The Chinese Written Character as a Medium for Poetry: A Critical Edition

Th e Chinese Written Language as a Medium for Poetry

75 This Twentieth Century not only turns a new page in the Book of the World, but opens another and a startling Chapter. Vistas of strange futures unfold for man, of world-embracing cultures half-weaned from Europe, of hitherto undreamed responsibilities for nations and races. [Especially for Great Britain and for the United States it sounds a note of hope,and,atthesametime,anoteofwarning.Theyalone,ofmodernpeoplesstill bear aloft the torch of freedom, advance the banner of individual culture. They alone, perhaps, possess the tolerance and the sympathy required to understand the East, and to lift her into honorable sisterhood. The peoples of Continental Europe fear the possibilities of selfhood in the East; therefore they aim to crush her, before her best powers shall have time to ripen. Strange as it may seem, the future of Anglo Saxon supremacy in the world is probably bound up with the future of that East. If the better elements in her be crushed,andtheworsebechainedinslaverytosomeWesternformofDespotism, Time may come to blow out our torch. For beyond a sentimental sympathy, our loyalty to our own ideals should urge us to champion the cause of China’s independence , to nourish and expand the germs of her own best thought and aim, and finally to help her merge them into the heritage of our own freedom.] (This Chinese problem, alone, is so vast that [it dominates the world, and forces on that supreme historical crisis which has been waiting for centuries.] No The Chinese Written Language as a Medium for Poetry E r n e s t F e n o l l o s a (final draft, ca. 1906, with Pound’s notes, 1914–16) 76 Fenollosa (with Pound’s notes) nation can afford to ignore it; we in America least of all. We must face it across the Pacific, and master it—or it will master us. And the only way to master it is to strive with patient sympathy to understand the best, the most hopeful, and the most human elements in it.) It is unfortunate that England and America have ignored or mistaken, so long, the deeper problems of Oriental culture. We have misconceived the Chinese for a materialistic people, for a debased and worn-out race. We have belittled the Japaneseasanationofcopyists .WehavestupidlyassumedthatChinesehistoryaffords no glimpse of change, no social evolution, no salient epoch of moral and spiritual crisis. We have denied the essential humanity of these peoples; and we have toyed with their ideals as if they were no better than comic songs in an “opéra bouffe.” The most pressing duty that faces us today is not to batter down their forts or to exploit their markets, but to study, and to come to sympathize with their [very real]humanityandtheirgenerousaspirations.Theirtypeof[culture]cultivation has been [a] high [one]. Their [rich] harvest of recorded experiences doubles ours [stock of spiritual data]. The Chinese have been idealists, and experimenters in the making of great principles; their history opens [on] a world of lofty aim and achievement parallel to that of the Ancient Mediterranean peoples. We, even we, need their best ideals, to supplement our own;—ideals enshrined in their Art, in their Literature, and in the tragedies of their lives. ThevitalityandpracticalvalueofOrientalArt,asakeytotheEasternsoul,and as a spur to ourselves, we have already seen. It may be worth while, now, to try to supplement that view, in however imperfect a way, with an after-glimpse [of] at the most artistic and spiritual portion of their Literature, namely, their Poetry. [In this attempt] I feel that I [owe to my hearers every apology in] should perhaps apologize by presuming to follow that series of able brilliant scholars,— Davis, Legge, St. Denys, Giles,—who have treated this subject of Chinese Poetry with a wealth of erudition to which I can proffer no claim. [In spite of the title of this lecture,] it is not as a professional linguist, nor as a Sinologue, that I humbly put forward what I have to say, but as an enthusiastic student of Beauty in oriental culture. Having spent a large portion of my years in close relation with orientals, I could not but breathe in something of the Poetry incarnated in their lives. [It is a satisfaction to know that American Education appreciates its present opportunity of inaugurating Chinese studies. The University of California has well taken the lead, appropriately on the Pacific Coast, in the rich courses which it offers upon the Chinese Language.1 [And now,] Columbia [follows] has fol- [18.222...