Intellectual and scholarly qualities in Tay ethnic folk poetry

Although Tay folk songs are rich in lyricism and passion, they are also sometimes quite “sober”, more or less intellectual and scholarly. These are signs of mutual penetration between oral folk literature and written literature, of the exchange between Tay folk literature and the general literature of the whole country. That exchange appears not only in love songs but also in other genres such as folk tales and poems.

The rationality in Tay folk songs is often pushed to a high level. Through the lyrics, we sometimes see instructions and vows to each other with careful calculations and detailed plans, looking far into the future: If ten out of ten cannot marry each other/We will invite each other to take vows/The money will be split in half, the person in half/Keep it carefully in the pocket we carry around/If later our hearts betray us/Let's insult and curse.

The rational nature of the Tay people's lyrical folk songs is not only expressed in the specific content of each lyric but also in the types of songs that are quite popular in terms of competition of talent and intelligence. This is most clearly shown in riddles and stories, such as the common riddles: Nhan thênh, nhat khẩu hop pen toi/Bay ca sloong hang ban tuc mai... Meaning: Nhan tren, nhat khẩu hop thanh doi/Bay set hai hang ban truc mai... (the word "hop" consists of the words "nhan", "nhất", "khau" combined)... Or the riddles Nhi do mai, Pham Tai - Ngoc Hoa are considered by Tay folk authors as their precious "treasures", borrowing the stories of Nom Viet to form male and female dialogue songs: Seeing you like a lord's son/I like Pham Tai going to beg... The type of love poem (phong slu) written on cloth, on silk exchanged between lovers, in which the author uses many Sino-Vietnamese words or many allusions: Xuan thien tiet van thang buon cau/Cac bach dieu noc nu vui men (Spring weather turns to September/Hundreds of birds and animals rejoice). The words “xuan thien”, “bach dieu”, “vui menh” are all written in Chinese and Vietnamese in the original text. Although the types of riddle songs, story songs, and phong slu poems belong to the lyrical folk song genre, they have a clear intellectual character, in which the authors use sophisticated compositional methods, closer to scholarly literature than to folk literature like other lyrical folk songs with simpler, more innocent language.

Tay folk songs are rich in lyricism, passion, and have intellectual and scholarly qualities.

In folk songs, the language is sometimes sophisticated but often rustic, simple, and close to the everyday language of the people. In narrative poems, besides the simple language, close to the everyday speech of the people, most authors have carefully polished the words, preferring to use formulas and allusions from the classical Chinese literary archives, and allusions borrowed from the poems of the Jin and Tang dynasties, such as: The fisherman is passionate about Dao Dong/The White Emperor's boat crosses the waves of Giang Lang. (Tran Chau, Tay - Nung narrative poems).

The above sentence is taken from the story "the fisherman lost in the Peach Blossom Spring" in the poem "Peach Blossom Spring" by poet Tao Qian. The sentence below is taken from two lines of Tang poetry: "Morning farewell to Bach De city in beautiful clouds, in one day return to Giang Lang land thousands of miles away."

Sometimes the author uses Sino-Vietnamese metaphors to express a certain thought or feeling, such as to show that although he is a poor but honest scholar, not a greedy person, the character Liu Dai speaks words: The metaphor that people are greedy for talent/Birds are greedy for food far away and die (Liu Dai - Han Xuan, Tay - Nung Poetry Tales). Or to show Liu Dai's humility before his lover, the author lets the character borrow the story of the poet Tao Qian to speak for him: Temporarily learn the way of the saint with a few words/Toads do not expect to fish in the Peach Garden. Moreover, along with the characters in the work, the author character begins to appear in the poem, through the opening verses of a self-proclaimed nature such as: Holding a pen to write down the story passed down/Dinh Quan tells the story of the old days in the country of Chu...

Normally, when talking about morality and ethics, the language of the poem is expressed in a formal, sophisticated style with idioms and Sino-Vietnamese formulas of a scholarly nature. For example, when talking about the relationship between husband and wife, the poem in the story Liu Dai - Han Xuan writes: The old saying has it that/A married woman follows her husband as usual. Or when talking about the mother-child relationship in a simple and normal way within the family, the author of the poem also "likes" to use that formal language: Being a person must be clever in all things/A gentleman's loyalty is not important...

In terms of art, Tay folk poetry has approached the poetic characteristics of scholarly literature, on the one hand inheriting and developing the narrative and lyrical tradition, on the other hand absorbing the influence of scholarly culture and especially of Vietnamese scholarly literature. From those inheritances and influences in many aspects, folk artists and national intellectuals have created a genre of folk literature with a large content in terms of volume, with more refined and perfected art.

Spring Love

Source