志异 Draft by Drama box december 2013 (english) | Page 20

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f e at u r e
m e m o r y x s p ac e
dr af t vo l 2 is su e 2

There is a poem from a poet
Su Shi, of the Song dynasty,
that I particularly like:
For the long years the living
of the dead knows nought,
Though to my mind not brought,
Could the dead be forgot?
Her Lonely grave is far,
a thousand miles away.
To whom can I my grief convey?
Revived even if she be, could she
still know me? My face is worn
with care. And frosted is my hair.
Last night I dreamed of
coming to my native place;
She was making up her face
Before her mirror with grace.
Each saw the other hushed.
But from our eyes tears gushed.
Can I not be heart-broken
when I am awoken
From her grave clad with pines,
Where only the moon shines!
Riverside Town: A Dream of the Night
of the 20th Day of the 1st Moon 1075

Thanks to the ability to
remember, feelings are able to

travel through time and space,
across life and death. Time
has no effect, and sentiments
are preserved. Su Shi's
emotions, thousands of years
ago, are accessible even by
readers today. Do human
sentiments gain ‘eternality’
because of this ability to
preserve memories? Or are
memories only precious because
of our ability to feel? I
guess both are equally
accurate descriptions of the
nature of time and sentiments.
In the play Everything
but the Brain, the main
character, in a bid to prolong
her father's life, tries to
stop time by attempting to
travel at the speed of light.
Hong Kong science-fiction
writer Ni Kuang pointed out
that human thought is faster
than the speed of light.
Simply with our thoughts, we
are able to control and travel
freely through time and space.
We are able to replay and loop
any episode from our memories,
to freely recall any point of

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