The
Universe
is neutral.
Like-Water-or-Clouds-The-Tang-Dynasty
I thought that mountains were mountains and rivers were rivers.
Later, on considering these things, I realised that mountains were not mountains and rivers were not rivers.
Eventually I achieved enlightenment.
I came to understand that mountains are mountains, and rivers are rivers.
i?
In our quantum universe the sub-atomic world is strange. There is no satisfactory visual model of the entities or continua that make up the microcosm. They appear and vanish. They carry with them a cloud of other entities. They seethe in a sea of reality that appears only in observation. The statistically predictable pattern is made up of intrinsically unpredictable events. The uncertainty principle prevents knowledge of the precise e? statei? of the universe. In measuring one attribute we destroy information about another. No sub-atomic entity can be observed twice. What is observed is always a different entity. All events are unique. Randomness is at the core of the microcosm. Only statistical
149
? prediction is valid. The observer changes the observation and is a crucial part of the observation. The e? particlei? that e? musti? go through one hole in the two-slit experiment appears at the screen having e? travelledi? as a probability e? wavei? through both holes. The pattern of the interference fringes dictates where the particle can appear on the screen. Its precise location is probabilistic and unpredictable. Is it e? reallyi? a particle or is it e? reallyi? a probability wave? This experiment is also a Zen koan. Enlightenment e? realisesi? what is strange. It e? finds the sun inside the rain, draws water from the roots of firei? .
The world of our mental processes is also inpenetrable to self-reflection. The conscious mind cannot e? seei? its own subconscious processes. The sources of our feelings, motivations and affinities are therefore not totally knowable. We absolutely have no language for feelings other than the language of how they affect others and the world. What does
150
? a e? feeling-in-itselfi? feel like? I know but cannot tell. I only hope you also know. We try to evoke the feeling through art, through action, through the spaces between words. Emotion and sensibility create image and situation so that image and situation may in turn re-create sensibility and emotion. We conjure in order to communicate, between the islands of our selves. The mind is a hand that cannot grasp itself, a mirror that cannot reflect itself, a process in time that can never be an object in space. e? You will not grasp it by thinking about it. You cannot realise it without thinking about it. i? says Zen, of enlightenment. And again e? What is the meaning of Reality? Wait until there is no one around and I can tell you. i?
Even Time is elusive and ungraspable. Our local time is created locally by the movement from one configuration to another configuration, from one set of events to another set of events, of the energies that make up our local universe. How can there not be a local e? Nowi? where
151
? events occur? We measure time through regularity, through recurring e? identicali? oscillations. We agree to meet at a local time, at a distance from e? Nowi? just as we agree to meet at a local place, at a distance from e? Herei? and amazingly we do meet. For us time e? flowsi? in a direction because events succeed one another. Configurations and events including our eye- movements and thoughts appear in a specific order. Yet there is still only the e? Nowi? . Neither past nor future exist. The past configuration is not here. The future configuration is not here either. Yet past events e? must have happenedi? . We infer them from cause and effect. We remember them in the mind. They have left their traces e? bound ini? as information and configuration in the present. Future events e? will happeni? because their macrocosmic causes are visible in the present.
Relativity theory says that since time intervals can differ at different speeds for different observers then one observer can age
152
? more slowly than another does. There is no universal e? Nowi? only local ones. In this sense there could be time travel into anotheri? s future. We could leave and then revisit our societyi? s e? Nowi? when less of our years and more of its would have gone by. We would have re-entered the e? Nowi? of our society without having experienced its intervening moments, like the sleeper waking. Though it would be profoundly strange it would not be travel into our own personal future. Our own personal future is always not here, not yet. It is always ungraspable.
Could we travel into the past, and so get back to a previous configuration? By that would we mean that all processes would continuously backtrack, undo and reverse themselves to a previous e? Nowi? and e? Herei? ? Then we would still perceive that reversal appearing in order in forward time. The film that is run backward still runs in our forward flow of time, even if what it shows is a reversing process. Each reversed
153
? moment of the physical past, would be a new e? Nowi? from which a forward future would insist on unfolding. So our perceived time would still run in the one direction. The future is not of the same kind as the past. The future is always possible. The past is always consumed. Every new configuration is the next moment. Every past configuration is no longer a moment.
How could the processes be reversed? The universe has no intention, no will to initiate such a reversal, and no universal information about the totality of its past configurations. We perceive processes that achieve disorder from order, irretrievably dissipating energy in the process. We perceive other processes that achieve order from disorder requiring energy in the process. Disorder stays disordered unless energy is added to create order. One type of process is reversed by the other type of process. Even if the mathematical model looks the same e? with a reverse of signi? , losing energy is not the same as adding energy. We can feel that deep in
154
? ourselves. Order is not merely disorder reversing. Order e? decaysi? into disorder but is e? createdi? from disorder.
And if the e? Nowi? did in some sense reverse to a previous state there would be no way of knowing it had done so completely since complete description of the e? Nowi? is denied us by quantum uncertainty and e? infinitei? complexity. If the universe must contain microcosmic events that are random and unique then reverse processes must also contain events that are random and unique. Each process is ultimately unknowable in precise, deterministic terms. If we attempted to reverse the process we could not achieve an exact reversal. The process of reversal would itself introduce new and unique random events into the unknowable local universe.
By travel into the past could we mean that a previous configuration of the universe or the total information about it might exist e? somewherei? unchanging in a e? parallel (that is
155
? orthogonal) universei? so allowing us to enter it and participate in it? But that past would then not be past but a e? parallel Nowi? , frozen e? alongsidei? this Universe. There would be an infinite number of parallel e? Nowsi? . What could it mean to say that a frozen universe exists in another e? Nowi? alongside this Universe? Nothing is frozen, everything unfolds. If the Universe has infinite dimensions then all e? Nowsi? are within it. And for the observer there can only be one local e? Herei? and e? Nowi? .
There is no e? memoryi? , in the energies outside us, of the past configurations of even this Universe. The Universe is without mind. We are the minds. There is no universal Will that might control.
The Universe is neutral. The Tao of Energy is e? without possession, without demands, without authority. i? e? The moon does not intend to create its reflection in the water, the water does not intend to reveal the reflection of the moon. i? And neither of them has any mind to be observed by us.
156
? The Universe and the Tao are ultimately unknowable, in the West as in the East. Who observes is crucial. Partial and local e? observationsi? of events are available to us, and available more or less precisely, but absolute and universal observation of e? alli? events with deterministic precision is ? 397? 38? . ,? ? ? impossible. The position of e? the observeri? and the observed is crucial in the relativistic universe because the measured e? realityi? depends on relative location and velocity, and the presence of gravitational fields. The intervention of the e? observeri? is crucial in the quantum universe because measurement e? disturbsi? and in a sense e? createsi? the e? realityi? that is measured, while the uncertainty principle denies complete knowledge. The perspective of the e? observeri? is crucial in the chaotic universe because different levels of the fractal infinities within finite e? realityi? are visible dependent on scale. And the e? observeri? si? unconscious processes are crucial in events within the mind because they are the
157
? invisible substratum that is part of e? thinkingi? . Without the observer there is no reality. And each reality is local, uncertain, partial, and scaleable. The spacetime of modern science is not smooth but coarse. The surface is e? reallyi? a sea of waves and ripples, swirls and vortices, foam and spume. Instead of a continuum there is a labyrinthine network of cavities and folds, surfaces and holes. The deepest insight is to e? seei? that in the quantum universe every part is connected to every other part in a vast, indivisible Vortex, that is a Void without reality until we separate observations from it, creating e? names and formsi? . Science makes theoretical models of great empirical power that are still models and not the reality. Heisenberg said that the mathematics describes what we know of the universei? s behaviour not the behaviour itself. Bohr said that science concerns what we can say about Nature not what it is. Sub-atomic entities have no meaningful existence or properties except as we perceive them in observation.
158
? The e? reali? mirror is empty. The universe that exists beneath, beside, beyond our observations and our names is visible to us as, at best, a shadow, or a brilliance. Within it there are no names and no forms. e? At root there are no things. i? That is why the universal Tao is nameless, and the eternal Way cannot be told. The Tao is the unknowable matrix of energies. It creates the Vortex of the visible and named. It is the Void of the invisible and unnamed. The reality is that we cannot escape the e? observeri? , cannot escape ourselves. In order to live with the e? observeri? , live with ourselves, we can only attempt to know the unknowable, be in harmony with the non-existent. That means that we must embrace the non-analytic, non-verbal emptiness, and vanish into the Vortex. What cannot be understood, what cannot be measured, what cannot be analysed, what cannot be grasped, can still be lived. The Universe does not understand the mathematical equations of its own existence. e? Entering the wildi? says a Master about the
159
? enlightened ones e? the grass does not move. Entering the river, the water is not stirred. i?
160
? ? ? ? ! 4
Li Po the elusive and fascinating. Li who is like Mozart. The precocious talent, the deeply serious artist, the effortless creator, the romanticist in perfect control blended with the effervescent personality of a Taoist e? childi? . There is the same social e? irresponsibilityi? combined with intense artistic responsibility, spontaneity and creative perfection. There is the same need for freedom, resentment of authority, disdain for accepted forms and constraints. The same enchantment with magical rituals (The Magic Flute, and Freemasonry parallel esoteric Taoism and Buddhism) and the colours of what is most alive. There is the same deep sensitivity and aesthetic subtlety combined with tensile strength and sexual vigour. There is the same ability to play every note of the scale, from the powerful and masculine to the tender and feminine. There is the same susceptibility to
161
? ? ? drink, e? entertainmenti? and pretty women as a means to release creative tension, escape constraint, and achieve spontaneity. The same inability to hold an official post for long. The same generosity, or carelessness about money, so that it flows through his fingers. The same roaming between cities, and wandering between lodgings. The same consciousness of and pride in his own genius. Underlying everything the same deep humanity. The same fluidity, the same enigmatic invisibility behind, or rather transparency in front of, his creations.
Sometimes he appears to be nothing more than his creations. That is the achievement of harmony. Not through meditation, but through being. Li does not seek or require e? approvali? . Social commitment and integration are irrelevant to the Tao. Equally humanity, empathy, sensitivity are deep components of his Taoist awareness. Li is the essentially lovable, gifted human being who challenges the leaden conventionality of society, and in some respects
162
? is punished for it, by a self-created isolation, through the inability of the world to understand inspiration or achieve the artisti? s paradise of a continuous and genuinely creative endeavour.
Like a child, like Mozart, he can betray a childi? s faults and a childi? s emotional and behavioural extremism. He could be hostile and then overly generous, proud, boastful and then subdued, irresponsible and then deeply serious, rude and then sensitive. It is easy to condemn such a personality as immature or over-sensitive, as egocentric or rebellious. It is equally easy for the artist to react with irony or indifference, pride or disdain, to devalue others efforts, to attack as a means of defence, to ignore as a means of self-protection, to be e? irresponsiblei? to hide deep hurt. Like Mozart, he is in his art both romantic and classical, concerned with form but aspiring to a world that is more than this world, more satisfying, more beautiful, and more harmonious.
163
? If the pliant, bowing and modest bamboo represents Confucianism, and the scented solitary ancient pine-tree represents meditative Buddhism, it is the plum-branch that represents Taoism. It is the tree of winter whose blossoms burst from the branch, whose sexual essence is the life and sadness of the transient world, whose flowering is spontaneous and free, whose roots are deep and resilient, but whose beauty is evanescent and delicate. Li is the sparkle on the water, the moonlight on the leaf, the flashes of light that contemporaries claimed to see in his eyes, the wild, unkempt, energised lightnings of nature.
Li was born in the west of China, possibly over the border in Turkestan. Family traditions claimed descent from Li Kao who created his local dynasty centred on Tun-huang the gate to the Silk Road. The Ti? ang Emperors claimed the same line of descent and that enabled Li to address the Imperial family as though they were distant cousins. Li Kao was himself a descendant
164
? of General Li Kuang (d. 119BC). Ssu-ma- Chi? ien, the great Han Dynasty biographer, brilliantly relates Li Kuangi? s story in his $? ? ? ? . ? ? , or Records of the Grand Historian. Li Kuang is an archetype of the honest, unassuming, courageous, but unlucky military man. He was named the e? Flying Generali? by the Huns, the Hsiung-nu, and fought more than seventy actions against them, his successes and failures sadly cancelling each other out, so that he never achieved high honours. Though judged too old he fought a last campaign, taking the blame for a failure to carry out the questionable orders of his superior Wei Chi? ing. Committing suicide, he was mourned throughout the Empire for his integrity, his courage and the sincerity of his intentions. A famous archer with the crossbow, Li Kuang gave rise to a Zenist anecdote illustrating the power of Taoist spontaneity and harmony. Mistaking a rock in the long grass for a tiger he was said to have pierced it effortlessly
165
? with an arrow. Trying to repeat the feat consciously he failed.
Li Poi? s e? Turkishi? ancestry provided an exotic element to the self-image that appears in his poetry, and perhaps made him particularly receptive to the Persian and Central Asian influences on Chinese culture. The family history suggests that a later ancestor was in fact banished to the far west around Lop Nor, and drifted further west still. Li Poi? s father returned to China when Li was a small child, and he was brought up in the southwest, in Szechwan, some distance from the local capital Chi? I? ng-tu. He was precocious. e? Already, at fourteen, I was reading strange books and writing verse to rival the masters. i? e? Already I was seeking the favour of great men. i?
As a young man he lived for a time as a Taoist recluse, with a Master, somewhere in the western mountains. e? For several years I never went near a town, and the wild birds ate from my hand without fear. The Kuang-han governor
166
? came to see us, offering to send us to the capital as persons of unusual ability but we refused. i? It is the image of the adolescent Yeats climbing up to his cave above the sea, or sleeping among the rhododendrons and rocks, playing at being a sage, wizard or poet. It is a young Alastor-like Shelley meditating among the ruins of Rome or making poetry by the Italian seashore. And Li became a ?
In our quantum universe the sub-atomic world is strange. There is no satisfactory visual model of the entities or continua that make up the microcosm. They appear and vanish. They carry with them a cloud of other entities. They seethe in a sea of reality that appears only in observation. The statistically predictable pattern is made up of intrinsically unpredictable events. The uncertainty principle prevents knowledge of the precise e? statei? of the universe. In measuring one attribute we destroy information about another. No sub-atomic entity can be observed twice. What is observed is always a different entity. All events are unique. Randomness is at the core of the microcosm. Only statistical
149
? prediction is valid. The observer changes the observation and is a crucial part of the observation. The e? particlei? that e? musti? go through one hole in the two-slit experiment appears at the screen having e? travelledi? as a probability e? wavei? through both holes. The pattern of the interference fringes dictates where the particle can appear on the screen. Its precise location is probabilistic and unpredictable. Is it e? reallyi? a particle or is it e? reallyi? a probability wave? This experiment is also a Zen koan. Enlightenment e? realisesi? what is strange. It e? finds the sun inside the rain, draws water from the roots of firei? .
The world of our mental processes is also inpenetrable to self-reflection. The conscious mind cannot e? seei? its own subconscious processes. The sources of our feelings, motivations and affinities are therefore not totally knowable. We absolutely have no language for feelings other than the language of how they affect others and the world. What does
150
? a e? feeling-in-itselfi? feel like? I know but cannot tell. I only hope you also know. We try to evoke the feeling through art, through action, through the spaces between words. Emotion and sensibility create image and situation so that image and situation may in turn re-create sensibility and emotion. We conjure in order to communicate, between the islands of our selves. The mind is a hand that cannot grasp itself, a mirror that cannot reflect itself, a process in time that can never be an object in space. e? You will not grasp it by thinking about it. You cannot realise it without thinking about it. i? says Zen, of enlightenment. And again e? What is the meaning of Reality? Wait until there is no one around and I can tell you. i?
Even Time is elusive and ungraspable. Our local time is created locally by the movement from one configuration to another configuration, from one set of events to another set of events, of the energies that make up our local universe. How can there not be a local e? Nowi? where
151
? events occur? We measure time through regularity, through recurring e? identicali? oscillations. We agree to meet at a local time, at a distance from e? Nowi? just as we agree to meet at a local place, at a distance from e? Herei? and amazingly we do meet. For us time e? flowsi? in a direction because events succeed one another. Configurations and events including our eye- movements and thoughts appear in a specific order. Yet there is still only the e? Nowi? . Neither past nor future exist. The past configuration is not here. The future configuration is not here either. Yet past events e? must have happenedi? . We infer them from cause and effect. We remember them in the mind. They have left their traces e? bound ini? as information and configuration in the present. Future events e? will happeni? because their macrocosmic causes are visible in the present.
Relativity theory says that since time intervals can differ at different speeds for different observers then one observer can age
152
? more slowly than another does. There is no universal e? Nowi? only local ones. In this sense there could be time travel into anotheri? s future. We could leave and then revisit our societyi? s e? Nowi? when less of our years and more of its would have gone by. We would have re-entered the e? Nowi? of our society without having experienced its intervening moments, like the sleeper waking. Though it would be profoundly strange it would not be travel into our own personal future. Our own personal future is always not here, not yet. It is always ungraspable.
Could we travel into the past, and so get back to a previous configuration? By that would we mean that all processes would continuously backtrack, undo and reverse themselves to a previous e? Nowi? and e? Herei? ? Then we would still perceive that reversal appearing in order in forward time. The film that is run backward still runs in our forward flow of time, even if what it shows is a reversing process. Each reversed
153
? moment of the physical past, would be a new e? Nowi? from which a forward future would insist on unfolding. So our perceived time would still run in the one direction. The future is not of the same kind as the past. The future is always possible. The past is always consumed. Every new configuration is the next moment. Every past configuration is no longer a moment.
How could the processes be reversed? The universe has no intention, no will to initiate such a reversal, and no universal information about the totality of its past configurations. We perceive processes that achieve disorder from order, irretrievably dissipating energy in the process. We perceive other processes that achieve order from disorder requiring energy in the process. Disorder stays disordered unless energy is added to create order. One type of process is reversed by the other type of process. Even if the mathematical model looks the same e? with a reverse of signi? , losing energy is not the same as adding energy. We can feel that deep in
154
? ourselves. Order is not merely disorder reversing. Order e? decaysi? into disorder but is e? createdi? from disorder.
And if the e? Nowi? did in some sense reverse to a previous state there would be no way of knowing it had done so completely since complete description of the e? Nowi? is denied us by quantum uncertainty and e? infinitei? complexity. If the universe must contain microcosmic events that are random and unique then reverse processes must also contain events that are random and unique. Each process is ultimately unknowable in precise, deterministic terms. If we attempted to reverse the process we could not achieve an exact reversal. The process of reversal would itself introduce new and unique random events into the unknowable local universe.
By travel into the past could we mean that a previous configuration of the universe or the total information about it might exist e? somewherei? unchanging in a e? parallel (that is
155
? orthogonal) universei? so allowing us to enter it and participate in it? But that past would then not be past but a e? parallel Nowi? , frozen e? alongsidei? this Universe. There would be an infinite number of parallel e? Nowsi? . What could it mean to say that a frozen universe exists in another e? Nowi? alongside this Universe? Nothing is frozen, everything unfolds. If the Universe has infinite dimensions then all e? Nowsi? are within it. And for the observer there can only be one local e? Herei? and e? Nowi? .
There is no e? memoryi? , in the energies outside us, of the past configurations of even this Universe. The Universe is without mind. We are the minds. There is no universal Will that might control.
The Universe is neutral. The Tao of Energy is e? without possession, without demands, without authority. i? e? The moon does not intend to create its reflection in the water, the water does not intend to reveal the reflection of the moon. i? And neither of them has any mind to be observed by us.
156
? The Universe and the Tao are ultimately unknowable, in the West as in the East. Who observes is crucial. Partial and local e? observationsi? of events are available to us, and available more or less precisely, but absolute and universal observation of e? alli? events with deterministic precision is ? 397? 38? . ,? ? ? impossible. The position of e? the observeri? and the observed is crucial in the relativistic universe because the measured e? realityi? depends on relative location and velocity, and the presence of gravitational fields. The intervention of the e? observeri? is crucial in the quantum universe because measurement e? disturbsi? and in a sense e? createsi? the e? realityi? that is measured, while the uncertainty principle denies complete knowledge. The perspective of the e? observeri? is crucial in the chaotic universe because different levels of the fractal infinities within finite e? realityi? are visible dependent on scale. And the e? observeri? si? unconscious processes are crucial in events within the mind because they are the
157
? invisible substratum that is part of e? thinkingi? . Without the observer there is no reality. And each reality is local, uncertain, partial, and scaleable. The spacetime of modern science is not smooth but coarse. The surface is e? reallyi? a sea of waves and ripples, swirls and vortices, foam and spume. Instead of a continuum there is a labyrinthine network of cavities and folds, surfaces and holes. The deepest insight is to e? seei? that in the quantum universe every part is connected to every other part in a vast, indivisible Vortex, that is a Void without reality until we separate observations from it, creating e? names and formsi? . Science makes theoretical models of great empirical power that are still models and not the reality. Heisenberg said that the mathematics describes what we know of the universei? s behaviour not the behaviour itself. Bohr said that science concerns what we can say about Nature not what it is. Sub-atomic entities have no meaningful existence or properties except as we perceive them in observation.
158
? The e? reali? mirror is empty. The universe that exists beneath, beside, beyond our observations and our names is visible to us as, at best, a shadow, or a brilliance. Within it there are no names and no forms. e? At root there are no things. i? That is why the universal Tao is nameless, and the eternal Way cannot be told. The Tao is the unknowable matrix of energies. It creates the Vortex of the visible and named. It is the Void of the invisible and unnamed. The reality is that we cannot escape the e? observeri? , cannot escape ourselves. In order to live with the e? observeri? , live with ourselves, we can only attempt to know the unknowable, be in harmony with the non-existent. That means that we must embrace the non-analytic, non-verbal emptiness, and vanish into the Vortex. What cannot be understood, what cannot be measured, what cannot be analysed, what cannot be grasped, can still be lived. The Universe does not understand the mathematical equations of its own existence. e? Entering the wildi? says a Master about the
159
? enlightened ones e? the grass does not move. Entering the river, the water is not stirred. i?
160
? ? ? ? ! 4
Li Po the elusive and fascinating. Li who is like Mozart. The precocious talent, the deeply serious artist, the effortless creator, the romanticist in perfect control blended with the effervescent personality of a Taoist e? childi? . There is the same social e? irresponsibilityi? combined with intense artistic responsibility, spontaneity and creative perfection. There is the same need for freedom, resentment of authority, disdain for accepted forms and constraints. The same enchantment with magical rituals (The Magic Flute, and Freemasonry parallel esoteric Taoism and Buddhism) and the colours of what is most alive. There is the same deep sensitivity and aesthetic subtlety combined with tensile strength and sexual vigour. There is the same ability to play every note of the scale, from the powerful and masculine to the tender and feminine. There is the same susceptibility to
161
? ? ? drink, e? entertainmenti? and pretty women as a means to release creative tension, escape constraint, and achieve spontaneity. The same inability to hold an official post for long. The same generosity, or carelessness about money, so that it flows through his fingers. The same roaming between cities, and wandering between lodgings. The same consciousness of and pride in his own genius. Underlying everything the same deep humanity. The same fluidity, the same enigmatic invisibility behind, or rather transparency in front of, his creations.
Sometimes he appears to be nothing more than his creations. That is the achievement of harmony. Not through meditation, but through being. Li does not seek or require e? approvali? . Social commitment and integration are irrelevant to the Tao. Equally humanity, empathy, sensitivity are deep components of his Taoist awareness. Li is the essentially lovable, gifted human being who challenges the leaden conventionality of society, and in some respects
162
? is punished for it, by a self-created isolation, through the inability of the world to understand inspiration or achieve the artisti? s paradise of a continuous and genuinely creative endeavour.
Like a child, like Mozart, he can betray a childi? s faults and a childi? s emotional and behavioural extremism. He could be hostile and then overly generous, proud, boastful and then subdued, irresponsible and then deeply serious, rude and then sensitive. It is easy to condemn such a personality as immature or over-sensitive, as egocentric or rebellious. It is equally easy for the artist to react with irony or indifference, pride or disdain, to devalue others efforts, to attack as a means of defence, to ignore as a means of self-protection, to be e? irresponsiblei? to hide deep hurt. Like Mozart, he is in his art both romantic and classical, concerned with form but aspiring to a world that is more than this world, more satisfying, more beautiful, and more harmonious.
163
? If the pliant, bowing and modest bamboo represents Confucianism, and the scented solitary ancient pine-tree represents meditative Buddhism, it is the plum-branch that represents Taoism. It is the tree of winter whose blossoms burst from the branch, whose sexual essence is the life and sadness of the transient world, whose flowering is spontaneous and free, whose roots are deep and resilient, but whose beauty is evanescent and delicate. Li is the sparkle on the water, the moonlight on the leaf, the flashes of light that contemporaries claimed to see in his eyes, the wild, unkempt, energised lightnings of nature.
Li was born in the west of China, possibly over the border in Turkestan. Family traditions claimed descent from Li Kao who created his local dynasty centred on Tun-huang the gate to the Silk Road. The Ti? ang Emperors claimed the same line of descent and that enabled Li to address the Imperial family as though they were distant cousins. Li Kao was himself a descendant
164
? of General Li Kuang (d. 119BC). Ssu-ma- Chi? ien, the great Han Dynasty biographer, brilliantly relates Li Kuangi? s story in his $? ? ? ? . ? ? , or Records of the Grand Historian. Li Kuang is an archetype of the honest, unassuming, courageous, but unlucky military man. He was named the e? Flying Generali? by the Huns, the Hsiung-nu, and fought more than seventy actions against them, his successes and failures sadly cancelling each other out, so that he never achieved high honours. Though judged too old he fought a last campaign, taking the blame for a failure to carry out the questionable orders of his superior Wei Chi? ing. Committing suicide, he was mourned throughout the Empire for his integrity, his courage and the sincerity of his intentions. A famous archer with the crossbow, Li Kuang gave rise to a Zenist anecdote illustrating the power of Taoist spontaneity and harmony. Mistaking a rock in the long grass for a tiger he was said to have pierced it effortlessly
165
? with an arrow. Trying to repeat the feat consciously he failed.
Li Poi? s e? Turkishi? ancestry provided an exotic element to the self-image that appears in his poetry, and perhaps made him particularly receptive to the Persian and Central Asian influences on Chinese culture. The family history suggests that a later ancestor was in fact banished to the far west around Lop Nor, and drifted further west still. Li Poi? s father returned to China when Li was a small child, and he was brought up in the southwest, in Szechwan, some distance from the local capital Chi? I? ng-tu. He was precocious. e? Already, at fourteen, I was reading strange books and writing verse to rival the masters. i? e? Already I was seeking the favour of great men. i?
As a young man he lived for a time as a Taoist recluse, with a Master, somewhere in the western mountains. e? For several years I never went near a town, and the wild birds ate from my hand without fear. The Kuang-han governor
166
? came to see us, offering to send us to the capital as persons of unusual ability but we refused. i? It is the image of the adolescent Yeats climbing up to his cave above the sea, or sleeping among the rhododendrons and rocks, playing at being a sage, wizard or poet. It is a young Alastor-like Shelley meditating among the ruins of Rome or making poetry by the Italian seashore. And Li became a ?
