This passage is right after Kieu has pledged herself to marry Ma so she can get some money to pay her family's debt. She has already met Ma and knows that he is bad man. Kieu's father is lamenting that his daughter, who is just becoming a woman must be sent away with a strange man to an uncertain future. This is where I think Nguyen Du's real philosophical critique of his society and Confucianism in general comes out.
In Confucius's mind, family is the most important aspect of someone's life and it is vital that the hierarchy of the family is maintained so they can live harmoniously. In the Confucian hierarchy, the father is the head of the family and a family without a patriarch is a recipe for disaster. This scene would be a good conundrum for Confucius to explain. I'm not sure if a similar situation is discussed in the Analects.
In this scene, Kieu's father is so distraught that he is losing his daughter that he even contemplates killing himself. He let his emotions run wild to the extent that he might have even hurt himself and his family for the sake of his daughter. His anguish is understandable but in the Tale of Kieu; Kieu is the example of virtue and so she cannot give into fear. In an interesting twist, she is forced to explain to her father about the moral debt she owes to him for bringing her into this life. She seemingly is calm about sacrificing herself to keep her father out of prison and protect her family. I think it can assumed that if her father and brother were in prison then her and the rest of her family would be killed, or worse, by bandits and other archetypal "bad men".
In the passage there is mention of a "Lady Oanh" and somebody called "Ly". According to what I read, they are women from old tales that exemplify filial piety. There is one metaphor towards the end of the passage that I want to bring up:
"Consider me to be a flower bud, everlastingly green."
What I understood from this is that she wants her father to always think of her as a young child, someone who never matured or "blossomed". Kieu is continually referred to as a flower in the story. Perhaps she wants him to think of her as always innocent and young so that his memory of her will be frozen in time; as if she died as a child. Even if she does ever return home, which she doubts will ever happen, she won't be the same daughter that he remembered.
It's a very tragic scene, but I like it because unlike a lot of old Asian tales depicting filial piety, Nguyen Du really tried to bring the humanity of the characters to the surface. He didn't just wash the situation with some allusions to Confucian aphorisms and I like the irony that Kieu has to disobey her father to save him.
655~684
Thương tình con trẻ cha già,
Nhìn nàng ông những máu sa ruột ràu
-“Nuôi con những ước về sau,
Trao tơ phải lứa, gieo cầu đáng nơi.
Trơi làm chi cực bấy trời!
Này ai vu thác cho người hợp tan.
Búa rìu bao quản thân tàn,
Nỡ đày đọa trẻ, càng oan khốc già.
Một lần sau trước cũng là,
Thôi thì mặt khuất, chẳng thà lòng đau.
Theo lời càng chảy dòng châu,
Liều mình ông rắp gieo đầu tường vôi.
Vội vàng kẻ giữ người coi,
Nhỏ to nàng lại tìm lời khuyên can:
-“Vẻ chi một mảnh hồng nhan,
Tóc tơ chưa chút đền ơn sinh thành.
Dâng thơ đã thẹn nàng Oanh,
Lại thua ả Lý bán mình hay sao?
Cội xuân tuổi hạc càng cao,
Một cây gánh vác biết bao nhiều cành.
Lòng tơ dù chẳng dứt tình,
Gió mưa âu hẳn tan tành nước non.
Thà rằng liều một thân con,
Hoa dù rã cánh, lá còn xanh cây.
Phận sao đành vậy cũng vầy,
Cầm như chẳng đậu những ngày còn xanh.
Cũng đừng tính quẩn lo quanh,
Tan nhà là một, thiệt mình là hai.”
Phải lời ông cũng em tai,
Nhìn nhau giọt ngắn giọt dài ngổn ngang.
655~684
You have to pity the father and child,
He gazed at her, felt his blood sink and his heart
mourned.
“You raise a daughter, giving her everything,
You hope she will find a nice man, one that deserves her.
Oh Heaven! Why have you punished us so harshly?
Who slandered us to break up our happy home?
This withered body could face the executioner’s ax!
Heaven ill-treats the young, while condemning the old to
tears.
There will be a
day, sooner or later, when I will die,
If only I could die, it would be better than this heart
wrenching pain!”
Following his speech, as tears streamed down his face,
Caution was lost to him and he went to smash his skull against
the limestone wall.
The guards and servants rushed to stop him,
Kieu went to her father and put her mouth to his ear,
She searched for the right words to soothe him:
“What is the beauty of a woman?
This small promise of marriage does not even come close
To the debt I owe you for bringing me into this world.
I would be ashamed if I couldn’t live up to Lady Oanh’s
filial piety,
Am I not as worthy as Ly who sold herself?
Father, you are like an aged spring tree that as it grows
Shoulders the burden of so many branches.
Even though the tenderness of my heart pulls me towards
you,
I won’t break off the engagement,
For it would bring a disastrous storm upon our home.
Rather, I will sacrifice my young body,
One withered flower petal will fall,
But the leaves on the branch will stay green.
I am resigned to my fate, bound to it,
Consider me to be a flower bud, everlastingly green.
Don’t wallow in worry, don’t fret over me,
Or our family will fade away and you will suffer in
dismay.”
He let her wise words sink into his ear,
They gazed at each other with tear-filled eyes,
And wept so hard it could be heard far and near.
Wooden Statue of Confucius in the Temple of Literature, Hanoi |
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