View/Open - University of Victoria
View/Open - University of Victoria
View/Open - University of Victoria
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102<br />
去 年 中 国 养 子 孙<br />
今 著 毡 裘 学 胡 语<br />
谁 能 更 使 李 轻 车<br />
248<br />
收 取 凉 州 入 汉 家<br />
In the past, the central region raised children and<br />
grandchildren,<br />
Now they wear fur coats and learn the language <strong>of</strong> the Hu.<br />
Who can once again dispatch General Li Guang <strong>of</strong> the<br />
Swift Armoured Cavalry,<br />
And take back Liangzhou, return it to the House <strong>of</strong> Han?<br />
The aforementioned brilliance <strong>of</strong> “Heptasyllabic Old Style Poem For Dugu Jian on Our Parting”<br />
becomes blinding when the second half <strong>of</strong> the parallel couplet “ The general <strong>of</strong> Huamen excels at<br />
singing Hu songs/The Fan king <strong>of</strong> Yehe can speak the language <strong>of</strong> the Han” is considered within the<br />
framework <strong>of</strong> a frontier poem whose thematic base is comprised <strong>of</strong> descriptions <strong>of</strong> local people and<br />
customs. In reading Cen Shen's poem against Zhang Ji's “Ballad <strong>of</strong> Longtou”, the disposal <strong>of</strong> the<br />
friend-foe framework in presenting non-Chinese peoples and their language is not merely seen to be<br />
superseded, the dyadic nature <strong>of</strong> the structural system through which non-Chinese <strong>of</strong> the frontier are<br />
presented, a binary where such peoples are the “Other” opposite the “Chinese/Han”, is itself also made<br />
to collapse. This particular dismantling is located in the Hu 249 -Han linguistic cross-pollination<br />
germinating in the mouth <strong>of</strong> the Fan king. After an initial exchange from “Hu” (song) to “Han”<br />
(singer), a process which familiarized, while humanizing, a non-Chinese feature <strong>of</strong> the frontier, the<br />
Fan king in the poem is shown to familiarize that which from the perspective <strong>of</strong> the “other” would<br />
appear alien and unusual: the language <strong>of</strong> the Han. The Fan king's Han (Chinese) language abilities<br />
obliterates a core principle <strong>of</strong> the portrayal <strong>of</strong> local frontier people and customs: they are not at all like<br />
us; they are different. Whether it be Gao Shi's descriptions <strong>of</strong> superhuman feats in “Song <strong>of</strong> Yingzhou”<br />
or Wang Wei's highlighting <strong>of</strong> local religious festivities in “Deity Worship at Liangzhou” , the<br />
proportionally few frontier poems with either a complete or partial emphasis on borderland peoples and<br />
their customs, including a number written by Cen Shen, have throughout relied heavily on maintaining<br />
a conceptual framework in which subjects are engaged in activities that the poet-narrator cannot<br />
248<br />
YFSJ 21.311.<br />
249<br />
Here used in the generic sense <strong>of</strong> “non-Chinese <strong>of</strong> the frontier”.