Chapter 26 Drinking alone in the rain

Life will come to an end, as it has always been said.There are Songqiao in the world, where will it be now?Therefore, when the old man gave the rest of the wine, he said that drinking would make him immortal;How can God go here?Ren Zhen has nothing to do first.Yunhe has strange wings, and the eight watches can be returned in a moment.I have been alone for forty years.The body has been transformed for a long time, what can I say when the heart is recovering? This is a drinking poem, but also a philosophical poem.According to the two lines in the poem "I have been alone, I have been alone for forty years", the general chronology determines that this poem was written by Tao Yuanming at the age of 40 in the third year of Emperor Yuanxing of Jin'an (404).However, Tao Yuanming also wrote in his poem "Encountering Fire in the middle of June at the age of Wushen", which says: "I am always lonely, and I am dying for forty years." The age of Wushen was the fourth year of Jin'an Emperor Yixi (408), and Tao Yuanming was 44 years old. , After resigning from Pengze county magistrate and returning to the field.Therefore, we can also speculate that "Drinking in the Rain Alone" was written after the poet returned to the field.

The title of the poem is "Drinking Alone in the Rain", which points out the environment in which the poet drinks. In the rainy weather, the poet lives and drinks alone, feeling lonely and contemplative.At the beginning of the chapter, a serious topic is put forward: "Luck and life will come to an end, and it will always be true in ancient times." People are born between heaven and earth, which is constantly running, and they will eventually die, which has been the case since ancient times.Although this sentence came straight from the sky, it has been a topic that the poet has often haunted his mind and expressed his pen since he was 40 years old.Since the nineteen ancient poems at the end of the Han Dynasty, the lament of "life less than a hundred" has been repeated in literati poetry.Tao Yuanming, on the other hand, integrates the natural fortune of human beings into the movement and transformation of all things in the world, and puts it in such a broad field of vision since ancient times, so he talks about the natural phenomenon that life is bound to die in a rational and philosophical style.

Under the premise that "luck and life will come to an end", the poet further thought about the attitude he should adopt in life.Taoism preaches the theory of becoming immortal by taking food, in an attempt to artificially prolong the life span.Since the Wei and Jin Dynasties, this has aroused the interest of some celebrities in "taking medicine" for health preservation.However, the turbulent society and dark politics have also made some literati who are in danger and precarious see through the falseness of the fairy tale.Cao Zhi once sighed: "Nothingness seeks to be an immortal, and pine nuts have been deceiving me for a long time. The accident is here, who can last for a hundred years?" ("Gift to the White Horse Wang Biao") Tao Yuanming also had "the hometown of the emperor" in "Return to Come Come" Unexpected" enlightenment words.Therefore, the next two lines of the poem are a rhetorical question against the Taoist immortals: "There are Songqiao in the world, where is it now?" If there are immortals in the world, then where are the legendary immortals Chisongzi and Wang Ziqiao today? where?

The first four lines of the poem are just talking about the mortal nature of life, and the gods cannot be believed, so they turned to drinking: "The old man gave me the rest of the wine, which is to say that he can drink to the gods; try to drink for a long time, and forget the sky when you drink it again." Ancient Poem Ten There is such a poem in the nine poems: "Take food to seek gods, and most of them are mistaken by medicine. It is better to drink fine wine and be served with money and vegetables."Tao Yuanming also turned from denying the existence of gods to drinking, but he has his own new ideas. The word "Nai" in "Naiyan Yindexian" follows the previous two sentences of "Songqiao", forming a semantic turning point.The well-informed old man even said that drinking can make you immortal.So the poet first "tasted" a cup, and he really felt that all kinds of lusts that dragged his life away from him one after another;This is the wonderful realm of the so-called "drinking fairy" by the "old man"!

However, "Where is the sky going here? Ren Zhen has nothing to do first." A word "天" connects the previous sentence, and a question sentence is used as a turning point.Is it true that everything in the world is far away?Then he answered with "Ren Zhen has nothing to do first".Ren Zhen can be said to be a state of mind, which is the state of "a hundred emotions far away" experienced by the poet with the stimulation of drinking.The potential meaning of this poem is that people and all things are born from the breath of heaven and earth, but people have "all kinds of emotions".If people can forget their feelings and self, they will achieve the state of being one with things and the natural movement and transformation, and will not feel separated from the world, or fantasize about surpassing the laws of natural movement and transformation to seek gods.This is Ren Zhen, that is, Ren Tian.Of course, this state of mind is only short-lived, and the word "hu" in "Hu Wangtian" points out that this is a temporary feeling.Renzhen is also an attitude towards life, which refers to conforming to the laws of one's own destiny.Tao Yuanming does not advocate drinking all day long to forget worries. He believes that "you can forget when you are drunk, and it will not be a tool for promoting age?" "("May Dan Zuo He Dai Master Book"), live a simple and natural life.

"The cloud crane has strange wings, and the eight signs will be returned in a moment." These two sentences still use the allusion of the fairy Wang Ziqiao.According to "Biography of the Immortals", Wang Ziqiao ascended to heaven "on a white crane".Yunhe has magical wings, which can fly high and far away, and can fly back quickly.But Tao Yuanming did not believe in gods, nor did he imagine the poetic fantasy of traveling far away on a crane, but had his own uniqueness: "I have been alone for forty years." And for, it has been forty years.This expresses the poet's attitude towards life of being independent and natural, and also shows the poet's aloof and honest personality.

The last two sentences sum up the whole article: "The body has been transformed for a long time, so what can the heart say?" Transformation and me." The whole poem is deduced from the observation of "life will come to an end" to the observation of the change of self-form. "The heart is there" refers to the sincere heart that the poet has always adhered to for more than forty years.These two poems have the same meaning as the saying in "Fire in the middle of June in Wushen Year" that "the appearance depends on the change, and the head of the Lingfu is alone".Let the shape change gradually according to the laws of nature until it disappears. I have already firmly established my faith, so what worries are there?These two poems can also be regarded as the abbreviation of the epilogue in "Xingyingshen · Shenshi": "In the midst of the turmoil, neither joy nor fear, do what you need, and don't worry about being alone." , Tao Yuanming's theory of natural migration is different from the theory of nothingness and world-weariness, which regards life as a burden and death as a release.

Looking at the whole poem, it starts with "life will come to an end", with deep emotion, then talks about the experience of drinking, and puts "everything" away, and ends with "the body has long been melted", which seems to be triggered, but ends with The phrase "what can I say in my heart" is stopped.The whole poem always conceals the specific reasons that trigger the poet's emotion of life and death, but it is thought-provoking and has an endless aftertaste.The whole poem focuses on discussing philosophy and self-liberation. Questions are used several times, causing semantic transitions and tone changes, which can be reflected back and forth, and fasten the topic at the beginning.These all show the characteristics of Tao Yuanming's philosophical poems.In connection with Tao Yuanming's life story, the poet gradually felt aging after the age of 40, and he reflected on life more consciously.He was anxious about failing in his career, and reminiscing about his "true thoughts" about falling into officialdom by mistake; after resigning from office at the age of 41 and returning to the farm, he also had troubles such as loneliness, poverty, and aging.In order to get rid of all kinds of confusion, the poet tried to explain the "suffering of form and shadow" with the theory of "nature" on the premise that life is mortal.Poems such as "Drinking in the Rain Alone" and "Shadow and Shadow" were successively written under this background.Therefore, the poet's attitude towards life and death when he talks about life and death, and his attitude towards life, really contains deep emotions about life. It also shows that after the poet is tired of the fake and dark social reality, he has always been alone in his simple and poor rural life. A true heart, an aloof personality that doesn't care about the burden of the world.