Poetics of emptiness: transformations of Asian thought in American poetry

284 Pages·2010·2.35 MB·English

by  Jonathan Stalling

Poetics of Emptiness
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Poetics of Emptiness
Transformations of Asian Tought
in American Poetry
jonathan stalling
Fordham University Press
new york 2010
© 2010 Fordham University Press
All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a
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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Stalling, Jonathan.
Poetics of emptiness : transformations of Asian thought in American
poetry / Jonathan Stalling. — 1st ed.
p. cm.
Includes bibliographical references and index.
ISBN 978-0-8232-3144-7 (cloth : alk. paper)
1. American poetry—Chinese infuences. 2. Emptiness (Philosophy)
3. Philosophy—East Asia. 4. Poetics. I. Title.
PS159.C5S73 2010
811.009’384—dc22
2010005596
Printed in the United States of America
12 11 10 5 4 3 2 1
First edition
A book in the American Literatures Initiative (ALI), a collaborative
publishing project of NYU Press, Fordham University Press, Rutgers
University Press, Temple University Press, and the University of Virginia
Press. Te Initiative is supported by Te Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.
For more information, please visit www.americanliteratures.org.
For Amy Noél Stalling
If we take an instantaneous photograph of the sea in motion,
we may fx the momentary form of a wave, and call it a thing;
yet it was only an incessant vibration of water. So other things,
more things, apparently more stable, are only large vibrations
of living substance; and when we trace them to their origin and
decay, they are seen to be only parts of something else. And these
essential processes of nature are not simple; there are waves upon
waves, process below processes, systems within systems;—and
apparently so on forever.
—ernest fenollosa, “theory of literature”
Contents
List of Figures and Tables ix
Acknowledgments xi
Prologue: Transformations of a Transpacifc Imaginary 1
Introduction: Te Poetics of Emptiness, or a Cult
of Nothingness 9
part one Buddhist Imaginaries
1 Emptiness in Flux: Te Buddhist Poetics of
Ernest Fenollosa’s “Te Chinese Written Character
as a Medium for Poetry” 33
2 Patterned Harmony: Buddhism, Sound, and Ernest
Fenollosa’s Poetics of Correlative Cosmology 59
3 Teaching the Law: Gary Snyder’s Poetics of Emptiness 97
part two Daoist Imaginaries
4 Language of Emptiness: Wai-lim Yip’s Daoist Project 123
5 Pacing the Void: Teresa Hak Kyung Cha’s Dictée 157
Epilogue 191
Notes 199
Bibliography 235
Index 257
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Figures and Tables

Figures
P.1 Wai-lim Yip’s cross-cultural interpretation diagram 5
P.2 Zong-qi Cai’s cross-cultural interpretation diagram 7
2.1 Five-element diagram 71
2.2 Fenollosa’s notes on classical Chinese tonal prosody 74
2.3 Section of Fenollosa’s notes on classical Chinese tonal
prosody 75
2.4 Tonal prosody chart 77
3.1 Tathāgatagarbha diagram 107
5.1 Image of Cha performing “A BLE W AIL” (1975) 158
5.2 Image of a Daoist cosmogonic chart, or 圖 (tu) 164
5.3 Chang Chung-Yuan translates taijitu as “chart
of ultimatelessness” 166
5.4 “Étang,” by Teresa Hak Kyung Cha (1978) 169
5.5 Acupuncture points 172
5.6 Modern anatomical diagram of vocal organs 173
5.7 “Communication diagram” 185
5.8 “Trans(l)ative / Trans(l)iterative” diagram 188