Crossing Delancey: Ripe Plums Are Falling (HD)

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   • Crossing Delancey: Ripe Plums Are Falling  

Excerpt from the romantic light comedy, Crossing Delancey. Izzy [Isabelle] (actress, Amy Irving) has lunch with Anton (actor, Jeroen Krabbé) when he recites the poem now made famous by the movie.

The poem itself is part of an anthology of 305 ancient chinese songs called the Shih Ching or Book of Songs. The songs were written around 1000 - 700 BC, during the Chou dynasty with some perhaps as early as the Shang dynasty ca. 1700 BC. Confucius compiled these songs into their present form and order, often referring to them in his teachings.

The Book of Songs was divided into three major sections: 1. Feng - Air of the States, 2. Ya - Courtly Songs, and 3. Sung - Hymns. "Ripe Plums Are Falling" belonged to the Feng section consisting of 160 songs and further divided by geography into fifteen subsections to correlate to the fifteen states in northern China. The songs in this section deal with everyday life of the common people, such as their joys as well as their hardships.

The poem as translated by Arthur Waley:

Ripe plums are falling
Now there are only seven
May a fine lover come for me
Now while there is still time

Ripe plums are falling
Now there are only three
May a fine lover come for me
Now while there is still time

Ripe plums are falling
I gather (lay) them in a shallow basket
May a fine lover come for me
Tell me his name

"Ripe Plums Are Falling" isn't actually the title of this poem, but placed #20 in the Feng and labeled an "Air of Shaou and the South." Waley reorganized the ordering according to theme rather than region and placed it #17.

Another translation by James Legge which draws a more vivid idea of what the poem is about, though not as graceful:

Dropping are the fruits from the plum-tree;
There are [but] seven [tenths] of them left!
For the gentlemen who seek me,
This is the fortunate time!

Dropping are the fruits from the plum-tree;
There are [but] three [tenths] of them left!
For the gentlemen who seek me,
Now is the time.

Dropt are the fruits from the plum-tree;
In my shallow basket I have collected them.
Would the gentlemen who seek me
[Only] speak about it!

At the first stanza, the woman is at the prime of her life and feels it is the optimal time for courtship and marriage. By the second stanza, the woman is a little older -- there's still time for courtship and marriage, but it's critical. The last stanza finds the woman older, gathering all the fallen plums (which had been overlooked by the prospective lovers), the tree no longer holding any. At this point, the women is outspoken and direct (counter to Chinese culture at the time) and wishes that the interested man override any courtship proprietaries and just tell her!

Anton may have not known who published it and, of course, he can't lend you his copy, but if you're interested in reading the Book of Songs, it's out in your favorite library, or you can buy online at:

http://www.amazon.com/Book-Songs-Anci...

Bibliography
http://mockingbird.creighton.edu/engl...
http://etext.virginia.edu/chinese/shi...

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