Chu Ci: Songs of Chu

The Chu Ci (Songs of the South) is an anthology of poetic works from the Chu region dating from the Warring States period to the Han dynasty. Alongside the Shi Jing (Classic of Poetry), it forms one of the two great fountainheads of Chinese literature, known as “Feng and Sao.” Breaking free from the predominance of four-character lines in the Shi Jing, it assimilates the language, music, mythology, and shamanic customs of Chu, giving rise to the “Sao style”—characterized by irregular verse forms, dazzling imagination, and unrestrained emotion—thereby inaugurating the tradition of Chinese Romantic literature.

Qu Yuan is the most important author of the Chu Ci. His masterpiece, Li Sao (Encountering Sorrow), is one of the longest lyric poems in ancient China. Through the imagery of fragrant herbs and beautiful women, it conveys his loyalty to the sovereign and love for his country, embodying the spirit of “Long, long had been my road and far, far the journey; I would go up and down to seek my heart’s desire.” Other major works include Jiu Ge (Nine Songs), Tian Wen (Heavenly Questions), and Jiu Zhang (Nine Elegies), which respectively address ritual sacrifice, cosmological inquiries, and the poet’s political misfortunes. Song Yu, following Qu Yuan’s style, inaugurated the “autumnal lament” theme in his Jiu Bian (Nine Arguments), exerting a profound influence on Han fu rhapsodies and later literature.

In the Western Han, Liu Xiang compiled the works of Qu Yuan, Song Yu, and others into a single collection. The most widely circulated commentary is the Chu Ci Zhang Ju (Chapter and Verse Commentary on the Chu Ci) by Wang Yi of the Eastern Han. Later generations have often regarded the Chu Ci as the wellspring of both poetry and rhapsodic prose (fu). Its artistic tradition, which equally emphasizes grief and indignation on the one hand and soaring imagination on the other, deeply influenced Han fu, Tang poetry, and subsequent “Sao-style” compositions.

As the most imaginative classic in the history of Chinese poetry, the Chu Ci fuses personal emotion, political ideals, and the mythical world. To read this book is to experience the splendor and melancholy of southern Chu culture and to understand how Chinese literature evolved from collective song into a lyrical tradition of individual creation.