Qu Yuan as Seen Through Emotional and Mental Illness

Li Yousheng (Community Newspaper, Issue 39, July 2016)

In the early 1980s, when I was pursuing my doctoral degree at Cambridge University in England, I wanted to write Qu Yuan’s poem “The road ahead is long and winding, I will search high and low” on the title page of my dissertation. When I went to the library to look for information, I found a biography of Qu Yuan entitled “A Madman”. I had never seen a Chinese book with a similar title before, which shows the difference between Eastern and Western cultures.

In the early years of this century, I was taking antidepressants. My psychiatrist told me, “In your situation, it’s normal to have depression; it would be abnormal not to.” This gave me the opportunity to become familiar with affective disorders and also allowed me to read the works of Qu Yuan. I was deeply moved at the time, feeling that Qu Yuan’s poetry was a reflection of the mental journey of chronic depression, a living specimen of affective mental illness. The prevalence, course, and treatment of affective mental illness are closely related to the social environment and corresponding cultural differences. When I was a doctor in China in my youth, I called all these illnesses “neurasthenia,” which seemed far less typical than Western depression. One direct reason for this was that in China under Mao Zedong’s leadership, everyone lived together, even in cowsheds, with several people living together and guards at the door. In contrast, in the West, if someone died in their home, they wouldn’t be discovered until the entire neighborhood reeked of the stench.

Modern people are increasingly aware of the prevalence of depression. Western statistics show that 8-15% of people will experience a major depressive episode in their lifetime, and 15% of the elderly have clinical symptoms of depression. Although we can only infer the extent of Qu Yuan’s illness from his surviving poems, it is almost certain that he suffered from dysthymic disorder or recurrent depressive disorder. The Western ICD-10 diagnostic criteria list eleven criteria for chronic depression (dysthymia), and a diagnosis can be made if any three of them are met. Qu Yuan exhibited six of these criteria: 1) reduced social interaction, 2) pessimism about the future and constant rumination on the past, 3) insomnia, 4) frequent crying, 5) loss of confidence and feelings of inadequacy, and 6) loss of interest in sex and other enjoyment of life.

Here, I will only briefly explain the last point: Sex plays a significant role in the fantasies of normal men. Qu Yuan’s poems are primarily lyrical and imaginative, but do not involve sexual desire; the women in his poems lack sensuality. Qu Yuan left behind a considerable number of poems, but no evidence can be found that he had a wife, daughters, lovers, or any relatives or friends. He was likely lonely throughout his life and had no children. According to Qu Yuan’s poems, there was a woman named Nüxu in his life. According to Professor Jin Daoxing of Three Gorges University, Nüxu was Qu Yuan’s concubine, but this concubine often scolded Qu Yuan and was a typical shrew in his presence.

As for the beauties and fragrant herbs in Qu Yuan’s poems, they represent his persistent pursuit of aestheticism in his fantasies. I once attended a lecture by a psychologist working at a Canadian university, who said: “We can find almost all signs of mental illness in teenage boys and girls’ first love; they are infatuated and intoxicated.” I once wrote: “Faced with rampant materialism and widespread decadence, the emotions of first love between boys and girls are the only remaining human love in the world today.” The beauties and pursuit of love in Qu Yuan’s poems are precisely Qu Yuan’s insistence on the human love of primitive society, while rejecting the secondary social imperial system represented by the Qin state.

Dividing human society into natural, primordial societies and artificial secondary societies reveals that China, during the Xia, Shang, and Zhou dynasties, systematically divided the country into numerous primordial societies. This superpower of primordial societies only finally disintegrated during the Warring States period (see author’s website: http://taoism21cen.com). The construction of China’s secondary societies was accompanied by the establishment of a centralized bureaucratic system, what Marxism calls a class dictatorship, backed by war and violence. Under the pressure of escalating warfare, only the state of Chu was the most backward in the process of building this dictatorship. There, abundant resources and a relatively easy life, human nature was sufficient to resist the encroachment of the secondary social system. It was precisely because of this that Chu produced the great poet Qu Yuan, “unprecedented and unparalleled,” whose famous line, “Even with only three households left, Chu will surely destroy Qin,” reflects the ultimate destruction of the Qin Empire by Chu figures Chen Sheng, Wu Guang, Liu Bang, and Xiang Yu. Chu also implemented Daoist governance for decades, leading to the reigns of Emperors Wen and Jing. Qu Yuan, from an emotional and aesthetic perspective, expresses the resolute despair and sorrow of primordial societies facing the defenselessness of secondary societies.

Emotional disorders are divided into two types: depression and bipolar disorder, the latter characterized by periods of elevated mood interspersed with depression. Qu Yuan likely suffered from bipolar disorder, which explains his lengthy fantasies of traversing heaven and earth. He also exhibited clear paranoia and unusual behaviors such as running alone and wearing fragrant herbs. The medical community has long linked genius with mental illness; many famous writers suffered from bipolar disorder, such as Ernest Hemingway, author of “The Old Man and the Sea.” This is a consequence of the artificial secondary society’s reliance on marginalized talent under the pressure of escalating war. Furthermore, Qu Yuan showed signs of obsessive-compulsive personality disorder and a natural inclination towards self-cultivation and a love of beauty.

Some people in China have successfully treated depression by studying Taoism. Qu Yuan, who fell ill in middle age due to social stigma, endured decades of hardship that most people could not bear, living to a ripe old age and leaving behind immortal poems. The source of his life was the ideal and practice of Taoism: refined taste, unwavering faith, a return to nature, and unity with the Tao. Whether Qu Yuan practiced qigong and guided breathing exercises is unknown, but he undoubtedly knew how to overcome illness through the power of imagination, creative passion, and a secluded, simple life.

Recently, some have questioned the theory that Qu Yuan committed suicide. Even according to the traditional account, Qu Yuan drowned himself in 278 BC after Qin general Bai Qi captured Ying, the capital of Chu. This suicide was neither a symptom of illness nor an escape from the pain of illness, but rather an expression of pure will: to avoid the defilement of the world and maintain the purity of life. Therefore, Qu Yuan’s death was unrelated to depression. (By Li Yousheng)