Shi Jing, The Book of Odes: Minor Odes of the Kingdom, Decade of Lu Ming

[x_los]

Welcome to Minor Odes of the Kingdom!

* I found the best option for the weekly reminder emails, via Gmail. The external service options are more involved than our purposes require. Does anyone know anything about how to arrange an Apps Script? Basically all it has to do is tell ten people, on Saturdays, to come and get their juice/poems.

Until someone knows what to do there, I'll send out manual messages weekly. If you'd like to receive these and are not getting them, please let me know.

* 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.

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

* 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.

* In case you missed it and are interested, some people on the com are doing a Nirvana in Fire read-along here. Anyone with thoughts is welcome to chime in. 

**NEXT BATCH MARCH 29.**

Comments

168. 出車 - Chu Che

[x_los]

我出我車、于彼牧矣。
自天子所、謂我來矣。
召彼僕夫、謂之載矣。
王事多難、維其棘矣。

We proceeded with our carriage,
To those pasture grounds.
' From the place of the son of Heaven,
Came an order to me to march, ' [said the general].
So he called his carriage-officers,
And told them to get the carriages all ready.
' The king's business, ' [said he], ' is surrounded with difficulties;
We must use despatch. '

我出我車、于彼郊矣。
設此旐矣、建彼旄矣。
彼旟旐斯、胡不旆旆。
憂心悄悄、僕夫況瘁。

We proceeded with our carriage,
To that suburban region.
The banner with tortoises and serpents was raised,
And the ox-tails set up at the top of its staff;
Did not it and the falcon banner,
Fly about grandly?
The [general's] heart was anxious and sad,
And the carriage-officers appeared full of care.

王命南仲、往城于方。
出車彭彭、旂旐央央。
天子命我、城彼朔方。
赫赫南仲、玁狁于襄。

The king charged Nan Zhong,
To go and build a wall in the [disturbed] region.
How numerous were his chariots!
How splendid his dragon, his tortoise and serpent flags!
The son of Heaven had charged us,
To build a wall in that northern region.
Awe-inspiring was Nan Zhong;
The Xian-yun were sure to be swept away!

昔我往矣、黍稷方華。
今我來思、雨雪載塗。
王事多難、不遑啟居。
豈不懷歸、畏此簡書。

When we were marching at first,
The millets were in flower.
Now that we are returning,
The snow falls, and the roads are all mire.
The king's business was not to be slackly performed,
And we had not leisure to rest.
Did we not long to return?
But we were in awe of the orders in the tablets.

喓喓草蟲、趯趯阜螽。
未見君子、憂心忡忡。
既見君子、我心則降。
赫赫南仲、薄伐西戎。

' Yao-yao go the grass-insects,
And the hoppers leap about.
While we do not see our husbands,
Our hearts must be full of grief.
Let us but see our husbands,
And our hearts will be at rest. '
The awe-inspiring Nan Zhong,
Is smiting the Rong of the west.

春日遲遲、卉木萋萋。
倉庚喈喈、采蘩祁祁。
執訊獲醜、薄言還歸。
赫赫南仲、玁狁于夷。

The spring-days are lengthening out;
The plants and trees grow full of verdure;
The oriole's cry comes jie-jie;
[Our wives] go in crowds to gather the white southernwood.
With our prisoners for the question and our captive crowd,
We return.
Awe-inspiring is Nan zhong;
The Xian-yun are pacified.

Re: 168. 出車 - Chu Che

[x_los]

Unusual to get another poem about the same historical subject.

It's one of the PoV switches from very early in the Shi Jing, as well! We haven't had one of those for ages!

The oriole's cry comes jie-jie I guess birds recognise the concept of sisters, who knew

Interesting to compare masculine and feminine forms of 'gathering' here.

Re: 168. 出車 - Chu Che

[douqi]

First two lines of the fourth verse parallel the first two lines of the last verse from the previous poem, somewhat in structure and also in sense (昔我往矣、黍稷方華。今我來思、雨雪載塗。vs 昔我往矣、楊柳依依。今我來思、雨雪霏霏。)

Re: 168. 出車 - Chu Che

[x_los]

Yeah, I didn't catch that. I wonder if it's a transcription slip, or a set phrase coming through in two contexts?

Re: 168. 出車 - Chu Che

[superborb]

I suppose it's really difficult to capture the repetition of words in an English translation -- a lot of characters are repeated here, which makes it sound pleasing when spoken.

Baike says this is passionately praising commander in chief Nan Zhong's victory over the Xianyun during the early years of Zhou Xuan gong's reign.