Selected Poems and Personal Notes: for September and October

by Shenzhan/申展

Time goes by in a strange way after the beginning of 2020. These years, I find myself looking for something to get lost into, desperately. And I rediscover the power of written languages through poetry.

锦瑟 The Sad Zither

李商隐 Li Shangyin (812－852)

锦瑟无端五十弦，Why should the sad zither have fifty strings?               

一弦一柱思华年。Each string, each strain evokes but vanished springs:

庄生晓梦迷蝴蝶，Dim morning dream to be a butterfly;                          

望帝春心托杜鹃。Amorous heart poured out in cuckoo[1]’s cry.

沧海月明珠有泪，In moonlit pearls see tears in mermaid’s eyes;                  

蓝田日暖玉生烟。From sunburnt jade in Blue Field let smoke rise.

此情可待成追忆，Such feeling cannot be recalled again;                                      

只是当时已惘然。It seemed long-lost even when it was felt then.

Translation by Yuanchong Xu (许渊冲， 1921 – 2021)

The Phoenix and Turtle

by William Shakespeare (1564 – 1616)

Let the bird of loudest lay

On the sole Arabian tree

Herald sad and trumpet be,

To whose sound chaste wings obey.

But thou shrieking harbinger,

Foul precurrer of the fiend,

Augur of the fever's end,

To this troop come thou not near.

From this session interdict

Every fowl of tyrant wing,

Save the eagle, feathered king;

Keep the obsequy so strict.

Let the priest in surplice white,

That defunctive music can,

Be the death-divining swan,

Lest the requiem lack his right.

And thou treble-dated crow,

That thy sable gender mak'st

With the breath thou giv'st and tak'st,

'Mongst our mourners shalt thou go.

Here the anthem doth commence:

Love and constancy is dead,

Phoenix and the turtle fled

In a mutual flame from hence.

So they loved, as love in twain

Had the essence but in one,

Two distincts, division none;

Number there in love was slain.

Hearts remote, yet not asunder,

Distance and no space was seen

'Twixt this turtle and his queen;

But in them it were a wonder.

So between them love did shine

That the Turtle saw his right

Flaming in the phoenix' sight;

Either was the other's mine.

Property was thus appalled

That the self was not the same;

Single nature's double name

Neither two nor one was called.

Reason, in itself confounded,

Saw division grow together,

To themselves yet either neither,

Simple were so well compounded.

That it cried, "How true a twain

Seemeth this concordant one!

Love hath reason, Reason none,

If what parts can so remain,"

Whereupon it made this threne

To the phoenix and the dove,

Co-supremes and stars of love,

As chorus to their tragic scene.

               Threnos

Beauty, truth, and rarity,

Grace in all simplicity,

Here enclosed, in cinders lie.

Death is now the phoenix' nest,

And the turtle's loyal breast

To eternity doth rest,

Leaving no posterity;

'Twas not their infirmity,

It was married chastity.

Truth may seem, but cannot be;

Beauty brag, but 'tis not she;

Truth and beauty buried be.

To this urn let those repair

That are either true or fair;

For these dead birds sigh a prayer.

A Personal Note for September/October, 2022

Butterflies.

Transformative creatures easily capture our imaginations. For example, cicadas, made into jade in ancient China and buried with kings, was expected to help bringing back life; or butterflies, written into poems and stories for centuries, symbolize love and rebirth. Beautiful, not a single pair with the exact same pattern, they dance lightly in the air, with their thin, colorful wings, as if carrying weightless and fragile dreams, of being free, loved, and dazzling.

Just like love.

Does love transform us? Loved, life suddenly is transcended, meaningful. At the moment of loving or being loved, we don’t need GOD, Buddha, nor Daoism. We just need each other.

But just as beautiful as butterflies, love is as elusive.

Not only the beloved vanishes, because of death, change of heart, immature nature of human beings, time passing unforgivingly...... the loving one may end up questioning, like scholar Zhuang (庄子) pondering who is the real butterfly,

“What exactly was I like back then?”

I remember the time when I was sitting on the sunlit balcony with mom, drinking tea and chopping up white radish to prepare them to be dried and pickled, laughing and chatting in the warm winter day in my hometown, southwest of China; Or as a college student I waited for K in the evening on the side of one of the busiest streets in Beijing so I could surprise him on his way back to college campus (which I did); Or the morning when I was contemplating the meaning of “cauldron”, conceiving, holding, encompassing, and warm with a fire underneath, and smiling with the thought of J in my kitchen; Or, the evening when M dropped off his luggage after a long trip and immediately jumped on a crowded peak-hour A train in New York City to come to me……

Oh, I have loved and being loved, even when each love equals a departure, a heartbreak, one way or the other.   

Unlike scholar Zhuang Zi, I would rather imagine myself as a cat.

I would walk silently in the darkness of the night, take a nap in the warmth of the mid-day sunlight, curling up on the lap of a human I adore, lick my coat as if no one is watching, or just sit as a loaf, closing my eyes from time to time, if I feels like it. Or better, I would be out in the wild, taking the harsh life that nature grants, fighting with hunger, cold weather, disease, or other cats to just barely stay alive. When time comes, I will go back to my den, and rest.

I wonder, had Shakespeare’s Phenix and Turtledove not died in the height of their burning love, would they have been moved by Li Shangyin’s lines one day?

此情可待成追忆，Such feeling cannot be recalled again;                                      

只是当时已惘然。It seemed long-lost even when it was felt then.

October 24, 2022

Astoria, New York 

[1] I would prefer “turtledove” over “cuckoo” in translating “杜鹃”, as the bird in the Chinese poem symbolizes passionate love. Shakespeare’s “The Phoenix and Turtle” provides reinforcing reference too.

Selected Poems and Personal Notes: for July and August

by Shenzhan/申展

Time goes by in a strange way after the beginning of 2020. These years, I find myself looking for something to get lost into, desperately. And I rediscover the power of written languages through poetry.

鹿柴 Deer Fence

王維 Wang Wei (701－761)

空山不見人，Empty hills, no one in sight,

但聞人語響。only the sound of someone talking;

返景入深林，late sunlight enters the deep wood,

復照青苔上。shining over the green moss again.

Translation by Burton Watson (1925 - 2017)

THE PEACE OF WHILD THINGS

by Wendell Berry (1934 - )

When despair for the world grows in men

and I wake in the night at the least

sound

in fear of what my life and my children’s

lives may be,

I go and lie down where the wood drake

rests in his beauty on the water, and the

great heron feeds.

I come into the peace of wild things

who do not tax their lives with

forethought

of grief. I come into the presence of still

water.

And I feel above me the day-blind stars

waiting with their light. For a time

I rest in the grace of the world, and am

free.

A Personal Note for July/August 2022

Of all the living things, are humans the only ones burdened by memories and forethoughts?

A few weeks ago, in the deepest grief over mom’s passing, I was convinced that the darkest summer is yet to come. Temperature keeps rising, the sun burning more brutally every day, people finally spilling out in the park, on the lawns for concerts, picnics, sunbathing…… I walk and bike around as many past summers, but this year with a hole in my heart, the ache of longing to see my mom again. The world feels less kind and less warm without her, and I am struggling to belong to it. 

One hot afternoon in July I found myself lying in a park in Astoria, New York, looking into the canopy formed by the trees above: layers and layers of leaves on top of each other, in different shades of green – some translucent in the sun with a magnificent glow; some thicker and darker in the shade as a contrast; mischievous birds chirping and jumping gingerly in between branches – above it all was the blue sky, pure as crystal; far as the furthest memory. 

Without words, the trees stood there, extending and growing. Are they silently contemplating the life in the past? Or whispering to each other in the breeze their worries about the future? They seemed just happy to be alive for that moment, and happy for every moment that they are alive.

Turning to nature is to turn to the moment that one exists enough to know and to feel. Trees don’t tell me in plain human language, but their mere existence remind me the great comfort nature offers, just like words by Wang Wei, and Wendell Berry.

Astoria New York

7/24/2022

Selected Poems and Personal Notes: for May and June

by Shenzhan/申展

Time goes by in a strange way after the beginning of 2020. These years, I find myself looking for something to get lost into, desperately. And I rediscover the power of written languages through poetry.

送友人 A Farewell to a Friend

李白 Li Bai （701-762）

青山橫北郭, 白水繞東城。

With a blue line of mountains north of the wall, and east of the city a white curve of water,

此地一為別, 孤蓬萬裏征。

Here you must leave me and drift away, like a loosened water-plant hundreds of miles....

浮雲遊子意, 落日故人情。

I shall think of you in a floating cloud; so in the sunset think of me.

揮手自茲去, 蕭蕭班馬鳴。

We wave our hands to say good-bye, and my horse is neighing again and again.

Translation by Witter Bynner (1881 – 1968)

ANTIDOTES TO FEAR OF DEATH
by Rebecca Elson (1969 – 1999)

Sometimes as an antidote
To fear of death,
I eat the stars.

Those nights, lying on my back,
I suck them from the quenching dark
Til they are all, all inside me,
Pepper hot and sharp.

Sometimes, instead, I stir myself
Into a universe still young,
Still warm as blood:

No outer space, just space,
The light of all the not yet stars
Drifting like a bright mist,
And all of us, and everything
Already there
But unconstrained by form.

And sometime it’s enough
To lie down here on earth
Beside our long ancestral bones:

To walk across the cobble fields
Of our discarded skulls,
Each like a treasure, like a chrysalis,
Thinking: whatever left these husks
Flew off on bright wings.

A Personal Note for May/June

On May 6, 2021, I left my hometown in China one last time, not sure when I would be able to return. A year later, covid, after its first appearance in the city of Wuhan in 2020, made a return to China in early March. Some of its biggest cities, including Shanghai and Beijing, adopted the strictest policy to keep the virus from spreading among its 1.4 billion people. Sitting in Astoria, New York, I feel traveling back to China simply a more daunting idea than February, 2021, when it felt like a magic when I successfully made my way back to my hometown, to be by my mother’s side. She was dying of multiple myeloma.

Is the hardest departing the kind you know is the last time you would see each other, flesh and warm? You look into each other’s eyes, knowing departing is inevitable, and unity will only return in a different form, metaphorically, perhaps. This time, you say good bye to each other, without making the next travel plan, nor new promises, nor “see you next time.” You just depart.

Perhaps Li Bai, and the poets in his time, know this kind of departing all too well. At a time when the fastest means of travel was by horses, and years would have to pass before a reunion, each departure is more likely to draw lines between life and death. They just wave their poetic hands and wait until the horses vanish in distance. They won’t say “see you next time”, not even dropping the slightest hint.

And only Li Bai, with his unique natural grace, so effortlessly sets such despair with the floating cloud in the sky and the falling sun at dusk. One feels instantly significant when connected with something as grand as the universe, and indifferent, as a tiny being that is the same as everything else born into this vast void. Oddly, there is comfort. 

That’s where I find the resemblance between Li Bai, the greatest Tang Dynasty poet in early 8th Century, and Rebecca Elson, a Canadian American astronomer and poet, who, died of cancer at the age of 39, has one slender poem collection, A Responsibility to Awe. They both studied the universe and told us its secrete -- that after departing, it is the universe that we all will return. There, we reunite with our ancestors and loved ones. Atomically speaking, aren’t the particles that we are all made of going back to the universe, ultimately?

Astoria, New York

May 22, 2022

Selected Poems and Personal Notes: for March and April

by Shenzhan/申展

Time goes by in a strange way after the beginning of 2020. These years, I find myself looking for something to get lost into, desperately. And I rediscover the power of written languages through poetry.

And here are my selections and notes.

Tulip in the Bryant Park, New York City, April 16, 2022

春曉 Spring Morning

By 孟浩然 Meng Haoran（689 – 740）

春眠不覺曉，Spring naps, unconscious of the dawn.  

處處聞啼鳥。Everywhere, birdsong.

夜來風雨聲，Night sounds, wind, and rain.

花落知多少。How many petals, fallen?

 Originally translated in French by Francois Cheng (1929 - )

BLOOM

By Emily Dickinson (1830 – 1886)

Bloom – is Result – to meet a Flower

And casually glance

Would cause one scarcely to suspect

The minor Circumstance

Assisting in the Bright Affair

So intricately done

Then offered as a Butterfly

To the Meridian –

To pack the Bud – oppose the Worm –

Obtain its right of Dew –

Adjust the Heat – elude the Wind –

Escape the prowling Bee

Great Nature not to disappoint

Awaiting Her that Day –

To be a Flower, is profound

Responsibility –

A Personal Note for March and April, 2022

What poem could be more appropriate for spring than this quatrain by Meng Haoran, the great Tang poet, friend of Wang Wei, admired by Li Bai? Refreshing, innocent, exquisitely simple yet natural, in image and sound, this poem fits in the first-grade textbook in China and deserves the appreciation of the most sophisticated heart.

March and April are the months for contemplating the spring, yet in the year of 2022, I am also researching nuclear shelters in New York City and found this:

By 1963, there were 17,448 buildings identified by the Army Corps of Engineers with shelter spaces that could accommodate a total of 11,703,090 New Yorkers. These shelter spaces, typically windowless and in the middle of a building, or basement, also called “FALLOUT SHELTERS”, were built during the cold war to provide shelter in the event of a nuclear attack. In 2017, these buildings with the outdated “fallout” signs were mentioned as “fun facts” about New York City on a website called “untapped new york.”

At four o’clock in the afternoon on March 6, 2022, I was on the subway from downtown Manhattan to 42nd street, amazed and disturbed at the same time that now I knew this much about the fallout shelters in the city. It’s the 11th day since Russia invaded Ukraine and the talk about a nuclear attack suddenly became more than just an empty threat. Friends started chatting when would be the best time to move out of the city (again!), or at least prepare an emergency kit including water, snacks, a flashlight, passport and a phone charger. I also got a light backpack carrier for my cat Xiaomi.

It is the third spring since the pandemic started in 2020. I want so much to feel an innocent spring, peaceful with lives sprouting, blooming and being born, perhaps with only a touch of melancholy as in Spring Morning. I just want to wake up to a spring morning pregnant with rain, semiconsciously in between a dream and the reality. The sound of the wind and rain during the night may be still lingering. But is that real or in a dream? The birds - I can’t decide whether I shall be annoyed at them or welcome their morning chirps – those frivolous beings, to what extend are they responsible for bringing down the flowers?

And the flowers. In the months of this March and April, they are blooming, like every spring. In New York, they start to decorate the trees in the streets, parks, outside of the buildings. The nature, with all the burdens and tragedies, still doesn’t disappoint us, and other beings, to bring flowers back to the season.

But we humans fail to deliver an innocent spring. Every morning, I wake up to news that bodies are found left in devastated cities of Ukraine after ruthless attacks by the Russian army; that  residents in Shanghai, the richest city in China with a population of 25 million, are crying out as facing unusual anxiety, stress, and deaths since its shut down on March 28 due to the Chinese government’s zero tolerance policy of Covid19; that a 62-year-old man opened fire randomly on a crowded N train in New York during morning peak hours, leaving 30 people wounded, blood shed on the platform of 36 Avenue in Brooklyn, and horror to millions who have no choice but continue riding the subways the next day……perhaps exactly because of these particular failures this spring, one may understand the weight of the word, responsibility, for conditions to keep a simple flower bloom, to live a simple life without fear of imminent death, and to read Spring Morning as a poem simply about birds and flowers, not thinking of lives lost in this spring when picturing the falling petals. 

April 15, 2022

Astoria, New York

Selected Poems and Personal Notes: for January and Febuary

by Shenzhan/申展

In the winter of 2021, I was desperately looking for something to get lost into. This time I find myself rediscover the power of written languages through poetry.

And here are my selections and notes.

次北固山下 A Mooring Under North Fort Hill

王灣 Wang Wan（693–751）

客路青山外，Under blue mountains we wound our way,

行舟綠水前。My boat and I, along green water;

潮平兩岸闊，Until the banks at low tide widened,

風正一帆懸。With no wind stirring my lone sail.

海日生殘夜，...Night now yields to a sea of sun,

江春入舊年。And the old year melts in freshets.

鄉書何處達，At last I can send my messengers –

歸雁洛陽邊。Wild geese, homing to Loyang.

 (Translated by Witter Bynner , 1881 – 1968)

The Year

Ella Wheeler Wilcox (1850 – 1919)

What can be said in New Year rhymes, 

That’s not been said a thousand times? 

The new years come, the old years go, 

We know we dream, we dream we know. 

We rise up laughing with the light, 

We lie down weeping with the night. 

We hug the world until it stings, 

We curse it then and sigh for wings. 

We live, we love, we woo, we wed, 

We wreathe our prides, we sheet our dead. 

We laugh, we weep, we hope, we fear, 

And that’s the burden of a year.

A Personal Note for January/February

We hug the world until it stings.

Thank you, Ella.

The beginning of the year is the best time to reset. It is still deep in winter; the world is bleak, cold and lifeless. And yet, we tell ourselves to rise from the darkness of the winter, to be hopeful, and get ready to hug this world once again.

We’ve been through the past year, and we can do it again. Only that we can do it better, because we have one more year under our human experiences. And of course, we forget, get carried away by the same old fear, and find ourselves in the same agony at some point, just like the year before, and the year before last year... But the beginning of a year, unfailingly gives us hope, exactly as we choose to believe.

Just ask any person in the Times Square on New Year’s Eve, waiting for the Big Apple to drop in freezing coldness, hugging each other like penguins huddling to fence against the gusty snow storm in the South Pole, only to see the giant neon billboards above their heads and others flashing commercials on things to buy, places to visit, or Broadway shows to watch, while keeping casual conversations with the unfortunate people stuck next to them as the waiting hours are long, miserable, and exhausting……all of the effort for the hope in one’s heart for the new year. Unbelievable!

Probably no one will talk about the despair, the sadness and the helplessness one may feel when facing the irreversibly passing of time. For whatever time we as a tiny being have in this vast universe, there is one less year left. In today’s fast-paced, forward-looking and superficially cheering materialized culture, we turn a blind eye on our deepest fear: our time is limited.

But who wants to dive too deep into it? In the end, it’s an act of balance – we admit the passing of time yet keep being hopeful for the new year.

Wang Wan, a Tang Dynasty poet from more than a thousand years ago in  China, captured the balance so well in “A Mooring Under North Fort Hill” that he made his name for this very poem at a time when so many great poets were shining like the brightest stars in the universe of Chinese classical poetry.  By 18th Century, a complete anthology of Tang poetry collected close to 50,000 poems by over 2,200 poets, how could one mark his own literary existence that is to be remembered after more than one thousand years with one single poem?  

I couldn’t find a better translation of this poem than Bynner’s, knowing the English version fails to unveil its greatness. Take the two most-known lines among Chinese today as an example:

海日生殘夜，...Night now yields to a sea of sun,

江春入舊年。And the old year melts in freshets.

As a pentasyllabic regulated verse (五言律诗), these two lines are perfectly paralleled: not only each line consists of 5 characters, the paralleling characters also share exactly the same part of speech, opposite pitch, and carry meanings complimentary to each other. “海” （ ocean）with a falling tone (hǎi)  in the first line is paired with “江” ( river) with a rising tone “jiāng”. Both characters, with radicals (the three dots on the left-hand side) mean something related to water, the most fundamental element of life. “日”（sun）with a falling tone “rì” following “海” corresponds “春” (chūn, spring) with a rising tone. In spring, the sun shines with warmth, temperature rises and life comes back to earth. While “日” and “春” reinforce each other by meaning, the written characters visually display such reinforcement too: look carefully, there is literally a “日“ component as part of the character “春” ! The third character in the first line, “生” (shēng, to be born) is magic. Followed by “殘夜” （cán yè, the lingering darkness of the night）, it reads as if the bright sun is conceived and born into the ocean by the darkness. The paralleling characters in the second line, “入舊年”（rù jiù nián, entering  the old year), in perfect juxtaposition of “生殘夜” in that “入” (to enter, to go back in), with a falling tone, also directionally opposite to that of “生”（ born out), and “舊” (old) is similar to “殘” (incomplete, lingering, residual) as both refere to something worn out with time passing and hence less desirable, associated to feelings of sorrow, melancholy, even despair. The last character in both lines, “夜” (night) and “年” (year) are related to time. Chinese New Year’s Eve is literally 年夜.

All characters pieced together, besides describing the scene that the night yields to the new sun, and the old year gives way to the new and the fresh, Wang Wan expresses his own feelings as a human being at the crossing hour of the old and the new year, the most sensitive time one could feel of the time passing as non-stoppable water. Helpless as it is, it is also where new life comes from: water is, by all means, naturing and cultivating. There is a lingering feeling of melancholy about the old and darkness, and yet, there is more to hope for than to feel sad about.

All that is lost in translation.

And yet, it is those who rise from such complex feelings about the old and the new, can say to the new year:

We hug the world until it stings.

Thank you, Wang Wan and Ella.

Astoria, New York

2/14/2022

Notes on A Literati Salon in New York: Along the Hudson River, December 2021

by Shenzhan/申展

A literati salon has a long tradition in China. I tend to also associate a Chinese literati salon with the ancient Greek symposium, an intellectual gathering with music and wine, which sounds so much more interesting than its contemporary version.

The original story of the Chinese literati salon started in the spring of 353 A.D., when Wang Xizhi (王羲之）, the greatest calligrapher, gathered a group of his friends, i.e., cultural and social elites including notable scholars, artists, officials, etc. at the Orchid Pavilion, a place surrounded by nature, along a winding stream. At the gathering, the men (yes, all of them were men) were playing a game - cups with wine were placed in the stream and floated among the guests who were sitting along the stream. Whoever picked up the wine had to come up with a poem. In the end, there were over 20 poems written. Wang Xizhi, on the spot, wrote the Preface to the Orchid Pavilion (《兰亭集序》） in calligraphy for the poem collection. Today, almost no one remembers the poems, but everyone with the slightest knowledge of Chinese calligraphy would know about the Preface as the most celebrated calligraphy piece in China’s history. The gathering, known as the Orchid Pavilion Gathering, became the very origin of Chinese literati salon, also called Elegant Gathering (雅集)，which typically involves a variety of elegant art forms including calligraphy, brush painting, poetry, possibly music, and definitely wine. The gathering itself has been reimagined and represented in calligraphy, brush paintings, poems, etc. for over 1,700 years afterwards. Many tried to replicate such a gathering, even in the year of 2021 in New York.

The circumstance was quite unusual on Friday, December 17, 2021, in New York. It was the second winter of the covid19 pandemic. After a few months of slight relief when many people felt to see the end of the tunnel after two shots of vaccinations, a new variant, Omicron, was at the verge of sweeping through the city, U.S. and the world. The gathering, named China Institute Literati Salon: Along the Hudson River, was planned weeks ago without the slightest knowledge of omicron, nor the prediction of what it was to become. Over 50 guests were expected to show up.

At 6: 00 pm, people, either clueless of the omicron, or voluntarily taking the risk regardless, started coming to the large multifunction hall on the 2nd floor of China Institute in lower Manhattan. The hall was set up with desks six feet apart with calligraphy paper, ink and brushes for two, surrounding in the center an “L” shape stage where 3 musicians were playing pipa, flute and percussion. A calligrapher was sitting across from the stage writing calligraphy. A minimalist podium was placed in between the stage and the calligraphy desk. The podium was for me. 

As the hostess and creator of the program, I was pleased to see things unfolding as planned: artists were in place (they have been, in fact, rehearsing since the morning); guests were walking around and finding their places to settle down; technology seemed to work so far. The hall, with over 20 desks, was getting full. One desk suddenly collapsed, ink splashed on the floor, and a guest’s winter jacket. Thank GOD my colleagues were there to reset everything quickly while waving to me, “Go start the program! “And the tinted winter jacket was black, the same color as the ink!

The program officially started at 6: 30pm. I greeted the guests and started the program by read-aloud 江雪 (River Snow), the first of three selected classical Chinese poems on the theme of winter for the evening. River Snow is a pentasyllabic quatrain by Liu Zongyuan (柳宗元）, a Tang Dynasty（618 - 907） poet whose interest in Buddhism was pretty obvious in this 20-character poem about a lone old fisherman fishing in the middle of the icy river on a snow day. After reading the poem in Chinese, I turned to the calligrapher, whose writing was projected on three big screens so people could see from every angle, asking her to write the character “寒“ （cold) in three calligraphy styles: the regular, the seal and the running style, all of which were established during Eastern Han Dynasty (25 - 220 A.D.) The regular style is most commonly used today; the seal style, while is completely archaic and only appears in calligraphy as an art today, is quite useful in deciphering the roots of Chinese characters. Known as pictographic, Chinese characters often keep more meaningful parts in the seal style that lead to better understanding the etymology of the character. For example, 寒 in seal style shows a curved roof on the top, with layers of straw underneath and a man in profile curled up in between. At the bottom of the straw, two sharp lines further indicate the frozen water, another sign for coldness. After the explanation of the etymology of 寒，the calligrapher continued with writing the poem River Snow in its entirety, while the musicians joined by playing Cold River and Remnants of Snow 寒江残雪, a mellow and quiet piece that connotes the poem itself. 

The second poem, 问刘十九 （A Question Addressed to Liu Shijiu) continued with the winter theme but is quite different. The author, another Tang poet, Bai Juyi 白居易, known to deliberately avoid writing sophisticated poems so that they were accessible even to illiterate farmers, in this poem was capturing a moment thinking of inviting a dear friend over for a cup of newly brewed wine as the snow is approaching. The much warmer poem was accompanied by a much lighter and happier Suite of White Snow 白雪组曲. A closer look at the etymology of the character 雪 reveals that the ancient creators were thinking of snow as “solid rain” that could be swept up by a bamboo broom from the ground. 

The last poem, 白梅 by a 14th Century poet Wang Mian 王冕, had a very problematic title in English, The White Mume Blossoms. Translated by the renowned Chinese translator Yuanchong Xu 许渊冲, it is only understood by very few English speakers of the word “mume”. Wikipedia refuses to explain “mume” by itself, instead says “prunus mume” is essentially “winter plums in East Asia”. I was going to take the liberty to change the title to “The White Plum Blossoms” as “plum” would be better understood. After all, who knows “mume”, which seems like a typo! However, eventually I agree with Mr. Xu and kept the original English title: plums would be a very different flower, blooming in spring and having plums as fruits, not at all the kind of winter plums in this poem, only blossoming in cold weather, white or red, never glorious with flowers nor fruits, yet with amazingly refreshing and pleasant fragrance. As they thrive during a time when all other flowers in the world are hiding from the coldness, such quality is especially appreciated in Chinese culture as it symbolizes the resilience and perseverance under uniquely challenging circumstances. For the poet Wang Mian, who’s in fact better known as a painter, the winter plum blossoms resemble him as a Han scholar/artist under the ruling of the Mongols, a non-Han nomadic group taking over China and practically the entire continent of Asia in the 13th to 14th Century. He never sought to serve in the court of the Mongols, nor the Ming court. Nevertheless, the poem reading was met with a classical piece, Searching Plum Blossoms in Snow 踏雪寻梅, which in the end turned into Jingle Bell, played on Pipa accompanied by flute. 

The guests were given the choice of following the calligrapher to write in brush themselves, or just sitting back and enjoying themselves. Wine and tea were carefully served outside of the room. People had to get up with their masks on to fetch the drinks themselves. It would be too hard to imagine a dry literati salon.

It seemed everyone had a really good time, including the musicians, the calligrapher, my colleagues and myself, and of course, the guests. I didn’t hear anyone tested positive with covid afterwards. But I did get in line for 3 and half hours myself to get tested the following Sunday. It was negative.

​It certainly would be the last in-person program for a while. 

Appendix:

China Institute Literati Salon: Along the Hudson River

The Program

6 :00 – 6: 30 pm

FLOATING STATIONS: Pipa, calligraphy and classical poems

no drinks please; masks on all time

6: 30 – 7: 15 pm

INTERACTIVE IMMERSIVE PROGRAM

Session I

Poetry Read-aloud: River Snow 江雪  

Music: Cold River and Remnants of Snow 寒江残雪

Calligraphy: 寒

Session II

Poetry Read-aloud:  A Question to Liu Shijiu 问刘十九

Music: A Suite of White Snow 白雪组曲

Calligraphy: 雪

Session III

Poetry Read-aloud: The White Mume Blossom 白梅 

Music: Searching Plum Blossoms in Snow 踏雪寻梅

Calligraphy: 梅

7: 15 – 7: 30 pm

Q & A; Free exploration

Music performance: Yi Zhou(周懿), Yiming Miao (缪宜民), Rex Benincasa

Calligraphy: Weini Zhao (赵娓妮)

Poetry read-aloud: Shenzhan Liao (廖申展)

Three Poems:

Selected Poems and Personal Notes: for December

by Shenzhan/申展

In the winter of 2021, I am looking for something to get lost into, desperately. This time I find myself rediscover the power of written languages through poetry.

And here are my selections and notes.

Two Poems for December

江 雪 River Snow

By 柳宗元 Liu Zongyuan （773 – 819）

千山鳥飛絕   A thousand mountains, no sign of birds in flight;

萬徑人蹤滅   Ten thousand paths, no trace of human tracks.

孤舟蓑笠翁   A lone boat, an old man in straw cape and hat,

獨釣寒江雪   Fishing snow, in the icy cold river alone.

(Translation adapted from William H. Nienhauser, Jr. etc.)

* * *

In the Bleak Midwinter                                                                                                             

By Christina Rossetti (1830 – 1894)

In the bleak midwinter, frosty wind made moan,

Earth stood hard as iron, water like a stone;

Snow had fallen, snow on snow, snow on snow,

In the bleak midwinter, long ago.

Our God, Heaven cannot hold Him, nor earth sustain;

Heaven and earth shall flee away when He comes to reign.

In the bleak midwinter a stable place sufficed

The Lord God Almighty, Jesus Christ.

Enough for Him, whom cherubim, worship night and day,

Breastful of milk, and a mangerful of hay;

Enough for Him, whom angels fall before,

The ox and ass and camel which adore.

Angels and archangels may have gathered there,

Cherubim and seraphim thronged the air;

But His mother only, in her maiden bliss,

Worshipped the beloved with a kiss.

What can I give Him, poor as I am?

If I were a shepherd, I would bring a lamb;

If I were a Wise Man, I would do my part;

Yet what I can I give Him: give my heart.

 * * *

A Personal Note for December

What’s on the fisherman’s mind when he is all out there in the cold and alone?

I cried a lot in the winter of 2021. It is the second winter since the beginning of the pandemic. A new covid variant put the world on edge again. Trees outside of my new studio in New York are shedding their beautiful red and golden leaves, once again turning lifeless. Mom passed away in July. The coldest days of the year are yet to come.

Sitting in front of my computer screen with “River Snow” on, all I can think of is the winter of 1996, when I went home from college in Beijing for the Chinese New Year. Right after I got home, Mom took me out for a walk and told me that Dad had passed away a couple of months ago due to heart attack. That year, instead of families and relatives gathering together like the past when Dad was around, it was just Mom and me. I was craving for spicy hotpot after being in Beijing for many months without authentic Sichuan food. Mom prepared hotpot for the two of us. In the small apartment where we lived as a family, she set up a small square table, where a boiling hotpot soup was sitting in the middle, surrounded by raw vegetables, meat, etc. She made the spiciest sauce I ever had! I don’t remember much of the meat and vegetables from that dinner, but it was very spicy. The two of us celebrated the Chinese New Year. The year after she would have met my stepfather and a few years later I would have left for the U.S. That winter, we had only each other in the entire world. But I didn’t feel I was short of anything.

I wonder, what I would be thinking of if I were out in the snow on a river. Perhaps the icy cold water will resonate my cry, like the silence in the studio. Perhaps the absolute quietness of the falling snow would calm the most aching heart. I could be there thinking of nothing, just in unity with the nature, emotionless and compassionate at the same time.

When I studied “River Snow” in elementary school in China, I was taught that this poem is famous because it captures the desolate scene and the loneliness, which to the heart of a teenager are all the unwanted and undesired. Thirty years have passed; it is an ideal world now.

As a comparison, “In the Bleak Midwinter” begins with such simplicity and beautiful rhyme that I feel a certain degree of similarity to “River Snow”. However, whereas Liu Zongyuan leaves the human quest largely unanswered after describing the river, the snow, the boat and the fisherman, Christina Rossetti, one of the greatest female poets in the English world in the 19th century, turns to the Lord in the bleak midwinter.

Astoria, New York

11/28/2021

Appendix: Original translation of “River Snow” by William H. Nienhauser, Jr.

A thousand mountains, no sign of birds in flight;
Ten thousand paths, no trace of human tracks.
In a lone boat, an old man in rain hat and straw raincoat,
Fishing alone, in the cold river snow.

关于爱

作者：申展

“爱”最初的形态，申展，2021年5月30日

关于爱，似乎总有千言万语, 待到下笔，忽而了然于胸，忽而四顾茫然，不知从何写起。

若追溯“爱”字的源头，案头一套许慎的《说文解字》，让这个过程从一开始便扑朔迷离。许慎对“爱”是这样解释的：

“爱，行儿。从夊（suī )，㤅( ài ）声。”

许慎解释，“爱”的本意是“行走的样子”。所以他把“爱”字放在“夊”部。“夊”从象形的脚趾演化而来，所以“夊”部的字，都跟行走有关。许慎对“夊”的解释是：“行迟曳夊夊，象人两胫有所躧（xǐ ）”——拖着没有后跟的鞋，摇摇摆摆慢慢走。（—— 申展）

这个解释，跟我们现在理解的“爱”很不一样。后世的学者，对许慎的说法也多有诟病。但我想他比我距离“爱”的本源，还是近了将近两千年，就不要妄自诽议。而且晋陶渊明“暧暧远人村，依依墟里烟。”的句子不知为何突然浮现，似乎“爱”这个字，不论是读音，还是字形，跟摇摇摆摆、模糊而暧昧的感觉，的确很有些关系。

许慎说，“爱”，读作“㤅”。“㤅”字，许慎归入“心”部，对其解释是：

“㤅，仁惠。从心，旡（jì ）声。”

这个现在已经不用的“㤅”字， 跟我们现在所理解的“爱”，意义比较一致了。若是比较“爱”与“㤅”在《说文解字》里的字形，也能看出它们的联系：

“爱”比“㤅”， 就多了左下角的脚趾。

清代的段玉裁在《说文解字注》中对“爱”和“㤅” 的关系，说得比较清楚：

“行皃也。心部曰：㤅，惠也。今字假爱爲㤅，而㤅廢矣。”

原来表示仁惠之意的“㤅”字，慢慢被同音的“爱”字替代，逐渐不再被使用。而“爱”字的涵义，也在不断的演变。《康熙字典》关于“爱”的词条写道：

“同㤅，仁之发也，从心，旡声。又亲也，恩也，惠也，怜也，宠也，好乐也，吝惜也，慕也，隐也。”

如果许慎对“爱”字摇摆行走之本意解释准确，后世将其“通感”为描述仁心所发各种类比可指，又隐含难述的情感，或许也不无道理吧。

王力先生在《王力古汉语字典》中对“爱”的解释，包含了三个层次：1.喜爱，爱好；2.吝啬；3.通“僾，薆”，隐蔽貌。

追根溯源到此，我也有些释然：“爱”字本身就指代那种说不清道不明的感觉啊！我想下笔写“爱”，本来就是痴念妄想吧！

㤅愛爱……

最早有“爱”字出现的文献，在战国时期。

1978年出土于河北省平山县的“中山王铜方壶”四壁铭文，记载了实力仅次于战国七雄的“千乘之国”中山国（公元前414年—前296年）伐燕得胜的历史，也为最早的“爱”字，提供了文本依据：

中山王刻铭铜方壶，战国，河北博物院

图片来源：https://www.sohu.com/a/439612226_537747

铭文拓印。倒数第二排右起第三字为金文“爱”

图片来源：https://www.sohu.com/a/439612226_537747

金文“㤅”字（申展手书）

铭文曰：“故辞礼敬则贤人至，愿爱深则贤人亲，作敛中则庶民附。”

当然，这并非是战国时期唯一的古”㤅“字。赵瑾昀在“知乎”上发表的《「愛」是如何简化为「爱」的？正说「愛」的前世今生》一文中提供了战国时期东方六国（与西方的”秦国“相对）古”㤅”字的不同形态：

图片来源：https://zhuanlan.zhihu.com/p/21356256

而在西方的秦国，出现了带“夊”部的古“爱”字。1975年12月在湖北省云梦县睡虎地秦墓中出土的《睡虎地秦简》，对战国晚期和秦始皇时期上至法典，下至日常做了详细记录，其中就出现了

图片来源：https://zhuanlan.zhihu.com/p/21356256

除了上部与古“㤅”字相似之外，下方的“夊”部也非常明显。但这究竟是同一字在不同地域文化当中的不同书写，还是两个意义不同的字——如许慎对于“爱”和“㤅”的分别对待——实在仍缺乏详实的依据理出头绪来。

比较清楚的是，到了西汉早期（约前193年）马王堆汉墓帛书中《老子》甲本中已经以有“夊”部的”愛“取代了无“夊”部的“㤅”， “愛以身为天下”。不论“爱”的本意是否与行走相关，这个字的意义到此已经跟行走相去甚远了。

必须要指出的是，在从“㤅”到“爱”不断演变的过程中，上部表音的“旡”如何逐渐演变为“爫冖”组合，还不甚清楚。“旡”古体为“㒫”(jì ）”， “㱃食气屰不得息曰㒫”， 就是说，“㒫”指吃喝的时候气息不顺，俗称“打嗝儿”。下面加个“心”为 “㤅”, 如果延申为“心中有情感要说”, 也觉得古人造字可爱：看到喜爱之人事，以手抚心，忍不住呼一句“哎~”。“爫”, “覆手曰爪。象形。”；“冖”，“覆也。从一下垂也。”（均出自许慎《说文解字》）二者与原来的“旡”看似没有什么联系，这个变化是如何发生的，目前只能脑补：以手揭开隐藏于心中的情感，曰“愛”。

最近一次“爱”的字形演变，当属二十世纪50年代的繁体字简化运动, “愛”变成了“爱”，中间的 “心”变成了“一”。拿汉字说故事的人，常常喜欢以此为例，说明简化字一不小心减掉了汉字中很重要的表意成分：没有“心”的爱，哪里是真爱呢？故事可以这么讲，但“爱”这个写法的出现，却可以推到晋代。书法大家王羲之一挥毫，也一不小心就让无“心”之“爱”流传了一千多年。即使楷体的“爱”字，也似乎可以追溯到元抄本的《京本通俗小说》。

李乐毅在1999年出版的《简化字源》中说得很清楚：

图片来源：https://zhuanlan.zhihu.com/p/21356256

如果非要看“字”说故事，简写的“爱”字，上有“手”，下有“足”，把“友”也包括在内，表明如手足一样的友爱之情，也算是简化字比较成功的案例吧，况且还有历史上一众名士先例。只是少了心中有话，不得不说的隐忍与难耐——但，这点天真，早在一千多年以前就已经丢掉啦！

爱的文字

虽然 “爱” 字目前的考古学依据出自战国，但关于“爱”的文字早已有之，而且显然跟“打嗝儿”或“摇曳地行走”，意义都相去甚远。

道尽心中喜欢，欲说还休的，可追溯到 《诗经 小雅 》中的《隰桑》：“心乎爱矣，遐不谓矣？”这首短短的四言小诗，将桑林边遇到心爱之人的女子婉转雀跃的心情，表达得直白而古雅——或许是四言古体的缘故吧，明明是在直白地说：看见了君子你，高兴得不得了！一句“既见君子，其乐如何”，现在看来，却无尽古雅。全诗抄录如下：

隰桑有阿，其叶有难。

既见君子，其乐如何。

隰桑有阿，其叶有沃。

既见君子，云何不乐。

隰桑有阿，其叶有幽。

既见君子，德音孔胶。

心乎爱矣，遐不谓矣？

中心藏之，何日忘之！

《诗经》是孔子（公元前551-前 479）编撰的，所以这首诗的出现，可以推断在公元前5世纪左右就已经广为流传了，为这个“爱”的用法，得以保留一个明证。

《道德经》的成书，应该在《诗经》之前。《道德经》第十三章提到：“故贵以身为天下，若可寄天下；爱以身为天下，若可托天下。”很明显，这里的“爱”与中山王方壶铭文中的“愿爱深则贤人至”更接近一些，不是捧着心窝子，羞羞答答地“哎”一声。《论语》中孔子及其弟子的言论也多次提到“爱”，不过多是君民之爱，君子之爱，父母之爱以及人性之博爱：

“道千乘之国，敬事而信，节用而爱人，使民以时。”（《论语 学而篇》）

“弟子入则孝，出则弟，谨而信，泛爱众，而亲仁。行有余力，则以学文。” （《论语 学而篇》）

“君子学道则爱人；小人学道则易使也。” （《论语 阳货篇》）

“予也有三年之爱于其父母乎？（《论语 阳货篇》）

北宋理学家周敦颐一篇《爱莲说》，可算是把孔子的“爱”学进一步发扬了。“予独爱莲之出淤泥而不染”，——顺便把菊花和牡丹，特别是牡丹，得罪一下！

无可置疑的是，“爱”的确是表意丰富的一个字，可以让理学家满篇言“爱”而不肉麻，也成为悲愤如屈原者的绝唱：“世溷浊莫吾知，人心不可谓兮。知死不可让，愿勿爱兮。” （《九章 怀沙》）

后记

这个五月末的长周末，纽约天气意外的湿冷，读到Raymond Williams1976年出版的“Keywords: A Vocabulary of Culture and Society”，觉得很受启发：每一个人所处的任何时代，总有些字词是特别耳热的。然而不论什么字词，什么起源，却都被不同的时代，赋予了特定的含义。Williams收录了331个跟culture 和society相关的词。不过里面没有收录“love”。从中国带回的《说文解字》一套四卷，搁在案头，似乎在等待我。

爱，这是一个在我的时代被屡屡提及的字，不论是在中国还是美国。这也是一个在特殊的一年于我特别的字，我想找到它。

去年3月开始在纽约肆虐的新冠没有挡住我回家的脚步。2021年2月，母亲病危，我从纽约回到荣昌家中，每日在医院陪母亲两个多月，于5月14日又回到了纽约。

“我们终将走入不同的时间。”我说。

“女儿，妈妈很爱你，很舍不得，可是老天只给我们这么多时间。”母亲说。那是纽约深夜2点过，微信视频。

我只能以手捧心，如骨鲠在喉——那就是爱，最初的样子吧。

纽约Astoria

2021年5月30日

参考资料：

1. Raymond Williams, Keywords: A Vocabulary of Culture and Society, 2nd edition, Oxford University Press, 1985

2. 汤可敬 撰《说文解字今释》，上海古籍出版社，2018

3. 战国篆书《中山王方壶》超清铭文：https://www.sohu.com/a/439612226_537747

4. 赵瑾昀，「愛」是如何简化为「爱」的？正说「愛」的前世今生　https://zhuanlan.zhihu.com/p/21356256

5. 爱（汉语汉字）_百度百科 (baidu.com）

6. 李乐毅， 《简化字源》，华语教学出版社，1999

A Talk of Shadow Figures 皮影

by Shenzhan/申展

White Snake, Pauline Benton’s shadow figures collection

To You Who Are Gay:

     Do not think us too grave and erudite

     We bear the burden of China’s past.

     We have lived through the depth of her

     suffering from which have flowered the greatest

     heights of her culture.

To You Who Are Serious:

     Do not think us too light and frivolous.

     For many centuries, we have brought Joy and

     Laughter to troubled monarchs, weary laborers,

     and fragile, lonely ladies in the dim seclusion

     of their courtyards.

To You Who Are Wise:

     Do not think us too naive and simple.

     We make no claims to colossal and 

     gigantic glories. We are the creations

     of men who have carved and molded us with

     their own hands and endowed us with life from

     the breath of their own souls.

Thus,

     We ask you ALL to laugh as we laugh,

     Weep as we weep, love as we love, and live

     with us our simple and homilies as

     we recreate them for you in our Show World.

The Shadow Actors

Written in 1940 by Pauline Benton, an American shadow player who studied from Lee Tuo-ch’en (李脱尘), the leading shadow player before WWII, the poem, “Greeting”, is from her book, “The Red Gate Players: Introduce the Actors and Plays of the Chinese Shadow Theatre”, beautifully capturing her love of “the Shadow World”, sentimentally and romantically. Given the current state of this almost extinct theatre art, it reads melancholy as well.  

Inside cover of “the Red Gate Players” by Pauline Benton, 1940

The world, recreated by light and shadow, and brought to life by the shadow players, has long gone. And the art itself is almost forgotten in this busy noisy world overwhelmed by multimedia.

Perhaps not yet. At least, on a sunny early spring Saturday in New York, there were still a group of people, gathering at China Institute for a talk on shadow figures, by Prof. Li Mingjie (李明洁), an anthropologist from the Folklore Institute of East China Normal University. To shadow players like Pauline Benton, and Jo Humphrey, who inherited the shadow figures Benton had custom-made in China, and passed the torch to Ms. Feng Guangyu, currently running Chinese Theatre Works in New York that continues to produce shadow plays and workshops, Li has one main question:

Why are you interested in the shadow plays? 

Because it’s a rich culture created by humans. It’s part of the world civilizations. You look at them, and you are led into the heart and soul of the people who created them. If no one continues it, those worlds and people will disappear, which would be a loss of the world. They said.

Shadow figures and shadow plays, evidently was already invented in China as early as Western Han Dynasty, when Emperor Wu (156 - 87 B.C.) was shown a shadow figure of Lady Wang,  one of his favorite concubines who he terribly missed after she had passed away. While very popular between the 8th and 12th centuries during the Tang and Song Dynasties, they are hardly viewed to be relevant any more in contemporary China. Perhaps very few people would care nowadays. Perhaps as it becomes so irrelevant,  it doesn’t hold the same kind of meaning in order to survive . But certainly it took people's heart before. People, like Benton or Humphrey, may not be born into the Chinese culture but nevertheless had a deep appreciation of it. Perhaps there is no point mourning for the decline, or the eventual extinction of certain arts at all. Civilizations are always like this. A culture has its own life cycle. One fades into the past when a new world with completely different people gradually, but surely replaces the old world. By luck there can be traces left, so that the new people will have something to build upon, for the new world at a different time. 

And hopefully it will be a better one.

Shadow figures from Chinese Theatre Work’s production of “Monkey versus the Mountain of Fire”, created for the Chicago Field Museum in 2015 by Stephen Kaplin, copied from original figures in the Benton Collection. Currently on view at China Institute until February 29, 2020.

2-24-2020 8:52 pm

Astoria, New York 

2020过鼠年

年画”莲年有余“，华东师范大学民俗学李明洁教授收藏

“过了腊八就是年。”民俗这样说。等我想起来的时候，腊八节竟然已经过了。

既然年已经悄然到来，把过去两年的笔记稍微整理了一下，为今年过年做个参考吧。

1月2日：腊八节，辞旧迎新开始。民俗为喝腊八粥，腊八粥与佛教的传播相关，相传用于纪念佛祖得到成佛。腊八粥的记载早在宋代便有，其食材根据时代和地点有异，民间多用有吉祥意义的食材，例如：

桂圆：富贵团圆

百合：百事和睦

红枣、花生：早生贵子

莲子心：恩爱连心

核桃：和和美美

桔脯、栗子：大吉大利

1月17日：腊月二十三，恭送灶神。改岁之际祭送包括灶神在内的各种神回归天上，备茶果，烧纸钱，以求一年当中在家中负责记录的灶神上天美言。

1月18日：扫尘。清洁家室，除污秽，清洁以迎新年诸神。

1月20日：沐浴祛秽，剃（年）头理发。

1月24日：大年三十, 立春，吃年夜饭，发压岁钱，守岁。这是人神共进的晚餐，各位先人用过年夜饭之后才能享用。年夜饭的食材充满象征，例如：

鱼：年年有余 （南方）

丸子：团团圆圆 （南方）

韭菜：音“久”，年寿长久。诗经记载“献羔祭韭”；新春尝新之物（闽南）

豆腐：音“斗富”， 丰裕富足 （闽南）

柑桔：吉祥如意

甘蔗：节节甘甜，步步高升

年糕：南方

饺子：馄饨，交子（时间变化的象征：更岁交子）

1月25日：正月初一, 元日。汉武帝颁布的《太初历》中就规定了夏历正月初一为新年。传统活动包括放爆竹，贴桃符、春联、门神，祭祀天地祖先，拜年。

如果在家乡荣昌，可以去小镇附近的锣罐山寺庙上香，到公墓拜祭逝去的亲人；晚上跟父亲家的亲戚聚餐，给小辈们准备红包。

1月26日：初二，出嫁女子回娘家的日子。小孩子可以跟父母回外公外婆家，当然有很多好吃的，还有红包。

1月27日：初三，拜访几个好朋友，带上自家熏的香肠，再捎上一碗自家做的叶儿粑：艾粑是甜的，把糯米跟艾草混在一起；猪儿粑肥肥白白的，外面是糯米，里面包了自家制的馅儿：猪肉末、熏豆干与酸菜末按照适当的比例混合在一起。香肠和叶儿粑从进入腊月就要开始准备了。

1月28日：初四，迎接灶神。初四这天，灶神就从天宫回来了。家庭聚会完毕，安安心心拜拜灶神。

1月29日：初五，财神回归，市集开放。做生意的要特别迎接财神。

1月30日：初六，开市以后逛街。新年伊始，街市应当特别热闹。故乡小镇这十几年来虽然变化巨大，热闹集市仍然集中在小镇两条老街，以穿城而过的护城河为中心。要是天气晴好，阳光和煦，在熙熙攘攘的街道集市上随意逛逛，下午坐在河边场坝喝喝茶，便是最好的。

1月31日：初七，人日。买七种时令新鲜蔬菜，配条鱼，全家再聚一次。

2月1日：初八，祭星。白天可以学习做“金灯”， 等晚上星斗出齐之后，在门槛、灶台、锅台及案头各放一盏，以祛除不祥。之后全家一起吃元宵。这天也可以放生。

2月2日：初九，祭天。这天是玉皇大帝的生辰。这个中国道家传说中天界最高的神选择初九为生日，可能因为九是数字当中最大的吧？这天好像除了祭天，也没有什么特别的活动。

2月3日：初十，各地风俗不一，最喜的是“老鼠嫁女”。这天在家可以剪“老鼠嫁女” 的窗花，故事可爱，老少咸宜，据说古时为了不惊扰老鼠嫁女，免点灯，所以全家晚上漆黑围坐吃炒豆子——看来古人虽颇有幽默感，的确以鼠为患。这一节倒是可以免掉！

⋯⋯（中间略去数日——要是有什么神照顾不周，就多有得罪啦！）

2月8日：十五，元宵节， 要是镇上有灯会，晚上可跟朋友约了去看灯、猜灯谜。白天应该有舞龙灯罢？

琵琶的故事: 纽约说

作者：Shenzhan Liao /申展

感谢周懿女士对该文的贡献。

封面照片：明代琵琶（1368-1644）， 纽约大都会博物馆

该文有英文版 The Origin of Pipa: Told in New York

茶话中国音乐：琵琶，Zhou Yi 周懿/Shenzhan 申展，2019年9月13日，纽约华美协进社

2019年9月13日晚，是中国传统的中秋之夜，团聚的日子：一家人就着月饼、点心，或许还有音乐的陪伴，仰望明月，闲坐聊天。在曼哈顿的华美协进社，一位纽约的中国音乐家周懿，捧着一个梨形的四弦乐器，问一屋子的观众：“你们知道这个乐器叫什么吗？”

大家都笑了。周懿身后的屏幕赫然写着：

“Pipa 琵琶”

每个人当然都答对了。

琵琶，英文作为Chinese lute的一种，号称有两千多年的历史，一直让世人惊艳。根据纽约大都会博物馆的Heilbrunn艺术编年史，琵琶在北魏时期（386-534）从西方和中亚传至中国，到了唐朝（618-906）——中国古代最据国际性的时代，兼容并包多种多样的世界文化——得以流行起来。

琵琶的音色优美而且极富表现力，且深深植根于中国文化。关于琵琶流传最广的故事正好也跟中国最强盛的两个朝代——汉朝和唐朝——相关。汉元帝（公元前48-33）著名的妃子，中国四大美人之一的王昭君，被汉元帝以和亲为由嫁给匈奴单于，以保证汉王朝与匈奴帝国相安无事。王昭君常常手捧琵琶出现在中国绘画中，因为人们普遍认为琵琶可以抚慰她的思乡之情（同时也体现“昭君和亲”在文化传递上的意义吧！）

唐朝是琵琶空前流行的时代。唐朝著名诗人白居易（772-846）的《琵琶行》对琵琶做了详细而生动地描述：

大弦嘈嘈如急雨，

小弦切切如私语。

嘈嘈切切错杂弹， 

大珠小珠落玉盘。

间关莺语花底滑，

幽咽泉流冰下难。 

冰泉冷涩弦凝绝，

凝绝不通声暂歇。 

别有幽愁暗恨生，

此时无声胜有声。

银瓶乍破水浆迸，

铁骑突出刀枪鸣。

曲终收拨当心画，

四弦一声如裂帛。

(《琵琶行》节选）

但是，对琵琶的起源稍作深入探究，就会发现它的历史并非那么简单直白。

早在东汉（25-220）末年，琵琶的名字就已经出现在应劭著的《风俗通义》中：

“批把，谨按近世乐家所作，不知谁也，以手批把，因以为名。”

这也许是琵琶早在东汉末年就已经从中亚传至中国的证据。不过，中国的典籍中还记载着一种更早的乐器，被称作“秦琵琶”或者“秦汉子”，源自秦朝（公元前221-203）时期就已经存在的打击乐器“鼗”。

鼗（音tao）

来源: 百度/百科 https://baike.baidu.com/item/%E9%BC%97

(作者注: “鼗”字很少见，虽然看起来很艰涩，不过并不可怕，类似的乐器就是今天的“拨浪鼓”! ) 

把鼗倒置，并鼓上弦，就是秦琵琶——一种圆身直颈的弦乐。东晋时期（266-420）“竹林七贤”之一的阮咸对其进行改造，并且推动它风行一时，后来秦琵琶就干脆以他的名字命名为“阮”。

南朝时期(420 - 589 ）画像砖拓印阮咸（左, 234 - 305) 弹奏阮

现代阮（图）

阮和琵琶是两种截然不同的乐器，也说明琵琶或有它自己的发展史。当代学者通常把琵琶的起源追溯到约公元前一世纪出现的一种叫“Barbat”的波斯乐器，通过丝绸之路传到了中国。许多学者以东汉末年刘熙（约公元200年）的著作为据：

“批把，本出于胡中，马上所鼓也。推手前曰批，引手却曰把。象其鼓时，因以为名也。”（《释名 释乐器》）

现代Barbat（图）

唐朝琵琶梨形曲颈，与Barbat有某种明显地形似。而且，与Barbat一样，早期的琵琶是横着弹的，而且用一个拔子弹拨。直到15世纪的明代，琵琶才改为直立，并用手指戴了假指甲弹奏。这些技术上的改进让音乐家们可以更得心应手地用琵琶弹奏更复杂的曲子。

女乐伶坐像，唐代 (618 - 906), 纽约大都会博物馆

对于琵琶来历和称谓，我自己形成了两个理论。一种理论是在Barbat传到中国之前，秦琵琶已经出现，但后来被改名为阮，所以，中国本土发明的名字”琵琶“，就被借用来称呼舶来的波斯乐器。久而久之，该乐器不仅在中国生根，而且成为最有代表性的传统乐器之一。

另一种理论是，琵琶本来就是发明给起源于Barbat并传至中国的乐器，——中国东汉末年的记录表明其传入年代大大早于大都会博物馆资料提到的年代。中国土生土长的乐器“阮”, 被称作“秦琵琶”，因为其与琵琶相似，但名称上又需要与舶来的琵琶有所区别。

不论来源如何，琵琶现在在中国仍然很流行。琵琶，以及中东的乐器Oud和日本的Biwa，在起源上都与Barbat关联。文化的传递和相互影响，穿越时空和地理的界限，在它们的故事中都得以体现。琵琶尽管起源于“异邦”，现在却是实实在在的中国文化的一部分了。

当周懿弹着一支曲颈琵琶，演奏一首根据唐朝敦煌乐谱谱曲的《西江月》时，所有的观众都深浸其中，关于琵琶扑朔迷离的起源似乎变得无足轻重了。说到底，超越语言和时空的音乐，对于纽约的琵琶之夜，再合适不过了。

纽约Astoria

2019年12月21日，冬至

“茶话中国音乐：琵琶”，周懿/廖申展现场录像

附：

西江月. 敦煌曲子词

女伴同寻烟水，今宵江月分明。柁头无力别，一舡横。波面微风暗起。

懒棹乘舡无定止。拜词处处闻声。连天红浪侵秋星，误入蓼花丛里。

The Origin of Pipa, Told in New York

By Shenzhan Liao /申展

Thanks to Ms. Zhou Yi 周懿 for helping with the creation of this essay.

Cover photo credit: Pipa, Ming Dynasty ( 1368-1644), collection of the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.

Chat on Chinese Music: Pipa/茶话中国音乐：琵琶，Zhou Yi 周懿/Shenzhan 申展，September 13, 2019, China Institute

On the evening of September 13, 2019, the night of the Moon Festival in Chinese tradition, families are united under the full autumn moon, with snacks, moon cakes, often accompanied by music. At China Institute in downtown Manhattan, Zhou Yi (周懿), a Chinese musician based in New York City, holding a pear-shaped four-string lute-like instrument, asked a roomful audience, “do you know the name of this instrument?” 

People laughed. The name of the instrument was on the screen behind Zhou Yi. 

“Pipa 琵琶”

Of course everyone answered the question correctly. 

Pipa, as a Chinese lute, is a fascinating musical instrument. With an over 2,000-year acclaimed history, Pipa is believed to be introduced to China from the West and Central Asia and appeared in China during the Northern Wei dynasty (386–534), according to the MET Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History. It later became popular during the Tang Dynasty (618 - 906), one of the most cosmopolitan periods in ancient China when cultures of worldly origins were thriving and integrated into the Tang culture. 

Besides its extremely beautiful and expressive sound, Pipa is deeply embedded in Chinese culture. Some best known stories of Pipa have to do with the two greatest dynasties in China. Wang Zhaojun（王昭君), a court lady of the Emperor Yuan of Han (汉元帝，48 - 33 BC) often appears in Chinese paintings holding a Pipa, as the musical instrument is commonly believed to soothe her longing for homeland when she was married off by the Han emperor to the Chanyu Huhanye of the Xiongnu Empire, for keeping the peace with the northern nomadic neighbor. 

During the Tang Dynasty, Pipa became undoubtedly popular, which is captured vividly in the Song of the Lute (琵琶行), by the famous Tang poet Bai Juyi (白居易，772–846) :

“大弦嘈嘈如急雨，The big strings plang-planged like swift-falling rain;

小弦切切如私语。 the little string went buzz-buzz like secret conversations;

嘈嘈切切错杂弹， plang-plang buzz-buzz mixed and mingled in her playing,

大珠小珠落玉盘。 like big pearls and little pearls falling on a plate of jade,

间关莺语花底滑， or the soft call of warbler voices resonant under the blossoms,

幽咽泉流冰下难。 the hidden sobbing of springs and rills barely moving beneath the ice.

冰泉冷涩弦凝绝， Then the ice springs congealed with cold, the strings seemed to freeze,

凝绝不通声暂歇。 freeze till the notes no longer could pass, the sound for a while cut off.

别有幽愁暗恨生，now something different, hidden anguish, dark reproaches taking form——

此时无声胜有声。at such times the silence was finer than any sound.

银瓶乍破水浆迸，Then a silver vase would abruptly break, water came splashing forth,

铁骑突出刀枪鸣。iron-clad horsemen would suddenly charge, swords and halberds clanging.

曲终收拨当心画，As the piece ended, she swept the plectrum in an arc before her breast,

四弦一声如裂帛。and all four strings made a single sound, like the sound of rending silk.”

(《琵琶行》节选，parts of “the Song of the Lute”, English translation by Burton Watson, from “Classical Chinese Literature: Volume I, from Antiquity to the Tang Dynasty, Minford & Lau Editors, 2000 )

However, a little deeper dig into its origin would make the story of Pipa more complex, if not a complete mystery. 

As early as late Eastern Han Dynasty (25 - 220), at least two hundred years before the Northern Wei Dynasty, the name of Pipa was already mentioned in A General Account of Customs (《风俗通义》）by Ying Shao (应劭，149-202）：

“批把，谨按近世乐家所作，不知谁也，以手批把，因以为名。”

“Pipa, according to musicians nowadays, names unknown, is named as “pi” and “ba” after its hand plucking technique.” (translation by Shenzhan Liao)

This might be the evidence that Pipa from Central Asia was introduced to China around late Eastern Han Dynasty. However, I also discovered that there was an instrument called Qin Pipa (秦琵琶， or 秦汉子) , evolved from 鼗 （tao）, a kind of raddled drum that existed since the Qin Dynasty (221 - 203 B.C.).

An image of Tao (鼗）

Source: 百度/百科 https://baike.baidu.com/item/%E9%BC%97

(BTW: Don’t be scared by the rare character “鼗”。 A similar instrument today is known as “拨浪鼓”! ) 

Placed upside down and stringed, 鼗 evolved into Qin Pipa （秦琵琶）, and gradually renamed as 阮（ruan), a round shaped string instrument with a straight neck, owing to 阮咸(Ruan Xian), one of the Seven Sages of the Bamboo Grove (竹林七贤）during the Eastern Jin Dynasty (266–420). Ruan Xian improved Qin Pipa and made it popular to such an extent that the instrument was named after his name ever since. 

Ruan Xian (阮咸, left, 234 - 305) playing Ruan (阮) in a rubbing of a brick carving from Southern Dynasties (420 - 589 ）

An image of a modern Ruan (阮）

Today Ruan and Pipa are two distinctively different instruments, which suggests Pipa does have its own path. Modern scholars often trace its origin to a Persian instrument “Barbat”, invented around 1st Century BC and introduced to China through the Silk Road. Most scholars draw the conclusion according to a literary record by Liu Xi (刘熙 ) in late Eastern Han Dynasty (about 200 AD), who wrote,

“批把，本出于胡中，马上所鼓也。推手前曰批，引手却曰把。象其鼓时，因以为名也。”（《释名 释乐器》）

“Pipa, originally from among the barbarians, is played on horse back. Plucking forward is “pi”, backward is “pa”. To sound like when it’s played, thus named as such.” (Explaining Names: Names of Musical Instruments)

a modern recreation of a Barbat

Pear-shaped with a bent neck, Pipa in Tang Dynasty clearly showed similarities to the Barbat. It’s also worth noting that Pipa was first played horizontally, like Barbat, and with a plectrum. Only until the 15th century during the Ming Dynasty, Pipa was held up straight and played by fingers with artificial nails, technical improvements that allowed musicians to play Pipa with more flexibility and complexity.

Seated Female Musicians, Tang Dynasty (618 - 906), China, the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York.

To wrap my mind around the origin of Pipa, I have two theories. One theory is by the time the Barbat-like instrument introduced to China, Qin Pipa was already on its way to be renamed as Ruan. Then, Pipa, as a name originated from China, was used for a Persian instrument that eventually took its root in China and became one of the most quintessential instruments throughout its history since.

The other theory is the name Pipa was invented for the Barbat-like instrument, though the Chinese record in late Eastern Han Dynasty indicates an earlier introduction than the MET. The Chinese indigenous instrument, which later became Ruan, was referred as Qin Pipa due to its similarity to Pipa, and for the purpose of differentiating from the Pipa with a foreign origin.

Regardless of its origin, Pipa is still popular in China. Like Middle Eastern Oud and Japanese Biwa, sharing ancestral connections to Barbat, Pipa continues to tell a story of how cultures travel, evolve and influence each other, over time and geographic borders. The instrument itself may have a “foreign” origin, but Pipa is completely Chinese now. 

While the intellectual quest for Pipa’s origin might not have an absolute answer, it’s absolutely enchanting when Zhou Yi started playing a twist-necked Pipa while singing 西江月 (West River Moon, See Appendix)，a Tang Dynasty song with music reconstructed from scores discovered in the Dunhuang caves. In the end, music transcends language, time and space, perfect for a night of Pipa in New York City. 

Astoria, New York

9/22/2019

The full video of the program by Zhou Yi, moderated by Shenzhan Liao:

Appendix:

西江月. 敦煌曲子词

女伴同寻烟水，今宵江月分明。柁头无力别，一舡横。波面微风暗起。

懒棹乘舡无定止。拜词处处闻声。连天红浪侵秋星，误入蓼花丛里。

Girl friends go out together, among misty water;

Tonight the river and the moon, so bright and clear.

No strength to turn the boat head; let it be sideways.

Above the gentle ripples, arisen the silent breeze.

***

So lazy with the paddle, let the oar float nonstop.

Singing followed by singing, all around to be heard.

Why endless pink waves mix with the autumn stars?

Bushes of flowers, entered by mistakes.

Translation by Shenzhan Liao

An Encounter of Qin

申展/Shenzhan

Thanks to Helan Ze, Lecturer, Sichuan Normal University and Independent Researcher of the Song of Qin.

（Search for “Studio Mandarin” on “喜马拉雅主播平台”or Podbean and listen to this article with my voice.）

该文有中文版: 与琴相遇

Prince Lu, 1634, China. Displayed at the Metropolitan Museum of Art (the MET), New York.

photo: from the MET

December 17, 2018, I was in a quiet and elegant tea house in the city center of Chengdu, China, waiting to meet for the first time Helan Ze (贺兰泽) , a qin（琴, zither) teacher who enjoys some reputation among the inner qin circle in Chengdu. A slender young man with thin-rimmed glasses, Helan showed up and asked for his usual tea from the receptionist, who apparently was an acquaintance. We settled in a small room on the side of the courtyard and started chatting about qin, an ancient seven-stringed Chinese music instrument currently having quite a revival in China, especially Chengdu. Trained as a western opera singer in college, Helan was trying to explain to me his unique approach to play qin, by singing along with it. “It involves completely different techniques to sing with qin, which is meant to be accompanied by singing, called “弦歌” （xián gē , song on the string).” To demonstrate, He took a qin conveniently available in the tea house, and started to sing. I sat across from him, with tea cups between us, listening.

qin, late 17th to mid-18th Century, China. Displayed at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

“绿丝低拂鸳鸯浦，想桃叶、当时唤渡。又将愁眼与春风。待去，倚兰桡，更少驻。

金陵路、莺吟燕舞。算潮水、知人最苦。满汀芳草不成归。日暮，更移舟，向甚处？”

Willow droops like green silk along Mandarin Duck Pier,

A reminder of Peach Leaf, at one time calling to cross the river.

Once again my sad eyes greet the spring breeze,

-- don’t leave yet,

Lean against the orchid-like oar, lingering a bit longer.
***

Path to Jinlin, warbler sings and swallow dances;

Supposedly, river tide knows the best of one’s sufferings.

The riverbank full of fragrant grass,

-- but cannot return,

The sun is setting down,

The boat is turning, again and again, but to where?

[translation by Shenzhan Liao, Carole Symer]

The poem, Apricot Blossom in the Sky Shadow, (杏花天影）was famously written by Jiang Kui（姜夔 , ca. 1155 – 1221) , a poet and musician from Song Dynasty. Jiang was passing Jinlin (金陵, current day Nanjing, an ancient capital and cultural center in southern China) at the time on his way to the north. As he was sailing further into unknown places and unsure of the returning date, the poem, about the sweet and sorrow memory of the past, expresses the melancholy of the sentimental moment of departure, and the helplessness when facing uncertainty.

Just as brush paintings and calligraphy, qin the instrument itself could be a priceless work of art. Typically about 48 inches long, 7 inches wide and 3 inches in depth, a qin is essentially a sounding-box, with an upper concave board made of paulownia (桐木) and a bottom flat board made of elm (梓木). Over the body, seven strings are placed over a bridge （called 岳山）made of a special kind of hardwood (typically red sandalwood, 紫檀). Each string ends with a peculiar knot called 琴軫（qinzhen）. The bottom of qin often has inscriptions indicating the creator or owner’s taste. One of the most famous qin is “冰磬” （bīng qìng , meaning “Icicle Sonorous Stone” ).  Made in 1187, it has its name and an inscription carved in the base by Zhu Xi (朱熹),  a famous Confucian philosopher in Song Dynasty. The inscription says:

宮應商鳴 (gōng yìng shāng míng )

擊玉敲金 (jī yù qiāo jīn)

怡情養性 (yí qíng yǎng xìng)

中和且平(zhōng hé qiě píng)

The tone Gong corresponds with the tone Shang.

The sonorous stones are tapped, bells are struck.

With calmed emotions nurturing one’s nature,

The music is harmonious and even.

(translation by Robert van Gulik)

Of course, the qin Helan played was only commercially made as those displayed in Chinese tea houses and restaurants to add a scholarly civil ambiance. Nevertheless, his singing accompanied by the subdued voice of qin quietly penetrated every corner of the room. Even after he stopped, it felt as if the music was still vibrating subtly in the wooden tables, pillars, window frames and the roof. The residual effect was so powerful that for quite a few seconds after it was all over, I wasn’t dare to utter any sound.

* * *

Riding in the New York subways these days, I now carry a book from 1930s,  “The Lore of the Chinese Lute” by Robert van Gulik, a Dutch sinologist known by his Chinese name 高罗佩. First published in 1940 in Tokyo, this book is perhaps still the best in English about qin. van Gulik preferred to call qin  “the Chinese lute” , as he thought the philosophical role qin plays in Chinese culture is similar to what the lute does in Europe.

Archlute, 1725, by David Tecchier (Austrian, Salzburg 1666-1747 Rome), Rome, Italy.

Allegory of Music, oil painting, 1649, by Laurent de La Hyre (Paris, 1606-1656）

the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York

photo credit: Shenzhan Liao

van Gulik, a diplomat in Japan with a Chinese wife from Chongqing, got himself deeply attracted to qin. He followed Yeh Shih-Meng, a great scholar, qin master,  and a nephew of Dowager Cixi, to study the instrument. While his study with Yeh was very brief, van Gulik respected Yeh so much that he attributed the entire book to the great master. On the first page, the book reads:

“This essay is respectfully dedicated to the memory of my first teacher of the lute, Yeh Shih-Meng, a gifted musician and a great gentleman.”

The attribution summarizes the main point about qin, a gentleman’s companion that captures the imagination of Chinese intellectuals for over two thousand years. As one of the four essential skills an educated man shall possess -- qin the zither, 棋/Chinese chess, 书/calligraphy and 画/brush painting -- qin was idealized to symbolize the sophisticate, philosophical and intellectual life only a very few could enjoy in ancient China. A musical and meditative tool to cultivate one’s heart and soul, qin hardly changed since the latter Zhou Dynasty (1046 - 256 B.C.)  once it’s matured from 5 strings to 7. While it had ups and downs during waves of foreign influences from central Asia and the West, it never fades out in the long history of China. In fact, van Gulik argues that qin survives without much change precisely because it is viewed as so pure and authentic to the “Chineseness” cherished by the cultural elites, whose role, one dynasty after another, is to ensure the lineage of “Chinese culture”, or at least the idea of a culture with the highest prestige, compared to almost everything else.

When a dear friend a year ago told me that she was studying qin and studios have been flourishing like mushrooms in Chengdu, I didn’t have the slightest clue that in the spring of 2019, I would sit across from 6 boxes of qin in my office at China Institute in New York, considering to join an introductory qin class opened just in March! Yes, as the small group class started, my office was temporarily turned into a storage.

* * *

As a good student of books, I dive into the history of qin before my fingers ever touch a string, and quickly find out its origin is quite mysterious. In “the Book of History” （《淮南子》, huái nán zǐ ) , compiled around 139 B.C., covering a variety of topics including philosophy, history, cosmology, geography, politics, you name it. It mentions that the pre-dynastic Emperor Shun (舜 , 2294 to 2184 B.C.), might have invented qin:

“舜彈五弦之琴而歌《南風》之詩, 以治天下。”《淮南子.诠言训》

“When Shun was Emperor, he played the five-stringed qin, and sung the song Nan-Feng (南风, air in the south), and the Realm was regulated.” (translation by Robert van Gulik)

The Classic of Mountains and Seas (《山海经》，shān hǎi jīng) attributes the invention of qin to Fu Xi (伏羲，fú xī ), a mythological hero who predates Shun and invented measurements, while other stories may claim the legendary Shen Nong (神农, shén nóng), a mythical emperor often associated with ancient Chinese medicine, was the creator of qin. While the earliest archeological evidence of qin was unearthed from the tomb of Marquis Yi of Zeng (曾乙父, zēng yǐ fù ), dated 433 B.C., it is generally believed that by the latter Shang dynasty (around 1,400 B.C.) qin already was one of the music instruments played in court orchestra. In the Book of Odes (诗经）, the oldest poetry collection from 11th - 7th Century B.C., qin is mentioned, in the very first poem The Osprey （关雎）:

“窈窕淑女，琴瑟友之。”

“Grace is the gentle beauty, with qin and se to sort after.”

By the way, Se (瑟） is a similar instrument often played together with qin. It’s bigger and has 25 strings.

Se, 19th Century, displayed at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

photo credit: Shenzhan Liao

While qin may first appear in  the court orchestra, usually played along with se, flute, or other instruments, it quickly became a solo instrument as a unique symbol of literary, wisdom, and elegance.

Lu’s Commentaries of History (《吕氏春秋》) , a classical text compiled in 241 B.C., offers an account of the story between Bo Ya, a qin player, and his friend, Zhong Ziqi, who understands the essence of Bo Ya’s qin music. After Ziqi passes away, Bo Ya never touches qin again as he claims no one else in the world would be able to understand his qin music (and truly himself as a person) . Until today, a true friend in China is still called 知音. 知, is “to know”； 音, is “music, voice, or tone”. A true friend is indeed a 知音, someone who gets one’s inner music or voice.

Ji Kang (嵇康, ca. 223 - 262 ), one of the “Seven Sages of the Bamboo Grove” (竹林七贤）who are renaissance intellectuals, poets and artists representing China’s elite literati tradition (and they love wine!), famously wrote “The Poetical Essay on the Lute” (《琴赋》). In conclusion, it says:

“愔愔琴德，不可测兮。体清心远，邈难极兮。良质美手，遇今世兮。纷纶翕响，冠众艺兮。识音者希，孰能珍兮。能尽雅琴，唯至人兮。”

“Solemn indeed is the virtue of the lute, it cannot be fathomed.

Purity of body and aloofness of heart, difficult indeed

   it is to attain to these heights.

Good instruments and excellent players, where are those to be

   found in the present age?

The silk strings resounding in harmony, this music surpasses

   all the arts.

As those who understand music are few, who can truly

   treasure this instrument?

Only to the Superior Man is it given completely to understand

   the elegant lute.”

（translation by Robert van Gulik)

A little more than one hundred years later, Eastern Jin Dynasty poet Tao Yuanming (陶渊明，ca. 365 - 427) further coined the philosophical significance of qin, to the extent that the technique of playing qin itself becomes completely irrelevant. The History of Jin Dynasty (《晋书. 陶潜传》）records Tao’s widely quoted saying, “但识琴中趣，何劳弦上声。” （I have acquired the deeper significance of the lute; Why should I strive after the sound of the strings? -- translation by Robert van Gulik).

Not surprisingly, Tao Yuanming’s minimalist approach to qin is highly admired in Japan. Since its introduction to Japan around 6th Century, qin had its waves in Japanese literati culture. After Xinyue (兴越, ca. 1639 - 1696) , a Chinese immigrant to Japan also known by his Japanese name Shin’ etsu, brought the revival of qin to Japan in the 17th Century, references to Tao Yuanming’s life, poetry, and his “no-string qin“ are numerous. The reference also  appears in haiku poetry, a Japanese poetic form. Yosa Buson (与谢芜村，1716 - 1784) writes：

Paulownia-wood hibachi----

Just like stroking

The no-string qin

Tao Yuanming (part), Minagawa Kien ( 1734 - 1807). Japan, Edo period, (1615- 1868). Hanging scroll, ink on paper. Private collection.

Surly the qin revival now has made its way to New York. In 1999, China Institute Gallery in New York had an exhibition, The Resonance of the Qin in East Asian Art, displaying the rare Icicle Sonorous Stone (how I wish I was able to see it with my own eyes!), among many other art objects from China, Japan and Korea. In March 2018, about two hours by train to the north of New York City along the Hudson River, a conference called “Harmony and Power” gathered (elegantly!) a group of musicians and ethnomusicologists to explore “the role of music in the cultivation of the literati in ancient China” at the Bard College Conservatory of Music. As conference participants (elegantly!) engaged in intellectual discussions, two concerts were prominently featuring qin with contemporary masters including Zhao Jiazhen (赵家珍) , professor of qin from Central Conservatory of Music in Beijing. Her qin performance with an unusual virtuosity provides a sharp contrast to the traditional calm and quiet voice of qin represented by previous masters such as Guan Pinghu (管平湖). A year later, a similar conference was held at the Bard College, this time called “Tradition and Discovery: Teaching Chinese Music in the West”. While some mentioned new qin pieces were created to demonstrate that Qin could perform with virtuosity, according to the western conservatory standards, others vehemently argued that there was no need to abide qin to western standards whatsoever. “It is the highest form of music by itself, period. Why do you want to play qin with virtuosity? It shall just play with virtue!” declared Randy Raine-Reusch.

Before I made up my mind to actually start learning to play qin, the first group class at China Institute was already full with 6 enthusiastic students. At least for now I could find peace after learning about the “no-string qin”. After all, as I am completely fascinated and charmed by the newly discovered rich yet complex cultural meanings of qin, I perhaps shall just settle with a “no-string qin”, or no qin at all!

qin, late 17th to mid-18th Century, in display with a Chinese vase and other contemporary western instruments. The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York.

Prince Lu, 1634, Hangzhou, China, in display with other Chinese and western music and art objects at the Metropolitan Museum of Art.

“Sizhu: The Sound of Silk and Bamboo”, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York (qin, 19th Century, Hebei, China)

Astoria, New York

3/19/2019

Other Resource

Stephen Addiss, The Resonance of the Qin in East Asian Art, New York: China Institute, 1999

Robert van Gulik, The Lore of the Chinese Lute, Tokyo: Sophia University, 1940

Robert van Gulik, Hsi K’ang and His Poetic Essay on the Lute, Tokyo: Sophia University, 1941

Kenneth Moore, the Qin, Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

沈冬，”琴道”何在？——高罗佩与文人想象。人文中國學報(第二十期)

Tomb of Marquis Yi of Zeng, Asian Art Education

与琴相遇

申展/Shenzhan

感谢中国琴歌研究者四川师范大学贺兰泽老师的指导。

（上“喜马拉雅主播平台”or Podbean 搜索“Studio Mandarin”可收听此文）

This essay has an English version: An Encounter of Qin

潞王琴，中国明代，纽约大都会艺术博物馆藏

2018年12月17日下午， 我在成都宽巷子一个优雅的茶社等贺兰泽。听说他在成都的古琴圈子里已小有名气了，不过我与他尚未谋面。贺兰泽年纪并不大，身材清瞿，戴了一副斯文的细边眼镜。他来到茶社，叫柜台上他常喝的茶，看来已经很熟了。我们在后院一间清净的小茶室坐定，开始聊古琴——这种古老的七弦乐器正在中国悄然复兴，成都更是如此。贺兰泽大学的专业是西方歌剧，现在我们谈的却是他对古琴的独特演绎——和琴而歌。“琴最初就是有歌相伴的，称为’弦歌’, 对歌者的技术要求完全不一样（跟歌剧比，笔者注）。” 他就近把茶室装饰用的琴拿过来，开始演示弦歌。我隔着一壶茶，坐在他对面聆听。

“绿丝低拂鸳鸯浦，想桃叶、当时唤渡。又将愁眼与春风。待去，倚兰桡，更少驻。

金陵路、莺吟燕舞。算潮水、知人最苦。满汀芳草不成归。日暮，更移舟，向甚处？”

图为纽约大都会博物馆展出明代古琴，与音乐无关。

这首《杏花天影》，作者是南宋以音韵著名的词人姜夔（1155 - 1221）。当时姜夔乘舟北去途中经过金陵（现在的南京，六朝古都和文化中心）， 旅途茫茫，归期难料。词人面对再次离别，飘渺无助，美好的回忆只增加当下的心酸，让人黯然神伤。

琴作为乐器，跟中国书画一样可以是无上的艺术。现在的琴一般长约1米2，宽20厘米左右，厚8-10厘米，正面略带弧形，由桐木制成，与平整的梓木背面合成一个共鸣音盒。琴身张有7根弦，每一根弦通过“岳山”（通常由紫檀制成），固定在一个特定的琴轸上。琴的主人常常会在琴身背面刻上铭文，以表心志。比如宋代著名的“冰磬”琴，刻有南宋著名理学家朱熹的铭文：

宮應商鳴

擊玉敲金

怡情養性

中和且平

贺兰泽弹奏的是茶社的琴，原本用来增添文艺氛围的。不过他的“弦歌”与琴声相伴，在房间各个角落回想。琴声落定，又似乎还在木质的茶桌，窗棂和屋顶缠绕。余音绕梁，好一会儿我都不敢发出一点声音。

* * *

最近在纽约坐地铁的时候，我的包里常常放了一本二十世纪30年代的书，《琴道》（The Lore of the Chinese Lute）。该书的作者是一位荷兰的中国学者，Robert van Gulik，中文名为高罗佩。《琴道》1940年在东京出版，至今或许仍是有关中国古琴最权威的英文著作。在《琴道》中，高氏把琴称作中国的“lute”，因为他认为琴在中国的哲学意义与lute在欧洲的文化地位更接近。

Archlute, 1725, by David Tecchier (Austrian, Salzburg 1666-1747 Rome), 意大利，罗马

音乐的寓意（Allegory of Music）, 油画，1649, by Laurent de La Hyre (法国，巴黎1606-1656）

纽约大都会艺术博物馆藏

高氏是驻日本的大使，娶了一位来自重庆的中国太太，对琴痴迷得很。他拜叶师梦为师（叶氏为当时著名的学者，古琴大家，也是慈禧太后的侄子）学琴。虽然时间很短，他却对叶氏尊敬有加，把《琴道》一书特别献给叶氏。书的扉页 上写道：

“谨以此书献给我的第一位古琴老师，叶师梦，一位天才的音乐家和君子。”

一语点睛：两千多年来，在中国文人的想象中，琴为“君子伴侣”。依中国的传统，一个受过良好的教育的人必得琴、棋、书、画皆通—— 琴象征着精致、哲理和智慧，在古代只有极少数人才能通晓。琴是乐器，更可助冥思，养性情，周代（公元前1046-256年）后期从5弦发展到7弦，之后就没有再改变过。在中国漫长的历史中，琴虽然不断受到中东和西方“外来”音乐的冲击，起起伏伏，却从未消失。事实上，高氏认为琴能基本保持不变，正因为它是纯粹的“中国性”的真正代表，受到中国文化精英的推崇，历代而不息。文化精英们的职责，不正是保证“中国文化”——或者精英们所认可的具有至高无上地位的文化精髓——的传承吗？

去年一位成都的好朋友告诉我她在学琴，而且琴馆如雨后春笋般涌现。我万万没有想到2019年的春天，坐在纽约的办公室里，我会面对6把摞在一起的古琴，考虑要不要报名参加三月在华美开设的古琴入门课。没错，开课之前，我的办公室暂时成了古琴储藏室。

* * *

虽然还没有碰过琴弦，作为一个书呆子，我首先一头扎进了古琴的历史当中，很快饶有兴趣地发现它的起源有些不明不白。公元前139年编撰的《淮南子》综合了古代哲学、历史、天文、地理、政治等等五花八门的内容，其中提到舜或许是琴的“始作俑者”：

“舜彈五弦之琴而歌《南風》之詩, 以治天下。” （《淮南子.诠言训》）

中国先秦古籍《三海经》认为伏羲——舜之前创造度量衡的神话英雄——发明了琴；其他一些传说则归功于遍尝百草的中医始祖神农。关于琴最早的考古学证据来自于公元前433年的曾乙父墓葬。不过，一般认为大约公元前1400年，也就是商代后期，琴就已经出现在宫廷乐队的演奏中了。中国最早的诗歌总集《诗经》，收集了公元前11-7世纪的诗歌，其开篇《关雎》写道：

“窈窕淑女，琴瑟友之。”

（补充一句：瑟是跟琴类似的乐器，略大些，有25根弦。）

瑟，19世纪，纽约大都会艺术博物馆藏

虽然琴一开始是宫廷乐队的演奏乐器之一，只用于合奏，它很快便用于独奏，而且被赋予了独特的人文意义，代表着涵养、学识和优雅。

编撰于公元前241年的另一部先秦经典《吕氏春秋》，记载了伯牙和钟子期的故事。

伯牙善鼓琴，钟子期善听。伯牙鼓琴，志在高山，钟子期曰：“善哉，峨峨兮若泰山！”志在流水，钟子期曰：“善哉，洋洋兮若江河！”伯牙所念，钟子期必得之。伯牙游于泰山之阴，卒逢暴雨，止于岩下，心悲，乃援琴而鼓之。初为霖雨之操，更造崩山之音。曲每奏，钟子期辄穷其趣。伯牙乃舍琴而叹曰：“善哉，善哉！子之听夫志，想象犹吾心也。吾于何逃声哉？子期死，伯牙谓世再无知音，乃破琴绝弦，终身不复鼓。

直到今天，真正的朋友在中文当中仍称作“知音”，可以聆听到一个人内心深处的声音。

南北朝时期“竹林七贤”之一嵇康 （223-262），在其著名的《琴赋》中总结道：

“愔愔琴德，不可测兮。体清心远，邈难极兮。良质美手，遇今世兮。纷纶翕响，冠众艺兮。识音者希，孰能珍兮。能尽雅琴，唯至人兮。”

一百多年之后，东晋诗人陶渊明（365-427）更将琴的哲学意义推向了极致，以至于弹琴的技巧本身几乎不足称道了。《晋书.陶潜传》记载了他的名言“但识琴中趣，何劳弦上声。”

这种”极简主义“的主张，在日本备受推崇，就不足为怪了。自公元6世纪传到日本，琴在日本文化中也几经起伏。公元17世纪，东皋兴越从中国至日本，掀起了琴的再次复兴，此时日本文人对于陶渊明的生平、诗歌以及“无弦琴”的引述更是比比皆是，甚至出现在日本的俳句中。著名的日本诗人与谢芜村（1716 - 1784）写道：

桐木碳炉

弹那

无弦琴

（转译自英文，可能与原诗有出入——笔者）

陶渊明，Minagawa Kien (1734 - 1807), 日本

无可置疑的是，琴也在纽约复兴。早在1999年，华美“中国美术馆”举办了”琴在东亚艺术中的回响“，展出了传世名琴”冰磬“（我多么希望自己能亲眼看到这把琴啊！），以及来自中国、日本和韩国的其他与琴相关的艺术品。2018年3月，在沿着纽约哈德逊河往北两个小时左右车程的巴德音乐学院，举办了一场名为“和谐与力量”（Harmony and Power）的雅集：一小群音乐家和研究者聚在一起探讨“音乐在古代中国人文精神中的作用”。与会者一边讨论学问，一边举办音乐会。中央音乐学院赵家珍教授极富表现力的古琴与传统古琴——例如管平湖——平和优雅的风格恰成强烈的对比，给与会者留下了深刻的印象。一年以后，巴德音乐学院再次召开类似的研讨会，题名为“传统与发现：在西方教授中国音乐”。有学者提到一些新创作的琴曲证明古琴可以跟西方音乐一样富有表现力，另一些学者则激烈地主张完全没有必要用西方音乐的标准来衡量中国的琴。美国学者Randy Raine-Reusch说：它（琴）自身就是音乐的最高形式，它表达的是“琴操”， 为什么要求它有“表现力”呢？！

在我对加入古琴课还迟迟不决时，就已经有6个学生报名，第一个班满额了。不过，既然我已得“琴中趣”， 就应该可以满足于“无弦琴”，或者比陶渊明更进一步，干脆“无琴”算了！看，一个不会弹琴的书呆子就可以这样发挥知识的力量！

与明代瓷器和同时代西方乐器共同陈列的琴（17世纪末18世纪初，中国），纽约大都会艺术博物馆藏

与同时代中西乐器共同陈列的“潞王琴”，1634，中国杭州，纽约大都会艺术博物馆。

“丝竹”，纽约大都会艺术博物馆中国乐器陈列 （琴来自19世纪中中国河北）

2019年3月19日于纽约Astoria

资料来源

Stephen Addiss, The Resonance of the Qin in East Asian Art, New York: China Institute, 1999

Robert van Gulik, The Lore of the Chinese Lute, Tokyo: Sophia University, 1940

Robert van Gulik, Hsi K’ang and His Poetic Essay on the Lute, Tokyo: Sophia University, 1941

Kenneth Moore, the Qin, Heilbrunn Timeline of Art History, the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

沈冬，”琴道”何在？——高罗佩与文人想象。人文中國學報(第二十期)

Tomb of Marquis Yi of Zeng, Asian Art Education

年画的前世今生

申展/Shenzhan

感谢华东师范大学李明洁教授的支持和指导。

（上“喜马拉雅主播平台”or Podbean 搜索“Studio Mandarin”可收听此文）

福，木版年画

2019年李明洁赠

大家好。橘子中文，Studio Mandarin。说说好玩的文化。我是纽约华美协进社申展。

猪年伊始，祝愿各位新年吉祥如意。初一已过，元宵节还未到，今天我想接着上次的话题春节，聊一聊年画。

2019年2月5日是猪年的第一天。这个冬天纽约出奇的暖和。晚上我站在公寓的阳台上，抬头可以看见猎户座，北半球冬季星空最亮的星座。我禁不住想像古人们根据月亮的周期发明阴历的时候，猎户座就是这样俯瞰地球了。要是根据某些传说，阴历可是公元前2637年黄帝发明的。四千多年后，在美国的纽约， 我们仍然根据那时发明的历法庆祝中国新年。这样仰望猎户座，就交织着宏大又渺小的感觉。

这个春节，有幸邀请到华东师范大学民俗研究所的李明洁教授来纽约展示她个人珍藏的清代年画，正好可以多了解一下这个话题。

木版画的历史可以追溯到公元前二世纪的秦汉时代。汉代的时候，神荼和郁垒就已经以门神的形象出现了。木版印刷最早多用于印制佛经，日历，书法以及桃符，到了宋代，市民文化空前发达，木版画也流行起来。宋代名画，张择端的《清明上河图》中，有一个“王家纸马”跻身于熙熙攘攘的市集之中。马，被认为是神的坐骑，也是木版画中最早的形象之一。后来木版画干脆就被称做“纸马”，意在承载神灵的形象。在庆祝新年，生日，丧葬，房屋奠基等场合常常焚烧“纸马”以祛恶除邪。后来木版画渐渐增加了自然、儒释道神佛圣贤，民间传说，历史英雄等各种内容。到明代的时候，随着彩色印刷的流行，对彩色绘本书和单页的需求大大增加，更促进了木版画的繁荣。年画作为一种民间艺术到了清代最为盛行。也很可能在此时通过商贸往来流传到了日本，至今学者仍然在争论中国木版画对日本浮世绘的影响。

The Great Wave off Kanagawa’ by Katsushika Hokusai (ca. 1829-1833)
Photo: Katsushika Hokusai [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

年画的主题常常是中国传统文化中普遍认可的美好祝福，比如驱邪，求子福荫，富贵有余等等。下面我们就来举几个例子。

门神

图片来源：网络

最普遍的年画自然是门神。如前所述，最早的门神是神荼和郁垒，在公元前3世纪记录神鬼方术，荟萃珍奇博物的地理风俗经典《山海经》中就有记载了，并赋予了看守门户，祛除鬼怪的职责。相传唐太宗把他最信任的两位将军，秦琼和尉迟恭的画像贴在自己门外作为护卫。随着雕版印刷的发展和木版画的流行，两位将军也进入了年画，成了护佑普通老百姓家的门神。

门神钟馗，桃花坞年画，清代（1644-1912），李明洁藏

还有一个广受欢迎的门神是模样很凶，会捉鬼的钟馗。比如这张年画里的钟馗穿着古代的官袍，手持宝剑，高举过头，更显示其捉鬼的特殊本领。

百子图，桃花坞年画，清代（1644-1912），李明洁藏

这张桃花坞的《百子图》通常贴于女性内室，表达了对子孙绵延，家族兴旺，香火永继的祝愿。

莲年有余，杨柳青年画，清代（1644-1912），李明洁藏

这张《莲年有余》意在祝愿新年物质丰厚。中文当中“鲤鱼”的“鱼”与“富余”的“余”同音，所以“有鱼”也就是“富足有余”的意思。此外，白白胖胖的小男孩自然也象征着对多子多福的期盼。第一个字“莲花”的“莲”，指代莲子，也象征着求子。

在中国的传统中，年画是为了普通的农民和城市居民而发明和发展起来的民间艺术，它们根据情景生产使用，很少能像士绅欣赏的中国绘画一样作为艺术品保留。不过，木版画自清代以来经过四百多年的发展，在技术、风格等方面也形成了自身的特点。“南桃北柳”的年画，即南方的代表是苏州桃花坞，北方的代表是天津杨柳青，至今仍享有盛誉。

到了19世纪末，随着更高效率的西方印刷术传入中国，木版画作为一种传统工艺逐渐衰落。不过在20世纪20年代一些反映日常生活新事物的年画带来了短暂的复兴。比如在《铁马行走》年画中，自行车这个当时的新事物也进入了年画。的确，作为民间艺术，木版画对于社会的反应是直接而迅速的。

或许正因为如此，20世纪30年代，当中国社会经历剧烈动荡的时候，木版画也发生了剧变。在著名文学家和社会评论家鲁迅的积极倡导下，当时的木版画运动转而采用了欧洲现代风格，成为号召社会变革的媒介。与色彩艳丽，充满美好祝福的传统年画相比，1930年的木版画运动以黑白为主，视觉上更严肃，以达到反映当时激烈的，甚至是暴力的社会冲突的目的。

怒吼吧，中国！李桦, 1936

来源: https://aphelis.net/li-hua-china-roar-1936/

今天，桃花坞和杨柳青的木版画社仍然继续着已经有两千多年历史的传统，生产精美的，富有艺术表现力的木版年画，保持这门古老技艺的当下生命力。时代变迁，人事皆非，然而，最重要的价值——祛除邪恶，家族兴旺富足，子孙绵延，等等——对于所有的人，不论贫富，仍然保持着其普世的意义。年画，通过明丽的色彩，生动的形象，把这些价值观直接而具体地表达出来，让所有人，不论学识如何，都能一眼看懂。从这个意义上说，年画也可以说是最普世的大众艺术。

你的家里，贴年画了吗？

纽约Astoria

2019年2月15日

资料来源：

文汇报春节特辑：当我们赏析年画时，心手相传的，是看得见的美好生活 李明洁

桃花坞年画不光承载农耕文明，也深植于市民文化繁盛的都市 李明洁

姑苏版与浮世绘：传说抑或论题 李明洁

木版年画集成总序 冯骥才

中华文化元素：节庆 萧放，长春出版社，2016年

History of Japanese Woodblock Prints, Kelly Richman-Abdou
The invention of woodblock printing in Tang and Song Dynasty

Lesson Plan: The Ukyio-e and Japanese woodblock print

History of Chinese Woodblock Printing, Stephanie Przybylek

Woodcuts in Modern China, Teach China, China Institute

New Year Prints from Ancient Times to Contemporary

by Shenzhan 申展

Thanks to Prof. Li, Mingjie （李明洁）for her generous support and advice.

（Search for “Studio Mandarin” on “喜马拉雅主播平台”or Podbean and listen to this article with my voice.）

FU, Prosperity, gift from Prof. Li, Mingjie, 2019

It’s almost 9 pm on Feb. 5, 2019. Astoria, New York. In the unusually warm air on my balcony during this time of the year, I looked up and saw Orion (猎户座), the brightest star in the northern hemisphere winter sky. The Moon was nowhere to be seen.

It’s the first day of the Year of the Pig and the best time to talk about Lunar New Year prints （年画, nián huà）, a Chinese folk art special to Spring Festival since ancient time. Prof. Li, Mingjie (李明洁），an anthropologist and folk art historian from the Folklore Institute, East China Normal University in Shanghai, China, is in New York with her own collection of the prints from late 19th to early 20th Century. I am excited about seeing those stunning prints in New York, and the possibility that they will charm New Yorkers and many people from the world.

There is something about just being seen in New York, isn’t it?

At the moment, I just want to look up to the Orion,imagining they were exactly the same when my ancient Chinese ancestors created the lunar calendar. Legend says it was created by the Yellow Emperor (黄帝, huáng dì) in 2637 B.C.. Here I am, more than 4,000 years later in New York, celebrating Chinese New Year defined by that calendar.

the Woodblock Prints and the Lunar New Year 木版年画 (mù bǎn nián huà）

The invention of woodblock prints may be traced back to Qin (秦，qín）and Han（汉，hàn） period in China before the 2nd Century B.C.. By Han Dynasty (203 B.C. -220 A.D.), Shen Tu (神荼，shén tú）and Yu Llei (郁垒，yù lěi）already appeared as door gods. First made for Buddhist texts, calendars, calligraphy, and auspicious charms, woodblock prints with images became popular in Song Dynasty (960 - 1279), when urban lives were thriving. A woodblock printing workshop, Wang’s Family Paper Horse Prints, appears in “Along the River During the Qingming Festival”(《清明上河图》，by Zhang, Zeduan (1085–1145), one of the most acclaimed Song Dynasty paintings in China. Horses, considered to be the ride for the gods, were one of the earliest woodblock designs. Subsequently those woodblock prints themselves took the name “paper horse” as the carrier of the gods images. Made to ward of the evils and often burnt at rituals for the lunar new year celebrations, birthdays, funerals, opening ceremonies for buildings, etc.  the design of “Paper Horse” gradually took on various objects incorporating nature, Taoist celestial beings, Buddhist gods, Confucian sages, folklore heroes, historical stories, etc. Later in Ming Dynasty (1368 - 1644), with full-color printing available and colorful illustrated books and single-sheet images high in demand,  woodblock printing was thriving. The Lunar New Year prints as a folk art were especially popular during Qing Dynasty (1644 - 1912). It is perhaps during this time period that Chinese woodblock prints were widely introduced to Japan, a source of the long debate among scholars regarding its influence on Ukyio-e (浮世绘), a mainstream art in the Edo Period (1603 - 1868) that presented “pictures of the floating world”. Ukyio-e further had an impact on western impressionist artists of the 19th century such as Vincent van Gogh and Paul Cézanne.

The Great Wave off Kanagawa’ by Katsushika Hokusai (ca. 1829-1833)
Photo: Katsushika Hokusai [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

New Year prints often have themes related to good wishes most popular and valuable in Chinese traditions, such as warding off the evilness, wishing for numerous sons to carry on a thriving family line, and praying for a year with surplus.

Door Gods posted at the entrance to guard the household.

source: online

The Door Gods are common for New Year Prints. The earliest door gods were Shen Tu（神荼）and Yu Lei (郁垒）, appeared in “Classic of Mountains and Seas” (山海经）, a  classical Chinese text of mythic geography and myths compiled before 3rd Century B.C.. They are believed to be the guardians of the household to keep the evils and ghosts out of the door. In Tang Dynasty, emperor Taìzōng (太宗, 598 - 649 A.D.) posted images of his most revered generals, the legendary Qìn Qióng (秦琼) and Yùchí Gōng (尉迟恭), outside his door as protection. As prints became more readily available with the development of woodblock printing technology, ordinary people began following this tradition, incorporating Qin Qiong and Yuchi Gong as one of the popular door gods.

Door god: Zhong Kui, by Tao Hua Wu, early Qing Dynasty (1644 - 1912)

Courtesy to Prof. Li, Mingjie, Folklore Institute, East China Normal University

Another popular door god and protector is Zhōng Kuí (钟馗), the fierce mythological figure with the ability to capture ghosts. Appeared in this picture in an ancient official robe, Zhong Kui holds a sword to indicate his special power over the ghosts.

A Portrait of A Hundred Children (百子图，bǎi zǐ tú），by Tao Hua Wu, Qing Dynasty (1644 - 1912)

Courtesy to Prof. Li, Mingjie, Folkore Institute, East China Normal University

Often posted inside the room for females, this print design represents the longing for a big, forever thriving family.

Every Year There Is Something to Spare (莲年有余, lián nián yǒu yú ), by Yang Liu Qing, Early Qing Dynasty (1644 - 1912)

Courtesy to Prof. Li, Mingjie, Folklore Institute, East China Normal University

This design shows the wish for a materially good year with more than enough to spend. The Chinese word for fish, “鱼” (yú), has the same pronunciation as the word for surplus “余”(yú). A happy and chubby healthy boy is a natural symbol for continuing the family line. The first word “莲”，(lian), refers to lotus seeds, also symbolizes fertility.

Unlike brush paintings, the art of the gentry class in traditional China, the New Year prints were originally created by and made for the general mass, the majority farmers in the countryside and urban residents in city centers. As a result, they were instantly consumed during the celebrations and were rarely preserved as a work of art. Nevertheless, for over 400 years, techniques and styles of these prints have evolved into different regional schools, famously recognized as the Southern School represented by Tao Hua Wu (桃花坞）in Suzhou, Zhejiang province, and the Northern School by Yang Liu Qing (杨柳青) in Tianjin.

As an ancient technique, woodblock prints started to lose its popularity in late 19th century when more efficient western printing techniques found its way to China. However, 1920s has seen a variety of new designs related to daily life introduced to woodblock prints as a revival. Indeed, as a folk art, the woodblock prints were quick to reflect social topics and issues.

Perhaps it is because of such reason, woodblock prints in 1930s went through some dramatic revival with the effort of the revered Chinese writer and social critic, Lu Xun (鲁迅), who re-positioned woodblock prints with a modern European style to call for social revolution. In contrast to the colorful and vibrant New Year Prints with positive wishful messages for the new year, the 1930s movement employed a much more bleak imagery in black and white, reflecting the intense and often violent social issues at the time.

China, Roar! by Li Hua (李桦), 1936

Source: https://aphelis.net/li-hua-china-roar-1936/

Today studios in places like Tao Hua Wu and Yang Liu Qing continue to produce delicate and artistically expressive new year woodblock prints, keeping a tradition started over 2,000 years ago alive. The time and people are different, while what’s considered to be valuable for people, rich or ordinary, —for example, staying away from the evilness, wish for a thriving family, wealth, prosperity, etc.— are the same. By directly communicating such values in colorful, positive and vibrant imageries, the storied pictographic new year prints serve as the most accessible medium to the majority of the people, literate or not. In this sense, it truly is a universal art of the people.

Astoria, New York

February 11, 2019

Reference:

文汇报春节特辑：当我们赏析年画时，心手相传的，是看得见的美好生活 李明洁

桃花坞年画不光承载农耕文明，也深植于市民文化繁盛的都市 李明洁

姑苏版与浮世绘：传说抑或论题 李明洁

木版年画集成总序 冯骥才

中华文化元素：节庆 萧放，长春出版社，2016年

History of Japanese Woodblock Prints, Kelly Richman-Abdou
The invention of woodblock printing in Tang and Song Dynasty

Lesson Plan: The Ukyio-e and Japanese woodblock print

History of Chinese Woodblock Printing, Stephanie Przybylek

Woodcuts in Modern China, Teach China, China Institute

The Year of the Pig and New York

Shenzhan/申展

（Search for “Studio Mandarin” on “喜马拉雅主播平台”or Podbean and listen to this article with my voice.）

A Red Envelope Design by XXX for the Year of the Pig, 2019

(script for the podcast “the Year of the Pig and New York)

Hello! This is Studio Mandarin, let’s learn to talk about Chinese culture in English. I’m your host Shenzhan in New York. As the Year of the Pig is approaching, today, let’s talk about Chinese Lunar New Year and New York city.

On February 5, 2019, over 1.1 million public school students in New York City will be happy to have a day off to observe the Lunar New Year. It’s been a tradition since the City officially made it a public holiday in 2016.

According to 甲骨文, jiǎ gǔ wén (the Oracle Bones), China's oldest written records, Chinese lunar calendar was already created during the 14th Century B.C. . Some even say it started with China’s legendary 黄帝, huáng dì(Yellow Emperor ) in 2637 B.C. While today in China the western calendar, which the Republic of China adopted in 1912, effectively regulates Chinese daily life and work, traditional holidays and festivals still follow the lunar calendar, or 阴历（yīn lì), literally translated as “yin calendar”.

According to the Chinese lunar calendar, each year is named after one of the 12 zodiac animals: Rat, Ox, Tiger, Rabbit, Dragon, Snake, Horse, Goat, Monkey, Rooster, Dog and Pig. Every Chinese knows his or her zodiac sign. For any baby born on and after February 5 in 2019, or anyone born in 1935, 1947, 1959, 1971, 1983, 1995, and 2007, he or she is a pig or the 属相（shǔ xiàng，zodiac sign) is Pig,(猪，zhu).

The fact that the pig is one of the 12 zodiac animals spotlights its historical importance in Chinese culture. Traditionally, pigs are one of the earliest domesticated animals in China, and have been closely linked to the livelihood in agrarian societies. Look carefully, the bottom part (豕）for the word “family”, 家（jiā），pictographically represents the profile of a pig.

Various early forms of the word "pig" (豕） in Chinese.

Source: “China: Empire of Living Symbols", by Cecilia Lindqvist, 1989

While there are many cultural characteristics and symbolic meanings associated with pigs, in China they represent wealth and treasure.

In terms of language, 恭喜发财 (gōng xǐ fā cái ）, probably is best known to New Yorkers. The Analects (论语，lún yǔ ), a classics compiling sayings of Confucius ( 479 - 551 B.C.), writes, “恭，近于礼；喜，犹福也。” (gōng, jìn yú lǐ; xǐ, yóu fú yě), explaining 恭 is similar to “respect”; 喜 equals “blessing”. Thus 恭喜 together literally means “a blessing with respect”. However, 恭喜发财 as a Lunar New Year greeting didn’t gain popularity until early 20th century after the Opium War. In addition, Chinatowns all over the U.S. were first built by Chinese immigrants mostly from Canton, which probably explains if there is only one Chinese Lunar New Year greeting known to Americans, it’s likely “Kung Hei Fat Choi”. That said, it’s probably time to expand the vocabularies:

吉祥如意（jí xiáng rú yì): In The I Ching ( 易经，yì jīng, or Book of Changes), a Chinese classics from around 10 Century B.C., 吉 indicates an auspicious and positive sign when performing divination. 祥 carries a similar meaning as 吉. 如意 literally means “as you wish”. The expression basically can be translated as “Have an auspicious year as you wish.”

恭贺新禧 （gōng hè xīn xǐ): 恭贺 means “to congratulate respectfully”；新 means “new; 禧 means “auspiciousness and happiness”. The expression essentially means “Wish you a happy and auspicious new year.” (You can never get too much auspiciousness and happiness for the new year, right?)

While in New York, Chinese New Year is always a significant event, Traditionally Most Chinese start the celebration of Chinese New Year, or the Spring Festival (春节，chūn jié), during 腊月， the Lunar December。On the 8th day of the month, people cook 腊八粥, a special congee with 8 grains or nuts,; on the 23rd or 24th, they “send away” 灶神， the “Kitchen God” residing with the household during the year with offerings, especially candies (so the kitchen god will speak sweetly about the household in his report to 玉皇大帝，the jade emporer). After the Kitchen God has departed, those left on Earth continue the preparation of welcoming the New Year through a thorough cleaning of the house, purchasing new clothing and getting haircut for themselves before the actual New Year’s Eve, or 除夕 (chú xī).

除夕(chú xī) is the peak of the celebration! All family members come together to feast on traditional dishes like fish, dumplings, meat balls, rice cakes, among many other delicious foods. Families sit together past midnight to send off the old year and welcome the new year with happiness, strength, and wealth.

Today, 除夕is all about family reunion and happiness. However, if we look a little deeper, it isn't always so festive. 除 means “time passed”, 夕 means “the time of dusk”. In the Book of Songs (诗经，shī jīng）from 11 - 6 Century B.C. (yet another very ancient literature), a poetic expression says the following:

“今我不乐，岁月其除” (jīn wǒ bù lè, suì yuè qí chú)

Translation: Right now if I don’t get to enjoy (time), months and years are passed.

For Chinese, 除夕 could indeed be a melancholy occasion to contemplate the insignificance of the individual life compared to the changing and passage of time. It perhaps explains in part why spending time with families with lots of food, overly joyful activities, and giving youngsters red envelopes are needed to counter such feelings of helplessness. Not surprisingly, many Chinese poems about the Lunar New Year are not so celebratory either, especially if the poet happened to be away from home. One poem I like is by 王湾 (wáng wān, 693-751 A.D.), a Tang Dynasty poet who is only remembered perhaps by this poem on the Lunar New Year:

次北固山下 (cì běi gù shān xià)

客路青山外, (kè lù qīng shān wài)

行舟绿水前. (xíng zhōu lǜ shuǐ qián)

潮平两岸阔, (cháo píng liǎng àn kuò)

风正一帆悬. (fēng zhèng yī fān xuán)

海日生残夜, (hǎi rì shēng cán yè)

江春入旧年. (jiāng chūn rù jiù nián)

乡书何处达, (xiāng shū hé chù dá)

归雁洛阳边. (guī yàn luò yáng biān)

(You can read the translation in the script)

Translation:

Title: Stopping By Mount Beigu

As a guest I pass by the lush mountain,

Riding a boat in the green water.

Tides full, the river banks are wide,

Wind straight, the sail hangs upright.

Born out of the lingering night, the sun rises above the ocean;

Into the passing year, the river carries the spring.

In what place would my letter to home arrive?

Luo Yang, where the wild geese return to.

We know that Wang Wan is from Luo Yang , an ancient northern city where mountains would be barren in winter. Away from home when the first sunshine of the new year breaks the lingering darkness, Wang Wan appears to be sensible yet not overly consumed by loneliness. Instead, picturing himself surrounded by the vast river with full yet calm waves, the rising sun, the mountain still thriving, his poem is perfectly uplifting in connecting the individual human and the greatness of the nature. 海日生残夜, 江春入旧年. (hǎi rì shēng cán yè, jiāng chūn rù jiù nián), has become one of the most celebrated lines describing the beginning of the new year.

Now New York is currently preparing many activities to celebrate the Lunar New Year, as many of you are getting ready for the Spring Festival break in China. I wish everyone a happy, healthy Year of the Pig. Hope this episode is helpful in explaining Chinese Lunar New Year in English.

Please come to my blog Studio Mandarin for a full transcript of this episode and more resources., looking forward to sharing with you my next episode on Chinese New Year prints，年画。Bye for now!

Astoria, New York

January 26, 2019

猪年，纽约，中国新年

Shenzhan/申展

（上“喜马拉雅主播平台”or Podbean 搜索“Studio Mandarin”可收听此文）

2019年2月5日，上百万纽约市的中小学生都会放假一天，庆祝农历新年。这个传统始于2016年，可说是亚洲文化团体，特别是纽约的一些华人团体积极努力的结果。这个结果对于让更多的美国人了解中国文化是件好事：要知道每个不用上学的孩子，都代表着一个家庭。虽然除了中国，还有很多亚洲文化也庆祝农历新年（比如日本，韩国，老挝，新加坡，尼泊尔，西藏，越南，等等），在纽约大家一提农历新年，lunar new year,想到最多的还是中国新年。

根据中国的甲骨文，可能早在公元前14世纪，农历就已经成为普遍接受的历法，当时称之为“夏历”。 也有人认为早在公元前2637年，传说中的黄帝就开始使用农历了。虽然中华民国1912年开始正式实施西方历法，并在中国延续至今，传统节日仍然遵循农历，或称“阴历”。

根据中国的农历，每年的属年来自于十二个生肖动物：鼠，牛，虎，兔，龙，蛇，马，羊，猴，鸡，狗，猪。关于十二生肖的来历，有很多传说，却并无定论。东汉哲学家王充的著作《论衡》（完成于公元前80年），是目前最早将十二生肖动物全部列出，并将其与“十二地支”对应的文字记载。每个中国人都知道他/她的生肖，或称“属相”。2019年在2月5日或之后出生的孩子都属猪。其他可能属猪的年份包括：1935, 1947, 1959, 1971, 1983, 1995，2007……以此类推，每12年都会有一批属猪的孩子出生。

猪是十二生肖之一，这已经说明它在中国文化中很重要。历史地看，猪是中国最早被家养驯化的动物之一，关乎家家户户的生计。仔细看看“家”字，你会发现它的下面是“豕”，很形象地表示了一头猪的侧面。（插入图片）。虽然在过去的两千多年中，“猪”被赋予了很多不同的涵义——往好了说它憨态可掬、心地善良；从反面它常常又跟好吃懒做，行动笨拙，反应迟钝联系在一起——可是，其历史文化涵义一定跟财富有关。

选自《汉字王国》，瑞典 林莉西 著

虽然纽约市大年初一放假，对于中国人来说，庆祝农历新年，或称”春节“，从进入农历十二月（又称”腊月“）就开始了。传统上，”过了腊八就是年“，腊月八日做”腊八粥“，腊月二十三或二十四送灶神上天，之后彻底洒扫门庭，并在”除夕“，也就是大年三十那天之前置办好新衣年货，准备迎接新年，又称”初一“，或者”元日“。

在迎接新年的各种准备中，”送灶神“也许是最值得一提的。有顺口溜称：“灶王爷，本姓张，骑着马，挎着枪，上天言好事，下界保安康。”灶神是个跟家家户户关系密切的小神，在中国民间地位最低，其和蔼可亲的形象常常被印在年画上贴在厨房，主要负责观察一年当中家里发生的各种事情，并负责记录：是不是慷慨施舍上门的乞丐啦？有没有浪费辛苦耕种后收获的粮食啦？或者到了现代，也可能会记录”垃圾有没有分类啦？”。每年除夕之前，灶神要回天庭，向玉皇大帝报告一年的家庭见闻，家中善恶，上天都会一清二楚，所在每家每户倒是要格外尊敬。送灶神这天，民间常常会特别供奉糖果，以求灶神在玉帝面前“甜言蜜语”，为一家来年多求一点福祉。除夕前的大扫除，常常也只能在灶神离开之后进行，以免惊扰灶神，引起不快。

清代灶神年画

欢庆春节的高潮当然是除夕之夜，家人团聚，一起享受一顿盛宴。根据地方的不同，宴席上的食物也会不同，不过通常一定会有鱼。因为”鱼“的发音，跟”年年有余“的“余”一样，所以”鱼”就代表了”年年有余“，表达了人们对新年的祝福。除夕的晚上，很多家庭会有”守岁“的习惯，全家人一起度过半夜12点，送走旧年，迎接新的一年。在北方，有半夜煮饺子的习俗。”饺子“的发音跟”交子“差不多，有的方言读出来也许一模一样，正是表明它是为新旧年交替的时辰特别准备的食物。

今天一提到除夕，大家首先想到的是欢聚和团圆。不过，要是我们多了解一点，就会发现除夕并不总是欢乐祥和的。”除“意味着”时间流逝“，”夕“指的是”太阳下山的时刻“。中国最早的诗歌总集《诗经》中这样写到：

”今我不乐，岁月其除。“

如果我不现在及时行乐，年年岁岁就这样过去了。

对中国人来说，可能在永不停止流逝的时间面前，新旧年交替的除夕，让个体更强烈地感觉到无能为力。也许这也是传统上要与家人一起热闹，用人为制造的欢乐抵御这一年当中万物萧条的最寒冷的时光。很自然的，许多关于春节的诗歌也并不一定是欢庆的。我比较喜欢的一首诗是唐朝诗人王湾（693-751）写的。他流传下来的诗歌并不多，这首写在农历新年的《次北固山下 》或许是他唯一为后代传诵的作品。全文如下：

次北固山下

客路青山外, 行舟绿水前.

潮平两岸阔, 风正一帆悬.

海日生残夜, 江春入旧年.

乡书何处达, 归雁洛阳边.

从诗中我们知道王湾来自中国北方的洛阳。在新年的曙光照亮黎明之前，王湾在北固山脚下，远离故乡洛阳，略带惆怅，但并没有完全被孤独感淹没。他想象在广阔而平静的河面上，初一的太阳正在升起，周围群山郁郁葱葱。虽然身在异乡，已然胸中有新生的迹象，气象广大而充满生机。”海日生残夜, 江春入旧年. “在千年之后的今天仍然是广为传诵的诗句。

除夕之后，便是初一。“千门万户瞳瞳日，总把新桃换旧符。”从这一天开始到元月十五日的元宵节，换的不仅是桃符，更是为新的一年重新筹划与神、祖先以及家人朋友的关系。

2016年猴年， 我坐在纽约的一个咖啡馆，想象可以这样过年：

除夕：跟家人一起准备晚餐，吃晚餐，洗碗；看春晚，加入评论春晚的行列；在微信上发红包，抢红包。

初一：去小镇附近的锣罐山寺庙上香，到公墓拜祭逝去的亲人；晚上跟父亲家的亲戚聚餐，给小辈们准备红包。

初二：出嫁女子回娘家的日子。小孩子可以跟父母回外公外婆家，当然有很多好吃的，还有红包。

初三：拜访镇上几个好朋友，带上自家熏的香肠，再捎上一碗自家做的叶儿粑：艾粑是甜的，把糯米跟艾草混在一起；猪儿粑肥肥白白的，外面是糯米，里面包了自家制的馅儿：猪肉末、熏豆干与酸菜末按照适当的比例混合在一起。香肠和叶儿粑从进入腊月就要开始准备了。

初四：迎接灶神。初四这天，灶神就从天宫回来了。家庭聚会完毕，安安心心拜拜灶神。

初五：财神回归，市集开放。做生意的要特别迎接财神。

初六：开市以后逛街。新年伊始，街市应当特别热闹。故乡小镇这十几年来虽然变化巨大，热闹集市仍然集中在小镇两条老街，以穿城而过的护城河为中心。要是天气晴好，阳光和煦，在熙熙攘攘的街道集市上随意逛逛，下午坐在河边场坝喝喝茶，便是最好的。

初七：人日。买七种时令新鲜蔬菜，配条鱼，全家再聚一次。

初八：祭星。白天可以学习做“金灯”， 等晚上星斗出齐之后，在门槛、灶台、锅台及案头各放一盏，以祛除不祥。之后全家一起吃元宵。这天也可以放生。

初九：祭天。这天是玉皇大帝的生辰。这个中国道家传说中天界最高的神选择初九为生日，可能因为九是数字当中最大的吧？这天好像除了祭天，也没有什么特别的活动。

初十：各地风俗不一，最喜的是“老鼠嫁女”。这天在家可以剪“老鼠嫁女” 的窗花，故事可爱，老少咸宜，据说古时为了不惊扰老鼠嫁女，免点灯，所以全家晚上漆黑围坐吃炒豆子——看来古人虽颇有幽默感，的确以鼠为患。这一节倒是可以免掉！

⋯⋯（中间略去数日——要是有什么神照顾不周，就多有得罪啦！）

最后，十五元宵节： 要是镇上有灯会，晚上可跟朋友约了去看灯、猜灯谜。白天应该有舞龙灯罢？

这样聚了家人，会了友人，拜了神人，热闹年才算过完了。

2019年的猪年是我在纽约过的第16个春节了。想像仍然是想像。没有浩浩荡荡的春运带来的紧张，没有亲友（甚至陌生人！）的各种追问，不用处理各种或近或远或亲或疏的复杂关系，这样的想像当然带着十分浪漫的成分。不过仔细想想，在千百年中累积下来的各种习俗仪式，或许正是不同时代的人们某种浪漫的想像或期盼的回忆吧。在浩瀚的，每时每刻不停消逝的时间面前，人们总要传承对于某种恒定不变的意义和秩序的把握，来抵御个体沧海一粟的渺小感。对于中国人来说，或许正是在这些点点滴滴的过年仪式中，确定并强化个体与家族、社区乃至整个宇宙的关系。现在的人们，当然不会真的相信厨房里会住着一个“灶神”，不过即使在最自动化的高科技厨房里，保持一点点对未知世界的敬畏，又未尝不是一件好事呢。

附录：2019猪年活动安排：腊八至初一

1月13日：腊八节，辞旧迎新开始。民俗为喝腊八粥，腊八粥与佛教的传播相关，相传用于纪念佛祖得到成佛。腊八粥的记载早在宋代便有，其食材根据时代和地点有异，民间多用有吉祥意义的食材，例如：
桂圆：富贵团圆

百合：百事和睦

红枣、花生：早生贵子

莲子心：恩爱连心

核桃：和和美美

桔脯、栗子：大吉大利

1月28：腊月二十三，恭送灶神。改岁之际祭送包括灶神在内的各种神回归天上，备茶果，烧纸钱，以求一年当中在家中负责记录的灶神上天美言。

1月29日：扫尘。清洁家室，除污秽，清洁以迎新年诸神。

2月1日：沐浴祛秽，剃（年）头理发。

2月4日：大年三十, 立春，吃年夜饭，发压岁钱，守岁。这是人神共进的晚餐，各位先人用过年夜饭之后才能享用。年夜饭的食材充满象征，例如：

鱼：年年有余 （南方）

丸子：团团圆圆 （南方）

韭菜：音“久”，年寿长久。诗经记载“献羔祭韭”；新春尝新之物（闽南）

豆腐：音“斗富”， 丰裕富足 （闽南）

柑桔：吉祥如意

甘蔗：节节甘甜，步步高升

年糕：南方

饺子：馄饨，交子（时间变化的象征：更岁交子）

2月5日：正月初一, 元日。汉武帝颁布的《太初历》中就规定了夏历正月初一为新年。传统活动包括放爆竹，贴桃符、春联、门神，祭祀天地祖先，拜年。

桃符宋代以前比较流行，内容为祈福避邪字样。五代以后内容逐渐丰富，遂成春联。（五代后蜀国主孟x撰写第一联：“新年纳余庆，嘉节号长春”。仄音为上联，平音为下联。

门神：桃木刻制的偶人以驱鬼，先秦时已出现，汉代演变为神荼与郁垒，后代增加钟馗、秦叔宝，尉迟敬德等。传统门神画产地：开封朱仙镇，江苏桃花坞，四川绵竹，山东潍坊，天津杨柳青河北武强。

纽约Astoria

2019年1月21日

海獭 Sea Otters

“the Illustrated Compendium of Amazing Animal Facts” by Maja Säfström

translated by Shenzhan Liao 申展翻译

Zhu Dake 朱大可：有自信的文化应该是更开放和包容的。

by Shenzhan 申展

#1

I am starting an experiment blending language and cultural learning, Studio Mandarin - Renwen Channel, 橘子中文-人文频道，a podcast on Chinese language, literature, arts and culture, in general, covering topics about humanities, or 人文.

#2

This past Sunday, March 4, 2018, I went to a Renwen lecture at China Institute in the Financial District of Manhattan. The lecture was titled “Traditional Chinese Culture – Attachment and Dissociation, 对中国传统文化的爱与怕”, by Prof. Zhu Dake, a Chinese scholar, cultural critics, and professor at Tongji University in Shanghai. ( don’t ask me why I go to the office on a Sunday...I guess, for the love of Chinese culture! I just can’t resist…!)

#3

I have heard of Prof. Zhu’s high reputation on cultural critics, but have never met him in person. In front of a full room, Prof. Zhu seemed to readily charm the audience with his concise and witty comments on Chinese culture, its glorious history, and tradition, as well as its concerning status quo, where the essence of Chinese tradition often gets misunderstood and misrepresented. Meanwhile, the attitudes towards western influence shown in China now, more than anything,  signals a lack of cultural confidence. At one point, Prof. Zhu showed photos of people marching in red festival clothing, holding “anti-Christmas” signs. “It’s not either this or that.” Prof. Zhu commented, or in Chinese, “不是非此即彼”。”if people like, why not celebrate both Western Valentines Day and 七夕，it’s Chinese version. In this way, ladies can get presents on two special days, and gentlemen have two days to express their love!” Prof. Zhu seemingly simple suggestion indeed touches a fundamental point: if a culture is sufficiently confident, it shall be more tolerating and open. 有自信的文化应该是更开放和包容的。

#4

Not surprisingly, Prof. Zhu offered three traditional schools of philosophy as one way to rebuild the cultural confidence. Confucianism,儒家，or， in his words， 批判型儒家, critical Confucianism, focusing on the Confucius intellectual tradition to guard social justice for the people, and fight against cruel rulings. Mohism, 墨家, a less known school founded by Mo Tzu, who lived sometime around 479- 381 B.C., right after Confucius’ time. For Prof. Zhu, 墨家 advocates compassion for all, or 兼爱， which perfectly compliments Confucianism prioritizing treating families and friends well. In Confucius words, it would be 亲亲 ，or be nice to people close to you. Last but not least, Daoism, 道家，may be particularly important when reconstructing the people-nature relationship is on high demand, a highly relevant topic in today’s world with drastic climate change, environmental problems, and for some, even a crisis of humanity, given the exponential development of big data and A.I.

#5

Of course, two hours were far from enough to even scratch the surface of these topics. Nevertheless, inspired by Prof. Zhu’s lecture, I am looking forward to reading his new book, Mythology of Ancient China, 华夏上古神系，a two-volume book arguing for China’s ancient civilization’s African origins.

To listen to Prof. ZHU’s entire lecture (in Chinese), please go to China Institute ‘s YouTube channel.

For those who are studying Chinese language, here is a summary of the vocabulary for today:

人文: humanities

中国传统文化: Chinese traditional culture

非此即彼: either this or that

七夕: Chinese version of the Valentine’s Day

儒家: Confucianism

墨家: Mohism

兼爱: Compassion for all

道家: Daoism

Lastly, a full sentence:

有自信的文化应该是更开放和包容的.

A culture with confidence shall be more open and tolerating.

Hope you like this segment!

3/5/2018

Astoria, New York