杜甫「登岳陽樓」の詩について : 「呉楚東南坼、乾坤日夜浮」考

Abstract

Tu Fu's "Climbing Yüeh-yang Tower" 登岳陽樓 may be ranked among the masterpieces of his late years. The purpose of this article is to arrive at a correct interpretation of the second couplet, 吳楚東南坼, 乾坤日夜浮. Concerning the first line the author shows from other examples of its usage that the compound tung-nan 東南 must be interpreted to mean the southeast, that is, the southeastern part of the country, not the east and the south. Furthermore the author points out that the poetic image of the line is probably based upon the myth of Kung-kung 共工 related in the T'ien-wen-hsün 天文訓 chapter of the Huai-nan Tzu 淮南子, according to which Kung-kung in a fit of rage bumped into Pu-chou Mountain and broke the pillar of heaven, causing the earth to sang in the southeast. In interpreting the second line the author contends that from the sentence structure the subject of the verb fou 浮 is not the lake but the heavens and the earth, and that the imagery of the heavens and the earth floating in the lake is derived from the so-called Hun-t'ien 渾天 theory, the conception of the earth as a globe suspended in the midst of the atmosphere.