In the 4th century BC, a new type of writing-SONGS OF CHU (楚辞, “Chu Ci” in Chinese) came into being in the Chu Kingdom in the Southern part of China. This new type of writing, originated by Qu Yuan, was being imitated by more and more people among whom Song Yu was the most famous one. During the reign of Qin, people paid little attention to 《The Songs of Chu》. When it came to the Han Dynasty in 26 BC, Liu Xiang compiled a book entitled 《The Songs of Chu》 which collected the works of Qu Yuan, Song Yu and some other imitators. Liu’s book contained 16 volumes, but all of them got lost in the later years. Wang Yi of the Eastern Han Dynasty wrote an annotation of 《The Songs of Chu》 which was entitled 《The Syntactic & Semantic Analysis of the Songs of Chu》which has 17 volumes, still exist and has always been popular. So, the term-THE SONGS OF CHU has two meanings: 1, a new type of writing occurred in the Kingdom of Chu during the Warring States period with Qu Yuan as its chief representative; 2, a title for the collection of ancient poetry that contains the works of Qu Yuan and others. Whatever the meaning is, the most important poet in 《The Songs of Chu》 is Qu Yuan, because he was the originator of this new type of poetry, his poems are most valuable and take up a greater part of the collection.
《The Songs of Chu》 has its own features. It is said its entire works were written in the Chu dialect with Chu pronunciations, and they referred to Chu place names and things happened in Chu. As a matter of fact, 《离骚, Li Sao, Grievances》, the representative work of Qu Yuan was a term in the Chu dialect of the time. Among these features, the Chu pronunciation is the most important, because this type of writing was a form of singing based on Chu dialect. When Liu Bang and his troops encircled Xiang Yu’s army, he asked his soldiers to sing Chu songs from all sides to shake the morale of Xiang Yu’s soldiers who were mainly from the Chu area and when they heard the hometown songs, they had no heart to fight any more. So, Liu won the battle and then became the first emperor of Han. We can see from this story that Chu songs were very attractive and dear to the Chu people. Chu was a big state during the Warring States period, it was situated in the basins of Changjiang and Huaihe rivers with fertile soil and abundant products. Its people were very fond of music and dances. Thus it provided favorable conditions for the development of singing and poetry. Wang Yi told us in his prelude to 《The Syntactic & Semantic Analysis of the Nine Songs》 that “as a custom of the Chu people, they believed in ghost and liked to offer sacrifices, and when there was a sacrificial ceremony, there were always singing and dancing in order to make the gods happy.” “九歌, Jiu Ge, Nine Songs” was a work of Qu Yuan’s revised version of folk songs for offering sacrifices to gods. 《The Songs of Chu》 contains many fairy tales and legends. It is rich in splendid imagination. The strong local flavor of Chu constitutes the uniqueness of 《The Songs of Chu》.
Unlike 《The Book of Songs》, the words in 《The Songs of Chu》 are much longer in both length and sentences. 《Grievances》 and 《Nine Chapters》 were written by basically six-word-a line sentences while 《Nine Songs》 by five-word a line sentences. 《The Songs of Chu》 is much stronger in feeling, more complicated in content and more varied in style.
《The Songs of Chu》 can never be parted from the name of Qu Yuan who originated a new type of writing, which can amplify the expressional power of poetry. With this new artistic form, Qu Yuan, the first great poet in China’s history of literature, composed many patriotic and beautiful poems. Until now we can still feel its intense artistic strength. In more than 2,000 years, his poems have been on the lips of people. His love of his state and people has been encouraging the Chinese people.
Qu Yuan was listed in the 20th century as one of the most famous person of culture in the world. He was born on January 14, 339BC, died in 278BC at the age of 62. He was the “Zuo Tu” (左徒) in the cabinet of King Huai of Chu. Zuo Tu was a position right after the prime minister. He was appointed later the Minister of Patriarchal Affairs. The position was called “San Lǚ Dai Fu”in Chinese. “San Lǚ” means “three family names”. The nobility of Chu was composed of three families of Zhao(昭),Qu(屈) and Jing(景). On this position, Qu Yuan was responsible for the education of the children of these families. Sima Qian said in his 《Record of History》that Qu Yuan “discussed state affairs with the king when he entered the palace and issued orders when he came out of the palace. He received guests and dealt with other dukes. The King really trusted him.” 《Record of history》 also tells us that he “had acquired a wide knowledge and a remarkable memory. He was good at handling social unrest and very articulate.” He was, however, being elbowed out by those in the ruling clique who envied his position and talents. As a result, King Huai of Chu believed their malicious slanders and deposed Qu Yuan, who, out of his love of Chu, cherished a broad aspiration in reforming the politics in Chu and helping Chu to unify the whole of China. Yet, the King didn’t have a clear sense of what was right and wrong, Qu was no longer able to contribute his efforts. There was only reactionary nobility around King Huai of Chu since Qu Yuan was dismissed from his office and the political life in Chu was thrown into confusion. There were supposed to be seven powers existing during the Warring States period, but Han, Zhao and Wei were smaller and weaker states, the state of Yan was far in the northeast, aloof from the center of struggle for supremacy. The state of Qin in the northwest with strong armies was actively expanding. Qi and Chu were big powers from the Spring and Autumn period, Chu had the largest territory and Qi was the richest state. As a matter of fact, those who were contending were Qin and Chu. The best policy for Chu was to ally itself with Qi in opposition to Qin. Qu Yuan advocated this policy and favored reform. To our regret, this upright stand of Qu Yuan was strongly opposed by the reactionary nobility. We can say the process of Chu’s decline caused the tragedy of Qu Yuan. To annex other states, Qin did everything possible to break the alliance between Qi and Chu, yet, at the same time, the ruling clique of Chu was time and again deceived by Qin until King Huai of Chu was lured into Qin and finally died as a prisoner there. The son of King Huai of Chu, King Qing Xiang was even more fatuous than his father and still pursued a pro-Qin policy. Qu Yuan was further persecuted and was sent into exile by the side of Mi Luo River in Hunan. As a result, Qin troops took Ying, the capital of Chu in 278BC and the tombs of all Chu kings were burnt into ashes. The King and his ministers fled in panic, and Chu was never able to rise again. Qu Yuan was 62 when Qin took over Chu. Seeing his own state being defeated, he could no longer restrain his grief and indignation, the poem 《The Elegy on Ying》 was composed. Before his death, he wrote another poem- 《Remembrance of Sha》. It was on the fifth of May that year; he drowned himself in the Mi Luo River. It was not yet three months since the fall of Ying. It is said that the people of Chu deplored at the loss of such a great poet, they rowed their boats hurriedly to save him, they threw “Zhongzi”- glutinous rice with fillings wrapped by reed (leaves)- into the river to keep Qu Yuan away from being eaten by fish. This is how the Dragon Boat Festival and the custom of eating Zhongzi started. The festival and the custom reflect how much people feel for and respect Qu Yuan.
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