A Many-Splendoured Banquet~ FinAle

I rate this wuxia date as a 5*****-plus Banquet fit for The King. Also the Queen. In mod society of equality in 21st century Malaysia; otherwise, the likes of Anak M, Helen and Sabbie would have a go at my head. Do you think I care for the ilk of Mave and Howsy, and Imran.

NOw that we have the informalities out of the way, let's obserrve some protocol in court.



Yes, a 5-Star-Plus Banq!

If you had not heeded Desi's advice to pay RM8-RM10 for the invite to THE BANQUET, to be up close and personal with Zhang Ziyi, it's your loss, not mind. As a punishment for disobeying a semi-royal command, thou art from henceforth, banned immediately from this banquet, so take please before I call the guards and have you summarily executed/excused. Furthermore, serious mode, for once as Desi has been mostly A-live and Hilarious (as counter-point to one Dead Seriuous heroine:) -- stop reading at this point before the maids-in-train start serving the Spoiler starters. FORWARNED, second helping.


*************** Main Course starts beyond this VIP table ***************

King Desi seated on the Left, Queen ..... on the Rite.
The other 'nites of the Round Table are self-invited LEST DEsi maketh more enemies
and it's not customary on GOoD BEaut Sundae, although I sacrified CON BF for Chinoserie Nine-Course Banquet. Why Nine, and not traditional Eight? I heard one ER arsk, brave soul dare she is!
Because there are many Cats and Pretty Kittens in attendance, I'm told. Truth be told, some Dogs (minus the Englishman) have also self-invited damnselves.
Table c(R)ash. Au, Ag or Platinum Kad not accepted.

Course1 (Stolen or borrowed or re-cycled, I'm knot responsible:)

In Chinese literature, the Tang period (618-907) is considered the golden age of Chinese poetry

Tang Shi San Bai Shou [300 Tang Poems] is a compilation of poems from this period made around 1763 by Heng-tang-tui-shi [Sun Zhu] of the Qing dynasty.

Sun's motivation for compiling the collection sprang from his dissatisfaction with the then popular textbook, the Qian Jia Shi [Poems by A Thousand Poets], an earlier collection from the Tang and Sung (960-1279) periods .

Sun made his own selection of Tang poems based on their popularity and effectiveness in cultivating character. Because it represented equally well each of the classical poetic forms and because it represented the best works by the most prominent Tang poets, Sun's collection became a "best seller" soon after its publication. It has been used for centuries since to teach elementary students to read and write, and also in cultivating character.

Sun's collection is still a classic today, its popularity undiminished. Nearly every Chinese household owns a copy of Tang Shi and poems from it are still included in textbooks and to be memorized by students.

We would like to make this World Wide Web version of the poems as a testimony to its compiler's intent :

" Learning Tang poems three hundred by heart, you can chant poems though you know not the art ."

Source: http://etext.virginia.edu/chinese/frame.htm

********************

Course2:

006
五言古詩
李白

月下獨酌

花間一壺酒， 獨酌無相親；
舉杯邀明月， 對影成三人。
月既不解飲， 影徒隨我身；
暫伴月將影， 行樂須及春。
我歌月徘徊， 我舞影零亂；
醒時同交歡， 醉後各分散。
永結無情遊， 相期邈雲漢。

Five-character-ancient-verse
Li Bai

DRINKING ALONE WITH THE MOON

From a pot of wine among the flowers
I drank alone. There was no one with me --
Till, raising my cup, I asked the bright moon
To bring me my shadow and make us three.
Alas, the moon was unable to drink
And my shadow tagged me vacantly;
But still for a while I had these friends
To cheer me through the end of spring ...
I sang. The moon encouraged me.
I danced. My shadow tumbled after.
As long as I knew, we were boon companions.
And then I was drunk, and we lost one another.
... Shall goodwill ever be secure?
I watch the long road of the River of Stars.

********************

Acknowledgment: The Chinese version of this Tang Shi is edited by UVa based on Mr. Wei-chang Shan's electronic version. English translations are primarily from Witter Bynner's Jade Mountain: A Chinese Anthology, New York : Alfred A. Knopf, 1929.

Course3:


+Ye Yan (2006)
Directed by
Xiaogang Feng

+ I consulted a Chinese scholar whose name rhymes closely with a Moo-Moo sounding animal, and he confirms the Hanyu Pinyin of 'The Night' character is Ye without the "h" that I had used before. My first APology for/to the knight. 'Yan', BTW, is as should be and not Desi's predilection to be power-associated with mGf nigh Catsville. No second Apology for this 'rite.


From Goodgling, in the style of Anak Merdeka, who, BTW, hails from Furong, of which I am very proud. The pride is wrt AM, not Seremban, just so that I don't have to shout out third Apology before the nite is out. I hear some brave soul murmur: CHeONG hee WAN, he he he...


Combined Courses4-8:

It's goin' to be "long", to live up to my name, so if you need to PEE, which is the crude or crass term for the more refined "Answer the call of Mother Nature" as you would use in the Tang courts...Among Queen, prince and princess and general, soldeirs andcourt jester. You see I left out the King because he can use any word he wants to, and who's to argue unless you have nine heads to surrender. Not cattle. The one that houses a human brain, you knave (rhymes close to naive: 4See, Hilarious, Yes?)

Thick-skinned headwaiter now summarises The Banquet's storyline~~

Desi's first recall is that the plot is a loose combination of Da Bard's Romeo&Juliet, Macbeth and Hamlet, "The Night Banquet" (lietral translation of Ye Yan)is set in an empire in chaos. The Emperor, the Empress, the Crown Prince, the Minister Mentor and the General all have their own Agendas which cometh to a climax -- IMHO, in fact, a series of climxes! -- at the les than auspicious banquet.

Cast protagonists:

Ziyi Zhang .... Empress Wan
Daniel Wu .... Prince Wu Luan
Xun Zhou .... Qing Nu
You Ge .... Emperor Li
Jingwu Ma .... The Minister Mentor
Xiaoming Huang .... The Minister's son

DESIDERATA:

Confession is that I had not seen previous films by director Feng Xiaogeng, such as World Without Thieves and Big Shot's Funeral, but I think his Banquet made me proud that Asian movies now are made with as generous a budget as Hollywood's, hence the luxurious backdrops and authentic, contextual choreography, not that I sell myself as an expert. I write mainly from aesthetics and poetics vantage point, OK? (WHICH goes without saying is a rhetorical Q so that I won't have to tender AP4 being the gentleman knight Desi's rumored 2B...4f's whisper to helen's ears.)



Opening scene~~

The sad strains of music and several poetic lines are recited. Desi wishes he can recall every sublime word or at least capture their essence in time, but the body was weak while the spirit roared at the cinematheque. But you read Li Bai's five-character poem above and you would be on the right spiritedstanza-cum-bonanza.

That's WHY I reproduced the opening poem, I now confess I stole it from royal residence @anakmerdeka.blogspot.com -- it belongs to the similar melancholy dwelling of an unrequited lover's laments. Desi can emphatise with that soul; I think mGf Kyels too, but this brokern-hearted silhouette was then quickly shattered by a giant-sized SCORPION crawling over a text (of less than immortal lines?) -- a portent of death, posion and passion. I was wondering if after copulation, the Fe-male Scorpion also makes a meal of the Male as payment in kind?

Sext, it was a chaotic scene of blood, gore and score -- with dark and gloomy effects accompanied by death-march music. The royal mauraders showed no mercy as they slashed at white-dressed pantomine dancers -- with red-coloured blood splashing ammarkedly against white canvas and brown-coloured wooden staged platforms. Defenceless acrobats dying with dignity as they danced against the grain of swoshiung blades and sloshing steps of murderous soldiers doing the King's command to spare no soul. The only target was really Prince Wu Luan, whose father was the just deposed King, whose wife Empress Wan was the successor's only want in life. Yes, Emperor Li is the epitome of human frailty, he covets his brother's wife.

In olde times of many kingdomed China, an Emperor would typically have thousands of virgin maidens at his command, but God forbid, Emperor Li only lusted after one, Wan.

Of course, it goes, or comes, without saying that the nephew -- Wu Luan -- escaped the mass-acre. Blood and Victim now turned into Brooding and Revenge. The Prince, who treated the General's only daughter like a sister, caused a most lloyal lament of the night. Unrequited lover Qing Nu declared total and undivided love for The Prince, but the tragedy is~~


The Prince also coveted after his step-mother the Empress.The traditional story of Man and the Eternal Triangle. Just an aside, do you know that the most stable of any buildings is the Pyramid with the three equal triangles on its sides? But the stability is often wrecked by the eternal war between the three faces looking in different directions, tearing at the fabric of the body?

So the whole movie was centred on Emperor Li's obsession of getting rid, at all costs, of his brother's son, Wu Luan, who once coveted undoubtedly the Emperor's conquered wife, but now his emotions were mixed.

One night, the Prince stole into her lady's chamber. Or did Empress Wan visit him in the steal of the night? (I must apologise-4 truly for this lapse.) The scene that follows to Desi was the most beautiful contradiction of this epic.

The one and only Wan he wanted was more than willing for AAmore. But Wu Luan the gentleman he is (I'm using the present tense because I believe Genteelmen never die, they only disappear for a w'ile) checked himself, and the sexual encounter was replaced by the splendid dance of a pair of butterfly lovers in love and in agony. The song whose lyrics were the Prince's Heart, Sweat and Tears writ of a canvas has imprinted the Lament ~~ the closest Desi can capture is te following Essence in his shared ecstasy-lah!


"The forest has its trees
The trees have their barnches
The maiden has her love song
But where is the Youth of my dream?..."

(Message to ER: If Desi's perception and reception is wlong, please correct me. Gorgive him, but don't forget him.
A poet always likes to be re-membered.
If thou have the original immortal lines,
please disPLAY at Comments, and I'll give thee
portion of dancer-singerSweetYoungThing Qing Nu's wine and lines sublime.)

The Emperor post dinner was entertained by a dance troupe headed by -- yes, he un-masked himself at The Emperor's bidding after the performance -- the nephew Wu Luan, enacting the dying minutes of the deposed Emperor, the actor's father. The blowing of poison concocted from the foulest combo of a root from cold wintry northern China plus The Scorpion's bile into the ears of The Father figure -- it brought forth the "horror" of the Throne-cum-Consort-Usurper's Secret Recipe.

My dear E-Readers, besides this poisonous concoction (Love portion number 9?), what can be more poisonous, asked the Apothecary( Twisted Heels, is this the right term? If Desi got it wlong, please send some AtenoLOL!:) of (the Emperor),the Prince, then the Empress, who were the royal customers...)

Th Empress was the last patron. After receiving the Apothecray's answer, she proved it by pressing into his hand some reward. "Here's some Aresenic, just enough to serve one person alone," she whispered, expecting the recipient to be eternally quietly grateful for her consideration.

The central theme presented by this riveting Tragedy is the human heart's DESIRE. Desiderata of Power.
At all costs. Death, More death, and Amore death. Even Death of the Most Close and Dearest to Thee.)

I'm calling TIME-OUT for this Sunday's Inter:lude.
Because the Banquet's Dish9 is the concluding Desiderata of Happiness.
YL Chong's quest ~~ on the great stage of LIFE
we are all Players.
And I would tread slowly the path of deciphering the Climaxes at The Banquet.
Come back for more later tonight, if I feel inspired. For Amore.

Just a foretaste of what the Emperor did.
Rubbing her bare back with his fingers and a white-coloured stone (Jade, FA?), the slow motions of his hands sweeping all the wy from down upwards to linger at her nape. Then his soft nipping at her ears. And her breaths axed and waned like a melody never soothed, reaching for ever rising crests. And he her breasts. The sighs of heavenly sounds whispped from her curved lips, and his panting sweatiung body. And her subtle answers of her massager's probes -- "How you truly know the ways to please a lady", whence he asked if her late husband/his brother, excelled in pleasing her?

The prospect that she would reward Him with an earth-shattering entrance soon made the Emperor Li declared that "he would give up all of the kingdom now, now that --- Yes, you are right! -- he has the one and only Wan so many coveted". Thinking allowed as the music fades, and the darkness claims the cloak of disissal of anonymous voyeuristic eyes, Desi makes another CONfess ~~ If I was the court-poet-recorder then, I too would have willingly succumbed and become a cowardly convert.

You want an elaboration, come into my writHing chamber then...they say Scorpions and other mystery creatures, including two-legged wans, abound at the Tang emperor's palace, andering even in the still of the night as the poet sings: "I'm coming into thee whence my Fires be quenched by the waters of thy greater Desires."



~~~~~~~~ Inter-MIssion ~~~~~~~


Course9 served @11.24AM afer a LONG INTER-MISSION,
after this royal scribe had caught up with some cat's nap,
then I brushed my teeth, went for a walk,
thence to habitual CON BF, I swear by H'avenly Peanut Butter!

Desi then went for a jog to work up an AP,
reached out to the PC still flashing~~
A Many-Spendoured Banq ~~
awaits conclusion:)

Otherwise, no rest for Da PC, not Desi!
I'm a slave to labour, LOve's Lost!
... on R&R Day called Sunday.
Some call It the Seventh Day.
I deem It Servant's Day, serving my damn'd,
Ooops, amend that to Those Darn'd Catty ER.
I don wanna offens, A-gin,
Two Fairy La'y Helen and AM,
Often workin' in/(as?) Consort.

Okay, The FinAle

When Prince Wu Luan was serviced by his adoring SYT Qing Nu, did it occur to you it was yet another demonstration of Man's epitome of CONtradiction? Here is a warm-eyed doe longing, yearning and pining for his Love. LOve. LOVe. Never made it fully to LOVE.

She tantalised the young prince, oh stunning stud who's That Youth of My Dream, with innocent smiles, singing the Song of Woes of a pining lover, now here to dis-miss HIS LONELINESS. Art thou lonely now, she asks. No, as long as I'm with you, he answers. But the girl knows he's lying a bit. But her love is unconditional. Yes, she's contented to be lonely as long as he throws her a few glances of tenderness. Qing Nu knows Prince has his tortured eyes only wrapped up in the Empress's infinite charms and warm embracing arms. Yet he resisted when She was willing.

But he gave in to One who longed for him w'ile he longed for Another. Foolish Man. Shakespeare has writ in mocking lines, so also Li Bai in tenderer soaking wines. Drinking alONE.

Aroused sensually but not spiritually, Wu Luan suddenly grabbed the Sweet and Inncoent lamb, who put on a coy play of resistance while within her her fires rose and rose, ready to break through the pores of her tenderest porcelain white skin. Her body was for the first time lain. He ravaged her. Did somebody whisper "he raped her"?Director Feng Xiaogeng truly knows how to tease, taunt and tantalise his voyeuristic audience, expecting H'avenly servings after paying a miserly RM8-10. No wonder most panted for the sext scene.it

The scene fades into a spent couple lying in a bed of marble yet felt like silk because, in the most tantalising coupling act of human dignity, it's all in the mind. Yours, his, hers, and mine. Voyeurs we all be, caught by the rising temperatures within the darkess in the small, closeted hall called a (ob)sine-tit-a-theque.

Flashback now to the Empress Wan trying to seduce her step-son turned nephew-in-law. maybe outlaw but all the most enticing. As Adam's seduction by Eve's forbidden apple in the original rehearsal for wicked, or weakling, Man's unending downfall since Time memorable. After embracing Prince Wu Lian guiding his wet lips to her snow-white bosom seen in parts through red-satin coerlet, suddenly the Prince hesitated, took an angry step back. No, my Empress. This can not be!

The perennial question Man is beguiled with: To be (seduced?) or not to be, that's the question.
Chinese fiction must stay its course. Honour thy father. Honour thy mother, now the Queen two. Damn the uncle. I'll have Her after his royal disappearance from this earth, Prince Wu swore that lusty night that did not proceed to a logical cuntclusion. And she gave him a stinging slap. It tasted good, and right.

Now fast forward to the Emperor entering Her Highness chamber, and the first word she uttered, the proverbial "I have a headache..." He wanted to call the palace physician. No, she said she could remedy her own pulpitations, it's her heart that truly aches. Earlier, she had visited The Apothecary for that poison ivy concoction, planning to take the Emperor's life inside her bowels after taking him for the lust time through h'avenly clouds. But even the vilest of humans have a conscience that pricks at unlikely moment, so the Emperor bought himself another ticket for the sext ride.

Arrived the Banquet night, fixed 24 earlier against the court adviser's warning that it was not anauspicious day. As the show was about to begin, the Empress rose to speak.
To mark her gratitude to the Emperor for her Coronation, she would like to make a Toast. A Royal Toast to "Long Live The King!" And she handed him a poisoned cup of red wine.

Yes, Red is the colour of propserity, her lipstick, her flowing gown. And portent of Death.

The Emperor was puting the Cup to his lips when a shrfill Voice pierces the iar. SYT Qing Nu says she wishes to honour the Emperor with a dance. And he was pleased, and presnted her the cup of red wine in appreciation of his most obedient subject.

Qing Nu took a few sips, put on a black mask, and began her song. And her dance. Her last. A few minutes as her voice faltered with her Lover's Lament about unrequited love, blood oozed from the singer's mouth. And she fell, and her dance partrner rused to her side, caressing her head in his arms.

Her last words, ever considerate of The Love of Her Dream: Are you still lonely, my love?
His melancholic reply: No, as long as you are with me.

The Emperor, after a deafening silence, not quite elegant, turned to his Consort: You put Poison into the Cup?
The Empress' nonchalant response: Yes, my King.

Even as Prince Wu rushed towards the Enmperor to avenge a SYT's death, the Emperor stately -- with the Cup in hand -- rose, stopping the Avenger in his steps. He faced his Consort, asking: "You Wan' me to die?"
She noodded, giving constancy to her earlier whsipered toasting words " before the ecsatsy ride tonight, I will take your life." He just didn't get it then. Figure of speech, also literary transportation into reality of a Hhman's heart's truest DESIRE.

Emperor Li put his royal lips to the Cup like it was Wan's breasts, suckling for the last time. And he fell, his head cold onto her warm lap.

Course9 must end prematurely as narrating what follows in quick succession would surely be the greatest Spoiler of what has been a many-spledoured banquet for Desi. I hope you see for yourself the message embraced by Li Bai's poem. Also, Prince Wu has not become wiser even after being lifted up to Heaven, so Desi's advice to the Young&Articulates here ~~

""The forest has its trees
The trees have their barnches
The maiden has her love song...

Can you pause and strive?

Be that Youth of Her Dream?..."


Poets always have a sense of loneliness even at a banquet crowd. So also a poet-aspirant among infinite blogospheric companions. Butsometimes Melancholy can be, like the most dignified human coupling ever, Ecstatic. It's all in the mind. Yours truly. And mine as sure as another banquet awaits. In the still of the night.