4

The Bamboo-Leaf Boat

INTRODUCTION

The story of the bamboo-leaf boat stems from an anonymous classical tale of the late Tang dynasty that is found in several recensions.¹ Known alternatively as “Chen Jiqing” (陳季卿), the name of the protagonist, or “The Bamboo-Leaf Boat” (Zhuye Zhou 竹葉舟), it formed the basis of a play by the mid to late Yuan playwright Fan Kang 范康, who was also known as Fan Zi’an 范子安 or Fan Ziying 范子英. Fan’s name occurs in the section of the Register of Ghosts titled “Those Famous and Talented Men Who Are Already Dead Whom I Knew Personally.” Since this section includes people who were listed as “still alive” in the first edition of 1330 but moved to the “already dead” section in Zhong Sicheng’s last revisions of 1345, we can date Fan’s passing sometime between 1330 and 1345. The Register of Ghosts provides us, in fact, with what little we know about Fan’s life and part of his literary production:

Fan Kang, also known as Zi’an, was a man of Hangzhou. He understood human nature and natural principle and was skilled at exposition and explanation; he was capable in writing, and also thoroughly versed in the rules of music. He composed the play Du Zimei Roams the Serpentine because Wang Bocheng had written Li Taibai Banished to Yelang,² and as soon as his pen touched paper, it was new and original. This was most likely because that with which heaven had endowed him was superb and distinct, unreachable by others.

[His plays:]

On Serpentine Reservoir Du Fu Roams in the Spring³

Chen Jiqing Is Enlightened to the Way on a Bamboo-Leaf Boat⁴

[An Elegy:]

Poems inscribed on Goose Pagoda, limning autumn’s clarity,

Wine filling the horn flagon, rowing in the evening breeze;

Poetic tallies from “wine commands”⁵ and leisurely chanted songs,

On the battlefield of letters he achieved the greatest merit;

Sweeping away a thousand troops, he was commander in chief in the arena of brushes.

Dreams of dragons and snakes,

Traces of fox and hare⁶—

Half of his life spent

In the sound of a finger snap.⁷

In addition to these plays, only the latter of which is extant, Fan also has a few surviving colloquial poetic works (sanqu 散曲): four “little songs” (xiaoling 小令) titled “Wine,” “Sex,” “Wealth,” and “Anger” (jiu se cai qi 酒色財氣), and an extended suite of songs called Finding Joy in the Way (Ledao 樂道). Both sets of songs have a tangential relationship with Daoism, particularly the Quanzhen (Perfectly Realized) sect. The early figures of this sect considered the emotions inspired by alcohol, sex, riches, and anger as the “four harms” (sihai 四害), giving in to which would dissipate the vital essence and virtue of the body and spirit.⁸ The second suite, Finding Joy in the Way, is a rather conventional set of songs about the joys of Daoist life; it bears a close resemblance to an inserted suite of songs found in the Yuan Edition of the play. We should, however, remember that these are rather cliché songs, and that the warnings against sex, alcohol, material possessions, and anger have a very old tradition reflecting an emphasis on restraint that is shared by many schools of Chinese thought and religion. Still, they do point to Fan Kang’s general interest in Daoism and exploring the idea of “the world as a dream.”

THE ORIGINAL STORY

The story of Chen Jiqing as it exists in the Tang makes no direct connection to Daoism, but it does speak of a hermit from Zhongnan Mountain, south of Chang’an. This mountain is particularly famous for its anchorites, as well as its relationship to the formative tradition of Daoism.⁹ The story in its entirety reads as follows:

Chen Jiqing’s home was in the area south of the Yangtze, and he had been gone from home for ten years to take the advanced scholar examinations. His ambition was such that it was impossible for him to return unless he had succeeded. He stayed in the capital, where he sold calligraphy and writing in order to clothe and feed himself. He often visited a monk at Green Dragon Monastery. It so happened that he went there on a day when that monk had gone somewhere else, so he rested in a heated room to wait for his return.

An old codger from Mount Zhongnan was also waiting for the monk, and he had just sat up near to the stove and he welcomed Jiqing to come close to it. They sat for a while, and he said to Jiqing, “It’s already late afternoon, you must be famished.” Jiqing replied, “Indeed, I am hungry, but since the monk is not here, what’s to be done?” The old man loosened a little bag that had been tied behind his wrist and took out an herbal simple about an inch square, which he steeped in a cup and gave to Jiqing, saying, “This can pretty much cure your hunger.” Jiqing swallowed it and then he felt pleasant and full, the suffering of cold and hunger washed from his body.

There was a map of the world on the eastern wall where Jiqing traced the road to south of the river and then sighed deeply to himself, “If I could get to float out on the Yellow River from the Wei, roam along the Luo, swim in the Huai, and ford across the Yangtze to get to my home, then I would not regret that I went back without any success.” The old man laughed and said, “This is easy to bring about.” So he ordered the monk’s acolyte to snap off a leaf from a bamboo in front of the steps, and he made a little leaf boat, placing it on the Wei River on the map and said, “You concentrate your gaze on this boat, sir, and it will be just as you had just desired. But when you reach your home, you must be careful not to stay too long.”

Jiqing stared at it for a long time and had just slightly perceived the waves of the Wei River when the leaf suddenly expanded, and the mat sails had already been set—it was just like he had boarded a boat. He first went from the Wei to the Yellow River, and he anchored his boat at a Chan meditation cave at a secluded monastery, where he inscribed a poem on the southern fore pillar, which read,

When the frosty gong rings, the evening winds quicken,

A chaos of crows once again roost in the cold forest;

At this time I quit the oars, grieve, and murmur:

Standing alone facing Lotus Blossom Peak.¹⁰

The next day he overnighted at Tong Pass and went ashore, where he inscribed some lines on the gate at Putong Monastery east of the gates of the pass, which read,

Crossing the pass grieving over ambitions lost,

Ten thousand thoughts disorder heart’s plans;

Even going down the slope, the horse lacks energy,

The dust from “cleaning the doorway” fills my clothing.¹¹

My plots and plans, most not reached—

Heart and mouth naturally turn against each other.¹²

But, having already set a plan to return home in shame

Is still better than not returning home because of shame.

From the eastern part of Shaanxi onward, every place he passed was a replication of his former desire. In ten days or so he reached home and his wife and children, and his brothers older and younger all welcomed him at the gate. That evening he wrote a poem titled “Evening Gazes from a Pavilion on the Yangtze” that he inscribed in his study:

I stand facing the Yangtze pavilion with a sorrow that fills the eyes,

Events past in the last ten years truly seem long gone and far away;

Fields and gardens¹³ have already dispersed like floating clouds,

Kinsmen and fellow villagers have half disappeared with the passing water.

On the banks of that stream I nowhere encounter those fishermen and woodcutters—

At the edge of the eddy it is hard to find the sand-spit gulls of older days.

Do not reason that because I still have my hair and teeth that I am not yet past my prime,

For facing those distant mountains and chanting is capable of turning the hair white.

On this evening, he told his wife, “My examination time nears, and I cannot tarry long. I should set off immediately.” Thereupon he intoned a stanza to separate from his wife:

The moon falls aslant, cold dew whitens,

This night I depart, but leave my heart behind;

Wine comes, filling us with sorrow as we drink,

The poem completed, it is intoned to a harmony of tears.

A song of separation from the “perching phoenix” pipes,

“Parting Cranes”¹⁴: we resent the jasper zither.

And tomorrow night, at my lovelorn spot,

The autumn wind will ruffle a half-empty coverlet.

As he was about to get on the boat, he left one more poem behind for his brothers:

In planning my life it is not that I was not early enough,

But, alas, that my fate comes too slow.

All of my old friends populate the Celestial River,¹⁵

But this body of mine is still out on the road.

The northern wind comes after a slight snow,

The evening scene still has a few clouds.

Disconsolate and dreary out on the clear river,

This petty little person must make this examination deadline.

After the first watch, he once again boarded his leaf boat, floated out on the river, and disappeared. His siblings and his wife and children wept and wailed on the bank, taking him now to be a “ghostly thing.”¹⁶

The single leaf floated as if to take flight on the wind and he traced his old route back to the banks of the Wei. Thereupon he rented a mount, and once again visited Green Dragon Monastery. He clearly saw the old codger sitting there wrapped in his coarse clothes, and Jiqing thanked him, saying, “Well, I did return. But wasn’t it just a dream?” The codger laughed, “You’ll know for sure only after sixty days have passed.” The day was drawing toward evening and the monk had still not returned. The codger left, and Jiqing went back to the host [of the house where he was staying].

Two months later, Jiqing’s wife and children brought gold and cloth from south of the river [in order to pay for his burial]. They were of the opinion that Jiqing had passed away and therefore came to find out. His wife said, “You came home on such and such a day in such and such a month, and on that night you wrote a poem for the western studio, and also left behind two parting poems.” He then became aware that it had not been a dream.

In the spring of the next year Jiqing failed the examinations and returned eastward, and he saw the poems he had left at the Chan meditation cave and the secluded monastery at the pass—the ink was still fresh. In his later years, Jiqing did pass the examinations, but then “gave up the grains”¹⁷ and went off into Zhongnan Mountain.¹⁸

This is one of the many Tang tales that teaches the illusionary quality of human existence through a dream. The two most famous examples of such tales are Li Gongzuo’s Tale of the Prefect of Southern Branch and Shen Jiji’s Inside a Pillow. In the first story the protagonist experiences a splendid official career as prefect of the county of Southern Branch in a dream only to realize once he awakes that it was a career in the kingdom of ants below the acacia tree in his courtyard. In the second story a young student on the way to the examinations experiences an even more splendid and eventful career while taking a nap in an inn on a headrest given to him by an elderly man at Handan while waiting for the yellow millet porridge to be cooked—when he wakes up, the yellow millet is still not done.¹⁹

THE DRAMA

Fan Kang made several changes to this story when he converted it into a play, adapting the Tang version to a subgeneric classification of zaju known as “deliverance plays” (dutuo xi 度脫戲).²⁰ This designation was first used by Aoki Masaru (1887–1964) in his Introduction to the Zaju Drama of Yuan Writers (Genjin zatsugeki kaisetsu 元人雜劇序說) published in 1938 and then supplemented and corrected by Sui Shusen and Xu Tiaofu in their 1941 translation of this book. In that work, Aoki remarked, “These are plays in which an immortal explains the Dharma to a mortal, causes him to be liberated from worldly cares, and leads him into the way of the immortals.”²¹ The term dutuo is considerably older than Aoki’s adoption, however, and in its frequent use in both the Daoist and Buddhist canons has the clear meaning of “to lead someone beyond [their current existence] and shed [worldly cares].” Of course, that other possible existence varies in Buddhism or Daoism. Aoki’s clear intent was to bring thematic specificity to the vague classification of “Immortals Transforming Others Through the Way” (Shenxian Daohua 神仙道化)²² in Zhu Quan’s Twelve Categories of Zaju (Zaju shier ke 雜劇十二科), the earliest attempt to categorize zaju by theme. In addition to Bamboo-Leaf Boat, fourteen other Yuan and Ming plays are usually classified as deliverance zaju:

Daoist

Anon., Lü Dongbin in Peach and Willow: A Dream of Ascending to Immortality (Lü Dongbin taoliu shengxian meng 呂洞賓桃柳升仙蒙)

Anon., Old Zhuang Zhou’s One Dream of the Butterfly (Lao Zhuang Zhou yizhen hudie meng 老莊周一枕蝴蝶夢)

Anon., Zhongli of the Han Leads Lan Caihe to Enlightenment (Han Zhongli dutuo Lan Caihe 漢鍾離度脫藍採和)

Dai Shanfu 戴善甫, Cripple Li Yue: Poetry and Wine at the River-Gazing Pavilion (Que Li Yue shijiu Wangjiang Ting 瘸李岳詩酒望江亭)

Gu Zijing 谷子敬, Lü Dongbin Thrice Leads the Willow South of the City to Enlightenment (Lü Dongbin sandu chengnan liu 呂洞賓三度城南柳)

Jia Zhongming 價仲明, Iron Crutch Li Leads Golden Lad and Jade Lass to Enlightenment (Tieguai Li du Jintong Yunü 鐵拐李度金童玉女)

Li Haogu 李好古, At Shamen Island Student Zhang Brews Up the Sea (Shamen dao Zhang Sheng zhuhai 沙門島張生煮海)

Ma Zhiyuan, Lü Dongbin Gets Drunk Three Times in Yueyang Tower (Lü Dongbin sanzui Yueyang Lou 呂洞賓三醉岳陽樓)

Ma Zhiyuan, Ma Danyang Thrice Leads Crazy Ren to Enlightenment (Ma Danyang sandu Ren fengzi 馬丹陽三度任風子)²³

Ma Zhiyuan, Li Shizhong 李時中, Hua Lilang Xueshi 花李郎學士, Hongzi Li Er 紅字李二, Gaining Enlightenment at Handan: The Dream of Yellow Millet (Handan dao xingwu huangliang meng 邯鄲道省悟黃粱夢)

Yang Jingxian 樣景賢, Ma Danyang Leads Head of the Guild Liu to Enlightenment (Ma Danyang dutuo Liu hangshou 馬丹陽度脫柳行首)

Yue Bochuan 岳伯川, Lü Dongbin Leads Iron Crutch Li to Enlightenment (Lü Dongbin dutuo Tieguai Li 呂洞賓度脫鐵拐李)

Buddhist

Li Shouqing (?) 李壽卿, The Monk of Moon’s Light Leads Liu Cui to Enlightenment (Yueming heshang du Liu Cui 月明和尚度劉翠)

Zheng Tingyu 鄭廷玉, The Monk with a Burden and the Story of “Patience” (Budai heshang renzi ji 布袋和尚忍字記)

For a more complete survey of the deliverance plays of the period 1250–1450 we should, moreover, add the deliverance plays composed by the early Ming princes Zhu Quan and Zhu Youdun written in the late fourteenth and early fifteenth centuries. Zhu Youdun informs us that deliverance plays were performed at major birthdays, and at one time in his life he would write a new deliverance play every year for the celebration of his own birthday, bringing his total of deliverance plays to seven. Zhu Quan’s only surviving deliverance play was clearly intended to be performed at his own birthday too. To what extent the performance of deliverance plays throughout the Yuan were limited to birthday celebrations is, however, not clear, but the large casts and special effects required by at least some deliverance plays may suggest that they too have been written for performance at court. This is also suggested by the collaboration of court actors in the composition of at least one deliverance play.

Fan seems to have been very interested in Daoism and the possibility of literary expression of its basic concepts. It is dangerous, of course, to create conclusions about a person’s inclinations based solely on a miniscule amount of material, and the extant poems and dramas of Fan Kang may reflect nothing more than appreciation by anthologists and bibliographers for these poems. But from what is left, we can assume that Fan knew and appreciated Quanzhen Daoism, and this appreciation is reflected in the way he changed the Tang story. For instance, he converts the “old codger from Zhongnan” into Lü Dongbin, one of the Eight Immortals as well as one of the lineage patriarchs of the Quanzhen sect of Daoism. Like all authors of deliverance plays, Fan Kang had to choose between the person to be delivered and the deliverer as the lead of his zaju. A choice for the person to be delivered would have resulted in many songs praising the pleasures of the flesh and reviling the mendicant as a crook; a choice for the deliverer will result in arias extolling the superior joys of the immortals. Fan Kang takes the second option and so shifts the focus of the story from Chen Jiqing to the Daoist patriarchs Lü Dongbin and the ancient magician Liezi 列子 (Master Lie, also known as Lie Yukou). The first act of the play on Chen Jiqing’s meeting with a stranger at Green Dragon Monastery is clearly modeled on the classical tale, as is the third act, which is devoted to Chen Jiqing’s nighttime visit to his parents and his wife back home. The second act, which dramatizes a meeting of Chen Jiqing with the immortal Liezi and his companions has no direct counterpart in the classical tale, but it may have been suggested by the reference to visiting a Chan meditation cave. But whereas in the classical tale Chen Jiqing returns to Chang’an following his visit home, the play does not allow for this and ends his journey in a dream with an abrupt near drowning at the end of the third act. Whereas in the Tang tale the dream is recounted in the vein of the traditional Chinese “tales of the strange” (zhiguai 志怪), in which Chen Jiqing begins his ascetic pursuit of enlightenment only after succeeding in the examinations, the dream sequence in the play brings Chen to the edge of death to reveal to him the uselessness of pursuing an official career, or any other worldly endeavor. In the final act, an awakened Chen Jiqing sets out in pursuit of his deliverer, Lü Dongbin, who once again explains the meaning of the Way and then takes Chen to meet the other members of the Eight Immortals.²⁴

The play follows the pattern of most deliverance plays. As in them, the person to be brought to enlightenment is usually someone of low status but with a level of material comfort. There are three basic patterns to the deliverance plays.²⁵ The first appear as stories of immortals who have been banished to earth to suffer for some misdeed stemming from rekindled desire or some faux pas in the transcendent realm. They are turned into mortal human form, from which they are delivered back to their original immortal being. The second pattern involves people who are not explicitly identified as banished immortals but who have some innate capacity to become an immortal—they “have what it takes to become an immortal” (you shenxian zhi fen 有神仙之分) or “half of what it takes” (you ban shenxian zhi fen 有半神仙之分). This is signaled to heaven by “a blue or purple ether” (qing, ziqi 青、紫氣) that radiates into the heavens. These humans are either students or “mean people” such as courtesan-entertainers, butchers, actors, or minor officials. The third pattern involves protagonists who are either inanimate objects or ghosts. These include spirit beings and the essentialized spirits (jing 精) of trees: most notably the peach, the apricot, and willow. In their inanimate form, they are all hindered from becoming immortal, even though they possess the “wind of an immortal and the bones of the Way” (xianfeng daogu 仙風道骨). Thus they must first be reborn as humans.

The human protagonists all cling to the world. They are characterized either by their burning ambition for success (as in the case of students) or by their brazen enjoyment of material comfort (as in the case of low-class characters like actors, courtesans, and butchers). They are confronted by their deliverer, who is often dressed as a mendicant. They are presented with their worst nightmare: a descent into poverty and the onset of all the material deprivation and discomfort of such that their mind could imagine.²⁶ Comfortable, and often surrounded by friends and colleagues, they are reluctant to leave their families and friends and, therefore, extremely resistant to the delights of the Daoist life relayed to them orally by their deliverer. To counter this resistance, the deliverer has no other recourse but to create, through either dreams or a carefully arranged minidrama that enlists the help of his immortal fellows, a situation that brings the targeted person to the understanding that unlimited desire is associated only with the “material self” that has a limited life span.²⁷ It is only at the end of the play when the person, suffering the trauma of the dream or event, is finally persuaded to join after realizing the power of the deliverer to create other worlds and manipulate time.

The majority of those who convert these souls are members of the Daoist lineage of patriarchs, and with the exception of the Spirit of Venus (Taibai Jinxing 太白金星) and Iron Crutch Li, they are all Quanzhen masters. The lineage of patriarchs in this school are, in order,²⁸ the Imperial Lord of Eastern Florescence (Donghua Dijun 東華帝君), Zhongli Quan 鍾離全, Lü Dongbin, Wang Zhe 王嚞, and Ma Danyang. Many scholars therefore assume a close link between Quanzhen Daoism and deliverance plays. There is a congruence between those converted—financially comfortable—and those who do the converting in the drama and in the doctrinal texts of Quanzhen. One of the early precepts of the school was the issue of charity: of giving up one’s wealth to a religious institution that would redistribute it to the poor in the form of medicine and food.²⁹ The point is that there is a definite audience in the minds of the writers and perhaps a theatrical audience that is reflected in the class status of those portrayed as waiting to be delivered.

The Buddhist agents of deliverance—the Monk of the Bright Moon and the Monk with the Burden—show no significant difference, despite their being Buddhist, from those who are Daoists. The essential generic rules of the deliverance play still hold. This should at least give us pause in considering any of these plays as “belonging” to a certain sect. Even the catchphrases that are often associated with Quanzhen asceticism—the monkey of the mind and the horse of the will, or the four deadly vices of wine, sex, anger, and material goods—are in fact shared not only by these two religions but by Confucianism as well. The main difference is that where Buddhism and Daoism argue for complete abnegation of desire and pleasures of the senses, Confucianism argues for moderation; and that plea to moderation exists at a very early, perhaps even pre-Confucian, stage in such works as the Book of Documents. Such concepts may more logically be considered as general cultural and social modes or norms that become more specifically and more stringently applied as they are incorporated into and shaped by the doctrines and praxes of various religions or schools of thought.

The Daoist deliverance plays often feature members of the Eight Immortals. This is a grouping of immortals that is first encountered in the thirteenth century and reached its final makeup in the fifteenth. While two of the members of the group (Zhongli Quan and Lü Dongbin) are also counted as Quanzhen patriarchs, other members such as the cripple Li Yue (Iron Crutch Li) and the actor Lan Caihe have no link to the sect. Many deliverance plays are concluded by a scene in which the company of the Eight Immortals introduces the new immortal to the Queen Mother of the West, a mythical creature whose history predates that of Quanzhen Daoism by more than a thousand years. Only two of the fifteen plays, in fact, deal specifically with one, and only one, of the human members of the Quanzhen sect: Ma Danyang.

One of the small ironies of the deliverance plays is that when the object of deliverance emerges from whatever parlous state in which he or she had been put, their transformation is not complete until the deliverer points out the significance of that state. It is only then, when these tremulous souls are still in a hazy state of uncertainty about their experience, that the magical nature of these immortals is displayed by their power of interpreting the state—the staged scene, dream, or death—that they had crafted. It is this magical power to create and interpret that finally erases all doubt and allows the delivered to be whisked off to the paradise of the Queen Mother of the West in like company.³⁰

The Bamboo-Leaf Boat itself is extant in two versions: the early fourteenth century Yuan edition and one heavily edited by Zang Maoxun, who has exercised his Confucian, anti-Daoist stance in several ways.³¹ Most noticeable among his changes is in the name itself. In the early Yuan edition, the play is known as

[Title:]	Lü Pure Yang appears in transformed form in a dream of blue waves
	Lü Chunyang xianhua canglang meng 呂純陽顯化滄浪夢
[Name:]	Chen Jiqing Is Enlightened to the Way on a Bamboo-Leaf Boat
	Chen Jiqing wudao zhuye zhou 陳季卿悟道竹葉舟

Zang Maoxun changes these to

Title:	Lü Dongbin Appears in Transformed Form in a Dream of Blue Waves
	Lü Dongbin xianhua canglang meng 呂洞賓顯化滄浪夢
Name:	Chen Jiqing Mistakenly Boards the Bamboo-Leaf Boat
	Chen Jiqing wushang zhuye zhou 陳季卿誤上竹葉舟

While this may seem, in fact, only a minor change, it captures the whole tenor of changes that Zang makes to the play. In the Yuan Edition, the emphasis is on Chen’s transformation, the expected result of Lü Dongbin’s creation of the boat and dream. In Zang’s version, it makes it seem as though Chen, as Song Ke and Yu Ying say, “has boarded a pirate ship and fallen into the clutches of Lü Dongbin.”³² The meaning of the change becomes clear in the play in the fourth act, where Zang Maoxun added an extra song that did not exist in the earlier edition:

(Gun xiuqiu)

You say I drove that little boat across the blue waves,

Held the bamboo fishing rod and threw on that green rain cape—

This I did!

You came within an inch of your life foolhardily crossing that river,

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) Master! Once you decided you would lead me to enlightenment, why did you dump me in the river, putting me at death’s door? You really know how to manipulate people! (MALE LEAD acts out pointing to LIE YUKOU, sings:)

If I hadn’t laid out that little snare [italics ours],

How could I have persuaded these immortal ones to bring this scene to an end?

I have seven other brothers among my old friends as well.

The intent of this addition seems clear enough: to suggest that Lü Dongbin is a charlatan whose interest lies not in enlightening Chen but in demonstrating to the rest of the Eight Immortals his own cleverness. This agenda of revealing the chicanery of the Daoists is carried out in minor and major ways throughout Zang’s Selection of Yuan Plays edition. For instance, minor changes in the padding words can produce significant changes in tenor. If we compare the following aria in the two editions, we can see how cleverly Zang makes these small changes:

Yuan version:

【天下樂】 (Tianxia le)

早經了一將功成萬骨枯。	I’ve already been through “One general’s success is ten thousand bleached bones,”
嘆你區區,文共武,	Ai, you insignificant little civil and military officials:
好辛苦麼紫羅袍、白象笏。	So much trouble, those purple silk court robes, and white ivory tablets—
爭如我誦《黃庭》《道德經》,	How can they compare to my chanting the Yellow Court and Canon of the Way and Its Virtue,
持金符《太素書》,	Holding a golden tally and The Text of Great Plainness—
傳清風一萬古。	That transmits a freshening wind across myriad antiquities.

Zang Maoxun’s A Selection of Yuan Plays version:

【天下樂】 (Tianxia le)

早經了一將功成萬骨枯。	I’ve already been through “One general’s success is ten thousand bleached bones,”
哎,你區區,文共武,	Ai, you insignificant little civil and military officials:
說甚麼榮耀人也紫羅襴、	Say what you want about those purple silk court robes that glorify a person,
烏紗帽、	Those raven’s black gauze hats
白象笏。	And white ivory tablets—
爭如我誦《黃庭》《道德經》,	How can they compare to my chanting the Yellow Court and Canon of the Way and Its Virtue,
諷《金精》《太素書》,	Or intoning Golden Essence and The Text of Great Plainness
倒落的播清風一萬古。	That unexpectedly wound up sowing a freshening wind across myriad antiquities.

The introduction of the phrase “unexpectedly” (dao luode 倒落的), italicized in the last line of the table, breaks what is a continuous flow in the final three lines of the Yuan Plays song—which culminates in a natural transmission of the freshening wind—and therefore creates a slight disjuncture in which activity and outcome seem not to have any natural connection.³³

More major changes involve shortening the suite of eight inserted songs that come between acts three and four to a suite of four, and changing the singer from Lü Dongbin to Liezi. Not only does this destroy Lü Dongbin’s long meditation on the nature of human activity and how enlightenment releases one from the vexations it produces, but Zang’s changes subtly undermine Liezi’s expression of similar pleasures by an introduced emphasis on the hedonistic, even lazy, nature of the life that Liezi describes: sleeping late, cadging food, a completely disinterested existence. Whereas the Yuan Plays edition allows Lü to ruminate about the difficulties he faced in coming to his decisions and about the contrast between historical awareness and rational judgments on one side and an enlightened intuitive knowledge on the other, Zang’s changes make Liezi seem simply like a social dropout who rationalizes his choice to be completely lazy.

Likewise, Zang changes the singer of the second act, Liezi in the Yuan Plays edition, to Lü Dongbin, and his choice seems dictated by a desire to bring about confrontation.³⁴ In this act, Zang introduces a theme that is not present in the earlier play: he has Chen Jiqing accuse Lü of completely one-sided knowledge. That is, that Lü Dongbin “had never been an official” so could not possibly “know about the happiness of being an official.” This effectively destabilizes Lü’s constant reference to the role of experience over learning and of nonhistorical time over the power of history, asking how one can make a judgment without knowing both sides.

These changes seem part and parcel of Zang Maoxun’s distrust of Daoism and a strong impulse to introduce—if not Confucian values—a sense of the function and value of history and human community built on interconnected social roles and responsibilities. Song and Yu suggest that these changes may not have been Zang’s alone but reflect a growing dissatisfaction with Daoism and its relationship to court and culture at large. They suggest that Ming rulers adopted a “pragmatic approach” to Daoism and exploited it for what it could offer in terms of lengthening one’s life span, which included not only drugs but also techniques of the bedchamber, which resulted in a heightened interest in sexual techniques and literary representation in the great pornographic novels of the Ming. As they point out, “There is not a single good Daoist” portrayed in the Journey to the West, one of the four major classics of fiction in the Ming.³⁵

Whatever the reason, there are significant differences between the two editions, and we have translated both in order that readers can investigate these differences and their significance for themselves.

SUGGESTED READINGS

Crump 1994, Katz 1996 and 1999, Song and Yu 2003.

 

NEWLY CUT WITH PLOT PROMPTS: CHEN JIQING IS ENLIGHTENED TO THE WAY ON A BAMBOO-LEAF BOAT, A FOURTEENTH-CENTURY EDITION

DRAMATIS PERSONAE IN ORDER OF APPEARANCE

Role type	Name and family, institutional, or social role
EXTRA MALE	CHEN JIQING
ACOLYTE	Young ACOLYTE at Green Dragon Monastery
MALE LEAD	LÜ DONGBIN (acts 1, 4)
MALE LEAD	LIEZI (act 2)
COMICS	DAOIST IMMORTALS
OFFICIAL	DAOIST OFFICIAL
MALE LEAD	FISHERMAN (Lü Dongbin) (act 3)
OLD MAN	CHEN JIQING’s father
OLD WOMAN	CHEN JIQING’s mother
FEMALE LEAD	CHEN JIQING’s wife
EIGHT IMMORTALS	EIGHT IMMORTALS

NEWLY CUT WITH PLOT PROMPTS: CHEN JIQING IS ENLIGHTENED TO THE WAY ON A BAMBOO-LEAF BOAT

EXTRA MALE costumed as CHEN JIQING enters and speaks—I am named Chen Jiqing and am from Yuhang in Wulin.³⁶ I studied the Confucian curriculum when young and came to the capital to take the examinations. I did not pass the examinations and am drifting around here. I’m now facing winter, and the thick and tossing snow is falling fast. Oh! Such bad luck. I just suddenly thought: the abbot of Green Dragon Monastery is an old hometown friend. I’ll go off and see him now.

Wait until EXTRA MALE has come on, opened, then stopped—Wait until after ACOLYTE speaks—After EXTRA MALE finishes inscribing the lyric “Fragrance Fills the Courtyard”—You, as MALE LEAD costumed in a stork-feather overcoat and carrying a thorn basket, enter and open—I, this humble Daoist, am named Lü Yan, with a second name of Dongbin; my name in the Way is Master of Pure Yang. [I’m here by] command of my master. Because in the mortal world there is a certain Chen Jiqing who is destined to be an immortal, I have been ordered to enlighten him. Far off, I see a shaft of purple light coming from Green Dragon Monastery, and that means he is probably there.

In the morning I rove the northern seas, at eventide Cangwu,³⁷

With Green Snake³⁸ in my sleeve I am rashly courageous;

Three days at Yueyang Tower,³⁹ not a soul recognized me,

Reciting a poem in a clear voice I flew over Lake Dongting.

([XIANLÜ MODE:] Dian jiangchun)

I have just visited northern Yue and Cangwu⁴⁰

And already the progressions of the seasons have passed many times

To evolve into past and present.

I sigh over the prosperity and decline of worldly events,

Who actually recognizes the path to long life?

(Hunjiang long)

I’ve measured that dollop of the cosmic realm,

And passed through the remains of pitched battles where dragons contested and tigers fought.⁴¹

From the time that swirling confusion was split open,⁴²

I have trod through to the empty void—

Hills and valleys, high and deep, have all changed apace,

Mountains and rivers, atmosphere and appearance, reflect in the blue void.

I have cultivated myself until my spirit is like water,

And the color of my face like vermilion.

Moreover, I take no mica of mysterious spirit,

No pound of lead to form a myriad-year gem,

I ingest no goji berries or rhizomes of cangshu,⁴³

Pluck no China root or osmanthus seeds,

And wear no miraculous tallies or precious spells at my belt.

I just harness that monkey heart and horse will tight:

So let the stars turn and things change one for the other,

Rocks rot and mulberries wither.

MALE LEAD acts out greeting EXTRA MALE, [speaks:] What are you doing here? Don’t plot for riches and wealth, or covet fame and fortune. Are you willing to leave with me?

(You hulu)

I laugh at this road to fame and fortune of yours, with its windblown waves ten thousand feet high;

Heading to the land of right and wrong, you’ll suffer all in vain—

Even if you had Su Qin’s very ministerial seals at your belt, what good would it do?⁴⁴

Just look: in that Gallery Soaring Beyond the Mists,⁴⁵ who are the true heroes?

In the precinct of the Golden Valley⁴⁶ they are all beclouded boys and girls.

Wait until EXTRA MALE speaks, [speak:] There are the worthy.

What kind of worthiness can you discern,

What kind of dullness?

Even if you cast a likeness of Zhugong of Tao in yellow gold,⁴⁷

In the end he would still float on the misty waters of Dongting Lake.

(Tianxia le)

I’ve already been through “One general’s success is ten thousand bleached bones,”

Ai, you insignificant little civil and military officials:

So much trouble, those purple silk court robes,

And white ivory tablets—

How can they compare to my chanting the Yellow Court⁴⁸ and Canon of the Way and Its Virtue,⁴⁹

Holding a golden tally and The Text of Great Plainness⁵⁰—

That transmits a freshening wind across myriad antiquities.

After EXTRA MALE speaks.—[Speak:] The Yellow Court and Canon of the Way and Its Virtue. … Aren’t you cold and hungry, scholar?—Wait until EXTRA MALE speaks.—[Speak:] I have some small techniques to free you from hunger and cold.—Act out taking out herbal simples and giving them to EXTRA MALE.—After EXTRA MALE takes the simples.—EXTRA asks MALE LEAD [ … ] the secret practices of above.—MALE LEAD speaks: In old days the Four Hoary Heads hid themselves on Mount Shang. Nestman and Xu You attained it at Ying River.⁵¹ These were all immortals who had attained the way.—Wait until EXTRA MALE has spoken.

(Nezha ling)

You must have heard of Lie Yukou

Who rode upon the freshening wind to enter the eight domains of the world?⁵²

And there was Master Zifang

Who accompanied Red Pine in his return to the Grotto Gates.⁵³

Zhang Qian floated his raft to the Thearch’s Capital,⁵⁴

And there was that Ye Jingchan too⁵⁵

Who welcomed the Lustrous Emperor to go off

And roam the byways of Heaven.

(Que ta zhi)

The sights in that place of ours are not common at all,

And there, none of you from the lower realms dwell.

What you will see are rainy mists and cloudy sunsets,

Their colors penetrating the heavenly avenues.

There the immortals of Grand Canopy Heaven⁵⁶ freely pass by.

I’ve come down to this dusty realm

To transform the obtuse and doltish—like you.

[Speak:] Do you know these things, scholar?—EXTRA MALE speaks again: What things?

(Jisheng cao)

Just think of that day when Liu, the Exalted Ancestor,

Drove Xiang Yu of Chu to his ruin.

Xiang Yu had displayed his “strength to uproot mountains,”

And single-handedly lifted a bronze tripod—

All these heroic acts.

But he was cast into the red dirt and lost his way on the road to Yinling,

And quickly reached Rook River—it was not a ferry crossing with no boat!⁵⁷

You should study Zhang Liang of the Han, who quit office, gave up his post:

“Better to hear ‘quickly return to the mountains.’”⁵⁸

Wait until EXTRA MALE has spoken.—MALE LEAD speaks: Can you find where I live?

(Reprise)

In vain you’ll wear out Wang Qiao’s sandals, he who ascended to immortal state,⁵⁹

You’ll never see the simples-refining stove of Ge Hong.⁶⁰

That house of mine: I come and go as I please, stop wherever I want,

No wind, no rain, hard to throw it over,

No repairing, no fortifying, yet it is always rock solid.

Nor have the grotto gates been deeply locked amid the mountains far,

Truly it is a place you can’t find in a land filled with snowy clouds!

Wait until EXTRA MALE has spoken.—After MALE LEAD speaks.—EXTRA MALE acts out ignoring him.—MALE LEAD acts out looking at the map of China and foreign lands and inscribing a poem. [MALE LEAD recites:]

Let your eyes roam in leisure over the Record of the Nine Areas:

Just like it is all here before your eyes;

Raise your head to gaze at the military districts,

The border courts are just an inch away.

One hundred thousand markets listed for each county,

Five thousand mountains sequestered in each province.

There may be no road home,

But you should check the map thoroughly.

EXTRA MALE acts out ignoring MALE LEAD.—After MALE LEAD finishes getting up and reciting EXTRA MALE’s “Fragrance Filling the Courtyard.”—After EXTRA MALE finishes speaking and reciting “The Phoenix Rests on the Wutong Tree.”—After MALE LEAD finishes getting up and reciting EXTRA MALE’s “Fragrance Filling the Courtyard.”⁶¹—MALE LEAD acts out laughing sarcastically, [speaks:] You doltish fellow, you are still thinking about your home. Scholar, before I came here you had recited a lyric poem that I still remember.—Wait until EXTRA MALE has spoken, [speak:] If you are willing to go with me, I’ll give you a full sail of freshening wind and you’ll reach there without using any travel money. Pointing to the leaf on the wall. This one path is truly the road to home.

(Zui zhong tian)

This poem is better than Wang Can’s “Rhapsody on Ascending a Tower,”⁶²

Just like Zhang Han’s “recollections of water mallow soup and sliced sculpin.”⁶³

MALE LEAD pastes the leaf on the wall.

Look—barely visible, a leaf of a vessel across the blue waves,

Wait until EXTRA MALE speaks. MALE LEAD speaks: Dolt! You’d better take the correct path!

Don’t guess that no one crosses waters in the wild;

You gave it your all to take the examinations in Chang’an,

And when you failed, like Tao Yuanming you wanted to return to your home⁶⁴—

But these two actions are no more than the single dream of Hua Xu.⁶⁵

MALE LEAD speaks: Dolt! Do you see the road you should take?

(Jinzhan’er)

Look at Jing and Wu, hidden by misty waves,

The distant waters bearing the homeward skiff.

Go ahead and

Let the windblown waves rise and surge, krakens and dragons grow angry!

After MALE LEAD speaks, [sing:]

You just close your two eyes tight,

Lay your body down.

Oars pierce the river’s moon, cold,

The sail is raised in the sea clouds, floating.

Cold mists arise over ancient fords,

Ahh …

There are the thatched huts of your former home.

Speak: Dolt! Don’t open your eyes! Don’t forget the correct path!

(Coda)

You and I will kick down the portals to the land of ghosts,

And our dreams will circle the road to Acacia Peace,

And wake up to “a pillow of the southern branch.”⁶⁶

Ensnared by the bridle of fame and the fetters of profit—

In the nodding of the head it is “mulberry and elm in the sunset scene.”⁶⁷

If you become my disciple,

We will cut off the vulgar and common together—

This is: “The Green Snake in my sleeve, rough and ready”—

Rely on this companion of misty sunsets,

Go back dancing in the west wind—

And I’ll have you “Chanting aloud as you fly across Dongting Lake.”

(Exits.)

[ACT 2]

After EXTRA MALE speaks.—MALE LEAD⁶⁸ enters with COMICS and OFFICIAL, four people in total, costumed as Daoists in free-wandering costume, and speaks: How delightful this all is, my fellow spirits!

([SHUANGDIAO:] Xinshui ling)

I’ve rambled over the five lakes and three isles

With just these two wind-sweeping sleeves of my robe.

I’ve summoned noumenal lads to pluck grass of good augury⁶⁹

And gone down to Immortals’ Islet⁷⁰ with fellow immortals.⁷¹

Free and untrammeled,

I sigh for all those days and nights in the dusty world.

(Zhuma ting)

I roamed as a god through my old domain,

Saw so many things change and so many stars make their transit.

I completely figured out that floating life,

Saw my share of “evening suns setting west” and “the Yangtze flowing east.”

I sigh over dynasties’ rise and fall, frown over the sorrow of the imperial court;

For merit and fame alone a person will “grow as emaciated as the yellow blossoms.”⁷²

Return and be done!

See how imposing, layer after layer, are the silver mountains and iron walls.⁷³

EXTRA MALE acts out entering unobtrusively.—MALE LEAD speaks:—Chen Jiqing, you stupid dolt! What did you come here for?—Wait until EXTRA MALE is startled and speaks.

(Yan’er luo)

You swallowed that hook of fame and fortune all by yourself,

Who will save you from this sea of misery?

Fortunately, your ethers did not soar through the clouds to pierce the Dipper and Buffalo constellations⁷⁴—

In vain would have been your kowtow, all atremble, at the Cinnabar Steps!⁷⁵

EXTRA MALE speaks: What are the names of the four of you?

(Gua yugou)

Silence!

I disparage those Marquises of Ten Thousand Households in that human realm,

I see their tears soaking the gauzy silk sleeves of their robes.

[(Speaks:)] The four of us play the pipes and strum the strings, sing to ourselves and dance for ourselves. What joy!

True it is: “Wherever there is music and song there is sorrow.”

You’ll wind up as emaciated as Bo Yi and Shu Qi!⁷⁶

So don’t go in front of the Phoenix Galleries

Or behind that Simurgh Terrace.⁷⁷

Once your name is listed on the Golden Plaque⁷⁸

You suddenly do your spiritual roaming in a strange land.⁷⁹

Wait until EXTRA MALE has spoken.

(Gu meijiu)

You shut up!

Do you really want to be a magistrate in the red dust?

To leave your name in the green books of history?

You tighten up your sleeves to “clamber up to the toad and snap the cassia branch.”⁸⁰

Stop this desire for merit and fame,

Plumb the Mysterious Pass⁸¹ as quickly as you can!

[(Taiping ling)]

Look at the bright mountains and luxuriant rivers in the Garden of Immortals,

So much better than Confucius, out of grain in Chenzhou!⁸²

For nothing have you studied and mastered “Kuang Heng boring through the wall,”⁸³

For nothing have you suffered the hardship of Sun Kang and his reflected snowlight.⁸⁴

Even if you were one of the Five Liege Lords

In a Phoenix Tower

Drinking imperial wine—

So much pain—

Those “golden seals and purple tassels.”

MALE LEAD speaks: You stupid dolt, do you remember arguing with that old man on Mount Zhongnan about the four immortals?—EXTRA MALE speaks: I remember.—MALE LEAD speaks: Do you recognize these four?—EXTRA MALE speaks: I don’t recognize any of them.—Wait until all four immortals have spoken.

(Didi jin)

I drive the winds of heaven,

Caress the stars and constellations.

This one once fervently set critical policy;⁸⁵

This one floated his nimble raft alone

And saw right through the Pass to Heaven.⁸⁶

This one roamed at will through the Moon Palace.⁸⁷

(Zhegui ling)

Fortunately I did not broadcast an empty name over the distant past,

After MALE LEAD has spoken. After EXTRA MALE has spoken.

Nor did I leap over the dragon’s gate in a single try

To stand alone on the tortoise’s head,

Then suddenly pack my lute and books to go to some distant place,

Bitter and depressed like Song Yu grieving over autumn.⁸⁸

You faced that aloof old codger at Mount Zhongnan,

Put your pillow on high and slept without a care at Green Dragon Monastery.

You rode that leaf of a boat

Over ten thousand miles of the River’s current.

If you now go in your dream into Acacia Peace,

Then both sides will concentrate their sorrow.

After MALE LEAD has spoken.—Wait for EXTRA MALE’s [lyric] “The Immortal Draws Near the River.”—You, as MALE LEAD, speak: This boy can be taught!—Wait until EXTRA MALE speaks.

(Chuan bo zhao)

No use for you to suffer and blame yourself,

Just shut tight that busy mouth that “discusses heaven and discourses about earth.”

Even if you destroyed Qin and helped Han arise,

Were made a prime minister or enfeoffed as a lord,

Aided the Exalted Ancestor of Han, spreading your merit to the entire cosmos,

Even if you truly are a helping hand to patch up heaven and earth,

(Qi dixiong)

Quickly nod your head

And shake your sleeves to leave

On your travels through the five-colored auspicious clouds.⁸⁹

Cast away that golden seal of the minister of education, as heavy as a peck measure.

Beside jade creeks misty waters unceasingly flow,

In front of the green cliffs, wind and moon remain as always.

(Meihua jiu)

Do not wait until the hair at your temples turns autumn white,

So you “can share anxiety with the emperor.”

Or sigh that years and months, so hard to slow,

Turn one’s head white all too soon.

You offer up your own “Rhapsody on Tall Poplars Palace”⁹⁰ and approach the imperial pylons,

I will clamber onto that bright-colored phoenix and ascend to Immortals’ Islet,

We three are old friends.

This one faces the cliffs, blowing his jade flute,

This one paces Cangzhou, relying on his silver-toned zither,

And this one boards a flat boat, strumming a brocade dulcimer.

(Shou Jiangnan)

I lie and blow the pipe, going to Yangzhou,

Availing myself of the fresh wind, blown into the blue above to roam with the clouds;

You sit astride the golden tortoise ascending steadily to the Phoenix Tower!

Instead of grasping for clouds, put your hands in your sleeves for the time being,

And pay attention to one scene of Zhuangzi’s dream of the butterfly.⁹¹

MALE LEAD speaks: You cannot stay here long! Your hometown is near. You’ll reach it in just a minute. Just don’t forget the true Way!

(Litingyan Coda)

Riding this freshening wind in the bright moon, after yellow dusk,

The tired traveler at heaven’s edge has suffered for nothing.

Trusting to a short sword and long zither,

You roamed all over the Seven States of the Springs and Autumns.

True it is,

You “Wrestled a tiger and forded the River,”⁹²

You “studied butchering a dragon”⁹³ but were left with your hands in your sleeves!

If you want to be free and unfettered,

Then wash clean all of the filth from your heart.

I will roam freely through the Garden of Immortals

And never trod again down that path to Handan.⁹⁴

After EXTRA MALE has spoken, act out calling for a fishing boat, then speak and exit.

[ACT 3]

Wait for one scene of OLD MAN, OLD WOMAN, and FEMALE LEAD to be finished—MALE LEAD enters costumed as FISHERMAN, dressed in rain cape and swinging a boat [as though sculling it], enters and opens.

Beneath the moon I punt my little leaf of a boat,

Before the wind I gather in my fishing hook;

With bamboo hat covering my head, I endure the days and months,

With rain cape thrown on my body, I pass the springs and autumns.

Ah, how happy we fisherfolk are!

([NANLÜ MODE:] Yizhi hua)

A squat brushwood window is newly woven,

The fine ropes of my net have been neatly rearranged.

Facing the westerly wind, I rolled up my line and hook,

And now row my skiff following the bright moon—

Mist and water stretch on and on,

I have brewed my own Master Huang’s wineshop wine,⁹⁵

And lift up this speckled bamboo sieve myself.

I’ll drink until I’m dizzy drunk, the moon is clear, the wind fresh,

And, at ease and happy, defy that vastness of time and space.⁹⁶

(Liangzhou diqi)

I pay no heed to seeing off greening spring, or the late sun’s setting in the west;

Let those unfeeling waters of the Yangtze flow on to the east.

“Light mists and drizzly rains obscure front and rear.”

Hanging poplars along the twisting banks,

Sand spits and islands in the stream.

A rain cape is thrown over my body

And a bamboo hat covers my head.

This is the fisherman’s grand lifestyle—

We befriend the wild egrets and sand gulls.

I have just left that level stretch of lake that was Master Zhu of Tao’s,⁹⁷

Brushed by the Three Rivers’ Ford of Master Zhuge of Shu,⁹⁸

And have now reached the head of Yan Ling of Han’s Seven-Mile Rapids.⁹⁹

The blue waves and old trees are my bosom friends,

The duckweed of the Yangtze in Chu is better than the finest food,¹⁰⁰

What I enjoy are sculpin newly from the hook and wine sieved on the spot—

I am happy enough to forget my troubles!

Wait until EXTRA MALE has spoken.—MALE LEAD acts out listening to him.

(Gewei)

Isn’t that Wen Qiao, burning a rhinoceros horn and walking midriver?¹⁰¹

Or the Spirits of the Xiang River ¹⁰² thrumming the zither and floating over the water?

I will concentrate my gazing eyes and wait patiently beside the bulrushes.

This is a gap in the bank of that sandy dike—

Not the front of the house or the backyard—

So how come this traveler, calling a boat to ferry him across, is standing there?

Wait until EXTRA MALE has seen the OLD FISHERMAN and called out to cross.—MALE LEAD speaks: Where are you going, scholar?—EXTRA MALE speaks:—What are you doing asking me?¹⁰³ [MALE LEAD sings:]

(He xinlang)

You want to ferry across the river,

So I have to ask why.

Are you some trader or traveling merchant?

Looking for your old friends or family?

You are just waiting dull-wittedly at the bank beside the blue waves.

You’re not one of the Three Grandees of Chu,¹⁰⁴ embracing sand to throw himself in the River, are you?

Or Wu Zixu, intent on taking vengeance for wrongs done to your father?¹⁰⁵

Or imitating the Banished Immortal Li, off to embrace the moon?¹⁰⁶

Or perhaps imitating Fan Li wanting to take a boat home?

Wait until EXTRA MALE has spoken. [MALE LEAD sings:]

So it turns out to be some local yokel student who had set off to take the examinations but failed.

He wanted to hold the white ivory plaque in springtime breezes at the Imperial Garden,¹⁰⁷

But having failed he wants to take a little fishing boat out on the misty waves and bright moonlight.

Wait until EXTRA MALE has spoken. [MALE LEAD sings:]

(Ma yulang)

The dew is cold and has soaked through my raincoat;

I wave my short oars and dip them into the main current,

Passing by a span of bridge, a lonely footbridge as thin as a dragon’s waist.

I see the several dots of gulls

Chasing each other ahead,

Little beauty spots on the autumn river’s elegance.

(Gan huang’en)

Reflections of the clouds glide on and on,

The force of the wind blows strong and chilly.

Winding my way by the green poplar dike,

Shores of fragrant grass,

Islets of water pepper flowers.¹⁰⁸

EXTRA MALE speaks: Where are we? [MALE LEAD sings:]

We have passed to the headwaters of the Huai,

And to where the Bian River splits its flow.¹⁰⁹

We already draw near your native village,

Approach your old home,

So don’t stop or slow down!

EXTRA MALE speaks: How strange! I am already at the gate to my home. Why, it’s only the second watch!¹¹⁰ [MALE LEAD sings:]

(Caicha ge)

You don’t need to ask, “What watch or wooden slip?”¹¹¹

Just look at how the clouds on the water disappear:

Drippingly bright, that half wheel of remnant moon is at the tip of willow’s branch.

Act out making the boat stop.—MALE LEAD speaks: Scholar, we have arrived in your village. Come back after you see your family.—Wait until EXTRA MALE speaks.—[Speak:] This is the house. Just allow me a moment and then disembark.

I’ll tie the boat to this little stump of a peg here so you can disembark,

You can hear the woofing hounds bark in the depths of the bamboo forest.

They both exit.

Wait until OLD MAN, OLD WOMAN, and FEMALE LEAD all enter.—Speaking stops.—You, as MALE LEAD, and EXTRA MALE enter together.—EXTRA MALE speaks:—You wait here and I will come back after I have seen my parents.—After FEMALE opens the door and speaks.—Wait until EXTRA MALE speaks.—Wait until OLD MAN speaks.—Wait until EXTRA MALE speaks.—Wait until OLD MAN finishes.—Act out offering wine.—You, as MALE LEAD, laugh coldly and speak: Jiqing, hurry up, come on! [Sing:]

(Muyang guan)

Quickly sing that “Golden Threads” at the feast mat,¹¹²

And raise that jade wine server before the goblet—

As soon as that single meal of yellow millet is done.

Quickly take leave of your white-haired parents

And set aside forever your perfect match of verdant spring.

You oh-so-simpleminded, dull-witted stupid dolt!

Quickly achieve enlightenment, you prisoner to officialdom.

If you are so attached to the idea of Shi Chong’s thousand weight of wealth,

How can we dispatch this little boat of Master Zhu of Tao’s?

Wait until MALE LEAD speaks.—Wait until FEMALE acts out grieving.

(Ku huangtian)

All she can do is go on and on to try and beguile him,

Her overflowing tears ever streaming.

Hurry and take off that golden cangue and those jade-link fetters,¹¹³

Be done quickly with those swallow companions and oriole mates.

Prepare raincoat and bamboo hat, line and pole, hooks, and boat,

And go off to the side of Pan Stream,¹¹⁴

The head of the Wei River,

And become a fisherman on the misty waves,

So free and untrammeled,

With loose gown and full sleeves.

Oh, to the paradises of Lang Garden or Immortals’ Isle

Let us both go and there rest, defying the western winds.

We’ll pay no heed to dragons fighting and tigers brawling,

To the raven flying or hare running.¹¹⁵

Wait until EXTRA MALE acts out finding brush and paper and writes a lyric poem.

(Wu ye ti)

You vie with Sui He¹¹⁶ but waste those lips in vain,

And don’t think I’ll “let any old wind carry me off east on an eastern rill.”¹¹⁷

Recite:

The moon slides down and cold dew grows white,

This night I go, but leave my heart behind;

Songs of separation are perched in a phoenix pipe,

Tears of parting sprinkle on the jasper zither.

The wine arrives, drinking it increases our sorrow,

The poem finished, we recite it with matched tears;

On moonlit nights I will have dreams of love,

And in the empty bed, lie beneath half the quilt.

[Sing:]

And now, you raise your eyebrows, as emaciated as a bare autumn cliff,¹¹⁸

Turn your heads to hold each other’s eyes

As the vexation of separation goes on and on.

One looks at the carved saddle, brows furrowed, in sorrows for the court;

One is filled with enmity at Yang Pass,¹¹⁹ tears soaking her spring robe’s sleeves.

Let’s go,

Stop suffering—

For my grass sandals and hempen robe

Far outdo fat steeds and fine sables!

Wait until OLD MAN, OLD WOMAN, and FEMALE exit.

(Three from Coda)

On these softly plied oars with their creaking groan we leave the river’s mouth,

To see a single dot of a flickeringly bright fishing lamp at the head of the ancient ford.

All I can see are snowy waves on the springtime river crashing against the heavens,

The moon growing blacker, the clouds ever more sorrowful.

Whipping wind grows wild, lashing rain violent—

To what part of what season should this weather belong?

An endless expanse of white, the silver waves flow unbroken—

Where is the end of Chu and beginning of Wu?

(Two from Coda)

All I see are

Krakens and dragons howling in the swirling abyss,

Ghosts and sprites sorrow in the blank emptiness of the hoary moon:

The roiling river and stirred-up sea shake the God of the Waves.¹²⁰

It scares me so much I grow cowardly and meek—

This has to happen to me: a dark sky, a sinking boat!

I grasp the short oar—who will save us?¹²¹

This leaf of a boat nearly flips,

And our lives are like a floating bubble on the water’s surface.

[EXTRA MALE speaks:]The waves are rising! What shall we do? Who will save us? Act out invoking the Buddha. [MALE LEAD sings:]

(Shouwei Coda)

In vain now you beseech the Dark Abyss, pay homage to the Spirit of the River, and bow with folded hands again and again.

Just settle your state of mind, make firm your soul, and close your eyes tight.

The waves billow and rise,

The river flows upstream,

Crashes against the Three Mountains,

Overflows into the Nine Kingdoms,

Shakes the Gates of Heaven,

Shifts the Axis of the Earth.

Rolling turtles of gold

Float on the sea:

You tremble and shake,

Cold sweat flows,

Your soul has left your body,

Your life is near its end—

And you will be unable

To be buried in your village

Below a three-foot overgrown mound—

Who will sacrifice a cup of wine over your grave at Beimang?¹²²

Wait until EXTRA MALE cries out: Save me! And he acts out falling into the water and waking up.—After ACOLYTE enters and speaks.—Wait until EXTRA MALE signals understanding and speaks.—After ACOLYTE speaks.—EXTRA MALE acts out chasing after the master and seeing the basket [and speaks:] The master is gone, but there’s this basket. There is nothing in it except this scrap of paper with writing on it. I’ll take a look. … [Recites:]

A single leaf was so kind as to send a traveler home,

Long bamboos with kingfisher leaves stand against each other;

Jade pipes at the banquet seat, on that day a message was left,

A marvelous song in one rendition was when he knew his mistake.

Upon meeting, incapable of expressing enough words,

He then left a poem on his wife’s makeup stand.

That beauty wept bitterly after the yellowing dusk—

You thought that this mountain codger knew nothing at all.

EXTRA MALE acts out deeply sighing [and speaks:] He is indeed a good man, for he knew everything I did in that dream. I am going to chase that master down!

[Exit.]

[ACT 4]

MALE LEAD enters beating on the drum that enlightens¹²³ [and recites:]

Yesterday Eastern Zhou, today the dynasty of Qin;

The lamp fires of Xianyang, and the Luoyang dust.¹²⁴

A hundred years is but a single dream of blue waves

That brings laughter to us here on the very peak of Kunlun.¹²⁵

There’s nothing to do this morning, so I’ll go to the street and collect alms.

(Jiejie gao)

All because

A hundred years of fame and fortune

Result in a single exemplary case.¹²⁶

Just try to look

At those officials and ministers of the Golden Horse Gate and the Jade Hall;

They all want to reside forever in the corridors and ancestral halls of the imperial capital

And accumulate merits for all eternity.

They reach the highest ranks,

Enjoy salaries of thousands of measures,

Ai!

They’re already at the top of the hundred-foot pole!¹²⁷

How could they know I’ve already handed in those black boots and ivory tallies?

(Yuanhe ling)

In my hut I sit in quiet meditation;

For merit and fame you busy yourself everywhere.

If that road of thorns¹²⁸ is linked to the gates of heaven,¹²⁹

People would still clamber up, even if it grows more difficult with each step.

They pay no heed to the fresh blood in Yunyang¹³⁰ that has yet to dry,

Or the vile windblown waves that have passed by their eyes.

(Shangma jiao)

Even if you are clever in all things,

And crafty in all that you do,

Who has ever reached a state where “both horse and man are at peace”?

Better to be Yan Ziling fishing alone on the autumn river,

Facing the red pepper-weed rapids,

Leisurely clutching the fishing rod.

(You simen)

When confronted with the difficulty of the world’s way, with its windblown waves ten thousand feet high—

We must admit that fame and fortune do not equal leisure.

I see the yellow cranes dancing as a pair by the green pine brook,

Unbothered by any vulgar business of the world.

Rein in your horse of will

And topple that mountain of right and wrong!

(Sheng hulu)

So much better than “A general in iron armor crosses the pass at night.”

He drives wild beasts before him,

Sits astride a carved saddle,

But one day when the battle is done, white bones will grow cold in the overgrown wilds.

Can this compare to my thatched hut, my grass shack,

My rush cushion¹³¹ and paper enclosure,

Resting at ease in pure leisure?

(Reprise)

When no affair deceives the heart, one sleeps self-secure—

I urge you in the dusty world, do not sorrow or worry.

Pack up your zither and books¹³² and return to your old mountains,

Search out the simples-refining stove and scriptures,

Face the stone table and the incense stand,

For in the end this surpasses the human world.

(Houting hua)

Look: the dirt on the tumulus has yet to dry,

But the bones of heroes are already cold.

Where are they, those at Hegemon King of Chu’s feast at Goose Gate,¹³³

Or at Marshal Han’s altar when he was commissioned as a general?¹³⁴

They are now completely deserted:

Human life is an empty illusion.

I sigh that human life is like [fleeting clouds] passing our sight.

On that old road to Handan, I

Grew weary of constant travel through the red dust.

I tied up my lame donkey outside the door,

Discarded success and fame as though it were nothing,

And in an instant became an immortal.

(Liuye’er)

I ate that meal of the immortal’s yellow millet

And it was better than the nine-times-refined noumenal cinnabar pill of Ge Hong.¹³⁵

I was used to coming to the streets of Chang’an,

Where I dissembled as a crazy man.

And temporarily took on the face of a drunkard;

Then in the nod of a head I fully understood the human realm.

([ZHENGGONG MODE:] Duanzheng hao)

I’ll not go and roam the Jade Hall,

Nor go to sleep at the Eastern Hills¹³⁶—

When you can wander freely, then freely wander as you will!

I beat out a few cadences from the drum that enlightens as I go to the dusty realm—

That is my leisurely daily ritual out beyond the world.

(Gun xiuqiu)

I passed by the tip of Penglai

To visit my old friend Lan Caihe.

Leading my old companions, we eight brothers who roam in leisure,

I watch the steeply rising Silver Pylons on the mountain in the sea.¹³⁷

With Ge Hongya,¹³⁸ I’ll stroke the starry constellations,

With Fei Changfang call for the dragon staff to stop.¹³⁹

I’ll tell the immortal lad not to lock the Grotto Gate;

Facing Cinnabar Mound, I will pour rippling golden waves,¹⁴⁰

I keep time to Shuangcheng’s¹⁴¹ trim-waist dance at Spreading Cold Palace,¹⁴²

And listen to Magu’s song from white teeth at Penglai Mountain.¹⁴³

Drunk, I enter into nothingness.

Wait until EXTRA MALE acts out running in a hurried way with hat askew.—[EXTRA MALE speaks:] Master, save me, your disciple!—Speak and [make false] exit. [Sing:]

(Tang xiucai)

Look at him, trembling and shaking, frightened and fearful, running all afluster.

This completely dumbstruck imbecile stares intently at me.

Wait for EXTRA MALE to speak:—[EXTRA MALE speaks:] Master, deliver me, and send me toward the Way of long life!—[EXTRA MALE] acts out bowing. [Sing:]

As if boldly unrestrained—why is he bowing to me?

I’m just a poor Daoist

Who lives far off at mountain’s bend,

How could I lead you, a Confucian scholar, to enlightenment?

Wait until EXTRA MALE speaks.—[Sing:]

(Gun xiuqiu)

This poem is seeking a first place pass at the immortals’ altar,

Do you know what this poem means?

[EXTRA MALE speaks:] Your disciple doesn’t get it. Sing:

If you cannot see through the Gate of Mystery in this little poem,

Then don’t raise your “hairs of purple frost”¹⁴⁴ to adjudicate the empire!

Do you know that the glory of the world is like froth on the water,

And merit and fame like sparks from a flint?

EXTRA MALE speaks:—I don’t get it.—Act out bowing.

Oh, how I wish I had punctured your façade in the lecture hall!

I will sweep the vulgar dust from you as I raise my sagely hand to rub.

You have been the victim of time, that has frittered away your youthful face,

Have been so buried by the affairs of the world that your white hair flourished—

You were gradually worn down.

EXTRA MALE speaks:—Where are you going, Master? I want to go with you!

(Daodao ling)

There we have dark-green pines crooked and twisting: krakens and dragons at rest,

Virescent hills and high peaks: a wash of clearing mists.

Unmoved by fragrant winds, pine flowers fall,

Grotto gates are closed away in the deep, no one locks them.

Follow me, oh,

Follow me—

To pay court to the Realized we will ascend together the Galleries of Penglai.¹⁴⁵

Arrange the formation of the Eight Immortals and enter.—EXTRA MALE speaks: Master, tell me, who are these people?

(Yaomin ge)

This one sticks flowers in his cap and once roamed in the Great Canopy Heavens.¹⁴⁶

This one blows an iron flute with beautiful harmonies and pleasant sounds.¹⁴⁷

This one has an ample mouth and her hand holds a wicker strainer.¹⁴⁸

This one with ragged beard drags an iron crutch behind him.¹⁴⁹

This one converted that Huayang woman.¹⁵⁰

This one in the long green robe dances wildly and sings out loud.¹⁵¹

[(Yaomin ge)]

This one has a beard on his chops and is always drunk, red in the face.¹⁵²

EXTRA MALE speaks: Master, you? (Sing:)

At an inn in Handan I passed through the yellow millet dream,

And when I awoke they had completely altered, those mountains and rivers.

It was all a dream of rise and fall at the southern branch.

True it is:

In the beginning, we all might suffer,

But today, a fresh wind for all eternity is set free.

Dispersal Scene

[Title:]	Lü Pure Yang appears in transformed form in a dream of blue waves
[Name:]	Chen Jiqing is Enlightened to the Way on a Bamboo-Leaf boat

Newly Cut with Plot Prompts:

Chen Jiqing Is Enlightened to the Way on a Bamboo-Leaf Boat

The End

 

A SELECTION OF YUAN PLAYS EDITION OF THE ZAJU CHEN JIQING MISTAKENLY BOARDS A BAMBOO-LEAF BOAT

DRAMATIS PERSONAE IN ORDER OF APPEARANCE

Role type	Name and family, institutional, or social role
OPENING MALE	CHEN JIQING (act 1)
EXTRA	HUI’AN, abbot of Green Dragon Monastery
ACOLYTE	ACOLYTE
MALE LEAD	LÜ DONGBIN (acts 1, 2, 4)
LIEZI	LIEZI, Lie Yukou
ZHANG LIANG	ZHANG LIANG, Zhang Zifang
GE HONG	GE HONG, Ge the Immortal Codger
MALE LEAD	FISHERMAN (Lü Dongbin)
EXTRA MALE	OLD MAN CHEN, CHEN JIQING’s father
OLD FEMALE LEAD	MADAME FANG, CHEN JIQING’s mother (old woman)
FEMALE LEAD	MISS BAO, CHEN JIQING’s wife
CHILD	ASHENG, CHEN JIQING’s son
OPENING MALE	IMPERIAL LORD OF EASTERN FLORESCENCE (act 4)
ZHANG GUO	ZHANG GUO, one of the Eight Immortals
ZHONGLI QUAN	ZHONGLI QUAN, one of the Eight Immortals
IRON CRUTCH LI	LIE TIEGUAI, one of the Eight Immortals
XU SHENWENG	XU SHENWENG, one of the Eight Immortals
LAN CAIHE	LAN CAIHE, one of the Eight Immortals
HAN XIANGZI	HAN XIANGZI, one of the Eight Immortals
HE XIANGU	HE XIANGU, one of the Eight Immortals
DIVINE CODGER XU	DIVINE CODGER XU, Daoist Immortal

CHEN JIQING MISTAKENLY BOARDS A BAMBOO-LEAF BOAT

WRITTEN BY FAN ZI’AN OF THE YUAN DYNASTY

COLLATED BY ZANG JINSHU OF WUXING IN THE MING DYNASTY

[WEDGE]

OPENING MALE costumed as CHEN JIQING enters and recites:

Ashamed now of my insignificant name, failed at the Ministry of Rites,¹⁵³

I am tossed and buffeted, no different from a swallow flying alone;

In the great buildings that stretch to heaven there are no places to roost,

Next year just like this one—returning, but not.

I am named Chen Jiqing and am from Yuhang in Wulin.¹⁵⁴ I studied the Confucian curriculum when young and was known for my literary talent. But because time and fate never matched, I did not pass the examinations and I am drifting about, unable to return home. And to top it off, I’ve run smack into late winter, and although the rain and snow have cleared, the cold becomes more and more unbearable. How can someone like me—“No relatives wherever I look”—avoid “sighing over hunger and cold”? (Acts out sighing, speaks:) Oh! Such bad luck. I just started to think, though, about Green Dragon Monastery on Zhongnan Mountain and the abbot Hui’an, an old hometown friend. He has often written and asked me to visit him at the monastery. Perhaps he can rescue me from this. But it’s no sure thing. I might as well go off to Zhongnan Mountain and see Abbot Hui’an.

(Exits.)

EXTRA costumed as pure esquire¹⁵⁵ HUI’AN enters leading an ugly ACOLYTE, recites:

A bright heart will twirl no flowers from hidden valleys,¹⁵⁶

To visualize the Buddha nature, what need for transmission of palm-leaf texts?

The sun comes out, ice melts: it was water all the time,

Refracted rays, when the moon sets, never leave the heavens.¹⁵⁷

I am monk Hui’an from Green Dragon Monastery here on Zhongnan Mountain. I was originally a man from Yuhang and from a young age worked hard at the Confucian enterprise, but in my middle years I shaved my hair to become a monk. Serendipitously, I came here to Green Dragon Monastery in my wanderings as an acolyte, and I so delighted in its scenery that I remained here to become the head monk. I have an old friend I studied with, called Chen Jiqing. This fellow has filled himself with the classics and histories, has gone through the whole of the Hundred Schools, has a talent that can weave all of heaven and earth together in perfect harmony, and the ability to drink the pure dew and course across the clouds. But because he has yet to realize success or fame, he is adrift for a while and cannot go home. I have sent him many letters asking him to come visit me in the monastery, but he’s sent not a single word in reply. Acolyte, go to the main gate and keep an eye out, and when Master Chen arrives, immediately inform me! (ACOLYTE speaks:) Understood! (CHEN JIQING enters and recites:)

I have just left those paths of purple¹⁵⁸

To enter into clouds of white.

Here I am at the gate of Green Dragon Monastery. Little monk, is Abbot Hui’an at home? (ACOLYTE speaks:) Faugh! You ought to open up your donkey eyes and take a closer look! How can you call a monk as tall as me a “little monk”?¹⁵⁹ You know nothing about proper ceremony! I’m beginning to see—you are wearing such a tattered old gown that’s holding up this yellow and dried skinny old face—you must be here to throw yourself on our master of the house. Well, how come you’re so arrogant? (CHEN JIQING speaks:) Ohh, what an unlucky little fellow. (Acts out bowing to him and speaks:) Please forgive me, Young Master. May I beg you to trouble yourself to report to Abbot Hui’an that his old friend, Chen Jiqing, has come to visit him? (ACOLYTE speaks:) You finally come out with it. No wonder that you Confucianists and my house have been at such odds since antiquity. Enough! Enough. Stand here and I will go and report for you. (Acts out going to report, speaks:) Hey, wait a minute. Let me have a little fun with Baldy first. (Acts out entering and greeting, speaks:) Master, an old friend is outside, who calls himself Che-en-ji-yi-qi-ying, has come just to visit you. (HUI’AN speaks:) This is gibberish. Who in the world would have a name like that? (ACOLYTE speaks:) You old bald good-for-nothing, you still want to be enlightened to the Dharma Law? Then you have to steal a glance at other fellows’ wives when you’re looking at the sutras. (HUI’AN speaks:) This guy’s gone mad! Go on back out and get it clear this time. (ACOLYTE speaks:) What’s not clear? Che-en-ji-yi-qi-ying has come just to visit you. (HUI’AN speaks:) I don’t get it. (ACOLYTE speaks:) Ask your old lady to come out, she’ll know. (HUI’AN speaks:) Pshaw! (ACOLYTE speaks:) Alright, I’ll tell you. I was having fun playing the word-splitting game. Cheen is Chen, Ji-yi is Ji, and qi-ying is qing. Hasn’t your old friend Chen Jiqing come to see you? (HUI’AN speaks:) Hurry out and invite him in. (ACOLYTE acts out going to greet him, speaks:) Mister Chen, my master just consistently refused to see you, but thanks to my cursing that bald old good-for-nothing, he’s relented and asks you to go on in. (CHEN JIQING acts out going in and greeting him, speaks:) This humble student has been remiss in visiting you for the past several years. (HUI’AN speaks:) This poor monk has known for a while that my beloved brother has been unsuccessful on the field of letters, and I sent you several letters asking you to come. That you have now stooped to make a visit is all to my good fortune! (CHEN JIQING speaks:) Abbot, I have continuously received your written summons, and it is not that I was unmoved by them, but I have labored for many years by the firefly-lit window¹⁶⁰ and by reflected snow light.¹⁶¹ I would have said that success and fame could be had as easy as spitting into my hand, and I never expected to fail time after time, or be too frightened to go home. For this reason, I had little face left to come and visit you. I just pray that you will forgive me. (HUI’AN speaks:) You are wrong, my beloved brother. Have you not heard the ancient’s saying, “To be without learning: this is poverty; to learn and be incapable of putting it into action: this is illness.”¹⁶² Based on your expansive talent and accumulated learning, there should be no worry about attaining success and fame. In the old days Yi Yin plowed in the state of Shen,¹⁶³ and Fu Yue was wearied with forms for building walls.¹⁶⁴ Later, they encountered enlightened rulers and ended up in the positions of mentors and ministers. Although you are in a bad state and dispirited now, when the day comes when luck and timing converge, you too will be a mentor and a minister. How hard will it be then to carry out the work of someone like a Yi Yin or a Fu Yue? (CHEN JIQING speaks:) Well said, but excessive! I am returning now. (Sings:)

([XIANLÜ MODE] Shanghua shi)

All because I spent ten years by the firefly-lit window, diligently studying texts,

I am totally ashamed that I have not yet set my body on the ten thousand mile Peng-bird path¹⁶⁵—

And because of this I willingly wander around in the wind and dust.

How many times in secret have I scorned myself,

Because I have so little face left to see my fellow villagers?

(Exits.)

(HUI’AN speaks:) Brother! Why are you leaving? Turn back. Aiya! He’s really gone. Acolyte, hurry out and tell him to turn back. Say that I have more to say to him. (ACOLYTE speaks:) I’ll scurry on out of the main gate and ask him to leave, lest my master’s wife won’t let him stay.

(Exits.)

(HUI’AN speaks:) Just look at how anxious my brother is about success and fame. I’m sure he wants to go back to his lodging to review all those classics and histories. My monastery may be desolate and dreary, but it doesn’t lack congee or gruel. It would have been better to keep him here, provide him some food and clothing, and let him wait for the next examination. That would have both let him succeed with his “ambitions of wind and cloud” and also let me display some of the affection I have for someone from my old home. (Recites:)

This old friend, alas, his time unmet,

Can avail himself of this mountain retreat;

I’m only afraid that once he ascends to high office,

He will never inquire again about a grass-woven hut.

(Exits.)

ACT 1

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) I am grateful for Abbot Hui’an’s feelings of friendship and loyalty for someone from his old home and that he has detained me to review the classics and histories and wait for the next examination. This is my fortune amid misfortune. There’s nothing happening today, so I’ll wait until Hui’an comes out of meditation, and ask him to point out to me where I might take a walk and see some old sites. (HUI’AN enters leading ACOLYTE, acts out greeting him, speaks:) Brother, you have humbled yourself to stay here; this mountain monastery is decrepit and dreary and I have been negligent in many things. Is there anything you would like to bring to my attention? (CHEN JIQING speaks:) How can you say that, Brother? I have disturbed you now for many months, and I am entirely grateful. But I have often heard that Mount Zhongnan is the most famous mountain in the empire, so there must be many sights to see here. I beseech you to point them out to me so that I might go and gaze upon them; it would certainly not be in vain. (HUI’AN speaks:) Well then, let me lead the way; you simply follow along and enjoy the sights of our temple. (CHEN JIQING acts out inspecting the monastery, speaks:) What a fine monastery this is! Look how the halls penetrate into the blue welkin, how the trees brush wispy stratus clouds, how the water winds about Ripple Lake, and how the peaks look down on the Purple Galleries of the Imperial City. Truly, “Never enough of gazing, ever an excess of joy!” (Acts out gazing far away, speaks:) Abbot, what is that indistinct ribbon of water there in the southeast corner? (HUI’AN speaks:) This is the waterway that runs into and out of Ripple Lake, and from here it runs into the Han River. It is the road home to our old village. (CHEN JIQING acts out sighing, speaks:) When I am confronted with this, Abbot, suddenly thoughts of return come unbidden. If you have a brush and inkstone, may I borrow them? I want to compose a lyric to the tune “Fragrance Fills the Courtyard” and write it on a blank wall—would that be alright? (HUI’AN speaks:) I’d love to see it. Acolyte, go and fetch the “four treasures of the studio.”¹⁶⁶ (ACOLYTE speaks:) Here they are. You think you’ve composed a good one. If you think you’ve composed a good one and can write it out well,¹⁶⁷ then write it out. Otherwise don’t write it out lest other people laugh at you as the “Hangzhou idiot.” (CHEN JIQING acts out writing it out, speaks:) Abbot, let me recite it for you. … (Recites:)

I sat until I wore out my blanket against the cold,

Ground through an inkstone of iron,

Boasting all the time that the classics and history would flow like water,

That gathering with others in purple and blue strings of ministerial caps

Would be as easy as spitting in the hand, and not worth a worry.

Time after time in Chang’an I sat for the tests—

I submitted my myriad word policy paper to the dragon’s throne.

But my talent of jade, worth a string of cities, was left unused,

And I was bereft of plans to seize official rank.

Pitiful, and dispirited too,

I set out to return to my old home,

Yet idly lingered in those August Precincts.

Moved by the weight of your feelings,

I tarried here in the cells of monks.

On your day of leisure you led me to climb high to gaze,

And from this high perch,

We looked out over the expanse with the eyes of poets—

The mountains of home are far away,

How can we go back?

We commit it all to a dream’s roaming.

(HUI’AN speaks:) What a talent! (ACOLYTE speaks:) It’ll do. (HUI’AN speaks:) What would you know? Go get the tea ready.

(ACOLYTE exits.)

(MALE LEAD costumed as LÜ DONGBIN enters carrying a thorn basket, speaks:) You people of worldly ways! Follow me and leave your family!¹⁶⁸ I will make each and every one understand the Way, each and every one become an immortal. Oh, there’s no one here. I am Lü Yan, known as Lü Dongbin, and my name in the Way is Master of Pure Yang. Because I did not pass the examinations and my road home passed through Handan, I got to meet my master, Master of Correct Yang, who transformed me in my “dream of the yellow millet.”¹⁶⁹ And I completed the Way of the Immortal. I now bear the command of my master to go lead a certain Chen Jiqing—a man from Yuhang who is destined to be an immortal—to enlightenment. I was just descending on my cloud tip when I saw a shaft of blue light—he’s at Mount Zhongnan. I’m going to have to go to Green Dragon Monastery. (Sings:)

(XIANLÜ MODE: Dian jiangchun)

“I have just left the northern seas and also Cangwu,”¹⁷⁰

And already the progressions of the seasons have passed many times,

To evolve into past and present.

I sigh over the prosperity and decline of generational events,

Who actually recognizes that path to long life?

(Hunjiang long)

I’ve measured that dollop of the world’s realm,

And passed through the remains of pitched battles of former courts and later dynasties.

From the time that swirling confusion was split open,¹⁷¹

I have trod through to the empty void—

I use no Nine-Sublimating Pill to complete my thousand-year life span,

No pound of lead to form a myriad-year pearl,

Pick no rare sprouts or strange grasses,

And carry no noumenal tally in precious seal script.

I just needed to nurture my spirit until it was like water,

And refine my bones until their marrow was like butter.

Every day I harnessed my monkey heart and horse will tight:

Let the mountains and valleys switch places

And rocks rot into these desiccated pines.

(ACOLYTE enters and speaks:) I’ll go off to the main gate and keep watch. (MALE LEAD speaks:) I've reached the gate of Green Dragon Monastery. Little monk, go on in and tell Chen Jiqing that a Daoist elder has come to visit him. (ACOLYTE speaks:) I’m just out of luck today. First that penurious scholar called me a little monk, and now this cow nose¹⁷² is calling me a little monk. Well, this little monk will carry your mother away! Look, cow nose, Chen Jiqing isn’t here. (MALE LEAD speaks:) I can augur the ethers, so I know he’s here in the monastery. (ACOLYTE speaks:) Well, augur away at your fucking impotence and scrotal pain! Even if you were the Most Venerated Laozi, Zhongli of the Han, or Lü Dongbin and you can augur ethers, I’m not going to report for you. I’m going off to my cell to enjoy some spirits and dog meat.

(Exits.)

(MALE LEAD speaks:) Since he wasn’t willing to announce me, I’ll just go on in. (Acts out entering and greeting, speaks:) Scholar! Abbot! I bow to you. I am a cloud-roving Daoist, and I have come here for nothing else but to lead a disciple to enlightenment, to “leave his home” and go with this poor Daoist. (CHEN JIQING speaks:) You’ve made a mistake, sir. This is Abbot Hui’an, and Buddhism and Daoism are two different religions. It is impossible for him to be your disciple. Could you be here to lead me to enlightenment? (MALE LEAD speaks:) You know it! Scholar, you’re a failed candidate right now; if you go with me, you’ll be an immortal tomorrow. This won’t put you to shame, scholar. Just bid the abbot good-bye, and go off with me. (CHEN JIQING speaks:) Listen, you Daoist, I don’t know you at all. How can you expect me to go off with you? I’ve studied until “my belly is stuffed with learning” and I am just getting ready to be an official. Honestly, I tell you, I can’t go off with you. (MALE LEAD sings:)

(You hulu)

I sigh over this road to fame and fortune of yours, fraught with waves of danger,¹⁷³

Truly, you’ll suffer all in vain—

I ask: even if you had Su Qin’s very ministerial seals at your belt, what good would it do?¹⁷⁴

Just look: in that Gallery Soaring Beyond the Mists, who are the true heroes?¹⁷⁵

In the precinct of the Golden Valley they are all affected boys and girls.¹⁷⁶

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) Well, you have to discern between the worthy and the dull. How can you call them all fake in one fell swoop? (MALE LEAD sings:)

What kind of worthiness can you discern?

What kind of dullness?

Even if you cast a likeness of Zhugong of Tao in yellow gold,¹⁷⁷

In the end you can’t carry off Xishi to float on river and lake!¹⁷⁸

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) If I become an official, this body will be dressed in a purple silk court robe, my head capped with a hat of raven’s black gauze, and my hands will be grasping a white ivory tablet—what glory and honor! You who’ve “left the family” just “dress in grass and eat bark.”¹⁷⁹ Where will you wind up? (MALE LEAD sings:)

(Tianxia le)

I’ve already been through “A single general’s success is ten thousand bleached bones of others,”

Ai, you insignificant little civil and military officials:

Say what you want about those purple silk court robes that glorify a person,

Those raven’s black gauze hats

And white ivory tablets—

How can they compare to my chanting the Yellow Court¹⁸⁰ and Canon of the Way and Its Virtue,¹⁸¹

Or intoning Golden Essence and The Text of Great Plainness¹⁸²—

That unexpectedly wound up sowing a freshening wind across myriad antiquities.

(ACOLYTE enters to serve tea, speaks:) Look: old baldy in the middle, a cow’s nose on the left, and a penurious scholar on the right, covering everything from past to present, pretending to be as smart as the very sages of the three religions.¹⁸³ (Acts out delivering the tea.) (CHEN JIQING speaks:) I’ve been so tied up with this Daoist I haven’t even eaten. (MALE LEAD speaks:) Scholar, if you are willing to chant the Scripture of the Yellow Court, then you won’t be cold or hungry. (ACOLYTE speaks:) Mister, don’t listen to this cow nose’s lies. I chant sutras all day long and my stomach is always so hungry that it is constantly rumbling. (MALE LEAD speaks:) You don’t think that you really won’t be cold and hungry after chanting this classic? It is precisely after you have completed the way of the immortal that you won’t be hungry or cold; and that comes after chanting this text. (CHEN JIQING speaks:) Daoist—how many can you name who have actually attained the way of changing into an immortal over the centuries? (MALE LEAD speaks:) Well, let me briefly mention a few for you. (Sings:)

(Nezha ling)

You must have heard of Lie Yukou

Who rode the cold wind to roam through the eight domains of the world?

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) That’s one. Others? (MALE LEAD sings:)

There was that Zhang Zifang,

Who left the imperial capital following Master Red Pine.¹⁸⁴

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) Others? (MALE LEAD sings:)

There was Immortal Master Ge,

Who plucked cinnabar sands to go into the cave abode.

Even though they started out with frames as insensate as clay and wood,

These turned out to be the bones of spiritual immortals,

Nothing like you mortal fellows with your common eyes.

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) May I ask, my Daoist, are there beautiful sights in that place where immortals reside? (MALE LEAD speaks:) Of course there are! (Sings:)

(Que ta zhi)

That place of ours there is called the Pot of Penglai¹⁸⁵

And is near the Capital of Heaven—

All cowry shell pylons and pearl palaces,

Paths through the sunsets, tracks through the clouds—

A place only an immortal from Grand Canopy¹⁸⁶ Heaven can dream of reaching.

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) Well, if it’s so great, what are you doing down here in our lower world? (MALE LEAD sings:)

I’ve come down to this dusty realm

To transform the obtuse and doltish like you.

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) Look, Daoist, don’t exaggerate. Where, in honest truth, is that immortal’s realm? (MALE LEAD speaks:) Since you’ve asked me, I’ll tell you, but you can’t find me there. (Sings:)

(Jisheng cao)

For nothing will you wear through those roaming-immortal boots of yours,

Because you’ll never find that simples-refining oven of mine.

I come and go as I please, stop wherever I want:

No wind, no rain, hard to throw it over,

No repairing, no fortifying, yet it is always rock solid.

At that place are grotto gates deeply locked amid the mountains far,

Truly it is a place you can’t find in a land filled with snowy clouds!

(Speaks:) Scholar, leave with me now! (CHEN JIQING speaks:) I want to be an official, how can you persuade me to join you? Running off at the mouth like this results in a lot of fine words that mean nothing to me! (Acts out ignoring him.) (MALE LEAD speaks:) Don’t think about glory and riches, scholar! Just leave with me! (CHEN JIQING acts out looking at a map with his hands on his back, speaks:) Here on this wall is a map of China and the foreign lands. Let me take a look at it. (MALE LEAD speaks:) Well that scholar is ignoring me and has gone off to look at a map of China and the foreign lands. Let me go and inscribe a poem on this map for him to look at. (Acts out inscribing a poem.) (CHEN JIQING speaks:) So, this Daoist can write poems. Well, let me read it out. … (Recites:)

Let your eyes roam in leisure over the Record of the Nine Realms:

The whole seems to lie within a foot rule,

One hundred thousand markets listed for each county,

Five thousand mountains sequestered in each province.

For You and Yan, you have to gaze toward the north,

For Wu and Yue, look toward the south;

There may be no road home,

But to go off as a spirit is not hard at all.

What tremendous talent! Daoist, how did you know I wanted to go home? (MALE LEAD speaks:) How could I not? When you inscribed that “Fragrance Fills the Courtyard” you wrote, “The mountains of home are far away, / How can we go back? / We commit it all to a dream’s roaming.” Didn’t this mean that you wanted to go home? (CHEN JIQING acts out sighing and speaks:) Och, it’s just that I’ve drifted to here and don’t know when I’ll get to go home. (MALE LEAD acts out laughing and speaks:) Scholar, if you leave with me, I’ll find a boat to take you home. That’s not a problem. (HUI’AN speaks:) Brother Daoist, where is your boat? You should avail yourself of it to send my old friend home. (CHEN JIQING speaks:) When did you see my “Fragrance Fills the Courtyard”? (MALE LEAD speaks:) I saw it as soon as you wrote it. (Sings:)

(Zui zhong tian)

This poem is better than Wang Can’s “Rhapsody on Ascending a Tower,”¹⁸⁷

Just like Zong Bing’s painting of “Roaming While Abed.”¹⁸⁸

(Acts out taking a bamboo leaf and sticking it on the wall, sings:)

Look at this barely visible leaf of a vessel across the blue waves.

(Speaks:) Presto! Scholar, isn’t this a boat now? (CHEN JIQING speaks:) It was just a sliver of a leaf pasted on the wall. … How could it change into a boat? Strange, strange indeed! (HUI’AN speaks:) This is a really small boat and not reliable enough to take my friend home. (MALE LEAD speaks:) Dull-witted one! It’s perfect to use. (Sings:)

Don’t guess that no one crosses waters in the wild;

Originally you wanted to “clasp three proposals,” become a noble by passing the examination,

But when it was clear you would not pass, like Tao Yuanming you wanted to return to your home—

How could you know that both of these are the same dream of Hua Xu?¹⁸⁹

(Speaks:) Can you see your road home? (CHEN JIQING speaks:) I already found it on the map of the world. (MALE LEAD speaks:) Look at this. (Sings:)

(Jinzhan’er)

Don’t you see the distant trees covering Jing and Wu?

Or dark waters bearing the homeward skiff?

Go ahead and let the windblown waves rise and surge, krakens and dragons grow angry,

You just close your two eyes tight,

And fix your body firm.

Let the oars pierce the cold of river’s moon

And the sail be raised in the loneliness of sea’s clouds.

Cold mists arise over ancient fords,

Ahh … there are the thatched huts of your former home.

(ACOLYTE speaks:) Don’t say this boat is made from a bamboo leaf, even if it were real, all it lacks is a single foot of mine, and it would be tipped over already. (CHEN JIQING yawns, speaks:) Why am I suddenly so tired? All I want to do is sleep. (MALE LEAD speaks:) This dull-witted one is asleep, I’ll wake him up from his “big sleep.” (Sings:)

(Zhuan Coda)

You and I will kick down the portals to the land of ghosts,

And open up the road to Acacia Peace

And wake up from “a pillow of the southern branch.”

Don’t be ensnared in the bridle of fame or the fetters of profit—

A quick turn of the head and already it is “mulberry and elm in the sunset scene.”

If you become my disciple,

We will cut off the vulgar and common together—

Will you fear “hard to leap out of a sea of bitterness that extends forever”?

Rely on this companion of misty sunsets,

Climb aboard this floating raft and depart—

Won’t you “Chant loud as you fly across Dongting Lake”?

(Leaving the thorn basket behind, he exits.)

(HUI’AN speaks:) How strange, indeed! This crazy Daoist just pasted a bamboo leaf on the wall, and it turned into a tiny little boat. What a fine magic trick. Chen Jiqing is asleep now. Acolyte, prepare a meal for us to eat when he awakens. I’m going back to my cell to meditate. (Recites:)

I will restrain my mind beneath the front window,

And pay no heed to right and wrong in the world of men.

(With ACOLYTE trailing, he exits.)

(CHEN JIQING dreams and acts out awakening, speaks:) What a great sleep, I’ll get on this boat now and return home with this favorable wind.

(Exits.)

[ACT 2]

(MALE LEAD enters leading EXTRA MALES LIEZI, ZHANG LIANG, and GE HONG, speaks:) I am Lü Dongbin. This is Lie Yukou, this is Zhang Zifang, and this is Ge the Immortal Codger. I went down to Green Dragon Monastery on Mount Zhongnan to lead Chen Jiqing to enlightenment. But this fellow is infatuated with success and fame, and he did not come to a realization. I pasted a bamboo leaf on the wall and magically turned it into a small boat, which he immediately wanted to get on and ride on favorable winds to go home and see his parents, his wife, and his children. My dear Superior Immortals, let’s wait here, and when he comes we will slowly transform him, and return him to the Correct Way. We will strike out both life and death from the Hall of the Yama King, and put his name among the ranks of Immortal Clerks.¹⁹⁰

Point to and open the road to heaven’s edge at the corner of the sea,

Lead the lost ones to walk upon the Great Way.

(LIEZI speaks:) That obtuse Chen Jiqing—we’ll bring him along sometime. (MALE LEAD sings:)

(SHUANGDIAO MODE: Xinshui ling)

I’ve rambled over the five lakes and four seas,

With just these two wind-sweeping sleeves of my robe.

I’ve summoned the noumenal lad to pluck grass of good augury,

And gone down to Immortals’ Islet¹⁹¹ with fellow immortals.

With such untrammeled freedom as this,

I sigh for all those days and nights in the dusty world.

(LIEZI speaks:) I think those people mired in common custom are greedy, angry, covetous, and full of desire, in the same way bottle flies have a fetish for blood, or a mass of ants love rotten meat. They just rush forward for profit, forgetting in the end that they will drown in it. They are so stupid and lost! (MALE LEAD speaks:) I can see that Chen Jiqing was originally endowed with a portion of an immortal, but that his dust-loving heart is too heavy. I tried two or three times, but just couldn’t get him to realize the truth. Ah, when will he get to complete the Correct Way? (Sings:)

(Zhuma ting)

Roaming carefree through the immortals’ gardens,

So many autumns where things have changed and the stars have made their transit.

I have completely penetrated through the Mysterious Pass,¹⁹²

And seen my share of “evening suns setting west” and “the Yangtze flowing east.”

One life emptily holds in its arms a whole life’s sorrow,

Can a thousand years have a thousand-year life span?

One should just turn one’s head as soon as possible,

And forever abide with idle clouds and cranes in the wild.

(CHEN JICHING enters and speaks:) I am Chen Jiqing. I met a crazy Daoist at Abbot Hui’an’s place, Green Dragon Monastery, who just kept on urging me to go away with him. He pasted a sliver of a bamboo leaf on the wall, and it magically transformed into a boat. I should not have been so quick to be moved by thoughts of home and board this boat to go back, because now I’ve reached here and have completely lost my way. There’s no one in front or behind to ask. … What shall I do? (MALE LEAD speaks:) Chen Jiqing, what did you come here for? (CHEN JIQING acts out looking over his shoulder with alarm and speaks:) Oh my, is someone calling me from somewhere? (MALE LEAD sings:)

(Yan’er luo)

All too quickly you mistakenly swallowed that hook of fame and fortune,

And, emptily aflutter in the end, forgot me, this old guy of misty sunsets;

In a hazy murky blankness you’ve come to the end of your road, where can you return?

Eyes wide open in this sea of misery with no one to save you.

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) Who’s calling me? Can you point out the main road for me? (MALE LEAD sings:)

(Desheng ling)

Oh-ho. Didn’t you say “that the classics and history would flow like water,”

That you didn’t need to worry about “purple and blue strings of ministerial caps”?

Why didn’t you take that “jade worth a string of cities” and memorialize at the cinnabar steps?¹⁹³

Or wrestle away an Earldom of Ten Thousand Families in Lingyang?¹⁹⁴

Today you’ve become withdrawn and meek,

And this is truly the unexpected scourge of wanting to be an official—

Better, indeed, to just give it up,

And quickly follow me off to freedom.

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) Oh, so it turns out to be the Daoist I met at the monastery. Please save me! (MALE LEAD speaks:) Quiet! (Sings:)

(Gua yugou)

You said I was no ardent friend, that we didn’t speak the same language,

And then went off to exhaustively research the Record of the Nine Realms.

But all that did was stir up a bit of desire to go home, and your tears secretly flowed

Until the drops saturated the sleeves of your traveling robe.

And now you’ve lost your way, and the road is hard to find.

On that map you took them for the mountains of home—

You couldn’t know it was a spiritual journey in a dream.

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) As there are actually three more of you, I would like to exchange names with them. (MALE LEAD speaks:) These are all my friends in the Way. This is Lie Yukou, this is Zhang Zifang, and this is Ge the Immortal Codger. (CHEN JIQING speaks:) I am completely unenlightened at the moment and do not know, which dynasty are you from? What were the reasons that allowed you to complete the Way of the immortal? Please, each of you explain in turn, and I will listen with a reverent bow. (LIE YUKOU speaks:) I am Lie Yukou, a man of Zheng. During the time of Duke Mu of Zheng, I witnessed Ziyang as prime minister. He was completely inclined toward corporal punishments and fines, and because of this I gave up my salary and went home to plow. Later I met the Master of Wide Attainment who passed on his great Way,¹⁹⁵ so I was able to become an immortal. (ZHANG ZIFANG speaks:) I am Zhang Liang, a man of the state of Han, and a ninth generation minister to Han.¹⁹⁶ The First Emperor of the Qin was a person without the Way and he exterminated my state. I made a secret alliance with a stout fellow to ambush the First Emperor at Bolangsha, but he mistakenly struck at the secondary chariot. The emperor searched for me for three days, but I hid out in Xiapi. Later, when I saw that the armies of the Ancestor of Han¹⁹⁷ had risen, I raised up my sword and gave my allegiance to Han, raising the Liu clan to power and squelching Xiang Yu—so I was able to take revenge for Han. The Ancestor of Han enfeoffed me as the marquis of Liu. But because he was also killing the meritorious officials who had helped him to power, I gave up my seal of office and followed Red Pine into the mountains, and consequently perfected the way of the immortal. (GE THE IMMORTAL CODGER speaks:) I am Ge Hong,¹⁹⁸ a man from Wuxing, and I was magistrate of Julou in the time of Mingdi of the Jin.¹⁹⁹ Because I was plucking cinnabar from the ground, I met the Realized One of the Luofu Mountains,²⁰⁰ and he taught me the techniques of the Nine Cycles of Reverted Elixir.²⁰¹ From that time on, I shed my post and perfected the Way, and consequently was able to complete the Way. (CHEN JIQING speaks:) I have lost any courage to speak to you! According to what you say, you have all given up your offices to perfect the Way, and by this were able to enter into the ranks of the arrayed immortals. But I “have spent ten years beneath the cold window,” and put in so much hard work that right now I can only think of being an official. I can’t make these high-sounding claims. (MALE LEAD speaks:) Idiot! (Sings:)

(Gu meijiu)

You say you were stuck for ten long years by the firefly-lit window,

And want to leave your name on the inscribed Goose Pagoda²⁰²—

Your strong ambition leaps and vaults to pierce the Dipper and Buffalo constellations.²⁰³

You hope for that chance meeting of wind and cloud, of lord and minister—

Would you settle to follow along behind others?

(Taiping ling)

You just talk about “the golden seals and purple tassels of being an official,”

I just speak of “three fairy isles and ten magic kingdoms of leaving the family.”

You just talk about “the merit completed and fame won by being an official,”

I just speak of “the prolonged years and augmented life span of leaving the family.”

You—leave off, shut your mouth and just look at my friends of the Way:

All of them abandoned their offices like so much filth.

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) You yourself say all three of these were officials, and I have seen their names in the historical records. But have you ever held office? (MALE LEAD sings:)

(Tianshui ling)

I once clambered up those phoenix pylons of the capital,

Leapt over the Dragon’s Gate,²⁰⁴

My horse’s hooves rushed forward,

In that autumn when I reached high to snap the cassia branch.²⁰⁵

But I, by chance, passed through Handan

And was transmuted when I met my master;

Awaking from the dream of yellow millet—

I wiped away my heart of dust with a single stroke!

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) I knew you’d never been an official! (MALE LEAD sings:)

(Zhegui ling)

Fortunately I never was disappointed about this “standing on the tortoise’s head” of yours.

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) You’ve never been an official—how would you know about the happiness of being an official? (MALE LEAD speaks:) Stupid dolt! Where is your position? (Sings:)

Weren’t you already too ashamed to return home?

And just hung around the capital?

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) But I want to go home now. (MALE LEAD sings:)

Hadn’t Ruan Ji already turned his cart around?²⁰⁶

And Liu Fen failed?²⁰⁷

And Wang Can climbed the tower?

You had already put your head together with your old friend on Zhongnan Mountain,

And were all smiles in your leisure days at Green Dragon Monastery.

You rowed a little leaf of a skiff,

And floated many twists in the flow of this river.

It’s clearly all a single pillow of Acacia Peace,

So why make it a case of “both parties feel the sadness of parting” instead?

(LIE YUKOU speaks:) Scholar, while it may be true that those who become immortals have immortal flesh and Daoist bones bestowed by heaven, these must be transferred to and received by extraordinary individuals before one can complete the Way of the immortal. Today, we companions in the Way have tried to lead you across three or four times so you will follow us, but you are still unable to realize enlightenment. Isn’t this making everything we do worth nothing? (CHEN JIQING speaks:) You fellows don’t understand; it’s not that I’m unwilling to follow him and leave my family, it’s that I simply cannot do it. There is no need to talk about failing the examinations—I have aged parents at home, a wife and children. How can I leave? Let me recite a lyric poem to the tune of “The Immortal Draws Near the River” to justify what I am saying:

From the time I came to Chang’an to sit for the examinations,

I was plotting for that wealth, nobility, and glory—

Who knew I would fail and have to return home?

My wife and children are still young in years,

The temple locks of my parents are dappled with frost.

Now in midpath I’ve lost my way, where could I ask?

Then you group of immortals came down to board my raft.

I hesitate, have nothing to say, just uselessly sigh.

Brokenhearted, we have all lost our way,

Sticking out our trembling necks, each at heaven’s edge.

(LIE YUKOU speaks:) Scholar, do you think your parents, wife, and children will stay with you to the end? You are stupidly deluded! (CHEN JIQING speaks:) Daoist, just point out the road to me so I can go home, and see how surely I will wrest away the title of Top of the List this time! (MALE LEAD speaks:) Stupid dolt! (Sings:)

(Chuan bo zhao)

I laugh at you, you stupid dolt,

If you match deed to word and wrest away this Top of the List,

And employ it so that you have outriders ahead and runners behind,

Painted galleries and vermilion lofts,

Dancing sleeves and singing throats,

That will be of no use to the cosmos.

(Acts out pointing to LIE and sings:)

How can that compare to our Lie Yukou, who rides on the fresh wind?

(Acts out pointing to ZHANG and sings:)

(Qi dixiong)

Or compare to our Han Marquis of Liu, planning strategies and deciding plans?

(Acts out pointing to GE and sings:)

How can that compare to our Magistrate Ge, refining cinnabar sands and resigning from Julou?

Just look beside Jade Creek where misty waters unceasingly flow,

Or in front of the green cliffs, where wind and moon remain as always.

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) Daoist! Just point out the road for me so I can go home. Don’t wait until I’ve turned into an old man. (MALE LEAD sings:)

(Meihua jiu)

Don’t wait until your temple hairs have turned autumn’s white,

So you “can share anxiety with the emperor.”

Or sigh that years and months, so hard to hold back,

Turn one’s head white too soon.

You offer up your own “Rhapsody on Tall Poplars Palace” and approach the purple steps,²⁰⁸

I will search for great herbal simples and return to Cinnabar Hill,

Where I will go back with these three to rest.

This one paces Immortals’ Islet, relying on his silver-toned dulcimer,

This one retires to the seclusion of cliffs, blowing his iron flute,

And this one boards a lonely boat, strumming a brocade zither.

(Shou Jiangnan)

Och! And me? I once was “three times drunk in Yueyang Tower,”²⁰⁹

Striding on the strong wind, blown into the blue above to roam with the clouds!

So in vain, the attempt of this immortal from Great Canopy Heaven to lead a prisoner awaiting execution to enlightenment!

For nothing did I make fun of that willow south of the city

Just to make you dream Zhuangzi’s dream of the butterfly.

(LIE YUKOU speaks:) Scholar, since you won’t follow us away, you cannot tarry here. Go on back. (CHEN JIQING speaks:) But I’m lost. (MALE LEAD speaks:) Stupid dolt! It’s straight ahead, not far, you’re close to your home. Just don’t forget the proper Way! (Sings:)

(Yuanyang sha Coda)

Just because you were seduced by the two words “merit” and “fame,”

You took on this dangerous thousand-mile journey.

Trusting to your short sword and long zither,

You roam all over the heartland of this divine kingdom.

True it is, “all those places of songs and music

Are just households of suffering and anxiety.”

It won’t take long before it will starve you until you’re as emaciated as Bo Yi and Shu Qi.²¹⁰

There’s no comparison to me, desiring nothing in this world,

Never to trod again down those paths of red dust.

(The four exit together.)

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) All four have gone. That crazy Daoist said I was close to home and wasn’t supposed to “forget the proper Way.” Well, I guess that “the proper Way” means “the main road.” I’ll just trundle along the main road a little further and then I’ll reach home. (Recites:)

I gradually become aware that my local dialect is getting closer,

And this turns the conditions of travel more grievous;

The road is long, I am wrapped in dreams of return—

“When the heart hurries, the real pace slows.”

(Exits.)

[ACT 3]

(EXTRA MALE costumed as OLD MAN enters, leading OLD FEMALE LEAD [costumed as] OLD WOMAN, FEMALE LEAD, and CHILD, and speaks:) I am a man of Yuhang, named Chen. Because I am well-off, everyone calls me Magnate Chen. I have five people in my family: my wife Madame Fang, my daughter-in-law Miss Bao, my grandson Asheng, and one who has gone off to take the examinations, Chen Jiqing. Now he’s been gone a long time, and there’s been neither message nor letter, all of which has made our family anxious. Wife, close the gates and sit inside for a while so I can go to the market and check to see if there is any news. (OLD WOMAN speaks:) I know.

(Exits together with OLD MAN.)

(MALE LEAD, costumed as FISHERMAN, enters and recites:)

Out on the river I punt my leaf of a boat,

On my rod tip I gather in the hook that gets the fish;

My rain hat and rain cape are always at hand—

No need to fret about wind-driven drizzle.

Ah, how happy we fisherfolk are! (Sings:)

[NANLü MODE] (Yizhi hua)

This squat brushwood window is newly woven,

The fine ropes of my net have been neatly rearranged.

With my back to the westerly wind, I just gathered in line and hook,

And now row my skiff into the bright moon—

Mist and water stretch on and on.

I have brewed my own chrysanthemum wine,

And lift up this speckled bamboo sieve myself.

I’ll give myself up to splendid drunkenness until the Dipper revolves and Orion sets,²¹¹

And enjoy to the full this unhurried pleasure amid the vastness of time and space.²¹²

(Liangzhou diqi)

I pay no heed to arranged times of arrival, or sun’s setting in the west,

And I let those unfeeling waters of the Yangtze flow to the east.

How often the case “light mists and scattered rains obscure front and rear.”

I have already passed some hamlet bridges and wilderness inns,

Sand spits and islands in the stream.

I already have a rain cape to drape askew,

And a rain hat to lightly cover my head.

We fishermen are never in the dumps and know no sorrow,

For we befriend the bathing egrets and roosting gulls.

I have just left that level stretch of lake that was Master Zhu of Tao’s,

Brushed by the Three Rivers’ Ford of Master Zhuge of Shu,²¹³

And have now reached the head of Yan Ling of Han’s Seven-Mile Rapids.²¹⁴

And which, would you say, were my finest friends?

No more than this: the blue waves and old trees are longtime bosom friends,

The duckweed of the Yangtze in Chu is better than fat meat,²¹⁵

And then there is that short-neck bream newly on the hook—

I’ll not stop until I’m drunk with it all!

(CHEN JIQING enters and speaks:) I’ve reached this ford where the road ends. How can I get a boat to ferry me across? (Acts out looking in the distance and speaks:) Isn’t that a fishing boat I see off in the distance? (Acts out summoning him with his hand and speaks:) Fisherman, punt your boat over here. (MALE LEAD acts out ignoring him.) (Sings:)

(Gewei)

Aren’t you Wen Qiao, burning a rhinoceros horn and walking midriver?²¹⁶

Or the Spirit of the Xiang River²¹⁷ thrumming the zither and floating on the water?

This makes me dumbstruck, yet I patiently abide beside the bulrushes.

This is no regular ferry at some narrows,

Nor in front of someone’s house or behind their backyard,

So how come this traveler, calling me to ferry him across, is standing there?

(CHEN JIQING acts out calling him and speaks:) Fisherman, punt your boat over here and ferry me across! (MALE LEAD speaks:) Where do you want to go? (CHEN JIQING speaks:) What’s the point of asking me? (MALE LEAD sings:)

(He xinlang)

So you say we fishermen should ask for no rationale or reason?

I’m just asking if you’re some trader or traveling salesman.

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) I’m not. (MALE LEAD sings:)

Looking for your home or old relations?

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) I’m not. (MALE LEAD sings:)

Well, if not then, why are you waiting for me at the bank of the Yangtze?

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) I want to go across the river. (MALE LEAD sings:)

You’re not one of the Three Grandees of Chu,²¹⁸ embracing sand to throw himself in the River are you?

Could you be Wu Zixu, intent on taking vengeance for wrongs done to your father?²¹⁹

Or are you the Banished Immortal Li, off to embrace the moon?²²⁰

Or perhaps Zheng Jiaofu toying with the pearls of his journey?²²¹

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) I need to get across the river quickly; I can’t take this fisherman’s wrangling discourse over past and present. All of this interrogation of me is just so much blabber. Fisherman, you’ve guessed them all wrong, just take me across the river and be done with it. (MALE LEAD sings:)

So it turns out to be some local yokel student who had set off to take the examinations.

If he had passed them, he would have spurred through the spring winds holding the bridle of a five-colored dapple,

But having failed, all he wants is one little fishing boat to float on the blue waves.

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) That’s right. I’m going back to Yuhang in Wulin to see my family, and I want to use your boat. I still want to go back and take the examinations again, so what if I give you a bit more money to hire the boat then? (MALE LEAD speaks:) Yeah, that’ll do. Hurry, get aboard, and I’ll get under way. (CHEN JIQING acts out boarding the boat.) (MALE LEAD sings:)

(Ma yulang)

My rain cape has been soaked through by a heaven’s worth of dew,

I wave my short oars and dip them into the main current,

Passing by this span of bridge, a lonely footbridge thin as a dragon’s waist.

I see the light gulls chasing each other ahead,

Dotting beauty spots on the autumn river’s elegance.

(Gan huang’en)

Reflections of the clouds glide on and on,

The force of the wind blows strong and chilly.

Winding my way out beyond the green poplar dike,

Shores of fragrant grass,

Islets of water pepper flowers. …

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) Where are we? (MALE LEAD sings:)

We have traveled to the headwaters of the Qinhuai,²²²

Unawares come to the flow that splits Wu and Yue,²²³

And already draw near your native village,

Approach your old home,

So don’t stop or slow down!

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) How strange! I am already at the gate to my home. (Acts out listening to the drums marking the night watch and speaks:) Why, it’s only the third watch!²²⁴ (MALE LEAD sings:)

(Caicha ge)

You don’t need to ask, “What watch or wooden slip,”²²⁵

Just look at how the clouds on the water disappear,

And that half wheel of a moon rises to the tip of willow’s branch.

(Acts out stopping the boat and speaks:) Scholar, I will wait here for you with my boat. Come back after you see your family. (Sings:)

I’ll just secure the boat line to this little stump of a peg here,

And listen to the woofing hounds bark in the depths of the bamboo forest.

(Exits for a moment with CHEN JIQING.)

(OLD MAN, OLD WOMAN, FEMALE LEAD, and CHILD enter, OLD MAN speaks:) This drives me nuts! My son has gone off to take the examinations, and I can find no information about him in town. Wife, let’s just close the gate for a while. (OLD WOMAN acts out closing the gate.) (MALE LEAD enters with CHEN JIQING and speaks:) Isn’t this your home? (CHEN JIQING speaks:) Wait until I knock on the door. Fisherman, I want to go back to take the examination again as soon as I have seen my family, so don’t take your boat anywhere. (MALE LEAD speaks:) Just hurry and get off the boat, I don’t have the spare time to sit around and wait for you. (CHEN JIQING acts out knocking on the gate and speaks:) Wife! Open the gate! Open the gate! (FEMALE LEAD speaks:) Who’s calling at the door? Let me open the door and take a look. (Acts out greeting and speaks:) I wondered who it was, and it turns out Jiqing is here! (CHEN JIQING speaks:) Where are my parents? (FEMALE LEAD speaks:) They are in the hall. (CHEN JIQING acts out entering and making obeisance, speaks:) Father, Mother; your son has come home. (OLD MAN speaks:) Child, have you gotten a post? (CHEN JIQING speaks:) My time is yet to come. I didn’t get a post, and so was too embarrassed to come back, and just drifted around away from home. I have been remiss in “serving you the sweet and flavorful.”²²⁶ Now that “the field of selection” is about to open again, I have come especially to see you, my parents, and then, like before, go off to take the examinations. (MALE LEAD speaks:) Son, you’ve been gone for many years and you just got back. Stay here for a few days. (CHEN JIQING speaks:) Father, Mother, the day draws near and I’m afraid I won’t get to the examination field on time. (MALE LEAD speaks:) Since the day is drawing near… Servant! Bring some wine so we can send our son off properly. (MALE LEAD acts out laughing and speaks:) Chen Jiqing! Get a move on! (Sings:)

(Muyang guan)

You sing that “Golden Threads” at the feast mat,²²⁷

And raise that jade wine server before the goblet—

Isn’t this the time that yellow millet cooking in the pot is finally done?

You’d better take leave of your white-haired parents soon,

And set aside forever your perfect match of youth.

(Continues in speech:) If you don’t go now what else are you waiting for? (Sings:)

You oh-so-simpleminded, dull-witted stupid dolt!

It seems in vain I was sent to quickly enlighten this fine Confucian type.

If you are so attached to the idea of imitating Laolaizi’s dance in colored clothes²²⁸

How can we dispatch the tethered boat of the Posthouse Captain of Rook River?²²⁹

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) Wife, I have to go off to the examinations. (FEMALE speaks:) Scholar, you just got home, how can you leave and abandon me? (She acts out grieving.) (CHEN JIQING speaks:) How could I ever set aside the feelings between us? It’s just that the time of the examination is pressing in, and in the blink of an eye another three years will be gone. What then? (MALE LEAD sings:)

(Ku huangtian)

All she can do is go on and on to try and beguile him,

Her glistening tears ever flowing.

Hurry up and follow these nice and orderly companions

And for the time being, cast away that charmingly pretty phoenix mate.

Better now to prepare line and pole, line and pole, hook, and boat,

And go off to the side of a Fuchun islet,²³⁰

The bank of the Wei River,

To be companion to the fisherman on the misty waves,

The idler of wind and moon,

Yet, the one who winds up with untrammeled freedom, freedom from a hundred cares.

Let those mountains crumble and the sea leak away,

That crow fly and rabbit run.

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) Wife, bring a pen and inkstone and let me compose a poem on the spot to leave as I part. (He acts out writing.) (MALE LEAD sings:)

(Wu ye ti)

From this point on, keep your babbling trap shut,

And don’t think I’ll “let any old wind carry me off east on an eastern rill.”²³¹

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) There, the poem is finished. Let me read it out loud so you can listen to it. (He acts out reciting.) (Recites the poem:)

The moon slides down and cold dew grows white,

This night is the hardest to bear;

Songs of separation choke the jade pipe with sobs,

And thoughts of parting sunder the jasper zither.

Wine arrives, we drink with linked sorrow,

The poem finished, we recite it with matched tears;

On moonlit nights, we’ll treasure dreams of the other,

And in the empty bed, lie beneath half the quilt.

(FEMALE speaks:) Jiqing, this poem is so heartrending and full of passion, it makes my glistening tears fall as I read it. Oh, it pains me to death! (CHEN JIQING acts out making obeisance and parting, speaks:) Father, Mother, your son is off to the examinations. (MALE LEAD sings:)

At your leisure you dillydallied until your poem was finally sung,

But why a piece on separation’s sorrows,

That holds both in concentrated gaze?

This one raises a golden whip, far away brushing wineshop doors,

And that one weeps at Yang Pass, secretly splattering on sleeves of fragrant gauze.

Let’s go,

Stop suffering—

For my grass sandals and hemp rope belt,

Far outdo those fat steeds and fine sables of yours!

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) Father, Mother, I am leaving for the examinations. (FEMALE acts out escorting him to the door.) (CHEN JIQING speaks:) Wife, go on back now. (Acts out going out the door and speaks:) Fisherman, where is your boat? (MALE LEAD speaks:) Hurry and get on the boat, how many hours do I have to wait?

(They exit together.)

(OLD MAN speaks:) Our son has gone off to take the exams. Wife, close the gate for a while. …

Our eyes will watch for the pennants and flags of victory,

Our ears will listen for good news.

(OLD WOMAN, FEMALE LEAD, and CHILD exit together [with OLD MAN].)

(MALE LEAD enters with CHEN JIQING and speaks:) Scholar, we’ve reached the Yangtze already! (Sings:)

(Three from Coda)

On these softly plied oars with their creaking groan, we have come to the mouth of the creek,

And already see those little dots of fishing lamps with their round brightness at the head of the ancient ford.

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) Fisherman! Turn the boat closer to the bank. … It’s getting really windy! (MALE LEAD sings:)

All I can see are snowy waves on the autumn river billowing up to crash against the heavens,

Then the moon grows black, the clouds more sorrowful.

Whipping wind grows wild, lashing rain violent—

To what part of what season should this weather belong?

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) Fisherman! This violent storm, these waves rising steep scare me to death! (MALE LEAD sings:)

Dissolving indistinct white, the silver waves flow unbroken,

Then the moon grows black, the clouds more sorrowful.

There is no “riding a crane to Yangzhou.”²³²

(Two from Coda)

Suddenly I hear thunder swirl in the steep cliffs—krakens and dragons howl,

And then see lightning circle the empty forest—ghosts and sprites sorrow.

This angry God of the Waves,²³³ roiling the river and stirring the sea,

Scares him so much he grows cowardly and meek—

How can we keep from tipping over,

Who will save your life?²³⁴

My fishing boat has nearly been trampled apart,

To become but floating scum on water’s surface.

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) Alas! The boat has broken apart! Fisherman, save me! (He acts out reciting a scripture, speaks:) O, Great One, Celestial Worthy²³⁵ who rescues us from peril! (MALE LEAD sings:)

(Huangzhong Coda)

In vain now, bowing with folded hands, you beseech the God of the Abyss and pay homage to the Spirit of the River,

All you have to do is settle your flighty soul, secure your vital spirit, and close your eyes tight.

The wind abruptly blows,

The waters flow backwards,

And slap against the three mountain ranges,

Overflow the Nine Kingdoms,

Shake the Gates of Heaven,

And shift the Axis of the Earth.

It has scared you so much you quake all atremble,

Just like the prisoner of Chu,

Who gave himself up to death—

Your whole life is over

And you cannot

Be buried in those old tumuli of home.

From this time on, for autumns eternal,

Who will sacrifice a cup of wine over your grave at Beimang?

(CHEN JIQING acts out falling in the water, speaks:) Help! Save me! (He acts out startling himself awake.) (ACOLYTE speaks:) Sir, my master requests your presence at a vegetarian feast. (CHEN JIQING speaks:) Where did the Daoist go? (ACOLYTE speaks:) You were asleep here, I am asking you to a meal here, who knows where the mad Daoist went? (CHEN JIQING speaks:) I just went home, and he was waiting for me midway, and he had some Daoist friends, who tried three or four times to get me to go away with them. These Daoists were a bit weird. … Let me catch up to them. (Acts out running over to look in the bramble basket, speaks:) That Daoist left this basket here. Let me take a look. There’s nothing inside this bramble basket but one piece of paper. Let’s see what he wrote. (Acts out a verse recitation:) (Recites a poem:)

A single leaf in a moment’s time sent a traveler home,

Mountains’ glow and waters’ radiance collapsed against each other;

We had barely passed the place where Qu Yuan sang his song,

Before we then passed the jetty where Yan Ziling fished.

His parents neglected, he was ashamed, so inattentive to their support—

So on his wife’s makeup stand why did he leave a second poem?

And when parting, wept in the yellowing dusk?

They thought that I knew nothing at all.

(Acts out being startled, speaks:) How can he know everything that happened in my dream? He is indeed an immortal. I think of the saying, “Human form is hard to achieve, the Middle Kingdom is hard to be born into, and an extraordinary person is hard to meet!” How could I have missed the signs? I’d guess that this Daoist hasn’t gone far. Little Master, please send my regrets and thanks to the abbot, but I’m not going to have this meal, I’m going to carry this bramble basket and go off after that Daoist!

(Exits.)

(ACOLYTE speaks:) Well, this scholar is really a pudding head. In broad daylight he falls asleep on an empty stomach, wakes up all flustered from I don’t know what kind of dream, and now wants to take off after that Daoist. Who knows how crazy monks and wild Daoists wind up, or where he’s gone? I’ll go back and report to my master. Whatever shit hunger squeezed out of this pudding head is none of my business in the least!

[ACT 4]

(LIE YUKOU enters leading ZHANG ZIFANG and GE THE IMMORTAL CODGER carrying drumming sticks and long clappers²³⁶ and recites a poem:)

Yesterday Eastern Zhou, today the state of Qin;

From the lantern globes of Xianyang to Luoyang’s dust.²³⁷

A hundred years is but a single dream of blue waves

That brings laughter to us here on the very peak of Kunlun.

I am Lie Yukou. That Master of Pure Yang, desiring to lead Chen Jiqing to enlightenment, relied on me, Zhang Zifang, and Ge Xianweng to help encourage him to enter the Way. But the dust lay too heavy upon his heart and, for the moment, we have yet to turn his head. But the Master of Pure Yang showed us the power of his magic and he created a completely different realm to give him a look, and this certainly must have enlightened him. Chen Jiqing hasn’t come yet and we have nothing to do, so we’ll go down into the marketplace and sing some “Songs of Daoist Sentiments” as a way to provoke people of the world into waking up! (ZHANG ZIFANG speaks:) This is the best! You first, Elder Immortal. (LIE YUKOU sings:)

(Cunli yagu)²³⁸

Here, deep in our grotto heavens,

Is a place, indeed, where no mortals come;

I just want to bury away all my names—

No glory, no shame, no troubles or vexations.

Look at that “snail’s horn” fame,

And that “fly’s head” profit,

All, more or less, the same.

I want to sleep at night until it turns bright,

Sleep in the bright until it turns night,

Sleep straight through until I awake!

Ai! Now light, now dark, time passes like wind ruffling a horse’s ears.

(Yuanhe ling)

What I eat is a half gourd of food, begged from a thousand households,

What I wear is a single set of clothes patched together from a hundred scraps;

This kind of coarse clothing and bland food is enough to linger over—

Let the Lord of Heaven grant it or not!

I just want to snuggle up at mountain’s waist inside a bamboo fence and thatched hut—

I close the brushwood gate, soundlessly silent and still,

And sigh over human life that is so muddled and befuddled in vain.

(Shangma jiao)

You want your fame to swell,

Your position to be high—

These are just knives to kill another!

When will you get to relax, enjoy, ease the feelings in your chest?

True it is,

“Burning anxieties finally destroy both brow tips!”²³⁹

(Sheng hulu)

You have to worry day and night, ponder a myriad plans,

Can that compare to my careless feelings of pleasure?

Here no grass withers, neither spring, summer, winter, nor fall.

I “lean against the bright window where I entrust my proud spirit,”²⁴⁰

Use a short bamboo as a staff and concentrate my gaze

To look for those Peaches of Immortality ripening on the sea.²⁴¹

(LIE YUKOU speaks:) Master of Pure Yang has arrived before we had a chance to finish these “Songs of Daoist Sentiments.” (ZHANG ZIFANG speaks:) Let us withdraw to one side.

(Exit.)

(MALE LEAD sings:)

[ZHENGGONG MODE] (Duanzheng hao)

I’ll not go and roam the northern abyss,

I’ll not go to sleep at the eastern peak—

When you can wander freely, then freely wander as you will!

In that dusty realm I’ll beat out a few cadences from the drum that enlightens—

That is my leisure daily ritual act.

(Gun xiuqiu)

I sigh over “now day, now night, it passes like a shuttle thrown,”

And over “who knows how long a life will last?”

In a quick turn of the head, a hundred years pass,

Then, facing the burnished bronze mirror your temples are speckled white.

Watch Wang Liu play his silly skit,

And listen to Sandy Three sing his satiric song.²⁴²

We send to the burial place those vainglorious do-nothings who schemed out of greed—

What can they keep when the end comes?

Can’t you see: old friends at your window grow fewer with each harvest,

The new graves beyond the suburbs multiply with each year,

This is all only a dream of the southern branch!

(CHEN JIQING enters in a fluster carrying the bramble basket and speaks:) Master! I have eyes but I’m blind. I can only hope, Master, that you will save me through conversion. (MALE LEAD sings:) Let us withdraw to one side.

(Tang xiucai)

Look at him running there all afluster.

(Acts out waving him away with his hand, sings:)

Ai! You stupid imbecile, stop following me!

(CHEN JIQING acts out catching up to him and grabbing him, making him stop, speaks:) Great Immortal! I only hope for your compassion that will free me from suffering²⁴³ and point out the road to long life. (Acts out making obeisance.) (MALE LEAD sings:)

Let me ask you, “Why are you bowing up and down in the road like you were pounding garlic in a pestle”?

I’m just a poor Daoist

Who lives far off at mountain’s bend,

How could I lead you, a Confucian scholar, to enlightenment?

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) Inside this bramble basket you left behind a poem that betrayed complete knowledge of my trip home to see my family. Doesn’t that mean you are an immortal? I want to follow you now with all my heart, leave the family, and become your disciple. (MALE LEAD speaks:) Dolt! Go on to the examination fields and wrest away your Top of the List. Why are you bowing to me? (Sings:)

(Gun xiuqiu)

With all your heart you want to meet your lord and king, get a first on the examination,

So why are you kowtowing to an immortal to seek a final outcome?

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) Master! Your disciple here has read the poem and now I don’t want to be an official anymore. (MALE LEAD sings:)

You say you read the poem and then saw through the Gate of Mystery,

I just fear that my “hairs of purple frost²⁴⁴ have wrongly adjudicated this state”!

(MALE LEAD speaks:) Dolt! Are you enlightened now? (CHEN JIQING speaks:) I am! (MALE LEAD sings:)

Since you already know that the glory of the world is but froth on the water,

And merit and fame like sparks from a flint,

Why did you take so many digs at me in the lecture hall?

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) I had only common and vulgar sight! How could I know a true immortal had descended from heaven! I only hope that you will raise your noble hand high and sweep dusty customs from me. (MALE LEAD sings:)

And now, I will sweep the vulgar dust from you as I raise my sagely hand to rub,

And then explain in detail why that Hall of Bright Radiance of the Son of Heaven within the ninth wall

Can never be the equal of the little tunnel of peace and security of us immortal folk on our three isles,

And you will never want to bustle around in the busy world again.

(The three, including LIE YUKOU, enter and he speaks:) Elder Brother of the Way, is that Chen Jiqing finally willing to follow you off? (CHEN JIQING enters and speaks:) So, all three of the great immortals have been here all the time. (Acts out bowing to them.) (MALE LEAD speaks:) We had to go down into the mortal world three times for this one dolt. (Sings:)

(Tang xiucai)

Yesterday, oh,

You couldn’t take off that golden cangue and those jade-link fetters.

But today, well,

You want to have “audience with the Prime Origin to verify completion of your discipline tasks”²⁴⁵—

So we know you know “Who is freely wandering!” and “Who is full of frustration!”

Raise your head: the mountain colors are fine,

Let it into year ears: the sound of water is mellifluous—

This is exactly the way we Daoist immortals live our lives!

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) I know it wasn’t one of these three, but was that old fisherman who ferried me home a transformation of you? (MALE LEAD speaks:) Dolt. (Sings:)

(Gun xiuqiu)

You say I drove that little boat across the blue waves,

Held the bamboo fishing rod, and threw on that green rain cape—

This I did!

You came within an inch of your life foolhardily crossing that river!

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) Master! Once you decided you would lead me to enlightenment, why did you dump me in the river, putting me at death’s door? You really know how to manipulate people! (MALE LEAD acts out pointing to LIE YUKOU, sings:)

If I hadn’t laid out that little snare,

How could I have persuaded these immortal ones to bring this scene to an end?

I have seven other brothers among my old friends as well.

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) Master! Just exactly where are the Eight Grotto Precincts of the Upper Realm?²⁴⁶ (MALE LEAD acts out gesturing with his hand in a direction, sings:)

The Grotto Precincts of which you ask are still cut off by the high peaks of Penglai’s range,

How would I have persuaded these immortal realized ones to bring this scene to an end?

(Continues in speech:) If you want to dance,

We have the slim waist twirl of “Rainbow Skirts and Feathered Sleeves,”²⁴⁷

(Continues in speech:) If you want to sing,

We have the white teeth songs of the Crimson Tree and Green Zither,²⁴⁸

So let us waste no more time.

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) Master! Can you tell me just about the sights you have there? (MALE LEAD sings:)

(Daodao ling)

There we have dark-green pines crooked and twisting: krakens and dragons at rest,

Virescent mountains and high peaks: waves of glaucous mist.

Unmoved by fragrant winds, pine flowers fall,

Grotto gates are closed away in the deep, no one locks them.

Let’s go, you and I,

Let us go—

To perfect realization we will ascend together the Galleries of Penglai.²⁴⁹

(OPENING MALE costumed as IMPERIAL LORD OF EASTERN FLORESCENCE²⁵⁰ enters, holding a tally and leading ZHANG GUO,²⁵¹ ZHONGLI QUAN, IRON CRUTCH LI,²⁵² DIVINE CODGER XU,²⁵³ LAN CAIHE,²⁵⁴ HAN XIANGZI,²⁵⁵ and HE XIANGU.²⁵⁶) (CHEN JIQING speaks:) Oh! So many great immortals and I recognize none of them. Could you tell me who they are, Master? (MALE LEAD points to ZHANG and sings:)

(Shier yue)

This one rides on a donkey backward, as fast as going downhill.

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) So it turns out to be the great immortal Zhang Guo (Acts out bowing.) (MALE LEAD points to XU and sings:)

This one blows an iron flute with beautiful harmonies and pleasant sounds.

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) It’s the great immortal Divine Codger Xu (Acts out bowing.) (MALE LEAD points to HE and sings:)

This graceful beauty holds a wicker strainer.

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) It’s the great immortal He Xiangu (Acts out bowing.) (MALE LEAD points to LI and sings:)

This one with ragged beard drags an iron crutch behind him.

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) It’s the great immortal Iron Crutch Li (Acts out bowing.) (MALE LEAD points to HAN and sings:)

This one converted the Literary Duke at Indigo Pass.²⁵⁷

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) It’s the great immortal Han Xiangzi (Acts out bowing.) (MALE LEAD points to LAN and sings:)

This one in the long green robe clacks his clappers and sings out loud.

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) It’s the great immortal Lan Caihe (Acts out bowing.) (MALE LEAD points to ZHONGLI and sings:)

(Yaomin ge)

This is the one with twin coifs who always drinks until he’s red in the face.

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) It’s the great immortal Zhongli of the Han (Acts out bowing and speaks:) May I ask, Master, what your name is? (MALE LEAD speaks:) You dolt! Didn’t I already tell you? (Sings:)

I once—in the moment when the yellow millet was boiling in the pot—

Had whiled away fifty years of life unknown.

(CHEN JIQING speaks:) Oh, you already said that! I was just too deluded to understand. (Acts out bowing and speaks:) Let me pay my deep respect now. (MALE LEAD sings:)

Now he knows I am Master of Pure Yang Lü and no one else.

(Speaks:) Dolt! Could you still be dreaming? (CHEN JIQING speaks:) I am truly enlightened now, I am not dreaming anymore. (MALE LEAD sings:)

Go now and think carefully about what has happened,

Don’t make us sneer at you,

We just want you to see how damn meaningless is that field of fortune and fame!

(IMPERIAL LORD OF EASTERN FLORESCENCE speaks:) I have received the emperor’s command: since Chen Jiqing already possessed the fate to become an immortal, and to become Master of Pure Yang Lü’s disciple, all of the assembled immortals can lead him off to the west to the feast of the Immortal Peaches. (Recites in ballad verse:)

To the west we gaze at the Porphyry Pool where all the Realized gather,

From the east comes a purple aura that pervades the Gates of Heaven;

From this point on, at the chalcedony feast mats of the Queen Mother,

One more will be added when the Peaches of Immortality are handed out.

(CHEN JIQING and the group all act out bowing.) (MALE LEAD sings:)

(Coda)

We gather at the Porphyry Pool and celebrate with Peaches of Immortality;

They fill to the brim the golden platter and are bestowed in Great Canopy Heaven.

They extend our fortune-allotted years beyond measure,

And secure our eternal bliss.

Take this feathered cloak and raven-black head cloth and tie it on yourself,

And arrange the straps on your kudzu-vine sandals.

Let that black mule be stabled and fed,

For now you ride with me on an auspicious cloud.

Even though it be some million-mile journey of the Peng,

We will fear the breadth of neither heaven nor sea.

Title:	Lü Dongbin reveals a transformation in a dream of blue waves
Name:	Chen Jiqing Mistakenly Boards the Bamboo-Leaf boat.

    1.  See Wang Meng’ou 1971, 33–37, esp. 37.

    2.  Wang Bocheng 王伯成was one of the most outstanding dramatists of the second part of the thirteenth century, but little of his work has come down to us. His Li Taibai bian Yelang 李太白貶夜郎has been preserved in a Yuan edition. The play deals with the famous poet Li Bai’s 李白 (701–762) principled and prescient criticism of the adulterous couple Yang Guifei 楊貴妃and An Lushan 安祿山. For a study of this play, including extensive quotations in translation, see Idema 2004; for an extensively annotated translation with copious notes, see Akamatsu et al. 2011. Wang Bocheng treated Emperor Xuanzong’s passion for Yang Guifei, her adulterous relation with a Sogdian general in Chinese service, An Lushan, and the latter’s eventual rebellion (resulting in the elderly emperor’s flight from his capital Chang’an and the death of Yang Guifei) in much greater detail in his Tianbao yishi zhugongdiao 天寶遺事諸宮調, which has been preserved only in fragments (see Fan Ben Li Chen 1992 and 2005–2006). Fan Kang’s Du Zimei you Qujiang 杜子美遊曲家江 (or, its alternative title, Qujiang chi Du Fu youchun 曲江池杜甫遊春) has not been preserved. Its main character must have been China’s most famous poet, Du Fu 杜甫 (712–770), lamenting the decline of the Tang dynasty on the eve of the An Lushan rebellion. Plays on this topic are discussed by Tan 2010, 55–68.

    3.  The alternative title found in n. 2.

    4.  Li Kaixian mistakenly attributes the fourth act of the play Fan Li Returns to the Lakes (Fan Li gui hu 范蠡歸湖) to Fan Kang rather than to Zhao Mingdao 趙明道, who is normally considered the author. See Li Kaixian 1982, 318.

    5.  Wine commands, or “wine songs” (jiuling 酒令), were commands issued by a game master at drinking bouts. The commands were normally based in the composition, use, or violation of various textual forms, including both prose and poetic works. If one failed in carrying out the command, one had to immediately drink or was issued a wine tally that had to be cleared by a drink at a later time in the evening. See Harper 1986.

    6.  Zhong 1982, 120; Lü and Wu 2000, 463–67. The precise referents in the last four lines of this song are highly ambiguous. “Dreams of dragons and snakes” probably refers to his lack of success as a writer. The phrase “not yet created the dream of dragons and snakes” (weizuo longshe meng 未作龍蛇夢) is often used in elegies (wan’ge 挽歌) written after Southern Song to describe an incompletely fulfilled artistic life. “Traces of fox and hare” usually refers to a deserted place or a place of splendor now filled with the tracks of foxes and rabbits, extended perhaps to mean a land of former glory (Song) now crisscrossed with the tracks of wild animals (Mongols).

    7.  The sound of snapping fingers means a flash or an instant, as in the common phrase “One hundred years pass in the sound of snapping fingers” (Tanzhi sheng zhong guo bainian 彈指聲中過百年).

    8.  See Komjathy 2007, 104–6, for a general discussion and bibliography on this topic. He translates sihai as “four hindrances.”

    9.  Ibid., 41, and sources cited there.

  10.  The westernmost peak of Mount Hua.

  11.  Originally from the story of a young man who wanted an audience with a noble official and had no other way but to arrive and clean the doorways of that official’s gate. From its earlier meaning of seeking audience with a noble or the powerful, by the Song it had come to mean simply “to expend energy in order to accomplish something you are seeking.” Here, a reference to the energy he put into seeking office.

  12.  That is, his former oral promise to succeed in the examinations and his current state of mind.

  13.  The family fortune.

  14.  A traditional song of separation between husband and wife, contrasted with the paired phoenixes above.

  15.  That is, the brilliant stars in the Milky Way are those of his friends who have succeeded. Passing the examinations and making a career in the imperial bureaucracy are often compared to ascending to heaven.

  16.  That is, as good as dead.

  17.  He went off to perfect the rituals of becoming a Daoist.

  18.  See Li Fang 1986, 462–63; Wang Rutao 1987, 569–72.

  19.  For extensively annotated translations of both tales, see Nienhauser 2010, 189–232 and 73–129, respectively.

  20.  For a thorough introduction to the deliverance plays, see Zhao Youmin 1975a, b. For a general introduction to the subgenre in English, see Idema 1985, 63–69.

  21.  Aoki 1941, 32.

  22.  This may also be understood as “Immortals Transforming Through Revealing the Change That Lies Behind the Way,” from its earlier use in Sima Qian’s Records of the Historian, where the term daohua is related to how the Book of Changes reveals the inner workings of the Way.

  23.  This is the only deliverance play besides Bamboo-Leaf Boat to have been preserved in a Yuan edition. Unfortunately, the text of the second act of that edition is heavily damaged. For a discussion of this play and its subsequent editions, see Idema 2007b, 70–76; for a list of translations of these plays, see West and Idema 2010b, 283–313 and 469–72.

  24.  Song and Yu 2003, 43–44.

  25.  See Zhao Youmin 1975a, 155.

  26.  Such imagined fear would have been given more weight by the ascetic practices of early Quanzhen, which included sleep deprivation, exposure to severe weather, beatings, and being forced to beg. See Komjathy 2007, 47, and Eskildsen 2004, 38–66.

  27.  Zhao Lingxia 2009, 50–51. Bamboo-Leaf Boat is an excellent example of how a dream sequence is used to terrify the one to be delivered. For a staged scenario, see the last two acts of Zhongli of the Han Leads Lan Caihe to Enlightenment, translated in its entirety in West and Idema 2010b, 283–313.

  28.  For an excellent brief introduction, see Goossaert 2008a.

  29.  See Eskildsen 2004, 161–66.

  30.  The ancient Daoist philosopher Liezi is not included among the Quanzhen patriarchs, nor is he ever counted as one of the Eight Immortals.

  31.  Perhaps not all changes can be attributed to Zang Maoxun, who, as a rule, worked on the basis of texts that directly or indirectly came from the court and may have been heavily revised there. The addition of a wedge at the beginning of the play, and the introduction of the abbot, Hui’an, may have already happened in the source text used by Zang. The court stage is also a much more likely source of the foul language of the acolyte than Zang’s study.

  32.  Song and Yu 2003, 45.

  33.  Ibid.

  34.  Zang Maoxun also suggests that the fisherman in act 3 is actually Lü Dongbin in disguise. In this way, the leading male plays a single character throughout the four acts of the play.

  35.  Ibid.

  36.  Modern Hangzhou.

  37.  These lines are based on a poem attributed to Lü Dongbin in early Song works. Lü Dongbin does not appear in any Tang-dynasty materials and appears to have been a figure created during the early Song. The earliest textual reference is found in the Categorized Garden of Song-Dynasty Affairs (Songchao shishi leiyuan 宋朝事實類苑), a work by Jiang Shaoyu 江少虞 that collects and categorizes citations from other texts covering a span of 120 years from 960 to 1085. In his citation from a collection of Yang Yi’s 楊億 (974–1020) conversations, recorded by his student, we find the following:

朝辭百越暮三吳,	In the morning I depart the land of the Hundred Yue, at evenfall reach the Three Wus*,
袖裏青蛇膽氣粗。	Green Dragon in my sleeve, I was rough and ready;
三入岳陽人不識,	Three times I entered Yueyang but no one recognized me,
朗吟飛過洞庭湖。	Chanting loudly, I flew across Lake Dongting.
*Wuxing, Suzhou, and Kuaiji in Jiangsu and Zhejiang

See Jiang 1981, 560–61. The poem varies considerably from source to source, particularly in the first line. For a general discussion, see Fu Xuanzong 1990, 1:393–404.

  38.  A sword.

  39.  Located on the Yangtze in modern Wuhan.

  40.  The term “northern Yue” is written here as 北粵. This yue is interchangeable in old texts with another yue 越 (see the early geographical record Shuijing zhu 水經注, “the two yue characters are interchangeable, just like the Hundred Yue become the Hundred Yue 粵與越通,猶百粵之為百越). See Chen and Li 1999, 1287. This may stem from the fact that both characters have the same initial and share a final stop (k). At the time they began to be interchangeable, we have no way of determining the medial vowels across a wide range of dialects. The term “Hundred Yue” is a common designation of the ancient peoples that lived in an area of southern China stretching from modern Zhejiang in the east to Guangxi and Yunnan in the west and southward to Cangwu in Hunan. Cangwu, also known as Mount Jiuyi, was often considered the southern end of the civilized world.

  41.  The king or emperor is the dragon, his generals, tigers.

  42.  Here, the expression means both “from the time I left my deluded secular state” and “from the beginning of the universe.”

  43.  Cangshu is Atractylodes chinensis; these two items (goji berries and Atractylodes) are still used to prepare a prophylactic rice gruel, good for “strengthening the liver” and “improving eyesight.”

  44.  Su Qin 蘇秦 was a politician of the Warring States period famed for his rhetorical skills who led an alliance of six states against Qin. At one time, he was prime minister of each of them and carried the seals of each of these states on his belt. See “Su Ch’in, Memoir 9,” in Ssu-ma Ch’ien 1995b, 97–121.

  45.  See chap. 3, n. 72.

  46.  Golden Valley was an estate owned by the fabulously rich Shi Chong 石崇 (249–300). It later became a stock metaphor for an elegant estate of the rich. “Boys and girls” is a term used by inferiors when addressing superiors as a self-reflexive humility; its use here is clearly sarcastic. While it might refer to both genders, it is most likely one of those terms in which only the first word carries meaning. Thus: those little boys who are vulgar and immoral. See Knechtges 2006.

  47.  This is a name later adopted by Fan Li 范蠡. See chap. 2, n. 39.

  48.  The Huangting jing 黃庭經, a text concerning visualization of the inner gods that animate the body. One of the earlier and more influential of the Daoist texts, it was related to the tradition of “nourishing life” (yangshen養生). See Robinet 2008b.

  49.  That is, the Daode jing道德經, the “Daoist bible.” See Robinet 2008a.

  50.  This may refer to a section of the Inner Scripture of the Yellow Emperor (Huangdi neijing黃庭內經) called the “Great Plainness” (Taisu 泰素), which exists only in an eleventh-century copy of an eighth-century manuscript. See Hsu 2008, 507.

  51.  Chaofu 巢夫 (“Nestman”) and Xu You 許由 were famous hermits who lived during the time of Yao. When Xu You told Chaofu that Yao had offered him the empire, Chaofu answered, “Why didn’t you hide your body and cover your brilliance? You are not my friend!” He thereupon went to a brook and rinsed out his ears. According to another legend, Xu You rinsed his ears after Yao had offered him the empire.

  52.  From the Zhuangzi: “Lie Tzu could ride the wind and go soaring around with cool and breezy skill, but after fifteen days came back to earth. As far as the search for good fortune went, he didn’t fret and worry.” See Watson 1968, 32.

  53.  Red Pine was a mythic figure of antiquity who, over time, had been considered the Master of Rain (Yushi 雨師), a magician, and a Daoist sage who specialized in the “circulation of breath” techniques (xingqi 行氣), which he taught to Zhang Liang (Zifang). See Raz 2008. On Zhang Liang, see chap. 3, n. 82.

  54.  As an ambassador of Emperor Wu of the Han, Zhang Qian 張騫 (d. 114 BC) repeatedly made extensive journeys to central Asia. Later legend claimed that he had boarded a raft floating on the Yellow River that had taken him up to the Silver River (the Milky Way) before bringing him back to earth.

  55.  The Daoist master who accompanied the Tang emperor Xuanzong on his visit to the moon is usually identified as Ye Fashan 葉法善. The story is also included, however, in a long prose account of the miracles wrought by the Daoist master Ye Jingneng 葉竟能. This latter text, known as Ye Jingneng shi 葉竟能詩, was found at Dunhuang.

  56.  The highest heaven that covers all other heavens; see Miller 2008.

  57.  See chap. 2, n. 5.

  58.  From a couplet attributed in the Song period to Red Pine, who sent the lines to Zhang Liang:

不如聞早歸山去 Better to hear early on, “go back to the mountains,”

免事君王不到頭 To avoid, in service to one’s lord, not making it to the end.

The poem is found as here in Jiang 1981, 881, and with a slight emendation to the first line (聞→閒) in Zeng 1982, 962 (56.31a), cited from Liu Gongfu shihua 劉貢父詩話, now lost.

  59.  Wang Qiao 王喬 (or Wangzi Qiao 王子喬) is one of the best-known immortals of ancient times. According to one tradition he was a son of King Ling of Zhou (r. 571–545 BC) who disappeared into the skies riding a white crane after studying the techniques of immortality for thirty years on Mount Song. See Raz 2008.

  60.  Ge Hong 葛洪 (283–343) was an alchemist and also the author of the famous Master Who Embraces Simplicity (Baopu zi 抱朴子), which is an important source for the history of Daoism and its practices. See Miura 2008; Pregadio 2008a, 2008b. Here the playwright rejects the discipline of exterior alchemy in favor of the meditation techniques of inner alchemy.

  61.  “The Phoenix Rests on the Wutong Tree” and “Fragrance Filling the Courtyard” are names of song lyric tunes. Each of these tunes would have its own demands in terms of number of lines, number of syllables in each line, distribution of level and deflected tones, and the placement of rhymes. Chen Jiqing apparently wrote one poem to the tune “Fragrance Filling the Courtyard” and one poem to the tune “The Phoenix Rests on the Wutong Tree.” The names of these tunes are conventional and give no indication of the contents of the lyrics. The repetition of the line “After MALE LEAD finishes getting up and reciting EXTRA MALE’s ‘Fragrance Filling the Courtyard’” is removed from some modern editions of the play. We have left it since it may indicate some scene in which it was necessary to repeat the action. However, there does seem to be some confusion in the lines.

  62.  This rhapsody written by Wang Can 王粲 (177–217) couples the general motif of “climbing to a height” and writing about the vastness of nature and insignificance of man with Wang Can’s own sense of nostalgia for his home and frustration at the constant and dangerous warfare of the period. See “Climbing the Tower,” translated by Burton Watson, in Lau and Minford, 2000, 311–13. For a discussion of Zheng Guangzu’s 鄭光祖 zaju Drunk and Longing for Home Wang Can Climbs the Tower (Zui sisiang Wang Can denglou 醉思鄉王粲登樓), see Idema 2005.

  63.  Zhang Han 張翰 (ca. 300) had taken a position in North China. When autumn came, he “longed for the wild rice, water mallow soup, and sliced prickly sculpin of Wu.” This later became a simple allusion to a strong desire for one’s home, or simple homesickness. For the story itself, see Liu and Liu 2002, 213–14.

  64.  When the famous poet Tao Yuanming陶淵明 (aka Tao Qian 潛; 365–427) had become a magistrate and learned he had to bow to his superiors, he promptly abandoned his position and wrote a rhapsody titled “Let’s Return Home” (Guiqulai ci 歸去來辭). For a complete translation, see, for instance, Robert Hightower’s translation, “The Return,” in Hightower 1970, 268–70.

  65.  A reference found in the Liezi to the dream journey of the mythical Yellow Emperor through the Land of Hua Xu, where there was no ruler, where people lived without desire, completely at ease with their lives. Because they did not fear death or contend for things out of desire, they lived in a world where there was no hatred or struggle for self-benefit. When the Yellow Emperor awoke from his dream, he became aware that the Way could not be sought through passion. Hua Xu thus becomes a standard trope for a utopian paradise. See Graham 1990, 34–35, and Zhou Shaoxian 1983, 158–59.

  66.  See chap. 3, n. 106.

  67.  Both “sunset” and “old age.”

  68.  Here costumed as Liezi.

  69.  Noumenal lads (lingtong 靈童), also known as “jade lads” (yutong 玉童) or “transcendent lads” (xiantong 仙童), are young attendants at the court of the Queen Mother of the West.

  70.  Literally, Yingzhou 瀛洲, a mountain in the Eastern Sea where immortals dwell.

  71.  Xianzi 仙子, a common designation for Daoists.

  72.  A famous quote from female poet Li Qingzhao (1084–ca. 1151).

  73.  Obstacles that cannot be torn down; insurmountable obstacles.

  74.  That is, beyond the highest point of the heavens.

  75.  That is, “Fortunately you did not pass the examinations and spend the rest of your life in fear serving at court.”

  76.  Two paragons of virtue, the eldest and youngest sons, respectively, of the lord of Guzhu, who mutually deferred the throne to each other and then fled together rather than either of them take the throne. They later decided to cast their lot with King Wen of the Zhou, but when they had reached his state, they found that he had died. They berated his son, later to become King Wu of Zhou, for attacking his enemies before burying his deceased father. They fled to Mount Shouyang, where they, refusing to eat “the grain of Zhou,” eventually perished from their diet of mountain bracken. See “Po Yi, Memoir 1,” in Ssu-ma Ch’ien 1995b, 1–6.

  77.  “Phoenix Galleries and Simurgh Terrace” can refer to both the imperial court and the high offices of the central government. Here the latter is probably meant since this is the way the expression is used in other dramatic contexts.

  78.  That is, as a successful examination candidate and hence in line for an official position.

  79.  It is unclear here whether this refers to the peripatetic life of a lower official who must travel every third year to a different post in the empire or if it is a reference to death away from home at an official posting.

  80.  The toad lives in the moon, where a rabbit also pounds out the elixir of life under a cassia tree; this is a metaphor for passing the examinations.

  81.  The primordial chaos that contains a unity of yin and yang that is beyond cognition and discursive speech. See Esposito 2008.

  82.  Besieged in the state of Chen, Confucius ran out of grain. His disciples were extremely weak with hunger, and one asked him, “Does the gentleman encounter hardship?” Confucius of course responded with a “yes” and took advantage of the situation to instruct his disciple, “The difference is that the petty man, encountering hardship, is overwhelmed by it.” From Analects 15.2; see Slingerland 2003, 174.

  83.  Kuang Heng was so poor that he had to work all day just to make ends meet. At night, too poor to purchase candles, he bored a whole in the wall that separated him from his neighbor so that he could steal enough light to read. He later rose to become a noted minister in the Han.

  84.  Sun Kang was another poor student, whose solution was to read by the moonlight reflected from the snow.

  85.  This probably refers to Han Yu, who had been enlightened by Han Xiangzi, one of the Eight Immortals (and also, in legend, considered Han Yu’s nephew). When Han Yu (the Literary Duke) was banished for his “Memorial on the Bone of the Buddha,” he was on his way to Chaoyang but was halted by a snowstorm at Indigo Pass (Languan 藍關) in Shaanxi. When impeded, he wrote a poem titled “To Show to My Nephew Xiang When I Reached Indigo Pass After I Had Been Banished” (Zuo qian Languan shi zhizun Xiang 左遷至藍關示姪孫湘), which included the lines

雲橫秦嶺家何在	Clouds lie across the Qinling Mountains, where is my home?
雪擁藍關馬不前	Snow stuffs Indigo Pass, the horse will not go forward.

Prior to this time, Han Yu’s legendary nephew, Han Xiangzi, had forced a peony to blossom during early winter, and on its petals was this couplet, which he showed to Han Yu, who did not understand the meaning of these lines. Later, when Han Yu was banished, Han Xiangzi traveled to meet him when he was stuck in the snow at Indigo Pass, and they then understood the meaning of the poem. They overnighted at the pass, and Han Yu followed Han Xiangzi to become an immortal.

  86.  That is, Zhang Qian; see n. 54.

  87.  That is, Ye Fashan/Ye Jineng/Ye Jingchan; see n. 55.

  88.  The poet Song Yu (third century BC) is famous for the lines “Alas for the breath of autumn! / Wan and drear! Flower and leaf fluttering fall and turn to decay. / Sad and lorn! As when on a journey far one climbs a hill and looks down on the water to speed a returning friend.” See Hawkes 1985, 209.

  89.  While this phrase can also signal high achievement or refer to the imperial palace, it is used here as an invitation to join Liezi on his trips through the heavens. Certainly an ironic jab is intended.

  90.  Yang Xiong was given rank at court (“purple steps”) on the basis of his rhapsodies in celebrating imperial power. As Knechtges notes, these rhapsodies also included subtle reprimands for extravagance. See Knechtges 2008, 63–80, 85–88; for a translation of the “Rhapsody on Tall Poplars Palace,” see Knechtges 1987, 137–50.

  91.  Once upon a time the philosopher Zhuang Zhou dreamt he was a butterfly, as happy as could be. When he woke up, he wondered whether he perhaps was a butterfly dreaming it was Zhuang Zhou.

  92.  From Analects 7.9, later a common saying about someone who is brave but heedless of danger; one who gives no forethought to what one is doing.

  93.  A story of a certain Zhu Pingman 朱泙漫, who spent years studying how to butcher a dragon but had no place to employ his skills. The hands he had used to perfect his skills rest idly in his sleeves.

  94.  From a Tang-dynasty tale by Shen Jiji 沈既濟 (ca. 750–800) titled “Inside a Pillow” (Zhenzhong ji 枕中記) about a certain student named Lu 盧生 who meets a Daoist named Codger Lü (Lü Daoweng 呂道翁) at an inn in Handan. Lü gave him a pillow so he could take a nap, and he dreamt of passing the examinations, attaining a high position, having a family, and finally dying. When he died, he awoke from the dream to find that the yellow millet that the innkeeper was cooking was not yet ready. In later traditions the story is grafted into the hagiographies of Lü Dongbin, who becomes Student Lu, and Zhongli Quan, who becomes Codger Lü, and the story is turned into a tale of Lü Dongbin’s enlightenment. For the original story, see “The World Inside a Pillow” in Nienhauser 1987. For the hagiographical materials about Lü and their representations, see Katz 1996 and “Taoist Immortals” in Little and Eichman 2001, 324–27.

  95.  Note the following passage from A New Account of the Tales of the World:

Once while Wang Rong was serving as president of the Imperial Secretariat in 301–302, he passed by Master Huang’s wineshop wearing his ceremonial robes and riding in a light one-horse carriage. Looking back, he remarked to the guests in the carriage behind him, “Long ago I used to drink and make merry in this wine shop with Ji Kang and Ruan Ji and, in the outings in the Bamboo Grove, I also took a humble part. But ever since Ji Kang’s premature death and Ruan Ji’s passing I’ve been hemmed in by the times. Today as I look on this place, even though it’s so near, it seems as far away as the hills and rivers.”

Translation adapted with minor changes in romanization from Liu and Liu 2002, 346.

  96.  Literally, “Heaven goes on and on, oh, earth lasts forever.”

  97.  See chap. 2, n. 39.

  98.  A generalized reference to the fords across the three rivers of Shu that empty into the Yangtze: the Min, Pei, and Tuo. Zhuge Liang was the great tactician and strategist who was employed by the Shu-Han in their contestation for the empire in the Three Kingdoms era. See Idema and West 2012, 302.

  99.  Yan Guang 嚴光, zi Ziling 子陵 (ca. 20 BC–AD 20) was a hermit of the Eastern Han period who lived at Seven-Mile Rapids (Qilitan 七里七) on the Fuchun River 富春江 near Hangzhou, where he fished to provide for himself. His old schoolmate Liu Xiu, who had restored the Han after ascending the throne and defeating the usurper Wang Mang, tried many times to enlist him in service to his court, but Yan Guang always rebuffed him.