CHAPTER XXIV
MUSIC AND POETRY
The sounds seem peculiar and far from pleasing, because we do not bring to them the Korean temperament and training, but the more artificial Western ear. We complain because they do not " keep time " ; but why should they ? There is no analogy for it in nature. The thrush does not " keep time," and the skylark, that joy of Korean waste places, knows nothing of art. It is a question whether music, as a pure expression of feeling, should be hampered by " time " any more than poetry should be hampered by rhyme. There are times when both rhyme and time are necessary adjuncts, and even Korean music frequently shows a rhythmic succession of notes which closely approximates to what we call " time."
Koreans like our music as little as we like theirs, and for the same reason. It means nothing to them. Our harmonies seem to them like a veritable jargon of sounds, but they take genuine pleasure in that indescribable medley of thumps and squeaks which emanate from a Korean orchestra. To us it seems as if there were no rhyme or reason in it, but in truth every note is produced according to a fixed law. There is a distinct science of music here that has been in existence for upwards of fifteen hundred years. Every note and cadence is produced according to a specific law. It only illustrates what is true of all art, that we must bring to it a trained sense in order to appreciate it.
Each of the Korean musical instruments has a long history back of it. The komungo may be described as a long, narrow bass viol without any neck. It lies upon the floor, and the player plucks the strings with his right hand while he " fingers " them with his left hand near the " bridge." In other words, he reverses the method which we adopt and plucks where we would finger and fingers where we would bow. The result is not particularly edifying, but they have never learned, even during nearly seventeen hundred years, that they are playing at the wrong end of the instrument. This komungo dates from the days of ancient Silla, and history takes particular pains to describe its origin. The flute is commonly used in Korea, but it differs in shape from ours. If a Western flute were sawed in two through the mouth hole, it would approximate to the Korean instrument. It is held squarely against the mouth, the lower lip of the performer closing the open end of the tube while he blows down into the semicircular hole. Of all the Korean instruments this sounds most like our Western ones. The flute is also a very ancient instrument, for we read in history of a jade flute that formed one of the heirlooms of the Silla dynasty nearly two thousand years ago. The curious story is told of it that if carried to any other place than the town of Kyong-ju, the site of the ancient Silla, it would emit no sound whatever. Koreans firmly believe that it is still preserved among the archives of that southern town. The hageum, or violin, looks like a large croquet mallet with a short handle; moreover, the head is hollow. The strings, two in number, are stretched from the head to the end of the handle, where they are fastened to a spool-like peg. The hair of the bow is interlaced between the strings of the violin, and the fingering is done by throwing the thumb around the " handle " and then hooking- one or other of the fingers over the strings. The result is anything but edifying, and it is safe to say that this instrument must have existed many centuries to have taken the hold it has upon the affections of the Korean people. They have a species of zither, which has the peculiarity of being triple-strung, like our modern pianos. It is struck with a sliver of bamboo. One ancient form of instrument consists of a set of metal bangles, which are struck as we strike a triangle. This is a very ancient instrument, but there was an interval of several centuries when not a single sample of it could be found in the country. Only historical notices remained; when fortunately, or otherwise, one of them was found at the bottom of a well which was being cleaned. This is something of a commentary upon the frequency with which the latter operation is performed. The drum has existed here from of old. It takes various forms, and is very commonly used instead of a bell. In the town of Taiku a huge drum is used for this purpose. It is larger than a full-sized hogshead. When used for music, the drum varies in size from one foot in diameter to three ; but there are various forms, the kettle-drum and the hour-glass variety, the latter being struck only with the hand. Strange to say, this hour-glass drum is almost the only instrument used as an accompaniment for singing.
Vocal music is divided into two distinct classes, the sijo, pr classical style, and the hach'i, or popular style. The former of these may be described as extremely andante and tremuloso, and it is frequently punctuated by the drum. The progress of such a piece is very slow and dignified, and the length of time that a single note is sometimes held makes one wonder whether the singer will succeed in getting another breath. The Koreans say that it requires long and patient practice to render a classical production well. We can well believe this, considering the time it takes to get used to listening to it. It is sung to perfection only by the professional dancing-girls; not because the sentiments are more properly expressed by them than by more respectable people, though this is too often the case, but because they are the only ones who have the leisure to give to its cultivation. To the Westerner there is nothing pleasing in this style of singing. It is one succession of long-drawn-out tremulous notes with no appreciable melody. The popular style, however, is comparatively like our own singing, and through many of the songs there runs a distinct melody which can be reduced to the Western musical score. The element of "time" has been considerably developed, and one can follow the air with ease. The following are samples of a few of the most popular motifs in Korean popular songs:
The commonest of all these songs, and one that is familiar to every child in Korea, begins as follows:
On Saijai's slope, in Mungyung town
We hew the paktal namu down
To make the smooth and polished clubs
With which the washerwoman drubs
Her master's clothes.
And then follows a chorus which has about as much sense as our own classical
Hei diddle diddle, the cat and the fiddle.
This song has innumerable verses, and can be indefinitely extended by clever improvisation.
In the spring, when the grasses and rushes are beginning to grow, almost every child will have his little reed whistle, just as American boys have their willow whistles, but the Korean instrument is quite different from ours. It is made on the principle of the flageolet. Two of the reeds are usually tied together so that a double note is produced.
One of the most characteristic Korean sounds is that of a very shrill, cornet-like instrument, which drones out a weird minor strain of a summer evening. No Westerner will ever quite understand why the Korean takes such pleasure in the monotonous but strident note of this implement of torture.
Music is considered one of the lesser arts, not only in Korea but also in China. As a profession, music occupies much the same position here that ballet-dancing does in the West. The best that can be said of it is that it is not necessarily disreputable. There are no professional singers in Korea, except the dancing-girls, and they cultivate music merely to enhance their meretricious charms. These people have never conceived of music as a great moral force; it has always been counted as merely an instrument of sensual pleasure, and as such has been classed with dancing, drinking and debauchery. It is for this reason that common music is denominated chap-doen sorai, " low down noise," by respectable people, and only one song in ten could with decency be published.
These people have a sort of musical notation which differs radically from ours. It has no staff and no notes, but simply a string of Chinese characters which indicate in some occult manner the various cadences. If we were to attempt a comparison with the Western method, we might say that it is like reducing the tune " Yankee Doodle " to the form do do re mi do mi re si do do re mi do si sol, etc.
We must not forget the Korean labour songs, which form, to the Western ear, the most charming portion of Korean music. The peculiar and elusive rhythm of these songs is quite unique in its way. It captures the ear, and you find yourself humming it over to yourself ad nauseam. It is a curious psychological study. Throughout the East there is a lack of the personal element. Individuality is adumbrated, and men count themselves not so much integral factors of society as mere fractions of a social whole. The unit of society is not the individual nor even the family, but it is the clan, the company, the crowd. Thus in their work they band together and accomplish tasks by the multiplication of muscle. This necessitates a rhythmic motion, in order that force may be applied at the same instant by every arm. Each band of ten or twelve workers has its leader, whose only duty is to conduct the chorus. He stands at one side and chants a strain of four syllables, and immediately the men take it up and repeat it after him. No work is done while he is singing, but as the men take up the chant they all heave together. It seems a great waste of time, but it would be very difficult to get Koreans to do certain forms of work in any other way. The following indicates very imperfectly a Korean labour song:
The leader uses mostly a certain set formula, but now and again he will improvise in a most amusing way, to the great delight of the men. They all seem to be in good humour, and are apparently able to make their work seem like play.
In connection with music we must take up the subject of Korean poetry, since this forms the subject matter of their vocal music.
Dialect stories are interesting because of their raciness, due to oddities of idiom and pronunciation; but these peculiarities are not felt, of course, by the people of whom it is the ordinary mode of speech. The humour of most dialect stories is of that low order which rests simply upon incongruity. So it is that we are sometimes deceived when it comes to the poetry of other peoples, or even to the life, customs and manners of other peoples. When a Korean says to you, "Is not the great man's stomach empty?" it makes you smile, whereas to him it means simply, "Aren't you hungry?"
This is my reason for rejecting all literal translations of Korean poetry. Such translations would not convey to us the same sensation that the original does to the Korean; and, after all, that is what we are primarily after. The first difficulty lies in the fact that Korean poetry is so condensed. A half-dozen Chinese characters, if properly collocated, may convey more meaning than a whole paragraph in English. One song, for instance, states the matter as baldly as this:
This month, third month, willow becomes green;
Oriole preens herself;
Butterfly flutters about.
Boy, bring zither. Must sing.
It cannot be said that this means nothing to us, but the bald translation conveys nothing of the feeling which the Korean experiences when he sees the original. If I have at least partially caught the inner sense of it, the following would better represent what it means to the Korean:
The willow catkin bears the vernal blush of summer's dawn
When winter's night is done.
The oriole that preens herself aloft on swaying bough
Is summer's harbinger.
The butterfly, with noiseless fŭl-fŭl of her pulsing wing,
Marks off the summer hour.
Quick, boy! My zither I Do its strings accord? 'T is well. Strike up,
For I must sing.
Another purely Korean poem that would appear utterly insipid to the uninitiated might be rendered freely:
O mountain blue, O mountain blue, |
Here we have a purely Korean picture - a youth on his way to attend the national examination, his life before him. He has stopped to rest on the slope of one of the grand mountains of Korea, and he thinks of all that must have trodden that same path to honours and success; and as he gazes up at the rock-ribbed giant, the spirit of poetry seizes him and he demands of the mountain who these successful ones may be. Between the second and third verses we imagine him fallen asleep and the mountain telling him in his dreams the long story of those worthy ones. As the youth awakes and resumes his journey, he looks up and asks that his name may be added to that list. In what more delicate or subtle way could he ask the genius of the mountain to follow him and bring him success?
There is another song that may be placed in that much maligned category of " Spring poems," whose deprecation nets the comic papers such a handsome sum.
The Korean is your true lover of springtime. The harshness of his winter is mitigated by no glowing hearth or cosey chimney-corner. Winter means to him a dungeon, twelve by eight, dark, dirty, poisonous. Spring means to him emancipation, breathing space, pure pleasure,—animal pleasure, if you will,—but the touch of spring affects him to the finger-tips and makes his senses " stir with poetry as leaves with summer wind." He is simply irrepressible. He must have song.
One branch of Korean classical music deals with convivial songs. This looks somewat paradoxical, but if Hogarth's paintings are classical, a convivial song may be.
'Twas years ago that Kim and I
Struck hands and swore, however dry
The lip might be, or sad the heart,
The merry wine should have no part
In mitigating sorrow's blow
Or quenching thirst. 'T was long ago.
And now I Ve reached the flood-tide mark
Of life; the ebb begins, and dark
The future lowers. The tide of wine
Will never ebb. 'T will aye be mine
To mourn the desecrated fane
Where that lost pledge of youth lies slain.
Nay, nay, begone ! The jocund bowl
Again shall bolster up my soul
Against itself. What, good-man, hold!
Canst tell me where red wine is sold?
Nay, just beyond yon peach-tree? There ?
Good luck be thine; I'll thither fare.
We have here first the memory of the lost possibilities of youth; then the realisation of to-day's slavery, and, lastly, the mad rush to procure that which alone will bring forgetfulness. Not an exclusively Korean picture, surely.
In central Korea there is a lofty precipice overlooking a little lakelet. It is called " The Precipice of the Falling Flowers," and I venture to say that, with no other evidence at hand than this, the reader would be compelled to grant that Koreans have genuine poetic feeling in them, for the story is something as follows :
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In Pakche's halls is heard a sound of woe.
The craven King, with prescience of his fate,
Has fled, by all his warrior knights encinct.
Nor wizard's art nor reeking sacrifice
Nor martial host can stem the tidal wave
Of Silla's vengeance. Flight, the coward's boon,
Is his ; but by his flight his Queen is worse
Than widowed ; left a prey to war's caprice,
The invader's insult and the conqueror's jest.
Silent she sits among her trembling maids,
Whose loud lament and clam'rous grief bespeak
Their anguish less than hers. But lo ! She smiles,
And, beckoning with her hand, she leads them forth
Without the wall, as when in days of peace
They held high holiday in nature's haunts.
But now behind them sounds the horrid din
Of ruthless war, and on they speed to where
A beetling precipice frowns ever at
Itself within the mirror of a pool
By spirits haunted. Now the steep is scaled.
With flashing eye and heaving breast she turns
And kindles thus heroic flame where erst
Were ashes of despair. "Th 1 insulting foe
Has boasted loud that he will cull the flowers
Of Pakche. Let him learn his boast is vain ;
For never shall they say that Pakche's Queen
Was less than queenly. Lo ! The spirits wait
In yon dark pool. Though deep the abyss and harsh
Death's summons, we shall fall into their arms
As on a bed of down and pillow there -
Our heads in conscious innocence." This said,
She leads them to the brink. Hand clasped in hand,
In sisterhood of woe; an instant thus
Then forth into the void they leap, brave hearts!
Like drifting petals of the plum, soft blown
By April's perfumed breath, so fell the flowers
Of Pakche; but in falling rose aloft
To honour's pinnacle.
The Korean delights in introducing poetical allusions into his folk-tales. It is only a line here and there, for his poetry is nothing if not spontaneous. He sings like the bird, because he cannot help it. One of the best of this style is the story of Cho-ung, who, after nailing to the palace gate his defiance of the usurper of his master's throne, fled to a distant monastery, and after mastering the science of war, came forth to destroy that usurper. The first day he became possessed in a marvellous way of a sword and a steed, and at night, still clad in his monk's garments, he enjoyed the hospitality of a country gentleman. As he stands at the window of his chamber, looking out upon the moonlit scene, he hears the sound of a zither, which must be touched by fairy fingers; for though no words are sung, the music interprets itself.
Sad heart, sad heart, thou waitest long,
For love's deep fountain thirsting.
Must winter linger in my soul,
Tho' April's buds are bursting ?
The forest deep, at love's behest,
His heart of oak hath riven,
This lodge to rear, where I might greet
My hero, fortune-driven.
But heartless fortune, mocking me,
My knight far hence hath banished ;
And sends, instead, this cowl-drawn monk,
From whom love's hope hath vanished.
This throbbing zither I have U'en
To speed my heart's fond message ;
To call from heaven the Wonang bird,
Love's sign and joy's sure presage.
But fate, mid-heaven, hath caged the bird
That, only, love's note utters;
And in its stead a magpie foul
Into my bosom flutters.
Piqued at this equivocal praise, Cho-ung draws out his flute, his constant companion, and answers his unseen critic in notes that plainly mean :
Ten years, among the halls of learning, I have shunned
The shrine of love, life's synonym ; and dreamt, vain youth,
That having conquered nature's secrets I could wrest
From life its crowning jewel, love. 'T was not to be.
To-night I hear a voice from some far sphere that bids
The lamp of love to burn, forsooth, but pours no oil
Into its chalice. Woe is me; full well I know
There is no bridge that spans the gulf from earth to heaven.
E'en though I deem her queen in yon fair moon enthroned,
The nearest of her kin, can I breathe soft enough
Into this flute to make earth silence hold that she
May hear ; or shrill so loud to pierce the firmament
And force the ear of night ?
Korean poetry is all of a lyric nature. There is nothing in the nature of an epic. The language does not lend itself to that form of expression. It is all nature music, pure and simple. It is all passion, sensibility, emotion. It deals with personal, domestic, even trivial matters oftentimes, and for this reason it may be called narrow. But we must remember that their horizon is. pitifully circumscribed. If they lavish a world of passion on a trivial matter, it is because in their small world these things are relatively great. The swaying of a willow bough, the erratic flight of a butterfly, the falling of a petal, the droning of a passing bee, means more to a Korean, perhaps, than to one whose life is broader.
Here we have the fisherman's song as he returns from hiswork at night :
As darts the sun his setting rays
Athwart the shimmering mere,
My fishing-line reluctantly
I furl and homeward steer.
Far out along the foam-tipped waves
The shower-fairies trip,
Where sea-gulls, folding weary wing,
Alternate rise and dip.
A willow withe through silver gills,
My trophies I display.
To yonder wine-shop first I '11 hie;
Then homeward wend my way.
In the following we find a familiar strain. It is the Korean setting of "O for a lodge in some vast wilderness!"
Weary of the ceaseless clamour,
Of the false smile and the glamour
Of the place they call the world;
Like the sailor home returning,
For the wave no longer yearning,
I my sail of life have furled.
Deep within this mountain fastness,
Minified by nature's vastness,
Hermit-wise a lodge I'll build.
Clouds shall form the frescoed ceiling,
Heaven's blue depths but half revealing;
Sunbeam raftered, starlight filled.
In this lakelet deep I'll fetter
Yon fair moon. Oh, who could better
Nature's self incarcerate ?
Though, for ransom, worlds be offered,
I will scorn the riches proffered,
Keep her still and laugh at fate.
And when Autumn's hand shall scatter
Leaves upon my floor, what matter,
Since I have the wind for broom ?
Cleaning house mere play I'll reckon,
Only to the storm-sprites beckon.
With their floods they'll cleanse each room.
From this it would seem that the Koreans cannot be charged with a lack of imagination but rather with an exuberance of it. The following few lines to a mountain brook show that in his appreciation of nature the Korean is not far behind the more polished poet of the West.
O cloud-born rivulet, that down this mountain slope
Dost thread thy devious way, fret not thyself because
Obstructions bar thy path, nor say "I may not be."
The rock that buffets thee to-day shall melt away
Before thy constancy. Thou'rt mightier than man;
For though, by human craft, athwart thy humble course
Mountains be piled, Time shall be with thee, and ye twain
Shall overtop them all. Though thou be curbed and bound,
Divided, used, aye, soiled, a thousand li shall seem,
In retrospect, triumphal progress. Dost thou now,
Like trembling hare, peep forth from out yon covert's shade?
Fear not, but know that ere days shall give birth to months,
Thy voice shall mingle with the chorus of the sea.
I will add but a single illustration of the poetic element in
Korean folk-lore. It is the legend of the casting of the great bell that hangs in the centre of Seoul. The master-founder stands with angry brow
Before the bell, across whose graven side
A fissure deep proclaims his labour naught.
For thrice the furnace blast has yielded up
Its glowing treasure to the mould, and thrice
The tortured metal, writhing as in pain,
Has burst the brazen casement of the bell.
And now like a dumb bullock of the lists,
That stands at bay while nimble toreadors
Fling out the crimson challenge in his face,
And the hot, clamouring crowd with oaths demand
The fatal stroke ; so hangs the sullen bell
From his thwart beam, refusing still to lend
His voice to swell the song hymeneal,
To toll the requiem of the passing dead,
Or bid the sun good-night with curfew sad.
The master-founder speaks : " If but an ounce
Of that rare metal, which the spirits hide
From mortal sight, were mingled with the flux,
It would a potion prove so powerful
To ease the throes of birth and in the place
Of disappointment bring fruition glad."
And lo ! a royal edict, at the hand
Of couriers swift, speeds o'er the land like flame
Across the stubble-drift of sun-dried plains.
" Let prayer be made to spirits of the earth
That they may render up their treasure, lest
Our royal city, like a Muslim mute,
Shall have no tongue to voice her joy or pain."
The great sun reddened with the altar smoke ;
The very clouds caught up their trailing skirts
And fled the reek of burning hecatombs ;
But still the nether spirits gave no sign.
When, look! a mother witch comes leading through
The city gate a dimpled child and cries,
" If to the molten mass you add this child,
'Twill make a rare amalgam, aye, so rare
That he who once has heard the bell's deep tone
Shall ever after hunger for it more
Than for the voice of mother, wife or child."
Again the furnace fires leap aloft ;
Again the broken fragments of the bell
Cast off their torpor at the touch of flame.
Unpitying are the hands that cast the child
Into that seething mass. Fit type of Hell !
Nay, type of human shame, that innocence
Should thus be made to bear the heavy cross
For empty pageantry. How could it be
That Justice should permit the flowing years
To wash away the mem'ry of that shame?
Nor did she. Through that seeming metal coursed
The life-blood of the child. Its fibre clothed
A human soul. Supernal alchemy!
And when the gathered crowd stood motionless
And mute to hear the birth-note of the bell,
And the great tongue-beam, hung by linked chain
Aloft, smote on his brazen breast, 't was no
Bell cry that came forth of his cavern throat.
'T was Emmi, Emmi, Emmi, Emmillé.
"O Mother, woe is me, O Mother mine!"[1]
- ↑ The Koreans hear in the dull thud of the wooden beam against the bell a far-off resemblance to the word em-mi, which means "mother." Hence the legend.