Wang Wei's "gift to Li guinian on the river" is a must for many children's Tang poetry readers, and has also become one of the best expressions of the "lovesickness" consciousness: "red beans grow in the south, and old branches grow in autumn. May you pick more, this thing is the most lovesick." I remember when I first read this poem, there is a question that often haunts my heart: why is "red bean" lovesick most? After further reading, I found that various notebooks only explained what is "red bean", what it looks like, where it grows, and so on. However, no matter how deeply we grasp the botanical knowledge of red beans, the problem still exists: Why are red beans lovesick? This has become a mystery of poetics, deposited in the depths of memory.



Once I read the second part of Wen Tingyun's "two poems of Southern Song": "light a lamp at the bottom of the well, light a deep candle, go for a long time, don't go. The exquisite dice, an Hongdou, fall in love with each other, know it or not." The problem precipitated in the depths of memory suddenly got a docking: the reason why red beans cause "Acacia" is that it is embedded in the "exquisite dice" as the symbol of "points", and the "dice" is made of bone, from which red beans "enter the bone". This "bone penetrating" red bean has become the most well-known representation of "Acacia". In other words, when Wang Wei wrote "red beans" into his poems as a symbol of "Acacia", it was completely understood and accepted by his contemporaries.



However, Wen Tingyun is a poet in the late Tang Dynasty, while Wang Wei is a poet in the prosperous Tang Dynasty. The later's description of the cause of red bean lovesickness cannot become the basis for predecessors to understand this problem. So does Wang Wei interpret "red beans" in this way? Unfortunately, Wang Wei's handed down works did not involve this issue. Of course, not involving does not mean that Wang Wei does not think so, because writing poetry is not writing papers, there is no need to demonstrate why red beans are lovesick. And the handed down works are only a part of his works. Those works that have not been handed down may have such descriptions. But this is a kind of tacit evidence, that is, by distinguishing historical records from real existence, it is assumed that unrecorded facts also have the possibility of existence, which is contrary to the presupposition of ancient history discrimination, but the basis of argument is the same. It should be remembered that this is only a possibility, for which circumstantial evidence is required in the absence of direct evidence.



There are two circumstantial evidences. First of all, we need to provide the basic conditions for the establishment of Shi Shide: "dice" an Hongdou's history must be earlier than Wang Wei's era. "Dice" was invented by Cao Zhi, king of CHEN Si, according to Lang Kai, a Ming Dynasty man. But this statement is wrong. Dice have been unearthed from the tomb of Qi in the Warring States period in Qingzhou, Shandong Province. According to the permanent Xia's Oriental Art series, "a square inch dice was found in the ancient magnetism left in the Eastern Jin Dynasty, which is exactly the same as the dice excavated in ancient Egyptian, Roman and Indian monuments, as well as the dice of modern China and India." However, before the Wei and Jin Dynasties, dice were mainly made of jade or kiln magnetism. In addition to the above dice used as "ancient magnetism" in the Eastern Jin Dynasty, Volume 45 of Lang Kai's "seven revisions" also contains dice with kiln magnetism in the Wei Dynasty. When the Ming people built the city of Weizhou, "they got to burn dice in the kiln and count them.". So when did dice become bone? This is related to the "penetration" of red beans. From the perspective of philology, at least the word "dice" has appeared in the jade chapter of the Liang Dynasty. "New Cong Kao" Volume 33 quotes "Shuo Ying" as saying: "Bo dice are made of wood, carved bones in the Tang Dynasty are stolen, mixed with vermilion ink, and even take Acacia red seeds to be stolen." It can be seen that the dice of the Tang Dynasty are not only made of bone, but also embedded with "Acacia", that is, red beans, which is what Wen Tingyun called "Acacia in bone". Dice games were quite popular in the Tang Dynasty. Bai Juyi has many such songs: "the pommel horse calls for teaching, and the dice plate drinks and loses." "Green chips gather rice bowls and red sleeves brush dice plates." "Drunk, turn over the sleeves, throw a small order, laugh, roll the dice, and shout loudly." "The wine is white with waves, and the dice are full of color." It can be seen that due to the popular dice Expo in the Tang Dynasty, and the dice are inlaid with red beans, red beans have become a symbol of "falling in love with each other".



The second is the proof of communication. "Red bean" is not a common thing. It was only born in the "southern country". Wang Wei called it "the most lovesick thing", which obviously presupposes that his era can understand this. Red beans not only become a general thing of Acacia, but also a symbol of "the most Acacia", which needs to be based on the general consensus of that era. If Wang Wei used only an individualized memory, such as not "red bean", but "black bean", which is of great lovesickness significance to him, this poem could not be spread. Li Kuangyi, who lived in the reign of emperor Zhaozong of the Tang Dynasty, recorded in zixianji that "beans are round and red, and those who are the first black ones are called 'Acacia' throughout the world, that is, the synonym of red beans." It is said that "the whole world calls it 'Acacia'". It can be seen that the symbolism of red beans has been a general consensus in the Tang Dynasty.



There is another point worth noting in the communication of this poem. The 16th volume of "Tang Shi Ji Ji Ji", a Song Dynasty man who made meritorious contributions, contains: "in the chaos of Lushan Mountain, Li Gui ran to the river and pond in the year of Lu GUI. He once interviewed the envoys in central Hunan and sang on the banquet:" red beans were born in the southern country, and a few branches were sent in autumn. It is the most lovesick thing to give you more picking. "Also:" the wind is clear, the moon is bitter lovesickness, and dangzi has been in the army for more than ten years. The conscripts go to the day and offer hospitality, and the time when the geese come back is enclosed. "These are all made by Wei, and how can the pear garden sing." This shows that this poem of the Tang Dynasty was widely sung in the "pear garden". The disciples of the pear garden are often far away from their hometown, and when they are in bloom, they always miss their lovers with "deep" feelings, which is the most common theme in geisha and quasi prostitute poems.



Wang Wei's poem has a wide influence on the "lovesickness" Poems of later generations, which also shows that people recognize "red beans" as a symbol of lovesickness. For example, Zhao Chongyi of the Song Dynasty said, "if you don't cut red bean branches, Acacia hangs alone." Zhao Yanduan: "red beans can't bear to see, full of Acacia tears." Cheng Long: "sigh half makeup red beans, Acacia has points." In the preface to Tang poetry on the snow mountain house written by the people of the Qing Dynasty, Wang Wei's "red beans born in the South" was "straight up the chest and under the false carving". Chen Yinque attached a song "chanting red beans" to "Liu Rushi's farewell biography", which explained that his writing motivation was "living in Kunming in the past year, I occasionally bought a red bean from Qian's hometown in baimaogang, Changshu, because it had the meaning of explaining Qian Liu's fate poetry".



However, circumstantial evidence is an incomplete proof, why red bean lovesickness has not been confirmed so far. However, this does not prevent us from deepening our understanding of this phenomenon. Because although there may be other answers to how the red bean became a lovesickness, it doesn't matter. What matters is that it has become a lovesickness and a symbol of lovesickness in the collective memory of a nation. How did this happen?



The formation of a collective memory is often associated with certain historical events and circumstances. However, the historical events in a certain era do not mean that they can all become a collective memory. The remembered historical scenes need not only strong impressions, but also the generation of consensus. Moreover, even if it becomes a collective memory of a certain era, it does not mean that it will be inherited by another era. As long as we look at the history of the Tang Dynasty, we can illustrate this point. For example, the history of Dezong Dynasty was an important historical memory of the governance of emperors in the middle and late Tang Dynasty. When Wei Guanzhi suggested that tangxianzong concentrate his military power to appease Wu Yuanji first, he cited the story of Dezong and said, "Your Majesty doesn't know what happened during the construction?" (new book of Tang Dynasty) this refers to the historical facts of the four rebellions in various regions at the beginning of Dezong's accession to the throne. Li Deyu admonished Wu Zong, and once cited the anecdotes of Liu Yan, Han Quanyi, and Li mi when he was in Dezong as examples to persuade. (Zizhi Tongjian) but these important historical memories of the Tang people have long been forgotten by later generations.



It can be seen that to transcend the specific historical era and become a cross era common memory, not only the object to be remembered is a common emotion, but also a permanent form of memory. We know that the memory of an event often needs some medium to trigger memory. For individual memory, a thing of great significance to the individual itself may be the catalyst for memory. For collective memory, it needs some common sensible things as a catalyst. Once this sensible object no longer exists in the future, this medium will continue to be preserved in the collective memory in the form of a symbol and become the catalyst of memory. However, not any specific sensible object can become a symbol. With the age-old and the failure of sensible objects, most of the once memory catalysts are also drifting away and slowly fading away. However, there is also a specific thing that can still maintain the nature of its memory catalyst, which is no longer used in reality. So how did this happen? Wang Wei's "Acacia" provides a way for the passing catalyst to become a symbol of collective memory, which is through a certain literary form. Moreover, if a symbol of collective memory can last forever, it also needs this literary form to become a classic. Only classics can have the ability to maintain lasting memory.



Interestingly, the memory symbol extracted from Acacia has a dual nature: it points to the memory object brought to us by the symbol - Acacia, but also points to the memory itself - Acacia itself is a kind of memory. Therefore, the memory content and memory form are combined into one. In fact, if this poem only points to the memory content, it cannot become a common memory, because a specific memory content, after thousands of years of washing, has no memory value for future generations. If what Wang Wei described in acacia is only a specific personal memory, this poem cannot become a classic. Only "Acacia" as "memory" itself is collective; Only in this sense can red beans be used as a universal symbol of memory. (Liu Xiaoming, sun Xiangrong, Professor of the literary thought research center of Guangzhou University and editor of the Journal of Guangzhou University)