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Ode to the splendor of China old and new
By Linda Neil |
December 15, 2011, Thursday
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Print Edition
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I have been in China now for over two months and I am surprised and sometimes a little embarrassed that so many Chinese people I meet scoff at my liking for Lao Tzu and the principles of Tao and Confucianism.
"The desire for harmony above else is what has held back this country for so many years." I have heard this opinion many times, as well as other views that decry Confucianism as a thorn in the side of the individualism which encourages the singular innovation and creativity that many admire in the West, but which some still find lacking in contemporary China.
But perhaps the ancient wisdom that so many younger Chinese feel the need to disregard could actually become a forward-looking contemporary practice, if adapted and adjusted to the specific needs of the times.
When I was researching recently the subject of love songs in China, I read about a popular folk song phenomenon called Hua'er, which is found in Qinghai Province in the northwest part of China. The province is known as the "ocean of Hua'er," a phrase that signifies its cultural abundance.
Hua'er means "flowers" and flowers usually represent the object or subject of these love songs. The repertoire of Hua'er illustrates that in a China that so justifiably values the financial and material progress it has made, there is still a huge wealth of intangible riches - its music, its poems, its philosophy - that are as valuable to a society as any number of fantastic buildings and sleek gleaming designer cars.
Essential 'food'
These treasures from China's cultural heritage might be listed in official data as "intangible," but to a society's psyche and emotional well-being they are as essential as food.
I think of the Hua'er now as I contemplate how the singing and sharing of love songs, which is the subject of the project that is slowly taking me around the world, is a calling out from isolation towards connection, whether it is from one outcast group to another, one soul to another, or one country to another.
Just as Lao Tzu once expressed, the sound of this calling can reverberate beyond the personal into a global tapestry of different melodies, sounds and calls.
Mutual flourishing
And as much as any possible future requires sufficient wealth, security, opportunity, education and stability, it also perhaps requires this calling between souls full of music and song - as well as an understanding that our shared human feeling is also necessary for our truly mutual flourishing.
As I think more about the love songs of Hua'er and of the ancient Chinese poets and the incredible vibrancy of life in modern Shanghai, I am aware again of how much more connected the ancient and the modern, the material and the contemplative, the past and the future are now in the era of the Internet and global communication. Our contemporary challenge may be to integrate and balance these opposites - within ourselves and within our societies.
Recently, as I prepared for this trip to China, I traveled back to the lake of my childhood on the grounds of the University of Queensland, where years after I first played there, I received degrees in music, a masters in philosophy, as well as a PhD in creative writing.
I took my violin with me and as I sat under a willow tree, I sang a simple love song of mine that is also about flowers. If I could I would sing it for you now, as an honoring of Hua'er folk music, of the splendor of modern China as its strides towards its future, and of the ancient Chinese poets, who inspired a young writer and songwriter from Australia long before she ever dreamed of traveling to this country.
This is the second and final part of Dr Linda Neil's article. The first part appeared on Monday. Dr Linda Neil is a writer, musician and documentary producer whose work frequently integrates writing and music in both print and audio texts. Her family memoir, "Learning How to Breathe," was published in 2009 and in 2011 she was a writer-in-residence with the Shanghai Writers' Association's International Writers' program sponsored by Asialink, Australia.
"The desire for harmony above else is what has held back this country for so many years." I have heard this opinion many times, as well as other views that decry Confucianism as a thorn in the side of the individualism which encourages the singular innovation and creativity that many admire in the West, but which some still find lacking in contemporary China.
But perhaps the ancient wisdom that so many younger Chinese feel the need to disregard could actually become a forward-looking contemporary practice, if adapted and adjusted to the specific needs of the times.
When I was researching recently the subject of love songs in China, I read about a popular folk song phenomenon called Hua'er, which is found in Qinghai Province in the northwest part of China. The province is known as the "ocean of Hua'er," a phrase that signifies its cultural abundance.
Hua'er means "flowers" and flowers usually represent the object or subject of these love songs. The repertoire of Hua'er illustrates that in a China that so justifiably values the financial and material progress it has made, there is still a huge wealth of intangible riches - its music, its poems, its philosophy - that are as valuable to a society as any number of fantastic buildings and sleek gleaming designer cars.
Essential 'food'
These treasures from China's cultural heritage might be listed in official data as "intangible," but to a society's psyche and emotional well-being they are as essential as food.
I think of the Hua'er now as I contemplate how the singing and sharing of love songs, which is the subject of the project that is slowly taking me around the world, is a calling out from isolation towards connection, whether it is from one outcast group to another, one soul to another, or one country to another.
Just as Lao Tzu once expressed, the sound of this calling can reverberate beyond the personal into a global tapestry of different melodies, sounds and calls.
Mutual flourishing
And as much as any possible future requires sufficient wealth, security, opportunity, education and stability, it also perhaps requires this calling between souls full of music and song - as well as an understanding that our shared human feeling is also necessary for our truly mutual flourishing.
As I think more about the love songs of Hua'er and of the ancient Chinese poets and the incredible vibrancy of life in modern Shanghai, I am aware again of how much more connected the ancient and the modern, the material and the contemplative, the past and the future are now in the era of the Internet and global communication. Our contemporary challenge may be to integrate and balance these opposites - within ourselves and within our societies.
Recently, as I prepared for this trip to China, I traveled back to the lake of my childhood on the grounds of the University of Queensland, where years after I first played there, I received degrees in music, a masters in philosophy, as well as a PhD in creative writing.
I took my violin with me and as I sat under a willow tree, I sang a simple love song of mine that is also about flowers. If I could I would sing it for you now, as an honoring of Hua'er folk music, of the splendor of modern China as its strides towards its future, and of the ancient Chinese poets, who inspired a young writer and songwriter from Australia long before she ever dreamed of traveling to this country.
This is the second and final part of Dr Linda Neil's article. The first part appeared on Monday. Dr Linda Neil is a writer, musician and documentary producer whose work frequently integrates writing and music in both print and audio texts. Her family memoir, "Learning How to Breathe," was published in 2009 and in 2011 she was a writer-in-residence with the Shanghai Writers' Association's International Writers' program sponsored by Asialink, Australia.
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