Last month, the New York
Times woke up and realized that it has
basically ignored women when it comes to publishing obituaries. Not because
we don’t die in equal measure to men, but because we lack (in addition to that
all-important Y-chromosome)…newsworthiness.
So they’ve decided to publish belated obits in a feature they call “Overlooked”.
They started out by
publishing a fistful of them, including one of the Chinese feminist,
revolutionary and writer we know as Qiu Jin, sometimes styled China’s “Joan of
Arc”, so you know her story doesn’t have a happy ending. Her pen name, Jianhu Nüxia,
means “Woman Knight of Mirror Lake”, which gives you an idea of her character.
Born into a family of provincial
gentry in 1875, one of her earliest revolutionary acts was to unbind her feet,
following an arranged marriage and relocation to Beijing. She took up with
other bluestockings, got into dressing in men’s clothes, learned swordsmanship
and educated herself. At the age of 29 she sold her jewelry, left her family
and moved to Japan, where she studied at a ladies’ university, joined anti-Manchu
secret societies and wrote. When she returned to China, she founded and ran a
publication that spoke out against (among other things) female foot-binding and
arranged marriages.
She also learned how to
make bombs.
Unsurprisingly, the
revolutionary rhetoric and activities—which she took no pains to hide—brought her
to the attention of the government. In 1907, she was captured and beheaded. She
was 31.
I’m giving you two of her
more militant poems, because Qiu speaks for me eloquently and succinctly.
“Capping Rhymes with Sir
Shih Ching from Sun’s Root Land”*
Don’t tell me women
are not the stuff of
heroes,
I alone rode over the
East Sea’s
winds for ten thousand
leagues.
My poetic thoughts ever
expand,
like a sail between
ocean and heaven.
I dreamed of your three
islands,
all gems, all dazzling
with moonlight.
I grieve to think of the
bronze camels,
guardians of China, lost
in thorns.
Ashamed, I have done
nothing;
not one victory to my
name.
I simply make my war
horse sweat.
Grieving over my native
land
hurts my heart. so tell
me;
how can I spend these
days here?
A guest enjoying your
spring winds?
*I do not know who Sir
Shih Ching is, or where you’d find Sun’s Root Land, but “capping rhymes” sounds
like a very gangsta thing to do.
In this next poem, Qiu
reflects on her life as an exile—she feels liberated, but has paid a heavy
price for it.
“Preoccupation (Written
while in Japan)”
Sun and moon have no
light left, earth is dark;
Our women’s world is
sunk so deep, who can help us?
Jewelry sold to pay this
trip across the seas
Cut off from my family I
leave my native land.
Unbinding my feet I
clean out a thousand years of poison,
With heated heart arouse
all women’s spirits.
Alas, this delicate
kerchief here
Is half stained with
blood, and half with tears.
1 comment:
Clearly she is addressing a Japanese noble about her exile in Japan, for Japan has always been known in China as the Land of the Rising Sun. And as the Three Islands.
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