Eighteen Refrains on Tartar Pipes    Cai Yan [Cai Wenji] (ca. 177-?)

胡茄演奏: Tartar pipes performance—

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ggpx5XuDOXw
喬珊古琴弹唱 Qiao Shan (alto) self-accompanied on the gu qun (old Chinese zither):
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NOsEWHk6FU8
Tr. YK Chan  陈耀国译

译者按: 蔡琰 (字文姬)，蔡邕 (133-192 CE) 之女。 蔡邕为曹操 (155-220) 之师友。 文姬博学多才，精通文史音艺，一如其父，曹赏识之。 夫亡，战乱被掳至南匈奴强嫁，年念三，达十二年之久，生二子， 后获曹用重金赎回归汉。再婚，作敘事长诗<胡笳十八拍>，述其济遇。论者对詩体及所述史實有疑，认为此詩为后人所作。今人读此诗，知古人对异族颇有歧视之嫌。

Translator’s remarks: Cai Yan (a.k.a. Wenji) was Cai Yong’s (133-192 CE) daughter.  Cai Yong was Cao Cao’s (155-220) teacher and friend.  Wenji was as scholarly as his father.  She was well versed in literature, history, music and art.  Cao admired her talents.  After her husband died, she was captured and abducted by the Southern Tartars at age 23, then forced to marry a tribal king and had two sons.  After twelve years Cao redeemed her to return to Han territory by paying a hefty ransom; she was then remarried.  She wrote an epic ballad, Eighteen Refrains on Tartar Pipes, about what experience.  Researchers have doubted her authorship of this poem from its structural form and anachronism, and speculate that later poets could have written it.  Present day readers of this poem would find tones of racial prejudice towards other races by the Han Chinese of that era.

[Ref. http://zhidao.baidu.com/question/9293885]

 
1

我生之初尚無為，我生之後漢祚衰。

‘Twas peace when I was born,

But Han’s fortune declined and torn.

天不仁兮降亂離，地不仁兮使我逢此時！

Without mercy from heaven, chaos descended from high;

Without mercy on earth, I came to this epoch nigh.

干戈日尋兮道路危，民卒流亡兮共哀悲。

A perilous road extending in days of war,

Refugees, aghast, dispersed in grief and all.

煙塵蔽野兮胡虜盛，志意乖兮節義虧

Hordes of Tartars rampaged far and wide;

Against my will, submit to coercion I abide.

對殊俗兮非我宜，遭惡辱兮當告誰？

Facing odd customs foreign to me,

To whom could I tell my abuses other than me?

笳一會兮琴一拍，心憤怨兮無人知！

Playing the zither harmonized to Tartar pipes at the first refrain,

Nobody would learn of the detestation I’ve sustained.

2

戎狄逼我兮为室家，将我行兮向天涯。

Tartars compelled me to be a concubine;

They abducted me afar to heaven’s confine.

云山万里兮归路遐，疾风千里兮扬尘沙。

Crossing cloud-clad distant mountains of no return,

Gusts blew along whipping sand and dust that churned.

人多暴猛兮如虺蛇，控弦披甲兮为骄奢。

Mobs were ruthless as a venomous snake,

They grasped bows and wore amour for show’s sake.

两拍张弦兮弦欲绝，志摧心折兮自悲嗟。

In second refrain the stretched strings almost snap to end,

My will and heart frequently break into a self-lament.