This article first appeared in Yutai New Poems, entitled Ancient Poems, and was included in Collection of Arts, Volume 32, People's Boudoir, also known as Ancient Poems. Taiping Yulan is quoted as an ancient poem in two places with different names. The 983 volume "Xiangbu Yiwu" is quoted as an ancient poem, and the 52 1 volume "Tribe" is quoted as an ancient Yuefu poem. Guo Maoqian's Yuefu Poetry Collection does not accept this poem. The Selected Poems of Ancient Poetry generally classified it as ancient poetry, not Yuefu. However, some editors of Taiping Yulan called it Ancient Yuefu, which is similar to Yuefu in system and style, so it might as well coexist.
Picking weeds on the mountain reproduces the process of a family marriage and the shadow left in the hearts of the parties through a short conversation between the abandoned wife and her dead husband. In the feudal society with the husband's right as the key link, it is common for men to divorce their wives. There was a saying in the Han Dynasty that "it is easy to make friends, but it is also easy to marry a rich wife". In the Tang Dynasty, there was also a record that "Tian She's son received ten kinds of welcome wheat and wanted to be a better wife", which proved that this was a long-standing social problem. This poem makes a person who likes the new and hates the old reflect on his behavior without regrets, which is obviously a reflection of life experience on the characters. It provides more life lessons than accusing the wife of divorce itself. So as to leave readers with deeper thoughts, which also had positive social significance at that time.
The subject of the first three sentences and the questioner of the fourth sentence are abandoned wives. She met her ex-husband on the road. She asked directly, "How is your new wife?" This problem contains very complicated feelings, including doubts that newlyweds can bring more happiness to their wives, doubts that they are full of confidence in themselves, and sadness and grievances about being abandoned.
The following twelve sentences are all my late husband's answers. Our understanding is slightly different from the main anthology popular today. The popular view is that the phrase "new people enter from the door, so old people walk from the pavilion" is interrupted by the abandoned wife in the middle of the old husband's answer, and it is considered that reading works in this way is tortuous and interesting. Of course, as an understanding, it makes sense. However, judging from the narrative structure of the works, it seems strange and complicated to suddenly insert another person's short sentence into one person's answer like this, which is not in harmony with the plain narrative style in Han Yuefu's narrative poems and is rare in Han Yuefu. So we think it is more appropriate to take the next twelve poems as a complete answer to my late husband.
Therefore, the husband did not simply answer the question of the deceased woman, but compared the deceased woman with the bride, not only introduced the bride clearly, but also praised the deceased woman skillfully. He said first: although the bride is not bad, she is not as good as her old friend; Her appearance is similar to yours, but her handiwork is not as clever as yours. In feudal society, "women's virtue, women's words, women's appearance and women's virtue" are called the "four virtues" of being a woman, which is an important standard to measure a woman's quality. Among them, virtue and words focus on people's temperament and morality, while tolerance and merit refer to people's appearance and working ability. This poem omits two items: virtue and words, and only makes a comparison between ability and merit, which reflects that the lower class pay more attention to reality in choosing a spouse. The bride's handiwork is not as good as that of the old woman, and her appearance is not as good as that of the old woman. Her husband is dissatisfied with his life after remarriage and has some kind of apology on his conscience. After making the above comparison, he returned to the scene of that year by the way. "Newcomers enter from the door, so old people come from the cabinet." It means: now it seems that the advantages and disadvantages of the two are more obvious, but in those years, they married the bride and sent the old woman away. There is obvious self-regret in the discourse. Then, he picked up the previous conversation again and compared the handiwork of the bride and the deceased with their images. The yellow silk woven by the bride is thick and slow; Therefore, the woman weaves the white scroll warp quickly; Yellow silk is not as good as white silk, and newcomers are not as good as old friends. The husband's above idea is not a whim after seeing his old woman, but a conclusion he has drawn through repeated comparisons in his life. Living with this regret in life, his inner loss and depression can be imagined. This is the punishment of life for those who don't know how to cherish happiness.
This poem consists of three parts: the meeting of a dead woman and her dead husband, questions and answers. This structure shows the artistic characteristics of the narrative of Han Yuefu in a smooth and progressive time sequence. The content of the question and answer involves a marriage change in their previous lives, which has the nature of memories and makes time extend in the direction of order. The whole poem closely links past lives, the fate of the characters. This idea makes the work expand the artistic capacity, while maintaining the simplicity of the text structure and the economy of pen and ink, which is obviously ingenious.
Implicit feelings are another feature of this poem. On the surface, my wife and husband are just talking about a past marriage, with a calm mind and an objective attitude. In fact, it is not difficult to feel the waves in their hearts by savoring the works carefully. When the old woman met her old husband, she knelt down and asked about the new man. Doesn't that mean she's obsessed with that abandoned thing? The contrast between my husband's old and new women reflects his depressed mood and unspeakable heart music after remarriage. In a sense, his praise for the old woman is a kind of compensation for her feelings and a kind of self-blame for her behavior.
In addition, the poet draws the difference between "weaving" and "weaving element" from "different hands and claws", and draws the conclusion that "new people are not as good as old people" from the difference between "weaving" and "weaving element". The metaphor is vivid and vivid, which makes this poem have the flavor of folk songs.