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Silbergeld-BackRedCliff-1995

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Back to the Red Cliff: Reflections on the Narrative Mode in Earlyliterati Landscape

Painting
Author(s): Jerome Silbergeld
Source: Ars Orientalis , 1995, Vol. 25, Chinese Painting (1995), pp. 19-38
Published by: Freer Gallery of Art, The Smithsonian Institution and Department of the
History of Art, University of Michigan

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BACK TO THE RED CLIFF: REFLECTIONS ON THE NARRATIVE
MODE IN EARLY LITERATI LANDSCAPE PAINTING
BYJEROME SILBERGELD

IN 1082, WRITING FROM POLITICAL EXILE IN SOUTH helped illuminate the study of broader topics. '
China, Su Shi, hao I)ongpo g W' A t (1037- Yet despite the frequent excursions into this
1101) described a moonlit journey down the material, I propose still another trip back to the
Yangzi River past the famous historical battle site Red Cliff. Not only does the "hypnotic effect" of
of the Red Cliff. He composed this in the fu Wt the topic encourage a periodic retelling, but all
or "prose-poem" form, which was popular at the these previous studies still leave some of the most
time of that ancient battle, in A.D. 208, and which basic issues unresolved: the authorship and dat-
Su helped to revive after centuries of neglect. 'In ing of three major paintings on this theme; which
1601, the chief arbiter of taste for his time, Dong of Su's two prose-poems is illustrated by some of
Qichang V v, wrote on Su Shi's surviving these paintings; and, most importantly, the very
manuscript of this "Red Cliff' prose-poem (now relationship of these painted images to the writ-
preserved in the National Palace Museum, ten text. What can be learned from ain explora-
Taibei), "This fu of lMr. [Su] Dongpo transforms tion of this topic is broader than might be ex-
the Chu Sao X 5; his handwriting transforms the pected, for these questions bear directly on our
Orchid Pavilion Manuscript. Of all Song literature, understanding of Chinese literati painting in its
this is the ultimate."2 The spell of Su Shi's "Red formative years.
Cliff' prose-poem lingers on in modern times, as
described by Lin Yutang: "the poet establishes a
prevailing mood that casts a hypnotic effect on The "Qiao Zhongchang" Handscroll
the reader, no matter how many times he has read
[it] before."3 Even Su Shi himself, having gone At least five Song-period paintings on the "Red
there once and written of it in unforgettable Cliff' topic can still be studied. These include two
terms, felt compelled to go back "for another trip versions that, arguably, illustrate the first prose-
past the base of the Red Cliff' and risked writing poem: a tall handscroll now attributed to Wu
about it a second tirne. I Yuanzhi X t f of the late twelfth centurT (fig
The "Red Cliff' poems' theme of political ex- 5; National Palace Museum, Taibei) and a fan by
ile had particular resonance in Su Shi's own time, Li Song _ A from the early thirteenth century
when the scholar class was deeply rent by faction- (fig. 2; Nelson-Atkins Museum). 6 And there are
alism and public service was punctuated by rough three Song handscroll versions of the second
dismissal fromn office. This was still truer in the prose-poem: one attributed to Qiao Zhongchang
decades that followed, when half of China was 7 5t , probably painted prior to 1123 (fig. 1:
conquered by Jin I'artars and many northern Nelson-Atkins Museum); one after an original,
scholars became exiles in their own land. Not now missing but (all too loosely) said to be by
surprisingly, illustrations of Su's two prose-poems Zhao Bosu f ni, (1124-82), copied by Wen
appeared almost iminediately. Those works initi- Zhengming t t in 1548 (fig. 4; National Pal-
ated one of the longest standing pictorial tradi- ace Museum, Taibei);7 and one by Ma Hezhi
tions, dealing with the theme of political exile, ,f fT N, in the mid-twelfth century (fig. 2; Pa
and they now comprise some of the earliest sur- ace Museum, Beijing).8 Ultimately, it can be
viving works in the literati tradition of painting shown which prose-poem each painting is relat-
that emerged from the cultural circle of Su Shi ed to, and it can be shown that the paintings in
and his friends. each group share a common stylistic source. Prob-
Popular through the centuries, Su Shi's "Red ably representing the oldest surviving illustration
Cliff' prose-poems are now among the most fre- of each prose-poem, the scrolls attributed to Wu
quently translated into English of any Chinese Yuanzhi and Qiao Zhongchang are the most im-
verse. Paintings based on these poems have been portant of these and represent the focus of this
the subject of a number of studies and have study.

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20 JEROME SILBERGELD

The Qiao Zhongchang attribution (fig. 1), art, Li Gonglin a &?, p-was recorded in the
based on Su's second "Red Cliff' prose-poem, is eighteenth-century imperial catalogue, Shiqu baoji
supposedly the oldest of all these paintings, but E E If in a colophon neither signed nor
the work is without signature or artist seals, and even extant today. "
the attribution lacks any substantial evidence. The This historical murk contrasts with the visual
oldest inscription, dated 1123, is by Zhao Ling- clarity of the scroll itself, which of all "Red Cliff'
zhi # 4 a member of the Song royal family scrolls best illustrates the physical setting of Su
and a painting collector who in his youth knew Shi's excursions. Of the two pictorial traditions
Su Shi; but Zhao wrote only of his feelings for that emerge from Su's two poems, this work es-
this long-deceased acquaintance and left no clue tablishes for the latter poem a more literal ap-
to the artist's identity. The only reference link- proach to the narrative treatment of text, with the
ing this scroll to Qiao Zhongchang-a cousin and repeated appearance of major figures, architec-
painting student of Su Shi's close colleague in ture, and landscape settings in a long, narrative

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FIG. I continued.

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BACK TO THE RED CLIFF 21

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22 JEROME SILBERGELD

format (in nine distinct scenes; Su Shi is depict- and as a reliable guide to a kind of painting Su
ed eight times and his home appears three times). himself must have admired. 13 Indeed, then, rath-
Not merely conservative, this approach is conspic- er than harboring the unsavory air of a pastiche,
uously archaistic, adopting Li Gonglin's mode of this scroll reveals the ways in which, and the strik-
reference to Six Dynasties and Tang narrative ing degree to which, the leading Yuan scholar
traditions. The spatial treatment of architecture painters based their trademark styles-perhaps
and many of the landscape motifs clearly dem- their whole landscape "revolution"-on Song pre-
onstrate a knowledge of Tang painting, asJames cedents by Su Shi, Li Gonglin, and friends.
Cahill suggested in describing "the strong bilat- An old-fashioned narrative following step by
eral symmetry of the house and yard near the step the sequence of the second "Red Cliff" prose-
end," "the strange shell-like forms of Qiao poem, the so-called Qiao Zhongchang painting
Zhongchang's rocks," and "the square-cut formal- visually introduces, with greater credibility than
ized drawing of fractured rock strata." 11 Even the can be found anywhere else, the setting for Su
peculiarly modulatecd brushwork used for the Shi's Red Cliff excursions. By 1079, Su had spent
rocks makes a knowing statement about mid- a decade in outspoken opposition to the politi-
Tang traditions, and the looming scale of the poet cal reforms designed by Wang Anshi E ? L-,
compared to his diminutive companions looks reforms which would have reshaped the nature
back to earlier norms. of Chinese government had they succeeded and
Beyond the lack of proper documentation, the which from Su's "conservative" point of view
chief connoisseurial problem obscuring the date would have undermined the hallowed indepein-
and attribution of this work-or at least instill- dence of the Confucian scholar-official. In that
ing my own doubts about them-arises from its year, his political adversaries charged Su with writ-
more progressive features, from artistic details ing poetry "slanderous" of the emperor (that is.
that too clearly anticipate later literati painters, of opposing Wang's policies, which the emperor
especially those of the mid-to-late Yuan. Some of then favored), and he was cast into the imperial
these progressive characteristics have already censorate prison for 130 days. In December, af-
been noted by Cahill-willows like Zhao Meng- ter a lengthy trial and imperial review of the case,
fu's j M and Wang Meng's T V and low, Su was demoted to low rank and ordered into
rolling hills like Huang Gongwang's W f .12 exile under tight travel restrictions. 14 Soon after-
In addition, there are texture strokes (at the very arriving in the small, rustic town of Huangzhou
beginning and end) distinctively like Huang A JJII in February 1080, Su (and his family, which
Gongwang's, slender tree trunks like Ni Zan's arrived shortly after) lived at a government way-
{, , thick-trunked pines like Wang Meng's, station intended to house officials traveling tip
Zhang Wu's K , or Yao Tingmei's tJLd, and down the Yangzi River. Located beneath a
dried-mud embankments derived perhaps from hill known as Lin'gao M V and set just a "few
the Li-Guo -1 tradition byway of Huang Gong- dozen steps" above the north bank of the Yangzi
wang, a bridge drawn just like one by Wang Meng, River, this crude abode was distinguished not by
and so forth. Looked at from a skeptical perspec- its architecture but by a lovely view of the riverC
tive, this work assumes the aura of a pastiche. And and the scenery of Wuchang A EH beyond tnot
yet it is superb in execution and surely not the the modern-day city of Wuchang).
work of a minor, derivative artist. Moreover, nu- Su Shi's famous villa on the Eastern Slope
merous features andl telling details-ranging (Dongpo, which he took as his studio name), set
from the rocks to the rendering of roof tiles to on some five-to-ten acres just east of the city, was
the distinctive facial features of the poet-lack acquired a year later from the district adminis-
correspondence in the work of any later artist. tration for his personal use, rescued from neglect
And finally, even if executed at some later date as a military encampment. 't It consisted of a
that permitted the inclusion of late Yuan features, three-room house above, a pavilion below that,
its composition could still only be understood in and still further down, his thatch-roofed Snow
terms of late Northern Song archaism, taking us Hall, completed in a snowstorm in February of
back to Li Gonglin and the cultural circle of Su 1082. The Snow Hall, whose walls he painted with
Shi. This is, in all likelihood, an original work of scenes of forests and rivers and fishermen, was
the period it claims to be from, however tenuous Su's cultural center, where later that year he host-
its link to any particular artist's name. And if so, ed the twenty-two-year-old Mi Fu AK f`. Su per-
it deserves broader recognition as the finest nar- sonally farmed these acres to help make ends
rative painting surviving from that culturai milieu meet, but his family continued to reside at

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BACK TO THE RED CLIFF 23

Lin'gao, to which he returned almost daily, about then retreats down the cliff; 7) the poet and
a third of a mile down a "yellow mud" path that friends, back in their boat, continuing their jour-
became well known in his verse. It is the Lin'gao ney when overtaken by a large crane flying out of
home to which Su returned from his Snow Hall the east; 8) home again, Su shown twice, once in
at the outset of his second Red Cliff excursion bed dreaming, and once seated with two Daoists
and which is depicted three times in "Qiao in feathered robes, whom he realizes had appeared
Zhongchang's" painted scroll. (Each time the earlier as cranes flying past his boat; 17 9) the poet
home is rendered differently, but the presence waking to seek these Daoist spirits at his door but
of two flat garden rocks and an old, gnarled pine realizing they are nowhere to be found. 18
along the right side of the forecourt is common Many observations can be made about this
to all three depictions.) work; a few are pertinent here. First, the paint-
In "Qiao Zhongchang's" painting, alone ing closely follows -the events of the text. The pri-
among all these works, the intent of painting lit- macy of figures and the archaic organization of
erally to illustrate the text is fulfilled by the in- landscape are means to that end. In a few cases,
clusion of the complete text written episodically the rendition is remarkably literal, as in its de-
across the painted scroll (nine passages in all, piction of a nesting falcon mentioned in the text
ranging from three to ninety-five words), in a fash-
or the shadows cast by the figures in moonlight
ion already archaistic by Song times. 16 If the oth- in the opening scene; and occasionally this be-
er antique features already noted refer to the comes supraliteral, as in the treatment of textual
Tang, this one harks back further still, to the Six passages like "[rocks like] crouching tigers and
Dynasties period. So, too, does the arrangement leopards," "[branches like] ascending coiled
of landscape forms to isolate a series of narrative dragons." This is not to deny that a great deal of
scenes. Dubbed the "space-cell" in Western art artistic imagination has been used visually, for
history (by Ludwig Bachhofer) but actually based the text is no painter's textbook-another artist
on Chinese notions of architectural siting, this could have followed the text equally closely yet
convention continued into the Tang but was al- produced entirely different results. On the oth-
ready old-fashioned by the time Wang Wei T? A er hand, anyone who knows the text will easily
applied it to his Wang River Villa in about 740. recognize the subject and can readily identfy the
The nine inscribed scenes show: 1) Su and two images in terms of certain passages. The paint-
friends walking back to his home at Lin'gao, in- ing is bound to the text; it is an illustration of it.
spired by the moonlight and equipped with some Second, the scenes are viewed from right to
freshly caught fish; 2) back home, Su's wife pro- left, as might be expected, though more will be
viding a jug of wine that she saved for just such said of this expectation later on. Also from right
an occasion; 3) Su and friends seated at the foot to left is the flight of the crane, described in the
of the Red Cliff, overlooking the river; 4) the poet text as westward.
ascending the cliff, something not undertaken Third, the narrative elements of this painting
in his first excursion; 5) the rugged mountain- are quickly reduced to their very essentials in lat-
side scenery depicted, sans Su Shi, in accord with er painted versions, the presence or absence of
a three-word inscription, "[rocks like] crouching this crane providing the chief, and sometimes the
tigers and leopards"; 6) again without showing sole, distinguishing means for identifying paint-
the poet-more surprising this time-a view ings as based on the second or first prose-poem.
down into the Hall of Bingyi, the river god, into This reduction can already be seen a generation
which Su gives a long whistle and is startied by the later in Ma Hezhi's painting of the second prose-
"mountain's moan, the response of the valley," poem (with crane) (fig. 2) and a century later in

A~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ 4W
Fic. 2. Ma Hezhi, Latter Prose-Poem on the Red Cliff, handscroll, ink and color on silk, 25.9 x 143 cm.
Palace Museum, Beijing. After Xu Bangda, Zhongguo huihua shi tutu.

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24 JEROME SILBERGELD

FIG. 3. Li Song, Form_erProse-


Poem on the Red Cliff, fan, ink
and color on silk, 24.8 x 26 cm. - J
The Nelson-Atkins
Museum, Kansas City.

Li Song's treatment of the first poem (without these two scrolls. Among them: in both scrolls,
it) (fig. 3). Such reductive works offer little by to the left of Su's Lin'gao courtyard is a stable
which to judge their narrative virtues other than with a horse and a groom lying down, mentioned
the relation of men and crane. In the painting nowhere in the poem and hardly a chance coin-
attributed to Qiao Zhongchang, of the three com- cidence (fig. 4a) ;20 in both, again with no textual
panions only Su Shi seems to notice the crane at basis, as Su departs from his Lin'gao home, he
all, perhaps because he alone is privy to its spiri- looks back over his right shoulder to his wife, who
tual message. In the Ma Hezhi, the crane and stands with hands in sleeves accompanied by a
cliff arejuxtaposed, and all bodies wheel, all eyes serving girl carrying a candle. If the attributive
turn to see the two, so despite the limitation of basis of the "Qiao Zhongchang" and Wen Zheng-
narrative detail, the effect is quite dramatic. In ming "after Zhao Bosu" works is more or less ac-
the Wen Zhengming painting "after Zhao Bosu" curate, as seems possible, then we have a major
(fig. 4c), nobody looks at anything. work of the Southern Song court (under which
Fourth, though the Wen Zhengming painting Su Shi's political goals and artistic values were
differs greatly from the "Qiao Zhongchang" in restored to high favor) borrowing not only liter-
many respects, in others, telling details show it ary subject matter but also compositional motifs
to be derived from it or to share with it a com- from Su's cultural circle (albeit, the court artist
mon origin. The narrative differences begin im- has substituted one superficial Tang archaism-
mediately-Wen's painting begins with the catch- blue-and-green color-for other more erudite
ing of the fish and illustrates Su's Snow Hall and "literary" ones, as discussed above).
before it shows his Lin'gao home. But scenes
three through seven of "Qiao's" scroll, as de-
scribed above, are recognizable in Wen's scroll, The Handscroll Attributed to Wu Yuanzhi
the chief difference being that Su Shi himself is
depicted in scene six (fig. 4b).'" Various other At first sight, the painting attributed to Wu
minor details confirm the relationship between Yuanzhi of Su Shi's first "Red Cliff' prose-poem

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BACK TO THE RED CLIFF 25

4a

K'~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~ ~~~~~~'
'04b

-x '1 4c

Ar 4~FIG. 4. Wen
Zhengming,

{ > .> ~~~~~~~~~~~~~Copy after


Poem on the
6i s A 1RedCliff
three secti

x ~~~~~~handscroll,
A ~ ~ ~~~ ~ink and color
on paper,

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26 JEROME SILBERGELD

(fig. 5) seems entirely different from the "Qiao Text, Bequeathed, of the Red Cliff' (Chibi yiyan
Zhongchang" scroll. The rendering of surface F t -1f, which specifies neither artist nor
detail with hatching strokes, small "ax-cut" tex- even just which text he has in mind. The chief
ture strokes, contrasts with "Qiao's" "plain-line" inscription that follows the painting, set on a sep-
manner of drawing. 21 Landscape dominates, not arate piece of paper and dated 1228, is a poem
the figures. The scroll is short, and the narrative by Zhao Bingwen id Tz (1159-1232), rhyming
seems to be truncated or nearly eliminated, as in with Su Dongpo's ci in (not with either of his fu)
Ma Hezhi's work. Surely, these are major differ- on the Red Cliff; this inscription, too, makes no
ences, and yet there is more here than meets the mention of the artist, referring only to Su Dong-
eye to indicate an equally strong narrative intent. po, whose cultural standard Zhao himself held
To appreciate the narrative dimensions of the aloft in north China a century after Su's death.
work, some detailed background is necessary. At the beginning and end of the scroll are in-
There is no signature or seal of the artist, and scriptions by Xiang Yuanbian T, X: t (1525-90)
the work is not readily identified. But a traditional attributing the work to Zhu Rui, who served as a
attribution to Zhu Rui * 23t and the modern re- painter-in-attendance at both the late Northern
attribution to Wu Yuanzhi are well known and and early Southern Song courts. It is peculiar that
need only to be summarized. The painting is pre- Xiang specifically referred in his first inscription
ceded by a tidle in four large characters by Sun to Zhu's Northern Song period of service as a
Gong i* r of the Ming, in small-seal script: "The possible date for the painting, since Su's ideas

NA~~~~~~~~~~~A

Fic. 5 continued.

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BACK TO THE RED CLIFF 27

and his followers were non grata at court at that poem by Zhao as inscribed on the Palace Muse-
time; Xiang's postscript, by contrast, referred to um scroll, so he clearly knew this text. But Yuan's
Zhu by the title of gonglang 1 which he re- inscription is not attached to this work and might
ceived under Southern Song rule; by that time have belonged instead to some other. And noth-
Su's values were made popular again by imperial ing precludes the possibility of Zhao's having in-
decree. While Xiang's varied dating suggests a scribed the same poem on other scrolls by other
clouded judgment of the attribution, the Qing artists. Although Wu Yuanzhi is known through
dynasty imperial painting catalogue Shiqu baoji other documentation to have painted this
followed his lead, and the attribution to Zhu Rui theme,22 none of this makes him the artist of the
stuck until about 1960. Palace Museum scroll. So while a better argument
At that time, Zhuang Yen of the Palace Muse- might be made for Wu Yuanzhi than for Zhu Rui
um in Taibei, where this scroll is now housed, as the artist of this painting, no firm conclusion
noted a colophon dated 1251 by Yuan Haowen can be drawn.
xt 4f Up (1190-1257), now lost but recorded The
as significance of the Wu Yuanzhi attribu-
originally attached to some painting of the "Red tion, widely (and perhaps too readily) accepted
Cliff," identifying the artist as Wu Yuanzhi and today, is that it would place the painting in the
referring to an inscribed Zhao Bingwen poem intellectual milieu of Su Shi's cultural followers
harmonizing with Su Shi's "Red Cliff' ci. A poet- in northern China, underJin rule, rather than at
ic anthology edited by Yuan includes the same an atelier of the Song court, where Zhu Rui

4 t

4'r~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

4 : - kg*w^'4Dt

F G W Y a h t b t o e P s P r z h R f ,aNr l i k n a r 5 8 1 6 c . a o l a c M e , a e

FIG. 5. Wu Yuanzhi, attributed, Former Prose-Poem on the Red Cliff, handscroll, ink on paper, 50.8 x 136.4 cm. National Palace Museu

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28 JEROME SILBERGELD

painted. Some three-quarters of a century after difficult of poetic undertakings) is not at all
the time of Zhu Rui Wu Yuanzhi was about a subject to matching-in other words, Zhao's
generation older than Zhao Bingwen and two choice of ci poetry probably does not represent
older than Yuan Haowen. Other paintings by Wu an identification of the painting as illustrating
were inscribed by Zhao, who wrote of him as a Su's ci.
fellow intellectual ("Master Wu is not an artisan Whatever Zhao Bingwen's understanding,
painter: / His breast is satiated with exceptional modern scholars have not hesitated to identify
scenes"), and Wu's poetic rhyme schemes were this work otherwise. Bush regards the scroll as
followed by Yelu Qucai W M X # (1190-1244, based on Su Shi's second "Red Cliff" prose-
another major adherent of Su Shi's tradition), poem.25 Stephen Wilkinson, who wrote a disser-
as Susan Bush has documented. 23 So Wu's socio- tation on Song paintings of this theme, offers an
intellectual bonafides may be secure, but his link even less predicatable view:
to this particular work is not. The painting is es-
pecially alert to the style of Li Tang ; )j (1050s- Looking at the painting [attributed to Wu Yuanzhi],
after 1130)-but does that betray a southern we see passages that seem to refer to each Prose Poem:

pedigree and artisan lineage, or does it remind the broad expanse of river at the beginning suggests
us of Li's own northern roots and a lack of dis- the passage at the beginning of the first poem where
Su says, "its shining surface reached to the sky." The
tinct social linkage in the perpetuation of his
choppy waves and vertical rock walls in the left portion
style?
reflect the description in the second poem, "The river
races along noisily, its sheer banks rising a thousand
feet.". . . We are presented with a view of nature done
Relationship of Text to Painting with more abstracted brushwork, but inventively com-
bining the style of depiction of rocky mountain masses
If the authorship and dating, the social con- from Northern Song academic painting with the com-
text, and the locus of this painting all remain position of Zhao Danian tX and Mi Youren
somewhat uncertain, equally disputed is the mat- X a f2, Northern Song literati artists. This i
ter of what text it illustrates and the nature of order to evoke the naturalistically incompatible ele-
how text relates to painting. Zhao Bingwen's in- ments of the river described in both Prose Poems, and
directed toward the end of dramatizing in a single view,
scription on the "Wu Yuanzhi" painting is in ci
the impact of the two excursions of three men in a small
form and entitled "Harmonizing with the Immor-
boat to the imposing natural site, the Red Cliff. 26
tal Po's [Su Dongpo's]l Ci on the Red Cliff." That
could imply that he regarded the painting as il-
lustrating Su's ci, "Historical Remembrances of Esther Jacobson believes the painting to be
the Red Cliff, [to the tune of] Remember This "based on the 'First Prose Poem on the Red
Woman of Yours for Her Delicateness," often Cliff ."27 On the other hand, her conviction tha
called "The Great River Flows Eastward" from its the painting is by no means a visual translation
first line. This is a "sentimental" poem, by Su's of the text28 would seem to suggest that the sub-
own internal description of it, the writer com- ject matter, really, is unknowable. I believe, to
paring his graying hair and dimming fortunes to the contrary, that a knowledge of the literary sub-
the "majestic and spirited" looks of that conquer- ject matter suggests otherwise, that through the
ing hero of the Red Cliff, Zhou Yu JM *, when painting the subject matter is knowable, and that
Zhou was a newly married gallant. While the only with this knowledge can the aesthetic dimeii-
poem concludes nostalgically, "Life is but a dream / sions of the painting be fully appreciated.
[So] let us pour a goblet of wine as a libation to On receiving his sentence of exile, Su wrote,
the river moon"-Su's excursion down the river "In all my life, writing has brought me into trou-
thinly analogized to his life's journey-on the ble. / From now on the lesser my fame, the bet-
whole, it has neither the philosophical depth nor ter it is for me."29 In exile and isolation, he wrote
the political significance of Su's first "Red Cliff' less, vet he achieved his greatest literary fame with
poem.24 At least as likely a reason for Zhao Bing- these poems."0 His "Red Cliff' fu must be under-
wen's use of Su Shi's ci in writing an improvisa- stood not only within the context of this trouble
tional colophon is that. he was capable in a single but as exactly the kind of writing that produced
sitting of producing a harmonizing poem in the trouble. The fu itself spells trouble. The very idea
short, lyrical ci form, whereas the fu (that most offi poetry as originally representing a moralizing

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BACK TO THE RED CLIFF 29

form was expressed in the fifth century by Liu and within a few days an imperial pardon arrived
Xie 91J A, whose Wenxin diaolong -; a 'pk re- with orders for him to travel to Lianzhou, in
fers to its "purpose of encouraging good and cen- Guangdong.35
suring evil."3' That famous Han practitioner of This fu is cast in three parts, shaped by an al-
the form, Sima Xiangru P f, tH t5, defined the ternation of voices: first that of Su Shi in high
fu as a work of uncensored individual disclo- spirits; then that of a friend, frustrated and dis-
sure-"to reveal one's concerns and to express consolate; then Su's voice again, in calm and loftv
them without reserve "-and yet the form that the
reply. Though the poem (some would say every
prose-poem takes, rather than direct and obvi-
line, every word) is full of literary allusion, there
ous, is complex, "obscure and coded" in Friedrich
are three direct references (not at all obscure to
Bischoffs words. 32 Bischoff regards the fu as in-
the educated reader of that period) that assist
tentional in every detail, in every word, with each
these alternating voices and focus the intent of
phrase a painstakingly selected referent to some-
the fu. These three have to be understood in ad-
thing more specific than itself, and he notes the
vance. The first of these paraphrases Qu Yuain
famous case of the young Yang Xiong % rAt (53
J9 ,0, a balladeer-in-exile who hoped to catch his
B.C.-A.D. 18), who worked so intently over a sin-
king's ear with verse that would win his recall to
gle prose-poem that he had a nervous breakdown
court and who first brought the fu to maturitv.
and remained ill for a year. 33
The passage alluded to by Su Shi comes from the
The idea that the first "Red Cliff' fu conceals
"Nine Songs," poetic laments traditionally
political intent is an old one, with interpretations
thought to be about Qu, in which shamans ro-
linking the appearance of the Han general Cao
mantically pursue gods and goddesses as a meta-
Cao W J in the poem to Wang Anshi, the boat
phor for Qu pursuing his lord at court; in each
to the Song state, and the "widow ... in her lone-
lament (this one about a goddess of the Xiang
ly boat" to abandoned government officials like
River), the shaman falls from spiritual ecstasy to
Su himself. That Sn- Shi himself recognized, at
mortal form, just as Qu failed to attain his lofty
the very least, the potential for such readings is
political goal:
evident in his own surviving manuscript of the
firstfu (National Palace Museum, Taibei), hand-
And over the great River [I] waft my spirit:
written a year after ithe poem's creation, with theWaft, but my spirit does not reach her;
text proper followed by this dedication to a po- And the maiden many a sigh heaves for me:
litically like-minded friend: While down my cheeks the teardrops in streams are
falling,
Su [I, Su Shi] composed this fu last year. I have not As with grieving heart I yearn for my lady.
lightly brought it forth to show others: those who have The cassia oars, the sweep of orchid
seen it are perhaps one or two people, and no more. A Churn the waters to foaming snow.
messenger from Qin-zhi [Fu Yaoyu 3 k X1 ' i Would you gather the wild-fig in the water?
1024-91 ] has come to seek my recent writings, so I have Or pluck the lotus-flower in the tree-tops?
personally written this out to send him. With so many Unless two hearts are both as one heart,
painful and dangerous matters [as have occurred to The matchmaker only wastes her labours;
me], if Qinzhi loves nme, he must bury this away deeplyAnd love not deep is too quickly broken. 36
and not bring it forth. 34
The second reference emphasized by Su deals
Su was particularly conscious of the relation of with the northern military dictator Cao Cao,
fu to the themes of exile and recall: in 1100, dur- whose southward drive to unify China at the end
ing his last period of banishment, in Danzhou, of the Han dynasty was halted in the year A.D. 208
Hainan, he reportedly informed his son, Guo, "I at the barrier of the Yangzi, his strategy for cross-
have always told you that I do not intend to re- ing the river undone at the Red Cliff by the hero
main banished for the rest of my life. Lately, I Zhou Yu. This defeat left China politically dis-
have had a premonition that I shall return to membered for years to come, transformed into
China." Then, preparing ink and paper, he con- the Three Kingdoms and numerous later geopo-
tinued, "If I write down eight of my fu without a litical permutations.37 Two lines of a famous
single mistake, then what I have said will come poem by Cao Cao are quoted by Su Shi. In the
true." Upon writing them all without mistake, he fictionalized account by Luo Guanzhong , a @,
concluded, "Undoubtedly I shall return home," whose fourteenth-century retelling classicized the

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30 JEROME SILBERGELD

popular view of that war, this poem was composed but since Confucius's intent was often no more
before the battle and revealed the character of clear than this, it was left for followers like Men-
Cao Cao in a way that made it clear that charac- cius to ensure that others understood:
ter, more than strategy, would determine the
military outcome. Seemingly assured of crossing The disciple Xu said, "Zhongni [Confucius] often
the Yangzi and celebrating his victory before ac- praised water, saying, "O water! 0 water!" What did he

tually securing it, Cao Cao was drinking on board find in water to praise?" Mencius replied, "There is a
spring of water; how it gushes out! It rests not day nor
his vessel with several hundred of his men, warm-
night. It fills up every hole, and then advances, flowing
ing to his wine and exulting in the booty soon to
on to the four seas. Such is water having a spring! It
be taken, when
was this which he found in it to praise." 40

suddenly they heard a raven cawing as it flew south- The moral function of the Red Cliff may not
ward. Cao said: "Why does the raven cry in the night?" yet be fully apparent, but the role of the Yangzi
Those around him replied: "It supposes the brilliance River flowing past it, like Confucius's fathomless
of the moon to be the dawn. That is why it has left its
source of natural virtue, necessitates that its earth-
tree and cries."
en counterpart be gauged through a reading of
the complete text. Again, a reading in three parts
This inauspicious omen of miscalculation reap- (marked below as such) seems most appropri-
peared shortly afterward, in the midst of a long ate.4'
poem that Cao Cao composed, obliging the oth-
ers to sing with him, (1) In the autumn of the year renxu, the seventh month,
when the moon had just passed its prime, a friend [or
The moon is bright, stars are few, friends] and I went out in a small boat to amuse our-
The raven flies south, selves at the foot of the Red Cliff. A fresh breeze blew
Circling three times a tree softly across the water, leaving the waves unruffled. As
That offers no branch to roost on. I picked up the wine jar and poured a drink for my
friend, I hummed a poem to the moon and sang a
phrase on its strange beauty.
Then, from the company,
In a little while, the moon rose from the eastern
hills and wandered across the sky between the Archer
a man stepped forward and said: "At this juncture of and the Goat. White dew settled over the river, and its
confrontation for our armies, when the generals and shining surface reached to the sky. Letting the boat go
officers must apply their commands, for what reason where it pleased, we drifted over the immeasurable
do you utter such ominous words?" Cao looked at him. fields of water. I felt a boundless exhilaration, as though
The speaker was Liu Fu J 9, a man long in Cao Cao's I were sailing on the void or riding the wind and didn't
service and with many achievements to his credit. Cao know where to stop. I was filled with a lightness, as
leveled his spear and asked: "What was ominous about though I had left the world and were standing alone,
my words?" Liu Fu: "The moon is bright, stars are few, or had sprouted wings and were flying up to join the
the raven flies south, circling three times a tree that immortals. As I drank the wine, my delight increased
offers no branch to roost on-these are ominous and, thumping the edge of the boat, I composed a song
words." Cao: "You dare t.o wreck our delight and en- that went:
thusiasm?" With a single heave of his spear, Cao Cao With cassia sweep and
pierced Liu Fu. He was dead. The assembly was aghast; Oars of orchid wood,
the banquet was dismissed. 38 Strike the empty moon,
Row through its drifting light.
The measure of Cao Cao as a potential Son of Thoughts fly far away-
Heaven, ruler of all China, is taken here, and no I long for my loved one
wonder that fate ordained him to lose the battle In a corner of the sky.

of the Red Cliff. Little wonder, too, that "Red


(2) My friend began to play on an open flute, follow-
Cliff' readers sympathetic to Su Shi might equate
ing my song and harmonizing with it. The flute made a
Cao Cao with Su's nemesis, Wang Anshi.
wailing sound, as though the player were filled with
The third of these references is to the Ana-
resentment or longing, or were lamenting or protest-
lects, which reads (with admirable Confucian ing. Long notes trailed through the night like endless
terseness), "The Master, standing by a stream, threads of silk, a sound to make dragons dance in hid-
said, 'It passes on just like this, not ceasing day den caves, or to set the widow weeping in her lonely
or night. "`9 The personification here is manifest, boat.

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BACK TO THE RED CLIFF 31

Saddened by his playing, I straightened my robe, Yuanzhi necessarily tried to capture the dynamic pat-
bowed and asked, "What makes you play this way?" terns of Su Shi's poem when executing this scroll ...
He replied, such conclusions would be purely hypothetical, if not
"The moon is bright, stars are few, completely erroneous. Each work of art-painting and
The raven flies south. poem-has its own unique aesthetic form, its own
That's how Cao Cao's poem goes, doesn't it? There you means and ends.42
can see Xiakou to the west, Wuchang to the east. A
The drift of recent research and interpretation
dense tangle of dark green, bounded by mountains and
in the field supports this view, suggesting that
river-this is the very spot where the young Zhou Yu
swooped down on Cao Cao, isn't it? After Cao Cao had despite the Chinese belief in "painting being
conquered Jing and taken Jiangling, he sailed down poetry without words, poetry painting without
the Yangzi to the east. The stems and sterns of his ships forms"-words that Su Shi himself applied to
touched for a thousand miles, and his flags and pen- Wang Wei and Du Fu f? M -these arts may b
nants blocked out the sky. He drank wine overlooking complementary but are by no means identical.
the river, laid his lance across the saddle, and wrote his Richard Edwards, looking at Southern Song court
poems. Surely he was the greatest hero of his time-
painting, has shown just where the differences
yet where is he now?
might lie. Edwards concludes that
"What then of you and me? Fishermen and wood
gatherers by the banks of streams, companions to fish
the poetry-painting link clings more to idea than to vis-
and crayfish, friends of deer and elk, riding this leaf of
ible fact and is fed most comfortably at the ever-expand-
a boat, dipping gourds into the wine jar and pouring
ing borders of imagination. The poem that conformed
for each other-we are no more than summer flies be-
to the painting endangered the richness of verbal am-
tween heaven and earth, a grain of millet on the waste
biguity; the painting that surrendered to the poem com-
of the sea? It grieves me that life is so short, and I envy
promised the clarity of seeing. 43
the long river that never stops. If we could only link
arms with the flying immortals and wander where we
please, embrace the rnoon and grow old with it.... But To be sure, in painting and poetry there are
I know that such hopes cannot quickly be fulfilled, and different possibilities and different modes of re-
so I confide these lingering notes to the sad air."
alization. Su's verse has its temporal dimensions,
its shifts of voice, its explanations and evocations
(3) I asked, "Do you know how it is with the water and
of mental states, not readily translated into im-
the moon? 'The water flows on and on like this,' but
ages. On the other hand, as EstherJacobson ex-
somehow it never flows away. The moon waxes and
plains, the painter more effectively explores such
wanes, and yet in the end it's the same moon. If we
physical dimensions as the space created between
look at things through the eyes of change, then there's
not an instant of stillness in all creation. But if we ob- the three boating companions, made poignant
serve the changelessness of things, then we and all be- and "richly filled with implied sensory interac-
ings alike have no end. What is there to be envious tion," or the "often harsh strokes and tones [that]
about? prevent the viewer from subjectively romanticiz-
"Moreover, everything in the world has its owner, ing the scene," or the "very atmosphere in which
and if a thing doesn't belong to us, we don't dare take [any particular object] is implicitly bathed [forc-
a hair of it. Only the clear breeze over the river, or the
ing] the viewer to become aware of extensions
bright moon between the hills, which our ears hear as
of space."44 ButJacobson shuns a more direct com-
music, our eyes see beauty in-these we take without
parison of text and image; and while the artist's
prohibition, these we make free with and they will nev-
visual options are different from Su's literary
er be used up. These are the endless treasures of the
ones, we shall see that much of his inspiration
Creator, here for you and me to enjoy together!"
My friend was pleased and, laughing, washed the comes directly from the poem. It is hypothetical
wine cups and filled them up again. But the fruit and but I think not "irresponsible" or "completely
other things we had brought to eat were all gone and erroneous" to conclude that the artist of this work
so, among the litter of cups and bowls, we lay down in strove to achieve specific visual analogues to the
a heap in the bottom of the boat, unaware that the east text and that his achievement can best be under-
was already growing light. stood when interpreted in that fashion. These an-
alogues evoke emotional responses derived from
EstherJacobson has written, a known text, as visual narrative should, so that
image and text work together, visual and textual
It would be highly irresponsible to infer that the paint- components inseparablyjoined as one. It involves
ing and the poem are analogous in effect or that Wu Ino denigration of the painting-or of painting

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32 JEROME SILBERGELD

in general-to see it so. The effective translation to whom that voice literally belonged,45 but po-
of text into painting is no mean feat. It is simply etically the voice serves as an external foil for Su's
a different feat than we have sometimes been led own vaunted optimism, or even as a second in-
to anticipate, especially from the Song literati who ner voice expressing the usually optimistic Su
encircled or followed Su Shi and for whom inde- Shi's rare self-doubt. Here, in poetry and paint-
pendent self-expression is thought to have ing alike, it is the mountain, the Red Cliff itself,
been the watchword. To pursue this form of in- the specter of history, that dominates the scene.
terpretation, we must suspend those expecta- Mystic time gives way to historical time. Here,
tions, reexamine the nature of textual narration where the greatest warrior of his time failed to
in Song literati painting, and be prepared to note win the day, how can the lowly exile hope for
major differences between Song and post-Song anything more? Politics, as embodied in the tale
literati art. of Cao Cao murdering Liu Fu, is a dirty business.
An important aspect of the so-called "Wu Yuan- In painting, the mountain pins the travelers to the
zhi" scroll is the left-to-right trajectory of the boat- base of the painting with the weight of history,
ing party. This contrasts with "Qiao Zhong- bearing down upon them like fate itself.
chang's" boaters, who travel from right to left But the Red Cliff is also a turning point in the
because that is the direction of the scroll-based poem,just as it was in history, a pivot in this three-
narrative format. In the "Wu Yuanzhi" scroll, the part drama; and so the river, not the mountain,
reason for this left-to-right direction must be and dominates the final stretch. In the painting, be-
soon will be sought elsewhere, but it shows where yond this low point in its course, the river rises.
the boatmen have already been and where the It broadens out, no longer rushing as before but
narrative must begin. In fact, if one looks for the calmly flowing on, a tranquil source of virtue for
narrative connection of painting with text, it can- those who know how to rely on it. Historical time
not be found by reading the scroll from right to now passes into timelessness, like changeless vir-
left in the usual manner. Rather, it is the left side tue flowing from a fathomless source. And in the
of the scroll that corresponds to the first part of end comes the light of the rising sun-the impe-
Su Shi's prose-poem. The first portion of the rial symbol, no less-to welcome the exile home,
poem is defined by the poet's initial and the painter drenches his mountains in natu-
ral sunlight, just as distinctively as the moonlight
boundless exhilaration, as though I were sailing on the of Su's second prose-poem had inspired "Qiao
void or riding the wind and didn't know where to stop Zhongchang" to paint the only shadows known
. . . filled with a lightness, as though I had left the world to be cast in early Chinese painting.46
and were standing alone, or had sprouted wings and
Clearly, this painter understands the prose-
were flying up to join the immortals
poem well. His re-creation of the poem in visual
terms is couched in the realization that the poem
-a shamanical flight identified by its specific ref- is about the victory of optimism over doubt, of
erence to Qu Yuan. Su Shi's initial mood corre- virtue over persecution, of choice over fate. He
sponds to the first part of a Qu Yuan song, when understands and gives visual form to that sublime
his pursuit of the deity is still filled with high- optimism for which Su Shi has long been beloved
energy magic, all potential and optimism. With- in China, a beacon of hope in the all-too-brutal
out figures, it is the landscape that personifies world of Chinese politics, embodied best among
this here: the river, compressed into a rapidly all Su's works by this one.47 This painting is no
flowing, downward rushing, narrow channel, is less a narrative work, bound to text, than that
the embodiment of all this energy; the rock- attributed to Qiao Zhongchang. It is simply more
strewn passage suggests the dangers of the course compressed and more conceptual. Among the
that the boatmen have just safely traversed. Cast most striking, and perhaps most innovative, of
in secular terms, this is the moment when the its narrative features is that landscape forms, not
political exile still expiects an imperial summons figures, carry the tale.
and a glorious return to court. But this compositional structure is classical,
But here the tone shifts, triggered perhaps by not new, and can be traced-in figure painting-
Qu Yuan's own negative potential, and the poem back in time through Tang to Han, all the way
introduces a new voice. Historically, we may knowback to the earliest political narrative now known.

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BACK TO THE RED CLIFF 33

In the horizontal format of an architectural lin- specifies the fall of the year renxu, the sixteenth day of
tel executed even before the painted handscroll the seventh moon, namely, August 12, 1082. On this

existed, from a first-century B.C. tomb excavated date the army of Song suffered a defeat crushing and
absurd.51
at Loyang, a similar tripartite structure prevails.
Illustrating The Feast at Hongmen, the central fig-
ures serve as a pivot: Liu Bang X9 #f, later to be- But the documentation suggesting Yang Shi-
come first emperor of the Han dynasty, and his chang's t? tH E companionship with Su Shi on
archrival, Xiang Yu *i R, plotting to have him these journeys is explicit about the date of the
slain. And the dramatic characters emerge from second trip and should leave little doubt that
the wings, posing alternative histories-Xiang actual events served as the basis for Su's two prose-
poems.52
Zhuang a E from the far left, quite prepared to So the question remains important, but
kill and assure Xiang Yu's ascendancy, and Fan it is resolved only with a three-part answer.
Kuai * M from the far right, intent on Liu Bang'sThe best-educated guess today is this: the his-
rescue.48 This formula was developed into a truly torical Three Kingdoms Red Cliff area, referred
classic arrangement in Tang and post-Tang com- to as Sanguo Chibi --7 k F, was much farther
positions and is reflected in such well-known upstream than Su Shi traveled, pastsjiayu
works as Xiao Yi Seizes the Orchid Pavilion Manu- in Puqi County Jt )it 0, with the cliff of tha
script, attributed to Yan Liben F X j, and "Zhou name located on the south bank; 53 the battle site
Fang's )X Hp" Ladies PlayingDouble-Sixes.9 itself was located across the river from Sanguo
What still requires explanation, then, is why Chibi, at the foot of the Wulin # 1c cliffs on the
the "Wu Yuanzhi" narrative progresses from left north bank;54 what Su Shi wrote of as the Red
to right, contrary to all experience in Chinese Cliff, now referred to as Dongpo Chibi X 7 t , t
scroll painting. We have seen that the painting is is located in Huanggang County X 9 on the
faithful to the text, and beyond that, where the north bank of the Yangzi, northwest of modern
text calls for it, beholden to naturalistic observa- Huangzhou city. 55 Su himself questioned the his-
tion. That, too, is where the answer to this ques- toric authenticity of the Huanggang Red Cliff in
tion lies, bound up with another question: just writing, "A few hundred paces from where I keep
where was the Red Cliff located? The troubling my home in Huangzhou is the Red Cliff, some-
fact is that the Red Cliff of Cao Cao's time be- times said to be the place where Zhou Yu defeat-
came so famous that the local inhabitants at nu- ed Cao. But I don't know if this is really true or
merous sites subsequently laid claim to the name. not."56 Yet if Su was unclear about where along
Locating the real Recl Cliff today is difficult, com- the river the Red Cliff was located, he clearly
plicating the attempt to locate Su Shi's excursion. understood it to be on the northern bank of the
It must be remembered that the terms of Su Shi's Yangzi, as did his close cultural followers. And
exile proscribed hinm from traveling out of the from the standard historical documentation in
Huangzhou district, and generally it is agreed that the Sanguo zhi-- , he knew that the battle
the original Red Cliff site was farther upstream site itself was on the northern bank. 57
than he could legally have traveled. Unintention- Given this, in the "Wu Yuanzhi" painting, it is
ally, Su once wrote a poem sparking a rumor that a simple act of fidelity to both text and geograph-
he had sailed away, frightening the Huangzhou ical accuracy for the boatmen to travel from left
magistrate responsible for seeing that he not to right. If the cliff is placed to the rear with the
leave the district. But that poem was just a poem, river set in front of it, for obvious pictorial rea-
not the record of a real journey. 50 Bischoff, who sons, then with the cliff being to the north, the
regards the fu as a form of detailed personal alle- west-to-east flow of the Yangzi must be depicted
gory, doubts that any expedition took place at from left to right. Although the artist might have
the date specified by Su Shi. For him, steered his boatmen toward the left, in a strug-
gle against the river's current, he has wisely cho-

whether Su Shi visited the original site illegally, or any


sen instead to show them borne along by the
other site legally, or whether (as I feel most likely) he water's own natural course, true to the essence
joined the boating party at his desk only, is irrele- of the poem. Free of the hubris and fate that
vant in understanding the fu: Red Cliff stands as the halted Cao Cao's progress at this point, they will
archetype of all defeats crushing and absurd. The date journey on downstream beyond the cliff, sprawled

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34 JEROME SILBERGELD

together in a mystic heap, riding a tide of virtue meant by Su Shi and his contemporaries in lik-
toward the auspicious eastern sunrise.58 ening good painting to good poetry? That as in
verse, the "depiction of shapes" may be neglect-
ed for the expressive "realization of conceptions,"
Conclusion with style becoming the true subject of painting?6'
Or that as in good Song poetry, fidelity to nature
Central to the concept of literati painting in was a much-valued aid to expression, and formal
China is the superiority of the artist over art. The description and structural qualities were honed,
subject to be rendered, be it nature or text, is crafted, and handled with remarkable skill? What,
less import than its expression. Painting, it was in other words, was meant by "poetic"?
said over and over, should be more "poetic," The two paintings attributed to Qiao Zhong-
which is often read today to mean more "sponta- chang and Wu Yuanzhi allow us to broaden our
neous," "expressive," "free," or "sketchy" and less understanding of the landscape traditions known
bound to descriptive skill and thematic intent. to and appreciated by Su Shi, enhancing what
Something of this notion is affirmed in a study can be gleaned from a few other rare works in
of subject matter in early Chinese painting by the idioms of Li Gonglin, Mi Fu, and Mi Youren.
Lothar Ledderose, who writes of "the progres- What they reveal is a strong interest in subject
sively diminishing concern with subject matter matter, not simply by choice of theme but
parallel to the rise of gentleman painting": through their careful, thoughtful, and creative
rendering of text. Undoubtedly, the tendencies
It was this very development that transformed Chinese that Ledderose has documented came into be-
painting into an art in which iconographical consider- ing, but they did not come about all at once, and
ations were almost irrelevant.... Both landscape and they were probably not an intended result of
flower and bird painting, which superseded figure
some theoretical agenda. Ironically, the first two
painting in popularity, tend to be iconographically
paintings to treat the Red Cliff tradition with di-
more "neutral." In these latter two fields very few paint-
minished interest in narrative came not from li-
ings have a thematic basis in specific literary sources. If
they are, as with "The Red Cliff' which illustrated the terati amateurs but from artists working under
famous poem by Su Dongpo, they tend to look very court patronage-from Ma Hezhi (fig. 2) and Li
similar to other paintings without a comparable degree Song (fig. 3), each reducing "Qiao Zhong-
of thematic specificity.59 chang's" or "Wu Yuanzhi's" painting to a singu-
lar, focal detail (what might be labeled "iconic"
Su Shi is regarded as the fountainhead of literati as opposed to narrative).62
theory and painting, and it is assumed that his The gradual decline of narrative literati art in
own paintings, which no longer survive, can only the post-Song period and its sudden, if brief, re-
be imagined in terms consistent with his theo- emergence in the era of Wen Zhengming still
retical writings. Yelt Su Shi's art and theory pose require much study. But the "Qiao Zhongchang"
a dilemma that resists easy assumptions: if we and "Wu Yuanzhi" paintings tell us that at the
misunderstand Su's visual frame of reference, we outset, in the formative years of Song literati
are subject, ironically, to misreading the writings painting, narrative interest was still strong and
themselves; and yet how can we reconstruct this literati painters were still great masters of the for-
visual context without his writings?60 So what was mal discipline of narrative art.

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BACK TO THE RED CLIFF 35

Notes (1981): 76-89; Daniel Altieri, "The Painted Visions


of the Red Cliffs," OrientalArt, n.s., 39 (1983): 252-
This study intersects with a number of Professor Rich- 64; Chibifu shu hua tezhan (Taibei: National Palace
ard Edwards's interests, including later Song painting, Museum, 1984), with text by Zhang Guangbin.
the "Red Cliff' theme (which he dealt with especially Writing on Wen Zhengming, who revived the pop-
in his Wen Zhengming scholarship), and the relation- ularity of this subject for his own era, Edwards, Art
ship of Chinese painting to poetry. It is modeled of Wen Cheng-ming, emphasizes the Red Cliffjour-
on his ideal of seeking the broader meanings of art ney as a thematic example of scholarly gathering.
through the patient study of critical detail.
6. A copy of the Li Song fan exists in album-leaf for-
1. This revival began. with Su's literary mentor, Ou- mat in the National Palace Museum, Taibei; see
yang Xiu 0 I fl (1007-72), in whose hands the Chibifu shu hua tezhan, fig. 13.
fu became "more prose than poem," and quickly
reached its high point with Su Shi; see Liu Wu-chi, 7. In a colophon on the work, dated 1572, Wen's son,
An Introduction to Chinese Literature (Bloomington: Wen Jia jt ., wrote: "Painting of the Latter Prose-
Indiana University Press, 1968), 138-40. Ch'ien Poem on the Red Cliff. In inscriptions about the Song
Chung-shu has provided this critique: "The whole period painting academy, they always write about
Tang dynasty is a blank as far as prose-poetry is [the works being by] Zhao Boju h {b J and Zhao
concerned. The famous prose-poems by Han Yu Bosu. And all the works I see, if they come from
and Liu Zongyuan are all stiff-jointed and second- Suzhou area collections, then they're all by Zhao
rate. [In the Song], Ouyang Xiu first shows the Bosu. When they heard about this one, they want-
way by his magnificent Autumn Dirge, and Su [Shi] ed to seize it to present it to the prime minister
does the rest"; in Cyril Drummond Le Gros Clark, [presumably, Yan Song R A ]. But the owner
The Prose-Poetry of Su Tung-p'o (Shanghai: Kelly and clung to it. Then my father said to him, 'How can
Walsh, 1935), xxi. See also Ronald Egan, The Liter- you court danger for a thing of such value? I'll
ary Works of Ou-yang Hsiu (1007-72) (Cambridge: make you a copy and perhaps preserve something
Cambridge University Press, 1984). of its outer appearance.' And so he made this
scroll." Gugong shu hua lu, 2:193; for a complete
2. Gugong shu hua lu (Taibei: National Palace Muse- illustration, see Chibi fu shu hua tezhan, pl. 11. A
um, 1965), 1:50. Tung's references here are to Qu Southern Song "academic" origin for this work
Yuan's Li sao $ 6,R, the most famous of prose-po- seems agreeable, but it is ironic that Wenjia's skep
ems, from the ancient Chu ci Q i anthology, and tical colophon became the basis for entitling it
to China's most time-honored calligraphy, by Wang "after Zhao Bosu."
Xizhi E E .
8. Ma's painting is mounted together with a calli-
3. Lin Yutang, The Gay Genius: The Life and Times of graphic rendering of Su's text by the first South-
Su Tungpo (New York: John Day, 1947), 228. ern Song emperor, Gaozong g I -

4. Su Shi, Second Prose Poem on the Red Cliff, translated 9. For sources documenting the relationship of Qiao
in Burton Watson, Su Tung-p'o: Selectionsfrom a Sung and Li, including the comment by Lou Yue Ia
Dynasty Poet (New York: Columbia University Press, (1137-1213) that Qiao's paintings were frequent-
1967), 91-93; Su's first "Red Cliff' prose-poem ap- ly mistaken for original works by Li, see Robert
pears on pp. 20-21. Harrist, "A Scholar's Landscape: Shan-chuang tC
by Li Kung-lin" (Ph.D. dissertation, Princeton Uni-
5. James Cahill, catalogue entry in Laurence Sickman versity, 1989), 60-62, 78, 249.
et al., Chinese Calligraphy and Painting in the Collec-
tion of John M. Crawford, Jr. (New York: Pierpont 10. Shiqu baoji (Taibei: National Palace Museum,
Morgan Library, 1962), 72-75; Susan Bush, "Clear- 1971), 2:968-69; cf. Cahill, Crawford, 72-73.
ing after Snow in the Min Mountains," Oriental Art,
n.s., 11 (1965): 163-72; Susan Bush, "Literati Cul- 11. Cahill, Crawford, 74-75.
ture under the Chin (1122-1234)," Oriental Art,
n.s., 15 (1969): 103-12;EstherLeong Jacobson], 12. Cahill, Crawford, 75.
"Transition and Transformation in a Chinese
Painting and a Related Poem," Art Journal 31 13. Cahill, in Crawford, 74, has perceptively noted the
(1972): 262-67; Richard Edwards, The Art of Wen similarity of this scroll to the only one plausibly
Cheng-ming (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan attributed to Su Shi himself, the Old Tree and Rock
Museum of Art, 1976), 109-11, 182, 196-97, 209- (collection unknown), illustrated in Osvald Siren,
12; Stephen Wilkinson, "Paintings of 'The Red Cliff ChinesePainting: LeadingMasters and Principles (Lon-
Prose Poems' in Song Times," Oriental Art, n.s., 37 don: Lund, Humphries, 1956), 3:195.

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36 JEROME SILBERGELD

14. The landscape painter Wang Shen I 9 (ca. 22. Bush, "Clearing," 171, n. 28, provides documenta-
1046-after 1100), son-in-law of the emperor, was tion that a Wu Yuanzhi Red Cliff scroll was in exist-
deprived of all rank for having engaged in sym- ence around 1195 with a poem on it by the Jin
pathetic communications with Su; Su's young- scholar Li Yan * # (d. 1197).
er brother, Su Che, zi Ziyou 4 e , : Et (1039-
1112), was demoted and exiled to Jiangxi 23. Bush, "Literati," especially 107-8; for further details
Province. For accounts of Su Shi's opposition, on the attribution of the Wu Yuanzhi scroll, see Xu
arrest, and trial, see Ronald Egan, Word, Image, and Bangda, 2:5-7, in which all the relevant Chinese texts
Deed in the Life of Su Shih (Cambridge: Council on are gathered, and Bush, "Clearing," 171, n. 28.
East Asian Studies and Harvard University Press,
1994), 27-53; also Lin Yutang, Gay Genius, 166- 24. For the translation of Su Shi's " Ci on the Red Cliff,"
204. see Liu Wu-chi, Introduction, 110. Zhao Bingwen's
poetic response is recorded in Gugong shu hua lu,
15. For discussion in biographical terms of Su's shi 2:100, and is translated in Bush, "Literati," 108.
poetry composed dluring this period, see Michael
Fuller, The Road to East Slope: The Development of 25.
Su Bush, "Literati," 108.
shi's Poetic Voice (Stanford: Stanford University
Press, 1990), chap. 6. 26. Wilkinson, "Red Cliff," 85, 88.

16. Authorship of this calligraphy is unclaimed and 27. Leong, "Transition," 263.
unknown.

28. Leong, "Transition," 267. Altieri, "Painted Visions,"


17. Watson, Su Tung-p'o, 92, has him visited by a single 256, 261, shares the same view of this whole genre:
Daoist; but Chinese editions are inconsistent on "Many of the details of the prose-poems are lost in
this matter, and the inscription on this scroll spec- the artists' conceptualizations.... [The] transcen-
ifies two. Cahill ( Crawford, 74) identifies the two dent spirit of the Red Cliff fu is more important
guests in this scene as his boating companions, but to the successful execution of the paintings than
they are clearly a different pair. small details concerning the setting of the prose-
poems. "
18. For suggestions on the political interpretation of
this poem, see n. 46, below. 29. Lin, Genius, 204.

19. Of the original absence of the poet from this crit- 30. Fuller, Road to East Slope, 262-63.
ical scene in the "Qiao Zhongchang" scroll and
his belated insertion into the "Zhao Bosu/Wen 31. Liu Xie, in Burton Watson, trans., Chinese Rhyme
Zhengming" rendition of it, James Cahill writes: Prose: Poems in the Fu Form from the Han and Six Dy-
"The disappearance of the image of the poet at nasties Periods (New York: Columbia University
this climactic point has the effect of interiorizing Press, 1971), 121.
the experience, so to speak, just when it is at its
most intense ancl personal, so that one seems to 32. Friedrich A. Bischoff, Interpreting the Fu: A Study in
be looking through the poet's eyes instead of look- Chinese Literary Rhetoric (Wiesbaden: Steiner, 1976),
ing at him having the experience, as in the rest. 9.
Fine, original touch, which the 'Wen Zhengming'
version loses" (personal correspondence). Perhaps 33. Bischoff, Interpreting the Fu, 5.
shaping this sensitive judgment is an implicit par-
tiality to painting that implies rather than de- 34. Gugongshu hua lu, 2:49; illustrated in Chibi shu hua
scribes. tezhan, fig. 3.

20. The philosophic significance of such resting fig- 35. Clark, Prose-Poetry of Su Tung-p'o, 8.
ures is a central theme of Professor Edwards's "Li
Gonglin's Copy of Wei Yan's Pasturing Horses," Ar- 36. David Hawkes, Ch'u Tz'u: The Songs of the South: An
tibusAsiae53 (1993): 168-94. Ancient Chinese Anthology (Boston: Beacon Press,
1959), 37-38.
21. Xu Bangda calls its style "related to late Song style,
but still not a 'member' of the Southern Song 37. For the standard historical account of this battle,
school of Li Tang, Liu Songnian, Ma Yuan, and see below, n. 57.
Xia Gui." Xu Bangda, Gu shu hua wez e kaobian
(Nanjing:Jiangsu guji chuban she, 1984), 2:5. 38. Luo Guanzhong, trans. Moss Roberts, Three

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BACK TO THE RED CLIFF 37

Kingdoms: China's Epic Drama (New York: Panthe- ourselves and leave the rest to the Creator's will. I
on, 1976), 183-86, except for Cao's quatrain in wouldn't say this to anybody except yourself. Please
my own translation. burn this letter after reading it. Other people may
misunderstand." See Lin, Genius, 210, for this let-
39. James Legge, trans., The Chinese Classics, vol. 1: ter and for another that reads, "During all his
Confucian Analects (Hong Kong: Hong Kong Uni- adversities, Du Fu never for a moment forgot about
versity Press, 1960), 22. his country. That is why he was the incomparable
one among all poets."
40. James Legge, trans., The Chinese Classics, vol. 2: The Su's second "Red Cliff' prose-poem, interpret-
Works of Mencius (F[ong Kong: Hong Kong Univer- ed in parallel fashion, must be seen in terms of his
sity Press, 1960), 324-25. ascent of the cliff (his scaling the political heights);
his isolation from the community spirit of schol-
41. The translation that follows is from Watson, Su ars at ground level and shocking discovery of the
Tung-p'o, 87-90, except that Cao Cao's poem is my forceful nature of the place (the startling dishar-
translation; the Chinese text of both poems may mony of court politics); and his achievement of
be found in Su Dongpo quanji, in Zhongguo wenxue peace and perspective in retreat from these forces.
mingzhu di liuji, ed. YangJialuo (Taibei: Shijie Book
Company, 1982), 2'68-69. 47. Su Shi, while exiled in Shandong Province, com-
pressed this attitude into the single memorable
42. Leong, "Transition," 267. phrase, "Where could I go that I would not be hap-
py?"; cf. Egan, Ou-yangHsiu, 95.
43. Richard Edwards, "Painting and Poetry in the Late
Sung," in Alfreda MIurck and Wen Fong, Words and
48. For the historical text illustrated here, see Burton
Images: Chinese Poety, Calligraphy and Painting (New Watson, trans., Records of the Historian: Chaptersfrom
York and Princeton: Metropolitan Museum of Art the Shih Chi of Ssu-ma Ch'ien (New York: Columbia
and Princeton University Press, 1991), 413. University Press, 1958), 83-85.

44. Leong, "Transition," 264. 49. For illustration and discussions of these two paint-
ings, see my Chinese Painting Style: Media, Methods,
45. This flute (or pipes) player has been identified and Principles of Form (Seattle: University of Wash-
through Su Shi's writings as Yang Shichang, a Dao- ington Press, 1982), figs. 12-15.
ist and musician firom Su's home province in Si-
chuan. Chinese language allowing for ambiguity 50. Lin, Genius, 226.
on the matter, one or more companions might
have been intended in this prose-poem-transla- 51. In this defeat, at the hands of the Western Xia,
tions usually indicate one, paintings two. The sec- several hundred thousand Chinese troops were
ond prose-poem is specific about there being two butchered along with all of their officers at Yulin,
companions, and Yang was apparently also one of in Gansu, under the failed leadership of a staunch
them. For documentation of this, see Clark, Prose- Wang Anshi follower named Xu Xi 1t i; like the
Poetry, 130-31. Red Cliff battle, this took place in a three-sided
encounter, Song and its enemies, Xia and Liao,
46. Despite his closing references to The Analects and arrayed like Wei, Shu, and Wu. Bischoff, Interpret-
the rising sun, which suggest otherwise, this prose- ing the Fu, 195-98.
poem is usually taken as Daoist in the sense that
Su uses the moon, the river, and wine to rise above 52. Clark, Prose-Poetry, 130-31.
and beyond social concerns. But read Su's come-
back in a letter to an intimate friend, Li Chang 53. See Chibifu shu hua tezhan, fig. 1, for a photo. Var-
> ~, who had ad.vised Su to do just that: "Why ious other sites, claimed as the historical site by
are you like this? I had expected you to be brave in their local populace, are arrayed along the Yang-
trouble. It is true that we are growing old and are zi, at Hanyang i* f, Hanchuan ' JIl Jiangxia
in distress, but down in our bones we are conscious tI , and elsewhere.
of having done the right thing, and with all the
philosophy that we have learned, we should be able 54. For a schematic battle diagram, see Luo Guan-
to take life and death with a laugh.... We are in zhong, trans. Moss Roberts, Three Kingdoms: A His-
present difficulties. But if an occasion comes up torical Novel (Berkeley: University of California
again when we can do something to benefit the Press, 1991), 373.
people and show our loyalty to our ruler, we should
do it regardless of all the consequences for 55. Cf. the 1885 map in Huangzhou fu zhi (Taibei:

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38 JEROME SILBERGELD

Chengwen chubanshe, 1976), 86, above; Ding then sent forth his boats, setting them on fire as
Yonghuai et al., Dongpo chibi (Wuhan: Hubei ren- he did.just then a wind blew fiercely, bringing their
min chubanshe, 1981), 1, 12-19. flames to the encampment on the shore. In no time
at all, the smoke and fires reached to the heavens,
56. Su Shi, Dongpo zhilini X i #4 (Beijing: Zhong-and the men and horses that were burned to death
hua shudian, 1981)., 75. In these travel notes, Su or drowned were many. The soldiers fled in de-
makes it clear that he had traveled to the Red Cliff feat, returning for reinforcements to Nanjun. [Liu]
quite a number of times, learned its lore, explored Bei, [Zhou] Yu, and the others pursued them to-
its "grotto" (Mr. Xu's Cave), and gathered up a gether. Cao Cao left Cao Ren V Ii and others in
large collection of walking sticks from its banks and defense ofJiangling, then took a direct route fromn
colored rocks from its shore. there to return north."

57. Sanguo zhi, ed. Chen Shou and Pei Songzhi 58. Note that in the "Qiao Zhongchang" scroll, this
(Beijing: Zhonghua shujui, 1959), "Wu shu" sec- fidelity to direction is also maintained. Though the
tion, ch. 54, 1262-63: "When Liu Bei 9i M had been boatmen head toward the left, as dictated by the
defeated by Cao Cao, he wanted to head south extended narrative format, the crane, too, is shown
across the Yangzi, so he met with Lu Su Z 9 at in flight from right to left, overtaking them from
Dangyang to plan a common strategy, then entered behind, as dictated by the west-to-east flight speci-
Xiakou and encamped there, sending Zhuge Liang fied in the text.
a * A to report to [Sun] Quan f . Quan then
dispatched [Zhou] Yu and Cheng Pu, among oth- 59. Lothar Ledderose, "Subject Matter in Early Chi-
ers, to join forces with [Liu] Bei in opposition to nese Painting Criticism," Oriental Art, n.s., 19
Cao and encounter him at the Red Cliff. By the (1973): 78-79.
time Cao's army amassed, they already had con-
tracted some disease, so when they engaged in 60. This dilemma is discussed by Kiyohiko Munakata,
battle, they suffered a defeat and he had them "Some Methodological Considerations: A Review
camp on the north side of the Yangzi. [Zhou] Yu of Susan Bush, The Chinese Literati on Painting,"
and the others were on the south bank. Yu's lieu- Artibus Asiae 38 (1976): 308-18.
tenant-general Huang Gai * X said: 'Those brig-
ands are many and we are few. It will be hard for 61. As suggested in verse by Su's poetic mentor, Mei
us to control them 'before a long time has passed. Yaochen 1 4 , in Susan Bush, The Chinese Lite-
But see that Cao's naval vessels are now linked from rati on Painting: Su Shih to Tung Ch'i-ch'ang (Cam-
stem to stern. They could be burned and dis- bridge: Harvard University Press, 1971), 24. Bush,
patched.' Then he assembled several tens of at- 26, says that in a poem written along similar lines,
tack boats and battleships with their prows covered "Su [Shi] would seem to be saying that painting
over, packed them with fresh hay soaked in fats cannot be bound by likeness to nature any more
and covered with tenting material. He raised a ser- than the composition of poetry can be restricted
rated flag above them. Then he sent a letter to Cao, by a set theme."
lying to him aboutrwishing to submit, writing that
he had prepared a number of boats for him to trav- 62. This, of course, does not contradict the continu-
el in, each ferrying large boats tied behind, fol- ing strong interest in narrative painting at the
lowing others in front. Cao's military officers and Southern Song court, in which Ma Hezhi himself
civil officials all stretched forward to look at this, played a leading role.
pointing and saying that Gai would surrender. Gai

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