• 2020-05-15

In an effort to promote cultural arts and encourage the public to read classical literature, on January 18, 2020, National Central Library and the Trend Education Foundation held the second lecture in the series “Trend Literature Theater: The Fantastical Han Dynasty” Gusting Winds Lecture Series. The event was hosted by the Executive Director of Trend Education Foundation Jenny Chen; invited to lecture was Academia Sinica Academician and National Taiwan University Chair Professor Dr. Yu-yu Cheng, who spoke on “Desire and Empire: Sima Xiangru’s Writing of All-under-Heaven.”

Dr. Cheng’s research expertise is in classical Chinese literature, especially that of Han rhapsodies. The lecture began with an introduction to the Han dynasty and Han rhapsodies. The Han dynasty is the longest dynasty in Chinese history. During the apex of Emperor Wu’s reign, how to maintain unity in the dynasty was one of the emperor’s most critical issues. In Han rhapsody, the most important poet was Sima Xiangru. His two representative works, “Rhapsody on Zixu” and “Rhapsody on the Supreme Park,” not only describe through flowery words and many melodic sounds the possessions of a ruler but more so the desires of a ruler. That, it can be said, is almost without limit—such as the exhaustive nature of his writings.

Dr. Cheng gave a guided reading of selected passages from the two rhapsodies, showing through Sima Xiangru’s wordsmithing a reflection of Emperor Wu’s desires, as well as creating a special dimension through text. Describing through lively words the empire or imaginative world that transcends time and space, he proclaims the formation of a supremely magnificent world never before known. It could also be said that through the text he created or constructed an eternal Han empire, embodying Emperor Wu’s bottomless desire to “possess All-under-Heaven” on his throne.