On the morning of April 1, Japan announced the new year's day as "Linghe", which will be officially opened at 0:00 on May 1. According to reports, the word "Linghe" comes from the preface of "thirty two plum blossom songs in parallel" in the fifth volume of "miscellaneous songs" in the Japanese ancient book "wanyeji". In the spring of the second year of Tianping (730), people enjoyed Mei Yongge at the banquet of Nara era politicians, singers and travelers' residence. The preface was written by Yi Liang, one of the participants, who came to China with the Tang envoy ship. Most of the poems in Wan Ye Ji are ancient Japanese poems that use Chinese characters to record sounds. However, this preface is completely authentic Chinese, similar to the parallel prose sketches of the Wei, Jin and six dynasties. If it is said that it is extracted from the parallel prose of the Six Dynasties in China, it is estimated that most people will believe it
On the 13th of the first month of the second year of Tianping, it was gathered in Shuai Lao's house, and the banquet was held. At that time, the moon in early spring, Qi Shu and wind. Plum powder in front of the mirror, the fragrance of orchid. To Shuling moving clouds, loose hanging Luo and tilt cover. In the evening, there is a mist on the hill, and the birds cover the forest.
The court dances new butterfly, empty return old goose. So he sat on the ground and sat on his knees and drank wine. Forget to talk in a room, open Jin smoke outside. Let it go, let it go. If it's not for Han Garden, why do you love it? How different are the poems about plum blossoms from ancient times to modern times.
The report also said that this is the first time that Japan has been able to identify the source of the year from ancient Japanese books rather than ancient Chinese books. After hearing this, many Chinese netizens immediately felt unconvinced and began to look up the source of the word "Linghe" in many ways. Without much effort, they found some similar sentences in the database of Chinese ancient books, such as "Zhongchun Lingyue, Shihe Qiqing" in Zhang Heng's GUI Tian Fu. After finding the "evidence", Chinese netizens "haughtily" dropped a sentence "welcome to continue to investigate", which probably means "it's not from ancient Chinese books!"
As we all know, the history of ancient Japanese literature is a history of coexistence of "Chinese Literature" and "Japanese Literature". During the Sui and Tang Dynasties, a large number of Japanese envoys went to China to study and introduce new ideas and new culture, learning and absorbing Chinese classical literature with great enthusiasm.
Huaifengzao, the first collection of Chinese poetry in Japan, was compiled in this period. Before the invention of kana, the first batch of Japanese documents in ancient Japan, such as gushiji and wanyeji, were also marked with Chinese characters.
Wanyeji is the first collection of Waka in ancient Japan, with 20 volumes. It contains more than 4000 songs in 400 years from the 4th century to the 8th century. Its status is equivalent to the book of songs of China.
When some Japanese scholars write a history of Japanese literature, they will deliberately devalue the value of Chinese literature, for example, "Chinese poetry is a rational literature produced from the mind and a literature showing off knowledge. As a classical work with infinite vitality, it is not huaifengzao, but wanyeji that has been handed down to the present. However, under the historical and cultural background of the compilation of Wan Ye Ji, its content and compilation will obviously be influenced by Chinese literature and poetics.
From the perspective of scholars, there is no need to distinguish whether the new year's number comes from Chinese classics or Japanese classics. Japanese classical researchers said: "there are many works written in classical Chinese in Japanese classics. Its roots are all from Chinese classics. The more stylistic the language, the stronger the tendency Robert Campbell, director of the Japanese literature research archive, also made a representative speech: "Northeast Asia is a cultural circle of Chinese characters. The year number comes from Chinese classics or Japanese classics. We can't look at things from different places. " Indeed, it doesn't matter which ancient books the word "Linghe" comes from.
Wanyeji, a collection of wakas, was compiled by some Japanese noble scholars. There are more than 4000 wakas in total, including long songs, short songs, head spinning songs and so on. With the passage of time, the long songs and other types with longer length were gradually eliminated, leaving only the 31 syllable short songs of "57577"; Later, the short song evolved into a haiku with 17 syllables. The trend of "narrowing down" established the form centered on the short song, and also established the Japanese national song style, reflecting the Japanese national aesthetic taste of "simplicity".
In addition, there are few poems praising the emperor in the collection of ten thousand leaves, most of which are about love. They not only reflect the feelings of men and women, but also touch the feelings of parents and children. Similar to the book of songs, the root of wanyeji is the individual consciousness of life.
Chen Li and Zhang Fenling, who have just published translations of Matsuzawa banana and Kobayashi ichicha haiku, are about to publish their new book "sunset: Japanese short song 400". They have also selected and translated some short songs in "Wanye Ji", among which there are two Japanese New Year's issue's "plum blossom song". They are happy to send the translation to readers for a preview
my family
Plum blossom in court, spring
How can one be the first to bloom
Enjoy alone, leisurely
Spend the spring?
——Good memories on the mountain
Plum blossoms
Scattered in my family garden,
It's like a snowflake
From afar to the sky
Floating down
——Great companion traveler
Now when it comes to appreciating flowers in Japan, everyone's default is to appreciate cherry blossoms, but in wanyeji, there are more poems about plum blossoms than cherry blossoms. Plum blossom originated in China and was sent to Japan with the envoys of Tang Dynasty. It retains the historical memory of cultural exchanges between China and Japan thousands of years ago. Some people even joked that if there were no plum blossoms in the East, there would be no Japanese New Year's "Linghe".
