A Brief Note on "Poems of the Lovesick Wife"

Author: Xiaoren1　Reply date: 2002-8-14　23:48:54
I have written many ci poems before, but they were all of the Su Shi / Xin Qiji heroic type. This is the first time I've written this kind of grievance poetry. They were completed over the past ten-odd days, posted intermittently on the Tang Wind Song Charm forum, and are now collected here. I'm not sure if this violates any rules — please advise.

Author: Xiaoren1　Reply date: 2002-8-15　0:17:47
Also, some of the ci tune names may differ. For example, "Fengle Lou" (Tower of Abundant Joy) is actually "Yingti Xu" (Prelude to Oriole's Cry), but the former name is more fun, so I used it.

Author: Xiaoren1　Reply date: 2002-8-15　11:05:11

First, it must be made clear that these 49+0 pieces form a single whole — looking at individual words or characters in isolation would be meaningless. The story is simple: it tells of thirty years. The first ten years are expressed in the first 49 pieces, and the final piece, "Fengle Lou," writes about one day twenty years later. The plot is roughly this: a young girl is deceived by Xiaoren (or someone like Xiaoren), then waits, loses hope, falls into despair, and finally enters a brothel (don't worry — she eventually rises to the rank of madam). Structurally, pieces 1 through 3 are set in autumn of a certain year, depicting the young girl's first premonitions that something is amiss (is Xiaoren keeping a mistress on the side?). This serves as a prologue. Piece 4 is set in the spring three years later, hinting that the girl and Xiaoren met in winter ten years prior (echoed in piece 11 and in "Fengle Lou"), and that Xiaoren left the following spring (piece 5, the spring after the prologue began) and has never returned (following Xiaoren's usual tricks — typically claiming to be going to the capital for the imperial examinations, or going abroad as an indentured laborer, etc.). From this point to piece 49, everything takes place within that single year, with piece 33 forming a dividing line, focusing mainly on spring and autumn. This is a complete psychological process — every subtle change, culminating in an eruption. Piece 0, "Fengle Lou," takes place twenty years later, also thirty years after the girl first met Xiaoren, and can be seen as an ending without an ending.

Thematically, this is clearly not mere boudoir lament. If one insists on mapping it onto history, just consider the span of thirty years and the time distribution within, and it becomes clear. But I don't care for purely historical readings. There is, of course, more to it than that — it can be applied in many other ways; the lovesick wife is merely a starting point. These poems can be dedicated to anyone who has lived more than thirty years, and considering the question of reincarnation, they can be said to be dedicated to all beings and all objects caught in the cycle of rebirth.

There are too many linguistic issues to discuss one by one. But one point is crucial: the overall rhythm and the building toward the climax. As mentioned above, piece 33 is a dividing line — in terms of number of pieces, it falls roughly at the golden ratio, and in terms of total character count, roughly at the halfway point. This gives the entire work a balanced structure. Before and after this dividing line, the choice of ci tunes also differs: the first half is dominated by short lyrics (xiaoling), while the second half is essentially all long tunes (changdiao), with the coloring growing increasingly intense. Moreover, the first half deliberately repeats certain ci tunes — for example, "Hudie Er" (Little Butterfly) appears four times, which precisely forms a latent structure that props up the first half, similar to a rondo form in music. In the second half, especially toward the end, the chosen tunes grow successively longer, and the alternation of level and oblique tones in the rhymes creates a certain rhythm, continuously releasing the energy accumulated by the rondo structure and pushing toward the climax. The overall structure here follows certain operatic methods. I'm currently working on writing the opera "Hamlet," which has probably had some influence on this.

Rhythm and climax are easier to understand from a musical perspective; those without much knowledge of music can only grasp them conceptually. If one were to choose a single art form to represent East and West respectively, poetry for the East and music for the West would be an excellent choice. Rhythm and climax are key themes in music, and these are precisely what the East has traditionally lacked. Listen to Chinese classical music — the free-tempo music of the guqin, for instance — while Indian and other Eastern music represents the other extreme of Eastern rhythm, but both differ from the Western concept of rhythm. As for climax, especially the structural climax of Western music, that is something Eastern art simply does not know. Conversely, the Eastern art of introspection and quiet contemplation is something Western art lacks. In these 49+0 pieces, I've attempted to integrate both aspects, but discussion at this level is already very difficult. For Eastern people, the structural, dramatic climax is not an innate quality but more of a conceptual import. The symphonies of Bruckner and Mahler are worth listening to — the first 49 pieces contain something similar, but the final piece 0 is different; it operates on another level entirely, to be analyzed another time.

I say all this not to claim how good I am — I have zero interest in that. Rather, I'm exploring a possible breakthrough for classical poetry. No matter how classical your writing feels now, or how you pour new wine into old bottles, you're still playing games on the same level. What I'm exploring here is a fusion of fragments from Eastern classical tradition with Western modern structural principles, which is why I've consistently emphasized the whole of 49+0. However, since not many people today are familiar with symphonic music, I don't know how to properly discuss the structural aspects, so I can only give a rough overview. As for the details, I'll discuss them another time.