Fei hua qing han () is an apocryphal poem falsely attributed to Li Bai, an influential 8th-century Chinese poet. The poem attracted attention in the Chinese Internet community when some people deciphered a hidden message in it that says "Go to hell

Japan Japan ( ja, 日本, or , and formally , ''Nihonkoku'') is an island country in East Asia. It is situated in the northwest Pacific Ocean, and is bordered on the west by the Sea of Japan, while extending from the Sea of Okhotsk in the north ...

Koizumi is a Japanese family name. It may describe one of several Koizumi railway stations. It can refer to a number of people, including the following members of the prominent Koizumi family: *, former prime minister of Japan *, a second-generation Die ...

must die" (日本去死, 小泉定亡). It was later revealed that the poem was written around 2003 to 2004. "Fei hua qing han" roughly means "a cold and flying chain of flowers".

Background

Following along with the

Japanese history textbook controversies Japanese history textbook controversies involve controversial content in government-approved history textbooks used in the secondary education (junior high schools and high schools) of Japan. The controversies primarily concern the nationalist ri ...

and a decline in Sino-Japanese relations, the poem began to circulate over China internet community via forwarded email and internet forums around 2003 to 2004. The circulation peaked during the

2005 anti-Japanese demonstrations The anti-Japanese demonstrations of 2005 were a series of demonstrations, some peaceful, some violent, which were held across most of East Asia in the spring of 2005. They were sparked off by a number of issues, including the approval of a Japane ...

. It was quickly revealed that not only does the cadence of the poem fail to match the tradition of Tang poetry, its writing style also differs from that of Li Bai. The archive of Li Bai also does not contain any such poem.《反日一族擺李白上枱》 Apple Daily, 5 October 2006 The real author is yet to be revealed, but it is believed to be written by a mainland Chinese angered by Japan's denial of World War II war crimes. Reaction to the poem has been mixed. Although its authenticity has been doubted from the beginning, some claimed that it was an "insight" of Li Bai who would foresee the war crime of Japan. Some Chinese felt disgraced by the humor, and blamed the author was so childish and shameful to imitate Li Bai in a bad taste apocryphal poem. However, most people simply took it as a joke.

Content

Original poem:

日暮蒼山蘭舟小，
本無落霞綴清泉。
去年葉落緣分定，
死水微漾人卻亡。

Rìmù cāngshān lánzhōu xiǎo,
běn wú luò xiá zhuì qīngquán.
Qùnián yè luò yuánfèn dìng,
sǐshuǐ wēi yàng rén què wáng.

A rough translation:

When daylight waned at mountains, an orchid-wood boat left
A cloud didn't belong to this brook
When maple-leaves fell last year, our fates were clear
A stagnant pool of water can still sway, but you have forever gone away.

Taking the first and last characters of each line as a single sentence, it reads "Go to hell

must die" (日本去死, 小泉定亡 ''Rìběn qù sǐ, Xiǎoquán dìng wáng''). In Chinese literature, there is a long tradition of hiding sensitive messages, mostly political related ones, in the lines of a poem. These hidden messages can be seen by reading the poem horizontally, diagonally, clockwise or anti-clockwise. One famous example is a poem protesting against Chinese prime minister Li Peng, after the

1989 Tiananmen Square protests and massacre The Tiananmen Square protests, known in Chinese as the June Fourth Incident (), were student-led demonstrations held in Tiananmen Square, Beijing during 1989. In what is known as the Tiananmen Square Massacre, or in Chinese the June Fourth ...

. The poem seemingly showed strong support for the communist-governed China, and was published by the

People's Daily The ''People's Daily'' () is the official newspaper of the Central Committee of the Chinese Communist Party (CCP). The newspaper provides direct information on the policies and viewpoints of the CCP. In addition to its main Chinese-language ...

in 1991, but when read diagonally, it showed a slogan "Li Peng must resign to appease anger of the people", which embarrassed the Chinese government.

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Fei Hua Qing Han Anti-Japanese sentiment in China Internet memes Literary forgeries Political scandals in China