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宋 Song · 词 Ci lyric

满江红

Man Jiang Hong: The Whole River Red

吴潜

Wu Qian

醉舞高歌海上山，天瓢承露结金丹。
夜深鹤透秋空碧，万里西风一劒寒。

Drunk, I dance and sing aloud on the mountain in the sea;
with a heavenly ladle I gather the dew and forge the golden elixir.
Deep in the night a crane pierces the blue of the autumn sky;
in the west wind blowing ten thousand miles, one sword flashes cold.

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Meaning

In four sweeping lines, Wu Qian conjures a xianxia world, a realm of immortals and knights. The speaker drinks, dances and sings on a fabled mountain rising from the sea, brews the elixir of immortality from dew gathered with a celestial ladle, and watches a crane shoot through the night-blue autumn sky. The final line turns from the immortal to the knightly: against a west wind sweeping ten thousand miles, a single sword blade glitters cold. The poem voices a bold, untamed spirit that longs for transcendence yet cannot sheathe the sword of its resolve.

醉舞高歌，在那海上仙山，天瓢承露，凝结金丹。夜深时分，仙鹤穿过秋空的碧色，万里西风之中，一剑寒光。

Appreciation

[Plain Paraphrase] Reeling drunk, the speaker dances and sings on a mountain in the sea; with a ladle from heaven he catches the dew and condenses it into the golden elixir. Late at night a crane darts through the jade-blue autumn sky, and across ten thousand miles of west wind a single sword gleams cold. [Imagery] Wu Qian stacks four brilliant images, sea mountain, golden elixir, night crane and cold sword, each stranger and grander than the last. The first two belong to the immortal's world of Penglai and the elixir of life; the last two descend to earth with a rush of weather and steel. The pivot is the third line: the crane that pierces the blue sky is the swift, weightless creature of Daoist legend, and its flight carries the poem from the immortality quest to the knight's vigil. [Structure] In only twenty-eight characters the poem moves from intoxication to alchemy to vision to a final flash of blade. The compression is the point: the immortal and the knight are one persona, and the four lines mount from rapture to a piercing clarity.

【白话串讲】吴潜写《满江红》：“醉舞高歌海上山，天瓢承露结金丹”——“夜深鹤透秋空碧，万里西风一劒寒”——他写豪情——万里西风一剑寒。【意象与手法】以海上仙山、天瓢金丹、夜鹤秋空、西风一剑的意象写豪情。四句之中，海山、金丹、仙鹤、剑光，意象瑰丽而境界阔大，从神仙世界的超凡到一剑西风的英武。【情感与主旨】吴潜短章之作，以醉舞高歌的豪迈与剑气冲霄的雄姿写志士襟怀，是吴潜豪放中见奇崛风格的写照。【名句点睛】常考“夜深鹤透秋空碧，万里西风一劒寒”以西风一剑写豪情；“醉舞高歌海上山，天瓢承露结金丹”以海上仙山写超凡气象。

Background

Wu Qian (1195-1262), courtesy name Yifu, studio name Luzhai, was a native of Xuanzhou Ningguo (present-day Ningguo, Anhui). He placed first in the jinshi examination of the Jiaxi era (1217), served under Emperors Ningzong and Lizong, and rose to be Left Chancellor of the Southern Song. He urged armed resistance to the Mongol (Yuan) invaders, opposed peace negotiations, and spoke out fearlessly, for which he was slandered by the powerful minister Jia Sidao, banished to Xunzhou and poisoned to death. His lyrics are marked by a bold, desolate grandeur, rich with feeling for the fate of the dynasty. This tiny, jewel-like piece is a rare flight of pure imagination in his corpus: where his longer poems mourn the state, here his spirit roams free in a world of immortals and sword-carrying knights.

此词为南宋大臣、词人吴潜之作。吴潜（1195—1262），字毅夫，号履斋，宣州宁国（今安徽宁国）人，嘉定十年（1217）状元，历仕宁宗、理宗两朝，官至左丞相，是南宋后期的名臣。他力主抗元，反对和议，直言敢谏，却遭贾似道排挤陷害，贬谪循州，后被毒杀，是一位有气节、有担当的悲剧性政治家。其词风豪放苍凉，长于写家国兴亡之感。此词以短章写仙侠之境：「醉舞高歌海上山」，写醉舞高歌于海上仙山——海上山，当指海上仙山，如蓬莱、方丈、瀛洲，是神仙所居之地，醉舞高歌于此，正是超脱尘世的豪迈；「天瓢承露结金丹」，写以天瓢承接露水，凝结金丹——天瓢为仙家之器，金丹为道家修炼之药，承露结丹，正是求仙问道的意象；「夜深鹤透秋空碧」，写夜深时分，仙鹤穿过秋空的碧色——鹤为仙禽，夜鹤穿秋空，正是神仙世界的意象；「万里西风一劒寒」，写万里西风之中，一剑寒光——「劒」即剑，「一劒寒」写剑光之寒，正是侠气冲霄的意象。全词以四句写尽仙侠之境，从海山金丹的超凡，到一剑西风的英武，意象瑰丽而境界阔大，是吴潜词中少见的神采飞扬之作。

Art

The poem's craft lies in its compression and its pivot. Each line packs a complete tableau: drunk dancing and loud singing on the sea mountain fuses action and setting; the heavenly ladle catching dew to form the golden elixir fuses object and process. The third line's verb to pierce is the poem's fulcrum: it gives the crane's flight the speed of an arrow and hints at the piercing quality of the knight's own resolve. The closing line achieves its charge through scale contrast, ten thousand miles of west wind against one sword's cold. The vastness of the weather dwarfs and therefore magnifies the single blade, and the synesthetic cold of the sword makes the steel itself seem to breathe. The design moves from the immortal's world to the knight's, so the poem ends not in repose but in a poised, shivering alertness.

此词艺术上以「意象瑰丽」与「境界阔大」为特色，在四句短章中写尽仙侠的豪迈。首句「醉舞高歌海上山」，以「醉舞高歌」写豪迈之态，以「海上山」写仙山之境——醉舞高歌于海上仙山，正是超脱尘世的放纵与豪迈；次句「天瓢承露结金丹」，以「天瓢承露」写仙家之器，以「结金丹」写道家修炼——承露结丹，正是求仙问道的意象，与首句的仙山相映；三句「夜深鹤透秋空碧」，以「夜深」写时间，以「鹤透秋空碧」写空间——仙鹤穿过秋夜的碧空，那「透」字写鹤飞的迅捷与空灵的境界，正是神仙世界的写照；四句「万里西风一劒寒」，以「万里西风」写境界之阔大，以「一劒寒」写剑光之凛冽——万里西风之中，一剑寒光，正是侠气冲霄的雄姿。全词四句，由仙山而金丹、由夜鹤而西风一剑，从神仙世界的超凡，到一剑西风的英武，层层递进而境界愈阔，意象瑰丽而气魄雄大，正是吴潜词「豪放中见奇崛」的风格，也是宋词短章中写仙侠之境的神采飞扬之作。

Allusions

Every image carries a classical charge. The sea mountain alludes to the three spirit-islands of Penglai, Fangzhang and Yingzhou in the Bohai Sea, homes of the immortals, recorded in Sima Qian's Records of the Grand Historian (Treatise on the Feng and Shan Sacrifices). The heavenly ladle is the vessel of the rain-god, said to hold celestial dew; the golden elixir is the Daoist elixir of immortality compounded from mercury and lead, whose mysteries Ge Hong details in the Baopuzi. The crane is the immortal's steed, for Wangzi Qiao rode a crane to immortality and Ding Lingwei was transformed into one, so the night crane crossing the blue sky is a token of the Daoist realm. The sword carries the chivalric tradition of sword-qi piercing the stars, the aura of the hero celebrated from Jia Dao onward. Each allusion serves the poem's single theme, the union of the immortal and the knight.

此词用典精切而自然。「海上山」，指海上仙山——古以渤海中有蓬莱、方丈、瀛洲三神山，为神仙所居，《史记·封禅书》载「此三神山者，其传在渤海中」，此词「醉舞高歌海上山」，写醉舞高歌于海上仙山。「天瓢」，为仙家之器，相传能盛天露、司雨泽，以「天瓢承露」写仙家承接天露之器，正见仙家气象。「金丹」，为道家修炼之药——以铅汞等炼制，服之可长生不老，葛洪《抱朴子》详言金丹之妙，此词「天瓢承露结金丹」，写以仙露凝结金丹，正是求仙问道的意象。「鹤」，为仙禽，仙人多乘鹤——王子乔乘鹤、丁令威化鹤，后以鹤写仙道之象，此词「夜深鹤透秋空碧」，写仙鹤穿秋空，正是仙家境界。「劒」，即剑，为侠客之器，写剑光之寒，暗含「剑气」的侠气传统——古人以剑气写英豪之气，如「剑气冲星斗」，此词「万里西风一劒寒」，写一剑西风的侠气。这些典故，或写仙山、或写天瓢、或写金丹、或写仙鹤、或写剑气，皆围绕仙侠这一核心，织成一张瑰丽的情网，正是吴潜词「以典写奇境」的特点。

Commentary

What makes this quatrain memorable is its pivot from the immortal to the knight. The first three lines live in the Daoist paradise, drunken singing on spirit-islands, brewing the elixir under a celestial ladle, cranes crossing the blue night. Then the fourth line turns: in a west wind sweeping ten thousand miles, one sword flashes cold. The immortal escapes the world; the knight answers for it. Critics have read the turn as Wu Qian's own heart-song: a Southern Song minister who urged resistance to the Yuan and was poisoned for his integrity, he may have longed for the island paradise, but he could never sheathe the sword of conscience. Within four lines the poem achieves a grandeur of scale and a purity of spirit rare among Song lyrics, standing beside Li Bai's Youxia xing and Jia Dao's The Swordsman as a classic of the sword-and-hero theme.

读此词，最令人神往的是四句之中由「仙」到「侠」的转换。前三句是神仙世界：醉舞高歌于海上仙山，天瓢承露凝结金丹，夜深鹤透秋空碧——那是超脱尘世的仙境，是求仙问道的想象；而第四句「万里西风一劒寒」，忽然转入侠气冲霄的雄姿——万里西风之中，一剑寒光，那不是仙人的逍遥，而是剑客的英武。由仙入侠，正是此词的神采所在：仙是超脱，侠是担当；仙是无为，侠是奋起。这一转换，或许正是吴潜这位力主抗元、终遭毒害的南宋名臣的心曲：纵然向往海上仙山的超脱，终究放不下万里西风的剑——那「一劒寒」的剑，正是他力主抗元、以死报国的剑。吴潜一生力主抗元而遭排挤陷害，此词以仙侠之境写其胸襟，于瑰丽的想象中见其气骨，正是「豪放中见奇崛」的风格。四句短章，气象阔大而神采飞扬，是吴潜词中别具一格的神作，也是宋词短章中写仙侠境界的罕见篇章。

Prosody

Form A seven-character quatrain (jueju-style short lyric) written under the tune-title Man Jiang Hong诗体短章（拟词格，七言四句）

Rhyme The rhyme falls on shan (mountain), dan (elixir) and han (cold), all of the level-tone -an rhyme group; the third line closes on the oblique-tone bi (blue), which is left unrhymed so that the turn into the last line lands with a snap. The even, resonant -an chime sustains the heroic, open tone.此篇虽题作《满江红》，实际文本为七言四句的短章，「山」「丹」「寒」等句末字皆属下平一先、十四寒、十五删韵，韵脚响亮而绵长，正合词情「豪迈」的声调。首句「醉舞高歌海上山」与次句「天瓢承露结金丹」、四句「万里西风一劒寒」皆押韵，韵脚整齐而气势畅朗；第三句「夜深鹤透秋空碧」不入韵，以「碧」字仄收，顿挫而见转折。整体声调由首句的醉舞高歌，到三句的秋空之碧，再到四句的一剑之寒，起伏有致，正合仙侠豪迈的词情。

Tone pattern The four seven-character lines are strictly parallel in construction. Line one stacks two action verbs (drunk dance, loud song); line two stacks two noun-verb units (heavenly ladle catches dew, forge golden elixir); line three lets the verb to pierce cut across a four-character color phrase; line four sets a four-character scale phrase (ten thousand miles of west wind) against a three-character close (one sword's cold). The rhythm moves from abandon, through ritual and vision, to a sudden arresting halt.句式上，此篇以七言四句为体，句式整饬而气韵流转：「醉舞高歌海上山」，以「醉舞」「高歌」两个动作连排，写豪迈之态；「天瓢承露结金丹」，以「天瓢承露」「结金丹」写仙家修炼；「夜深鹤透秋空碧」，以「鹤透」写鹤飞之迅捷，句法奇崛；「万里西风一劒寒」，以「万里西风」写境界、「一劒寒」写剑气，对举有力。全篇四句，由仙山而入金丹、由秋空而入一剑，句式随之由豪迈转奇崛、由奇崛转凛然，正是吴潜词「豪放中见奇崛」的节奏美学。

Reading note Though titled Man Jiang Hong, the piece is in fact a 28-character quatrain, and its beauty lies in using the loud, even -an rhyme and the neat seven-character line to carry a xianxia vision. The progression runs from sea mountain to golden elixir, from night crane to the sword in the west wind; each layer widens the scene while the breath runs unbroken to the end. In this grandeur within a small form it can be set beside Li Bai's Youxia xing and Jia Dao's The Swordsman, tracing the sword-and-hero theme from Tang to Song.作为七言短章，《满江红》名下的这一篇，其声律之美在于以响亮的平韵与整饬的七言句式，写出仙侠境界的豪迈情思。全篇四句，首句「醉舞高歌海上山」以豪迈起笔，写海上仙山的醉舞高歌；次句「天瓢承露结金丹」以瑰丽承接，写天瓢金丹的仙家气象；三句「夜深鹤透秋空碧」以奇崛转折，写夜鹤穿秋空的空灵境界；四句「万里西风一劒寒」以凛然收束，写万里西风的一剑寒光。四句之中，由仙山而金丹、由秋空而一剑，境界层层拓展而气韵一气流转，正是「短章见气象」的典范。就全篇而言，此篇以四句短章写尽仙侠之境，意象瑰丽、境界阔大、气魄雄健，是吴潜词中神采飞扬之作，与李白《侠客行》、贾岛《剑客》同为写剑气豪情的篇章，而一写侠客的「十步杀一人」，一写仙侠的「万里西风一剑寒」，可见剑气这一母题在唐宋诗词中的传承。

Line by line

醉舞高歌海上山，

Drunk, I dance and sing aloud on the mountain in the sea,

醉舞高歌，在那海上仙山。

Drunken dancing and loud singing on the isles of the sea,

这一句是全词的起笔，写醉舞高歌于海上仙山，是此词豪迈基调的开端。「醉舞高歌」，写醉中起舞、放声高歌——那醉舞高歌的放纵，正是超脱尘世的豪迈，是「李白斗酒诗百篇」式的狂放；「海上山」，写海上仙山——蓬莱、方丈、瀛洲，是神仙所居之地，醉舞高歌于此，正是超脱尘世的境界。以「醉舞高歌」写豪迈之态，以「海上山」写仙山之境，一放纵一超脱，正是此词「豪放中见奇崛」的开端。这一起笔，以最豪迈的动作、最奇崛的境地，为全词定下神采飞扬的基调——不是尘世的歌舞，而是海上仙山的醉舞高歌，正是「谪仙」般的境界，也是吴潜这位志士胸中豪气的第一次喷薄。

This line is the ci's opening, writing the drunken dancing on the sea isles, the start of the ci's heroic tone. Drunken dancing and loud singings writes the drunken dance and the full-throated song — the drunken revel's abandon, precisely the world-transcending heroism, the Li Bai-a-bottle-a-hundred-poems wildness; the isles of the sea writes the immortal isles — Penglai, Fangzhang, Yingzhou, the immortals' dwelling, the drunken dance and song here precisely the world-transcending realm. The drunken dancing writes the heroic pose, the sea isles the immortal realm, one abandon one transcendence, precisely the ci's start of the strange within the heroic. This opening, with the most heroic action and the strangest realm, sets the whole ci's soaring tone — not the worldly song and dance, but the drunken revel on the immortal isles, precisely the banished-immortal realm, and the first outbreak of Wu Qian's breast heroism.

夜深鹤透秋空碧，

Deep in the night a crane pierces the blue of the autumn sky,

夜深时分，仙鹤穿过秋空的碧色。

The night deepens; the crane pierces the autumn sky's blue,

这一句写夜鹤穿秋空的景象，是此词由仙山金丹转入剑气的枢纽。「夜深」，写时间之深——夜深人静，正是仙家修炼之时；「鹤透秋空碧」，写仙鹤穿过秋空的碧色——「鹤」为仙禽，「透」字写鹤飞的迅捷、如箭穿透，「秋空碧」写秋夜晴空之澄碧，一鹤穿碧空，正是神仙世界的空灵境界。以「夜深」写时间，以「鹤透秋空碧」写空间，一深一碧，正是此词境界由仙山金丹向更深远的拓展；「透」字，写鹤飞的迅捷，也暗含突破、穿越之意，正是「鹤唳青霄」的仙家气象。这一句，是此词由「仙」入「侠」的枢纽——仙鹤既去，剑气将出，正是此词境界转换的关键一笔。

This line writes the night crane's piercing of the autumn sky, the ci's hinge from the immortal isles and alchemy to the sword spirit. The night deepens writes the time's depth — the deep night and the still world, precisely the immortal's cultivation hour; the crane pierces the autumn sky's blue writes the crane through the autumn blue — the crane the immortal bird, the word pierce the flight's swiftness, like the arrow through, the autumn sky's blue the clear autumn night, one crane through the blue, precisely the immortal world's lucid realm. The night deep writes the time, the crane through the blue the space, one deep one blue, precisely the ci's realm expanding from the immortal isles to the farther depth; the word pierce writes the crane's swiftness, and secretly the breaking-through, the crossing, precisely the immortal's crane's cry through the azure sky. This line is the ci's hinge from the immortal to the knight-errant — the crane gone, the sword spirit about to come, precisely the key stroke of the realm's turn.

万里西风一劒寒。

In the west wind blowing ten thousand miles, one sword flashes cold.

万里西风之中，一剑寒光。

Ten thousand li of west wind, and one sword's cold gleam.

这一句是全词的结穴，写万里西风中的一剑寒光，是此词由仙入侠的最高点。「万里西风」，写境界之阔大——西风浩荡，吹遍万里，正是「大风起兮云飞扬」的雄阔；「一劒寒」，写剑光之凛冽——那寒光闪烁的一剑，正是侠气冲霄的雄姿。以「万里西风」写境界，以「一劒寒」写剑气，一阔一寒，正是此词由神仙世界的超脱，转入侠客世界的英武；「一劒寒」的「寒」字，写剑光的凛冽，也暗含「十年磨一剑，霜刃未曾试」的锋芒。这一结句，把前三句的仙山、金丹、仙鹤，尽收于万里西风的一剑之下，气象阔大而侠气凛然，是此词由仙入侠的最高点，也是吴潜这位力主抗元的名臣，胸中「剑」的写照。

This line is the ci's knot, writing the one sword's cold in the ten-thousand-li west wind, the highest point of the ci's turn from the immortal to the knight-errant. Ten thousand li of west wind writes the realm's vastness — the west wind sweeping ten thousand li, precisely the great wind rises and the clouds fly's grandeur; one sword's cold gleam writes the blade's edge — the cold-flashing sword, precisely the knight-errant's spirit reaching the sky. The ten-thousand-li west wind writes the realm, the one sword's cold the sword spirit, one vast one cold, precisely the ci's turn from the immortal world's transcendence to the knight-errant world's martial bearing; the one sword's cold's word cold writes the blade's edge, and secretly the ten years' grinding of one sword, the frost edge never tried. This closing line gathers the first three lines' immortal isles, alchemy, and crane all under the ten-thousand-li west wind's one sword, the realm vast and the knight's awe-inspiring, the highest point of the ci's immortal-to-errant turn, and the portrait of the sword in the breast of Wu Qian, the statesman who urged resistance against the Yuan.

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Word focus

海上山 Sea mountain: the fabled isles of Penglai, Fangzhang and Yingzhou rising from the Bohai Sea, homes of the immortals. Writing 'on the sea mountain' rather than simply 'on a spirit-mountain' stresses the distance and unattainability of the poet's realm. 「醉舞高歌海上山」之「海上山」，写海上仙山，是此词仙侠境界的开端。「海上山」即海上仙山——蓬莱、方丈、瀛洲三神山，为神仙所居，《史记·封禅书》载「此三神山者，其传在渤海中」，后以「海上仙山」写神仙境界。以「海上山」写醉舞高歌之地，比直写「仙山」更见遥远缥缈——那海上的仙山，渺不可及，正是超脱尘世的境界；醉舞高歌于此，正是「谪仙」般的放纵。这一词，把此词置于海上仙山的境界之中，为全词定下神采飞扬的基调，也是仙侠意象的开端。以「海上山」写仙境，遥远缥缈而境界阔大，是吴潜词「以典写奇境」的开篇，也是此词豪迈基调的奠基石。

金丹 Golden elixir: the Daoist elixir of immortality, compounded from mercury and lead to grant eternal life, its making detailed in Ge Hong's Baopuzi. The phrase condenses the whole immortal quest into one gleaming object. 「天瓢承露结金丹」之「金丹」，写道家修炼之药，是此词仙家意象的核心语。「金丹」为道家修炼之药——以铅汞等炼制，服之可长生不老，葛洪《抱朴子》详言金丹之妙，后以「金丹」写道家修炼、神仙不死。此词「天瓢承露结金丹」，写以天瓢承接仙露，凝结金丹——承露结丹，正是求仙问道的意象，与首句的仙山相映。以「金丹」写修炼，比直写「求仙」更见道家之具体，也暗含「金丹换骨」的超脱；「天瓢承露」与「结金丹」相连，正是仙家修炼的完整意象。这一词，是此词仙家意象的核心，也是由「海上山」向「秋空碧」过渡的枢纽。以「金丹」写仙家修炼，具体而瑰丽，是吴潜词「以典写奇境」的体现。

一劒寒 One sword's cold: jian is the sword, han the chill of its blade. Cold makes the flash felt on the skin, implying a blade long whetted and never tried; against the vast west wind it becomes the emblem of unbowed resolve. 「万里西风一劒寒」之「一劒寒」，写一剑寒光，是此词由仙入侠的最高点。「一劒」即一剑，「寒」写剑光之凛冽——那寒光闪烁的一剑，正是侠气冲霄的雄姿；以「万里西风」对「一劒寒」，一阔一寒，正是此词境界的顶点。以「一劒寒」写剑气，比「一剑光」更见凛冽——「寒」字写剑光的凛冽之气，也暗含「霜刃未曾试」的锋芒；「万里西风」的浩荡之中，一剑寒光，正是「十年磨一剑」的侠客写照。这一词，是此词由仙入侠的最高点，也是吴潜这位力主抗元的名臣胸中「剑」的写照——纵然向往海上仙山的超脱，终究放不下万里西风的剑。以「一劒寒」写侠气，凛冽而雄健，是吴潜词炼字的精妙处。

满江红