Du Fu

Description

Du Fu was a warrior and poet who lived in the Shogunate Era. Fu was an officer in the armies of the Shogunate, and later an official of the court at Meru, though despite being acclaimed as a poet his advancement was limited... some theorize it was halted in backlash due to the honesty which dominated several of his poems, that were critical of incessant daimyo conflicts and of the Shogunal Court itself.

Life

Du Fu’s output as a poet is divided by many scholars into three periods, a common practice amongst poets and officials in the Shogunate era. These are perhaps most clearly set out in Tepet Sadayo’s text Life and Works of Poet Fu:

Sadayo defines Fu’s early ‘Spring’ period as taking place in his youth, a time of classical Shogunate poetry, primarily drawing from immediate elemental and seasonal themes, description of vistas seen on his travels, or offering praise to poets and officials (such as his friend and mentor, the master poet Plum Blossom). Some of these poems survived the Great Contagion, though not many.

The middle ‘Summer’ period of Fu’s poetry is said to come some time into his military service, with his most energetic martial works linked to his early period and this middle time home to far darker material, responses to the constant battle and devastation of the War of One Thousand Shoguns, which many in the present day consider to be unacceptably pacifist and anti-militarist, This view was shared by Fu’s contemporaries, and this in addition to the constant purges of court officials as the Shogun’s title changed hands meant he failed to achieve the military or bureaucratic rank which matched the quality of his poems and his martial accomplishments. Even the sympathetic Sadayo notes that ‘struggling to bear the pressures of war, Fu’s compassion overcame his conviction, and his poetry suffered for it, as is always the fate of art composed without strong spirit’.

Only a small number of poems written by Fu during this period have survived, due to the destruction of the Hall of Righteous Thought where nearly all censored Shogunate texts were kept, during the fall of Meru at the end of the Great Contagion. However, at least two are known to have survived, Song of Wagons and Official at Stone Moat Village, from copies that were distributed or included in anthologies against the Shogun’s edict. These remain censored in the Realm and banned as seditious in Lookshy (carrying a sentence of death for treason if possessed).

The late ‘Autumn’ period is said to encompass the latter years of Fu’s retirement, when he had chosen to retire from court, spending much of his time on poetry and meditation, or travelling and enjoying himself with friends. The poems from this period are considered his finest works.

Du Fu is said to have died of old age, a rarity for a Dragonblood, while making a journey along the Great Coast Road from the southern Blessed Isle, to accept a new appointment at the Shogunate Court in Meru… it is said that he composed four hundred poems on this journey alone. He had fathered several children, and his line and panoply continued until it was extinguished during the Great Contagion.

Works

In the Age of Sorrows, the primary source for Du Fu’s poetry is the compilation known as the Autumn Meditations, which was assembled after his death and traditionally contains most of his works from the latter period of his life, along with a few poems from his ‘Spring’ period. There was some dispute during the Shogunate about the nature of this text, with the dominant approach holding that it was meant to include his best works, drawn from Spring and Autumn, others that it was meant to exclusively contain all the works from his last period (copies produced under this philosophy exclude Spring period poems). Far less common were those who held that the compilation was meant to include every poem composed by Fu, regardless of the period in which it had been written.

Faith

Due to clear evidence of meditative practice and ascetic rejection of many material possessions, a few Immaculate scholars have attempted to present Fu as an adherent of the Order, though given the lack of religious terms in Fu’s works, and his unapologetic drunkenness, this view has never become widespread.

Panoply

Du Fu was renowned not only for his poems, but for his blade, a golden dire lance bearing the name 'Shaft Shining with the Light of Heaven', which was said to have slain a thousand men in a single blow. The blade was lost in the Great Contagion, as Du's descendant fought the Fae invasion deep in the Southern Threshold, though many young Dynasts expend their wanderlust in search of it. The Scarlet Empress herself is said to have viewed the weapon as myth.