"That pleasure which is at once the most pure, the most elevating and the most intense, is derived, I maintain, from the contemplation of the beautiful." ～Edgar Allan Poe / "Understood in its metaphysical sense, Beauty is one of the manifestations of the Absolute Being. Emanating from the harmonious rays of the Divine plan, it crosses the intellectual plane to shine once again across the natural plane, where it darkens into matter." ～Jean Delville
To feel most beautifully alive means to be reading something beautiful, ready always to apprehend in the flow of language the sudden flash of poetry.
～G. Bachelard
I would define the poetic effect as the capacity that a text displays for continuing to generate different readings, without ever being completely consumed.
～Umberto Eco
Innate in nearly every artistic nature is a wanton, treacherous penchant for accepting injustice when it creates beauty and showing sympathy for and paying homage to aristocratic privilege.
～Thomas Mann
Stay, little ounce, here in/ Fleece and leaf with me, in the evermore/ Where swans trembled in the lake around our bed of hay and morning/ Came each morning like a felt cloak billowing/ Across the most pale day. It was the color of a steeple disappearing/ In an old Venetian sky. (...)
Would they take/ You now from me, like Leonardo's sleeve disappearing in/ The air. And when I woke I could not wake/ You, little sphinx, I could not keep you here with me./ Anywhere, I could not bear to let you go. Stay here/ In our clouded bed of wind and timothy with me./ Lie here with me in snow.
~For a Snow Leopard in October, Lucie Brock-Broido
The Asuras are powerful beings opposed to the Devas (gods). Originally, in the Vedic times, they were another class of gods, perhaps the indigenous deities. By the end of the Vedic period, however, the Asuras had attained their demonic role. The Asuras are demons capable of assuming the form of animals or humans. They are completely evil, powerful creatures that delight in spreading fear, confusion, chaos, and destruction amongst the humans, sometimes even more powerful than the gods.
Mishima Yukio came into my life relatively late, when I was around eighteen. The first book I read was his Forbidden Colours 禁色. I remember how enchanted I was, and how absorbed by the story I was that there was a certain sadness when I was approaching the end of the book, as if I did not want to leave that magical realm just yet. After reading his Golden Pavilion Temple, I would say that my thoughts, views of this world and aesthetics were much defined, perhaps they even found an identity. In a way, I felt a sense of belonging in the intense, exquisite and intricate flashes of poetry in his articulate and abstract writing. Yet how his language and narratives flow. My favourite work of Mishima, and one that influenced me the most, is his final novels - the tetralogy The Sea of Fertility (豐饒之海), composed of Spring Snow (春雪), Runaway Horses (奔馬), The Temple of Dawn (曉寺), and The Decay of the Celestial, or The Decay of the Angel (天人五衰). Although in my opinion these four books are best read in sequence, my personal favourite ones are The Temple of Dawn and The Decay of the Angel. I was deeply moved ("rocked" could be a better word!) by this tetralogy the first time I read it that I wrote poems after each novel, and dedicated to Mishima Yukio, to whom I feel that I am indebted to - for his artistic achievement, aesthetics, thought system, and his love. These poems were all written in 1999.
“If, raised by the power of mind, a man relinquishes the common way of looking at things, gives up tracing… their relations to each other, the final goal of which is always a relation to his own will; if he thus ceases to consider the where, the when, the why, and the whither of things, and looks simply and solely at the what; if further, he does not allow abstract thought, the concepts of the reason, to take possession of his consciousness, but, instead of all this, gives the whole power of his mind to perception, … so that it is as if the object alone were there, without any one to perceive it, and he can no longer separate the perceiver from the perception, but both have become one … if thus the object has to such an extent passed out of all relation to something outside it, and the subject out of all relation to the will, then that which is so known … is the Idea, … he who is sunk in this perception is … pure, will-less, painless, timeless subject of knowledge.”
~ Schopenhauer, The World as Will and Representation, Vol. I., Third Book, p. 231, in the English version trans. by R. B. Haldane and J. Kemp (London, three vols, 1909).
longed for as the sunwarmed earth is longed for by a swimmer
spent in rough water where his ship went down
under Poseidon's blows, gale winds and tons of sea.
Few men can keep alive through a big surf
to crawl, clotted with brine, on kindly beaches
in joy, in joy, knowing the abyss behind:
and so she too rejoiced, her gaze upon her husband,
her white arms round him pressed as though forever."
~ from, The Odyssey
Homer
translated by Robert Fitzgerald
My friend Leanne's lovely post on 楊貴妃 Yang Guifei has inspired me to re-read Tang poet Bai Juyi's The Song of Everlasting Sorrow (長恨歌), a poetic narrative of the mournful love story of Tang Emperor Hsuan Tzung 唐玄宗 (Xuanzong) and his beloved imperial consort Yang Yu-Huan 楊玉環 (Yang Guifei), and the emperor's perpetual grief and regret at the eventual loss of his love. Yang Guifei is known as 羞花 (xiu hua - literally meaning "shames flowers"), and considered first of the Four Great Beauties of China. 「西施沉魚, 昭君落雁, 貂嬋閉月, 貴妃羞花。」(Xi Shi sinks fish, Wang Zhaojun drops birds, Diaochan closes the moon, Yang Guifei shames flowers.)
In response to Leanne's beautiful post that I enjoyed reading so much, I wrote a rather long comment (see below, after the poem), which rarely happens even in my own blog! I included it here as I write so little these days - where has the writer in me gone...? (A writer friend used to say to me, "Did you choose to write? Or did writing choose you?") At the moment I suppose I am more of a "micro-blog" and visual/sensory type when it comes to recording my daily inspiration... Nevertheless, thank you, all the peonies of Chang'an...
The story of Xuanzong and Guifei, as well as Bai Juyi's Song of Unending Sorrow, are said to have inspired the Japanese Heian literary gem - The Tale of Genji (源氏物語 Genji Monogatari).
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(Here is my comment in response to Leanne's post on 楊貴妃...)
The preservation of Tang dances in Japanese court also interests me very much. In fact Dr. Liu Feng-Xue (founder and artistic director of Neo-Classic Dance Company 新古典舞團, and the first Chinese dance historian/ scholar/ artist/ choreographer to receive a PhD) devotes a large part of her career reconstructing ancient Chinese court music and dance, including getting special permission to study in the royal court of Japan and learning Labannotation from scratch to record the pieces etc. Neo-Classic is premiering Dr. Liu's new work in October, another reconstruction of ancient dance/music - I must be back in Taipei to attend!
I love Dr. Liu's works and have a special affection for Neo-Classic as that was where I learned ballet since 5! I mentioned these in a blog post 唐詩樂舞 Beauty of Tang: Music, Dance and Poetry. (A reader later introduced me to an amazing artist Elyse Ashe Lord. Perhaps you know her work already? If not I highly recommend checking out her paintings...!)
Another gem I adore, Han Tang Yuefu 漢唐樂府, might also interest you - I have almost all their DVDs and CDs. Such beauty... Sigh. I can listen to the music and watch the dances all day long.
I really enjoyed reading the English translations of the Chinese poetry, and must re-read these poems one of these days... I am a lover of Li Bai - when I was a kid it was a drag having to memorise and recite all these classics, but now I realise they do stay with me in my heart (not just poetry, philosophy as well), even though one can no longer recite them! It's fascinating to know that the story of 玄宗 and 楊貴妃 might have influenced 源氏物語, as people tend to associate Tale of Genji to Dream of the Red Mansion, I suppose. I remember when I went to a special exhibition at Kyoto National Museum, I stood in front of a large screen depicting The Tale of Genji, forever. I think I was trying to absorb as much of that quiet yet glorious beauty as I possibly could. A while ago there was a small (yet well-curated) exhibition of noh masks, costumes, manuscripts etc. in Tokyo - it was magical, with quiet gagaku playing in the background at that wonderful little gallery... I miss it.
And the Oedipus Complex (or the reverse) you hinted at the end of this article... How universal and yet how different it is between the East and the West. The stories you mentioned here, and the poems, give me a sense of 無奈, 悵然若失 (I can never seem to find the right words for these in English). These are similar emotions I felt after watching one of my favourite films "In the Mood for Love." A kind of tranquil/peaceful sadness, but perhaps even more heartrending...
I also posted Tamasaburo's Yokihi in my blog post Adieu ma concubine! We do share such similar interests. :) I will search for his Peony Pavilion on YouTube. Do you know Tamasaburo performed Peony Pavilion at the last Hong Kong Arts Festival? Shame I missed it...!! My love for kunqu is even deeper than Peking opera, and Peony Pavilion and Peach Blossom Fan are my favourite.
On a slightly different note, I went to see 北京當代芭蕾舞團 Beijing Dance Theatre's Golden Lotus (adapted from 金瓶梅) at the Hong Kong Arts Festival this year. The choreographer Wang Yuanyuan (王媛媛) also did the full-length ballet drama Raise the Red Lantern, with Zhang Yimou's direction & stage design. Ballet being one of my "core passions," her Raise the Red Lantern is the single best ballet I have ever seen, perhaps as it is very close to my heart (a combination of ballet and Chinese opera - what a dream for me!). Wang Yuanyuan is seriously talented.
Just would like to say again how much I love this post!
Ting-Jen xx
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I will leave you here with a few lines of beautiful poetry exchanged between Genji and Fujitsubo, also from Leanne's post...
"Through the waving, dancing sleeves could you see a heart So stormy that it wished but to be still?"
"Of waving Chinese sleeves I cannot speak. Each step, each motion, touched me to the heart."
Photo of Mei Lanfang taken during the Sino-Japanese War
梅蘭芳演譯楊玉環
Mei Lanfang as Yang Guei-Fei in "The Drunken Concubine"
青年時期的梅蘭芳 Young Mei Lanfang
張國榮於霸王別姬片中的角色程蝶衣飾演楊玉環
Leslie Cheung as Yang Guei-Fei in Farewell My Concubine
Forever Enthralled is another film about Peking (Beijing) Opera by the critically acclaimed Chinese director Chen Kaige (best known for Farewell My Concubine). This time the film centres around the life of my Mr. Poetic Oneirism, the legendary Chinese opera artist Mei Lanfang. *Click here for a higher-resolution version, with subtitles in simplified Chinese (unfortunately no English at this time).
*Read more about 齊白石 (Qi Bai-Shi) here {in English} and here {in Chinese}. Master Qi is one of my parents' favourite artists, and I shall certainly write a separate blog post on him in the future. Or more appropriately perhaps, on the inspiration his life and his art have given me.
Let me not to the marriage of true minds Admit impediments. Love is not love Which alters when it alteration finds, Or bends with the remover to remove: O, no! it is an ever-fixed mark, That looks on tempests and is never shaken; It is the star to every wandering bark, Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken. Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks Within his bending sickle's compass come; Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks, But bears it out even to the edge of doom. If this be error and upon me proved, I never writ, nor no man ever loved.
I think the reason why I love Svetlana Zakharova as a ballerina and find her dancing so entrancing and unique, above everything else, above her exquisite musicality, poetry, delicateness, gorgeous lines and tender beauty, is that she is regal. She exudes an aristocratic air in almost all her performances, in the best way imaginable. Seeing her dance on-stage is one of the most thriling experiences for me. Her Odette is pure poetry and music, her Odille intoxicating magic, her Giselle moves me to tears whilst her Nikiya literally takes my breath away. It is incredibly beautiful to be so absorbed in an artform, as it is one of the rare moments in daily life when one's aesthetic experience transcends ordinary consciousness to a higher, purer realm. (See also my old post Princess Odette of My Heart, on Svetlana's Swan Lake.)
In one of her 2003 interviews, when asked what she personally saw as her qualities which distinguished her from other dancers, she gave this answer after much hesitation (a truly modest ballerina and a perfectionist!):
"There's one thing which I usually do when I am onstage—I just open myself. I open up my heart. Every time when I am on stage, I keep telling myself, 'You have to give your heart and your soul to the audience!' And this is usually what I do when I am performing. I open up what I have in my heart. This is the exact opposite of what I do in my real life! I am always trying to hide my private life as much as possible."
And this is perhaps how she is able to move her audiences to tears, to make one hold his breath, and how she falls in love with every ballet that she dances—by opening up her heart.
This is my favourite variation of Nikiya in La Bayadère, where she performs the saddest, most heartbreaking dance at the princess's wedding to Solor, the man who swore eternal love to her in front of the sacred fire of the temple. Svetlana's painfully beautiful interpretation, together with the haunting music, make this my favourite rendition of Nikiya's death scene.
Also, I love the music and this solo of Princess Gamzatti. For me it is the counterpart of Nikiya's heartbreaking "death scene" variation. Whilst Svetlana is my favourite Nikiya, Darcey is my favourite Gamzatti, especially in this variation. In addition to Darcey's brilliant, effortless speed and precision, which adds something extraordinary to her beautifully musical movements in this slow and poetic adage (as if she was floating on air), I think what first attracted me in her rendition is the soft but clear demi-plié following her double pirouettes...
Nikiya (Svetlana) is dancing on the wedding of the man who swore eternal love to her in front of the sacred fire, to the princess of the kingdom. Imagine her heartbreak, sadness, humiliation and helplessness, being a mere temple dancer! Whereas Gamzatti, albeit a precious princess, also has her misfortune—she is married to (and in love with) a man whose only incentive to be with her is for her status and money, for what she has instead of who she is, and eventually she even dies from this cursed union. I find both dances to be highly entrancing and moving. Many classical ballets do touch upon the fundamental problems of human emotions and difficulties—their simplicity as well as complexity...
Darcey's brilliance lies in her speed and precision, and Svetlana (my favourite ballerina) is not unlike Maria Callas in that she has the ability to truly become the characters she's dancing - her musicality and poetry break my heart. Both of them are very lyrical in La Bayadere, in their own different ways.
Hands of Svetlana Zakharova, in La Fille du Pharaon.
