Shi Jing, The Book of Odes: Lessons from the States, Odes Of Zheng

[x_los]

Back after the Christmas/New Year break! I'd really like to get through the Book of Odes in the next months, so we can enter into our next Tang or Song offering. I'll try to be more regulated in the poem posts accordingly. 

Some notes:

* Every week I search the poems' English results to see if I can find any scholarship or neat bits and pop the results in Resources. Here is this week's collection.

* I believe the reminder emails have stopped, so I'll seek a new service to run that. 

When the second batch of these is up and running, if you would like not to be on the list and there isn't an unsubscribe option in the email itself, please just respond 'unsubscribe' or something and I'll take you off the reminder roster.

* IF YOU HAVE FRIENDS WHO MIGHT LIKE TO JOIN or have other ideas, please let me know on this post.

* If you haven't read it yet, chapter one, on tetrasyllabic shi poetry, in How to Read Chinese Poetry is hugely useful for the Book of Odes, imo.

**NEXT BATCH FEB 1.**

Comments

83. 有女同車 - You Nu Tong Che

[x_los]

有女同車、顏如舜華。
將翱將翔、佩玉瓊琚。
彼美孟姜、洵美且都。

There is the lady in the carriage [with him],
With the countenance like the flower of the ephermeral hedge-tree.
As they move about,
The beautiful Ju-gems of her girdle-pendant appear.
That beautiful eldest Jiang,
Is truly admirable and elegant.

有女同行、顏如舜英。
將翱將翔、佩玉將將。
彼美孟姜、德音不忘。

There is the young lady walking [with him],
With a countenance like the ephermeral blossoms of the hedge-tree.
As they move about,
The gems of her girdle-pendant tinkle.
Of that beautiful eldest Jiang,
The virtuous fame is not to be forgotten.

Re: 83. 有女同車 - You Nu Tong Che

[x_los]

countenance like the flower of the ephemeral hedge-tree

A friend for Congealed Fat Face.

That beautiful eldest Jiang,
Is truly admirable and elegant.

Ah shit, sorry Yanli, my bad.

Re: 83. 有女同車 - You Nu Tong Che

[superborb]

I know this is so wrong, but I could not help reading the title as "lesbian cars" lolol. (女同 is modern slang for lesbian)

V disappointing I'm sure; this is a different Jiang than Jiang Yanli.

WHY does Legge translate hibiscus to hedge tree. PLEASE. Baidu says it's bc the hibiscus flowers are red and white (presumably, her cheeks are red and the rest of her face is white)
Also instead of "move about" why not light like a bird flying (baidu's gloss), which is a much prettier image than SOME Legge has chosen to translate literally

Meng Jiang (eldest daughter Jiang) is now a generic term for a beauty according to Baidu

It seems that this poem was used to help determine the historical pronunciation of the words here -- via the fact that the two poems are v similar except for a few words, and following the assumption that they should rhyme.