野 But neither are we rhinos or tigers, who navigate this windsweptwilderness哀我征夫 朝夕不暇 Alas for us campaigning soldiers, day and night we have no rest有芃者狐 率彼幽草 The bushy [tailed] fox, he navigates these thick plants有棧之車 行彼周道 But we have bamboo carts and trudge on the circuit road.The fox in this poem is presented without the details which I have previously discussed - namely,binome suisui or the location near a river. The fox (together with the rhinos and tigers), and its easein the thick plants of the wilderness, is juxtaposed with the situation of the campaigning soldiers inwhose voice the poem is spoken, they who are unaccustomed to the harsh surroundings. While theatmosphere of the poem is one of difficulty and arduousness, this is not a result of the fox image.Indeed, the fox and the other animals are seemingly able to transcend the difficulty of the situation.This treatment is significantly different from that found in either You Hu or Nan Shan, in which thefox imagery is inextricably linked to the human emotive atmospheres, not contrasted to it. He CaoBu Huang thus demonstrates that foxes do not, per se, necessitate a traditional anthropomorphicreading or symbolic association.
Foxes can evidently be exploited in the Shi Jing for figurative purposes, divorced from their ritualassociations, which are inscribed in particular accompanying phrases and scenes. In this poem, therole of the fox image is to act in juxtaposition with the human world, emphasising the differencebetween the situation of an animal which is naturally suited to the conditions and that of soldiers forwhom the harsh winter is foreign and unfamiliar. The figure, located from the initial couplet of thepoem, where xing imagery is usually found, is, if you will, an anti-analogy, a foil to the human world,which negates similitude. This is in direct opposition to the way in which the fox imagery operates inthe opening xing lines of You Hu and Nan Shan, where it is clear (and accepted) that the fox’ssituation has some sort of metaphorical or analogous connection to the human world (partly as aresult of its very presence in each poem’s opening lines).
[...] This clear difference in treatment demonstrates that fox imagery in You Hu and Nan Shan isexploited for other implications, and that there must be other meaningful elements to the treatmentin those poems. As we have observed, that extra meaningful information is provided by a connectionto a ritual context - a contention that the negative evidence of He Cao Bu Huang would appear toconfirm, in that it provides a context which appears unconnected with ritual. Logically speaking,there would seem no obvious function for a ritual recalling the privations of a military campaign.The song does not display ritual echoes such as distinct repeatable physical actions, nor is its form(with five interrogative phrases in the first stanza and none in the second) evocative of repetitive andbalanced ritual diction. He Cao Bu Huang shows how an unadorned fox image in a poem without(actual or imitated) ritual resonances does not summon up the key notions of liminality or frustratedachievement. Those meanings are only accessible through connection to the imagery of foxes whichis found in the divinatory ritual tradition, and which is accompanied by a particular apparatus ofattendant detail (including the river and/or the suisui binome)
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Re: 234. 何草不黃 - He Cao Bu Huang
Date: 2021-05-11 06:27 pm (UTC)https://ses.library.usyd.edu.au/bitstream/handle/2123/1527/02whole.pdf?sequence=2
野 But neither are we rhinos or tigers, who navigate this windsweptwilderness哀我征夫 朝夕不暇 Alas for us campaigning soldiers, day and night we have no rest有芃者狐 率彼幽草 The bushy [tailed] fox, he navigates these thick plants有棧之車 行彼周道 But we have bamboo carts and trudge on the circuit road.The fox in this poem is presented without the details which I have previously discussed - namely,binome suisui or the location near a river. The fox (together with the rhinos and tigers), and its easein the thick plants of the wilderness, is juxtaposed with the situation of the campaigning soldiers inwhose voice the poem is spoken, they who are unaccustomed to the harsh surroundings. While theatmosphere of the poem is one of difficulty and arduousness, this is not a result of the fox image.Indeed, the fox and the other animals are seemingly able to transcend the difficulty of the situation.This treatment is significantly different from that found in either You Hu or Nan Shan, in which thefox imagery is inextricably linked to the human emotive atmospheres, not contrasted to it. He CaoBu Huang thus demonstrates that foxes do not, per se, necessitate a traditional anthropomorphicreading or symbolic association.
Foxes can evidently be exploited in the Shi Jing for figurative purposes, divorced from their ritualassociations, which are inscribed in particular accompanying phrases and scenes. In this poem, therole of the fox image is to act in juxtaposition with the human world, emphasising the differencebetween the situation of an animal which is naturally suited to the conditions and that of soldiers forwhom the harsh winter is foreign and unfamiliar. The figure, located from the initial couplet of thepoem, where xing imagery is usually found, is, if you will, an anti-analogy, a foil to the human world,which negates similitude. This is in direct opposition to the way in which the fox imagery operates inthe opening xing lines of You Hu and Nan Shan, where it is clear (and accepted) that the fox’ssituation has some sort of metaphorical or analogous connection to the human world (partly as aresult of its very presence in each poem’s opening lines).
[...]
This clear difference in treatment demonstrates that fox imagery in You Hu and Nan Shan isexploited for other implications, and that there must be other meaningful elements to the treatmentin those poems. As we have observed, that extra meaningful information is provided by a connectionto a ritual context - a contention that the negative evidence of He Cao Bu Huang would appear toconfirm, in that it provides a context which appears unconnected with ritual. Logically speaking,there would seem no obvious function for a ritual recalling the privations of a military campaign.The song does not display ritual echoes such as distinct repeatable physical actions, nor is its form(with five interrogative phrases in the first stanza and none in the second) evocative of repetitive andbalanced ritual diction. He Cao Bu Huang shows how an unadorned fox image in a poem without(actual or imitated) ritual resonances does not summon up the key notions of liminality or frustratedachievement. Those meanings are only accessible through connection to the imagery of foxes whichis found in the divinatory ritual tradition, and which is accompanied by a particular apparatus ofattendant detail (including the river and/or the suisui binome)