6. Gazing at Mount Tai | Du Fu
Text
English translation
Original Chinese text
岱宗夫如何，齐鲁青未了。
English translation
What is Daizong, then, like? The blue of it runs on through Qi and Lu and does not end.
He opens with a question put to himself. Before writing about the mountain's height he writes about its size: past the old borders of Qi and Lu, the blue still has not stopped. The poem measures by looking, not by climbing — it never describes an ascent.
Original Chinese text
造化钟神秀，阴阳割昏晓。
English translation
Nature gathered its marvel and beauty into this one place; its shaded and sunlit sides cut dusk from dawn.
The force is in the word 'cut': the same mountain, one slope already dark, the other still lit. This is not about height. It is about bulk enough to divide morning from evening.
Original Chinese text
荡胸生曾云，决眦入归鸟。
English translation
Clouds rising in layers wash through my chest; I strain my eyes to splitting and the homing birds come in.
The couplet turns from the mountain to the man looking at it. Clouds churning inside the chest is the inner half; birds entering the eye is the outer half. Both describe the effort of looking — it is precisely because he stands far off that he must open his eyes to the point of splitting.
Original Chinese text
会当凌绝顶，一览众山小。
English translation
One day I will stand on the highest peak, and every other mountain will look small.
The close turns 'looking' into 'climbing'. The first six lines are what he sees now; the last two jump to an act that has not happened. The force of the poem is in that jump. This is not a sigh after reaching the top — it is a resolve made before the climb has begun.
赏析 · Commentary
先写大，不写高 · Size First, Not Height
写泰山的诗多写它高，杜甫先写它大。头两句一问一答：岱宗什么样？青色穿过齐鲁两国故地还没有完。这是从远处看的结果——只有站得足够远，才能看见一座山横跨两个古国的范围。全诗八句都在「望」，没有一句写攀登，连山路的石头都没有出现。这个选择决定了诗的气质：它不是游记，是一次远望。
Most poems on Mount Tai write about its height; Du Fu writes about its size first. The opening couplet is a question and an answer: what is Daizong like? The blue crosses the old lands of two states and still is not finished. That is what you see from a distance — only from far enough away can a mountain be seen spanning two ancient states. All eight lines stay with 'gazing'; not one describes a climb, and not a single stone of the path appears. That choice fixes the character of the poem: it is not a travel record, it is one long look.
「割」字担着两句 · The Word 'Cut' Carries the Couplet
「阴阳割昏晓」五个字里，前面「造化钟神秀」是铺垫，出力的是「割」。山北已经暗下去，山南还亮着，同一座山身上分出两个时辰。杜甫没有用「分」「隔」这类现成的字，选了一个带刃口的动词——昏晓不是自然过渡，是被切开的两半。这个字把泰山的体量写成了能动手的东西。
In the five characters of "its shaded and sunlit sides cut dusk from dawn", the preceding line about nature gathering beauty is only preparation; the word that does the work is "cut". The northern slope has already gone dark while the southern one is still lit — two hours of the day separated on the body of one mountain. Du Fu does not reach for ready-made words like "divide" or "separate". He picks a verb with an edge: dusk and dawn are two halves severed by a blade. That one word turns the mountain's bulk into something that acts.
还没登就已经定下 · Decided Before the Climbing Starts
「会当凌绝顶，一览众山小」常被读成登顶之后的感慨，其实不是。「会当」是将来之词，杜甫此刻还站在山下眺望。前六句写的都是眼前——青色、昏晓、层云、归鸟，全是用眼睛能拿到的东西；最后两句忽然换时态，说有一天我要上去。全诗压在这个时态跳跃上：不是征服之后的回望，是还没出发时定下的决心。写这首诗时杜甫二十多岁，落第不久，也没有真的把泰山爬完。
The closing couplet is usually read as a reflection made after reaching the summit. It is not. The phrase rendered "one day" points to the future; Du Fu is still standing at the foot of the mountain looking up. The first six lines are all present tense — the blue, the dusk and dawn, the layered cloud, the homing birds, everything the eye can actually take in — and then the last two switch tense: someday I will go up. The poem rests on that jump in tense. This is not a look back after a conquest; it is a resolve formed before the departure. Du Fu was in his twenties when he wrote it, shortly after failing the examinations, and he had not in fact finished climbing the mountain.