Classic of Poetry

Bizarrely enough, aesthetics-centered romanticization of the yin archetype is intimately bound up (and in gross paradoxical sympathy) with the subjugation of women to the sexual and romantic mores of the patriarchal order. This commonplace dyad—domineering double-standard romanticism and an oppressive (frankly silly) passion for inaccessible archetypes--is at the heart of The Classic of Poetry. The libido-corrputing ideal of a virginal purity is affixed to the young girl's concept of romanticosexual dynamics in this compendium of poetic didact and dicta.

In “Fishhawk” the mesmerizing refrain “pure and fair,” and the lavishing of princely attentions on the “gentle maiden,” serve to inculcate notions of the preeminence of the submissive and virginal. The same aesthetic is evident in “Plums are Falling,” where the monogamous ideal is underscored; and more graphically, in “Dead Roe Deer,” where temptation is linked to the ugliness of death, and the originary terror of death is employed as an inculcative tool: loss of virginity is likened to a cadaver, and amorous desire to the barking of a “cur.” While in “Zhongzi, Please” the more canny fear of social isolation and rejection by father, mother and brother are called into play to discourage the extra-monogamous tryst.

These corrupt fixities and obsessions of the patriarchal mind have an aesthetic basis: The gentle virgin, conceived as more evocative of masculine passions and attentions, provides the masculine spirit and biochemistry with the profound omni-connective and self-and-time-transcendent sensations associated with appreciation of a masterly work of art. This subjugative mysticism—the wish to recruit and oppress a fellow lifeform for the purpose of perpetualizing the omni-connective sensation forming the heart of the mystical—has been a source of gender tension in the West as well, buttressed up for centuries (and millenia) by the chivalric and knightly marian ideal.










“Classic of Poetry,” Owen, Stephen, trans. Puchner, Martin, ed. The Norton Anthology of World
             Literature. Third ed. Vol. 1&2. New York: W.W. Norton, 2013. 756-766. Print.

Somadeva

"The Red Lotus of Chastity" paints the picture of a moral atmosphere accepting of deception and intrigue as a practical habit. The heroine, Devasmita, instinctively employs the deceptive arts to secure her happy ending, to the approving hearty laughter of king and all.

Devasmita looks to stories of past deceptions for precedent and encouragement in intrigue. The motif of the heroine in disguise serving to hoodwink a male authority seems to suggest the greater wit and cunning of the feminine mind. It may also imply a general distrust for feminine wiles. But taking into account Somadeva's patron queen, Suryamati of Kashmir, for whom he composed the bulky compendium of tales (and tales within tales), the motive of the author is clear: He sought to entertain his queen with agreeable conceits centering on the aggrandizement of feminine prowess in intrigue. One can imagine the queen satisfactorily entertained by the quick wit and strategic thinking, and edified by the devotion and constancy, of the heroine Devasmita.

The general ambience and thematic content of the work speak more to the relation of author and patron than to broad-brush male-female, culturally contextualized interactions, in my view. What the composition has to say about its cultural locus can hardly be pinpointed without extensive research into the character of patron and poet and male-female politics of the age and queendom.

Work Cited

Somadeva. "From Kathasaritsagara." The Norton Anthology of World Literature. Third ed. Vol. 1. New York: W. W. Norton, 2013. 1274-1279. Print.

Biography

David Evans is a spiritualist and student of the Creation, anti-citizen of the infamous hyperreality and aspiring Transcendant of the fickle, fairweather cadaver. Born to the Dark and Luminous Age---the superimposition of all times upon all times!---of the wild Western, strictly canny, schizo-capitalist experiment (maddest of sciences!), he has set his little spirit and voice against the anti-poeticomysticality of the terror-reign of the atom and its funny little quanta (but not, to be sure, against the (transparticular!) Mysteries beyond). He hopes to make Death proud.