The Song of Everlasting Sorrow
The Tang emperor Xuanzong finds Yang Guifei, stops holding court at dawn on her account, and is on the road in flight from rebellion when his own escort refuses to march another step until she is dealt with. Back in a palace full of her absence he sends a Daoist adept to search heaven and earth, and the adept reaches an island of immortals where a woman receives him and sends back a token with a message only two people alive could recognize. Memorized so widely that it set the Chinese vocabulary of love for a millennium, and known well enough in Japan that the opening of the Tale of Genji assumes its readers have it by heart.
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Lineage
- influenced by ↑ Southeast the Peacock Flies
Attributes
Archetype (Jung / Campbell)
Plot structure
Symbol / motif
Conflict
Culture / tradition
Closest analogues
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- 48% · 9 shared