This episode, the podcast takes a look at a poem Mao Zedong wrote in February 1936, after he and his party had undergone the near-death experience of the Long March. Yet still, Mao has the gumption to imply in the poem that he would be the greatest ruler China had ever seen. 

My Translation:

Original Poem

沁园春·雪

北国风光，千里冰封，万里雪飘。望长城内外，惟余莽莽；大河上下，顿失滔滔。山舞银蛇，原驰蜡象，欲与天公试比高。须晴日，看红装素裹，分外妖娆。

江山如此多娇，引无数英雄竞折腰。惜秦皇汉武，略输文采；唐宗宋祖，稍逊风骚。一代天骄，成吉思汗，只识弯弓射大雕。俱往矣，数风流人物，还看今朝。

AI Generated Transcript:

  My name is Lee Moore and this is the Chinese Literature podcast. Today we have a very cool episode for you. It’s a poem written by a dude. His name is, hang on, let me, let me check my notes here. But Ong, he wrote a poem called Spring in a Soaked Garden Snow. So kind of a two part name there. Spring in a Soaked Garden, snow Re.

But before we get into the discussion of that MAO poem, I first want to remind y’all my book China’s Backstory, the history of Beijing doesn’t want you to read, is coming out September 30th. I’m dropping this podcast either at the end of July or at the very beginning of August. I recorded this in July.

It was meant to be a July podcast, but I’m actually waiting on Word from my publishers Unsung Voices books. They’re finishing up right now as I speak with getting the pre-order page ready before. When I came onto the podcast, I would say, Hey, pre-order my book. But you weren’t really pre-ordering it, you were just giving my publishers your email.

So now at this very moment, you can go to the website and actually hand money to my publishers. I know this because I’m not gonna let this podcast drop until we have all our ducks in order, and y’all can do that. So if you go to the podcast website, that’s chinese literature podcast.com, you click on the button at the top that says, pre-order my book exclamation point.

That will take you to the publisher’s pre-order page for those of y’all who’ve already quote unquote, pre-ordered by giving unsung voices books your email address. So I think they’re gonna send you an email just letting you know to go to the site, and it should be available for you to, to actually give them your credit card information.

But if you are eagerly anticipating the book coming out, you can head over there right now. The book is called China’s Backstory, the History Beijing doesn’t want you to read. It takes a look at the four most important China related issues winding up in the news feeds of most Americans, Xinjiang, Taiwan, the Chinese economy, and Hong Kong.

This book is written by me, an expert if I do humbly say so myself. It’s, it’s not written for experts, it’s written for everyday folks. There’s no jargon. You don’t need to know anything about Chinese history though. If you’re listening to this podcast, you probably already know quite a bit about Chinese history.

The book is written to be fun. The Xinjiang section has a drinking game embedded in it. As I go through the history of Xinjiang, every time someone gets beheaded or otherwise loses their head, you if you are playing the drinking game. You’re supposed to take a shot and the history of Xinjiang is so violent that there are gonna be some sections you need to be careful about driving.

After reading the history of Taiwan section, I have a segment that’s titled The Gay Taiwanese Pirates Who Changed History. It’s how a group of Chinese, Japanese, Taiwanese pirates, I don’t know how they would describe their identity, but rumor has it that they were literally in bed together, and that is.

Partially responsible for Taiwan. The island becoming a Chinese island. There’s another section titled, actually, I can’t really say it on the podcast, ’cause unlike the book, the podcast is family friendly. I try to keep the podcast clean, but this is a chapter in the Taiwanese section of the book. And if y’all listen to the podcast regularly, y’all are gonna be pretty good at reading between the lines.

So this. Segment in the Taiwan section of the book is called The Most Important Mother Flipper in Taiwanese history. All of that is to say this is not your typical, well-researched, boring China book written by an academic. This is a well-researched, funny, irreverent book on China written by an academic.

So go take a look at the website, chinese literature podcast.com. Click on pre-order. My book, exclamation Point, the book is coming out September 30th. If you pre-order now, we’ll send it out to you. Okay. I’m sick of promoting myself and bragging about how awesome me and my book are. Let’s turn to today’s poem, which is by Mao Zong, and it’s all about Mao bragging about how awesome he is.

So as I mentioned before, the poem’s called Spring in a Soaked Garden Snow. The poem was written in. February, 1936, though it was not published until November 14th, 1945. That was the first time it was published, but obviously Mao was still not in power until 1949. Uh, it gets republished in 1957. Let’s zero in on the.

Period in which it’s written. 1934, the Chinese Communist Party was in a bind from October, 1934 to October, 1935. The Communist Party participated in what’s. Called the Long March. They were forced to abandon their main base in southern China as Chiang Kai-shek successfully. Finally pushed them out of that base there, that, uh, Ong had been a leader in the CCP, didn’t know what to do.

They spent the next year marching from southern China to southwestern China. Then across the eastern edge of. Tibet and then they dropped into that communist base in North China. In Yan. Early on in the long march at the Sunni conference, Mao became the unquestioned leader of the CCPA position he would maintain for the rest of his life.

The CCP marched for a full year at nearly every turn. They were almost destroyed. The main CCP Army, that is the first red Army, they left their main base in southern China with 86,000 members in October, 1934. By the time they arrived at Nan, they had only 7,000 people left, so they had lost about 90% of the people in their army.

Looking back on this period, we can see this long March as a success story for the CCP because despite their massive losses, they found this new base in Northern China that kept them away from their main enemy. That was Chiang Kai Shk, and it gave them a chance to fight the Japanese who were. Gonna become hated colonizers.

The base that they found was isolated, which allowed the CCP to become this very powerful organization. A decade later, when the Japanese were defeated by America at Hiroshima and Nagasaki, the CCP would emerge from a very strong position. They would come out of World War II hitting very hard and eventually.

They were able to take over the country and push Chiang Kai-shek to Taiwan. But at the time, in 1936, it didn’t look like that. In February, 1936, Mao looked like he was just barely hanging on five months before his ragtag army of communists had limped into Yan. If I were a betting man, I would not in February, 1936, have put my money on Mao.

Looking back, it’s easy to underestimate how precarious the CCPs chances of survival. Were So, Mao writes this poem in classical Chinese Spring in a Soaked Garden snow. It is a poem that’s a style of Chinese poetry that became popular in the Song Dynasty. So from around nine 60 to 1279. In English.

Sometimes we call that a lyric or a song lyric, and here song is referring not to the dynasty, but to the thing that she’s sing. It’s all very confusing, but it makes for great puns. There’s a section in my book on the Song Dynasty. I called that section, new song. Same old tune. Sorry, I’m a dad, so I have to make dad jokes.

Okay, back to mouse poem. I’m just going to read you mouse. This is a poem here. This is my own translation. Spring in a soaked garden snow, the North Country scenery, frozen over for a thousand miles, snow floating for 10,000 miles. I look inside and outside the Great Wall of China. All that remains is Boundlessness, up and down the Yellow River.

It suddenly has lost its surging vigor. The mountains dance like silver snakes, the plains gallop like white elephants. I want to compete with heaven and see which of us is taller. I must wait for a clear day and look at the snowy landscape wrapped in red and white. It’s really but witching the rivers and mountains of this land.

They’re so pretty. It has brought out countless heroes to compete and to serve the nation. Pity the first Chinese emperor and Han Wdi, the greatest Han Emperor. Their writing ability ain’t all that good. Tongue tied own. The Greatest of the Tongue, emperors and Song, the greatest song Emperor. They kind of lack style.

Those northern barbarian rulers like Gingis Khan, all they knew how to do was shoot arrows at big eagles. Those guys are all dead. If you want to count the true bad mamma Jammas look. To today, so this is made up of two parts. If you want to put eyeballs on the original, along with my translation while I’m talking about it, check out the website, chinese literature podcast.com, so you can see the, the form of the poem if, if that helps you.

Obviously, if you’re driving or. Making love or something. You don’t have to actually about that. I had a former student and a fan of the podcast imply that that is what he and his girlfriend did. They would leave the podcast on while getting it on, they broke up. I’m not sure what that says about my podcasting skills or his sanity.

I’m just gonna leave it at that. Okay, now let’s get back to Mao. This to the poem is divided into two parts. The first part, Mao praises the landscapes of Northwestern China. Remember, he just arrived in Northwestern China a few months ago. Mao is from Hunan in South China, a very different landscape. He’s lived in Beijing, which is.

In the north, but it’s on the plains there. He worked as a revolutionary in Shanghai, which again is at the mouth of a river right next to the ocean. As best I can tell, Mao has never been to China’s ancient, relatively isolated northwest. This is a landscape that’s both new and foreign to him as foreign as New England is to Florida or as Sweden is to Italy.

But I think there’s something in that he’s landing in this new landscape. He’s drinking in the beauty of Northwest China. That region is really beautiful. If you haven’t been there. It has this ancient beauty, these massive never ending hills that are carved up over millennia by Chinese farmers as they try and make that area land that they can farm.

Mao praises this beauty, but there’s also something wrong with this land. The Yellow River has lost its surging vigor. The snow here in the first half of this poem comes off to me as a symbol of some sort of somnolence. It’s as if. This land Northwest China, the country itself is somehow asleep and that half of the poem ends with these lines.

I must wait for a clear day and look at the snowy landscapes wrapped in red and white. It’s really bewitching. When I was translating, I was wondering, wait, what is he actually waiting to do? What is he planning to do on a clear day? Is it what he alludes to before in the, the lines right above it, which is trying to compare himself to heaven and see which is taller?

I, I think that’s probably the correct answer, but that also struck me as incredibly maniacal. And that’s actually a good way to set us up for the second half of the poem. ’cause the second half of the poem is focused all on Mao’s pridefulness. So first half of the poem ends there with that line on. It’s really bewitching.

The second half of the poem shifts from this praise of landscape to this praise of the heroes that, that the landscape has produced. Weirdly, simultaneously, he’s dissing, he’s insulting those same heroes that the landscape has produced. The first two lines of the second half of the poem, the rivers and mountains.

Of this land are so pretty, it has brought up countless heroes to compete and serve the nation. That sounds like praise, but then you drop one stanza and he says, pity Han the first Chinese emperor and Han Wdi, the greatest Han Emperor. Their writing ability ain’t all that good tongue. The greatest Tongue Emperor and song, the greatest song Emperor.

They’re kind of lacking. In. Those northern barbarian rulers like Genghis Khan, all they knew how to do was shoot arrows at big eagles. So except for Song Tzu, all of these Chinese leaders are closely associated with the Northwestern region that Mao is now in Tzu. I have no idea why Mao threw him in there.

Other than that he founded the amazing Song Dynasty, but he’s not clearly associated with the Northwest whatever. So Mao says, this beautiful landscape of Northwestern China brought out all these people. They became heroes and served the nation, but they aren’t all that good. They can’t write, they’re lacking in style.

They only knew how to hunt eagles. And you know what, all of those guys, they’re dead. It’s just, it’s so conceited. I don’t know what to do with it. I mean, it’s, it’s just. The, for lack of a better word, it’s very ballsy. He goes, if you want to see Northwestern China’s greatest heroes, you know what you gotta look to today.

I. What is he saying there? The way I read this poem, and I, I think this will probably be controversial, I think that he is saying, I am China’s greatest hero. I am better than Xin. Huang, the first emperor of China. I am better than Han Wti, the most famous emperor of the Han Dynasty. I am better than tongue, own the second emperor.

Of the TNG dynasty and the architect of tongue greatness, I am better than Gingis. Kahan, the man who, along with his sons and grandsons strung together, the largest land empire ever witnessed in history. On his deathbed, he had the cojones to say, purportedly quote, life is short. I could not conquer all the world.

You will have to do it. Mal was saying, you know what? None of those guys are as good as me. None of them are as good as me. As I read this. I was just like, wow. What an incredible ballsy statement to make. He had nothing but a ragtag army behind him. He was nearly eliminated by Chiang Kai-shek the greatest loser in all of Chinese history.

It turns out he was right. You know, we can debate the historical merits of MAO compared to those other emperors, but I don’t think anyone would tell me, you know what? There was a Chinese person in the 20th century who is more important to history than Mao. I don’t, I, I don’t think that that person exists.

Mao is the most important Chinese person in the history of the 20th century, but at the time, he had no way of knowing that. He had no way of knowing that he was gonna be the most important Chinese figure in the 20th century. The only thing he had telling him that that was true was his bloated sense of self-confidence and self-importance.

So this is a great poem to look at because it displays Mao’s poetic virtuosity. He’s a decent poet in classical Chinese. He’s not great. You’re not gonna be writing home about this and comparing it to Tongue Dynasty or Song Dynasty grades, but his poetry is not that bad either. But this poem is also fascinating because MAO is able to produce poetry that depending on how you view Mao in the process of history, it’s either overly confident or justifiably confident.

Okay. I’ve been banging on for a really long time. I’m gonna leave this poem where it is. Let me know what you think of the poem in the podcast, Chinese Literature [email protected]. You can go to the website, chinese literature podcast.com, read my translation of Mals poem along with the original. You can also pre-order my book, which I can modestly say is better than any of the writings of WAN or hamoudi.

My name is Lee Moore and this is the Chinese Literature podcast.