tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6189835368912940966.post7402291493830144981..comments2023-10-14T16:16:59.067+09:00Comments on Riosloggers: Hydrangea, Solace During The Rainy Seasonriodanhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/15797052027747764415noreply@blogger.comBlogger1125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-6189835368912940966.post-33379602522979355182013-04-01T22:28:18.437+09:002013-04-01T22:28:18.437+09:00Hi Imamura-san,
Thank you for your interesting an...Hi Imamura-san,<br /><br />Thank you for your interesting and informative blogs, which I only discovered today by chance.<br /><br />As for the mystified flower in Bai Juyi's poem, I've also been curious about his naming, which coincides with its Japanese name 'Ajisai' (紫陽花) but is not common in China -- we usually call it '繡球花' (literally 'embroidered ball' for its resemblance with the love token girls toss to their beaus). However, the former name is in the record. One educated guess is that Japanese scholars adopted Bai's coinage and spread the kanji in Japanese literature (as Ajisai appears as early as in 'The Tale of Genji') for Tang poetry was quite fashionable in Japan then.<br /><br />And as modern botany has already corrected itself in many cases, Asian plants first found in Japan by Europeans, even some still named Japanese, are not necessarily native to Japan or Japan only. So is the case of Hydrangea. It grows originally in Sichuan, China, as well. Probably it was not widely cultivated in other parts of China, so Bai claimed to be 'ignorant of the flower'.<br /><br />By the way, I'm from Hangzhou, the city Bai Juyi was once closely associated with.<br /><br />Cheers,<br />Eric<br />eric at westlaker dot orgAnonymousnoreply@blogger.com