382 a s y n tHe sis
Tetrasyllabic Shi Poetry
We begin with the semantic rhythm and syntactic constructions of early tetra-
syllabic shi poetry. As shown in chapter 1, the Book of Poetry is made up largely of
poems composed in tetrasyllabic lines. A tetrasyllabic line almost uniformly con-
sists of two disyllabic segments. So 2 + 2 becomes the distinctive semantic rhythm
of tetrasyllabic shi poetry. Depending on the words chosen, this 2 + 2 rhythm en-
acts either a subject + predicate or a topic + comment construction:peach tree this yao yao 桃之夭夭 (táo zhī yāo yāo)
zhuo zhuo its flowers 灼灼其華 (zhuó zhuó qí huá)
this girl going to marry 之子于歸 (zhī zǐ yú guī)
fit her chamber house 宜其室家 (yí qí shì jiā)
In this stanza from “The Peach Tree Tender” (C1.2), lines 3 and 4 each constitute
a subject + predicate construction. Line 3 introduces a complete declarative state-
ment (“This girl is going to be married”) and line 4 a truncated one, with the sub-
ject omitted (“fit for her chamber and house”). Lines 1 and 2 each introduce a topic
+ comment construction. In line 1, the “peach tree” marks the topic of attention,
while “yaoyao,” a reduplicative (lianmian zi), constitutes the comment on the peach
tree by the perceiver. Line 2 displays the same structure even though the comment
(zhuozhuo) is placed before the topic (peach flowers).
Lines 1 and 2 exhibit the distinctive features of the originative topic + com-
ment construction in the Book of Poetry. It typically yokes together two disparate
segments—an external object and an inward response—without any connective.
It is also marked by a prodigious use of reduplicatives as the comment. While
English reduplicatives are usually onomatopoeic (for example, “hush-hush” and
“ticktock”) and sometimes conceptual as well (for example, “hanky-panky” and
“helter-skelter”), reduplicatives in the Book of Poetry primarily express a perceiver’s
emotional response to external phenomena by translating it into alliterative and
rhyming sounds untainted by conceptualization. This emotive use of reduplica-
tives has had a lasting impact on Chinese poetry.Sao Poetry
The Chuci (Lyrics of Chu) furnishes us with the first instance of a significant
remolding of the topic + comment construction. The basic rhythm of early Chuci
works is 3 + 2. As shown in the following excerpt, the initial trisyllabic segment is
made up of a monosyllabic word and a binome and entails a minor pause (as indi-
cated by ◦). Thus the semantic rhythm may be detailed as (1 + 2 or 2 + 1) + 2. The
total number of 5, however, should not be confused with the actual character count
of a line. A line of an early Chuci work contains one pause-indicating character, xi,
placed in the middle (after the third word). This 3 + 2 rhythm gives rise, in most
cases, to a topic + comment construction:lord◦ not come xi^ hesitant — 君不行兮夷猶
oh◦ whom linger xi middle isle 蹇誰留兮中洲