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The Works of Li Qingzhao, Ci Poems 3.25 - 3.32
The fourth instalment of Li Qingzhao’s ci poetry. This book is freely available via De Gruyter's Library of Chinese Humanities in Mandarin and English and via several publication formats, including two open access options (the pdf appears to be better formatted than the ebook). We're reading the poems 3.25 through 3.32, inclusive.
Four of this week’s poems have endnotes, but these offer only small points of Chinese language exegesis.
How to Read Chinese Poetry has three chapters on the ci forms Li Qingzhao uses here:
Chapter 12, Ci Poetry: Short Song Lyrics (Xiaoling)
Chapter 13, Ci Poetry: Long Song Lyrics (Manci)
Chapter 14, Ci Poetry: Long Song Lyrics on Objects (Yongwu Ci)
This week, we look at Chapter 13 as recommended additional reading.
It may interest you to know that if you’ve been doing the additional reading, you’re now more than 1/3 of the way through How to Read Chinese Poetry:
Ch 1 (Shi Jing)
Ch 5 (19 Old Poems)
Ch 8 (Du Fu
Ch 9 (Du Fu)
Ch 10 (Du Fu)
Ch 12 (Li Qingzhao)
Ch 18 (Du Fu)
These next two chapters related to ci poetry will see us to the halfway point.
In contrast, I’ve been neglecting Chinese Poetry in Context: I believe we've read only Ch 15. I hope to be more assiduous about recommending it in future, when we cover pertinent people. So far, we’ve been a bit misaligned (or I wasn’t yet recommending specific chapters for discussion, when something pertinent came up).
THIS WEEK, recall from the introduction that 3.24 - 3.28 may be misattributed.
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3.31 The Lantern Festival
元宵
落日鎔金
暮雲合璧
人在何處。
染柳煙濃 吹梅笛怨 春意知幾許。 元宵佳節
融和天氣 次第豈無風雨。
來相召
香車寶馬 謝他酒朋詩侶。
中州盛日
閨門多暇
記得偏重三五。
舖翠冠兒 撚金雪柳
簇帶爭濟楚。
如今憔悴
風鬟霜鬢
怕見夜間出去。
不如向
簾兒底下
聽人笑語。
To the tune “Always Having Fun”
The Lantern Festival
The setting sun is molten gold, the clouds at dusk are a disk of jade. and where am I now?
The willows dyed with dark mist, “Plum Blossom” flutes are sorrowful, how much springtime feeling is there? The lovely time of the Lantern Festival:
the weather is balmy now, but any moment there could be wind and rain.
They come to invite me out,
in fragrant carriages drawn by festooned horses, but I turn them down, drinking buddies and poetry friends.
In the halcyon days back in the central provinces, there was much leisure in the women’s apartments, I remember how we cherished the Fifteenth!
We wore kingfisher feather caps, and snowy willows of plied gold, each trying to outdo the others in layered splendor! But today, gaunt and haggard,
hair disheveled by wind and temples touched by frost, I’m embarrassed to go out at night. Better to sit behind lowered blinds
and listen to others’ talk and laughter.
Re: 3.31 The Lantern Festival
“the clouds at dusk are a disk of jade.” Weird image—how are they disc-like?
““Plum Blossom” flutes” oh it’s the tune mentioned in the earlier footnote I guess
“It was one of the few times of the year that women were permitted to go out at night, to view the lanterns that were hung everywhere to celebrate the start of the New Year.” He should maybe specify the class he means, because working women must have had marketing and such anyway. Also, many of the women in Li’s poems seem to be mobile and active at night?
“poetry friends” a whole category of friends
“and snowy willows of plied gold,” ?
Re: 3.31 The Lantern Festival
I think it might be a different tune, bc Baike calls it 梅花落 which might translate to something more like 'plum blossom falling'
Baike says the snowy willows are a white head ornament like willow leaves, made of thin white silk and silver paper.