Asian Studies

It was a classic case of love and tragedy.  The restless soul of Emperor Xuan-zong, forsaking duties and office, finds love anew in the beautiful maiden Yang Xuan-yan.   This frail little girl is raised up before the kingdom as Gui-Fei, and it is with her that the Emperor gives all his time and all his life.   Their love affair is cut short, when the traitor An Lu Shan marches to the capital to take power for himself.    And poor Gui Fei is accused of sympathizing with the rebel leader and is ultimately led to her execution by the Emperors eager troops.  Using the two accounts of the scholars Bai Ju Yi and Chen Hong, can we say that Yang Xuan-yan, Gui Fei, was guilty of betraying her kingdom and her Emperor

    First of all, she had no motivation.   What could she hope to gain in the enterprise that her Emperor and lover did not already give her   Chen Hong explains that she was given half the provisions of an empress Her father, her uncle,and her brothers were all given high honorary offices her sisters were enfeoffed as Ladies of Domains.   Indeed, her and her familys power practically surpassed even that of the Emperors aunt.   She had the ear of the Emperor.   She had his full confidence.   Why would she risk the taking of ultimate power when she already enjoyed it

    Then, we come to the actions of her uncle.   He stole the office of Chancellor, and abused his power.   His actions may have driven the country to rebellion, and as Chen Hong relates, An Lu Shan used punishing Yang Go-zhong as his pretext.  Ton Pass was left undefended   Could Gui Fei anticipate the actions of her uncle   There is nothing in the accounts of Bai Ju Yi and Chen Hong to say that she had prior knowledge of his treason, and most certainly not implicit support of it.   The only thing we can attest to in the text is that the soldiers, in their bloodlust, were not satisfied with executing the guilty party but wanted to extend it to probably the rest of the Yang clan, and in this case the unfortunate one in hand Gui Fei.

    Finally, we examine the consequences of the Emperors giving favor to her.   Bai Ju Yi relates that he from that time forth, forsook his early hearings And lavished all his time on her   She illuminated and glorified her clan and admittedly paved the way for the ambitious plotting of her uncle.   From this we might be inclined to think that the Emperors power was deftly snatched from him by his mistress.   But a careful examination would reveal that even before he met Yang Xuan-yan, he had already turned over practical government to his Assistant Director Li Lin Fu.   She did not pull him from his duties and offices, he chose to shy away from them.   And as for her appointment of her family to prestigious offices, what else could she have done   To do otherwise than what she had done would amount to ungratefulness of a daughter.

    To sum, then, she was not guilty of being part of the rebellion, being the cause of the rebellion, or giving support to it.   Her only crime was to be a faithful daughter, a loving mistress and devoted lover to her Emperor.    The actions of the Emperors troops in that fateful day were precipitate and driven by unreasonable anger.   They took away the one thing that gave their Emperor meaning, and for their pains, their Emperor abdicated and longed for the hereafter, slipping to it soon afterwards.