Representation and symbolism of Huaixiang in Ji Xian’s nostalgic poetry

Abstract

This paper aims to examine the representation and symbolism of huaixiang 懷鄉 (“homesickness”) in the nostalgic poetry of Ji Xian 紀弦 (1913-2013), with a specific focus on the symbolism of trees. Ji Xian was among the Chinese writers who relocated to Taiwan in the late 1940s. On the island, he played a pivotal role in the diffusion of modern poetry, advocating for a modernist movement through the publication of poetry magazines and the establishment of a Modernist School, which attracted more than a hundred poets. Ji Xian’s theories and poems mainly promoted the introduction of Modernism to Taiwan through the incorporation of Western literature and experimentation with new imagery, language and style. However, amidst Ji Xian’s writings, one also finds several nostalgic poems that reveal the poet’s distress upon leaving Mainland China and the alienation and loneliness experienced on his arrival on the island. His nostalgic poetry features new symbols often related to Chinese and Taiwanese vegetation. Trees of different species, such as the Acacia and Wutong trees, as well as the Betel palm, become carriers of his homesickness or self-referential symbols through which he expresses the hardship of settling into Taiwan and the complex process of establishing roots in a foreign land.