标题: Xu Zhimo's Stone [打印本页] 作者: choi 时间: 3-22-2016 15:36 标题: Xu Zhimo's Stone 本帖最后由 choi 于 3-22-2016 15:39 编辑
David Cox, Poetry or Property Punts: What's Driving China's Love Affair with Cambridge? House prices in Cambridge have risen 50% since 2010 – caused in part by Chinese investors whose passion for the city may have begun with a poem they learned at school. But what do local residents make of this romantic vision? Guardian, Mar 22, 2016. http://www.theguardian.com/citie ... o-farewell-property
My comment:
(a) The "property punts" in the title. The noun punt has several meanings (with different etymologies).
punt (n):
"1: A long, narrow, flat-bottomed boat, square at both ends and propelled with a long pole, used on inland waters chiefly for recreation
* * *
3: informal, chiefly British a bet" http://www.oxforddictionaries.co ... erican_english/punt
The "property punt" looks to definition 3.
(b) King's College, Cambridge
(i) King's College "was founded in 1441 by Henry VI, soon after he had founded its sister college in Eton." en.wiipedia.org
(ii) Henry VI of England (1421-1471; succeeded to the English throne at the age of nine months upon his father's death; House of Lancaster; Wars of the Roses (1455-1487)
(c) "On the edge of Scholar's Piece, the strip of farmland just behind King's College, lies a granite stone which has become arguably Cambridge’s most coveted tourist attraction. * * * placed rather innocuously next to the bridge that joins Scholar's Piece to the rest of the college" is Xu Zhimo's stone.
(i) I spent hours pouring over maps of King's College and at last find this useful map. A picture is worth a thousand words.
Please locate Chapel (number 4), Back Lawn (10), River Cam (11; Xu Zhimo's stone) and The Backs (12; also known as Scholar's Piece).
(A) The Backs (12) includes the following: "In the 15th century the stretch of river which now runs through King's College was the very heart of the town of Cambridge. Henry VI had to give a £26-a-year tax break to the town for compulsorily taking the land and demolishing the quayside and buildings."
quay (n): "a wharf, typically one built parallel to the shoreline Compare pier [which juts out into a body of water]" www.collinsdictionary.com/dictionary/english/quay
(B) There is a map at the end of this (c)(i)(B) manual, which is not helpful at all, not identifying Scholar's Piece and all that.
(ii) King's College for visitors interested in undergraduate studies. undated, at page 5 www.kings.cam.ac.uk/files/undergraduate/kings-self-tour.pdf
(1f says King's College Chapel is for religious services; "4. KING'S AVENUE (leading to the Back Gate)[:] a. Xu Zhimo's stone * * * b. Scholar's piece")
(d) Read up to the following paragraph and skip the rest, which is about property speculation that does not interest me.
"According to China’s Ministry of Education, 459,800 students enrolled at overseas universities in 2014, an increase of 11.1% on the previous year. Of these, 423,000 were entirely funded by their families. And at the top of their list is Cambridge: Chinese students make up the largest ethnic population at the university, with around 1,000 admitted last year.
(e) Here is another gulf separating China and Taiwan. Due to Chiang Kai-shek's censorship, a few Taiwanese (me included) heard of Xu Zhimo and this poem (the last two lines only) but little else (including his love life and death). Naturally his poem has not been in Taiwan's textbook, because few in Taiwan thinks he is that important.