Keith Holyoak has succeeded in producing translations of Chinese poetry that achieve a high level of literary excellence while conveying a real sense of the musicality of the originals.
— Jonathan Chaves, Professor of Chinese, George Washington University
The clarity and simplicity Holyoak brings to his translations carry the reader into the profundity and complexity of the originals. Over twelve hundred years disappear and another culture--in no essential way dissimilar to our own--reveals the similarities. Holyoak catches the spirits of China’s two greatest poets: “The wine keeps flowing; the moon keeps watch.”
— Sebastian Barker, Editor of The London Magazine
Copyright © 2007 by Keith Holyoak
Calligraphy: Copyright © 2007 by Hung-hsiang Chou
Paintings on cover and title page: Copyright © 2007 by Xing Jie
Chen
All rights reserved. No part of this book may be used or reproduced in any manner whatsoever without written permission from the publisher or the translator, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical articles and reviews.
Print ISBN: 978-1-882291-04-5
E-book ISBN: 978-1-882291-12-0
Library of Congress Control Number: 2007930491
Designed and composed at Hobblebush Design, Brookline, NH
(www.hobblebush.com).
Printed in the United States of America
Many of the translations appeared (often as earlier versions) in Candelabrum Poetry Magazine, Chrysanthemum, Cumberland Poetry Review, Literary Imagination, Measure, Poetry NZ, Poetry Salzburg Review and Two Lines.
Published 2007 in print and 2015 as an ebook by
OYSTER RIVER PRESS
36 Oyster River Road, Durham, NH 03824
www.OysterRiverPress.com
603-868-5006
All ORP titles may be ordered at www.oysterriverpress.com.
Contents
Acknowledgments
Introduction
Idling Alone
Poems of Li Bai
Idling Alone
Going to Visit the Daoist Master on Daitian Mountain but Not Finding Him
Farewell, on the Ferry Passing Jingmen
The Meaning of Life Revealed Upon Waking Up Drunk on a Spring Day
Question and Answer on the Mountain
Sorrow of Long Gate Palace
Seeing Du Fu Off at Stone Gate Road, in the Lu District
Inscribed at a Mountain-Top Temple
Gazing upon the Ruins at Yue
Listening to a Sichuan Monk Playing His Lute
On Yellow-Crane Tower, Farewell to Meng Haoran Leaving for Yangzhou
Reproach at the Top of the Marble Staircase
Gazing at Waterfall on Lu Mountain
Sending Off a Friend
A Playful Gift for Du Fu
Climbing Phoenix Tower in Jinling
Farewell at a Jinling Tavern
Song of Changgan
Crows Calling at Dusk
Midnight Song of Wu
Laolao Pavilion
Setting Off This Morning from Baidi
Sitting Alone at Jingting Mountain
Quiet Night Thoughts
Below Sand Hill City, Sent to Du Fu
Old Poem #9
Drinking Alone Under the Moon
Missing My Little Son
Poems of Du Fu
Missing My Little Son
Moonlit Night
Heaven’s River
Facing the Moon on the 105th Night
Where to Live
Spring View
Dreaming of Li Bai
Thinking of My Brothers on a Moonlit Night
Unbearable Heat in Early Autumn and Too Much Work Piled on My Desk
Seeing a Friend Off on a Long Journey
Washing and Pounding Clothes
Thinking of Li Bai at the World’s End
A Pair of Swallows
Empty Purse
A Guest Arrives
The Sick Horse
Bound Chickens
To My Brother Zhan, Who Returns to Look After My Thatched Hut
Grieving the Defeat at Green Slope
Facing the Snow
Passing the Night at Governor’s Headquarters
On Hearing of the Recovery of Henan and Hebei Provinces by the Imperial Army
Happy Over Rain
Overnight in the Pavilion by the River
On the Heights
Struggling South
Climbing Yueyang Tower
Thoughts Written While Traveling by Night
Notes on Translations
Further Reading
About the Translator and Artists
Acknowledgments
I am grateful to the distinguished scholars and poets who have translated classical Chinese poetry for English readers, and those who have written (for over a millennium in Chinese and a century in English) about the lives and poetry of Li Bai and Du Fu. I was first introduced to these poets through English translations by Xu Yuan Zhong, Father John Turner, and Sebastian Barker. The scholarship and translations of Arthur Waley, William Hung, Arthur Cooper, David Hawkes, Hugh Stimson, David Hinton and Sam Hamill proved especially helpful. John Derbyshire, Douglas Hofstadter and M. L. McCarthy offered valuable suggestions. I am especially grateful for the encouragement and careful editorial assistance I received from Cicely Buckley, editor and publisher of Oyster River Press.
My Chinese-English bilingual informants generously helped me with translations and critiques of early drafts. The three who worked most extensively with me (all with PhDs in psychology) were born and raised in regions that have played key roles in preserving the poems of Li Bai and Du Fu. Shaw Jing Chao is a native of Taiwan, where classical Chinese poetry continues to be taught using the traditional characters. Patricia Wenjie Cheng is from Hong Kong, for centuries a crossroads of the Chinese- and English-speaking worlds. Hongjing Lu grew up in Shaanxi Province of the People’s Republic of China. The provincial capital of Shaanxi is the city of Xi’an, previously called Changan, which was the capital of China during the Tang Dynasty.
Introduction
The Times
In the eighth century, the most advanced civilization on earth was the empire of China. The Tang Dynasty reached its apex under Emperor Xuanzong, known to his people as the “Brilliant Emperor.” He governed from the capital city of Changan in the area of China that today includes Shaanxi, Sichuan and neighboring provinces. Xuanzong ruled for 43 years, and for the first half of his reign he governed an empire in peace and prosperity. Taxation was low, and corruption was almost unknown. One government minister even lived in a temple to save the state the expense of maintaining a house. The frontiers were well defended, crime was rare, and travelers moved safely over an extensive network of rivers and roads.