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汉 Han · 文 Prose

垓下之围·版本

The Siege of Gaixia (Version)

司马迁

Sima Qian

名篇masterpiece 史传historical biography 项羽Xiang Yu 悲剧tragedy

项王军壁垓下，兵少食尽，汉军及诸侯兵围之数重。
夜闻汉军四面皆楚歌，项王乃大惊曰：汉皆已得楚乎？

The King of Xiang's army had entrenched itself at Gaixia; his troops were few and his food was gone, and the Han army together with the forces of the feudal lords had encircled him many layers deep. In the night he heard on all four sides the Han troops singing the songs of Chu, and the King of Xiang, greatly alarmed, cried out: Have the Han already taken all of Chu?

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Meaning

This passage from Sima Qian's Records of the Grand Historian describes Xiang Yu's final predicament: his army entrenched at Gaixia with few soldiers and no food, encircled many layers deep by the Han armies and their allies. When Chu songs rise from the Han camp on all four sides in the night, Xiang Yu is stunned, fearing that all of Chu has already fallen to Han. It is the prelude to the great tragic scenes of his farewell to Lady Yu and his death at the Wu River.

项王的军队在垓下筑营驻守，兵士已经很少、粮食也已吃光，汉军和各路诸侯的军队把他们重重包围了好几层。夜里听到汉军四面都唱起楚地的歌谣，项王于是大惊失色地说：难道汉军已经把楚地全部占领了吗？

Appreciation

The passage is a summit of tragic historical narration, winning its power by writing morale through sound rather than battle. Eight characters—'troops few, food exhausted, encircled many deep'—summarize the hopeless situation before a single defeat is narrated. The four-sided Chu songs strike directly at Xiang Yu's homesickness and psychological defenses, and his stunned question, 'Have the Han already taken all of Chu?', captures the instant a hero loses his composure.

【白话串讲】司马迁写《垓下之围》：项羽被围垓下，“夜闻汉军四面皆楚歌”——“汉皆已得楚乎？是何楚人之多也”。他夜起饮帐中，“悲歌慷慨，自为诗曰：力拔山兮气盖世，时不利兮骓不逝。骓不逝兮可奈何，虞兮虞兮奈若何”——虞姬和他，自刎。项羽突围到乌江，亭长劝他渡江，他说：“纵江东父兄怜而王我，我何面目见之”——自刎而死。【意象与手法】以围写势、以声写心：不写刀兵而写歌声，以四面楚歌直击项羽的乡心与心理防线；兵少食尽、围之数重八字写尽绝境，设问「汉皆已得楚乎」写英雄失色的瞬间。【情感与主旨】写英雄末路的苍凉与历史的无情，寄寓司马迁对项羽「自矜功伐」而败亡的批评与深挚的悲悯。【名句点睛】常考「四面楚歌」成语的出处与含义，以及「以声写心」的叙事艺术。

Background

The Siege of Gaixia is excerpted from the 'Basic Annals of Xiang Yu' in Sima Qian's Records of the Grand Historian. Sima Qian (c. 145–c. 87 BC), courtesy name Zichang, was a Western Han historian and man of letters who, carrying on his father Sima Tan's ambition, completed China's first general history in biographical form, praised by Lu Xun as 'the ultimate song of historians, a Li Sao without rhyme.' Xiang Yu, a leader of the anti-Qin uprising and descendant of the Chu general Xiang Yan, crushed the Qin main force at Julu after breaking his cauldrons and sinking his boats, and proclaimed himself Hegemon-King of Western Chu; after four years of war with Liu Bang he was besieged at Gaixia (southeast of present-day Lingbi, Anhui), defeated, and died by his own hand at the Wu River. The 'Annals of Xiang Yu' is the most admired chapter of the whole work: with deeply sympathetic brushwork, Sima Qian portrays both the hero whose strength could 'uplift mountains and whose air eclipsed the sun' and the pathos of a man too ashamed to face the elders of Jiangdong. This version records the famous opening scene: the army entrenched at Gaixia, troops few and food exhausted, the enemy's encirclement many layers deep, and then the sudden rising of Chu songs on all four sides and Xiang Yu's alarmed question, 'Have the Han already taken all of Chu?' Though brief, it is the starting point of the two great tragic scenes—the farewell to Lady Yu and the death at the Wu River—and a key entry into Xiang Yu's character and the lyrical narration of the Records. Anthologies have long read this passage together with those two scenes to present the full course of the hero's end, showing its pivotal place in the chapter.

垓下之围节选自《史记·项羽本纪》，作者司马迁（约前145—约前87），字子长，西汉史学家、文学家，继其父司马谈之志著《史记》，成中国第一部纪传体通史，鲁迅誉之为「史家之绝唱，无韵之离骚」。项羽是秦末起义领袖，楚将项燕之后，巨鹿之战破釜沉舟大破秦军，自立为西楚霸王；后与刘邦争夺天下，历时四年楚汉战争，最终在垓下（今安徽灵璧东南）被围，兵败乌江，自刎而死。《项羽本纪》是全传中最为人称道的篇章，司马迁以饱含同情的笔触写项羽力拔山兮气盖世的英雄气概与无颜见江东父老的末路悲怆。本组所录版本为《垓下之围》的开篇：写项羽军壁垓下、兵少食尽、被围数重，及四面楚歌骤起、项羽惊疑「汉皆已得楚乎」的著名一幕。此节虽短，却是霸王别姬、乌江自刎两大悲剧场面的起点，也是理解项羽形象与《史记》抒情性叙事的关键入口。历代选本多取此段与霸王别姬、乌江自刎连读，以完整呈现英雄末路的全过程，可见其在全篇中的枢纽地位。

Art

The Siege of Gaixia is the summit of tragic narration in the Records, its art lying in writing the situation through the siege, the heart through sound, and much through little. The opening sentence—'The King of Xiang's army entrenched at Gaixia; troops few, food exhausted; the Han army and the lords' forces encircled him many layers deep'—captures army, place, and predicament at one stroke, so that defeat is visible before any battle is narrated; 'encircled many layers deep' conveys an airtight trap whose spatial suffocation is palpable. The next line, 'In the night he heard the Han troops on all four sides all singing Chu songs,' is the most breathtaking stroke of the passage: 'night' deepens the darkness, the songs make the encirclement audible, and the melodies of Chu strike at Xiang Yu's most vulnerable point—Chu songs on every side mean Chu itself has fallen into Han hands, a psychological pulling-away of the very ground beneath him. 'The King then cried out in great alarm: Have the Han already taken all of Chu?' shows the hero losing color and his inner resolve wavering: the Hegemon who once never blanched now feels, for the first time, heaven's mandate turning away from him. Sima Qian writes songs instead of combat and astonishment instead of rout—the immortal technique of writing the heart through sound; in a few dozen characters the desolation of the hero's end and the ruthlessness of history already fill the page. This method—first the great situation, then the inner voice—lays the emotional fuse for the later scene in which the king wept streams of tears while all around him sobbed, unable to look up.

垓下之围是《史记》悲剧叙事的巅峰，其艺术特色在以围写势、以声写心、以少总多。节选首句「项王军壁垓下，兵少食尽」八个字，写尽绝境：军（兵）、地（垓下）、势（少、尽）四要素一网打尽，不写败而败象已成；「汉军及诸侯兵围之数重」以数重写包围之密不透风，空间的窒息感扑面而来。次句「夜闻汉军四面皆楚歌」，是全节最惊心动魄的一笔——夜字写暗夜之沉，四面楚歌以听觉写包围，更以楚歌直击项羽的乡心：楚地之歌，意味着楚地已尽入汉军之手，这是心理上的釜底抽薪。「项王乃大惊曰：汉皆已得楚乎？」以大惊写英雄失色，以设问写其内心的动摇——曾经力拔山兮气盖世的霸王，此刻在歌声中第一次感到天命的背离。司马迁不写战斗而写歌声，不写溃败而写惊疑，正是以声写心的千古妙笔；寥寥数十字，英雄末路的苍凉与历史的无情已弥漫纸面。这种先写大势、再写心声的章法，为后文项王泣数行下、左右皆泣，莫能仰视的悲哭场面埋下了情感的引线。

Allusions

The passage condenses several far-reaching allusions and cultural images. First, 'Chu songs on all four sides': originating here—Zhang Liang (some say Han Xin) had the Han army sing Chu songs in the night to crumble Chu morale—it became the classic idiom for being isolated and besieged on every side, still in wide use today. Second, Gaixia itself: as the site of the final battle of the Chu–Han war, Gaixia became a cultural symbol of the ground of downfall. Third, the homesickness of Chu song: the Chu people loved song, and the Songs of Chu are the crowning glory of that tradition; here the songs serve both as a tactic to dissolve morale and as the mournful music of a falling state—Xiang Yu's 'Song of Gaixia,' sung amid the four-sided songs, is the swan song that follows directly from this scene. Fourth, the archetype of the tragic Hegemon: Xiang Yu, who could lift a cauldron, broke his cauldrons at Julu, spared his rival at Hongmen, and refused to cross the river, has become the archetype of the failed hero in Chinese culture—Li Qingzhao's 'To this day I think of Xiang Yu, who would not cross to Jiangdong' celebrates him, and Du Mu and Wang Anshi both wrote poems on his rise and fall. Fifth, the military image of 'troops few, food exhausted, encircled many deep' echoes the Art of War's maxim 'surround only with tenfold force,' showing the vastness of Han's power and the desperation of Chu's plight.

本篇浓缩了多个影响深远的典故与文化意象。其一是四面楚歌：源于此处的「夜闻汉军四面皆楚歌」，张良（一说韩信）令汉军夜唱楚歌以瓦解楚军士气，后成为「陷入孤立无援的绝境」的经典成语，至今广泛使用。其二是垓下之地：垓下决战是楚汉战争的终局，此后垓下成为败亡之地的文化符号。其三是楚歌的乡愁意象：楚人好歌，《楚辞》即楚歌之集大成，楚歌在此既是瓦解军心的战术，又暗含亡国之音的悲凉，与《史记》以悲歌写末路的笔法相通——下文力拔山兮气盖世，时不利兮骓不逝的《垓下歌》，正是项羽在四面楚歌中发出的绝唱。其四是霸王的悲剧原型：项羽力能扛鼎、破釜沉舟、鸿门纵敌、无颜过江，已成为中国文化中失败的英雄的原型，李清照「至今思项羽，不肯过江东」即咏其事，杜牧、王安石亦有诗论其成败。其五是兵少食尽与围之数重的用兵意象，暗合《孙子兵法》十则围之之说，写尽汉军的势大与楚军的穷蹙。

Commentary

The Siege of Gaixia holds an irreplaceable place in literary history and in national culture. As historical literature, Sima Qian writes a defeat as tragic and noble as poetry, making Xiang Yu the literary archetype of the failed hero: endowed with every heroic gift—strength, valor, generosity—he fell through self-glorification and misplaced kindness, and Sima Qian both criticizes him for 'exerting his private wit without learning from the ancients' and mourns him deeply; this method of neither flattering nor concealing, with feeling shining through the words, is the Records' supreme fusion of record and lyric. In cultural influence, 'Chu songs on four sides,' the farewell to Lady Yu, and the death at the Wu River have crystallized into Chinese culture's most desolate tragic symbols: the Peking opera 'Farewell My Concubine' has been sung for a century, and Li Qingzhao's lament made Xiang Yu a symbol of integrity. In education, the piece has long been set in middle-school textbooks as essential reading for grasping the Records' narrative art and tragic spirit. Read today, the alarm of 'Have the Han already taken all of Chu?' still carries the echo of an age collapsing in ruin—a limit case of lyricism in historical narration. Later readers said of the Records that it 'comprehends the changes of past and present and completes the words of one school,' and the Siege of Gaixia is the most perfect union of that historical vision and lyrical brushwork.

垓下之围在文学史与民族文化中具有不可替代的地位。就史传文学而言，司马迁以如椽之笔将一场败亡写得悲壮如诗，项羽成为失败的英雄的文学原型——他拥有英雄所需的一切禀赋（勇力、豪气、仁爱），却因自矜功伐与妇人之仁而败亡，司马迁既批评其「奋其私智而不师古」，又深致其悲，这种不虚美、不隐恶而情见乎辞的笔法，正是《史记》实录与抒情兼具的极致。就文化影响而言，四面楚歌、霸王别姬、乌江自刎已凝为中国文化中最凄怆的悲剧符号，京剧《霸王别姬》传唱百年，李清照「至今思项羽，不肯过江东」的咏叹使项羽成为气节的象征。就教育而言，本篇长期入选中学语文教材，是学生体认《史记》叙事艺术与悲剧精神的必读篇目。今日读之，汉皆已得楚乎的惊疑之中，仍能听见一个时代轰然倒塌的回响，这是历史叙事所能达到的抒情极限。后人论《史记》每谓其「通古今之变，成一家之言」，而《垓下之围》正是这种通变意识与抒情笔法最完美的结合。

Prosody

Form Han dynasty historical prose (biographic-annals form)汉代史传散文（纪传体本纪）

Rhyme Prose without rhyme; rhythm arises from the alternation of long and short clauses and the deployment of particles, as in the four-character beats of 'troops few, food exhausted; encircled many deep' against the more leisurely 'the King then cried out in great alarm.'散体文，不押韵；靠句式的长短与虚词的运用形成节奏，如兵少食尽、围之数重的四字顿挫与项王乃大惊曰的舒缓。

Tone pattern The first sentence is built of short four-character clauses, terse and heavy, conveying the urgency of the desperate straits; the second, introduced by 'in the night he heard' and 'then in great alarm,' moves more slowly but with greater tension, closing on a question whose echo lingers.首句以四字句为主，短促凝重（军壁垓下、兵少食尽、围之数重），写绝境之紧；次句以夜闻、乃大惊领起，节奏稍缓而张力更甚，以设问收束，余音激荡。

Reading note The prose rhythm of the Records has always been called free-ranging yet charged with extraordinary spirit, and this excerpt is a model of it. The opening—'The King of Xiang's army entrenched at Gaixia; troops few, food exhausted; and the Han army and the lords' forces encircled him many layers deep'—strings together short four-character clauses that strike like drumbeats, each word a beat, so that the reader can almost feel the encirclement tightening step by step; when it reaches 'In the night he heard the Han troops on all four sides all singing Chu songs,' the clauses ease, the rhythm turning from dense to sparse—like songs drifting through the darkness—so that the tension is stretched into a deeper suffocation; 'the King then cried out in great alarm' halts on the word 'then,' marking the suddenness of the shock; and the final 'Have the Han already taken all of Chu?' closes on a question whose pitch rises and abruptly falls, like a hero's voice breaking. This design—short clauses storing force, longer clauses releasing it, a question to close—gives a narrative of fewer than fifty characters the tension of drama and the cadence of poetry. Though unrhymed, its sound and feeling are complete—truly 'the ultimate song of historians, a Li Sao without rhyme.'《史记》的语言节奏素称疏荡有奇气，本篇节选正是标本。开篇项王军壁垓下，兵少食尽，汉军及诸侯兵围之数重连用四字短句，一字一顿，如鼓点般敲出绝境的紧迫，读者几乎能感到包围圈的步步收紧；至夜闻汉军四面皆楚歌，句式稍舒，节奏由密转疏，恰似暗夜中歌声的飘来——紧张被拉长，变成一种更深的窒息；项王乃大惊曰五字，以乃字一顿，写惊变之骤；末句汉皆已得楚乎以设问作结，句调上扬又急落，如英雄失声的呐喊。这种短句蓄势、长句荡开、设问收束的节奏设计，使一段不足五十字的叙事具有了戏剧的张力与诗的韵律。虽无韵脚，而声情自足，正可谓史家之绝唱，无韵之离骚。

Line by line

项王军壁垓下，兵少食尽，汉军及诸侯兵围之数重。

The King of Xiang's army entrenched at Gaixia with troops few and food exhausted, and the Han army and the lords' forces encircled it many layers deep.

项王的军队在垓下筑营驻守，兵士已经很少、粮食也已吃光，汉军和各路诸侯的军队把他们重重包围了好几层。

The King of Xiang's army fortified its camp at Gaixia; the soldiers were few, the food was gone, and the Han and the lords' troops besieged them in ring after ring.

首句十字写尽绝境，是全书最凝练的开篇之一。军壁垓下写项羽仍以王者之姿筑营坚守——壁字作动词，写筑垒自守，霸王至死不失其威；兵少食尽四字，两两相对，写尽兵源与粮草的枯竭，不写一兵一卒的厮杀，而败亡之势已如山倒；汉军及诸侯兵围之数重更以数重二字写包围的层层叠叠，空间的窒息感与日暮穷途的苍凉同时扑面。尤为精妙的是诸侯兵三字——当年巨鹿之战，正是各路诸侯作壁上观、见项羽破秦而膝行而前；如今诸侯兵反与汉军合围项羽，兴亡之变、人心之离，尽在诸侯二字之中。司马迁以极简的笔墨写尽大势已去，为四面楚歌的心理重击铺好了全部前提，字字千钧。

The opening sentence of the siege. The king's army fortified its camp at Gaixia—the fortified camp shows he still commands even in defeat; the soldiers were few, the food was gone. Then the Han and the lords' troops besieged them in ring after ring. The lords' troops are the detail: the same lords who once watched him break Qin now close in with Han. To have described the encirclement would be a situation; the fortified camp, the gone food, and the lords' rings are the situation.

夜闻汉军四面皆楚歌，项王乃大惊曰：汉皆已得楚乎？

In the night, hearing Chu songs from the Han army on all four sides, the King of Xiang cried out in great alarm: Have the Han already taken all of Chu?

夜里听到汉军四面都唱起楚地的歌谣，项王于是大惊失色地说：难道汉军已经把楚地全部占领了吗？

At night he heard the Han army on every side singing Chu songs; the King was greatly alarmed and said: Has Han taken all of Chu?

这是全节最著名的一笔，也是中国文学史上以声写心的典范。夜字定下暗沉的时间底色，暗夜中的歌声比白昼的呐喊更慑人；四面皆楚歌以听觉写包围，更以楚歌直击项羽最脆弱的一环——歌声是楚地之音，楚歌四面而起，意味着楚地已尽入汉军之手，这是比兵败更彻底的釜底抽薪：战士闻乡音而思乡，军心随之瓦解；项羽闻乡音而惊心，斗志随之动摇。乃大惊三字写英雄失色——曾经的霸王，巨鹿城下破釜沉舟而面不改色，此刻却在歌声中惊疑不定；汉皆已得楚乎的设问，写其内心的动摇与对天命的第一次怀疑。司马迁不写刀兵而写歌声，不写溃败而写惊疑，以极温柔的笔触写极残酷的败亡，使英雄末路的悲怆直抵人心，为下文《垓下歌》的绝唱与乌江的悲壮做好了情绪的蓄积。

The famous moment. At night he heard the Han army on every side singing Chu songs; the king was greatly alarmed and said: Has Han taken all of Chu? The singing is more dangerous than the siege: it means his own people have defected to the enemy. The alarmed question is his first loss of nerve. To have said the enemy sang his hometown songs would be an anecdote; the Chu songs on every side and the alarmed question are the anecdote's force.

Study

Word focus

壁 In 'the army entrenched (bi) at Gaixia,' bi is a noun used as a verb meaning 'to build fortifications and hold one's ground,' showing Xiang Yu still defending with royal bearing even at the end. 项王军壁垓下之壁字，此处作动词用，筑营垒驻守之意，是《史记》炼字的名例。壁本是名词（军营的壁垒），司马迁活用为动词，一字写尽项羽大军驻扎垓下的情状：壁垒森严、以守待变，仍不失霸王威仪。若用屯、驻、次等寻常动词，则只见军队之驻扎，不见壁垒之森严；唯壁字，既写军事部署，又暗含壁垒这一防御意象——即便兵少食尽，项羽仍要筑壁而守，其刚愎不屈的性格于此已见端倪。且壁字与下文围之数重形成对照：项羽之壁再坚，终被汉军数重之围层层困住，壁垒之固与围困之密，一进一退，更见局势之不可挽。一字而兼军事、性格、局势三义，正是司马迁字字有千钧之力的笔法。

皆 In 'Have the Han already taken all (jie) of Chu?', jie means 'entirely,' pushing Xiang Yu's alarm to the extreme—the fear that not a city or two, but the whole of Chu, has fallen to Han. 汉皆已得楚乎之皆字，全句之眼，写尽项羽惊疑的深度。皆者，全部、尽也——项羽所惊的不是汉军得了一城一池，而是皆已得楚，即整个楚地、所有楚人尽归汉家。这一字把问题的严重性推到极端：若仅失数城，尚可再战；皆已得楚，则退路已绝、人心已尽，霸王真正成了无根之木。而已字又写时态的完成——一切已经发生，无可挽回，惊疑之中藏着大势已去的明悟。从心理层面看，皆字也是项羽自信崩塌的标尺：巨鹿之战时他以少胜多、气吞山河，从不疑天之助己；此刻面对皆字，他第一次感到天命已移。司马迁不用尽、全而用皆，音节短促，脱口而出，恰似惊疑之下的失声，一字而见英雄心理的巨变。

大惊 'Great alarm' marks the instant the hero loses composure—the turning point of the passage's emotion, as the man who never blanched in battle is stunned by the betrayal of his homeland and of heaven itself. 项王乃大惊之大惊二字，写英雄失色的瞬间，是全节情绪的转折点。惊者，因意外而震动；大者，极言震动之深。项羽一生以勇力自负，临阵则瞋目叱之，楼烦目不敢视，手不敢发，何曾惊过？唯其如此，大惊二字才格外惊心动魄——这不是对兵力的惊，而是对天意的惊：四面楚歌告诉他，连故土、乡人、天道都已背他而去，英雄第一次感到自己与整个世界为敌。司马迁以乃字承接，写大惊之来毫无预兆，如雷击顶；又以曰引出汉皆已得楚乎的失声自问，惊疑之状如在目前。大惊一词，既写项羽心理的剧烈震荡，也为下文项王泣数行下的悲哭与力拔山兮的绝唱做了情绪的铺垫——英雄可以流血，唯有大惊之后，才见其泪。两字之力，抵得上一篇心理分析。

The Banquet at Hongmen and the Siege of Gaixia are the two peaks—height and decline—of the 'Annals of Xiang Yu,' together tracing the complete arc of his fate. At Hongmen, Xiang Yu with four hundred thousand troops held absolute advantage yet released Liu Bang out of misplaced kindness—the beginning of his missed opportunity; at Gaixia, troops few and food gone, encircled many deep, his morale dissolved by Chu songs—the end of his ruin. Set side by side, the two scenes reveal Sima Qian's deep design in characterization: Xiang Yu's defeat lay not in force but in character—Hongmen's forbearance and Gaixia's alarm are the necessary trajectory of the same stubborn yet feeling-hearted man. In technique, the Banquet unfolds through the dialogue and stratagems of many figures, the Siege through song and psychological portraiture—one dense, one spare; one bustling, one desolate—displaying the variety and maturity of the Records' narrative art.

鸿门宴与垓下之围是《项羽本纪》中一盛一衰的两大高峰，恰构成项羽命运的完整弧线。鸿门宴上，项羽兵四十万、坐拥绝对优势，却因妇人之仁放走刘邦，是失机的起点；垓下之围中，项羽兵少食尽、被围数重，四面楚歌而军心瓦解，是败亡的终局。两相对照，可见司马迁塑造人物的深意：项羽之败不在武力，而在性格——鸿门之不忍，垓下之大惊，皆是同一个刚愎而重情之人的必然轨迹。笔法上，鸿门宴以多方人物的对话与权谋铺陈场面，垓下之围以歌声与心理刻画悲凉，一密一疏、一热闹一苍凉，足见《史记》叙事笔法的多样与圆熟。

屈原列传·版本 Biography of Qu Yuan (Version) 司马迁 · 同为《史记》中的悲剧人物传记，一忠臣一霸王，皆以末路见其人格 Both biographies of tragic figures in the Records—one a loyal minister, one a Hegemon-King—each revealing character in the final extremity

Qu Yuan and Xiang Yu are the two most famous tragic figures in the Records, and Sima Qian poured deep sympathy into both. Qu Yuan, loyal yet slandered, chanting by the marshes, at last clasped a stone and plunged into the river—the ultimate song of fidelity; Xiang Yu, mountain-uplifting in strength, sang his lament at Gaixia and cut his own throat at the Wu River—the elegy of a hero. Their ends are alike (each dying for his convictions) but their characters differ: Qu Yuan grieved over sovereign and state, his sorrow rooted in devotion; Xiang Yu fell through vaunting his own deeds, his sorrow rooted in the regret of his final straits. In writing Qu Yuan, Sima Qian wove the language of the Li Sao into the biography in sumptuous color; in writing Xiang Yu he used terse narrative and desolate scenes—one ornate, one stark. Read together, the two lives show the two faces of the Records' tragic aesthetics and trace the twin themes of the thwarted minister and the fallen hero in Chinese literature.

屈原与项羽是《史记》中最著名的两个悲剧人物，司马迁对二人皆倾注了深挚的同情。屈原忠而被谤、行吟泽畔，最终怀石投江，是忠贞的绝唱；项羽力拔山兮、垓下悲歌，最终乌江自刎，是英雄的挽歌。二人结局相似（以身殉志），而人格底色迥异：屈原因信而见疑、忠而被谤而悲，其悲在君国之思；项羽因自矜功伐而败，其悲在末路之憾。司马迁写屈原，多用《离骚》之文入传，辞采华茂；写项羽，则以简劲的叙事与凄怆的场面，一华丽一苍凉。两传并读，可见《史记》悲剧美学的两副面孔，也可体认中国文学中不遇与败亡两大母题的源流。

观沧海·版本 Viewing the Blue Sea (Version) 曹操 · 同为汉末乱世英雄的慷慨之音，一以诗写志、一以史写悲 Both voices of heroes in an age of chaos—one writing aspiration in poetry, one writing grief in history

Cao Cao and Xiang Yu both stand for heroes of an age of chaos in Chinese history, and 'Viewing the Blue Sea' and the Siege of Gaixia write, in poetry and in history, a hero's two postures before heaven and earth. Cao Cao, come east to Jieshi, viewing the sea and chanting his resolve, gathers sun, moon, and the starry River into his breast—the vast pride of a victor swallowing the cosmos; Xiang Yu, besieged at Gaixia, hearing Chu songs in great alarm, a hero at his end—the grief of the vanquished before heaven's mandate. Cao Cao's poem directly utters its heart in grand imagery ('the sun and moon on their journey seem to rise from within it'); Sima Qian's history obliquely sounds the heart in somber strokes (the alarmed question 'Have the Han already taken all of Chu?'). One at height, one in decline; one poem, one history; one heroic, one tragic: together they show the two faces of the hero theme in literature since the end of Han—the enterprise of the advancing and the elegy of the fallen—completing the picture of an age of chaos.

曹操与项羽都是中国历史上乱世英雄的代表，观沧海与垓下之围则分别以诗与史两种文体写出英雄面对天地时的两种情态。曹操东临碣石、观沧海而歌以咏志，日月星汉尽入胸怀，是胜利者吞吐宇宙的豪情；项羽垓下被围、闻楚歌而大惊，英雄末路，是失败者面对天命的悲怆。曹操以诗直抒胸臆，意象宏阔（日月之行，若出其中）；司马迁以史曲写人心，笔致沉郁（汉皆已得楚乎的惊疑）。一盛一衰、一诗一史、一豪一悲，恰可见汉末以降英雄主题在文学中的两面：进取者的意气与失败者的悲歌，共同构成了乱世精神的完整图景。