羌村三首·其一

Meaning

Du Fu comes home to Qiang Village after the rebellion and finds his family believing him dead. The scene is ordinary — evening red clouds, sparrows at a bramble gate — but the reunion is built out of small physical shocks: surprise, then tears, then neighbours on the wall, then the candle lit again late at night as the two sit opposite in disbelief. The poem asks how a return from war can be anything but a dream.

峥嵘赤云西，日脚下平地。柴门鸟雀噪，归客千里至。妻孥怪我在，惊定还拭泪。世乱遭飘荡，生还偶然遂。邻人满墙头，感叹亦歔欷。夜阑更秉烛，相对如梦寐。

Appreciation

[Plain Paraphrase] Only twelve lines, and barely one of them is about emotion. The red clouds, the slanting sun, the chattering sparrows — all normal country evening, until 'a guest returning from a thousand li has come.' What the poet then records is a household behaving in a way no one would behave in peacetime: his wife and children simply do not believe he is there. [Structure] Four moves: the approach, the arrival, the neighbours, and the all-night sitting. Each is linked by a single concrete object — the gate, the wall, the candle — so that the poem narrows from the landscape to a table and two figures. [Imagery] The famous details are almost awkwardly small: hands wiping tears, neighbours crowded on the wall tops, a candle re-kindled at dead of night. Du Fu never describes a feeling directly; he describes the body's reaction to one.

【白话串讲】 杜甫写《羌村三首·其一》：“峥嵘赤云西，日脚下平地”——“柴门鸟雀噪，归客千里至”——“妻孥怪我在，惊定还拭泪”——“世乱遭飘荡，生还偶然遂”——“夜阑更秉烛，相对如梦寐”——他乱后回家，家人以为他死了——“相对如梦寐”。 【意象与手法】 此诗写乱后归家的悲喜，以细节写亲情，是杜甫的名篇。前四句写归家的景象：「峥嵘赤云西」写峥嵘赤云西，「日脚下平地」写日脚下平地，「柴门鸟雀噪」写柴门鸟雀噪，「归客千里至」写归客千里至；中四句写家人的反应：「妻孥怪我在」写妻孥怪我在，「惊定还拭泪」写惊定还拭泪，「世乱遭飘荡」写世乱遭飘荡，「生还偶然遂」写生还偶然遂；后四句写邻人与夜谈：「邻人满墙头」写邻人满墙头，「感叹亦歔欷」写感叹亦歔欷，「夜阑更秉烛」写夜阑更秉烛，「相对如梦寐」写相对如梦寐。全诗以细节写亲情，写尽乱后归家的悲喜，是杜甫的代表作。 【情感与主旨】 此诗写乱后归家的悲喜，以细节写亲情，是杜甫的名篇。此诗是杜甫《羌村三首》组诗之一，作于至德二载（757）闰八月，杜甫自凤翔归鄜州羌村（今陕西富县）探家时。安史之乱中杜甫陷贼长安，后逃归凤翔，被任左拾遗，因上疏救房琯触怒肃宗，放还探家。此诗写归家：峥嵘赤云西，日脚下平地——写夕阳西下、赤云峥嵘；柴门鸟雀噪，归客千里至——写柴门鸟雀喧噪，归客千里归来；妻孥怪我在，惊定还拭泪——写妻儿惊怪我还活着，惊定之后还拭泪；世乱遭飘荡，生还偶然遂——写世乱遭飘荡，生还只是偶然；邻人满墙头，感叹亦歔欷——写邻人满墙头观望，感叹亦歔欷；夜阑更秉烛，相对如梦寐——写夜深更秉烛，相对如梦寐。全诗以细节写亲情——那「妻孥怪我在，惊定还拭泪」写尽乱后重逢的悲喜，那「夜阑更秉烛，相对如梦寐」写尽相逢如梦的恍惚，写尽乱后归家的悲喜，是理解杜甫安史之乱时期诗歌的重要篇章。 【名句点睛】 常考「妻孥怪我在，惊定还拭泪」写乱后重逢的悲喜；「夜阑更秉烛，相对如梦寐」写相逢如梦的恍惚；「世乱遭飘荡，生还偶然遂」写乱世生还的偶然；「邻人满墙头，感叹亦歔欷」写邻人的感叹；以及全诗以细节写亲情、真实动人的手法。

Allusions

The 'bramble gate' is the traditional marking of a poor hermit's house, from Tao Yuanming onward, and here it means simply a farmer's gate. 'The sun's feet' is an older image for the low, level rays of sunset. The neighbours on the wall are not a literary borrowing but village life itself, though the poet is echoing the convention of the watching village in classical verse. The relit candle at the end inherits the topos of the night vigil — the classical ideal of friends or lovers keeping watch by lamplight — and turns it toward a family reunion after chaos.

此诗的用语深植于归家与乱世的传统。「峥嵘赤云西」令人想到「峥嵘」写高峻的意象——「山高谷深」的峥嵘，也令人想到「赤云」写晚霞的意象——「赤云西」写西天的红云；「日脚下平地」令人想到「日脚」写日光的意象——「日脚斜穿窗隙来」，也令人想到「平地」写地面的意象；「柴门鸟雀噪」令人想到「柴门」写贫寒之家的意象——「柴门闻犬吠，风雪夜归人」（刘长卿），也令人想到「鸟雀噪」写鸟雀喧噪的意象；「归客千里至」令人想到「归客」写归来的游子，也令人想到「千里至」写千里归来的意象；「妻孥怪我在」令人想到「妻孥」写妻子儿女的意象——「妻孥怪我在」正是杜甫的名句，也令人想到「怪我在」写惊怪还在的意象；「惊定还拭泪」令人想到「惊定」写惊魂方定的意象，也令人想到「拭泪」写擦泪的意象；「世乱遭飘荡」令人想到「世乱」写乱世的意象——「世乱遭飘荡」正是写安史之乱，也令人想到「飘荡」写漂泊的意象；「生还偶然遂」令人想到「生还」写活着归来的意象——「生还偶然遂」正是写乱世生还的偶然，也令人想到「偶然遂」写偶然遂愿的意象；「邻人满墙头」令人想到「邻人」写邻居的意象，也令人想到「满墙头」写满墙围观的意象；「感叹亦歔欷」令人想到「感叹」写感慨的意象，也令人想到「歔欷」写叹息的意象——「歔欷流涕」；「夜阑更秉烛」令人想到「夜阑」写夜深更尽的意象——「夜阑卧听风吹雨」（陆游），也令人想到「秉烛」写持烛的意象——「秉烛夜游」；「相对如梦寐」令人想到「相对」写相对的意象，也令人想到「如梦寐」写如做梦的意象——「相对如梦寐」正是杜甫的名句，更令人想到「梦里不知身是客」的恍惚。全诗化用柴门、世乱、夜阑、秉烛、如梦寐的传统意象，以细节写亲情，正是杜甫「沉郁顿挫」而善用细节、承归家乱世传统写真情的本领。

Commentary

The line 'My wife and children wonder that I am still alive, once the shock settles they keep wiping away tears' is among the most-quoted couplets of Tang poetry, and the closing couplet has been praised from the Song onward as an example of Du Fu's ability to end a poem without naming its own feeling. Later readers have noted that the poem's intimacy is its argument: the catastrophe of the age is measured not in battles but in a wife wiping her tears and a candle burning at midnight. It is read together with the rest of the Qiang Village set and with the long poem 'Northward Journey', which tells the same return on a far larger scale.

此诗历来被推为杜甫的名篇，也是唐人写乱后归家诗的代表。历代论者对此诗评价极高：清人评此诗「以细节写亲情，真实动人」；近人更指出「妻孥怪我在，惊定还拭泪」「夜阑更秉烛，相对如梦寐」写乱后重逢的悲喜，是千古名句。在诗歌史上，此诗的特殊价值在于：它以八句的短歌写尽乱后归家的悲喜——那峥嵘的赤云，那下平地的日脚，那喧噪的柴门鸟雀，那千里归来的归客，那惊怪的妻孥，那拭泪的惊定，那飘荡的世乱，那偶然的生还，那满墙头的邻人，那歔欷的感叹，那更秉烛的夜阑，那如梦寐的相对，都写尽了乱后归家的悲喜；那「妻孥怪我在，惊定还拭泪」更写尽乱后重逢的悲喜。此诗与杜甫《羌村三首》组诗、与《北征》同为安史之乱时期的名篇，一写归家的悲喜，一写归途的见闻；又与刘长卿「柴门闻犬吠」的归家传统一脉相承，可见中国诗写归家与乱世的传统。对于今日读者，此诗是理解杜甫安史之乱时期诗歌的窗口，也是中国诗写乱世归家的经典——那相对如梦寐的烛光，穿越千年，仍在诉说着乱后重逢的悲喜。

Prosody

Line by line

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