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January 1991
When the vast land of Jiangnan was draped in the feeble sunshine of an early-winter day, I paid a second visit to the Retreat and Reflection Garden in Tongli, a small town in the water-bound county of Wujiang. Past events faded and vanished like mist, but when this garden's scenery met my eyes, memories of the people associated with it kept flashing into mind. It is a long story, but I have got to make it short in this brief note.
Since I labelled the Retreat and Reflection Garden a "water-hugging" one, local authorities have taken the cue and gone out of their way agreeably to repair and renovate it. As I paused at its pond, I remembered coming across this garden's name some forty years ago. At the time I was teaching in St. John's University in Shanghai, and my colleague Ren Chuanxin (1887-1962) 1 happened to be the garden's owner. The venerable Ren was thirty years my senior, but we became bosom friends despite the age gap. A scholar and a celebrity, German educated, and, like his friend Wu Mei (1884-1939) 2 , a polymath in Chinese theater, Ren could compose music and sing Kunqu Opera. He was also a pioneering educator in modern China and the founder of the Lize Girls' School east of the garden.
The Retreat and Reflection Garden is connected with dwellings. In front of it is a yard in which a thousand chrysanthemums are as luxuriant as the Chinese rose planted in the Ethereal Outline Garden by Zeng Pu (1872-1935) 3 in the nearby county of Changshu. I gather someday these chrysanthemums will become a seasonal attraction at the Retreat and Reflection Garden.
Tongli is the hometown of Ji Cheng (1582- c . 1642), an immortal name in Chinese garden-making history. His three-volume The Craft of Gardens is a classic that has impacted China and spread to Japan and the West. As the next year will be the 410th anniversary of his birth, I would like to propose that under the auspices of the government of Wujiang county, a memorial meeting be held at Tongli and a pavilion dedicated to him so that garden-makers and tourists from around the world can come to honour his memory.
Wujiang county is a cultural center. The tea houses and wine shops in town have hosted so many famous scholars and theatrical experts who come to appreciate paintings, recite poems, take in a story-telling performance or two, or gather to learn how to sing Kunqu operas correctly. Among those who are my acquaintances are Jin Songcen (1873-1947) 4 , Ling Jingyan (1904-1959) 5 , Jin Lichu (1911-1994), Cai Zhengren (1941- ), Ji Zhenhua (1943- ), and Xu
Xiaomu (1916-1998) 6 , whose lives approximately encompassed a hundred years. Inspired by the cultural tradition of this water-bound town famous for its garden and Kunqu Opera repertoire, I call Wujiang "Glorious Cultural Edifice of Jiangnan and Waterbound County with a Celebrated Garden." Now that Wujiang's another name is "Songling," I also add "Opera Singers' Songling" to the appellation.
Ren Chuanxin was the last owner of the Retreat and Reflection Garden. As he lived in Shanghai in his evening years, the garden gradually fell into decay, and became dilapidated in early post-1949 years. Out of concern for this esteemed colleague of mine, I put in a word for the garden with the local government, and as a result it has been resurrected at last. Isn't it karma, to cite a Buddhist term, that is at work?
The town of Tongli is named after her abundance of water. Without water there would be no Tongli today. In the past there was a clear stream flowing by the Retreat and Reflection Garden, but it has long been filled in. How I wish it were restored! In terms of seniority, this garden is a latecomer among others, but probably because of this it has a much better layout. It features a main road, a screen wall, a portal gateway, servants' rooms, a sedan-chair hall and a main lobby. The master's suite is located in the east, which is a horse-accommodative loft 7 connected left and right by a storied walkway, with a spacious patio in the center. Guestrooms and a studio are situated further east. Tranquillity is enhanced with rockery and trees in between the buildings. The easternmost part of the property is found in the garden, while the aforementioned girls' school sprawls in the distance. The whole estate extends west and east in a series of self-contained sections. There are other gates opened onto the garden. The well-preserved buildings and the picturesque garden supplement each other in delightful and comfortable ways. The only pity is that the external view borrowed by the garden is marred by a water tank, an embarrassing eyesore that makes me wonder when it shall be removed.
Everybody is talking about economic growth nowadays. At the town of Tongli, it is water that has revived its famous garden. It is water, too, that brings wealth to town. With its water-bound land and garden over and above its Kunqu Opera's water-mill tune, Tongli is China's veritable answer to Italy's Venice. If the stream that used to run across town is restored, Tongli will rise to become the Jiangnan area's another tourist center that entices visitors with its abundant water.
With the tune over, I have passed Songling Road,
Looking back, fourteen bridges in mist I descried.
Through these two beautiful lines, the poetic sentiment and picturesque charm imbued in the views of Tongli are brought to vivid life.