Chu Ci — 路漫漫其修远兮

This line—“The road is long and arduous; I will search high and low”—captures the defiant perseverance at the heart of *Li Sao* (“Encountering Sorrow”), the longest and most celebrated poem in the *Chu Ci*. Here, the speaker does not merely lament hardship but affirms an unrelenting commitment to inquiry and integrity, even as the path ahead grows dimmer and more obscure. The surrounding lines reinforce this mood: “The road is dark and hidden; the way is distant and uncertain,” and “I hold my inner nature and true feelings—alone, without a match.” Elsewhere, he describes being mired and unable to advance, his virtues unrecognized, his sincerity mistaken for strangeness by the barking dogs of the village—a metaphor for shallow judgment. He insists on “repeated benevolence and layered righteousness” as his foundation, yet finds no wise judge like Bo Le to recognize his worth. Even the ancient sages Yao and Shun seem impossibly remote; still, he resolves to “suppress grief and strengthen the heart,” to “not deviate though beset by sorrow,” and to fix his will with broad resolve. The *Chu Ci* gives voice to this kind of solitary, principled striving—not as abstract idealism, but as lived tension between inner conviction and outer indifference. In its closing affirmation—“I declare plainly to the noble-minded: I shall take you as my kind”—the poem locates kinship not in agreement, but in shared fidelity to what endures.