17. Jh.) A Letter Wang, Wei (Shanxi 701-761) Seeking a Mooring Ho, Shuang-ch'ing = He, Shuangqing (1715-?) To the tune "A Watered Silk Dress" To the tune "Washing Silk in the Stream" Sun, Yun-feng = Sun Yunfeng (1764-1814) On the Road Through Chang-te " On the last year's trip I enjoyed this place. I am glad to come back here today. The fish market is deep in blue shadows. I can see the smoke for tea rising From the thatched inn. The sands of the river beaches Merge with the white moon. Along the shore the willows Wait for their Spring green. Lines of a poem run through my mind. I order the carriage to stop for a while." Travelling in the Mountains "Traveling homesick with the West wind, The dust of my cart rises to the evening clouds. The last cicadas drone in the yellowing leaves. In the sunset a man’s shadow looms like a mountain. One by one the birds go to roost. I wander aimlessly and never go home. I pause above a stream and envy the fisherman Who sits there in solitude and leisure, Thinking his own elegant thoughts." Starting at Dawn The Trail Up Wu Gorge Wu, Tsao = Wu, Zao (geb. ca. 1800) To the tune "The Pain of Lovesickness" For the Courtesan Ch'ing Lin To the tune "The Love of the Immortals" To the tune "The Joy of Peace and Brightness" To the tune "Flowers Along the Path through the Field" Returning from Flower Law Mountain On a Winter Day To the tune "Washing Silk in the Stream" In the Home of the Scholar Wu Su-chiang From Hsin-an, I Saw Two Psalteries of the Late Sung General Hsieh Fang-te To the tune "A Dream Song" Yu, Ch'in-tseng = Yu Qingzeng (spates 19. Jh.) To the tune "Intoxicated with Shadows of Flowers" Ch'iu, Chin = Qiu, Jin (Xiamen, Fujian 1875-1907 Shaoxing, Zhejiang) A Call to Action A Letter to Lady T'ao Ch'iu "All alone with my shadow, I whisper and murmur to it, And write strange characters In the air, like Yin Hao. It is not sickness, nor wine, Nor sorrow for those who are gone, Like Li Ch'ing-chao, that causes A whole city of anxiety To rise in my heart. There is no one here I can speak to Who can understand me. My hopes and visions are greater Than those of the men around me, But the chance of our survival is too narrow. What good is the heart of a hero Inside my dress? My perilous fate moves according to plan. I ask Heaven Did the heroines of the past Encounter envy like this?" To the tune "Walking through the Sedges" Two poems to the tune "The Narcissus by the River" I, II To the tune "The River Is Red" Ping, Hsin = Bing, Xin = Bingxin = Xie, Bingxin = Xie, Wanying (Fuzhou, Fujian 1900-1999) Remembering For the Record (given to my little brother) From Multitudinous Stars and Spring Waters I-IX Pai, Wei = Bai, Wei = Huang Zhang (Zixing, Hunan 1894-1987) Madrid Cheng, Min = Zheng, Min (Minhou, Fuzhou, Fujian 1920-) Evening Rendezvous Student Jung, Tzu = Rong, Zi (1928-) My Dressing Mirror is a Humpbacked Cat Lin, Ling (Sichuan 1938-) Sinking A Cloud Dissects Itself Footpaths Cross in the Rice Field Vague Apprehension, to a gambler Woman Wall Tuo, Ssu = Duo, Si = Chou Tsui-ching = Zhou, Zuijing (Chiayi, Taiwan 1939-) Train Sprout Night Street Hsiung, Hung = Xiong, Hong (1940-) The Pitcher Summer Freezes Here Written in the Sunset "Time is engraved on the pale green faces Of the floating lotus leaves. Our hearts are a sea, a lake, Finally a little pond, where Spider webs interlock over the round leaves, And below them our longing Is only a single drop of dew. Sometimes, suddenly the old story overcomes us. Time triumphs then. And lets down its hair — Shadowy black, Trailing like a willow. The old melancholy Comes from the land of longing. The colors of the sunset thicken. The shadows grow fast on the water. You can tear them, But not tear them away." To Who Stops the Dance? If You Think with Fire Thinking of Someone Lan, Ling (Philippinen 1949-, lives in Taiwan) = Chen Wan-fen = Zhen Wanfen A Melody https://buoy.antville.org/stories/334370/. I Wind shakes the grass. Its upright posture Is torn apart. A voice awakens The ashes. The news is written On vanishing dew. II It encircles the reeds and flows Along the two banks of the stream. The reflection on the water Has no light. Suddenly a splash. The shadow of a face Descends like night on stone. III Leaning against the wind, he stands. Grass withers between his brows. The stars descend into the midnight river, Emptied by the storm. He who has never worn shoes Has gone far away but is still inaudibly near. The Arrival Beyond Silence From The White Color of Nearness Tan, Ying = Dan, Ying = Liu, Baozhen (Perak, Malaysia 1943-) Drinking the Wind Chung, Ling = Zhong, Ling (Chongqing, Sichuan 1945-) Dusk on the Veranda by Lake Mendota The Fall of Moon Lady Before the Landing of Apollo X On the Melting Lake Song of Rootless People Visiting Jen, Jui = Ren, Rui (?) Midnight Li, Chü = Li, Ju = Li, Ru (Shanghai 1942-, lives in Taiwan) Harvesting Wheat for the Public Share Sekundärliteratur 1973 Stephen Owen : Of the many new books of Chinese poetry in translation, this section is unique : the poems, dating from the third century B.C. to the present, are all by women. The translations are followed by notes and a brief essay on the status of women in traditional Chinese society. Considering that only a handful of such poems has been previously translated, the intent is laudable, though perhaps nobler in the conception than in the execution. As the translators acknowledge, some of the earliest poems are of highly questionable authenticity, though they are the most interesting of the early poems. Mr. Rexroth's delicate style has not left him, but it requires something to work with : a number of the poems, particularly some of the Tang selections, are genuinely insignificant, and throughout the book are places where the translators might have chosen better poems. Most of the Yuan, Ming, and Qing selections are delightful, particularly the Ming erotic poems, and well deserve translation. About a third of the book is devoted to twentieth century women poets, and these poems are uniformly interesting. When a poem gets difficult, the translators' imaginations will often supply a solution remarkable both for its ingenuity and incorrectness. The worst disaster is Xue Tao's 'An old poem to Yuan Chen', which from the title to the last line bears very little resemblance to the Chinese text. This book is enjoyable to read and gives the reader the kind of poems he won't get a chance to read elsewhere. It is not scholarship nor does it pretend to be. If one accepts this fact and the fact that it does contain many errors, it is still a pleasurable book and a valuable book in that it introduces many poems which the non-sinologist would never see other wise and which the sinologist might never have thought to look for in the corpus of Chinese poetry. 1988 Shu Yunzhong : In the first place Rexroth chooses many little known women poets for his anthology because their poems, mostly love poems, fit into his literary conceptualization. Out of one hundred and fifteen poems in this collection fifty-one poems deal, in one way or another, with the theme of love. Some of the poets are courtesans or prostitutes and they write about love between man and woman rather openly by Chinese standards. With all their audacity, they still appear to Rexroth too reserved in their treatment of love. To intensify the treatment of human love, Rexroth inserts some words for which we cannot find any equivalent in the original text. |
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Cited by (1)
| # | Year | Bibliographical Data | Type / Abbreviation | Linked Data |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1 | 2000- | Asien-Orient-Institut Universität Zürich | Organisation / AOI |
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