Chu Ci — 举世皆浊

“Everyone in the world is muddy, yet I alone am clear; all people are drunk, yet I alone am sober”—these lines capture a moment of stark moral solitude. They come from the *Chu Ci*, specifically the “Fisherman” chapter, where the exiled poet Qu Yuan walks the riverbank, gaunt and weary, after being banished from court. A fisherman encounters him and asks why he has fallen so low; Qu Yuan replies with those exact words, naming his clarity and wakefulness as the very reason for his exile. The fisherman does not condemn him but offers a different path: if the world is muddy, why not stir the mud and ride the waves? If others are drunk, why not share their wine lees and thin ale? His question is not about compromise for its own sake, but about adaptability—about moving with the current without surrendering one’s footing. Qu Yuan refuses. For him, purity is non-negotiable: just as one shakes dust from a cap after washing the hair, or shakes out robes after bathing, so too must the self remain unstained by the world’s murk. He would rather drown in the Xiang River than let his whiteness gather dust. The fisherman smiles, sings a quiet verse about washing either crown or feet depending on the water’s clarity, and rows away—leaving no resolution, only the weight of that choice hanging in the air.