Du Fu: The Wandering Poet Sage

Today, we’ll introduce arguably the greatest-ever Chinese poet, who lived more than 1,000 years ago and is survived by over 1,400 poems, which in itself is nothing short of a miracle since he spent most of his life wandering across the country.

Transcript

Du Fu: The Wandering Poet Sage

Today, we’ll introduce arguably the greatest-ever Chinese poet, who lived more than 1,000 years ago and is survived by over 1,400 poems, which in itself is nothing short of a miracle since he spent most of his life wandering across the country.

During the 2023 World Robot Conference, a seven-day event convened in August in Beijing, humanoid robots that were made to look like 8th-century poets Li Bai and Du Fu created a lot of buzz. Their outward appearance and facial expressions looked completely natural, and they simulated the voices and actions of real people while interacting with the audience.

Li Bai and Du Fu represent the culmination of the cultural glory of the Tang Dynasty, which lasted from 618 and 907 and is considered the golden age of Chinese poetry. While widely acknowledged as the two greatest Chinese poets of all time, the debate over which of the two, Du Fu or Li Bai, is the greatest has existed in one form or another ever since scholarship on their poems first appeared in the 9th century.

Harvard sinologist Stephen Owen considers Du Fu to be the unequivocal greatest poet of China and likens him to Shakespeare and Dante stating that Du Fu’s “literary accomplishment has itself become a major component in the historical formation of literary values”.

In one of our previous podcasts, we looked into the life and times of Li Bai, the “banished immortal” featured in this year’s animated summertime blockbuster Chang An. But while Li Bai’s greatness is seen perhaps as part of the result of his immortal heritage, Du Fu’s excellence is seen as resting in his innovative style and treatment of subjects ignored by his contemporaries and predecessors.

Du Fu generally followed the rules of poetic form, but he also expanded and changed those conventions by introducing new perspectives and topics. His poems show a concern for the civil society and for the lives of the underprivileged. But not much is known about Du Fu’s own life, and in fact, most of what is known about the innovative artist comes from his poems.

Du Fu was born in the year 712 in Gongyi of central China’s Henan Province. As the son of a scholar official, he was trained to study and memorize Confucian classics, history and poetry since his early childhood.

At the age of 24, he traveled to the capital to take the imperial examination, but failed in the end. The reason for his failure is unclear. Some speculate it was because his style did not fit with the current fashion, while others suggest the most likely explanation is that he was unable to make influential connections in the capital.

But Du Fu did not seem frustrated. Prior to the exam he had spent four years wandering through east China’s Zhejiang and Jiangsu provinces, a region rich in legends and history. After the exam, he continued his travels, this time heading to east China’s Shandong Province where his father was serving in an official position. There, he climbed Mount Tai, the greatest of the five sacred mountains in China, and composed one of his earliest surviving poems know in English as Gazing on the Peak. I’ll read it for you now as translated by Stephen Owen. 

And what then is Daizong like?

over Qi and Lu, green unending.

Creation compacted spirit splendors here,

Dark and Light, riving dusk and dawn.

Exhilarating the breast, it produces layers of cloud;

splitting eye-pupils, it has homing birds entering.

Someday may I climb up to its highest summit,

with one sweeping view see how small all other mountains are.

Instead of succumbing to failure, Du Fu promised himself that he would someday mount its peak and gaze down upon the world. Exuding with self-encouragement, the poem has long been admired for the strength and boldness of its voice. It has been engraved on a stone tablet standing at the foot of the mountain, immortalized along with the mountain itself.

In the year 740, Du Fu’s father died, so he spent the next four years at home, fulfilling his duties in domestic affairs. In the autumn of 744, he met Li Bai, the poet immortal who was 11 years his senior. The two lived in the same accommodation for a while and shared their love of poetry and wine. But the friendship was somewhat one-sided – Du Fu wrote 12 poems to or about Li Bai, while there was only one from the other direction.

At the age of 34, Du Fu traveled to the capital to sit the imperial examination for the second time. Unfortunately, the chief examiner, who was also the prime minister of the reigning Emperor Xuanzong, failed all the candidates as a power play to control the official selection system.

After failing twice, Du Fu never again attempted the examination. Perhaps inspired by his friend Li Bai, who secured a position by presenting his writings to powerful officials to seek their patronage, Du Fu petitioned Emperor Xuanzong directly several times and finally received an appointment to a minor position at the crown prince’s palace. But even before he had begun to work, the position was swept away by the An Lushan Rebellion.

In the year 755, General An Lushan declared himself emperor in north China by establishing the rivaling Yan Dynasty. The rebellion spanned eight years over three Tang emperors and stroke a devastating blow to the most glorious empire in Chinese history. During the disturbances, Du Fu led a largely itinerant life, forced to move by wars, famines, and the occasional command by the emperor.

This period, however, played a significant role in the making of Du Fu as a poet. His work during this period took a Confucian turn and became marked by social realism with responsibility to depict present political and social conditions.

While war was also a topic of earlier Chinese poetry, most mentions of it were limited to indirect representations. Du Fu, on the other hand, contributed a new perspective by capturing moments from his personal life. He wrote about his experiences during the rebellion in such quantity and detail that his collection has been labeled a “poetic history”. One of his epithets, “poet historian”, relates most strongly to his poems around this period. It was only after the An Lushan Rebellion that Du Fu truly discovered his voice as a poet.

In the year 760, Du Fu arrived in Chengdu in southwest China’s Sichuan Province. Despite financial problems, the five years he spent in Chengdu was one of the happiest and most peaceful periods of his life. With the help of his friend Yan Wu, who was serving as the governor of Chengdu at the time, Du Fu built a modest cottage beside a brook in the western suburb of the city. The cottage not only provided shelter for Du Fu, but also became a source of inspiration. He composed more than 240 poems in the cottage, including one of his most widely circulated, A Song on How My Thatched Roof Was Ruined by the Autumn Wind, in which he wrote:

If only I could get a great mansion of a million rooms,

broadly covering the poor scholars of all the world, all with joyous expressions,

unshaken by storms, as stable as a mountain.

Alas, when will I see such a roof looming before my eyes?– 

then I would think it all right if my cottage alone were ruined and I suffered death by freezing.

(translated by Stephen Owen)

With the death of Yan Wu in 765, Du Fu’s financial support was cut off. He decided to leave Chengdu and sailed down the Yangtze River, apparently with the intention of making his way back home. The travel was held up by his ill health, beginning with lung problems and developing into a series of ailments. He had to stay in Chongqing for three years before setting off again. This last journey got him as far as central China’s Hunan Province, where he died in a boat at the age of 58.

As a poet, Du Fu was not greatly appreciated in his own lifetime nor immediately after his death. His popularity began to increase in the 9th century, after renowned Tang poet Yuan Zhen recognized the breath of his achievements, noting that “united in his work were traits which previous men had displayed only singly”. Du Fu’s reputation kept increasing in the 11th century during the Song Dynasty, when a comprehensive reevaluation of earlier poets took place. He came to be regarded, together with Li Bai and Wang Wei, as representing respectively the Confucian, Daoist and Buddhist strands of Chinese culture.

Du Fu’s compassion for himself and for the people was part of his contribution to the broadening of the scope of poetry – he devoted many of his works to topics that had previously been considered unsuitable for poetic treatment. As Zeng Xiangbo, professor of Chinese literature at Renmin University of China, noted, “Du Fu is better than anyone at reflecting history in his poetry… because historical events are mirrored in his own life and spiritual journey.”

There have been a number of notable translations of Du Fu’s work into English. In 2016, Stephen Owen completed the first English translation of the complete works of Du Fu, a project he worked on for eight years. The 3,000-page The Poetry of Du Fu was published in six volumes.

In 2020, British historian and documentary producer Michael Wood made a special trip to China to retrospect Du Fu’s journeys across the country. He shared his insight on Du Fu and ancient Chinese poetry in the BBC documentary he produced – Du Fu: China’s Greatest Poet.

Du Fu’s thatched cottage no longer existed after he left Chengdu, however, during the Song Dynasty, a temple dedicated to Du Fu was built at the site. In 1997, the cottage was recovered, and the site was expanded into the Du Fu Thatched Cottage Museum, providing visitors a glimpse into the life and work of the poet sage.

Well, that’s the end of our podcast. Our theme music is by the famous film score composer Roc Chen. We want to thank our writer Lü Weitao, translator Yang Guang, and copy editor Pu Ren. And thank you for listening. We hope you enjoyed it, and if you did, please tell a friend so they, too, can understand The Context.