Roaming into the beyond: the theme of immortality in early medieval Chinese verse

TLDR: In this paper, a broad analysis of the major features of the Youxian verse and its meaning in the context of early medieval Chinese literature through considering its complex interactions with other, more famous poetic currents of the period is presented.

Abstract: During the Six Dynasties (220 – 589) there evolved a distinct poetic current of “roaming into immortality” (youxian shi), which is distinguished as a sub-genre of lyrical poetry shi in the 6 century anthology Wenxuan. The youxian shi concern higher realms of nature, inhabited by divine immortal beings, replete with paradisial marvels and ecstatic cosmic flights. Although poetry on immortality was written by the leading poets of the age, it remains even today much neglected in the literary history of the Six Dynasties, having been consciously marginalised by generations of later critics and commentators. And yet, considerations of this “otherworldly” poetic current not only reveal the other, more imaginative and mystic side of Chinese poetic vision, but also allow us to make significant additions to and re-evaluate traditional notions of poetic developments and the meaning of poetry in early medieval China. A major problem in the study of the poems on “roaming into immortality” is the narrow definition of genres on the basis of concrete verse form, whereby the connections between the various forms are largely neglected. This approach, deeply rooted in traditional Chinese literary history, does not allow us to perceive the concrete literary works in the wider context of poetry, or even of literature as such. In the present study I attempt to go beyond the narrowly defined youxian shi genre limited to shi lyric poetry written mostly in pentasyllabic verse, and to consider a broad range of literature which treats the theme of immortality, although bearing different titles and traditionally anthologised under different genre categories. Thus, although the central focus of the study is on lyric poetry shi, it is discussed within the context of other contemporary genres such as rhapsody fu, eulogia song and encomia zan. These genres are traditionally classified among the prose writings wen and apart from the rhapsody they so far attracted little attention of literary history. Yet they were written by the same members of the intellectual elite, using mostly polished versified form and dealing with similar topics as the youxian shi and thus exhibit close connections with the genres generally accepted as poetic. That is why, disregarding the traditional genre classification, we will for the purpose of this study consider all the variety of versified texts dealing with the youxian theme as “verse on roaming into immortality”. The study aims to trace the rise and transformation of the verse on immortality on the basis of themes, plots, imagery and poetic conventions that were central to it in its formative stages prior to the Tang dynasty. Each of the four chapters is devoted to one rather broad thematic aspect of the “roaming into immortality“ verse: the image of immortals, their paradise worlds, the way to attain immortality, and finally, the changing relations between the human world of the poet and the otherworldly realms. These themes are further subdivided into more specific motifs and images, with a view of tracing their origins, evolution and continuous transformations during the period in question. This analysis aims to elucidate the major features of the youxian verse and its meaning in the context of early medieval Chinese literature through considering its complex interactions with other, more famous poetic currents of the period. Because the themes it deals with are essentially religious, it is also important to take into account the relationship of the youxian verse to the developments of Daoist religion. Especially significant in this regard is the interrelation between the court poetry of the Southern Dynasties and the “celestial“ verse contained in records of Daoist revelations, which has been generally excluded from the discourse on Chinese poetry. INTRODUCTION Among the twenty-three sub-genres that Xiao Tong 蕭統 (501 – 531) distinguished in the Wenxuan 文選 („Selections of Refined Literature“) anthology as thematic variations of lyrical poetry shi 詩, there is a category named Youxian 遊仙 (“Roaming into Immortality“). The Wenxuan section on youxian is far from being extensive. It contains works by only two poets – one poem by He Shao 何劭 (236 – 301) and seven poems by Guo Pu 郭璞 (276 – 324). These works are but a small fragment of a much wider poetic current, which during the Six Dynasties paralleled the more famous literary developments of the period, such as eremitic poetry (zhaoyin shi 招隱詩), landscape poetry (shanshui shi 山水詩), poetry of objects (yongwu shi 詠物詩), etc. The youxian poems open up worlds different from the mundane reality of their authors and their ordinary experiences. They concern higher realms of nature, inhabited by sublime figures possessed of divine powers, replete with paradisial marvels and ecstatic cosmic flights. The verse on immortality can be regarded as the other side of the Chinese poetic vision – the more imaginative, the more mystic and exalted. Nevertheless, even today it remains much neglected in the literary history of the Six Dynasties period, having been consciously marginalised by generations of traditional critics and commentators. Its undeniable religious inspiration meant that it was consciously eschewed by later literati critics. On the other hand, as a part of “secular” poetry it never attracted the serious attention of scholars of Daoist religion. The aim of the following study is to trace the constitution and transformation of the verse on immortality on the basis of themes, plots and imagery that were central to it in its formative stages prior to the Tang dynasty. Considerations of the “other-worldly” poetic current allow us to make significant additions to and re-evaluate traditional notions of poetic developments and the meaning of poetry in early medieval China. Before turning to the treatment of the theme of immortality in poetry, it is necessary, however, to take a brief look at the religious notions connected with xian 仙immortality, since an apprehension of these is indispensable for proper understanding of the youxian verse. 1 Wenxuan (completed between the years 526 and 531) is the oldest surviving anthology of Chinese literature arranged by genre and the primary source for pre-Tang literature. It contains 761 compositions in prose and verse by 130 writers, covering the period from late Zhou and right through the Liang dynasty (ca. 4 cent. BC – 6 cent. AD). On the content, scholarship and editions of Wenxuan see Knechtges 1982: 2170. 2 Later anthologies and compendia contain more specimens of youxian verse. The most important sources for the Six Dynasties poetry on immortality are the early seventh century leishu collectanea Yiwen leiju 藝 文 類 聚 , “Categorized Collection of Literary Writing”(juan 78, Xiandao 仙 道 [“The Way of Immortality”]), and Chuxue ji 初學記 , “Records for Early Learning” (juan 23), compiled at the beginning of the eighth century. 1. Religious Background 1.1. The ideal of xian-ship Although the hope of longevity and avoidance of death has been an integral part of Chinese culture since early times 3 , the concept of xian immortality was developed consistently and theoretically grounded within the context of Daoist religion from the late Han dynasty. The major aspiration of Daoist adepts was to become a xian – a perfected, higherthan-human being, enjoying an enduring life of purity, freedom and bliss. The concept of xian involved a specific notion of eternal life in which not only the spiritual components of man survive, but his physical body as well – although much purified and sublimated through the successive stages of a course of various alchemical, physiological and ritual practices. It was believed that xian-immortality could be achieved during a man's lifetime, without an inevitable passage through death. The adept who rose to the state of a xian could ascend as a perfected immortal into the ranks of the heavenly bureaucracy, or choose a terrestrial life among picturesque earthly landscapes. Liberated from the anxieties of old age, death and dissolution, he could enjoy a finer and eternal life which still included all the pleasures of human existence. The established translation of xian as “immortals/ immortality” is rather misleading. Immortality in the sense of "not passing away" (busi 不死) is only one aspect of the xianstate, which more fundamentally involved a transformation of the psycho-spiritual complex of the individual and thereby a change in the very state of his being. Many texts explicitly emphasize the distinction between xian and mere longevity or not-dying. Sometimes the achievement of longevity is conceived as a preliminary stage of attaining xian-ship, while sometimes the two are presented as separate options. Another translation of xian, which has gained currency in the last two decades, is “transcendents“, which emphasises their exalted 3 Yu Yingshi 1964-65: 87 has pointed out that the wish that death might be avoided altogether was already expressed in bronze inscriptions from the eighth century BC on. 4 In ancient China the notion of the survival of the individual self and hence the concept of eternal life was intricately bound to the preservation of the body. The soul was never perceived as an invisible spiritual counterpart to a visible, corporeal body. Both soul and body were simply aspects of the same primordial breath qi 氣 (translated also as pneuma or vital energy), condensed to different degrees. Moreover, every person possessed not one but many souls, or more precisely, spiritual components, roughly divided into two groups – generally, three superior hun 魂 and seven inferior po 魄souls, which scattered at death. It was the physical body which held the numerous souls and spirits together, like a thread holding beads, and provided them with a habitat, which thereby ensured the individual personality of every human being. Hence only through preservation of the body could one achieve an everlasting continuation