Quick Answer: What Happens in Visiting an Absent Hermit?
In *Visiting an Absent Hermit* (寻隐者不遇, Xún Yǐnzhě Bù Yù), a visitor asks a boy where his master is. The boy says he has gone to gather herbs on this mountain, but the clouds are so thick that he cannot say where. The Tang poem is traditionally credited to Jia Dao (贾岛, Jiǎ Dǎo).[1]
- The setting: A conversation under a pine tree opens onto a clouded mountain.
- The technique: The poem gives the boy’s answers and leaves the visitor’s questions for you to infer.
- The author: A second entry in the collected Tang poems credits the same lines to Sun Ge (孙革, Sūn Gé).[1][2]
The hermit stays offstage, and his absence is what holds the four lines together.
The visitor comes close enough to speak to someone who knows the hermit. The boy can point to the mountain where his master should be, yet the information is too broad to guide the visitor through the clouds.
Visiting an Absent Hermit in Chinese, Pinyin and English
The version below follows the text under Jia Dao’s name, with simplified Chinese and a fresh English rendering. It is a five-character quatrain (五言绝句, wǔyán juéjù), meaning it has four lines of five Chinese characters each.[1][3]
| Chinese | Pinyin | English |
|---|---|---|
| 松下问童子 | Sōng xià wèn tóngzǐ | Under the pine, I ask the boy. |
| 言师采药去 | Yán shī cǎi yào qù | He says his master went to gather herbs. |
| 只在此山中 | Zhǐ zài cǐ shān zhōng | He’s here on this very mountain. |
| 云深不知处 | Yún shēn bù zhī chù | The clouds are thick. I don’t know where. |
The Chinese names the boy and his master but leaves several subjects unstated. In the English, the first “I” is the visitor. The “I” in the last line is the boy, continuing his reply. The shift is easy to follow once you read the last three lines as a sequence of answers.[3]
How the Poem Fits a Conversation Into Four Lines
The first line tells you that the visitor asks a question. From the first answer you can infer the question was something like “Where is your master?” His master has gone to gather herbs. That tells the visitor what he is doing. The next line supplies the rough location that a follow-up question would seek. The last line answers the natural next question about where exactly to look.
You can read the three lines as one reply or hear pauses between them. In either reading, each answer offers a little more information until the boy reaches the limit of what he knows. The question that matters most to the visitor is the one the boy can’t answer.
What the Pine, Mountain and Clouds Do
The pine gives the conversation a precise location. The clouds spread over the mountain and undo that precision. Between the two comes the phrase “this mountain,” which sounds promising because the boy is talking about the ground they are on. The place is close enough to point to and still too broad to search by his directions.
The clouds are ordinary mountain weather. The poem ends as the boy explains that they keep him from giving better directions. The hermit’s work, gathering herbs, tells you a little about his life through another person’s words. He remains somewhere within the scene and outside the visitor’s view. In Wang Wei’s Deer Enclosure, the speaker likewise knows someone is near without seeing them, this time because voices carry through the woods.
Why the Poem Is Attributed to Jia Dao
The *Complete Tang Poems* prints the poem under Jia Dao’s name in volume 574 and under Sun Ge’s in volume 473, where it is titled *Visiting Master Yang*. The two entries cross-reference each other, and the version in the *Three Hundred Tang Poems* anthology is associated with Jia Dao. Both entries preserve the same short encounter.[1][2][3]
Stephen Owen reads the poem in the context of Tang verse about arriving at a dwelling and finding its resident absent.[4] For a much later visual treatment of withdrawal from public life, see Tang Yin’s Scholar Hermits in the Autumn Mountains.
FAQs About Visiting an Absent Hermit
What does the Chinese title mean?
It means something like “Seeking a recluse and failing to meet him.” “Visiting an Absent Hermit” is a concise way to give the visit and its outcome in English.
Why has the hermit gone to gather herbs?
The boy says he went to collect medicinal plants. The poem leaves the purpose of those plants open. The detail explains why the master is out on the mountain and gives the visitor a clue about where to look.[3]
Sources
[1] Wikisource. Visiting an Absent Hermit, the text under Jia Dao’s name
[2] Wikisource. Visiting Master Yang, the text under Sun Ge’s name
[3] Web Kanbun Taikei. Classical commentary on Visiting an Absent Hermit
[4] Stephen Owen. An Anthology of Chinese Literature