What seasons are depicted in Su Shi's "Drinking on the Lake, First Clear Then Rain" and Du Mu's "Mountain Journey" respectively?
Su Shi's "Drinking on the Lake, First Clear Then Rain" and Du Mu's "Mountain Journey" are famous quatrains depicting landscapes in ancient China, so what seasons do the two poems respectively depict? According to historical and literary records, one wrote of West Lake in spring, the other of Yuelu Mountain in autumn.
One, "Drinking on the Lake, First Clear Then Rain" is a seven-character quatrain praising the beautiful scenery of West Lake, written during Su Shi's tenure as Assistant Prefect of Hangzhou. This poem does not describe a single spot or a single moment of West Lake, but offers an overall portrayal and appraisal of its beauty.
The first half of the poem describes both the water and mountains of West Lake, and its sunny and rainy demeanors. “The water's shimmer ripples, fine when clear” describes the lake's water on a sunny day: under brilliant sunlight, West Lake's waves dance and sparkle, exceedingly beautiful. “The mountain's hue is misty, wondrous too in rain” describes the mountains on a rainy day: shrouded in a curtain of rain, the hills around West Lake are dim and hazy, as if present yet not, exceedingly wondrous. From the title we can tell that on this day the poet feasted and lingered all day on West Lake; in the morning the sunlight was bright, later it turned overcast, and toward dusk it began to rain. Yet in the eyes of a poet skilled at savoring nature and deeply attached to West Lake, whether water or mountain, clear or rainy, all is beautiful and wondrous. From the praise “fine when clear” and “wondrous too in rain,” one can imagine the splendid scenery of lake and mountain under different weather, and also imagine the poet's inspiration as he wielded his brush on the spot, along with his free-spirited character and broad mind. The scenery in the first half is alternating, corresponding scenery, and the feeling is broad and unrestrained; scene and feeling blend, line answers line in scene and feeling, the beauty of West Lake is fully sketched, and the poet Su Shi's emotions are fully expressed.
In the second half of the poem, the poet does not closely follow the first two lines and further use his brush of capturing spirit and form to depict the clear light and rainy colors of lake and mountain; instead he discards the outward form to grasp the spirit, using a single ingenious simile both ethereal and apt to convey the charm of lake and mountain. Between the vehicle and the tenor, apart from the literal fact that West Lake and Xi Shi share the character “Xi,” the poet's focus is simply the beauty of West Lake before him, which in spirit and charm has an affinity with the imagined beauty of Xi Shi that can be sensed but not put into words. And precisely because both West Lake and Xi Shi have their beauty in spirit, for West Lake, clear or rainy, and for Xi Shi, light makeup or heavy, none diminishes the beauty but only adds to it. Regarding this simile, there are two opposing interpretations: one holds that the poet “compares West Lake on a clear day to Xi Shi in light makeup, and West Lake on a rainy day to Xi Shi in heavy makeup”; the other holds that the poet “compares a clear day to heavy makeup and a rainy day to light makeup.” Both views have their insights and their grounds. But for a poet overflowing with talent, this is a spirit-grasping simile caught by a master hand, a stroke of genius that came to him in a flash of poetic thought, a momentary meeting of mind and scene, associating the beautiful scenery of West Lake with Xi Shi as the embodiment of beauty; from West Lake's “fine when clear” and “wondrous too in rain,” he imagines Xi Shi must likewise be “light makeup or heavy, always suited.” When he devised the simile and set brush to paper, he likely did not rigidly insist on which of clear and rain referred to heavy makeup and which to light makeup. When appreciating this poem, if one insists on assigning heavy makeup and light makeup respectively to clear and rain, it may actually harm the completeness of the simile and the ethereal beauty of the poetic thought.
Two, "Mountain Journey" is a seven-character quatrain by the poet Du Mu describing and praising the scenery of mountain forests in late autumn. This poem depicts the colors of autumn, presenting a moving picture of autumn in the mountains; mountain path, households, white clouds, and red leaves form a harmonious and unified scene. In this poem, Du Mu uses feeling to command scenery, swiftly and accurately capturing images sufficient to embody natural beauty, and blending his own emotions into them, so that the beauty of emotion and the beauty of nature merge seamlessly, scene and feeling becoming one.
The whole poem is novel in conception and exquisite in layout, capturing splendid autumn colors amid the bleak autumn wind, competing with spring light, delighting the eye and gladdening the heart. This little poem is not merely an impromptu celebration of scenery, but further celebrates things to express aspiration; it is a revelation of the poet's inner spiritual world.
This poem depicts the colors of autumn, presenting a moving picture of autumn in the mountains. The poem writes of mountain path, households, white clouds, and red leaves, forming a harmonious and unified scene. These elements are not arranged side by side in equal status, but organically linked, with principal and subordinate, some at the center of the picture, others in supporting roles. Simply put, the first three lines are the guest, the fourth line is the host; the first three lines paint the background and create the atmosphere for the fourth, serving to pave the way and set it off.
“Far up the cold mountain the stone path slants,” writes of the mountain and the mountain path. A winding little path stretches in a serpentine way toward the mountaintop. The word “far” conveys the path's long extent, and the word “slants,” echoing “up,” conveys the high yet gentle lie of the mountain.
“Where white clouds deepen, there are households,” writes of clouds and households. The poet's gaze follows this mountain path upward, and where the white clouds drift, there are several stone houses and stone walls built of mountain rock. The “households” here echo the “stone path” of the previous line — this mountain path is precisely the passage by which those households come and go. In this way the two elements are organically linked. The wreathing white clouds show that the mountain is very high. The poet uses the technique of horizontal clouds cutting off the ridge, letting these patches of white clouds block the reader's view, yet leaving room for imagination: above those white clouds, beyond the clouds there are mountains, and there must be another kind of scenery.
Toward these elements, the poet is only giving an objective description. Although he uses the word “cold,” it is only to draw out the later words “late” and “frost,” and does not express the poet's emotional leaning. After all, it is still only building momentum for the later description — sketching the environment in which the maple grove stands.
“I stop the carriage, loving the maple grove at dusk” is different; the leaning is already very distinct and very intense. The mountain path, white clouds, and households did not move the poet, but this evening scene of the maple grove made his delight impossible to restrain. In order to stop and savor this mountain forest scenery, he actually paid no heed to driving on. The word “dusk” in this line is incomparably exquisite, containing multiple layers of meaning: (1) it indicates that the first two lines are what was seen by day, while the last two are the scene at evening. (2) Because only in the evening is there sunset light, and the splendid evening glow and the bright red maple leaves set each other off, the maple grove is especially beautiful. (3) The poet lingered and forgot to return; by evening he was still unwilling to board the carriage and leave, showing how extremely he loved the red leaves. (4) Because he stopped the carriage for a long time and observed minutely, he could arrive at the fourth line, “Frosted leaves are redder than February flowers,” such an aphorism rich in reasoned delight.