Wang Fu (Han dynasty)

Transcription

Clarity of thought is prior to expression To express yourself clearly you have to think clearly Of course it's different in speech and writing When you speak you haven't time to think You try your best to keep a clear head But you're given allowances: It's okay to repeat yourself It's okay to repeat the same point We're less tolerant of repetition in writing That's why writing requires organization and editing Let's discuss "narration" Narration is the art of story-telling It has several characteristics A narrative is the plot of a story A "plot" is how a story is told There are characters This isn't a science fiction class Science fiction may feature non-human characters like aliens Narratives also have themes Certain characters are chosen to advance the plot in order to express a certain theme In the story of the assassin Jing Ke the theme might be "righteous self-sacrifice" or overthrowing the tyrant ruler of Qin Something like that In any case, narratives have themes Narratives also have a "view-point" Authors decide how much the narrator knows To put it simpler there are omniscient narrators and limited narrators An omniscient narrator knows what characters are thinking This in reality is impossible Think about it Do you know what others are thinking? Even your family and loved ones? Do you really know what they think? It's not likely, is it? You can only guess But in fiction, the author can claim to know what characters think Fiction allows it but what about history? History does not It's impossible for historians to personally know the historical people or what they thought So historians write "objective" narratives but that doesn't mean history is objective Viewpoints can be objective but historians are prejudiced They may portray a historical person positively or negatively Prejudice is part of a historian's viewpoint These are all issues worth considering So narratives can be analyzed by examining plot, characters, theme and viewpoint In <i>Records of the Grand Historian</i> observe how Sima Qian portrays characters Then look at other sources Not just "Strategies of Yan" <i>Strategies of the Warring States</i> is the source for many of Sima Qian's characters But <i>Strategies</i> portrays Wei Wuji one of the Four Lords of the Warring States Nas a tyrant But Sima Qian used some other source Clearly he didn't use <i>Strategies</i> As many have pointed out Sima Qian wrote charitably about Wei Wuji Sima Qian really liked Wei Wuji Another example is Bo Yi Bo Yi is not in <i>Strategies</i> He lived before the Warring States era during the Western Zhou (1045-771 BC) So these characters are not in <i>Strategies</i> But some characters are in both histories You can compare the plots The historical personages are the same but maybe not the cast of characters Perhaps one source has more characters There are often discrepancies in the dramatis personae You can also compare characterization and the themes Earlier I mentioned viewpoint The viewpoint may still be objective but what about the historian's prejudice? Viewpoint includes a historian's prejudice his praise or censure Try analyzing a historical narrative Try analyzing works of literature Literature can be analyzed It isn't just for appreciation Compare Han Xin's biography and Xiang Yu's annals Xiang Yu's faults aren't in his chapter Sima Qian decided to put it elsewhere Han Xin's biography reveals Xiang Yu's soft-heartedness and indecisiveness Han Xin told Liu Bang so Han Xin knew Xiang Yu's fault and that's how he defeated Xiang Yu Sima Qian designed the narrative and arranged the plot carefully He arranged it so Xiang Yu was a nice person but we later learn his downfall elsewhere That's the art of editing That's the way you edit to turn the subject matter into a gripping piece of writing You'll soon learn how Myths often seem bizarre But it's only to humanists or humanistic rationalists In a "primitive" society myths may be completely natural In studying mythology, we should try to put aside our own "common sense" Some things may seem bizarre but maybe they made sense in an ancient world Maybe that was how people saw the world then Let's talk about mythical narratives The characters in myths are divine We'll talk about Kua Fu who chased the sun and the headless fighter Xing Tian Legends are less supernatural Legends feature heroes or beings with superhuman abilities like Houyi who shot the suns or Chang-e who ascended to the moon "Houyi" and "Chang'e" used to be myths as well but were rewritten as legends We'll discuss this later in our class Chinese writers liked to historicize myths The Chinese humanistic spirit doesn't accept fantasy If something is not humanly possible Chinese writers think it's "incredible" and rewrite it to make it more credible Characters There's only one character in this myth: Kua Fu There's also the sun he chases maybe that makes it two characters Pretty simple Myths have simple characters and plots It's like the seed of a story Kua Fu chased the sun to see who was faster Does the sun move fast or slow? We now know that the sun doesn't move It's the earth turning But the ancients believed the sun moved, because it rises and sets Kua Fu caught up with the sun No matter if the sun was fast or slow Kua Fu could keep up He was probably quite fast He caught the sun and felt very thirsty because it was very hot in the sun He wanted some water Water here is "yin" 飲 "He drank (yin) from the Yellow and Wei" In this line, "yin" is drank He started to drink from the rivers The rivers couldn't slake his thirst Absurd, right? How can one drink a river? Absurdity is not an issue in a myth Myths are fundamentally absurd If you insist on plausibility you're being absurd So myths are inherently absurd After draining the Yellow and Wei rivers Kua Fu went north towards the Great Marsh Some ask where this Great Marsh is and some suggest it's a sea At any rate, he was still thirsty so he headed north Perhaps he had chased the sun south and wanted to return north North of the Yellow and Wei rivers That much is clear But, he never made it to the marsh He died of thirst halfway But the narrative doesn't end here He "tossed his staff, which became a grove" This additional line makes a great difference It changed the theme If the story ended with Kua Fu dying halfway the theme would have been failure: Kua Fu chased the sun and failed But then Kua Fu tossed his staff before dying and his staff turned into a peach grove Now there's a vivid symbol The staff becomes a forest, the myth involves a metamorphosis He dies, but leaves behind a peach grove Let's take a closer look The story is written in short sentences very succinct Kua Fu moves quickly He catches the sun, feels thirsty drinks a pair of rivers, goes north and dies halfway He's hurried, always in a rush and he moves vast distances In myths, time is usually hard to track but space is clearly defined There's space in any narrative It has to take place somewhere, in a given society even dynasty But myths seldom feature dynasties they're temporally hard to place The plot is very concise Kua Fu chases the sun and catches up gets thirsty, drinks water but can't drink enough in time Then his staff turns into a peach orchard This is a myth about a posthumous deed that benefits later generations There might be several interpretations of the theme Because his staff turned into a peach grove it's not a story of a failed hero In death, Kua Fu benefits posterity by leaving behind a peach grove called the Deng Forest The blossoms are beautiful, the fruits juicy Later generations can enjoy the peaches and quench their thirst Kua Fu died hoping nobody would go thirty here Sheltering posterity may be a theme just not the main theme The main theme is conquering nature The sun and moon were the first mysteries to humans Why do they rise and set day after day in a regular pattern? What's the secret? Men wanted to comprehend nature to learn its secrets Or perhaps they sought light or eternity That's reasonable in a northern myth It's so cold there one would want to capture sunlight and bask in its warmth Perhaps the theme was time the pursuit of eternity? Human life is limited but we want to live forever The sun represents eternity It never dies and rises every day So to chase the sun is to pursue eternity This is another interpretation You can interpret the Kua Fu story in many ways