Week 3_Reading 1

 


(H, 46m) After Xiang Yu proves to his men (with his three victories) that he can kill with a ferocity unlikely to be challenged, he finds himself at a crossroads. He is presented with a choice: to cross the Yangtze towards the east or to proceed on foot towards the Han enemy. This choice is made possible by the village head of Wujiang who offers Xiang his boat, the only one around, and the appeal of ruling over a 300,000/400,000 populace. (H, 46b) But in response, Xiang Yu laughs at the idea of even considering such an option. He is thoroughly convinced that he has Heaven as his enemy, and that no boat, no river, no person can help him overwhelm such an opponent. Why does he reach this conclusion? (H, 45b/46t) At Dongcheng (his final horizon), Xiang Yu recounts his battle histories, considering how his victories began turning to defeats once he became “dictator of the world”. Since his strength in arms hasn’t faltered, and his forcefulness hadn’t changed, he concludes that his newly found failures do not stem from a defect within. Xiang Yu places such great value on his prowess in arms, that he blinds himself to the potential influence of other qualities/skills. Instead of questioning his strategical judgments, he reaches out as far as Heaven to cast blame. (H, 46m) When the Wujiang village head offers Xiang Yu the boat as refuge, when he provides him the opportunity to hide out east of the Yangtze, Xiang Yu ceases to reflect on the potential benefits of hiding or the potential rewards of stepping back from battle. This refusal to see past the merit of arms, harkens back to two encounters Xiang Yu has—one with Song Yi and the other with the King of Han. (H, 23b) In the first encounter, Song Yi suggests that strategy can overwhelm arms; (H, 41b) in the second, the King of Han proposes the power of brains over that of arms. (H, 48b) Sima Qian concludes Xiang Yu’s chapter by casting Xiang’s refusal to accept responsibility as delusional. And given the aforementioned examples, it can be argued that the said delusion stems from Xiang’s failure to balance out the scales of brains and arms; the culmination of which occurs the moment Xiang Yu laughs at the village head’s offering rather than boating east in a strategic gesture.

 

 

 

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