![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
x_los posting in ![[community profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/community.png){kind=small}
dankodesThe seventh 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 3.49 through 3.56, inclusive.
How to Read Chinese Poetry has three chapters on the ci forms Li Qingzhao uses here:
Recall from the introduction that everything after 3.35 is relatively likely to be misattributed. This is especially true after 3.45: these may be written deliberately 'in Li Qingzhao's style'.
If you’d like to be added to the reminder email list, let me know the address you wish to be contacted via. (You can also unsubscribe from the reminders at any time simply by replying ‘unsubscribe’.)
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)
Recall from the introduction that everything after 3.35 is relatively likely to be misattributed. This is especially true after 3.45: these may be written deliberately 'in Li Qingzhao's style'.
If you’d like to be added to the reminder email list, let me know the address you wish to be contacted via. (You can also unsubscribe from the reminders at any time simply by replying ‘unsubscribe’.)
3.50
薄露初零。
長宵共
永晝分停。
遶水樓臺 高聳萬丈蓬瀛。 芝蘭為壽 相輝映
簪笏盈庭。 花柔玉淨 捧觴別有娉婷。
鶴瘦松青。
精神與
秋月爭明。
德行文章
素馳日下聲名。
東山高蹈 雖卿相
不足為榮。
安石須起 要蘇天下蒼生。
To the tune “New Lotus Leaves”
This song is a birthday offering, congratulating an elderly and retired statesman on his birthday. It is thought by modern commentators to have been written for Chao Buzhi, a famous literatus who once praised the literary talent of the youthful Li Qingzhao, but that is just a guess, if indeed the song was written by Li Qingzhao at all (the attribution to her is from a fifteenth century text).
When light dew first falls, the long night perfectly matches the persisting morning.
Pools wind around the storied buildings and watchtowers that soar aloft ten thousand feet, a Land of Immortals. Irises and orchids offer long-life felicitations, shining on each other,
hatpins and tablets fill the hall. Delicate as flowers and pure as jade, holding goblets, they have a special feminine charm.
Thin as a crane and pine-tree green, 12 his vitality of his spirit competes
with the glow of the autumn moon. His virtuous conduct and literary talent have peerless repute in the imperial city.
Stepping aloft in the Eastern Mountains, even ministers of state do not impress him with their eminence. Anshi must soon emerge from reclusion,
To bring new life to the commoners of the empire.
Re: 3.50
“concentrating on the autumn time (when the yin and yang forces of day and night were said to be balanced)” huh
“hatpins and tablets fill the hall.” Signifiers of office?
The movement between subjects here in stanza 1 is very unclear, and between stanzas
“pine-tree green,” his clothes, I guess
Re: 3.50
Yes, Baike says the hatpins and tablets are used by the officials.
Baike says the pine trees are green year round, making it a suitable birthday wish.