General Preface

Poetry is where the aspiration of the heart tends. When it dwells in the heart, it is aspiration; when expressed in words, it becomes poetry. Among the Three Hundred Poems, there are Airs (feng), Odes (ya), and Hymns (song): the Airs stir the people, the Odes correct them, and the Hymns celebrate them. The Greater Odes (Daya) were largely composed by high ministers and officials, serving to set forth the successes and failures of royal governance and to illuminate the root causes of order and chaos. And the "Yi" ode from the Greater Odes stands as the crown jewel of admonitory poetry. Its language is earnest, its intent far-reaching, its message insistently repeated -- like a father or elder brother instructing his children, like a tutor or guardian admonishing a king -- every word steeped in blood and tears, every line forged in metal and stone.

"Yi" comprises twelve stanzas: the first four of twelve lines each, the latter eight of eight lines each. The entire poem totals one hundred and twelve lines and four hundred and forty-eight characters. Its length, richness of content, and density of moral reasoning are exceedingly rare among the Three Hundred Poems of the Classic of Poetry. Viewed as a whole, its central theme can be summed up in a single word: "admonition" -- admonishing against indulgence, against loss of virtue, against reckless speech, against arrogance, against disorder -- with "dignified bearing" (weiyi) and "virtuous conduct" (dexing) as its fundamental guiding principles throughout.

Without presuming upon our shallow learning, we now attempt -- from the perspective of the pre-Qin era, within the linguistic context of high antiquity -- to elucidate this poem stanza by stanza, line by line. We shall also examine its author, period, and historical background, drawing widely upon the Classics and citing broadly from ancient texts, in the hope of glimpsing the intentions of the ancient sages, and perhaps offering something of value to today's scholars as well.