Chūn WàngSpring View 春望
Du Fu's lament for Chang'an in the spring of 757.
Original Chinese text with pinyin
国破山河在
guó pò shān hé zài
城春草木深
chéng chūn cǎo mù shēn
感时花溅泪
gǎn shí huā jiàn lèi
恨别鸟惊心
hèn bié niǎo jīng xīn
烽火连三月
fēng huǒ lián sān yuè
家书抵万金
jiā shū dǐ wàn jīn
白头搔更短
bái tóu sāo gèng duǎn
浑欲不胜簪
hún yù bù shēng zān
Simplified characters; traditional title: 春望.
English translation
Though a country be sundered, hills and rivers endure;
And spring comes green again to trees and grasses
Where petals have been shed like tears
And lonely birds have sung their grief.
After the war-fires of three months,
One message from home is worth a ton of gold.
I stroke my white hair. It has grown too thin
To hold the hairpins any more.
Original translation by Poetune — literal but poetic, written for this site.
Line by line
Meaning and imagery
The famous opening contrasts human ruin with nature's indifference: the state has fallen, yet mountains and rivers carry on, and spring grass grows "deep" over abandoned streets. Lines three and four can be read two ways — the poet weeps at flowers, or the flowers themselves seem to weep — and the ambiguity blurs the line between the man and the world. The second half narrows from war to family to the poet's own aging body, ending on the small, almost comic image of hair too thin for a hatpin, which makes the grief more personal and more real.
Background
Written in spring 757 in rebel-occupied Chang'an, where Du Fu was trapped during the An Lushan Rebellion, separated from his wife and children. Matsuo Bashō echoed its first line in Oku no Hosomichi.
Key words
- 国破 guó pò
- the state shattered
- 烽火 fēng huǒ
- beacon fires, i.e. war
- 家书 jiā shū
- a letter from home
- 簪 zān
- hairpin used to fix an official's cap
About the poet: Du Fu
Du Fu (also romanized Tu Fu) lived through the An Lushan Rebellion, which tore apart the Tang empire and his own family life. His precise, compassionate poems record war, poverty and loyalty, earning him the titles "Sage of Poetry" and "poet-historian."
Lifetime: 712–770. Other famous works: Happy Rain on a Spring Night (春夜喜雨); The Prime Minister of Shu (蜀相); The Officer at Shihao Village (石壕吏); Thoughts While Traveling at Night (旅夜书怀); Qujiang (曲江); Meeting Li Guinian in Jiangnan (江南逢李龟年); Ballad of the Army Carts (兵车行); Moonlit Night (月夜); Spring View (春望); Climbing High (登高); Quatrain: Two Orioles (绝句·两个黄鹂鸣翠柳); On Yueyang Tower (登岳阳楼); My Thatched Hut Torn by the Autumn Wind (茅屋为秋风所破歌).
More by Du Fu
- Quatrain (The River Blue)绝句
- Climbing High登高
- On Yueyang Tower登岳阳楼
- Moonlit Night月夜
- Happy Rain on a Spring Night春夜喜雨
- Meeting Li Guinian in Jiangnan江南逢李龟年
- Qujiang曲江
- The Officer at Shihao Village石壕吏