"Thousands of sailboats passed by the side of the sunken ship, and thousands of spring trees passed in front of the diseased trees." This poem means that there are still thousands of sailboats passing by the capsized ship; there are also thousands of spring trees in front of the withered trees. The trees are thriving.
Original text:
Bashan Chushui is a desolate place, abandoned for twenty-three years.
Nostalgically reciting the poems on the flute in the air, and when I go to the countryside to read it, I feel like a dead person.
Thousands of sails pass by the side of the sunken boat, and thousands of trees spring in front of the diseased trees.
Listen to a song of Junge today, and let me have a glass of wine for the time being.
Translation:
Being relegated to desolate areas like Bashan and Chushui, he spent twenty-three years in decline.
Reciting the poem Wen Di in vain in memory of old friends, returning from exile for a long time and feeling that it is no longer the same scene as in the past.
Thousands of sailboats are still passing by the capsized ship; in front of the withered trees, there are thousands of thriving trees.
I listened to the poem you recited for me today, so let me cheer myself up with this glass of wine.
Notes:
1. Remuneration: thank you, reward for reply, here it means to answer with a poem. Give answers with poetry.
2. Lotte: refers to Bai Juyi, whose courtesy name is Lotte.
3. See the gift: give it to (me).
4. Bashan Chushui: refers to the area of ??Sichuan, Hunan and Hubei. In ancient times, eastern Sichuan belonged to the Ba State, and northern Hunan and Hubei belonged to the Chu State. After Liu Yuxi was demoted, he moved to remote areas such as Langzhou, Lianzhou, Kuizhou, and Hezhou. Here, "Bashan Chushui" is used to refer to these places in general.
5. Twenty-three years: From the first year of Yongzhen reign of Emperor Shunzong of Tang Dynasty (805), Liu Yuxi was demoted to the governor of Lianzhou, to the second year of Baoli reign (826), when he was summoned in winter, about 22 years. Because the place of demotion was far away from Beijing, he could not actually return to the capital until the second year, so it was said to be 23 years.
6. Abandonment: Refers to the poet himself who was relegated. Place: place. Abandoned: relegated (zhé).
7. Nostalgia: Miss old friends.
8. Yin: chant.
9. Wen Di Fu: refers to "Si Jiu Fu" by Xiang Xiu of the Western Jin Dynasty. In the late Cao Wei Dynasty of the Three Kingdoms, Xiang Xiu's friends Ji Kang and Lu An were killed because they were dissatisfied with the Sima family's usurpation of power. Later, Xiang Xiu passed by Ji Kang and Lu An's old residence and heard his neighbors playing the flute. He couldn't help but feel sad, so he wrote "Reminiscence of the Past". The preface says: I passed by Ji Kang's former residence, so I wrote this poem in memory of him. Liu Yuxi borrowed this allusion to commemorate the deceased Wang Shuwen, Liu Zongyuan and others.
10. Arrive: Arrive.
11. Translation: similar. Translate: adverb, instead.
12. Lanke people: refers to Wang Zhi, a person from Jin Dynasty. According to legend, Wang Zhi, a native of Jin, went up the mountain to chop wood. He saw two boys playing chess and stopped to watch. By the time the chess game is over, the ax handle (Ke) in his hand has rotted away. When I returned to the village, I realized that a hundred years had passed. All his contemporaries have died. The author uses this allusion to express his emotions after being demoted for 23 years. Liu Yuxi also used this story to express the vicissitudes of the world, the changes in people's affairs, and the feeling of returning to his hometown in his old age as if he had been separated from another world.
13. Sunken boat: This is the poet comparing himself to a sunken boat and a diseased tree.
14. Side: next to.
15. Song Yi: Refers to Bai Juyi's "Drunken Gift to the Twenty-Eight Envoy Liu".
16. Long (zhǎng) spirit: cheer up. Long: growth, cheer up.
Appreciation:
"Rewarding Lotte Seeing Gifts at the First Banquet in Yangzhou" shows his open-minded mind about the changes in world affairs and the ups and downs of officials, and expresses the poet's firm belief and optimism. , and at the same time it also implies philosophy, indicating that new things will inevitably replace old things.
The first couplet of the poem shows the author's extraordinary lyrical talent. Liu Yuxi was persecuted for his active participation in the political reform movement led by Wang Shuwen of Shunzong Dynasty. Under the joint counterattack of the eunuchs and vassal towns, Shunzong gave way to Xianzong, Wang Shuwen was killed, and Liu Yuxi and others were demoted. He was first demoted to Langzhou (today's Changde, Hunan), then to Lianzhou (today's Lianxian, Guangdong), transferred to Kuizhou (today's Fengjie, Chongqing), and Hezhou (today's Hexian, Anhui), without leaving his exile. Langzhou was a Chu region during the Warring States Period, and Kuizhou was a Bajun region during the Qin and Han Dynasties. The Chu region had lots of water, while Bajun was mountainous. "Bashan Chushui" generally refers to a degraded region. Liu Yuxi did not directly express his strong injustice of being demoted for a long time because of his innocence. Instead, he used emotionally charged words such as "desolately" and "abandoned" to allow readers to understand and sympathize with the author's painful experience of being exiled for a long time. Feeling the poet's long-suppressed anger has strong artistic appeal.
In the poem's jawline couplet, Liu Yuxi uses two allusions. The first is "Wen Di Fu", which refers to "Si Jiu Fu" by Xiang Xiu in the late Cao Wei Dynasty. Xiang Xiu was good friends with Ji Kang and Lu An. Ji Kang and Lu An were killed by the Sima family. When Xiang Xiu passed by their former residence, he heard his neighbor playing the flute. The sound was "generous" and passionate. Xiang Xiu sighed at the sound. He wrote "Reminiscence of the Past" to express his memory of Ji Kang and Lu An. The other is "Lan Ke". According to "Shu Yi Ji", Wang Zhi of Jin Dynasty went into the mountain to chop firewood and saw two boys playing chess. When he watched the chess game to the end, he found that the "Ke" (the wooden handle of the axe) in his hand had already Decayed. Wang Zhi went down the mountain and returned to the village, only to realize that a hundred years had passed and all his contemporaries were dead. The sentence "Nostalgia" expresses the poet's condolences to his comrade Wang Shuwen who was killed, and the sentence "Going to Hometown" expresses the poet's lament about the passage of time and the changes in personnel. The allusion is appropriate and the emotion is deep. "Xiang" refers to Luoyang. One book is called "County", which refers to Yangzhou.
Yangzhou was the seat of Huainan Jiedushi at that time, and Hezhou was affiliated to Huainan Road.
There are two lines in Bai Juyi's poem "Looking up at the scenery makes you feel lonely, and all the officials in the dynasty are wasted", which means that all the people of your generation have been promoted, but you are the only one who is wasting away in loneliness in a desolate place. When he was young, Liu Yuxi was quite unhappy. Regarding this, Liu Yuxi wrote in his poem: "Thousands of sails are passing by the side of the sunken boat, and thousands of spring trees are in front of the diseased trees." Liu Yuxi used the sunken boat and diseased trees as metaphors for himself. Although he felt melancholy, he was also quite optimistic. On the side of the sunken boat, there are thousands of sails racing; in front of the diseased tree, all trees are in spring. He translated these two sentences from Bai's poem, and instead comforted Bai Juyi not to be sad about his loneliness and wasted time, and showed an open-minded mind about the changes in world affairs and the ups and downs of officials. The poetic meaning of these two lines echoes Bai's poems "There is nothing to do when life is overwhelming" and "Yizhihe is ruined by talent and fame", but their ideological realm is higher than Bai's poems, and their meaning is much deeper. Twenty-three years of relegated life did not make him depressed. Just as he wrote in another poem: "Mo Daosangyu night, the sky is still full of clouds." His diseased tree still needs to regain its spirit and welcome the spring. Because these two lines of poetry are vivid and vivid, they are still often quoted and given new meanings, indicating that new things will inevitably replace old things.
Just because the couplet "Sinking Boat" suddenly became popular, and changed the sad and low mood in the front, the last couplet went down, writing: "Today I listen to a song of Junge, and I will hold my cup for a while. Drinking makes you energetic." This clarifies the meaning of Bai Juyi's question. The poets did not remain depressed. They comforted and encouraged each other with a change of writing. He has not completely lost faith in life. Although the poem contains deep emotions, the feeling when reading it is not depressing, but on the contrary, uplifting.
Liu Yuxi used a layer-by-layer technique in this poem. The first couplet, the first level of the poem, first writes about his own experience of being demoted for a long time despite being innocent, setting an angry tone for the whole poem. The jaw couplet, the second layer of the poem, further deepens the anger through the mourning of the victimized comrades and the scene when he returned to his hometown and felt like he was a world away. The neck couplet, the third layer of the poem, takes a step forward and contrasts his own decline with the upstart's rise to power. The poet's self-motivating emotions reach their peak. The last couplet, the fourth level of the poem, takes a sharp turn, indicating that we are not negative and discouraged, but should cheer up, be proactive, re-enter life, and end with self-encouragement. Deep in depth, concise and profound. Angry but not superficial, emotional but not depressed, melancholy but not decadent, it can be called Liu Yuxi's representative work. Liu Yuxi's perseverance and perseverance in facing dangers in this poem have greatly inspired and encouraged future generations, so it has been recited and praised by both ancient and modern people.
Creative background:
This poem was written in the second year of Baoli (826 AD) by Emperor Jingzong of the Tang Dynasty. Liu Yuxi returned to Luoyang after serving as the governor of Hezhou. At the same time, Bai Juyi returned to Luoyang from Suzhou. When they first met in Yangzhou, Bai Juyi wrote a poem and presented it to Liu Yuxi at the banquet. Liu Yuxi wrote this poem in reply.
Liu Yuxi loved to play Go since he was a child, and he was very close to Wang Shuwen, the chess master who taught Prince Dezong of Tang Dynasty to play chess. After the prince became emperor, his teacher Wang Shuwen formed a cabinet to govern, so he promoted his chess friend Liu Yuxi to the position of censor. Later, after the political reform of Wang Shuwen Group failed, Liu Yuxi was demoted to another place as an official, and was recalled to Beijing in the second year of Baoli (826 AD). Passing through Yangzhou in winter, he met Bai Juyi, who was also demoted. Bai Juyi wrote a poem at the banquet, "A Drunken Gift to Liu Twenty-eight Envoys" as a gift to him: "Bring me a glass of wine and drink, and sing with you on the plate with chopsticks. The poem says that the hands of the country are just for you, and the life is heavy on the head. No matter what. The scenery is lonely, and the official position in the Manchu Dynasty has been wasted. He has lost his talent and lost too much in twenty-three years." In the poem, Bai Juyi expressed his sympathy and injustice for Liu Yuxi's demotion. So Liu Yuxi wrote this poem "Reward Lotte at the First Banquet in Yangzhou" as a gift to Bai Juyi.
About the author:
Liu Yuxi (772-842), courtesy name Mengde, Han nationality, a native of Pengcheng (now Xuzhou) in the Tang Dynasty of China, native of Luoyang, a writer and philosopher of the Tang Dynasty , claimed to be a descendant of King Jing of Shanzhong Mountain in Hanzhong, served as a supervisory censor, and was a member of Wang Shuwen's political reform group. A famous poet in the middle and late Tang Dynasty, he was known as the "Poetry Hero". His family is a scholarly family with Confucianism passed down from generation to generation. He advocated political innovation and was one of the central figures in the political innovation activities of Wang Shuwen School. Later, Yongzhen's reform failed and he was demoted to Sima of Langzhou (now Changde, Hunan). According to Mr. Zhou Xinguo, a historian and collector in Changde, Hunan, Liu Yuxi was demoted to Sima of Langzhou and wrote the famous "Spring View of Han Shou City" during his demotion.