The story of a deer
Suddenly feel like telling a story.
Ancient poets used to write using flowery languages to describe love. They were one damn bunch of romantic pple actually. I'll share with u how romantic they are next time. Tonight i shall begin with a story abt an animal - a deer. Famous poets like Han Yu and Liu Zhong Yuan placed much emphasis on the content of their literature works rather than the flowery of it. And they started a movement against use of useless flowery language. My fellow sec lit classmates, hope it can refresh a bit of it in u. LOL.
柳宗元
临江之人，畋得麋麑，畜之。入门，群犬垂涎，扬尾皆来，
其人怒怛之。自是日抱就犬，习示之，稍使与之戏。
积久，犬皆如人意。麋麑稍大，忘己之麋也，以为犬良我友，抵触偃仆益狎。犬畏主
人，与之俯仰甚善。然时啖其舌。
三年，麋出门，见外犬在道甚众，走欲与为戏。外犬见而喜且怒，共杀食之，狼藉道上。麋致死不悟。
畋：读音tián，打猎。麑：读音ní幼鹿
怛：读音dá，恐吓
良：真
偃：读音yǎn，仰倒
啖：读音dàn，吃，这里作舔解
I copied the original text so that u can have a look.
This is how the story goes, in a place called Lin Jiang, there was a hunter, and on one faithful day, he went hunting and found a very young deer. He decided to keep it as a pet. Upon entering his house, his pet dogs(seemingly more than a handful accordingly to the text) all went near him waggling their tails and drooling. This hunter was furious and shouted at them. From that day onwards, he carried the young deer faithfully everyday to let it mingle with the dogs, and tried his best to tame the dogs to play with the young deer.
After a some long time(according to the term 积久), the dogs were really tamed and acted as the owner wanted. And the deer had grown up, but it had forgotten that it was a deer. The deer then had thought that the dogs were indeed its good friends, very often it would show its intimacy with the dogs like knocking its head into them and play ard with each other. The dogs were fearful of the owner, and pretended to be good friends with it. However, sometimes, they could not help but drool(an example of a leopard cannot change its spots) !
3 years later, the deer went out of the house on its own. It saw a large group of wild dogs, went up and wanted to play with them. The wild dogs, upon seeing it, were happy yet furious(maybe the writer meant that they were drooling and hostile at the same time towards the deer), they went up, killed and ate the deer up. The deer's carcass was torn to pieces and was all over the area. The deer died not knowing the reason.
Can anyone tell me wad is the writer trying to mean in this piece of work?
posted by GoldJade at
12:55 AM
9 Comments:
I think this story reflects the hypocrisy of human nature, which is told through the story of this deer and the dogs; where unrestrained by any stricture, one does not need to conceal his true colours (the dogs); and where one has an ulterior motive, one will resort to certain measures, and in doing so often subdue their own true nature.
In both cases, the deer can still be seen as a victim; it was a victim of hypocrisy and ingenuine friendship with the first pack of dogs, then a victim of ignorance to the very same species' true nature in a sadly different context. This story perhaps underlines the deceptiveness and hypocrisy in our society, and the sad, practical reality that perhaps some part of our innocence (and thus ignorance) has to be lost for us to survive in this harsh world; to which the deer's innocence/ignorance certainly did not get him far, in fact, it disarmed the deer to the point it was oblivious of any danger even as it walked into the tiger's den (very aptly chinese phrase here =P).
His death at the end is a pity, and sadly inevitable, and his not knowing the reason for his own death further highlights its innocence/ignorance untainted by the world. However, it might not be an entirely sad affair, for it retains its innocence and goodness; of which in this case, IGNORANCE is perhaps indeed a BLISS for the deer =D
OOPS, I meant LION's den... then again, in order to have a stronger chinese reference to 羊入虎口, I'll still settle for TIGER's den, or is 虎 lion????? OOPS! Blur liao...
Wow. Critically written. Well, let me slightly intro the back ground of the author. He was involved in politics and lost grounds in it, while those in power continued to try to protect certain group of political figures, granting them lots of privileges.
The author felt that those under the protection of such political power were arrogant. He detested them and thought that they would eventually lose their own selves in this deep shit.
Anyway, he wrote it in a very very indirect manner, cos he definitely need to cover his own ass. I feel that wad u have written have illustrated similar hidden meanings which he intended, but from a different angle=D
Of cos he tried to write in a way which causes sympathy for this "deer". However, if readers realised who this deer is, it will be turned into ridicule=D
Oic, haa knowing the poet's background is useful, but not surely a good thing I suppose; I had an inkling about the poet's resentment with social at large, but I could not put a finger on what it is exactly, which is think is the purpose of a poem. The subtlety with which the poem conveys its words allows room for both the intended social purpose as well as the appreciation of the beauty of literary art itself.
Haha. I feel that the correct way is to hear ur view 1st b4 letting u know the background. Cos anybody who researches on a literature work, generally read the work 1st den research on them=D
By the way, i feel that this prose is short and well written. And it would be easier for me to translate cos its very short!=D
Haa, too bad I can't dissect chinese poems well whatsoever and my severely limited mastery of the language doesn't help in my full appreciation of the literary work itself either.
Short poems are nice, EPIC poems are a drag, really, just like the EPIC matches we have in dota.
Lol, sorry for my spams, I'm running off at my mouth! Luckily, no one notices this except you and I, haa... just how long more are we gonna expand on this tread? I'm waiting for you to concede =X
Feel free to spam. maximize the use of this space man!=D
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