Yu dafu sinking pdf

Sinking

by vo Ta-fu

Translated by Joseph S. M. Lau and C. T. Hsia

I

Lately he had been feeling pitifully lonesome. His emotional precocity had placed him at con-

stant odds with his fellow men, and inevitably the wall separating him from them had gradually grown thicker and thicker.

The weather had been cooling off day by day, and it had been almost two weeks since his school started.

It was September 22nd that day. The sky was one patch of cloudless blue; the bright sun, time- less and eternal, was still making its daily circuit on its familiar track. A gentle breeze from the south, fragrant as nectar, brushed against his face. Amidst the half-ripened rice fields or on the meandering highways of the countryside he was seen strolling with a pocket edition of Wordsworth. On this great plain not a single soul was near, but then a dog's barking was heard, softened and rendered melodious by distance. He lifted his eyes from the book and, glancing in the direction of the barking, saw a cluster of trees and a few houses. The tiles on their roofs glittered like fish scales, and above them floated a thin layer of mist like a dancing ribbon of gossamer. "Oh, you serene gossamer! you beautiful gossamer!" 1 he ex- claimed, and for reasons unknown even to him- self his eyes were suddenly filled with tears.

After watching the scene absently for a while,

he caught from behind him a whiff suggestive of violets. A little herbaceous plant, rustling in the breeze, had sent forth this scent and broken his dreamy spell. He turned around: the plant was still quivering, and the gentle breeze dense with the fragrance of violets blew on his pallid face. In this crisp, early autumn weather, in this bright and pellucid ether, his body felt soothed and languid as if under a mild intoxication. He felt as if he were sleeping in the lap of a kind mother, or being transported to the Peach Blossom Spring in a dream.f or else reclining his head on the knees of his beloved for an afternoon nap on the coast of southern Europe.

Looking around, he felt that every tree and every plant was smiling at him. Turning his gaze to the azure sky, he felt that Nature herself, time- less and eternal, was nodding to him in greeting. And after staring at the sky fixedly for a while, he seemed to see a group of little winged angels, with arrows and bows on their shoulders, dancing up in the air. He was overjoyed and could not help soliloquizing:

"This, then, is your refuge. When all the philis- tines envy you, sneer at you, and treat you like a fool, only Nature, only this eternally bright sun and azure sky, this late summer breeze, this early autumn air still remains your friend, still remains your mother and your beloved. With this, you have no further need to join the world of the

1 Italicized common words, phrases, and sentences in this translation appear in Western languages in the original. 2 An utopia depicted by the poet Tao Ch'ien (365-427) in his poem "Peach Blossom Spring" (Tao-hua-yiian. shih) and its more

famous preface.

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shallow and flippant. You might as well spend the rest of your life in this simple countryside, in the bosom of Nature."

Talking in this fashion, he began to pity him- self, as if a thousand sorrows and grievances find- ing no immediate expression were weighing upon his heart. He redirected his tearful eyes to the book:

Behold her, single in thefield, Yon solitary Highland Lass!

Reaping and singing by herself; Stop here, or gently pass!

Alone she cuts and binds the grain, And sings a melancholy strain; o listen! for the Vale profound Is overflowing with the sound.

After reading through the first stanza, for no ap- parent reason he turned the page and started on the third:

Will no one tell me what she sings? Perhaps the plaintive numbers flow

For old, unhappy,far-off things, And battles long ago:

Or is it some more humble lay, Familiar matter of to-day? Some natural sorrow, loss, or pain, That has been, and may be again?

It had been his recent habit to read out of sequence. With books over a few hundred pages, it was only natural that he seldom had the pa- tience to finish them. But even with slender vol- umes like Emerson's Nature or Thoreau's Excur- sions, he never bothered to read them from beginning to end at one sitting. Most of the time, when he picked up a book, he would be so moved by its opening lines or first two pages that he liter- ally wanted to swallow the whole volume. But after three or four pages, he would want to savor it slowly and would say to himself: "I mustn't gulp down such a marvelous book at one sitting. In- stead, I should chew it over a period of time. For my enthusiasm for the book will be gone the mo- ment I am through with it. So will my expecta- tions and dreams, and won't that be a crime?"

3 Yii Ta-fu'stranslation of the two stanzas is omitted here.

Every time he closed a book, he made up simi- lar excuses for himself. The real reason was that he had already grown a little tired of it. However, a few days or even a few hours later he would pick up another book and begin to read it with the same kind of enthusiasm. And naturally the one which had touched him so much a few hours or days earlier would now be forgotten.

He raised his voice and read aloud once more these two stanzas of Wordsworth. Suddenly it oc- curred to him that he should render "The Solitary Reaper" in Chinese."

After orally translating these two stanzas in one breath, he suddenly felt that he had done some- thing silly and started to reproach himself: "What kind of a translation is that? Isn't it as insipid as the hymns sung in the church? English poetry is English poetry and Chinese poetry is Chinese po- etry; why bother to translate?"

After saying this, unwittingly he smiled a little. Somewhat to his surprise, as he looked around him, the sun was already on its way down. On the western horizon across the great plain floated a tall mountain wrapped in its mists which, satu- rated with the setting sun, showed a color neither quite purple nor quite red.

While he was standing there in a daze, a cough from behind his back signaled the arrival of a peasant. He turned around and immediately as- sumed a melancholy expression, as if afraid to show his smile before strangers.

II

His melancholy was getting worse with time. To him the school textbooks were as insipid-

tasting as wax, dull and lifeless. On sunny days he would take along a favorite work of literature and escape to a secluded place on the mountain or by the sea to relish to the full the joy of solitude. When all was silent about him at a place where sky and water met, he would now regard the plants, insects, and fish around him and now gaze at the white clouds arid blue sky and feel as if he were a

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sage or hermit who had proudly detached himself from the world. Sometimes, when he ran into a peasant in the mountain, he would imagine him- self Zarathustra and would repeat Zarathustra's sayings before the peasant. His megalomania, in exact proportion to his hypochondria, was thus in- tensified each day. Small wonder that, in such a mood, he didn't feel like going to school and ap- plying himself to the mechanical work. Sometimes he would skip classes for four or five days in a row.

And when he was in school he always had the feeling that everyone was staring at him. He made every effort to dodge his fellow students, but wherever he went, he just couldn't shake off that uncomfortable suspicion that their malevolent gazes were still fixed on him.

When he attended classes, even though he was in the midst of all his classmates, he always felt lonely, and the kind of solitude he felt in a press of people was more unbearable by far than the kind he experienced when alone. Looking around, he always found his fellow students en- grossed in the instructor's lecture; only he, despite his physical presence in the classroom, was wan- dering far and wide in a state of reverie.

At long last the bell rang. After the instructor had left, all his classmates were as lively and high- spirited as swallows newly returned in spring- chatting, joking, and laughing. Only he kept his brows knit and uttered not a sound, as if his tongue were tethered to a thousand-ton rock. He would have liked to chat with his fellow students but, perhaps discouraged by his sorrowful counte- nance, they all shunned his company and went their own ways in pursuit of pleasure. For this reason, his resentment toward them intensified.

"They are all Japanese, all my enemies. I'll have my revenge one day; I'll get even with them."

He would take comfort in this thought when- ever he felt miserable. But in a better mood, he would reproach himself: "They are Japanese, and of course they don't have any sympathy for you. It's because you want their sympathy that you have grown to hate them. Isn't this your own mis- take?"

Among his more sympathetic fellow students

some did approach him, intending to start a con- versation. But although he was very grateful and would have liked to open his heart to them, in the end he wouldn't say anything. As a result, even they respected his wishes and kept away from him.

Whenever his Japanese schoolmates laughed and joked in his presence, his face would redden because he thought the laughter and jokes were at his expense. He would also flush if, while convers- ing, one of these students glanced at him. Thus, the distance between him and his schoolmates be- came greater each day. They all thought him a loner and avoided his presence.

One day after school he was walking back to his inn, satchel in hand. Alongside him were three Japanese students heading in the same direction. Just as he was about to reach the inn, there sud- denly appeared before him two girl students in red skirts. His breathing quickened, for girl stu- dents were a rare sight in this rural area. As the two girls tried to get by, the three Japanese boys accosted them: "Where are you going?"

Coquettishly the two girls answered, "Don't know, don't know."

The three students all laughed, pleased with themselves. He alone hurried back to his inn, as if he had done the accosting. Once in his room, he dropped his satchel on the tatami floor and lay down for a rest (the Japanese sit as well as sleep on the tatami). His heart was still beating wildly. Placing one hand underneath his head and an- other on his chest, he cursed himself:

"You coward fellow, you are too coward! If you are so shy, what's there for you to regret? If you now regret your cowardice, why didn't you summon up enough courage to talk to the girls? Oh coward, coward!"

Suddenly he remembered their eyes, their bright and lively eyes. They had really seemed to register a note of happy surprise on seeing him. Second thoughts on the matter, however, prompted him to cry out:

.lOh, you fool! Even if they seemed interested, what are they to you? Isn't it quite clear that their ogling was intended for the three Japanese? Oh, the girls must have known! They must have

I28 YU TA-FU

known that I am a Chinaman; otherwise why didn't they even look at me once? Revenge! Revenge! I must seek revenge against their in- sult."

At this point in his monologue, a few icy tear- drops rolled down his burning cheeks. He was in the utmost agony. That night, he put down in his diary:

"Why did I come to Japan? Why did I come here to pursue my studies? Since you have come, is it a wonder that the Japanese treat you with contempt? China, 0 my China! Why don't you grow rich and strong? I cannot bear your shame in silence any longer!

"Isn't the scenery in China as beautiful? Aren't the girls in China as pretty? Then why did I come to this island country in the eastern seas?

"And even if I accept the fact that I am here, there is no reason why I should have entered this cursed 'high school.' 4 Those who have returned to China after studying only five months here, aren't they now enjoying their success and pros- perity? How can I bear the five or six years that still lie ahead of me? And how can I be sure that, even if I managed to finish my long years of stud- ies despite the thousand vexations and hardships, I would be in any way better off than those so- called returned students who came here simply for fun?

"One may live to a hundred, but his youth lasts only seven or eight years. What a pity that I should have to spend these purest and most beau- tiful seven or eight years in this unfeeling island country. And, alas, I am already twenty-one!

"Dead as dried wood at twenty-one! "Dead as cold ashes at twenty-one! "Far better for me to turn into some kind of

mineral, for it's unlikely that I will ever bloom. "I want neither knowledge nor fame. All I want

is a 'heart' that can understand and comfort me, a warm and passionate heart and the sympathy that it generates and the love born of that sympathy!

"What I want is love. "If there were one beautiful woman who under-

stood my suffering, I would be willing to die for her.

"If there were one woman who could love me sincerely, I would also be willing to die for her, be she beautiful or ugly.

"For what I want is love from the opposite sex. "0 ye Heavens above, I want neither knowledge

nor fame nor useless lucre. I shall be wholly con- tent if you can grant me an Eve from the Garden of Eden, allowing me to possess her body and soul."

III

His home was in a small town on the Fu-ch'un River, about eighty or ninety li from Hangchow. The river originates in Anhwei and wanders through the length of Chekiang. Because it tra- verses a long tract of variegated landscape, a poet of the Tang dynasty wrote in admiration that "the whole river looks like a painting." When he was fourteen, he had asked one of his teachers to write down this line of four characters for him and had it pasted on the wall of his study. His study was not a big one, but since through its small window he could view the river in its ever- changing guises, rain and shine, morning and evening, spring and autumn, it had been to him as good as Prince Teng's tall pavilion." And in this small study he had spent more than ten years before coming with his elder brother to Japan for study.

When he was three his father had pased away, leaving the family in severe poverty. His elder brother, however, managed to graduate from W. University in Japan, and upon his return to Pe- king, he earned the chin-shih 6 degree and was ap- pointed to a position in the Ministry ofJustice. But in less than two years the Republican revolu- tion started in Wuchang. He himself had by then finished grade school and was changing from one middle school to another. All his family reproved him for his restlessness and lack of perseverance. In his own view, however, he was different from

4 A Japanese "high school" of the early modern period provided an education equivalent to the last two years of an American high school and the first two years of college.

5 Celebrated in the Tang poet Wang Po's lyrical prose composition, "The Pavilion of Prince Teng" (T'eng Wang Ko hsii). 6 See footnote 7 to "Yu-kuan," p. 62.

SINKING

other students and ought not to have studied the same prescribed courses through the same sequence of grades. Thus, in less than half a year, he transferred from the middle school in the city K. to one in H. where, unfortunately, he stayed less than three months owing to the outbreak of the revolution. Deprived of his schooling in the city H., he could only return to his own little study.

In the spring of the following year he was enrolled in the preparatory class for H. College on the outskirts of Hangchow. He was then seven- teen. Founded by the American Presbyterian Church, the college was notorious for its despotic administration and the minimal freedom it al- lowed its students. On Wednesday evenings they were required to attend vespers. On Sundays they were not allowed to go out or to read secular books-they could only pray, sing psalms, or read the Old and New Testaments. They were also required to attend chapel every morning from nine to nine twenty: the delinquent student would get demerits and lower grades. It was only natural that, as a lover of freedom, he chafed under such superstitious restrictions, fond as he was of the beautiful scenery around the campus. He had not vet been there half a year when a cook in the employ of the college, counting on the president's backing, went so far as to beat up students. Some of his more indignant schoolmates went to the president to complain, only to be told that they were in the wrong. Finding this and similar injus- tices altogether intolerable, he quit the school and returned to his own little study. It was then early June.

He had been home for more than three months when the autumn winds reached the Fu-ch'un / River and the leaves of the trees on its banks were about to fall. Then he took a junk down the river to go to Hangchow where, he understood, the W. Middle School at the Stone Arch was then recruit- ing transfer students. He went to see the principal '[r. M. and his wife and told them of his experi- ence at H. College. Mr. M. allowed him to enroll in the senior class.

It turned out, however, that this W. Middle School was also church-supported and that this Mr. M. was also a muddle-headed American mis-

sionary. And academically this school was not even comparable to the preparatory class at H. College. After a quarrel with the academic dean, a contemptible character and a graduate of H. Col- lege as well, he left W. Middle School in the spring. Since there was no other school in Hang- chow to his liking, he made no plans to be admit- ted elsewhere.

It was also at this time that his elder brother was forced to resign his position in Peking. Being an upright man of strict probity and better educated than most of his colleagues in the ministry, he had invited their fear and envy. One day a personal friend of a certain vice-minister asked for a post and he stubbornly refused to give him one; as a result, that vice-minister disagreed with him on certain matters, and in a few days he resigned his post to serve in the Judicial Yuan. His second elder brother was at that time an army officer sta- tioned in Shaohsing. He was steeped in the habits of the military and therefore loved to squander money and associate with young gallants. Because these three brothers happened at the same time to be not doing too well, the idlers in their home town began to speculate whether their misfortune was of a geomantic nature.

After he had returned home, he shut himself in his study all day and sought guidance and com- panionship in the library of his grandfather, fa- ther, and elder brother. The number of poems he wrote in his diary began to grow. On occasions he also wrote stories in an ornate style featuring him- self as a romantic knight-errant and the two daughters of the widow next door as children of nobility. Naturally the scenic descriptions in these stories were simply idyllic pictures of his home town. Sometimes, when the mood struck him, he would translate his own stories into some foreign language, employing the simple vocabulary at his command. In a word, he was more and more en- veloped in a world of fantasy, and it was probably during this time that the seeds of his hypochondria were sown.

He stayed at home for six months. In the mid- dle ofJuly, however, he got a letter from his elder brother saying: "The Judicial Yuan has recently decided to send me to Japan to study its judicial system. My acceptance has already been for-

I3° YU TA-FU

warded to the minister and a formal appointment is expected in a few days. Lwill, however, go home first and stay for a while before leaving for Japan. Since I don't think idling at home will do you any good, this time I shall take you with me to Japan." This letter made him long for his brother's return, though he did not arrive from Peking with his wife until the latter part of Sep- tember. After a month's stay, they sailed with him for Japan.

Though he was not yet awakened from his dreams of the romantic age, upon his arrival in Tokyo, he nevertheless managed to pass the en- trance examination for Tokyo's First High School after half a year. He would be in his nineteenth year in the fall.

When the First High School was about to open, his elder brother received word from the minister that he should return. Thus his brother left him in the care of a Japanese family and a few days later returned with his wife and newborn daugh- ter.

The First High School had set up a preparatory program especially for Chinese students so that upon completing that program in a year they could enroll along with the Japanese students in regular courses of study in the high school of their choice. When he first got into the program, his intended major was literature. Later, however, when he was about to complete the course, he changed to medicine, mainly under pressure from his brother but also because he didn't care mucq either way.

After completing his preparatory studies, he requested that he be sent to the high school in N. City, partly because he heard it was the newest such school in Japan and partly because N. City was noted for its beautiful women.

IV

In the evening of August 29, in the twentieth year of his life, he took a night train all by himself from Tokyo's central station to N. City.

It was probably the third or fourth day of the seventh month in the old calendar. A sky the color of indigo velvet was studded with stars. The eresent moon, hooked in the western corner of the sky, looked like the untinted eyebrow of a celestial maiden. Sitting by the window in a third- class coach, he silently counted the lights in the houses outside. As the train steadily surged ahead through the black mists of the night, the lights of the great metropolis got dimmer and dimmer until they disappeared from his ken. Suddenly his heart was overtaken by a thousand melancholy thoughts, and his eyes were again moist with warm tears. "Sentimental, too sentimental!" he ex- claimed. Then, drying his tears, he felt like mocking himself:

"You don't have a single sweetheart, brother, or close friend in Tokyo-so for whom are you shedding your tears? Perhaps grieving for your past life, or feeling sad because you have lived there for the last two years? But haven't you been saying you don't care for Tokyo?

"Oh, but how can one help being attached to a place even after living there for only one year?

The orioles know me well because I have long lived here;

When I am getting ready to leave, they keep crying, four or five sad notes at a time."

Then his rambling thoughts turned to the first Puritans embarking for America: "I imagine that those cross-bearing expatriates were no less grief- stricken than I am now when sailing off the coast of their old country."

The train had now passed Yokohama, and his emotions began to quiet down. After collecting himself for a while, he placed a postcard on top of a volume of Heine's poetry and with a pencil com- posed a poem intended for a friend in Tokyo:

The crescent barely rising above the willows, I again left home for a distant horizon, First pausing in a roadside tavern crowded with rev-

elers, Then taking off in a carriage as the street lights re-

ceded.

7 A couplet from a quatrain by the Tang poet lung Yu, entitled "I-chia pieh hu-shang-t'ing" (Bidding goodbye to the pavilion on the lake on the occasion of moving my home). We are indebted to Professor Chiang Vee for this identification.

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A youth inured to partings and sorrows has few tears to shed;

The luggage from a poor home consists only of old books.

At night the reeds find their roots stirred by autumn waters-

May you get my message at South Bank!

Then after resting for a while, he read some of Heine's poetry under a dim light bulb:

Lebet wohl, ihr glatten Stile, Glatte Herren, glatte Frauen! Aufdie Berge will idi steigen, Lachend auf euch niederschauen! 8

But with the monotonous sound of the wheels pounding against his eardrums, in less than thirty minutes he was transported into a land of dreams.

At five o'clock dawn began to break. Peering through the window, he was able to discern a thread of blue making its way out of the nocturnal darkness. He then stuck his head out the window and saw a picturesque scene wrapped in haze. "So it's going to be another day of nice autumn weather," he thought. "How fortunate I am!"

An hour later the train arrived at N. City'S railroad station. Alighting from the train, he saw at the station a Japanese youth wearing a cap marked by two white stripes and knew him for a- student of the high school. He walked toward him and, lifting his cap slightly, asked, "How do I find the X. High School?" The student answered, "Let's go there together." So with the student he left the station and took a trolley in front of its en- trance.

The morning was still young, and shops in N. City were not yet open. After passing through several desolate streets, they got off in front of the Crane Dance Park.

"Is the school far from here?" he asked. "About two li." The sun had risen by the time they were walk-

ing the narrow path between the rice fields after

crossing the park, but the dewdrops were still on the rice stalks, bright as pearls. Across the fields in front were clusters of trees shading some scat- tered farmhouses. Two or three chimneys rising above these structures seemed to float in the early morning air, and bluish smoke emanating from them curled in the sky like incense. He knew that the farmers were preparing breakfast.

He inquired at an inn close to the school and was informed that the few pieces of luggage sent out the previous week had already arrived. The innkeeper, used to Chinese lodgers, gave him a hearty welcome. After unpacking, he had the feel- ing that the days ahead promised much joy and pleasure.

But all his hopes for the future were mocked by reality that very evening. His home town, however small, was a busy little town, and while he had often felt lonely amid large throngs in Tokyo, nevertheless the kind of city life there was not too different from what he had been accustomed to since childhood. Now this inn, situated in the countryside of N. City, was far too isolated. To the left of its front door was a narrow path cutting across the rice fields; only a square pond to the west of the inn provided some diversity to the scene. Since school had not yet begun, students had not yet returned, and thus he was the only guest in this spacious hostel. It was still not too unbearable in the day, but that evening, when he pushed open the window to look out, everywhere was pitch darkness. For the countryside of N. City was a large plain, with nothing to obstruct one's view. A few lights were visible in the distance, now bright and now dim, lending to the view a spectral quality. Up above the ceiling he could hear the scampering rats fighting for food, while outside the window several wu-t'ung trees would rustle whenever there was a breeze. Because his room was on the second floor, the rattle of the leaves sounded so close that he was frightened almost to the point of tears. He had never felt a stronger nostalgia than on that evening.

8 "You polished halls, polished men, I Polished women-to all adieu! I I'm off to climb in the mountains, I And smiling to look down on you!" These lines form the last stanza of the Prologue to Heine's "Harzreise" (Travels through the Harz Mountains). See Heinrich Heine, Werke, ed. Martin Greiner (Cologne and Berlin, 1962), pp. 767-824. The poem is a satire in the form of a travel diary written in late 1824, criticizing the superficial polish of polite society which Heine's narrator longs to abandon for the simple life in the mountains. The Editors are grateful to William Nienhauser for translating this poem.

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He got to know more people after school started, and his extremely'sensitive nature also be- came adapted to the pastoral environment. In less than three months he had become Nature's child, no longer separable from the pleasures of the countryside.

His school was located on the outskirts of N. City which, as has already been mentioned, were nothing but open fields offering an unobstructed vision of broad horizons. At that time Japan was not so industrialized or populous as it is now. Hence this large area of open space around the school, diversified only by clumps of trees and little knolls and mounds. Except for a few sta- tionery shops and restaurants serving the needs of the students, there were no stores in the neigh- borhood. A few inns, however, dotted the cul- tivated fields in this mainly untilled wilderness. After supper he would put on his black serge mantle and, a favorite book in hand, take a walk in the lingering glow of the setting sun. Most probably it was during these idyllic wanderings that he developed his passion for nature.