The sea has been a favorite motif in Occidental poetry since the time of the ancient Geeks. The sea has constantly been enjoyed and richly experienced by Western people, and it has played an important symbolic role in Western literature. Traditional Chinese poetry, however, with a few exceptions, has not made significant use of sea imagery. Instead Chinese poets have favored images of mountains. We could even say that the symbolic function of the mountain seems to have been more important for Chinese poets than that of the sea for Western poets. Having noticed this remarkable phenomenon, the present author has attempted to do a comparative analysis on the issue in terms of a semiotic descriptive approach.

I. Types of Signification of Aesthetic Objects

     For the purpose of understanding aesthetic problems, it is necessary to know something about the connection between the expression plane of aesthetic objects and their relevant content plane. But, considering the theme of this article, we need not be much involved in the technical aspects of a semiotic approach here. Initially, we will merely present a simple model of  signifying processes of aesthetic objects.    

     We will divide every kind of aesthetic object, including both works of art and natural objects, into two parts: the expression plane and the content plane. We will then choose four types of aesthetic objects as our illustrative examples: natural scenery, painting, music, and. poetry. Consequently, we have four kinds of different expression planes (or vehicles) which can be  can be designated respectively by the letters S (scenery), V (painting), T (music), and M (poetry). Each kind of expression planes is seen as a system of signs which can be semiotically analyzed in some detail. The correspondent content (or the expressed) planes will be further divided. into two parts: the signified and the connotations. Here we defined that each signifier on the expression plane has one correspondent signified and one or more correspondent connotations, respectively designated by G (signified) and Cl (connotation 1) , C2 (connotation 2), etc. According to our definition G, Cl and C2 can touch upon the totality of the external and internal human experience.    

    To be brief, we separate the whole human experience into three domains: the physical (including Nature, man-made things, and the external behaviors of human beings, namely, everything perceived through our sense organs), designated by P; the emotional (including simple moods and complicated emotions), designated by E; and the ideal, the intentional, the volitional, and the unconscious (namely, the whole realm of what can be experienced in one's Psyche except for the perceptional and the emotional), designated by I. It is clean that the connection between the expressing and the signifieds is more immediate than that between the expressing and the connotations. While the former is definitely fixed and socially well-established, the latter is a looser, somewhat vague, and even elusive signifying tie, which is culturally determined and varies with national patterns of imagination.

     The foregoing can be illustrated by a schema :

                         Schema A

          Four Types of Signification of Aesthetic Objects

       Content/ signified / connotation 1/ connotation 2/ connotation 3

        *        G        C1              C2              C3

   expression

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

scenery/ visual/   P        E                L   

         images/     

painting/ visual/  P      E              I             

          sign

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

music/audible/            P                E               I

       sign 

----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------       

poetry/ verbal sign/     P              E               I  

     With the exception of music, each kind of expressing signs (the expressing or the signifier) of the above aesthetic objects has P, the directly perceived physical world, as its signified (G). And in the case of actual scenery, the expressing sign S is equal to P (the perceived merely “represents” itself). It is obvious that the different forms of the expression plane of various aesthetic objects have different ways to convey their own signifieds and to arouse their respective connotations. Among them the verbal system is the most complicated.

2. The Structure of Significations of Poetry

     We will now focus our attention upon poetry: a specific system of the verbal signs. We can at first separate this system of verbal signs into three sections according to our above classification of human experience: the words about  P, the words about E, and the words about I, designated by Wp, We, and Wi respectively. It should he stressed that each section of the verbal system has its own correspondent layers. of the expressed G and C which also touch upon the three parts P, E, and I of human experience. We then have another schema which can present in outline the connections of significations of poetry.

                          Schema B

               Network of Significations of Poetry

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

         content      G              C1                   C2               

expression

-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------   

        Wp          P               E                      I

    _______________________________________________________

W    We           E                E                      I

    ______________________________________________________

       Wi          I                  E                      I

     Now let us give a brief explanation to schema B. In the first row the the expressing Wp, the words about P, has P (the physical world) as its range of the signified and has E (the emotional) and I (the other psychical) as its range of connotations. In the second row, however, we has the element of  E  itself as its signifieds, and, at the same time, subtly enough, has other elements pertaining to E and I as its connotations. (For example, some emotional words in a poetic text can incite other emotional or ideal associations.)  Similarly, Wi has I as the range of the signified and  has E and I as the range of its connotations. We then have three kinds of verbal signs, each with their three relevant kinds of  signifieds and six relevant connotations, namely, nine categories altogether, that form a complicated multilayered network of significations of poetic text. Structurally, every “check” in Schema B is separable from each other,  but are also closely connected with and reflecting on each other along various directions.      

    Moreover, the actual functioning of the various members of Schema B is more intricate. In fact, the signs in the three sections of the expressing do not function directly or independently. The signifiers in the verbal system W are articulated into some sequences of verbal signs (sentences) which will be furtzer combined into a network of sequences (text). And according to the same well accepted assumptions, every verbal unit can only exert its signifying and connoting functions in a hierarchy of sentagmatic and paradigmatic relation of text. Consequently, the resultant ideal and emotional effects a verse brings about must come from the multiple interactions of the various signs. Still, it will be stressed that in significations of poetry Wp plays a more important and determinative role than We and Wi. Otherwise stated, imaginary words are more essential than “abstract” words. Nevertheless, We and Wi exercise their own coordinating roles as well. In such a compound verbal system W, therefore, the total poetic value must be a subtly synthesized product which comes from piling up the varied images, emotions, ideas, and other units appearing in various checks.

3. The Structure of Significations of Sea Poetry

     In this article we use the term “sea poetry” in a rather broad sense. Any poem touching upon the following situations could be called a “sea poem”: (1) seascape as the subject of a poem (a. poem describing the beauty of the sea view, for instance); (2) the sea as an abstract entity becoming the subject of a poem (the sea as a metaphor of God or love, for instance); and (3) seascape as an ambiance in which the story of a poem is unfolded. We indicate in the last paragraph that the expression plane of a poem can structurally produce six kinds of members on the planes of the signified and the connoted when it is conveying a meaning. Meanwhile, it is stressed that the signifying function of Wp is the pivotal one among the three sections of the ex pressing. It is now time to shift the emphasis on the layer P of the signification system of a sea poem.    

    As observed above, in a sea poem its G is P consisting possibly of the whole sea view which can be theoretically segmented into several parts: the water area, the sky area, the coast area, the meteorological phenomena, the human and animal creatures, and other natural and artificial entities which could possibly appear at sea. All of them in their respective areas can be again broken down into smaller sections, and the same procedure may be extended. Finally, we can get some basic classes of “small” units which are within man's visual limits as well as in conformity with the requirements of our aesthetic analysis. They may be, for example, the classes of shape and contour, matter (water, air, earth, etc.), color, brightness, dynamic manner, sound, savor, etc. It should be noted that these basic classes, derived from a detailed anatomy, can be applied to various parts regardless of our first spatial compartments. It is obvious that each basic class consists of still smaller elements. (For instance, for the class of color we have “red”  etc., and each definite color consists of some mutually similar shades.) We thus get an array of constituent elements (or “qualities” or of various kinds) which can be compared with the “brick” of types for the “building” of a seascape. We will use the letters h1, h2, ... hn) to designate these “smallest” units. Accordingly, they may be the various shades of colors, the diverse shapes of clouds, the different of waves, etc. We could call them the “word” of a visual vocabulary a seascape language.    

    Similarly, for the layer Cl we will roughly separate it into two main parts: simple moods and the complicated emotions, respectively designated by m (m1, m2, .., mn) and a (al, a2, ... an). We can here assume that m1, m2, . . . mn are the immediate emotional reactions to hl, h2, . . . hn (for example, they may be the various nuances of a cheerful mood). And a1, a2, .., an are the more complicated as well as aesthetically meaningful emotional elements (or “aesthetic qualities”). It should be noted that they are only partly formed by a combination of elements of the class h (accordingly by a combination of the elements of the class h), because they have at the same time various interactions with the elements of the expresseds of We and Wi  as well as the elements of the layer C2 of Wp. Almost all classical aesthetic feelings can be contained in this category, notably those discussed by Aristotle and Kant.    

    The most complicated item is connotation 2 of Wp. Its range is the layer I in which we see a great number of intentionalities like ideas, motives, desires, attitudes, will, and even some latent factors in the unconscious. For brevity we place all such assumed elements in the layer C2 with i (i1, i2, ,., in). As will be mentioned below most of the symbols in sea poetry appear in this layer. But for the present, the concrete contents of this layer are not  required in our analysis.    

    Structurally considered, in the whole system of signification of Wp the three layers of its content plane disclose two pivotal passages: the passage from G to Cl and the passage from G + Cl to C2. The formations of various aesthetic devices and feelings occur in these two main passages which are, however, difficult to grasp clearly. In fact, we know very little about the mechanism of the two passages, namely, some closely correspondent relations between the three layers. Moreover, in our actual vocabulary the words about the small material vehicles (h) and the words about their correspondent simple emotional elements are in most cases the same. To put it another way, our ordinary words are “polysemous,” and refer to the physical as well as the psychological. No doubt the second passage is still more intricate, for it is indiscernibly overdetermined in a cultural context. In the final analysis, the realizations of the two kinds of passages are not of a purely psychological nature; they depend considerably on cultural patterns, spiritual strains, and some related material factors.    

    So far we have presented a heuristic model about the signifying pattern of sea poetry in terms of a relational analysis between the expression plane and the content plane. Through Schema B we have outlined a scheme of the interactions among the nine categories of the elements of poetry, while stressing the predominant role of P (the physical elements of a seascape) in the whole hierarchy. In conclusion, 1 would like again to apply a mathematical expression to illustrate metaphorically this signifying relation of sea poetry. Let us use V to represent a poetic value of a sea poem. Then we have an expression V = F (P). In this functional form the first check of Schema B, namely, P, is used as the independent variable, and the structure of We function F( ) is made of an organic whole of the other eight checks. Then we can say that within the framework of F( ) the independent variable P is the genuinely determinative factor for a possible dependent variable V.

4. Symbolizations of The Sea in Occidental  Poetry

     It is time now for us to lift from the “lower,” micromechanical level of analysis to the “higher,” macromechanical level (namely, a descriptive level) in our investigations on 'the signification passage from P to Cl and C2. That  means we are trying to discuss the symbolizations of sea imagery in the history of occidental poetry.     So far as I know, there seem to be five types of sea symbolism used by the poet over the history of Western literature. I tend to assert that these five symbolic roles of the sea suggest five kinds of spiritual transcendence exercised by Western poets.     

 l ) Metaphysical transcendence (the spatial boundlessness and the temporal eternity).

         — boundless, endless, and sublime,

         We image of Eternity, — the throne

         of the Invisible. . . . (G. G. Byron, “The Sea”)

     The boundless, ever receding misty horizon of the sea tends to lead man to fancy the sea surface as actually unlimited. In ancient times the sea became a stimulant for human imagination of a boundless cosmos in contrast to a finite earth. Since then the sea has been the transcendental symbol of a world without end or edges, although the latter could not be experienced directly. On the other hand, the empty, monotonous sea surface, the repetitious, unvaried marine life, and the permanent sharp contrast between the sea and the sky easily make man feel that no substantial change could be distinctly experienced at sea. And the constant repetition of day and night creates an illusion of the idea of the eternal existence of Nature. As a result, the sea has become a symbol, a metaphor, and a medium through which man could imagine reaching the spatially boundless and the eternal which are always the antithesis of the transience and brevity of mundane life.

2) Religious transcendence :

         I feel thy wondrous power to save

         from perils of the stormy wave

           . . . . . .. . .... ... . . .. . . . . .. .

         In ocean cave, still save with Thee

         The germ of immortality? (E. H. Willard, “Rocked in the Cradle of the Deep”)

     The metaphysical transcendence or the cosmological absolute naturally yields a religious imagination for the existence of the Creator of the cosmos. Besides, in ancient time the sky-sea continuum at sea could hint at the sky - the site of Heaven accessible through a sea route. What is more, facing the dangerous challenge of the stormy sea, the sailors were naturally forced to appeal to God. At such a moment the existence of God seems more believable and . more needed; Heaven or hell depends on the Almighty?

3) Transcendence of the triviality and monotonousness of mundane life — longing for mystery and adventure:

         I must go down to the sea again, to the vagrant gipsy

         To the gull's way and the whale's way where the winds

         like a whetted knife. (J. Masefield, “Sea Fever”)

     The infinity, uncontrollableness, voidness, dramatic alternation of storm and sunny sky on the sea surface as well as the unfathomable depth under the sea bottom - all such variegated phases of the seascape bring forth a mysterious and dreadful feeling which is both threatening and exciting. 0n the other side, the voyage ever the oceans has always been a stimulating and inspiring adventure enjoyed by the sailors. Therefore, the voyage over the sea could create a peculiar experience which might amount to a transcendence over triviality and the transience of ordinary life. Among the various vehicles of exploring the world, sailing remained a favorite for Westerns until the turn of this century. And the changeable sea view could arouse a strong yearning for natural mystery and romantic adventure.

4) Transcendence over existential and social limitedness — search after

freedom:

         I am on the sea? I am on the sea!

         I am where I would ever be;

         With the blue above and the blue below,

         And silence wheresoever I go. (B. W. Procter, “The Sea”)

     The sea has long been a symbol of freedom in Western poetry and many attractive features of the sea can explain the remarkable literary phenomenon. The sea surface stretches away unlimitedly. There can be no obstacles in any direction at sea; free sailing may reach as far as the vehicle could move. The experience the poet gets at sea can incite an intoxicating sense of freedom. Moreover, the state of being completely secluded from community, of being extricated from all social involvements and commitments, and of having escaped from various social fritters, must produce in his heart a strong feeling of emancipation. Besides, owing to experiencing a thorough solitude at sea the poet not only feels being cut off from people but also separated from human life itself. Therefore, this feeling of emancipation savours of the unworldly and the absolute. In addition, the beautiful mariner of flying of  seagulls on the sea has always been a well accepted emblem of freedom.   

5) Transcendence over loneliness — love:

         I will go back to the great sweet mother,

         Mother and lover of men, the sea.

         I will go down to her, I and none other,

         Close with her, kiss her, and mix her with me. (A. C. Swinburne, “Stanza”)

     The notion of love has at least two kinds of connection with the sea. At first, the sea itself could be an emblem of the beloved. The powerful potential of the sea could indeed be the very symbol of a maternal love, while the dimly moonlit seascape would surely be the token of the sweetheart. No. matter whether it feel powerful or tender, the beautiful sea view is certain to awaken a longing for a feminine love. Besides, the poet's loneliness while sailing, the dread of the unpredictable perils, can all the more make love an inner need and a source of strength supporting the poet sailing toward a save land. On the other hand, the seashore and sailing at sea could offer charming ambiance for making love. In this indirect sense the sea is also symbolically suggestive of love.

5. Deficiency of Symbolization of the Sea in Traditional Chinese Poetry

     For about three thousand years traditional Chinese literature had been seemingly short of significant sea imagery in its huge wealth of poetical .  works. Having  entered the twentieth century, however, modern Chinese literature now abounds in vivid descriptions and symbolizations of seascape. applying the sea imagery to symbolize the ideal of freedom and to color a romantic ambiance has become popular in China ever since the democratic-individualist, anti-feudalist movement became predominant in the earlier decades of this century. Undoubtedly, this phenomenon has been practically due to the ever-increasing sea traveling activities between China and foreign countries. But there are still, I would claim, some other more important cultural and psychological factors at work.    

    Albeit China has a long coastline, in ancient times she was not an important marine country. This lack of maritime experience explains, in part, why many great Chinese poets were not emotionally enchanted by the sea. Indeed, there are many descriptions and notes about the sea in ancient classics. For example, one of the earliest Chinese mythological books has a title literally called Mountain-Sea Classic. However, in this famous book there are far more descriptions of mountains than of the sea. The same could be said of another early Chinese book (Guanzi) which distinctively divided the cosmos into three major parts: the sky, the earth, and the sea. In such books the sea was mainly conceived of as a purely geographical fact without rich imaginations and associations engendered by it. Even in the earliest anthology of poems, the Book of Songs, we rarely encounter lively sea images. But of course there are a few exceptions. In the two greatest ancient classics  Lunyu and Zhuanzi ¾ which are the “bibles” of the two leading Chinese philosophies: Confucianism and Taoism ¾ appears the “metaphor” of the sea. Lamenting his political failures, Confucius expressed clearly his idea to escape to the sea which was taken as the token of a spiritual refuge. (Nevertheless, the image sea here connotes mainly the remotest area away from the human world) And the sage Zhuangzi in the first chapter of his book definitely used an imaginary “North Sea“, as a beautiful background against which to unfold a philosophical fable. Here the sea image is suggestive of existential freedom. But strangely enough, such metaphors were not developed seriously afterward. It should be indicated that in ancient times the sea had often been imagined by some Taoists and necromancers as the abode of celestial beings, but such kind of rough imagination is short of genuine literary value. Even in some famous poems, which take the sea as the source of literary imagination, there is obviously a lack of poetic charm and power.

6. The Counterpart of The Sea: The Mountain

     We have suggested above that Western poets have been fond of employing sea imagery to symbolize their transcendental ideas and feelings: If transcendence means to go beyond limitedness of any sort, then Chinese poets, having a noble idealism, have unquestionably had their characteristic form of transcendence. Theirs is not metaphysical or religious, but mainly ethical in nature. This article seeks to show that ancient Chinese poets rarely made use of the symbolizing functions of the sea mainly because they did not feel the sea a suitable “vehicle” for their preferred transcendental “tenor.” It is probable that for an ethical transcendence persistently cherished by them the sea image (not the sea as a factual phenomenon) looked too unworldly, too remote, and therefore too irrelevant. Instead, they chose a seemingly more intimate member of Nature — the mountain.    

    Since early times traditional Chinese literary men have chosen a purely worldly morality as the highest principle of living. Roughly speaking, there have been two major schools of thought that taught life ideals. Confucianism and Taoism. The former advocated the people's active partaking in the pursuit of ethical idealism, while the latter preached the people's getting rid of worldly commitment and worries and practicing a reunion with Nature. Despite the apparently contrary direction of the two systems of teachings, both exhibit a similar worldly character. That means that they are both concerned with obtaining a genuine bliss in this world. But compared with Taoism, Confucianism has had more influence in Chinese intellectual as well as political life; the latter has been predominant in Chinese Society at least for the past twenty centuries. Paradoxically, however, while Confucianism helped ancient intellectuals form a firm belief in an ethical idealism, which teaches the ethical perfection of personality and political systems, in fact a great number of upright intellectuals of ancient China were destined to a harsh life. And among them the great poets suffered most terribly.    

    Over the course of Chinese feudal history we can see a sharp contrast between political reality and the poets' earnest moral idealism. Consequently, the only feasible way a honest and persevering poet could pursue his life was a purely inward quest for perfection or purification of his personality ¾ that is tantamount to an ethical transcendence; namely, a spiritual uplift from the morally imperfect to the morally perfect. So their poetical creation . could be taken as  disembosoming their emotional and volitional attitudes  to this ideal. And for the purpose of maintaining and strengthening personal perfection, they could not help extricating themselves from corrupt society, searching for a symbolic refuge. The mountain had accordingly become the very place for them. 

7. The Mountain ¾The Symbol of Seclusion from Society and of Moral Sublimation

     Because of the constant, almost unavoidable conflict between the poet's idealism and social reality, most probably the genuine poet eventually became a spiritual escapist or an errant singer in exile, that is, he achieved an escape from society to nature; but the poet's preference is for the lake, the river, and the mountain rather than the sea. The river could carry him away from his  native town to a strange place; the lake could bring him into the middle of the water dissociated from villages on the bank; but after all the favorite refuge is just the mountain. The reasons could be the following.    

1) Usually the mountains frequented by the poet are not cut off from peopled places, but must be secluded enough from the community. Chains of mountains and valleys can form a reliable shelter for the escaping poets.    

2) A life in the mountains can afford the poet a complete tranquility. and desired solitude which are favorable for him to conduct deep mediations.    

3) Standing on the summit of a mountain, overlooking the miniaturized villages and fields, the poet's hurt heart could be easily assuaged owing to a suddenly aroused sympathy with his pitiful countrymen and a temporary forgiveness toward both the fatuous sovereign and the indifferent common majority. Actually, he does not mean to forsake them for good. He is constantly waiting for the moment of his being called back to the royal court again, although he is doomed to an everlasting disillusionment.    

4) Some strong-willed and indomitable poets entered the mountains mainly for the sake of strengthening their will to sustaining this moral idealism. It seemed to them that the mountains were the most excellent places for spiritual training. Even the Buddhist temples in the depth of the mountains, beside their religious functions, could offer an ideal retreat for lay poets. Frequently, “the temple in the mountains” itself became the symbol of mundane solace and spiritual sublimation as well as ethical training.     

5) Obviously mountains can offer various scenic beauties to visitors. Enjoying himself with the beauties of Nature certainly plays a magically compensate role for a disappointed poet. Besides, mountains in China have always served a particular cultural function. Indeed, a number of famous mountains have become valuable treasuries of historical records owing to those poets: in some mountains there have been left a multitude of historic signs and relics on the paths, reeks, stone tablets, pagodas, pavilions, temple houses, and even cliff boards on which have been carved the poems and maxims by noted poets of earlier periods. Therefore, strolling in the mountains the poet could have an active dialogue with the respected ancients. There he would he inspired by ancient ethically exemplary patterns. Consequently, entering the mountains seems to be a necessary “ritual” for the devoted poet who is committed to a spiritual transmission. As a result, ethical and aesthetic communication between earlier and later poets has been silently and concretely practiced within the valley and on the summit.     Escape into the mountains is a symbol of exile: seeking for an exile in imagination through an exile in action. Poets' actions were no doubt devoid of utility in the social and political realms but quite functional in the moral and spiritual realm. I would like to suggest that Confucian has really functioned as an art of living morally in an immoral world. As a matter of fact, the evil creates, sustains, and strengthens the good. We could even say that the bulk of traditional Chinese poetry has been richly expressive of the moral mentality of the errant poets and their self-chosen exile. Accordingly, in contrast to Western poetry, traditional Chinese poetry has been opulently implicative of the moral senses which have been elaborated and embellished to a very high degree.    

    One of the greatest poets in ancient China is Qu Yuan, the author of Chu Ci - the earliest lyric epic composed by a literary man. He is the original prototype of poets in exile in Chinese history. He chose a life of exile by his action of protesting and lamenting the corrupt politics of his time. Consequently, his action has become an archetype for many Chinese poets choosing a similar fate. A national pattern has been established: Chinese poets prefer a moral perfection of the self to worldly benefit and glory. That means they have been devoted to an apparently painful but innately self-inspiring life in an ethically transcendental realm. From this point of view, maintaining the mentality of an exile itself becomes a meaningful form of existence.    

    We could say without exaggeration that in the long and protracted course of ancient Chinese history, there has remained two parallel forms of existence: politically unjust existence and morally just existence. Traditional Chinese poetry is one of the most magnificent manifestations of the latter. While historically the two parallel traditions has been intricately and subtly mixed into a peculiarly organic whole.

8. The Poetics of the Sea and the Poetics of the Mountain

     Because of an ever-lasting and unparalleled strong preoccupation with a morally ideal world on earth, ancient Chinese poets needed a poetics of the mountain rather than a poetics of the sea, which is in conformity with the Western metaphysical, religious, and individualist temperament.

    In conclusion, let us offer a Schema showing the contrast between the two different symbolic characters of the sea imagery and the mountain imagery.

                      Schema C

   A comparison between the two different symbolic characters

         of the sea and the mountain