Why do 'we'
have such anxiety
about the Chinese??
(Please note the variations within the triple rhyme scheme).
Frankly, I am wondering whether or not 'we' are waiting for 'the Chinese' to write the American, Australian, Latin American, and European poem. Or, what might that mean?
After all, the Brits - all those poems in the colonial textbooks - did it for a long time.
Memories here of trying to explain a Wordswoth daffodil to a Nigerian college student raised in the bush. No Google back then to throw up an Internet pic.
Not to damage the idea of reciprocal translations & then some.
Stephen
http://stephenvincent.net/blog/
--- On Fri, 2/5/10, andrew burke <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
From: andrew burke <[log in to unmask]>
Subject: Re: How To Write A Chinese Poem
To: [log in to unmask]
Date: Friday, February 5, 2010, 2:36 PM
Thank you, ABN! It is a simple equation indeed >g< Andrew
On 6 February 2010 03:00, Angel Robert Marquez <[log in to unmask]>wrote:
> A WELL-KNOWN Japanese poet was asked how to compose a Chinese poem.
> "The usual Chinese poem is four lines," he explained. "The first line
> contains the initial phase; the second line, the continuation of that
> phase;
> the third line turns from this subject and begins a new one; and the fourth
> line brings the first three lines together. A popular Japanese song
> illustrates this:
> "Two daughters of a silk merchant live in Kyoto.
> The elder is twenty, the younger, eighteen.
> A soldier may kill with his sword,
> But these girls slay men with their eyes."
>
--
Andrew
'Beyond City Limits', pub. ICLL @ ECU, available at topnotch indie bookshops
- list at http://hispirits.blogspot.com/
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