The Literary Archive
Travel Poems
‘I am for extensive travelling and reading, even greater than man’s is my ambition’ Wang Zhenyi wrote in her poem Praise of Manly Woman, which is part of thirteen volumes of poetry, prose, prefaces and postscripts that comprise her literary archive, on top of her work in astronomy and mathematics. (see Peterson 2000, 342). As Yanning Wang has commented, Zhenyi lived for only twenty-nine years, but she spent half of her life traveling with her father all over China. Her travels played an essential role in her life and she wrote about them in her travel poems. (Wang 2014, 70)
A major source for studying Zhenyi’s travel poems is her extant poetry collection entitled Dengfengting chuji 德風亭初集 (The preliminary collection from Defeng Pavilion), in which about 30 percent of her poems are on journeys. (see Wang 2014, 70) This collection has now been digitized and is available on line at https://curiosity.lib.harvard.edu/chinese-rare-books/catalog/49-990073809840203941 . Apart from some poems that have been translated and included in some biographical and literary studies of her work (see Peterson 2000, Wang 2014) Zhenyi's extraordinary poetry collection has not been transated in English or in any other European language, so the translation of her poetry is a much anticipated project, a translation to come ...
I have traveled east to the Shanhai Pass, and west to the Lintong Pass. I passed Wu, Chu, Yan and Yue, covering at least tens of thousands of li. The mountains and rivers on the way were marvelous, enough to broaden my horizon. Therefore, when my personality became unrestrained, I did not realize it. When I wrote, how could I consciously think about robust and concise styles, and how could I have time to decide on the exquisite or the inferior? As for losing the grace of the inner quarters, I purposefully avoided a feminine style. . . . Alas, [the feminine style] adopts the mode of rhapsody but omits comparison, adopts the “Hymns” but ignores the “Songs” and the “Elegance,” and the Four Beginnings and the Six Principles are incomplete. I consider these serious flaws of the inner quarters and feel sorry precisely because I am not able to totally discard them.
(Zhenyi, Reply to Mrs. Hu Shenrong, in Defengting chuji, 4.9b–11a.
Spontaneously Written after Reading
the Record of the Huang Mountains
讀黃山志偶作
The Huang Mountains are famous throughout the world,
Their splendid beauty has achieved perfection.
Travelers from various places take a stroll in the mountains,
Bundling some food they hike for a thousand miles.
When climbing, it does not matter far or near,
When trekking, one is also joyful in heart.
Travellers either narrate their journey,
Or compose a poem to keep a record.
Such travel writings mostly
End up with pieces written for the occasions.
The special collections are too many,
By naming one good one, I miss a hundred.
If one inscribes their titles on stone,
Wind and rain will easily wear them away.
I’ve only heard of the Huang Mountains’ reputation,
And have not had a chance to tread on them with my light shoes.
In vain, I decide to visit them in my mind,
My mental wandering is inexhaustible.
I opened and read the Record of the Huang Mountains,
But felt as if I were only having a partial view.
Yet then I looked at a painting,
And got a better idea.
Fortunately there are texts there on the mountain top
That can serve as the history of the mountain clouds.
The tip of my brush is covered with cold mist,
In front of my eyes the colour of lavender is overwhelming.
The delicate feather crown unfurls itself,
Hanging in the sky, the colourful banners stand tall.
The illusory sea prods my mind to practice detachment,
The ancient pine trees line up in the cracks of the stones.
Inside the myriad solemn layers of the trees
I suspect is where a couple of immortals dwell.
Tired of reading the book, I get up and wander;
Have I achieved a fair understanding of these mountains?
How can I explore their depths to my heart’s content,
And one by one exhaust all that my tracks can cover?
The clouds that hand over the thirty-six peaks,
I will carry them back with me and study them more.
Zhenyi, Defengting chuji, 12.12b–13a, translated in Wang 2014, 24-26
Diagram of Women Providing for Husbands
提女众丈夫图
I recall my past journeys through mountains and seas,
And how swiftly I crossed rivers and climbed mountains.
Treading ten thousand miles and reading ten thousand volumes.
I once compared my ambition to a kind even stronger than a man’s.
To Lintong in the West and to Heishui in the East,
I thrilled at riding a horse to urge the carriage as a girl.
I also learned archery and equitation,
And was reluctant to ride a horse with make-up
Zhenyi, Defengting chuji, 12.20a–21a, translated in Wang 2014, 71
Written by Deng Taiyue
登泰岳作
The major mountain marks the land of Shandong,
The lofty mountain overlooks the extreme East.
Clouds in the valley are steaming myriad peaks,
The sun over the sea is bathing the three Daoist temples.
Numinous air is in the control of Heaven,
Divine root is in touch with Earth.
Tall and flat, the mountain belittles the whole world,
My image and the world, equally, are barely discernible.
Zhenyi, Defengting chuji, 10.10b–11a, translated in Wang 2014, 72
Transiting Tong Pass
So important is the doorway,
occupying the throat of a mountain
Looking down from the heaven,
The sun sees Yellow River streaming
Zhenyi, Defengting chuji, translated in Peterson 2000, 342
Apart from her admiration of the landscapes, the mountains and rivers she travelled through, Zhenyi got interested in people's lives and as Barbara Bennet Peterson has commented, her poems depict the hardships of working women, but also point to economic and social inequalities, as in the following verses:
A Poem of Eight Lines
Village is empty of cooking smoke,
Rich families let grains store decay;
In wormwood strewedpitiful starved bodies,
Greedy officialsyet push farm levying
Zhenyi, Defengting chuji, translated in Peterson 2000, 343
References
Peterson, Bennet, Barbara. 2000. ‘Wang Zhenyi’ in Notable Women Of China: Shang Dynasty to the Early Twentieth Century, edited by Barbara Bennett Petrson with He Hong Fei, Han Tie, Wang Ziyu and Zhang Guangyu, 341-346. New York: M. E. Sharp.
Wang Yanning. 2014. Reverie and Reality: Poetry on Travel by Late Imperial Chinese Women. New York: Lexington.