one
At the end of Jiashen's year, he took the opportunity of a friend's invitation to give lectures in Jinan and visited Baotu Spring Park. There is a memorial hall for Li Qingzhao in the park, located in the east of Baotu Quandong. Previously, some people thought that this memorial hall was the former residence of Li Qingzhao and made a lot of noise about it. It is based on a poem "Liu Xuquan visits Li Yian's former residence" by Tian Wen, who served as the Minister of Household Transfer in the early Qing Dynasty. Six lines of the poem:
Jumping in the waves and splashing guests' clothes, playing the rippling road back to the pond;
In the old days of Qingzhao, there were poplar trees hanging outside the door;
The sand bird flew alone and headed toward the continent alone.
Before this poem, there was no record of Li Qingzhao's former residence being here. After this poem, many good people followed in Tian Wen's footsteps and came here to look for Yi'an's remains. Those who seek victory are blameless, but spreading lies is not a good thing. Mr. Yu Zhonghang wrote a special article questioning and denying the former residence theory, which is well-founded. The old house said that he would go to bed. This former residence of Li Qingzhao, built in the Qing Dynasty, was renamed the Memorial Hall. Li Qingzhao was from Jinan. It was a wise move by the local government to keep a memorial hall for him on the side of Baotu Spring to commemorate his great achievements.
The memorial hall is a courtyard-style building. I was wandering around it at dusk. The weather in the Jiashen Year was a bit abnormal. The summer was so hot that several cities in the north, such as Xi'an and Beijing, became furnaces. The winter was extremely cold, and cities in the south, such as Changsha and Guiyang, experienced heavy snowfall. The autumn between winter and summer is also much longer than in previous years. I arrived in Jinan after the great cold, but the scene of late autumn remains everywhere. The willows in this memorial hall turn from yellow to green; the spring water in front of the museum gushes like summer. What's more, the soft and clear evening mist gives people a poetic state of indifference and tranquility. The scene stirred up emotion, and Li Qingzhao's words came to my mind: "Flowers float and water flows, a kind of lovesickness, and two places of sorrow. There is no way to eliminate this feeling, so I lower my brows, but it is in my heart."
This is the second half of Li Qingzhao's early work "One Cut Plum", which expresses the resentment of a young woman who is most suitable for pregnant women. Although it is leisure and sorrow, it is because I think leisure and sorrow should be the best nutrition for all female poets. But this Li Qingzhao fell into the deepest and greatest "true sorrow" because he was obsessed with the pain of his family and country in his later years. He is lonely and haggard. There are thousands of idle sorrows, but true sorrow is like poison. Just a drop of it is enough to make it disappear.
two
Li Qingzhao was born into a family of officials. In today's terms, he was a "son of high-ranking cadres." His father Li Gefei's official position was Minister of Rites, which is equivalent to today's deputy minister level. Father-in-law Zhao Tingzhi even reached the position of prime minister. Her husband, Zhao Mingcheng, was born as a college student, and later became an official. His last position was as the prefect of Jiangning. Although his rank is not as high as his father's, he is still among the senior officials. In Chinese history, "children of high-ranking officials" is almost synonymous with dandy, and the so-called peaceful and prosperous times are all filled with the corrupt atmosphere of indulgence and enjoyment. This seems to be unchangeable even today in the 21st century. The luxurious life of the rulers encouraged the whole society to live in a state of dissipation and extravagance. In this situation, few people would think that their good times would not last long, let alone believe that all their dreams are in danger of being subverted.
Let’s talk about Empress Li of the Southern Tang Dynasty. When he was in the enjoyment of “not knowing that he was a guest in his dream, he was greedy for pleasure for a while”, he never thought that his subsequent ending would be “the day he resigned from the temple in a hurry. Two lines of clear tears were directed at the palace maid."
The Huizong era of the Northern Song Dynasty was a watershed in the Zhao family's transition from prosperity to decline. More than a hundred years ago, under the rule of six emperors, it could be said that "the peace lasted for a long time, and there were many people. The boy with a bun in his bun was good at singing and dancing; the gray old man did not know how to fight." Zhao Mingcheng and Li Qingzhao lived there Born and raised in such an environment of singing and dancing. However, since the era of Song Shenzong, a profound social crisis has actually occurred. Wang Anshi's reforms caused a dispute between the old and new factions among the civil servants of the imperial court. During the reigns of Zhezong and Huizong, they reached the point of incompatibility between water and fire. Li Gefei was a scholar of Su Dongpo's family and was included in the Yuanyou Party. He was demoted after Cai Jing came to power. Although Zhao Tingzhi was a member of the New Party and ranked as the right prime minister, he was eventually dismissed from office because he offended Cai Jing and was framed after his death. The political grievances of their fathers will undoubtedly leave psychological trauma and frustrations in life for Zhao and Li. But the ups and downs at this time have not yet made them truly appreciate the dangers and difficulties of the world. Therefore, they can still maintain their human dignity.
What is worthy of recognition is that although Li Qingzhao and Zhao Mingcheng were both born into official families, they were not dandy at all. Historical records record that "the Zhao and Li people were cold and poor." I understand that although the Zhao and Li families are high-ranking officials, they are not wealthy families. Both Zhao Tingzhi and Li Gefei have biographies in the "History of the Song Dynasty". Neither of them is known for corruption, but they have published articles. Li Gefei's "Luoyang Famous Gardens" is still praised by people today. It is said that Li Gefei's wife, Li Qingzhao's biological mother Wang, was the granddaughter of the writer Wang Gongchen and was also good at writing. Born in such a family, Li Qingzhao was deeply influenced by the morning and evening of poetry and the spring and autumn of books. Her life as a girl is leisurely and a bit monotonous. The only thing she can do is probably have a child. Please read her "Red Lips":
Stop playing on the swing and get up to straighten your slender hands. The dew is thick, the flowers are thin, the sweat is thin and the clothes are light. Seeing guests coming, gold hairpins slip out of socks. He walked away shyly, leaned against the door and looked back, sniffing the green plums.
The vivid image of a pregnant girl emerges on the page, shy yet cheerful, lively and arrogant. This kind of taste, this kind of mentality, this kind of life style can only occur in scholarly families who become officials.
According to historical records, the early life of Zhao and Li couple did not seem to be wealthy. When the two got married, Zhao Mingcheng was still a student and usually lived on campus. When he came back to reunite with Li Qingzhao, he would first go to a pawn shop to pawn one or two pieces of clothing in exchange for a few copper coins, and then go to a second-hand bookshop in Bianjing City to buy some rubbings of ancient stele and come back to admire them with Li Qingzhao. Influenced by his father, Zhao Mingcheng likes antiques and also studies epigraphy. He later became a famous epigraphy researcher in the Song Dynasty, and his book "Inscriptions on Epigraphy" was published in the world.
When searching for clothes and rubbings, it shows the pursuit of this young couple. They are close to poetry and books but neglect the sensuality of dogs and horses. This pursuit lasted throughout their lives. Li Qingzhao later became the prefect's wife and rarely wore jewelry. Most of Zhao Mingcheng's salary was used to search for gold and stones. As a result, their reputation was passed down to future generations, and they also suffered an unexpected blow.
three
In 1125 AD, which was the seventh year of Xuanhe in Huizong's reign, the Jin soldiers launched a large-scale attack on the Song Dynasty and captured Bianjing the following year. Emperors Hui and Qin were captured. The Zhao and Song regime had no choice but to move southward in a hurry. In 1127, Emperor Gaozong moved the capital to Jiankang, which is today's Hangzhou. This year, Li Qingzhao was 44 years old. She set off from Qingzhou and went south to meet Zhao Mingcheng, who was attending the funeral of his mother in advance, in Jinling. In 1128, Zhao Mingcheng was appointed as the prefect of Jiangning and died in office a year later. At this time, Li Qingzhao was 46 years old.
When political power passed, mountains and rivers changed color. At this time, after experiencing wars and chaos, literati's poems were often gloomy and confused. Before Li Qingzhao, there was Du Fu who was devastated in the Anshi Rebellion, and there was Li Yu who lost his country; after that, there was Zhao Mengfu who was demoted to the Yuan Dynasty, and there was Wu Weiye who was forced to become an official in the Qing Dynasty. If you look at their poems written before and after the turmoil, you can understand the decline of life and the sorrow of leaving the country.
Let’s take a look at Li Qingzhao’s last poem before going south:
When the night comes, I am too drunk to remove my makeup, and the calyx of the plum tree is inserted into the broken branches. When you wake up from wine, you will break your spring sleep, and your dream will never come back. People cherish it, the moon lingers, and the green curtain hangs down. The remaining stamens are removed, the remaining fragrance is twisted, and the time is gained.
Let’s look at her first poem after moving to the south, “Die Lian Hua”:
I am tired of the eternal night and have little joy. Dream of Chang'an in the sky, recognize the road of Chang'an. In order to report the good spring scenery this year, it is better to take pictures of the flowers and the moonlight. Although the cups and plates are casual, the wine is delicious and the plums are sour, just like a person's embrace. Don't arrange flowers when you're drunk, don't laugh when you're drunk. Spring is as pitiful as a person getting old.
Although these two poems are both Li Qingzhao's usual cool and charming, they are equally sentimental and pathos. But it is not difficult to see that the previous poem is about the resentment of the woman. The last poem already hides the pain of nostalgia that cannot be dismissed. Normally Li Qingzhao should be happy when she reunited with her husband after a long absence and reunited with relatives and friends. However, she said that she "is tired of having little joy all night long, dreaming of Chang'an in vain, and recognizing the road to Chang'an." The homesickness caused by losing her country, Then her "singing and swallowing words" began to have a bit of historical confusion.
There were two famous patriotic poets in the Southern Song Dynasty: Lu You and Xin Qiji. They can be said to have captured the pain of losing their country to the extreme. However, neither of these two poets saw with their own eyes the prosperity of Bianjing in the Northern Song Dynasty. Lu You was born in 1125, when the Jin soldiers launched a massive attack on the Song Dynasty. At this time, Li Qingzhao was already 42 years old. Xin Qiji was not born until 1140, 15 years later in Shaoxing, when Li Qingzhao was 57 years old.
The eccentric Southern Song Dynasty did not learn from the hedonistic lessons of the late Northern Song Dynasty, and its corruption was even worse. There is even a sad poem like "Beyond the mountains, there are towers outside the mountains, the West Lake's singing and dancing are closed, the warm wind makes tourists drunk, and Hangzhou is called Bianzhou". Lu and Xin were two great men in the small court of the Southern Song Dynasty. They took it as their mission to recover the country and rebuild Jin'ou. It is a pity that Zhao and Song Dynasty moved south and did not want to return to the north; the ignorant king sat in the court and the sycophants were in charge of the government. How can a poet's pen truly become a cavalry crossing a river or a spear charging into battle?
It should be said that the pain of leaving the country for Li Qingzhao was more tragic than that of Lu You and Xin Qiji. After all, she grew up in Bianliang City, the capital of the Northern Song Dynasty. Under the carriage of a brocade embroidered boudoir, she was used to the life of the proud people who sang and sang every night. After crossing the Huaihe River, Hangzhou's life and dreams were even better than those in Bianzhou. The noble officials were "full and warm and lustful," while the poor people were "hungry and cold, and their hearts were stolen." Comparing the two, how could Li Qingzhao not fall into despair.
In the second year of his journey to the south, Li Qingzhao's husband Zhao Mingcheng died of illness. From then on, the loneliness of a broken country and a disabled family accompanied this extremely intelligent female poet until she died of old age. Since she left Qingzhou and went south to Hangzhou in 1127, Li Qingzhao lived in the south for no less than 30 years. This period was not short, but she only left 15 poems. Although she always cherishes ink as much as gold in her creation, these 15 poems seem too few. Even so, these few lyrics are still full of the misery of a heartbroken person. In addition to the popular song "Slow Voice", which expresses "How can the word "sorrow" be so great?", there are others:
In the old days, the weather and clothes were old, only the feelings were there, not like the old days at home.
"Nan Ge Zi"
I feel the moon and sing the wind, so many things have happened, but now I am getting old and have nothing to do. Who pities the haggard and withered. It's no fun to test the lights, and I'm not in the mood to walk in the snow.
"Linjiang Mountain"
When the flute player goes to the jade tower, who will he lean on with his broken heart? If you break a branch, there will be no one in the world or heaven to whom you can send it.
"Lonely Goose"
Things are different and people are not the same. Everything stops. If you want to speak, you will shed tears first. I heard that the spring in Shuangxi is still good, so I plan to take a boat trip. I'm afraid that the boat in Shuanggai will not be able to carry it, and I will be very sad.
"Wulingchun"
I don't know why, every time I read these words, two poems will flash in my mind: "You must indulge in drinking when singing in the day, and you can return home with your youth!" This is when Du Fu heard that the army had recaptured Jibei and the Anshi Rebellion was about to happen. Two lines from a rhythmic poem written during a period of calm. I think this is the first quick poem left by Du Fu, a bitter poet. Previously, he had written poems full of sorrow and sorrow, such as Three Officials and Three Farewells, Eight Poems on Autumn Joy and "Song of Thatched Cottage Broken by the Autumn Wind". Compared with Li Qingzhao, Du Fu was lucky. After all, he saw the Anshi Rebellion subsided. But Li Qingzhao never enjoyed the joy of returning home. Not only him, but also Lu You, who died half a century later than him, could only leave behind the sigh of "I knew everything was futile once I died, but I couldn't see the same sadness as all the other states".
The last poem Li Qingzhao wrote before her death, "Yong Yu Le", recalled her leisurely and wealthy life in Bianliang City. Although this old woman was in the Southern Song Dynasty, her heart always stayed in her hometown north of the Huaihe River. Based on this, this introverted and gentle woman actually wrote a ground-breaking poem:
Live as a hero, die as a ghost.
I still miss Xiang Yu and refuse to cross Jiangdong!
Four
It is inevitable that women's poems will have a rosy air. If they are full of such thundering and heroic spirit, there must be something wrong with the country. The female poets before Li Qingzhao include Xue Tao and Yu Xuanji. Their fates do not seem to be very good, but they have sadness and anger, but not domineering. After Li Qingzhao, Qiu Jin came out in the late Qing Dynasty. She wrote a powerful saying: "I don't hesitate to spend a lot of money to buy a precious sword, and I can even carve fur in exchange for wine." In the end, she became a martyr for her country. The country is unlucky and the poet is lucky, this refers to poetry. People who have experienced national hatred and family hatred can write poems about the vicissitudes of life. Only its sense of vicissitudes can make it full of tragedy. Poetry moves people with emotion, and I think the most tear-jerking thing is sadness.
Having said that, let me make a digression:
I could recite this poem by Li Qingzhao at the age of eleven. That year, my uncle, who was a doctor, wrote this poem on the whitewashed wall of his dormitory. He liked the poem but felt that the whitewashed wall was empty, so he wrote it on it for decoration, but who knew that he got into big trouble? . The political workers in the hospital immediately reported to their superiors, saying that my uncle wrote reactionary poems with the intention of opposing the new China and invoking the ghosts of the old regime. In the years when "class struggle is the key link", this is nothing less than a heinous crime. Although my uncle repeatedly argued that it was Li Qingzhao of the Song Dynasty who wrote this poem and not himself, it was of no avail. He was still sentenced to seven years in prison for copying the poem and becoming an "active counterrevolutionary". I went to school when I was 5 years old, and I graduated from elementary school that year. Because of my uncle’s involvement, I was deprived of the right to go to school. This incident cast a huge shadow on my young mind, which will remain with me for the rest of my life.
Today, I am over fifty, which is the age when Li Qingzhao wrote "Slow Voice". When I was young, I had a taste of sorrow. If I talk about sorrow now, I am afraid it will be idle sorrow. After all, I was born after the founding of the People's Republic of China, and I belong to the category of "old people who don't know how to fight". But after all, I can understand the desolation of Li Qingzhao's later life through the sufferings of my childhood. But what is worthy of vigilance is that the powdery atmosphere in Li Qingzhao's early poems has now spread everywhere in our lives. After enjoying happiness for a long time, the heroic spirit will inevitably transform into a powdery spirit; if there are many suffering days, the pinky energy will condense into a heroic spirit. This change is almost a rule.
