AW32
Of saucer shape, centrally painted in underglaze blue with a two line poem accompanying a scene of a man, seen in profile, dressed in long robes, holding an open fan in one hand and his other hand stretched above his head, his mouth open in a wide grin, facing a lady, beautifully painted, dressed in a long over-garment of a patterned fabric over her long robe, her arms folded out to each side, her long sleeves completely covering her hands, she stands in front of a building with a pagoda roof, its door slightly ajar and from behind the door another lady peers her head around to watch as the scene unfolds, in the foreground stylised rockwork and a wall painted with a smouldering dragon amongst clouds and the sun/moon, the top of the wall adorned with a border of pagoda like gables, to the side of the lady a pine tree grows, its gnarly trunk well delineated, behind the building another tree, to the left and in the background further large stylised rockwork from behind which issues grass, the back glazed and painted with the four character mark inside double blue lines.
Literature
The poem on the dish is from the famous Yuan Dynasty romance Xixiang ji, Romance of the West Chamber. The original line is 'qie jiang ya shan qi liang yi, quan zuo you yun ti yu xin'. On the dish, the third character is changed from (ya) to (yan).
The poem translates roughly as:-
Let me put aside my intention to bully the kind,
And focus on winning over the heart of the beauty.
For examples of similar dishes refer to Julia Curtis, Chinese Porcelains of the 17th Century, 1995 no.48; and Sir Michael Butler, OCS Translations, 1983-84, page 60, fig. 41.
Also see for a paper read by Mr Craig Clunas - The West Chamber: A Literary theme in Chinese Porcelain Decoration in the Transactions of the Oriental Ceramic Society, 1981 - 1982, p 69 and onwards.
