Structure of Chinese Language and Spatial Imagination
Oppure, la nuvola si fermava appena uscita dalle labbra, densa e lenta, e rimandava a un’altra visione: le esalazioni che ristagnano sui tetti delle metropoli, il fumo opaco che non si disperde, la cappa di miasmi che pesa sulle vie bituminose. Non le labili nebbie della memoria né l’asciutta trasparenza, ma il bruciaticcio delle vite bruciate che forma una crosta sulle città, la spugna gonfia di materia vitale che non scorre piú, l’ingorgo di passato presente futuro che blocca le esistenze calcificate nell’illusione del movimento: questo trovavi al termine del viaggio.
也许，缓缓离开嘴唇的雾还会悬留着，使人想到一种景象：首都上 空的山岚、无法吹散的浓烟、压住柏油路面的瘴气。不是那种不安 定的、记忆的薄雾，也不是干燥透明，却是烧焦的生命在城市表面 结成的痂，是渗透了不再流动的生命液的海绵，是过去和现在以至 未来的阻滞，在动的假象之中，已钙化的存在被它堵住了：这就是 你在旅途终点发现的。
Italo Calvino
Le città invisibili
Translated by Zhang Mi
The four / eight elements that composed nature environment in Empedocle's theory / Yi Jing ( 易经 )
In the 5th-7th centuries B.C., two philosophies almost simultaneously appeared in ancient Greece and East Asia: the cosmogony by Empedocles and Yi Jing composed by unknown Chinese prophets. Both philosophies believed that the natural elements should be the origin of matter; Empedocle proposed four elements: fire, water, earth and air, while Yi Jing proposed even four more (thunder, mountain, sky and ground).
As time passes by, Western philosophers' focus on mechanical movement gradually exceeds natural essense; but in Asia, the keen perception of nature has never disappeared. Nowaday, we can still extract many groups of Chinese characters with related meanings based on the same natural elements. Besides the four elements previously shown, we also have "metal" ( 钅 → 铁 iron / 银 silver ...), "waterfall" ( 雨 → 雪 snow / 霜 frost ....) , “arbor” ( 木 → 树 tree/ 根 root ...), etc., over twenty in total.
When these Chinese words flow into different vocabularies, they form massive number of Chinese words "painted" with natural elements. Thus, Chinese readers may be able to grasp VISUALLY the natural composition of text. For instance, when Calvino is translated into Chinese, the paradox of "wetness against dryness, air flowing through the solid" is immediately highlighted. We can also imagine that a text with more " 钅 " is cold and solid, while a text with more "木" exudes the fragrance of forests ......
PingJiang Picture ( 平江图 )，the masterplan of Suzhou City carved on tomb in 1229, preserved to today. It is a typical example of ancient Chinese city urban fabric: multilayered rectangular city wall containing blood-vessel like water system; mountainous area on suburb.
A nation that is extremely sensitive to the natural attributes in the picture, when building its own habitat, will also pay great attention to whether the city has left enough space for the existing natural landscape.
Ancient Egyptian people built lighthouse of Alexandria “Alexandria was stretching into the sea like a marvelous starfish.” But for ancient Chinese people, it is always the mountain and water taking the most prominent layer on a masterplan: Chinese citys are built, at least in its tradition, always by stepping back.
Of course, this kind of strategy will empower Chinese city not only in its masterplan, but also influencing the urbanscape all over its territory. The everyday life of people living at that time will always be influenced by the presense of strong natural environment.
"An ideal Chinese city should let people feel mountain and water everywhere, because it is where our spirit lies."
Map of Peking in Yuan Dynasty, 16th Century;
Peking's satellite map nowadays, where relationship to historical drawings are clearly seen from the mountain and lakes.
Bajo árboles ingleses medité en ese laberinto perdido: lo imaginé inviolado y perfecto en la cumbre secreta de una montaña, lo imaginé borrado por arrozales o debajo del agua, lo imaginé infinito, no ya de quioscos ochavados y de sendas que vuelven, sino de ríos y provincias y reinos... Pensé en un laberinto de laberintos, en un sinuoso laberinto creciente que abarcara el pasado y el porvenir y que implicara de algún modo los astros.
Absorto en esas ilusorias imágenes , olvidé mi destino de perseguido. Me sentí, por un tiempo indeterminado, percibidor abstracto del mundo. El vago y vivo campo, la luna, los restos de la tarde, obraron en mí; asimismo el declive que eliminaba cualquier posibilidad de cansancio.La tarde era íntima, infinita. El camino bajaba y se bifurcaba, entre las ya confusas praderas. Una música aguda y como silábica se aproximaba y se alejaba en el vaivén del viento, empañada de hojas y de distancia.
Jorge Luis Borges El Jardín de Senderos que se BifurcanTranslated by Wang Yongnian
我在英国的树下思索着那个失落的迷宫：我想象它在一个秘 密的山峰上原封未动，被稻田埋没或者淹在水下，我想象它 广阔无比，不仅是一些八角凉亭和通幽曲径，而是由河川、
省份和王国组成……我想象出一个由迷宫组成的迷宫，一个 错综复杂、生生不息的迷宫，包罗过去和将来，在某种意义 上甚至牵涉到别的星球。
我沉浸在这种虚幻的想象中，忘掉了自己被追捕的处境。在 一段不明确的时间里，我觉得自己抽象地领悟了这个世界。
模糊而生机勃勃的田野、月亮、傍晚的时光，以及轻松的下 坡路，这一切使我百感丛生。傍晚显得亲切、无限。道路继 续下倾，在模糊的草地里岔开两支。一阵清越的乐声抑扬顿挫， 随风飘荡，或近或远，穿透叶丛和距离。
Xu Bing / Gravitational Arena (2022)
In Chinese, time is always a vague issue. There is absolutely no verb conjugation in Chinese. To illustrate time, one way is to directly tell the time point, like yesterday or tomorrow; another way is to add suffixes to verbs, such as " 思索着 (medité)" ( 思索 =mediate, 着 =past progressive indicator) or " 忘掉了 (olvidé)" ( 忘掉 =forget, 了 =perfect past tense indicator).
However, the consecutive use of suffixes is seen as disturbing, and should be avoided to facilitate reading. In Chinese literature, narratives that do not explicitly express time (using mostly verb original form) are sometimes seen as more beautiful, as if multiple timelines intermingled to form a richer universe.
In fact, the Chinese text not only weakens individual verbs, but also reduces the density of verbs. For example, in quotation's last sentence talking about music, "se aproximaba y se alejaba" (music rose and fell) is transformed into " 抑扬顿挫 ”(music has the feeling of tone change)". Obviously the picture illustrated by Chinese is more peaceful, but also ambiguous.
Tranquilty and Fusion, are the two ultimate aesthetic pursuit of Chinese literature, for which we have sacrificed the logic of time. We enjoy that kind of feeling: everything lies silently together like a labyrinth, nothing stands out. Until a sudden moment, when you solve the text riddle, all of the compound feeling pours on you like thousands tons of shining star falling from the universe.
Plan of Humble Administrator Garden ( 拙政园 )， one of the most well preserved private garden in China.
The ancient Chinese builders are obsessed with labyrinth. In Chinese, 'walking around a garden and enjoying the view' is not called 'visit a garden', but 'swim in a garden' . This means that the paved, walkable space in Chinese garden should be something like water, with no fixed form or definite direction.
The labyrinth of void exists not only in the plan, but also in threedimensional space. One must be able to feel the entirety of the garden wherever he stays. Since there is no regular geometry nor solid walls in the nature, the elements of the garden should also be varied in shape and permeable in texture.
The Roman Emperor Augustus once engraved 'Festina Lente' on coin to remind himself of not losing prudence while being fast in war. But in Chinese, fast ( 快 ) and slow ( 慢 ) are not even strict opposites. The two characters have the same counterpart 忄 , which signs "mental activities". Similarly, when creating spaces, Chinese garden builders never clearly indicate where people walk or inhabit: because the place for movement is exactly the place for stay. No matter where he stops, there should always be splendid scenery.
A local perspective of Suzhou Garden. The perspective of private gardens are highly similar to those drawings produced in 15-16 century with which Chinese literati show their aspiration for their dwelling environment.
Olafur Eliasson 'Your Embodied Garden'(2013). In this video, a dancer is exploring a Suzhou garden with his body, in both static and dynamic position.
Aturdido por dos nostalgias enfrentadas como dos espejos, perdió su maravilloso sentido de la irrealidad, hasta que terminó por recomendarles a todos que se fueran de Macondo, que olvidaran cuanto él les había enseñado del mundo y del corazón humano, que se cagarán en Horacio, y que en cualquier lugar en que estuvieran recordaran siempre que et pasado era mentira, que la memoria no tenía caminos de regreso, que toda la primavera antigua era irrecuperable, y que el amor más desatinado y tenaz era de todos modos una verdad efímera.
两种怀念如同双镜对立，他夹在其间不知所措，无法再保持 高妙的超脱，最后甚至劝说他们全都离开马孔多，忘掉他传 授的一切世道人心知识，让贺拉斯见鬼去，还说不论在什么 地方都要记住，回忆没有归路，春天总是一去不返，最疯狂 执著的爱情也终究是过眼云烟。
Gabriel García Márquez Cien años de soledad Translated by Fan Yela memoria no tenía caminos de regreso
toda la primavera antigua era irrecuperable
( predicative ) has gone, and will never return
el amor más desatinado y tenaz era de todos modos
una verdad efímera
( noun ) trivial things that only last for very short time
( predicative ) has gone, and will never return
Original Text: Cui Hao, The Tower of Divine Bird, 750 AD
The divine bird has gone and will never return The only thing visible is the white cloud that has last thousand years
( noun ) cloud and smoke passing quickly, namely trival things that last shortly
Original Text: Su Shi, The Diary of Pearly Hall, 1077 AD
见可喜者，虽时复蓄之，然为人取去，亦不复惜也。譬之 烟云之过眼，百鸟之感耳。
When I see something I love, I will try to collect it, but in case it is taken by someone else, I also won't feel sorry for it. I imagine those trivial fortune as clouds and smoke drifting past my eyes, or the sound of various birds flashing through my ears.
In Chinese, there are many idioms made up of four Chinese characters, just like " 一去不返 " or " 过眼云烟 ". Unlike Western languages, Chinese Idioms are rarely used in speaking, but more in written text in order to add aesthetic quality to the article.
Many Chinese Idioms are derived from the most famous classical Chinese poetries. In other words, when we use a Chinese Idiom in literature, a trained Chinese reader will not only understand the surface meaning, but also recall the picture created by the poem (even if he has never read that full piece of work, because the idiom itself is the shortened line). Thus, the reader could be impressed by emotion elaborated in double layers.
Once a literature translator uses Chinese Idiom, the picture illustrated by the Latin language text will undergo a process of 'Chinese-nization': it will immediately be coloured with a mysterious oriental hue. In other words, the oriental imagintation that Chinese reader relates to may ignite a magnificent chemical reaction with the scene described by Western text.
The ink painting by Wu Guanzhong ( 吴冠中 ). His work looks like code but contains huge amount of typical "Chinese wonderful phenomenon"：Wandering path on mountains where people could walk alone; Massive amount of flower blossom in spring; Lonely house on mountain peak; river flowing endlessly to the neverland that no one could reach...
The idioms are so widespread in Chinese texts that it has become a cultural identity embedded in the mind of native speakers. Moreover, as the same Idiom has been used repeatedly in many different texts over a thousand years, an Idiom may be associated with more than one scene. These multi-layered scenes are like superimposed exposed film, eventually forming one 'ultimate scene' after another.
Over years, these 'ultimate scenes' may gradually become the common pursuit with regard to 'Space of Beauty' for people raised in Chinese culture. They belong only to this nation and are difficult to understand for those who have grown up in other cultures. It is these 'ultimate images' that form the basis of the Chinese aesthetic identity.
There is no answer to how many 'ultimate scenes' exist and what form they take. But what is certain is that these images, which have been flowing through Chinese civilisation for thousands of years, are a kind of divinity that the Chinese would want to pursue in the space on their own land.
The two important characteristics of this divinity are, in my opinion, the very ones mentioned in the previous two chapters: the erasure of time and the giving way to nature.
The Japanese temple Kinkakuji, was burnt and thus become the symbol of extremely beautiful but untouchable Asian architecutre. Picture from movie " 金閣炎上 ".
An ultimate spatial imagination, in almost every civilization, is meant to be something unbuilt. Babylon exist only in legend, 'Le città invisibili' will always be invisible, and Kinkakuji was reduced to ashes at its most gorgeous moment.But we are still keen to talk about these utopias because they tell what is inherent in us, what was brought to us by the language our father and mother speak, by our skin, our eyes and our blood.
Talking about Chinese utopia, we must all go back to a myth, happening in 4th century, a period of war, clash and turmoil in feudal China.
Once upon a time, there was a fisherman who got lost when walking along a creek. He ran into a mysterious land where peach blossoms bloomed everywhere. The people there lived a life that is completely isolated from the outside world, knowing nothing about the dynasty change or warfare happened in previous decades.
The fisherman got warmly treated by local people, but was also told to keep a secret of the place. After he left, he tried to call on people and find way back, but he could never, ever find the entrance of ‘Peach Blossom Land’ again.
Until today, in daily talking, we still describe the paradise we want to dwell as the 'Peach Blossom Land'（
Li Xinggang / The Instant Peach Blossom Spring, Nanjing
It seems amazing: this nation has travelled through the ocean of time, has experienced countless brutal eras, but our ultimate spiritual anchor has always been returning to the embrace of natural gods.
The whole nation is still confused today: Who are we? Where are we going? Why are we behaving like this? Do we really enjoy what we have now?
One thing is for sure, we are the only ones that can help ourselves find the answer. But I still want to go back to one of the most amazing literature moment I ever seen in my life. In 'Cien años de soledad', where Buendía recalls the moment he saw ice for first time in his life.
“Inside there was only an enormous transparent block, with infinite internal needles in which the clarity of twilight was shattered into colored stars.“
Dive into ice.
Qian Kexin 2022.12.23