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| [a] Gathering RF |
I
recently wrote an essay for a website that proposed to deal with
history, philosophy, culture, and the practice of daily life in early
China and Greece. The piece that was
finally published was a great deal different from this one, so I am
happy to post the "long version" here. As will be clear soon enough, I
see profound connections between the thought of Greek thinkers such as
Hesiod and Herodotus, on the one hand, and Chinese writers from Sima
Qian to the anonymous authors of the Book of Songs (詩經/诗经).
Through it all, like a flowing watercourse, runs the calendar and a
question that I think needs asking (and re-asking) as we study history:
what is the relationship between repeatable events, such as we find
every year at certain points of the calendar, and singular moments in
the past. This is a philosophical question...about history, culture, and
time. That is why it is the second post in this series on the
philosophy of history (of philosophy).
The Classic of
Poetry
It is probable that no single work has been
read, studied, and recited by more people in Chinese history than the Classic of Poetry (詩經). It presents all of the challenges we have
faced to this point regarding early texts, point-of-view, and knowledge about
everyday life. Above all, though, it allows us to return to the cyclical
movements of the calendar, people’s lives, and almost everyone’s daily distance from the sources of power. To
complete the circle, then, we need to grasp the patterns of the calendar and the details of our texts. Few works shows
this coherence better than the Classic of
Poetry.
Take, for example, the love songs from the Classic of Poetry. Some of these lines
served as the inspiration for Marcel Granet’s interpretation at the beginning
of this essay. He had learned to see where the detail “fit” and where the
context buried it. These quoted lines, if read side-by-side with Granet’s description
of the spring festivals, above, show how relevant they are for an interpretation
of how people moved and acted; they are not merely an accounting of “they did
this…and then they did that.” The Classic’s
lines put everything into the context of a calendar, the patterning of life
throughout a year, and the life cycles of people. The temporal movements make
everything else cohere.
As we have seen, the spring festivals—the
verdant rhythms and chants of young men and women—announced the cycle of
engagement. This poem brings us face-to-face with its marital implications.
101 Southern Hill
Over the southern
hill so deep
The male fox drags
along,
But the way to Ku
is easy and broad
From this Qi lady
on her wedding way.
Yet once she has
made the journey,
Never again must
her fancy roam.
Fiber shoes, five
pairs;
Cap ribbons, a
couple.
The way to Lu is
easy and broad
For this lady of Qi
to use.
But once she has
used it,
No way else must
she ever go.
When we plant hemp, how do we do it?
Across and along we put the rows.
When one takes a wife, how is it done?
The man must talk to her father and mother.
And once he has talked with them,
No one else must he court.
When we cut firewood, how do we do it?
When we plant hemp, how do we do it?
Across and along we put the rows.
When one takes a wife, how is it done?
The man must talk to her father and mother.
And once he has talked with them,
No one else must he court.
When we cut firewood, how do we do it?
Without an axe it
would not be possible.
When one takes a
wife, how is it done?
Without a
match-maker he cannot get her.
But once he has got
her,
No one else must he
ever approach.[1]
The tone is both suggestive and startling, and
the careful reader will ask what she can learn of everyday life from it, just
as she did in considering Hesiod, Herodotus, and Sima Qian. A great deal, might
well be the answer, but what we can learn in meaningful ways is always
dominated by the text. We must react to it, learn to ask new questions, but
always realize that the text (unlike the person to whom an anthropologist
speaks in the present) will never clarify its answers for us, never answer our
follow-up questions. At most, upon rereading, it will repeat its message, and
we will gain clarity through repetition.
What is significant here? As with almost every
example in this essay, marriage plays a role. The careful reader will note the
manner in which the poem mixes natural and cultural imagery in every stanza. It
is tempting to sever precise details from the narrative thrust of the poem.
Fiber shoes (five pairs) and cap ribbons seem harmless enough as “data.
Indeed,
experienced readers such as Marcel Granet learned how to extract precise
details for understanding in other contexts. Woe to the researcher who carries
this mission too far, however. Then the whole enterprise fails, as though the
very weight of excised detail threatens to bury the text itself.
If done well, it is a precise operation. The
fiber shoes and cap ribbons—copies, really, since the “originals” must stay
with the narrative—are, in a sense, put into a conceptual holding bin, where
they await other references in other texts that might confirm them. Too few of
them and the researcher fails to comprehend how textual details can aid her
project; too many, and it becomes a great game of separating the peas from the
pods in a chimerical pursuit of “facts” about daily life.
There are fewer problems with the thrust of
the narrative itself. Even the most gullible reader can see that the focus on
marriage is so overwhelming that every line touches upon it in one way or
another. Somewhat more careful readers will note the gendered advice, which (at
least at first) seems to say that women leave their homes…never to return again.
They would not, at least not in a broader life-cycle sense. They, as well as
their husbands, would never return to the relative freedom of youth. They could
never look at anyone quite the same way again, and it is about this social
point-of-no-return that the poem sends its warning to both men and women. Youth
dances and sings at the spring festival; by autumn, youth ends in marriage.
Conclusion
For Greek and Chinese society in the
millennium before the Common Era, we have precious few documents. We have
touched upon some of them in this essay, and it should be clear that none will
give up its details about everyday life with all of the clarity that we seek.
Most often, they represent a challenging jigsaw puzzle of life fragments that
have persisted since Hesiod’s time, almost 3000 years ago. We can make small
assessments of the importance, for example, of the axe (referenced in several
of our documents and relevant to this day). We can understand something of
marriage alliances, fashions, and cultural variation. At the very highest levels,
we can put those pieces together into a moveable framework that gives us a
sense of time and change. Even in the simplest societies (as they continue to
be called), we know that winter and summer have enormously varied social
qualities.[2] In the most complex ones, the pattern of nature can be seen in
the movements of social groups and activities throughout the calendar year. If
we want to understand everyday life on a deep level, in short, we must focus on
how those exquisite details fit the pattern, and not only in the world of our
documents. We also must understand the flow of the year—and patterns of work
and rest over lifetimes—experienced by those who wrote them.
It is difficult, to be sure.
Heaven is high; all else is far away.
This is one post in a four-part series. Click below for the other posts:
This is one post in a four-part series. Click below for the other posts:
Notes
[1] Arthur Waley, The Book of Songs: The Ancient Chinese Classic of Poetry (New York:
Grove Press, 1996), 80.
[2] These rhythms are brilliantly
captured by Marcel Granet’s friend and colleague, Marcel Mauss, in a work on
the social cadences of yearly life among the Eskimo. Marcel Mauss (with Henri
Beuchat), Seasonal Variations Among the
Eskimo: A Study in Social Morphology (London: Routledge Books, 2004).
Bibliography
—Mauss, Marcel (with Henri
Beuchat). Seasonal Variations Among the
Eskimo: A Study in Social Morphology. London: Routledge Books, 2004.
—Waley, Arthur. The Book of Songs: The Ancient Chinese Classic of Poetry. New York: Grove Press, 1996.
—Waley, Arthur. The Book of Songs: The Ancient Chinese Classic of Poetry. New York: Grove Press, 1996.
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