A.
Sima Qian's account in his seminal 史记 (Shiji, History Record - usually translated as 'Records of the Grand Historian') of six assassins is probably the most absorbing part of that work. But why would Sima Qian devote a section on commoners in a work that otherwise considers only nobility and rulers? Perhaps the better question is: what's the effect of this inclusion on us?
B.
Lu Xun, considered (by the orthodoxy, at least) to be the father of modern Chinese literature, has this to say: "[Shiji is] the unique work of all historians, the songs of Qu Yuan without rhyme." I thought it interesting that Lu Xun should evoke Qu Yuan. Qu Yuan is the author of Li Sao, the closest China has to an epic poem. The poem is, at its heart, a lament, not for a lost homeland, but for the trust, regard, and understanding of the poet's liege.
C.
"A man will die for one who understands him," says one assassin in Shiji, "as a woman will make herself beautiful for one who delights in her."
These stories are paeans to the lateral relationship between one human and the "one who understands him ... who delights in her." It is the recognition by another (an Other? the Superior Other?) that allows self-fulfillment and realization of identity. To be understood is to be.
As one of the assassins says to justify why he so serves one master and not others he had had: "The others treated me commonly, and so I treated them commonly. [This one] treated me as though I were a master scholar, and so I must treat him extraordinarily."
D.
Wrote Emily Dickinson:
"I died for Beauty -- but was scarce
Adjusted in the Tomb
When One who died for Truth, was lain
In an adjoining room -- "
E.
In the middle of his life, with Shiji unfinished, Sima Qian was caught up in a court intrigue and forced to choose between suicide and castration. The penalty was calculated to force suicide. But Sima Qian chose castration in order to finish Shiji.
He wrote in a letter:
"...There is no defilement so great as castration. One who has undergone this punishment is nowhere counted as a man. This is not just a modern attitude; it has always been so. Even an ordinary fellow is offended when he has to do business with a eunuch -- how much more so, then, a gentleman! Would it not be an insult to the court and my former colleagues if now I, a menial who sweeps floors, a mutilated wretch, should raise my head and stretch my eyebrows to argue right and wrong?
"I am fit now for only guarding the palace women's apartments. I can hope for justification only after my death, when my histories become known to the world."
Sima Qian's account in his seminal 史记 (Shiji, History Record - usually translated as 'Records of the Grand Historian') of six assassins is probably the most absorbing part of that work. But why would Sima Qian devote a section on commoners in a work that otherwise considers only nobility and rulers? Perhaps the better question is: what's the effect of this inclusion on us?
B.
Lu Xun, considered (by the orthodoxy, at least) to be the father of modern Chinese literature, has this to say: "[Shiji is] the unique work of all historians, the songs of Qu Yuan without rhyme." I thought it interesting that Lu Xun should evoke Qu Yuan. Qu Yuan is the author of Li Sao, the closest China has to an epic poem. The poem is, at its heart, a lament, not for a lost homeland, but for the trust, regard, and understanding of the poet's liege.
C.
"A man will die for one who understands him," says one assassin in Shiji, "as a woman will make herself beautiful for one who delights in her."
These stories are paeans to the lateral relationship between one human and the "one who understands him ... who delights in her." It is the recognition by another (an Other? the Superior Other?) that allows self-fulfillment and realization of identity. To be understood is to be.
As one of the assassins says to justify why he so serves one master and not others he had had: "The others treated me commonly, and so I treated them commonly. [This one] treated me as though I were a master scholar, and so I must treat him extraordinarily."
D.
Wrote Emily Dickinson:
"I died for Beauty -- but was scarce
Adjusted in the Tomb
When One who died for Truth, was lain
In an adjoining room -- "
E.
In the middle of his life, with Shiji unfinished, Sima Qian was caught up in a court intrigue and forced to choose between suicide and castration. The penalty was calculated to force suicide. But Sima Qian chose castration in order to finish Shiji.
He wrote in a letter:
"...There is no defilement so great as castration. One who has undergone this punishment is nowhere counted as a man. This is not just a modern attitude; it has always been so. Even an ordinary fellow is offended when he has to do business with a eunuch -- how much more so, then, a gentleman! Would it not be an insult to the court and my former colleagues if now I, a menial who sweeps floors, a mutilated wretch, should raise my head and stretch my eyebrows to argue right and wrong?
"I am fit now for only guarding the palace women's apartments. I can hope for justification only after my death, when my histories become known to the world."
This raises a number of interesting questions -- how big is the difference, really, between dying for 'one who understands' you and dying for religion, where, theoretically, one dies for the one being who without a doubt understands one -- God? But that is, in many cases, an abstract idea. And what are the consequences of making 'me' into God, or into the 'one who understands'? (Again, essentially the same thing.) Scary when you think about it, and also an explanation for all the self-destructive behaviour we see in today's society.
ReplyDeleteHave to bake, but your profile pic is nice btw.