The Sanguo Yanyi - Chapter 58
Monday, June 25, 2012 at 2:38AM The Sanguo Yanyi - Chapter 58:
Ma Chao Launches An Expedition For Revenge;
Cao Cao Flees The Field In Disguise.
Listen:
Download Episode(Click this link. It will bring up a page with an audio player loaded with the file. Right click your mouse and "save as" to download episode.)
WARNING: TYPING IN CAPS CAN OFTEN LEAD TO PEOPLE THINKING YOU'RE SHOUTING AT THEM. AND THERE ARE SPOILERS IN THE FOLLOWING COMMENTARY.
Annnnnnd, it's Chapter 58 already. Bet you weren't expecting TWO audiobook episodes in one night, were you? Oh, you were? Well....ummmm....hmmmmmm....guess that wasn't as big a surprise as I meant it to be then. :p
At any rate, we've reached Chapter 58. Ma Teng is dead, slain by the soldiers of Cao Cao, and Ma Dai, nephew of Ma Teng, has escaped from the capitol, carrying back to Ma Chao the tale of Ma Teng's ending. Filial Piety was a cardinal virtue in the people of the Han, and Ma Chao was, as could be quite expected, not quite happy with Cao Cao for the murder of his father.
You might remember Ma Chao. He got introduced way back in like Chapter 11 or so, when Ma Teng and Han Sui marched east to attempt to rescue the Emperor from the clutches of his then-"Protectors", Li Jue and Guo Si, former generals of the Tyrant Dong Zhuo. He was described then as a warrior of great skill and a terror on the battlefield, pretty much, and not much has changed in that regard. Ma Chao is armed with the righteous anger of the bereaved, and he marches east with the aid of his Father's sworn brother, Han Sui, swelling his ranks.
The fate of Ma Chao is an interesting one. Here's a guy who is remembered for lesser rank more than the far more exalted rank he previously held. Ma Chao, of course, eventually is appointed one of Liu Bei's Five Tiger Generals, and it is for that honor that he is most remembered by history, but it must not be forgotten that before he ever served Liu Bei, Ma Chao was a Feudal Lord in his own right, the rightful heir of Ma Teng, who himself had been the direct descendant of the great Han general Ma Yuan. Thus, for a time, Ma Chao held an eminence as lofty as Liu Bei himself, his future Lord.
The thing about Ma Chao is that he was a very great man who did very great deeds, so long as he had someone more clever than himself to give him his marching orders. But Ma Chao was, perhaps, not the best example of a great Feudal Lord. For one thing, his father having just fallen into Cao Cao's trap, one would think that Ma Chao would have understood that attacking immediately in revenge would only be playing into Cao Cao's hands. Cao Mengde was a truly intelligent man, and a cunning strategist far beyond Ma Chao's ken, and Ma Chao, if he had been wise, would have waited and bided his time, waiting for a good opportunity to take Cao Cao completely by surprise. Instead, the invasion of Ma Chao's Xi Liang army was hardly a surprise to Cao Cao. And surprising Cao Cao was pretty much the only way to defeat him. Taken off guard, Ma Chao might have made a match for Cao Cao. However, once that element of surprise was lost, there was no force on earth short of a plague of natural disasters which might have been able to help Ma Chao defeat his father's murderer. And it would seem that Heaven was not all THAT much on Ma Chao's side at the Battle of Tong Gate...
Still, Ma Chao managed a feat which was not often managed. He forced Cao Cao to flee in panic, and in all the story up to this point, only two other men had ever managed to accomplish that, those being Zhang Xiu and Zhang Fei (no relation...maybe). In his flight from Ma Chao's forces, Cao Cao even chopped off his own beard and disguised himself to get away. That's truly impressive, and imagine the blow to the morale of Cao Cao's army that such a thing must have caused...
"Hey, soldiers of Cao Cao! Your leader is a sissy and a coward who cut off his own beard to escape."
But, you know, it would seem that the escape was the important part. Cao Cao could live that down, in time, with victories. Death, however, kinda stops the whole process one way or another. A Cao Cao that has been humiliated in order to escape the spear of his enemy is still a living Cao Cao, and that means he's still quite a dangerous Cao Cao.
The Battle of Tong Gate covers both the action at Tong Gate and the ensuing battle between Cao Cao and Ma Chao/Han Sui at the Yellow River, and it's at the Yellow River that it is to become quite clear why it is that a living Cao Cao is a dangerous Cao Cao.
Mengde was a remarkable man for many, many reasons, but one of the top reasons was that he was willing to take some enormous risks in order to lure his enemies into a false sense of security.
There are parts of the story where this or that character particularly shines. Think about it. Dian Wei at Wancheng. Xiahou Dun in the Xu Province, where he ripped out his own arrow-pierced eye and ate it, or Zhang Fei at Chang Ban Bridge, singlehandedly holding back Cao Cao's million-man army with the power of his voice alone. Or Zhao Zilong at Dangyang, where he fought his way through Cao Cao's army with Liu Bei's infant son sleeping in his arms. Or Lu Xun at Yi Ling, a virtual unknown toppling the might of the Shu-Han. This part of the story is where the mighty Xu Zhu, Cao Cao's remaining bodyguard, really shines. It could be surmised that Mengde gambled this whole battle upon the ability of Xu Zhu to keep him alive, even despite fearsome opposition from such great warriors as Ma Chao, Ma Dai, and Pang De, not to mention a veteran general like Han Sui. Cao Cao had a plan at Tong Gate, and it was a very clever one, but it could have gone very, very sourly for his army if Cao Cao's spurious defeat at Tong Gate had led to him being skewered at the tip of someone's spear.
Xu Zhu does not disappoint, and in fact, though I never was particularly all that much a fan of Xu Zhu, this chapter really makes him look awesome. And I mean the word "awesome" in both the original and the modern contexts. The guy is standing up in a boat in the middle of the river, getting shot at from all over the place with arrows, and he's steering the boat with one hand while protecting his Lord with the other. You see, this is why I love this story. Stuff like that is pure heroism, and no matter what side the guy was on, no matter the politics which ruled the macro, there were genuine heroes in this story. And Xu Zhu was definitely one of them. You go, Swashbuckler. :p
This chapter kinda ends on a cliffhanger. Cao Cao's got a plan, but he seems to have been getting the worst of things in this chapter, and the chapter ends with the army of Ma Chao, with Ma Dai and Pang De in support, coming up to raid his main camp. So, of course, you're totally going to want to see the next chapter to find out what exactly it is that Cao Cao does about the little problem he's in, huh? Well, good, because you might just find out in the next chapter. Thanks for letting me drop some spoilers on you.
Enjoy this, Chapter 58 of the Sanguo Yanyi Audiobook, here at djraspe.com, your source for...ummmm...this stuff you're reading and the stuff playing on your speakers...
Reader Comments (2)
Thanks for the new audio chapters!!! I've been checking back every couple of months and waiting (somewhat) patiently. These chapters are fantastic and I can't wait to hear the rest. Keep up the awesome work!
I love you! I admire you!
I thank you!