Little Primer of Du Fu, Poems 16-20

[x_los]

 This is week 4/7 on David Hawkes' Little Primer of Du Fu. I'll replicate the poems themselves here, but this book contains considerable exegesis, so I do advise you to grab this copy.

 

This week we're reading poems 16 through 20, inclusive.

 

How to Read Chinese Poetry (https://dankodes.dreamwidth.org/1483.html?thread=16843#cmt16843) has two chapters on forms Du Fu uses extensively:

 

Ch 8, Recent Style Shi Poetry, Pentasyllabic Regulated Verse (Wuyan Lüshi) 

Ch 9, Recent Style Shi Poetry, Heptasyllabic Regulated Verse (Qiyan Lüshi) 

 

Three other chapters on other verse forms Du Fu sometimes employs, or which people quoting Du Fu employ, also mention him:

 

Ch 10,  Recent Style Shi Poetry, Quatrains (Jueju): some mention of Du Fu’s “Three Quatrains, No. 3”

Ch 14, Ci Poetry,  Long Song Lyrics on Objects (Yongwu Ci): some mention of Du Fu's “Beautiful Lady” (Jiaren)

Ch 18, A Synthesis:  Rhythm, Syntax, and Vision of Chinese Poetry: some mention of Du Fu’s poem “The Jiang and Han Rivers” 

 

Additional Reading for this Week: Chapter 9

Comments

Re: 20. 別房太尉墓 Bié Fáng-tài-wèi mù

[x_los]

“Tu Fu had resolved to return with his family” he really drags them around!! Aren’t his wife and kids annoyed?

“I who once sat at play with Grand Tutor Hsieh, now come sword in hand to seek the Lord of Hsü.” Grateful for the explanation of these allusions

Are the final two lines as straightforward as they seem? If so, it’s kind of a soft closer to the poem.