Journey Through Anxiety: The Landscape Poetry of Hsieh Ling-Yün

Abstract

The fifth century poet Hsieh Ling-yün (385–433) is generally considered the “founder” of “landscape poetry” in China. As Mather points out, “his fame seems to have rested largely on his ability to depict the natural beauties of the Chekiang mountains which he loved, and to evoke in his readers the moods which they inspired in him.”¹ Hsieh’s love for mountains and streams needs to be seen in the historical context of his life: the descendant of a wealthy and illustrious family, Hsieh was caught between two conflicting loyalties — he had pledged both to the Chin dynasty, under which his grandfather held high military office, and to the usurper of Chin, the Sung dynasty. With a political allegiance tentative and ambivalent, Hsieh failed to extricate himself from “the careerist intrigues of a court [Sung] which eventually forced him to his knees on the blood-soaked execution ground.”² We are told that throughout his tumultuous political career, Hsieh “continuously skirted his duties, spending all his time roaming among the mountains....”³ How do we understand this inveterate tendency of the poet to roam among the mountains? The general consensus recognizes the obvious, namely that his “love of mountains” signifies “an escape from a violent and unpleasant life.”⁴ This paper intends to probe deeper than the obvious by looking at the poet’s “escapist” tendencies from an ontological point of view.