A Song at the Farewell Feast
宴詞
Yàn cí
A river boat’s departing rhythm meets an impossible plea about shallow water in Wang Zhihuan’s banquet quatrain.
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Read the original and its translation together. Open a line’s word meanings for a closer look.
About the text and pronunciation
The simplified view changes character forms, not the edition. Notes and sources retain the cited text.
The Chinese source is shown in traditional characters by default, with a simplified view available. Pinyin is modern standard Mandarin, a reading aid, not Tang or Song pronunciation.
Word by word, in the order of the line. A gloss is a crib. It is not the translation.
Word meanings — Line 1
- 長 cháng long
- 堤 dī bank
- 春 chūn spring
- 水 shuǐ water
- 綠 lǜ green
- 悠 yōu far
- 悠 yōu far
Word meanings — Line 2
- 畎 quǎn channel
- 入 rù enters
- 漳 zhāng Zhang
- 河 hé River
- 一 yí one
- 道 dào course
- 流 liú flows
Word meanings — Line 3
- 莫 mò do not
- 聽 tīng heed
- 聲 shēng sound
- 聲 shēng sound
- 催 cuī urge
- 去 qù departing
- 櫂 zhào oar
Word meanings — Line 4
- 桃 táo Peach
- 溪 xī Stream
- 淺 qiǎn shallow
- 處 chù places
- 不 bù not
- 勝 shēng bear
- 舟 zhōu boat
English translation by PoemWell.
Read the whole poem
Original
長堤春水綠悠悠，
畎入漳河一道流。
莫聽聲聲催去櫂，
桃溪淺處不勝舟。
Translation
Along the long bank, spring water stretches green;
a channel joins the Zhang River's single flow.
Do not heed each call that hurries the oars away:
Peach Stream's shallow places cannot bear the boat.
Try it from memory
After reading, recall the underlined word or phrase in each line. Say its meaning before opening the answer. These prompts use the text edition printed above.
-
Line 1 · What does the marked word mean?
長堤春水綠悠悠，
Pronunciation hint
shuǐ
Reveal meaning and translation
水 — water
Along the long bank, spring water stretches green;
-
Line 3 · What does the marked word mean?
莫聽聲聲催去櫂，
Pronunciation hint
shēng
Reveal meaning and translation
聲 — sound
Do not heed each call that hurries the oars away:
-
Line 4 · What does the marked word mean?
桃溪淺處不勝舟。
Pronunciation hint
chù
Reveal meaning and translation
處 — places
Peach Stream's shallow places cannot bear the boat.
One more question: what changes?
Compare the opening and closing lines. What changes in the scene, the speaker’s attention, or the feeling? Choose a Chinese word as evidence, then compare your reading with the notes. More than one answer may be reasonable.
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Line-by-line notes
Lines 1–2 · Water already on the move
長堤 stretches the view along the embankment. 悠悠 gives the green spring water a sense of extension. 畎 names a small channel or ditch, and the English follows that channel as its water enters the Zhang River and joins a single flow (一道流). The two lines establish movement in the water before the question of moving the boat arises.
Lines 3–4 · Voices urging a departure
聲聲 makes the calls successive. 催去櫂 lets the oars stand for the boat about to be sent away, and 莫聽 asks the traveler to disregard the urging. The translation puts a colon after the appeal so that the last line can be heard as the reason offered for staying.
淺處 gives the objection a concrete place, the shallows of Peach Stream. 不勝 here means “cannot bear,” read bù shēng in the retained literary reading. The speaker can use an apparent difficulty of navigation to delay a farewell. The poem leaves room to hear the excuse behind the practical claim.
Form and tone
The seven-character jueju makes sound intervene between a flowing landscape and a held boat. 悠, 流, and 舟 rhyme. 不勝, 'cannot bear,' uses the retained literary reading bù shēng. Modern Mandarin also commonly uses shèng for this meaning. This documented reading is not a reconstruction of Tang speech; historical tone classes are not guessed.
Historical context
The title places Wang Zhihuan's poem at a feast; the words place that feast beside a departure. On the farewell shelf, compare the delay sought in Sending Yuan Er to Anxi with the interruption heard in To Wang Lun. Here the farewell tries to make the water itself an obstacle.
Sources
《全唐詩》, juan 253, Wang Zhihuan section, checked in the Wikisource transcription. The printed main reading is followed; 爲 is normalized to 為. Punctuation is editorial. The reading of 不勝 is recorded in the Ministry of Education dictionary.
English translation, gloss, and notes by PoemWell. The translation is original to this site.
The Chinese source is shown in traditional characters by default, with a simplified view available. Pinyin is modern standard Mandarin, a reading aid, not Tang or Song pronunciation.
Updated .
Cite this reading
Wang Zhihuan. “A Song at the Farewell Feast” (宴詞). PoemWell. English translation by PoemWell. Updated .
https://poemwell.org/poems/wang-zhihuan-banquet-song
Credit the poet for the Chinese original and PoemWell for this translation and commentary. Use the permanent page link above; source editions are listed separately.