Last night a friend and I watched, for the first time, the National Ballet of China's production of The Red Detachment of Women. It's apparently what they showed Nixon when he came to hang out in '72. From the start, of course, we expected the experience to be deeply ironic: after all, ballet doesn't exactly stick out as the most proletarian of art forms. Though, in a pretty ridiculous tract published during the early 70s in MIT's The Drama Review under the heading "Documents from China," some defender of the production claimed that Detachment was deliberately designed to overcome the counterrevolutionary evils of classical ballet.Regardless of whether the ballet form is capable of transcending its roots in the muck of bourgeois decadence, the leading sponsors for the National Ballet were Mercedes-Benz, a luxury airline, and the Bank of China. Hmm.
As for the show itself, I am totally an outsider when it comes to dance and performance art generally. But here's what I did notice.
(1) The colors made me feel like I was watching a bunch of Legos onstage. Fierce, unyielding primaries for the leads and villainously pastel for the main landlord, "Southern Tyrant." Subtlety is not the name of the game for the "Model Operas" of the Maoist years. Red blazoned on arms and waved in the form of a huge snapping flag. Deliriously bright backgrounds ostensibly depicting idyllic Hainan Island ("the Hawaii of China").
(2) Speaking of the lack of any pretension to subtlety*: there are lots of revolutionary poses struck, firm, determined revolutionary nods made, and (on the other side) lots of sleazy bowing and old-fashioned handclasping. The music is (unsurprisingly) militant-folksy-cheery and major-key when the Good Guys are on and cool-cat jazzy when the Bad appear (the latter also get much dimmer lighting for an extra bit of "Bad Old Society" smarm).
(3) One innovation I found actually appealing was the fight scenes that drew heavily upon the physical vocabulary of martial operas. (Of course, it was also pretty...unique to include masses of company dancers wielding their bayonets en pointe, but that element of Red kitsch is given away right in the posters for the ballet--it's downright iconic.) If there had been a gong, clapper, and eight-cornered drum instead of a full symphony for some of the battle scenes, it would have felt a lot more like some clip from Romance of the Three Kingdoms than a struggle of the oppressed proletariat against landlord depredations.
(4) The interesting lack of a prima ballerina, and the similarly interesting sexual dynamics among the principals. While Wu Qionghua is certainly the protagonist, there's also Hong the party advisor to the Detachment and the commander of the Detachment. With the latter, Qionghua dances half-a-dozen pas de deux and exchanges several dramatic embraces; with the former, zero on both counts. It was all very Anchee-Min-Red-Hot-Lesbian-Tension** or Sexy Iron Girl (-on-girl), and it made me wish I were doing work on gender and sexuality of the Maoist years.
Anyway, it was a technically superb production and so worth the $30 to go see it at the bombastic National Opera House. If any of my gentle readers are intrigued, I believe there are various clips scattered about the usual places on the Internet for a glimpse of the action.
*Subtlety, as we all know well, is the first sign of counterrevolutionary corruption.
**Not intended to disparage Min's book or lesbians, of course!
Showing posts with label homoerotica. Show all posts
Showing posts with label homoerotica. Show all posts
2008/12/23
Shoutoku: The Man, The Myth, The...Angst?
Who doesn't like some déshabillé period costume ?Just finished reading Yamagishi Ryouko's epic Hi no izuru tokoro no tenshi [『日の出ずる処の天子』Ruler of the Land of the Rising Sun], which ran from 1980 to 1984. In a sentence, the 10-volume (in Chinese translation; I believe the bunko version in Japanese is 7-8 volumes total) was
REVISIONIST JAPANESE HISTORY, JERRY SPRINGER STYLE.
Maybe that makes the book sound unpalatable to some readers, but believe me when I say that this is not "so horrible it's good." It's so good it's horrifying. At least, enough people thought so that the work won a Kondansha Manga Award in 1983.
First, the art: Yamagishi Ryouko is famed as one of the pioneering female mangaka who jump-started the shoujo manga or "girls' comics" movement--the so-called "Year-24 Group" (二十四年組), or "Forty-niners," who were born in 1949 and were among the first women to enter the Japanese comics-making world. Most of this group's work would thus be considered rather old-school by the aesthetic terms of modern manga. Take this page from Kaze to ki no uta, by Yamagishi's fellow Year-24er Takemiya Keiko:
Major characteristics of classic shoujo from authors in this generation include stylized, glamorous-looking protagonists, cartoony cariactures in the supporting cast, an unironic abundance of flowers, pointillist bubbles, and sparklies, and an earnest deployment of coventions such as vertical lines on the face, which denote shock and/or fear. No CG technology here, folks--all the toner and ink carefully hand-applied. Most of the lines are highly organic and finished, in contrast to some of today's authors, who may strive for a "rougher" or "simpler" look. On top of all this, Yamagishi demonstrated a decided fondness for period costume and, to a lesser extent, other material bits of history (her interiors never as dense as Takemiya's, nor her page layouts as complex and thickly packed). To wit, a page from Hi no izuru:
Now that the aesthetic context is gotten out of the way, onto the juicy part. The story concerns the exploits of young Prince Shoutoku [CE 574-622], known also as Prince Umayado [厩戸]. As most know him, Shoutoku was a promulgator of Chinese culture--Buddhism and Confucian values*--as exemplified in his patronage of temples: Shitennoji, and the magnificent Houryuuji. The "Seventeen-Article Constitution" that Wikipedia so helpfully calls "one of the earliest moral dictatorial documents in history" is generally attributed to him, as well. In case you, hypothetical reader, cares, the moral injunctions were mostly pretty "duh": obeying imperial commands, not rushing to decisions by one's lonesome, etc. Awesomely, until the 1890 Meiji constitution came into effect, this document was completely valid. Even today, the Japanese constitution does not technically override it.*Anyway, Shou-chan is a very respected figure, indeed almost a saintly one, though apparently some have disputed his existence (not to mention the attributions of various things to him). Even so, he was on Japanese currency until 1984:
Don't make me get all moralistic on your a$$, yo.
Mmm, beefy.-Countless plots to horribly murder various important people, quite a few of which succeed
-Quasi-incestuous marriages between step-parents and -children
-Actual incest [which, by the way, the reader sees from a mile away but is like unto a runaway locomotive in its relentless momentum], consummated via deceitful trickery
-Illegitimate children who represent about 80% of the births in the book, the most plot-central of which result from suspiciously endogamous sex
-Nonconsensual sexual acts
-Dream [GHEI] sex
-General homoerotics, riddled with more angst and Unresolved Sexual Tension than a gay Harry Potter "deathfic" and all kinds of gender issues
-Issues of which are mostly manifest in Shoutoku's repeated and highly successful cross-dressing
-Suicidal thoughts and attempts so far up the frigging wazoo that it's probably come out on the other end
-Trippy-as-hell and very distressing dreams, visions, out-of-body experiences, ESP, telekinesis, telepathy...Shoutoku will kill you with his mind
In this delightful melting-pot of freakishness, Yamagishi mixed a beautiful, cold, traumatized Prince Umayado, his [very obvious] love interest Soga no Emishi, various historically recorded folks from the Soga clan, the imperial line, and what feels like everywhere else. The thing is over two thousand pages long, so here I'll just discuss why I think this particular bit of revision is so engrossing quickly.
1. Yamagishi plotted her political and romantic intrigues with great mastery: gripping, intense, but not quite so over the top that one lost a deep engagement with the story. Mostly, she achieved this by plumbing the vast casts' psychologies with consistent dexterity. Emishi isn't just a stupid 6th-century frat boy, though that could have been his lot. His ultimate rejection of Umayado is so devastating because the reader believes that, for one, it might not have been that way "if only...", and for another, Yamagishi gives us so much insight into the human torments of the characters that we feel all the proper mono-no-aware catharsis.
2. The art feels sometimes archaic and a little stiff, but there's something about classic manga's willingness to conventialize and stylize that reveals the medium's parity to other highly formulaic yet nonetheless engaging visual genera, i.e. noh or Peking opera. It's a little silly when Umayado can't seem to put his hand on anything without making it look as delicate as possible, but then again, arguably that's part of manga's heritage from more traditional Japanese art. Where she needs it, Yamagishi makes use of the image's power to "tell all."
In short, the images and words together convey an immense, realistically textured emotional universe for not just the protagonists, but all the major characters. There are not too many absolutes in Yamagishi's world. Just about everyone is capable of making the reader groan in frustration, recoil in horror, or smile.
3. Also importantly, the manga isn't shy about its facts. The machinations of Soga no Umako, Emishi's doggedly conventional father, and virtually all of the characters, are situated with what was a surely considerable amount of research. The politics of 6th-century Japan are not just about sleeping with sisters and cross-dressing to impress, but related to international history: the Paekche-Koguryo-Silla standoff on the Korean peninsula, for instance, is of great import to the cast--and even if the reader didn't have any clue about the situation, its immediacy in the story. On the mainland, the Sui dynasty exterminates the Chen and unites a huge swathe of formerly divided territory. And, of course, the title takes its title from the famous missive Shoutoku wrote to the Sui emperor in 607: "From the ruler of the land of the rising sun, to the ruler of the land of the setting sun, greetings...."
To draw hundred of pages in quest of the legendary creature who wrote those haughty words and coined the phrase "Nihon" is impressive enough, but to give these long-dead folks, often without much more than a name, the dimensionality of people trying to cope with their situations, their emotions, their pasts, is truly the most admirable point of good history as well as good historical fiction. Sometimes the boundary isn't so clear, and verification almost seems unimportant. Yamagishi's Shoutoku, with his angelically beautiful androgyny, a boy by turns cruel, vulnerable, brilliant, loveable, domineering, and passionate, is nothing like the moralizing gentleman with a respectable beard whose portrait is printed in history books. But his divergence from that man fails to signify after we pass through the landscape that Yamagishi drew for him. That's the sign of the best kind of historifandom: with enough power that it can stand alongside what is conventionally accepted as "reality," in a strange and attractive symbiosis.
Basically, if you have time to spare and would like to spend it marathoning through an epic of some kind, Hi no izuru is an excellent choice. Have another nice thing to look at, to whet your appetite:
From left to right: Prince Umayado, Futsuhime, Emishi, and his sister Tojikome. Aka Emishi and his harem. Damn frat boys with Mickey Mouse hair always get the fun.-Actual incest [which, by the way, the reader sees from a mile away but is like unto a runaway locomotive in its relentless momentum], consummated via deceitful trickery
-Illegitimate children who represent about 80% of the births in the book, the most plot-central of which result from suspiciously endogamous sex
-Nonconsensual sexual acts
-Dream [GHEI] sex
-General homoerotics, riddled with more angst and Unresolved Sexual Tension than a gay Harry Potter "deathfic" and all kinds of gender issues
-Issues of which are mostly manifest in Shoutoku's repeated and highly successful cross-dressing
-Suicidal thoughts and attempts so far up the frigging wazoo that it's probably come out on the other end
-Trippy-as-hell and very distressing dreams, visions, out-of-body experiences, ESP, telekinesis, telepathy...Shoutoku will kill you with his mind
In this delightful melting-pot of freakishness, Yamagishi mixed a beautiful, cold, traumatized Prince Umayado, his [very obvious] love interest Soga no Emishi, various historically recorded folks from the Soga clan, the imperial line, and what feels like everywhere else. The thing is over two thousand pages long, so here I'll just discuss why I think this particular bit of revision is so engrossing quickly.
1. Yamagishi plotted her political and romantic intrigues with great mastery: gripping, intense, but not quite so over the top that one lost a deep engagement with the story. Mostly, she achieved this by plumbing the vast casts' psychologies with consistent dexterity. Emishi isn't just a stupid 6th-century frat boy, though that could have been his lot. His ultimate rejection of Umayado is so devastating because the reader believes that, for one, it might not have been that way "if only...", and for another, Yamagishi gives us so much insight into the human torments of the characters that we feel all the proper mono-no-aware catharsis.
2. The art feels sometimes archaic and a little stiff, but there's something about classic manga's willingness to conventialize and stylize that reveals the medium's parity to other highly formulaic yet nonetheless engaging visual genera, i.e. noh or Peking opera. It's a little silly when Umayado can't seem to put his hand on anything without making it look as delicate as possible, but then again, arguably that's part of manga's heritage from more traditional Japanese art. Where she needs it, Yamagishi makes use of the image's power to "tell all."
In short, the images and words together convey an immense, realistically textured emotional universe for not just the protagonists, but all the major characters. There are not too many absolutes in Yamagishi's world. Just about everyone is capable of making the reader groan in frustration, recoil in horror, or smile.
3. Also importantly, the manga isn't shy about its facts. The machinations of Soga no Umako, Emishi's doggedly conventional father, and virtually all of the characters, are situated with what was a surely considerable amount of research. The politics of 6th-century Japan are not just about sleeping with sisters and cross-dressing to impress, but related to international history: the Paekche-Koguryo-Silla standoff on the Korean peninsula, for instance, is of great import to the cast--and even if the reader didn't have any clue about the situation, its immediacy in the story. On the mainland, the Sui dynasty exterminates the Chen and unites a huge swathe of formerly divided territory. And, of course, the title takes its title from the famous missive Shoutoku wrote to the Sui emperor in 607: "From the ruler of the land of the rising sun, to the ruler of the land of the setting sun, greetings...."
To draw hundred of pages in quest of the legendary creature who wrote those haughty words and coined the phrase "Nihon" is impressive enough, but to give these long-dead folks, often without much more than a name, the dimensionality of people trying to cope with their situations, their emotions, their pasts, is truly the most admirable point of good history as well as good historical fiction. Sometimes the boundary isn't so clear, and verification almost seems unimportant. Yamagishi's Shoutoku, with his angelically beautiful androgyny, a boy by turns cruel, vulnerable, brilliant, loveable, domineering, and passionate, is nothing like the moralizing gentleman with a respectable beard whose portrait is printed in history books. But his divergence from that man fails to signify after we pass through the landscape that Yamagishi drew for him. That's the sign of the best kind of historifandom: with enough power that it can stand alongside what is conventionally accepted as "reality," in a strange and attractive symbiosis.
Basically, if you have time to spare and would like to spend it marathoning through an epic of some kind, Hi no izuru is an excellent choice. Have another nice thing to look at, to whet your appetite:
**Oh Wikipedia, educational as always.
2008/11/11
On the tragedy of coercion
Can I just tell you how good Watase Yuu's Sakura Gari is? (Yes, the Fushigi Yuugi woman. No, it's not as hackneyed, obviously.*) Warning, may spoil you, though this "sneak preview" color page from 2007 could give some things away as it is.
(On the right, our hardworking protagonist Masataka. On the left, our charming failed hero Souma.)
It combines the best dramatic trademarks of Yuki Kaori's work--gothic houses, hopelessly beautiful psychotic aristocrats, fancy clothes (in this case Taishou-era period wear, which is thumbs-up for sure), violence, and sex. The last is perhaps where some readers would have issues with the manga, because though this is an exceedingly sexy work, not very much of it is warm or fuzzy.
I've been thinking about why I can stomach some types of coercive sex--what I could probably call "non-sex-positive" sex--and not others (for instance, what apparently occurs in the Twilight series). The reason here may be that Watase manages to tread the delicate line between inspiring disgust at sexual violation and cathartic, tragic sympathy for the inability of the characters to escape their pasts. In this sense, the visuality of manga gives it a distinct advantage: it can convey horror and despair even as unspeakably violent, destructive acts are being perpetrated. It can accomplish a degree of psychological revelation that is almost certainly harder for the novelist. And it is that insight into the souls of Watase's dramatis personae that makes this less a suspect piece of rape apologetics than an excruciatingly well-executed piece of tragic drama that is almost Greek in its amounts of helpless self-destructiveness. The best Yuki Kaori manga have also this sense of epic personal failure. Thus we the readers can sympathize.
Another possibility might be that the players of this sad game are male. Some time ago, I read one person's account of how, as a gay man, he felt violated and horribly objectified at Yaoi-Con, "A Celebration of Male Love and Beauty" that happens not too far away from here annually. What if the target of the sexual violence here were a young woman? I suppose that would generate more distaste, at least personally, if only because (a) young women are still by far the target of most reported sexual violence and (b) the biological capacity for childbearing adds another, highly unpleasant layer onto the already problematical physical and psychological domination. In this case, then, I am siding with the explanation for "why is yaoi so popular (especially among female fans)" that attributes it to a leveling of the sexual playing field between partners. The baseline power differential is smaller than if Masataka were Masako. Furthermore, there is certainly physical force in this coercion, but much of it is in manipulative mind-games--just as abusive, but with less potential to viscerally revolt the reader than the kind of purely physical power that is all too often the basis of "normal" (that is, not same-sex) erotic manga.
Of course all this could perhaps be seen as my self-justification, but I truly feel that this work is not a massive attempt to allow prurient readers to revel in sexual exploitation. But maybe I'm the only one who sees the echoes of Classical tragedy--everyone else's just enjoying the power play and admittedly technically polished sex scenes...
*Actually, several of her lesser-known works (Ayashi no Ceres, Imadoki) are supposed to be quite good in contrast to the very, very mainstream and much less challenging FY.
(On the right, our hardworking protagonist Masataka. On the left, our charming failed hero Souma.)
It combines the best dramatic trademarks of Yuki Kaori's work--gothic houses, hopelessly beautiful psychotic aristocrats, fancy clothes (in this case Taishou-era period wear, which is thumbs-up for sure), violence, and sex. The last is perhaps where some readers would have issues with the manga, because though this is an exceedingly sexy work, not very much of it is warm or fuzzy.
I've been thinking about why I can stomach some types of coercive sex--what I could probably call "non-sex-positive" sex--and not others (for instance, what apparently occurs in the Twilight series). The reason here may be that Watase manages to tread the delicate line between inspiring disgust at sexual violation and cathartic, tragic sympathy for the inability of the characters to escape their pasts. In this sense, the visuality of manga gives it a distinct advantage: it can convey horror and despair even as unspeakably violent, destructive acts are being perpetrated. It can accomplish a degree of psychological revelation that is almost certainly harder for the novelist. And it is that insight into the souls of Watase's dramatis personae that makes this less a suspect piece of rape apologetics than an excruciatingly well-executed piece of tragic drama that is almost Greek in its amounts of helpless self-destructiveness. The best Yuki Kaori manga have also this sense of epic personal failure. Thus we the readers can sympathize.
Another possibility might be that the players of this sad game are male. Some time ago, I read one person's account of how, as a gay man, he felt violated and horribly objectified at Yaoi-Con, "A Celebration of Male Love and Beauty" that happens not too far away from here annually. What if the target of the sexual violence here were a young woman? I suppose that would generate more distaste, at least personally, if only because (a) young women are still by far the target of most reported sexual violence and (b) the biological capacity for childbearing adds another, highly unpleasant layer onto the already problematical physical and psychological domination. In this case, then, I am siding with the explanation for "why is yaoi so popular (especially among female fans)" that attributes it to a leveling of the sexual playing field between partners. The baseline power differential is smaller than if Masataka were Masako. Furthermore, there is certainly physical force in this coercion, but much of it is in manipulative mind-games--just as abusive, but with less potential to viscerally revolt the reader than the kind of purely physical power that is all too often the basis of "normal" (that is, not same-sex) erotic manga.
Of course all this could perhaps be seen as my self-justification, but I truly feel that this work is not a massive attempt to allow prurient readers to revel in sexual exploitation. But maybe I'm the only one who sees the echoes of Classical tragedy--everyone else's just enjoying the power play and admittedly technically polished sex scenes...
*Actually, several of her lesser-known works (Ayashi no Ceres, Imadoki) are supposed to be quite good in contrast to the very, very mainstream and much less challenging FY.
2008/04/04
17th-century sex education
I got a very pretty edition of Bian er chai (弁而钗)from the library, thinking I'd need it for my thesis, but all I ended up doing was reading two of the four standalone sections, namely "Chaste Love"(情贞) and "Chivalrous Love"(情侠), for fun. [The edition in question is part of a series of erotic xiaoshuo, Si wu xie hui bao, published by a joint Taiwanese-French venture, btw.]
What really tickled me were the frequent interjections from the commentator, which are to me best described as those of a "seventeenth-century literatus fanboy." I'm sure this, er, epithet will strike about zero of the people who actually work with Bian er chai as serious or even accurate, but...well, I should probably let others decide. Starting today I'll post some translated bits of the text with commentary here, and if anyone ever reads them they can sort out the fanboy-or-not question hirself. [NB: no translations of the text into English exist, as far as I'm aware. All the better because my rendition can't get compared to real professionals'!]
To assure you, dear hypothetical reader, that I'm not in this for prurient ends (alone), I should add some FYI about BEC first. Its author is known only as "West Lake-Drunk Master Moon Heart" (醉西湖心月主人); he put out another erotic anthology called the Yi chun xiang zhi (宜春香质, "Fragrance from the Court of Spring"). BEC's full name is Bi geng shan fang bian er chai (笔耕山房弁而钗), "Cap and Hairpin of the Bigeng Mountain Room," and was published late in the Ming dynasty, during the reign of Emperor Chongzhen (r. 1627-1644). The commentator called himself "Resisting Heaven is Futile Daoist Ha-ha " (奈何天呵呵道人--I know the translation sounds like Babelfish, but it's the best I could do). Master Moon-Heart wrote in baihua, or vernacular Chinese.
Now that I've gotten some kind of gesture toward edification out of the way, let me begin the first installment:
Chapter the First: The Interested Hanlin Scholar Disguises Himself to Seek a Friend; The Charming Student Shows Himself a Hero.
The tale goes that there was a student in Yangzhou prefecture, Jiangdu county, who was named Zhao Wangsun, with the courtesy name Zijian. He was fifteen, with delicate, long eyebrows and bright, quick eyes. (Daoist Ha-ha: Nice portrait.) His hair was black as if painted and hung to his shoulders. His face was pale as if powdered, and his lips red as if rouged. His teeth were white and his flesh glowing. Even an immortal would probably be not much better than this. All who saw him were bewitched.
But student Zhao was also a diligent student who had all the classics at his command, and was ambitious, so he never interacted with devious people. (Daoist Ha-ha: Good means of self-preservation.) ...[cold young master Zhao goes to attend a private school headed by one Master Qin, and is assigned a room.] After meeting his Master and hearing the strict rules of the school, student Zhao returned to his room, which was quite tidy and pleasing. Satisfied, he murmured to himself, "Now I'll be free of those lewd companions for good." (Daoist Ha-ha: Not necessarily.) ...
[Enter one hotshot Hanlin scholar, Mr. Feng, who happens to also "love the man-route." Cute Wangsun bumps into his procession one day, and there's some mutual glancing.] That Hanlin sitting on the sedan-chair was not more than twenty years old, in black-satin cap, white-soled boots, blue robe and silver belt, his face as jade and his gaze as autumn water. (Daoist Ha-ha: Like a picture.) Suddenly catching sight of student Zhao, who sparkled blindingly, the Hanlin's soul quickly vacated his flesh. He thought, "What kind of old crone gave birth to a pleasing little piece like this?"
...
[As the Hanlin and his servant-boy "Fragrance" engage in the first sex scene of the book:]
Fragrance cried out, "Sir, harder. Inside it doesn't hurt, doesn't itch, isn't sore, isn't numb--I don't know what it is, but it's uncomfortable." (Daoist Ha-ha: The Western Nirvana-paradise has appeared.) ... The lewd fluids" burst from Fragrance. (Daoist Ha-ha: Marvelous.)
Okay, I think that makes the point pretty well.
Next time, I will bring you the Joys of the "Rear Courtyard." Stay tuned!
What really tickled me were the frequent interjections from the commentator, which are to me best described as those of a "seventeenth-century literatus fanboy." I'm sure this, er, epithet will strike about zero of the people who actually work with Bian er chai as serious or even accurate, but...well, I should probably let others decide. Starting today I'll post some translated bits of the text with commentary here, and if anyone ever reads them they can sort out the fanboy-or-not question hirself. [NB: no translations of the text into English exist, as far as I'm aware. All the better because my rendition can't get compared to real professionals'!]
To assure you, dear hypothetical reader, that I'm not in this for prurient ends (alone), I should add some FYI about BEC first. Its author is known only as "West Lake-Drunk Master Moon Heart" (醉西湖心月主人); he put out another erotic anthology called the Yi chun xiang zhi (宜春香质, "Fragrance from the Court of Spring"). BEC's full name is Bi geng shan fang bian er chai (笔耕山房弁而钗), "Cap and Hairpin of the Bigeng Mountain Room," and was published late in the Ming dynasty, during the reign of Emperor Chongzhen (r. 1627-1644). The commentator called himself "Resisting Heaven is Futile Daoist Ha-ha " (奈何天呵呵道人--I know the translation sounds like Babelfish, but it's the best I could do). Master Moon-Heart wrote in baihua, or vernacular Chinese.
Now that I've gotten some kind of gesture toward edification out of the way, let me begin the first installment:
Chapter the First: The Interested Hanlin Scholar Disguises Himself to Seek a Friend; The Charming Student Shows Himself a Hero.
The tale goes that there was a student in Yangzhou prefecture, Jiangdu county, who was named Zhao Wangsun, with the courtesy name Zijian. He was fifteen, with delicate, long eyebrows and bright, quick eyes. (Daoist Ha-ha: Nice portrait.) His hair was black as if painted and hung to his shoulders. His face was pale as if powdered, and his lips red as if rouged. His teeth were white and his flesh glowing. Even an immortal would probably be not much better than this. All who saw him were bewitched.
But student Zhao was also a diligent student who had all the classics at his command, and was ambitious, so he never interacted with devious people. (Daoist Ha-ha: Good means of self-preservation.) ...[cold young master Zhao goes to attend a private school headed by one Master Qin, and is assigned a room.] After meeting his Master and hearing the strict rules of the school, student Zhao returned to his room, which was quite tidy and pleasing. Satisfied, he murmured to himself, "Now I'll be free of those lewd companions for good." (Daoist Ha-ha: Not necessarily.) ...
[Enter one hotshot Hanlin scholar, Mr. Feng, who happens to also "love the man-route." Cute Wangsun bumps into his procession one day, and there's some mutual glancing.] That Hanlin sitting on the sedan-chair was not more than twenty years old, in black-satin cap, white-soled boots, blue robe and silver belt, his face as jade and his gaze as autumn water. (Daoist Ha-ha: Like a picture.) Suddenly catching sight of student Zhao, who sparkled blindingly, the Hanlin's soul quickly vacated his flesh. He thought, "What kind of old crone gave birth to a pleasing little piece like this?"
...
[As the Hanlin and his servant-boy "Fragrance" engage in the first sex scene of the book:]
Fragrance cried out, "Sir, harder. Inside it doesn't hurt, doesn't itch, isn't sore, isn't numb--I don't know what it is, but it's uncomfortable." (Daoist Ha-ha: The Western Nirvana-paradise has appeared.) ... The lewd fluids" burst from Fragrance. (Daoist Ha-ha: Marvelous.)
Okay, I think that makes the point pretty well.
Next time, I will bring you the Joys of the "Rear Courtyard." Stay tuned!
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