"The Flower Burial Song"
The flowers on the pavilion are flying all over the sky, and who can pity the red silk fragrance? The soft hairspring is tied to the floating spring pavilion, and the fallen catkins lightly touch the embroidered curtain.
The daughter in the boudoir cherishes the twilight of spring, full of sorrow and nowhere to complain; she hoe the flowers out of the embroidered curtain, and endures stepping on the fallen flowers to come and go.
Willow silk and elm pods will bloom from time to time, regardless of peach blossoms and plum blossoms. If peaches and plums can bloom again next year, who will be in my boudoir next year?
In March, the fragrant nest is first built, the swallows in the beams are so ruthless! Although you can peck at the gray hair next year, you won’t be able to enjoy it even if you leave the nest empty!
Three hundred and sixty days a year, the wind, the sword, the frost, the sword force each other; how long can the bright beauty last, and it is hard to find it once it wanders.
The flowers are easy to see but hard to find when they are gone. I worry about killing the flower buryer in front of the steps. I secretly shed tears when I hoe the flowers alone, and I can see traces of blood on the empty branches.
The cuckoo is speechless. It is dusk, and the hoe returns to cover the heavy door; the green lantern shines on the wall, and the man is sleeping for the first time, while the cold rain knocks on the window and the quilt is not warm.
It’s strange that things like this are doubly distressing, half pity for spring and half anger for spring; pity for spring comes and goes, anger and then goes away, and when it comes, there is nothing to say but not to hear.
The tragic song was played outside the court last night. Did you know it was the soul of the flower or the soul of the bird? The soul of a flower and the soul of a bird are always hard to retain, the bird is speechless and the flower is ashamed;
May I have wings today and fly with the flowers to the end of the sky. The end of the world! Where is the fragrant hill?
It is not like a bag of tricks to collect the beautiful bones, but a cup of pure soil to cover the wind; the essence comes and goes clean, and it is better than the filth sinking into the ditch.
You will be buried after you die now. I wonder when you will be buried. People who bury flowers today are laughing like idiots, but who do you know who they will bury next year?
Look at the flowers falling in spring, it is the time when the beauties die of old age; once the spring is gone, the beauties are old, and the flowers fall and people die without knowing it! Poetry Appreciation
"The Burial of Flowers" is the representative of all the lamentations of Lin Daiyu lamenting her life experience. It is also an important work by the author Cao Xueqin to shape this artistic image and express her character traits. Like "Elegance of Furong's Daughter", it is a text copied by the author with great effort. The style of this song imitates the style of the early Tang Dynasty. It is lyrically vivid and artistically very successful.
This poem is not simply sad and desolate, it still has an air of depression and injustice. "The willow silk and elm pods are young, regardless of the peach blossoms and Li Fei", which expresses resentment towards the harsh world and the warmth and coldness of human relationships; "Three hundred and sixty days a year, the wind, the sword, the frost and the sword force each other." Isn't this a reflection of the long-term persecution of her? An indictment of cold, hard reality? "May I have wings under my wings and fly with the flowers to the end of the sky. Where is the fragrant hill at the end of the sky? It is not like a brocade bag to collect the beautiful bones, but a cup of pure soil to cover the wind. The essence comes and goes clean, and it is better than the filth. "Quogou." It is the aloof character that is unwilling to be humiliated and tainted, and unwilling to bow its head when it is impossible to obtain freedom and happiness. These are where its ideological value lies.
Another value of this poem is that it provides us with important clues to explore the tragedy of Bao Dai written by Cao Xueqin. There is a comment in the Jiaxu version: "I read "The Song of Burial Flowers" again and again, and it was so sad and regretful that it made me forget my life experience. I raised my pen again and again, but could not write down the comment. A visitor said: "Mr. Treasure Lord, how can you write? "The words are double-circled, and the words are written by immortals. It is difficult to predict the meaning of Bian'er. I will wait for Brother Yu to comment later. 'Geez! The rest of them want to read "The Story of the Stone", so they stop writing and wait. ”
It is worth noting that the review points out that there is no way to criticize this poem without reading “Brother Yu’s Post-Articles”; the reviewer’s “stop writing and waiting” is also related to this poem The so-called "posterior text" undoubtedly refers to the text written in the second half of the lost manuscript about Daiyu's death. If this poem only uses falling flowers to symbolize the fate of a beauty, there is no need for it. You have to wait for the following text; only when the poems contain non-general remarks, and most of them are closely related to the subsequent plot of Daiyu's death, then it is necessary to emphasize that after reading the following text, you should go back and deepen the understanding. Understanding of this poem.
It can be seen that "Yan of Burial Flowers" is actually a prophecy written by Lin Daiyu. It has been proved in the quatrains of "Dream of Red Mansions". The poem says: "It is like a prophecy to bury a flower, but it is not as good as a prophecy to come true." Only those who know the plot of Daiyu's death written by the author can say this.
In the past, we thought that Mingyi might not be able to read the whole novel like Zhiyan, but now it seems that he can read it. It is very possible that I have read the manuscript of the second half, or at least heard people in the author's circle talk about the main plot of the second half in more detail. If we say, the later events are mentioned in the Mingyi quatrain. Such words as "spring dreams scattered like smoke" and "the stone returned to the mountain with no spiritual energy" can also be known by speculation; then, the description of "the king and grandson is thin and jagged" about the poverty of King Bao, and the artificiality in his heart caused by his conviction The poems such as "Ashamed of Shi Jilun" when he died of misfortune and anger can no longer be imagined.
The same is true for the last two sentences of the poem quoted above: Mingyi said, He really hoped that the soul-reviving incense could bring Daiyu back to life, let Bao and Dai become lovers, and reconnect the red silk rope held by the old man under the moon that had been severed.
Just imagine, as long as "Shen Min" can be revived, "Red Silk" can also be continued. This is so different from the later writers who imagined that the cause of Bao and Dai's tragedy was the involuntary marriage! If everything is as written in the sequel compiled by Cheng Weiyuan and Gao E, then Baoyu already belongs to another person. What is the use of "sinking" Daiyu? Could it be that "renewing the red silk" is to make her the second concubine?
The last few sentences of this poem are repeated several times in the book, with special emphasis, and even parrots are used to imitate poems. also mentioned. It can be seen that the day when the beauty dies of old age is indeed when the spring flowers fall, and it is not an empty comparison. At the same time, it is said here that "I don't know who he will be buried in", and it is said before that "who will pity her when her fragrance fades", "it is hard to find her once she wanders", etc., then Daiyu also died in a very miserable and lonely death like Qingwen. There is no doubt that in the situation. At that time, it was not that everyone was busy organizing a happy event for Baoyu and therefore had no time to take care of it. On the contrary, both Baoyu and Sister Feng were living abroad to avoid disaster. Those were the days when "when a family dies, no one cares about relatives" and "everyone has to find his own family." , in the poem "willow silk and elm pods are fragrant, regardless of peach blossoms and plum blossoms" may have this meaning.
"In March, the fragrant nest has been built, and the swallows in the beams are too ruthless. Although the flowers of the next year can be pecked, the empty nests in the beams will fall if people go to them." These sentences are originally in the realm of what can be understood and what cannot be understood. It is difficult to understand the meaning of pity for falling flowers and resentment for the return of swallows. Now, if we look at the prophecies, it will be more clear. Probably in the spring, Baodai's marriage was basically decided, that is to say, "the fragrant nest has been built". However, in the autumn, something happened, just like the swallows flying ruthlessly from the beams, Baoyu was forced to run away from home. . Therefore, she lamented that "the souls of flowers and birds are always hard to keep", and then left with the fantasy that she could "give birth to two wings under her body". She cried sadly day and night, and finally "all tears came to bear".
In this way, "Flowers fall and people perish without knowing it." If "flowers fall" is compared to Daiyu, and "people perish" (people go into exile) is used to describe Baoyu, it is completely consistent. Whenever Baoyu encounters a so-called "ugly misfortune", someone else will suffer the same misfortune. First there was Jinchuaner, then Qingwen, and finally Daiyu was sealed in turn. Therefore, there is a pun in the poem that "the nature is originally clean and comes and goes, it is better than the dirty water sinking into the ditch", which can be used to express and show integrity. "Farewell to the autumn wind and another year", Baoyu returned to Jia's house in the next autumn, but what he saw was that the Yihong Courtyard was "red, thin and green" (Zhi's review), and the Xiaoxiang Pavilion was even more "fallen leaves rustling, and the cold marriage was deserted". (Zhi Ping) shows a desolate scene. Daiyu's boudoir is the same as Baoyu's Jiangyunxuan, with only "spider silk covered with carved beams" (Zhi Ping refers to Bao Dai's residence). Although Baochai is still there, and in the future. It also became his "golden marriage", but how could this make up for the huge mental pain caused when he "mourned his ugly son"? "Although you can peck at the gray hair next year, it won't make you fall into an empty nest!" Isn't that what it means? These are just some details that can be confirmed from the clues mentioned in the fat review, and not all of them may be accurate. However, this poem must correspond to the plot of Bao Dai's tragedy, which is probably not a subjective assumption; in fact, there are more poems that "seem to come true", such as Daiyu's "Farewell between Generations? A Stormy Evening in the Autumn Window" and "Peach Blossom" "Xing" also has this quality. The former seems to unfortunately describe the scene of her later farewell to Baoyu, while the latter seems to be a pre-portrait of her ending of "dying in tears" (Zhi Ping).
Some people say that "Ode to the Burial Flowers" was "derived" from two poems by Tang Yin ("A Dream of Red Mansions"). Of course poetry can be inherited and used for reference, but the relationship between the "source" and "flow" of literary and artistic creation should not be reversed. When it comes to the use of previous works in terms of certain words, sentences, artistic conception and style in "The Song of Burial Flowers", there is no need to look for it in Ming Dynasty collections. In the early Tang Dynasty, Liu Xiyi's "Sorrowful Pulsatilla" and other well-known poems such as "the color of the flowers will change this year, who will be there next year when they bloom again" and "the flowers are similar every year, but the people are different every year" are not enough to borrow. Take advantage? Even the flower burial plot does not necessarily follow Tang Yin's story of "packing the peonies in a brocade bag and burying them on the east side of the medicine column". The author's grandfather Cao Yin's "Mei Pavilion Poetry Notes" also has "a hundred years of solitary burial". Isn't the poem "Peach Blossom" enough to inspire his ideas? But these are all "flows" and are just uses. They neither express the main spirit of the poem nor can they replace the author's creation derived from real life. What's more, as mentioned before, the author's uncanny craftsmanship in this poem does not lie in the seemingly sentimental and lingering words about hurting spring and cherishing flowers.
Of course, the negative and decadent emotions in "The Burial of Flowers" are also extremely strong and cannot be ignored. It has had a negative impact on readers who lack analytical thinking skills. Although this kind of emotion is artistically completely consistent with the ideological and character formed by the environment and status of Lin Daiyu, it is revealed because the author consciously expresses his feelings about his life experience to a certain extent through the mouth of the character he is attracted to. revealed the weakness of his own thinking. We sympathize with Lin Daiyu, but at the same time we also see that this sentimental aristocratic lady is very fragile in her thoughts and feelings.
Reference: Chapter 27 of A Dream of Red Mansions