First-year Seminar 1XX, Hollins University
RECORDS OF DISTANT PLACES
NOTE: This course is to be offered as one of Hollins’ First-year Seminars, required in the fall term
for all first-time students: “These seminars are designed to improve student learning at a critical early
stage in the undergraduate experience, offer a unique class bonding experience based on academic
excellence, and introduce stduetns to a number of general education skills and perspectives.”
Pending approval under Hollins’ General Education guidelines, the course is designed to
allow individual students to fulfill either the Global Systems Perspective or the Aesthetic Analysis
Perspective. It will also allow them all to fulfill, under Skills, the First-year Writing Requirement.
Catalogue description:
Maps, phantasms, a hall of mirrors, roads of paper or silk: this is a course for people who like to
read odd books. We’ll consider a variety of texts—true, false, fictive, historical, poetic, visual, and in
all kinds of prose. Our investigations will center around amazing tales and earnest reports by men
and women from China, Japan, and the U.S., and a few from other places (Argentina, Belgium,
Britain, Ireland). Many tell of travel on Eurasian trade routes called “the silk roads”. All reveal the
global power of narratives: as we shape them, as they shape us, as they are shaped by one another.
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Instructor: Jeanne Larsen
Swannanoa Hall 211
(362-)6276; jlarsen@hollins.edu
Office Hours: TBA (but for sure)
I asked about the place and was told the following story….
It was here, I remembered, that the princesses in Lady Murasaki’s Tale had lived.
—“Lady Sarashina”, As I Crossed a Bridge of Dreams (Ivan Morris, transl)
A road is made by people walking on it; things are so because they are called so.
What makes them so? Making them so makes them so.
What makes them not so? Making them not so makes them not so.
—Zhuangzi [Chuang Tzu], Basic Writings 2 (Burton Watson, transl)
COURSE GOALS
We’re here to think and talk and learn about the power of stories: the ones we read, the ones we tell
ourselves, the ones that fill our heads. We’ll get into some complex questions: What is “art”? What’s
“good art”? What’s “truth”? What is “fiction”? What’s an “author”? How is the teller altered by the
tale, and is the reader a teller too? What, oh, what is “intertextuality”?
Another set of questions we’ll consider: What’s “distant”, what’s“foreign”, what’s “exotic”? What
happens when strangers encounter one another and swap ideas, art-forms and other objects of value,
religious beliefs and practices? What’s “a culture” and what does “multi-cultural” actually mean? Are
maps realities? How does an individual (Ursula K. LeGuin or Jonathan Swift or Lady Sarashina or
the pilgrim monk Faxian or you) make sense of all the data that one encounters as a traveler on
planet Earth? Oh, and: Is translation possible?
Also: Globalization—are we there yet? If so, when? How about “the Silk Road”: what can we learn
from examining verbal / visual / conceptual maps like that one? What does the transmission of
Buddhist ideas and practices out of India teach us about the nature of global systems? How do
historical exchanges among empires, kingdoms, nations help us understand the interdependence of
life in the 21st century?
We’re here, too, because this is college; you are now on a journey toward a sharper, more supple,
better-furnished mind. Expect to work to hone your skills in written and oral expression, effective
argumentation, and the perceptive analysis of what other people utter. Bon voyage. Yilu xunfeng.
COURSE TEXTS
1. Readings from course pack / on Blackboard / on line.
2. In addition, buy these books: [prices as of July, 2010]
Arthur Waley, translator. Monkey: Folk Novel of China by Wu Ch’eng-en [a.k.a. Wu Cheng’en] $13
Hergé (a.k.a. Georges Prosper Remi) The Blue Lotus (The Adventures of Tintin) $10.99
Susan Whitfield Life Along the Silk Road 19.95
“Lady Sarashina” [a.k.a. “Sugawara Takasue’s daughter”] As I Crossed a Bridge of Dreams $15 (Ivan
Morris, translator)
Anthony C. Yu, transl. & ed. The Monkey & The Monk: An Abridgment of The Journey to the West $20
Dong Yue The Tower of Myriad Mirrors $21 (Shuen-fu Lin & Larry. J. Schulz, transl)
COURSE REQUIREMENTS
Attendance: Be here. Be prepared. Be alert.
Participation in discussion: Essential. What happens between:30 and 12 on Tues. & Thursday mornings
is a collaborative event. Quality and quantity of your contributions will both affect your final grade.
Honor code: You should know about this. All written work must be turned in with a signed pledge.
Point is: you’re not putting anything forward as your work (your thinking, your knowledge, your
labor in producing quality English prose free from errors in mechanics) if it is not.
If you have any questions about what’s legit, please ask. For example, I encourage you to
make use of the Writing Center, but having a friend edit your paper is out of bounds.
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Written assignments:
Traveler’s Report: 500 word record of a visit to Hollins, written by a medieval Chinese monk or nun
Analytical paper #1: 1000 + words
Litterchure or forgery?: 1250 + word “newly discovered” chapter from Xiyouji [Monkey], Guliver’s Travels,
or Flowers in the Miror, with an introduction by the translator
Analytical paper #2: 1250 + words showing how a theme or themes from Tang literary tales are
handled in Xiyouji, using the Anthony Yu translation [The Monkey & the Monk].
On the Inky Road: 1000 + word travel narrative with embedded poems, in the Japanese haibun mode,
about a trip you have taken, whether to Kyōto, downtown Roanoke, D.C., or Prague.
Graded group assignment: Digital project for first 3-4 weeks still under development—class website with
object biographies and map or maps of Eurasian trade routes, focused on “the silk road/s”.
[Possible alternate / additional assignments: Brief oral reports on additional chapters from Yu’s translation
of Xiyouji; group compliation of on-line annotated list of refracted versions of Xiyouji, including
manga and anime, with links / clips / digital images where possible. ]
Final exam: Details to be announced.
HOUSE RULES
Tinker Day: There’s a reason people climb up mountains: see you there. If it falls on Tuesday or
Thursday, continue with readings on the schedule.
Phones: Off, please. We are engaged in serious business and need to focus. No texting either. Srsly.
Computers: They are our friends, but not in class. Take notes on paper. Thank the trees.
SCHEDULE OF READINGS
(specifics for underlined assignments can be found below)
week 1
THU Introduction
week 2
TUE 1941, Argentina: “The Library of Babel” by Jorge Luis Borges (Andrew Hurley, translator)
16th century, China (with a touch of England): Monkey [Xiyouji, Hsi-yu chi]
attributed to Wu Ch’eng-en (A.Waley, transl.) Intro, Preface, Chapters 1-9
1999, UK: from Life Along the Silk Road by Susan Whitfield assignment 1
THU Monkey Chapters 10-12
Life Along the Silk Road assignment 2
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week 3
TUE Monkey Chapters 13-21
1st century? 7th?, Kushan Empire? China?: The Heart Sutra (a.k.a. The Heart of Perfect
Wisdom Sutra, Essence of Wisdom Sutra, etc.) 3 versions (the Zen Community of
New York, Red Pine/Bill Porter, Donald S. Lopez, Jr., translators)
7th – 10th centuries, China: Poems by Tang era women, assignment 1: Buddhism
THU Monkey Chapters 22-30
week 4
TUE 646, China: Book 1 of Xuanzang's Record of the Western Regions (Samuel Beal, transl, 1884)
http://depts.washington.edu/silkroad/texts/xuanzang.html
2004, USA: The Silk Road Journey with Xuanzang by Sally Hovey Wriggins
Chapters 1, 3, 4, part of 9, 10: pp. 1-18, 37-54, 55-76, 159-167, 182-193
1952, UK: from The Real Tripitaka by Arthur Waley pp. 34-37 “In the Punjab”
c. 400, China; from A Record of Buddhistic Kingdoms by Faxian [Fa-hsien] (James Legge, transl)
http://depts.washington.edu/silkroad/texts/faxian.html
http://www.silkroadfoundation.org/toc/index.html go to: route maps >Fa-hsien
THU 838 [-847], Japan/China: Ennin’s Diary: the Record of a Pilgrimage to China in Search of the Law,
by Ennin (Edwin O. Reischauer, transl, 1955), pp. 1-29, 268-69
1955, USA: Ennin’s Travels in T’ang China by Edwin O. Reischauer, 138-152: “The Traveler in
T’ang China”, “Food & Lodging on the Road”, “Monasteries, Cloisters…Traveler"
313-314?, [Sogdian people in what’s now NW China]: 4 letters, w/ modern introdution
http://depts.washington.edu/silkroad/texts/sogdlet.html (N. Sims-Williams transl)
Life Along the Silk Road assignment 3
week 5
TUE 7th – 10th cent.s, China: Poems by Tang era women, assignment 2: the borderlands; exotica
Life Along the Silk Road assignment 4
1978, USA: “Introduction” from Orientalism by Edward Said1 ; 1994: “Afterward” part I
1939, Argentina: "Pierre Menard, Author of the Quixote” by J.L. Borges (A. Hurley, transl)
1989, USA: [on Dunhuang, on Chang’an, on famine] from Silk Road by Jeanne Larsen
pp. 51-56; 188-93, 284-87; 74-76
THU 2001, USA: Ultimate Journey: Retracing the Path of an Ancient Buddhist Monk Who Crossed Asia in
Search of Enlightenment by Richard Bernstein, MAP & Introduction, Chaps. 2 (part), 11,
12 (part), 15, 19: pp. 3-13, 36-44, 170-191, 204-205, 232-245, 296-311
1935, 1938, Ireland: 2 poems by William Butler Yeats, “Meru”, “Lapis Lazuli”
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s3HqfFUA3wE
The Edward Said Reader (Moustafa Bayoumi & Andrew Rubin, eds., Vintage, 2004) has a lightly edited version which
looks to be slightly more reader-friendly for beginning-level undergrads. The editors’ brief (4+ pages) intro to this
selection may be helpful to students, too.
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week 6
TUE 1899, UK: from The Yangzi Valley and Beyond by Isabella Bird, Chap. 2 “The Model
Settlement”, p. 15-26
1969 (re 1935), USA: “The Big Smoke” by Emily Hahn
1934; 1946(re 1931), Belgium: The Blue Lotus (The Adventures of Tintin) by Hergé (transl, anon)
1941, Argentina: “The Garden of Forking Paths” by Jorge Luis Borges (A. Hurley, transl)
THU
[Fall Break, phew!]
week 7
TUE 1899, UK: from The Yangzi Valley and Beyond by Isabella Bird, Chapters 17, 18, 19, 30, 31
pp. 177-209, 367-397
1997, USA: from Questions of Heaven: The Chinese Journeys of an American Buddhist by Gretel
Ehrlich, Chapter 1, “The Road to Emei Shan”, pp. 1- 36
c. 1827, China: from Flowers in the Mirror [Jinghua Yuan] by Li Ruzhen (Lin Tay-yi transl) 1543, 107-141 [Chapters 1-5, 13-16], & notes 293-99, 302-05 + brief excerpt at
http://www.wsu.edu/~wldciv/world_civ_reader/world_civ_reader_2/li_ju-chen.html
THU 1726; 1735, UK: Gulliver’s Travels, Book III by Jonathan Swift
week 8
TUE e. 11th century, Japan: As I Crossed a Bridge of Dreams [Sarashina Nikki] by “Sugawara
Takasue’s daughter” [a.k.a. Lady Sarashina] (Ivan Morris, transl) read the notes too!
THU 13th century, Japan: from Journal of the 16th-night Moon [Izayoi nikki] by the nun Abutsu
(Helen Craig McCullough, transl.), pp. 340-371 in H.C. McC’s Classical Japanese Prose
13th/14th century, Japan: from The Confessions of Lady Nijō [Towazugatari] (Karen Brazell,
transl), Introduction, Book Four (Chaps.19-23) + Chap. 24 from Book Five,
pp. vii-xxxi, 181-225, 227-237
week 9
TUE 1688, Japan: The Records of a Travel-Worn Satchel [Oi no kobumi] by Matsuo Bashō
(Nobuyuki Yuasa, transl)
1689, Japan: The Narrow Road to the Deep North [Oku no hosomichi] by Matsuo Bashō
(David Barnhill, transl)
THU 1994, 1997, 2006, USA: 9 poems by Jane Hirshfield: from The October Palace “’Perceptibility is
a Kind of Attentiveness’”, 23-24, “Leaving the October Palace”, 76; from The Lives of
the Heart “Reading Chinese Poetry Before Dawn” 83, “The Poet”, 86; from After
“’Of’: An Assay” 25, “The Monk Stood Beside a Wheelbarrow” 57, “Jasper, Feldspar,
Quartzite” 69, “One Sand Grain Among the Others…” 71, “Letter to C.” 87-90
1996, USA: “The Humped-Back Flute Player” & “Finding the Space in the Heart”
by Gary Snyder (poems from Mountains and Rivers Without End, 79-82, 149-152)
2002, USA: “Body and Soul” & “Body & Soul II” by Charles Wright
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(poems from A Short History of the Shadow, 71-73, 77-79)
1989, USA: faux Tang poems from Silk Road by Jeanne Larsen pp. 14, 37, 218-9, 358
week 10
TUE 646, China: “The Vigil of the Champion” from Records of the Western Region by Xuanzang
(Samuel Beal, transl, 1884) details in assignments section
618-907, China: 10-13 Tang literary tales (chuanqi) details in assignments section
THU 16th century, China: The Monkey & the Monk (Anthony C. Yu, transl.) Preface, Chapters 1-6
week 11
TUE M&M Chapters 7-15
THU M&M Chapters 16-19 [= Ch. 18, 19, 22, 23 in the original]
week 12
TUE M&M Chapters 23-25 [= Ch. 53-55 in the original]
Chapters 59-61 from Yu’s complete translation of the original, Vol. III
THU M&M Chapters 29-31 [= Ch. 98-100 in the original]
[Thanksgiving Break—Give thanks!]
week 13
TUE 1640, China: The Tower of Myriad Mirrors by Dong Yue (Shuen-fu Lin & L. J. Schulz, transl,
Introduction, Chapters 1-12, pp. 1-105
THU The Tower of Myriad Mirrors, Chapters 13-16, “Tung Yueh’s Answers…”, pp. 106-135
1989, USA: [on Xuanzang] from Silk Road by Jeanne Larsen, pp. 23-26, 153, 418
week 14
TUE 1982, USA: 3 stories by Ursula K. LeGuin (from The Compass Rose, pp. 3-52, 343-368)
“The Author of the Acaia Seeds”
“The New Atlantis”
"Sur: A Summary Report of the Yelcho Expedition to the Antarctic, 1909-1910"
THU 1968, USA: “Lost in the Funhouse” by John Barth (story from book of the same name)
DETAILED READING ASSIGNMENTS:
Whitfield Life Along the Silk Road 1: Preface, Note on Names & Romanization, Map,
Introduction, The Merchant’s Tale, The Soldier’s Tale, Further Reading: vi-xii, 1-75, 226-229 & both
sets of photographs
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Whitfield Life Along the Silk Road 2: The Horseman’s Tale, The Monk’s Tale: 76-94, 113-137
Whitfield Life Along the Silk Road 3: The Princess’s Tale, The Courtesan’s Tale, The Nun’s Tale:
95-112, 138-173
Whitfield Life Along the Silk Road 4: The Widow’s Tale, The Official’s Tale, The Artist’s Tale,
Epilogue: 174-225
Poems by Tang era women, assignment 12 3 4 BUDDHISM
Wu Zhao [Wu Zetian] “To Shaolin Temple In His Majesty’s Carriage, After My Mother’s Death” D
Li Ye [Li Jilan] “The Tao & the Path: Thoughts Sent to Officiary Cui” C 100
Xue Tao “On Beyond-the-Clouds Temple I” A 63 [at Le Shan where the large stone Maitreya is]
“On Being Presented to Monk Xuan: A Poem to Rhyme with Those by the Gathered
Nobles” A 69
“Listening to a Monk Play the Reed Pipes” A 70
Yu Xuanji “Winter Night” D
“Written on a Wall of Abundance Temple, Built by Hermit Ren” C 106
Haiyin [only poem reliably attr. to Tang Buddhist nun] “Nighttime, Aboard a Boat, One Text” C 12
Praiseworthy Consort Xu “At Ultimate Virtue Buddhist Temple on Cinnabar Scenes Mt.” C 42
“Written at Skyturn Courier Station” C 44
Exemplary Consort Xu “Written at Ultimate Virtue Buddhist Temple on…” C 43
“Written at Skyturn Courier Station II C 45
Some of these traditional attributions of authorship are dubious. But by no means all of them.
Also: following the practice of past editors of Chinese poetry anthologies, I’ve taken considerable
liberties with the poem titles. (Ask yourself why.)
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SOURCE TEXTS
A: Xue Tao. (Jeanne Larsen, transl.) Brocade River Poems: Selected Works of the Tang Dynasty Courtesan
Xue Tao (Princeton, 1987)
B: Kang-I Sun Chang & Haun Saussy, eds. Women Writers of Traditional China (Stanford, 1999)
C: Larsen, ed. & transl. Willow, Wine, Mirror, Moon: Women’s Poems from Tang China
(BOA Editions, Ltd., 2005)
D: Michael Farman, ed. [forthcoming anthology of poems by women of various dynasties, which
may have the title Blossom Branches: Women’s Voices from China’s Past] White Pine, 2011 or 2012
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RECOMMENDED COMPANION BOOKS for instructors or students:
Chang & Saussy, “B” above
Wilt Idema & Beata Grant. The Red Brush: Writing Women of Imperial China (Harvard, 2004)
Clouds Float North: the complete poems of Yu Xuanji David Young & Jiann I. Lin, transl, (Wesleyan, 1998)
(A C, and D also have info in their introductions, and brief notes on the poets and the poems.)
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Poems by Tang era women, assignment 2
ON THE BORDERLANDS
Bao Junhui “Moon at the Frontier Pass” B 56
the Yifen Princess “Written on a Screen at Empty-Pond Courier Station” C 34
Xue Tao “Seeing-Off a Friend” A 11
“For Someone Far Away I” & “For Someone Far Away I” A 22, 23
“On Being Banished to the Borderlands: Submitted to Commander Wei A 45
“Another Poem for Commander Wei on Being Banished” A 46
“On Arriving at the Borderlands: Submitted to Minister Wu” A 47
Pei Yuxian “Missing Him: Two Poems” C 73
Li Xunxian “Accompanying His Majesty to the Greenwall Mountains, East of the Himalayas” C 46
ON EXOTICA FROM CENTRAL EURASIA (2)
Yang Yuhuan (Yang Guifei) “For My Maidservant Zhang Yunrong, upon Seeing Her Dance” C 33
Sheng Xiaocong “A Turkic Santai Song” B 76
Week 10, TUE, both assignments:
a) This selection from Xuanzang’s Records may be found on pp. 835-838 of The Columbia Anthology of
Traditional Chinese Literature, Victor Mair, ed.
b) 10 Tang literary tales (chuanqi): apx. 66 pages
From The Golden Casket, translated by Christopher Levenson from Wolfgang Bauer & Herbert
Franke’s German version of the original Chinese: “A Lifetime in a Dream”, “The Stranger
with the Curly Beard”
from Traditional Chinese Tales translated by Chi-chen Wang: “Hsü Yen’s Strange Encounter, or
Lovers with a Lover”, “The Ancient Mirror”, “The White Monkey”, “The Disembodied
Soul”, “The Magic Pillow”, “Hsieh Hsiao-wo, or A Monkey in the Carriage”, “The Kunlun
Slave”, “Tu Tzu-chun” (selections courtesy of Robert Hegel, who also suggested we read The
Blue Lotus)
NOTE: alternate translations that I may substitute include: for “A Lifetime…”, William
Nienhauser’s “An Account of the Governor of the Southern Branch” in Mair’s anthology
ALSO: I may add, from Karl S.Y. Kao’s Classical Chinese Tales of the Supernatural & the Fantastic, “A
Record of Three Dreams” pp. 193-196, “The Prefect of Ch’ien-yang”, pp. 244-247, and
“The Merchant’s Wife” pp. 290-1
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