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假使我们不去打仗

If We Had Not Fought

田间

Tian Jian

假使我们不去打仗，敌人用刺刀杀死了我们，还要用手指着我们骨头说："看，这是奴隶！
"

If we had not fought,
the enemy
with bayonets
would have killed us,
and then would point at our bones and say:
Look —
this is a slave!
Listen

Meaning

An eight-line recruiting song of the war with Japan. Its argument is entirely a conditional: if we had not fought, we would be dead, and after death our conquerors would point at our remains and identify us as slaves. Nothing is described as happening — the entire poem is the content of a hypothetical — and the force comes from the last three words, which put the label not on the living but on the corpse. The poem's subject is therefore the meaning of defeat rather than the horror of battle.

假使我们不去打仗，敌人用刺刀杀死了我们，还要用手指着我们骨头说：看，这是奴隶！

Appreciation

[Structure] The poem is one long sentence in nine lines, which makes it closer to a slogan than to a lyric: the reader holds the condition in mind until the final two words pay it off. [Imagery] Only two objects appear, 刺刀 and 骨头, and the choice of each is deliberate — the bayonet is the intimate instrument of assassination, and the bone is what survives as evidence. [Voice] The speaker is not a poet but a propagandist, and the verse adopts the flat, imperative tone of the street meeting: 看 and 这是 are words of accusation. [The close] 因为 withholds nothing. The reader is left with a definition of the defeated that is intended to be shameful enough to inspire volunteers. The poem's art is the art of making the reader say the last line.

【白话串讲】 田间写《假使我们不去打仗》：“假使我们不去打仗，敌人用刺刀杀死了我们”——“还要用手指着我们骨头说：看，这是奴隶”——他写假使我们不去打仗——这是奴隶。 【意象与手法】 “假使我们不去打仗、敌人用刺刀”写不去打仗；“杀死了我们、还要用手指着我们骨头说”写杀死了我们；结以“还要用手指着我们骨头说：看，这是奴隶”写这是奴隶。警策鼓动。 【情感与主旨】 田间写抗战鼓动之作，以“看，这是奴隶”警策国人奋起抗战，是田间诗中的名篇。 【名句点睛】 常考“假使我们不去打仗，敌人用刺刀杀死了我们”写不去打仗的后果；“还要用手指着我们骨头说：看，这是奴隶”写警策。

Background

Tian Jian (1916—1985), whose given name was 田世荣, was a writer of martial songs from the Shanxi and Shaanxi border region. 假使我们不去打仗, written in 1938, was printed on leaflets and in the supplements of 新华日报 and became one of the most effective poems of the war of resistance; it was set to music and sung in towns behind the lines. The poem belongs to the short tradition of Chinese martial song that runs from the 击鼓 of the Book of Songs through the Song 满江红 of Yue Fei to the anti-Japanese verses of the 1930s, whose whole purpose was recruitment rather than reflection.

《假使我们不去打仗》为现代诗人田间所作诗。田间（1916—1985），原名童天鉴，安徽无为人，现代诗人，抗战诗歌的代表作家之一。此诗写抗战鼓动，为抗战宣传之作。诗中「假使我们不去打仗，敌人用刺刀」写假使我们不去打仗，敌人用刺刀；「杀死了我们，还要用手指着我们骨头说」写杀死了我们，还要用手指着我们骨头说；「看，这是奴隶」写看，这是奴隶。田间此诗以抗战鼓动、这是奴隶写其鼓动之情，警策鼓动，是田间诗中的名篇。此篇《假使我们不去打仗》在历代选本中多被收录，其艺术价值与流传之广，正可见此诗在同类题材中的重要地位。诗人以匠心独运之笔写寻常之情事，遂使此作历千载而犹有生气，为后人所称赏不绝。此篇《假使我们不去打仗》在历代选本中多被收录，其艺术价值与流传之广，正可见此诗在同类题材中的重要地位。诗人以匠心独运之笔写寻常之情事，遂使此作历千载而犹有生气，为后人所称赏不绝。

Art

The entire poem is one conditional clause stretched over eight lines, and this is its main technical virtue: the reader's mind stays on the hypothesis until the last two words release it, so the verse achieves suspense without narrative. The second device is the choice of only two concrete nouns. 刺刀 is short, metal, and personal; 骨头 is what a defeated man literally leaves behind, and by making the enemy's design fall on bones rather than on bodies the poem converts murder into a form of classification. The final movement is a borrowing of the grammar of accusation — 看，这是 X — which the poet hands over to the enemy, so that the reader, identifying with the condemned, hears his own sentence pronounced in the enemy's voice.

此诗艺术上以「警策鼓动、以刺刀写情」见长。全诗由假使我们不去打仗而杀死了我们而还要用手指着我们骨头说。起「假使我们不去打仗，敌人用刺刀」写假使我们不去打仗：假使我们不去打仗，敌人用刺刀；「杀死了我们，还要用手指着我们骨头说」写杀死了我们：杀死了我们，还要用手指着我们骨头说；结「看，这是奴隶」写这是奴隶：看，这是奴隶。全诗以刺刀写情，由假使我们不去打仗而这是奴隶，警策鼓动，是田间诗中的名篇。通篇以少总多之法出之，章法严谨而用意深曲，意象凝练而情韵悠长，读之愈久，愈觉其构思之精与笔力之健，堪称同类诗作中不可多得之佳篇，足见诗人炉火纯青的艺术功力。通篇以少总多之法出之，章法严谨而用意深曲，意象凝练而情韵悠长，读之愈久，愈觉其构思之精与笔力之健，堪称同类诗作中不可多得之佳篇，足见诗人炉火纯青的艺术功力。

Allusions

The frame is that of the classical 赋弓 and of the 国殇 of Qu Yuan, in which the fallen are praised; here the fallen are dishonoured, and the reversal is the poem's whole point. 奴隶 recalls the standard Chinese term of insult for a person without spirit, and 看 is the 看 of the popular executionground rally. The bayonet is not a classical image at all, and its modernity is what makes the poem a document of 1938 rather than of the Song dynasty.

诗中「假使我们不去打仗敌人用刺刀」「杀死了我们还要用手指着我们骨头说」「看这是奴隶」等语，皆含典故故实。「假使我们不去打仗敌人用刺刀」写假使我们不去打仗敌人用刺刀；「杀死了我们还要用手指着我们骨头说」写杀死了我们还要用手指着我们骨头说；「看这是奴隶」用奴隶之典（奴隶写亡国之辱），写看这是奴隶。诗人用奴隶之典入诗，不着痕迹，而把抗战鼓动之情写得真切可感，是善于熔铸典故的体现。此等用典之法，熔铸古今而不着痕迹，既不炫博以示学，亦不拘泥于旧解，正见诗人学养之深与运思之巧。读者于此等处尤当细心玩味，方能领会其言外之旨与味外之味。此等用典之法，熔铸古今而不着痕迹，既不炫博以示学，亦不拘泥于旧解，正见诗人学养之深与运思之巧。读者于此等处尤当细心玩味，方能领会其言外之旨与味外之味。

Commentary

The poem has usually been discussed as an example of literature used directly for mobilisation, and in that use it was unquestionably successful. Later judgement has been kinder to its economy than to its politics: readers have noted that the conditional is the poem's moral, since only a man who believes defeat would bring ignominy can be summoned by this argument. It is still the most quoted of Tian Jian's poems and remains in the modern anthologies of the war.

这首《假使我们不去打仗》，是田间写抗战鼓动之作，写假使我们不去打仗、杀死了我们、这是奴隶之情，警策鼓动。起「假使我们不去打仗，敌人用刺刀」——假使我们不去打仗，敌人用刺刀。写假使我们不去打仗：假使我们不去打仗、敌人用刺刀——不去打仗、用刺刀；「杀死了我们，还要用手指着我们骨头说」——杀死了我们，还要用手指着我们骨头说。写杀死了我们：杀死了我们、还要用手指着我们骨头说——杀死了我们、指着骨头说；结「看，这是奴隶」——看，这是奴隶。写这是奴隶：看、这是奴隶——看、奴隶。这「看，这是奴隶」，是全诗之结：以这是奴隶写其鼓动。全诗警策鼓动，以刺刀写情，正是田间诗中的名篇。综观全诗，情真、景切、理深，三者浑融无迹，故能于短短数语之中寄无限深意，令人百读不厌。其含蓄蕴藉之处，正是中国古典诗歌以少总多、言有尽而意无穷的美学精神的生动体现。

Prosody

Form Free verse; short martial song intended to be spoken or sung to a crowd诗（现代自由诗）
Rhyme No end-rhyme; the poem rhymes by the recurrence of line-initial words (假使, 敌人, 杀死, 还要) rather than by terminal sound, which is characteristic of the Chinese martial song.此诗为现代自由诗，共六行。不押韵，而靠反复与警策之语构成声情，正与写抗战鼓动的警策鼓动相称，也见其以自由诗写鼓动的凝练。
Tone pattern Line lengths shorten towards the close — 敌, 看，从 four characters to one — so that the verse gains in weight as it narrows, and the final 这是奴隶 falls like a stamp.句式上，「假使我们不去打仗，敌人用刺刀」写假使我们不去打仗，音节警策；「杀死了我们，还要用手指着我们骨头说」写杀死了我们，音节沉痛；结「看，这是奴隶」写这是奴隶，音节冷峻。全诗音节随情起伏，由警策而沉痛、由沉痛而冷峻，正合自由诗「凝练」之妙，读来如抗战鼓动、这是奴隶之音，警策而动人。
Reading note The poem was written to be delivered aloud, and its prosody is that of oratory rather than of metre: short lines, no subordination, and a结尾 of three syllables that can be shouted. The irregular line lengths are deliberate, and the shortest lines (敌, 看) are the loudest. In performance the pause after 还要用手指着我们骨头说 gives the enemy's line time to be anticipated; the poem has been set to music and sung, and this pause is what makes it work in song as well.此诗为现代自由诗，是田间写抗战鼓动之作，也是其诗中的名篇。全诗的艺术特色在于「警策鼓动、以刺刀写情」：「假使我们不去打仗，敌人用刺刀」写假使我们不去打仗、「杀死了我们，还要用手指着我们骨头说」写杀死了我们、「看，这是奴隶」写这是奴隶。全诗警策鼓动，以刺刀写情。尤为精妙者，是「敌人用刺刀」写尽用刺刀；而「这是奴隶」用奴隶之典，正是田间诗「警策鼓动」的典范，为历代选本所常收。《假使我们不去打仗》一诗之所以读来声情并茂，正在于诗人以声韵配合情思、以节奏烘托意境，音节之长短、平仄之起伏，皆与诗意相为表里，此亦可见中国古典诗歌声律之美与匠心之工。

Line by line

假使我们不去打仗，

If we had not fought — the conditional that opens and silently governs the whole poem, and which the reader must keep in mind until the last two words pay it off.

假使我们不去打仗，

If we did not go to fight,

起句写假使我们不去打仗，起笔即见其警策。「假使我们不去打仗」写假使我们不去打仗，「假使我们」写假使我们、「不去打仗」写不去打仗。一句写假使我们不去打仗，以假使我们写假使、以不去打仗写不去打仗，写尽假使我们不去打仗之情。以假设起兴，警策而鼓动，是「以假设起兴」的妙笔。此句以寥寥数语写尽深意，情韵兼胜，正是全诗点睛之笔。其于字句之间暗藏波澜，于平易之中寄寓曲折，尤当反复涵泳，方能得其三昧。

The opening is a startling, conditional proposition that is at once a warning and a call to arms. The poet does not rally the crowd with slogans but posits a frightening hypothetical—what if we refused to fight?—and the plain, drilled rhythm of the line, broken into short beats, suits the wartime verse designed to be chanted and to shock the reader out of indifference. The conditional 'if' makes the reader complicit in imagining the shame of submission, the better to make the case for resistance.

敌人用刺刀

The enemy, with bayonets: the only agent in the poem, and the instrument is named so precisely because it is short, metal and personal.

敌人用刺刀

the enemy, with bayonets,

此句写敌人用刺刀，是全诗写敌人之态的关键。「敌人用刺刀」写敌人用刺刀，「敌人」写敌人、「用刺刀」写用刺刀。一句写敌人用刺刀，以敌人写敌人、以用刺刀写用刺刀，写尽敌人用刺刀之情。以刀写情，警策而鼓动，是「以刀写情」的点睛之笔。此句以寥寥数语写尽深意，情韵兼胜，正是全诗点睛之笔。其于字句之间暗藏波澜，于平易之中寄寓曲折，尤当反复涵泳，方能得其三昧。

The line delivers the first horror of the hypothetical, abruptly shifting to the aggressor. 'The enemy' names the invader, 'with bayonets' fixes the cold instrument of slaughter; the fragmentary, unfinished phrasing enacts the violence breaking off speech itself. By placing the bayonet before the act, the poet makes the threat visceral, not abstract, and the line's spareness is itself menacing—a blade before the eyes.

杀死了我们，

Would have killed us: the consequence, stated without sentiment, and stated as the fate of the collective rather than of any individual.

杀死了我们，

would kill us,

此句写杀死了我们，是全诗写杀死了之态的关键。「杀死了我们」写杀死了我们，「杀死了」写杀死了、「我们」写我们。一句写杀死了我们，以杀死了写杀死了、以我们写我们，写尽杀死了我们之情。以死写情，警策而鼓动，是「以死写情」的点睛之笔。此句以寥寥数语写尽深意，情韵兼胜，正是全诗点睛之笔。其于字句之间暗藏波澜，于平易之中寄寓曲折，尤当反复涵泳，方能得其三昧。

The short line completes the nightmare, the word 'kill' blunt and unflinching. 'Us' is the collective—the people, the nation—so that the hypothetical death is not one man's but a people's; the comma trailing off leaves the consequence hanging. The plain, soldierly diction refuses rhetorical ornament, and the gravity of mass death is conveyed in the baldest of terms, a hallmark of Tian Jian's drum-beat war poetry.

还要用手指着我们骨头说：

And would then point at our bones and say: the poem's turn, which moves from bodies to remains and hands the reader's future verdict over to the enemy.

还要用手指着我们骨头说：

and still point at our very bones and say:

结句写还要用手指着我们骨头说，是全诗立意的落点。「还要用手指着我们骨头说」写还要用手指着我们骨头说，「还要用手」写还要用手、「指着我们骨头说」写指着我们骨头说。一句写还要用手指着我们骨头说，以还要用手写还要用手、以指着我们骨头说写指着骨头说，写尽还要用手指着我们骨头说之情。以骨写情，警策而鼓动，是全诗最动人处，也是「以骨写情」的点睛之笔。

The closing line pushes the humiliation beyond death itself: the enemy would not stop at killing, but would point at the bones and speak. The image of the bones—dry, picked clean—is the ultimate dehumanization, and the pointing finger the insult after death. The colon trails off into the enemy's sneer, the force of which is that conquest means the conqueror may mock the conquered even in their graves. It is this final, unbearable shame that turns the opening hypothetical into an incontrovertible argument for fighting, the verse ending not on battle but on the spur to avoid that disgrace.

Study

Word focus

打仗 To fight, to wage war; the plain colloquial term rather than the literary 战争, chosen because the poem addresses ordinary soldiers and civilians rather than readers of classics. 「打仗」写假使我们不去打仗，是写打仗之态的关键。「假使我们不去打仗」着一「打仗」，写打仗——着一「打仗」，写假使我们不去打仗，见其仗之打。两字写尽打仗之态，是「以词写仗」的妙笔。「打仗」一字之用而全篇生色，与诗中情韵相为表里，正见诗人炼字之精与匠心之独运。读者于此等处若细细体会，自能领会其于平淡之中见功力、于寻常处见神奇之妙。
刺刀 Bayonet: the short, metal blade fixed to a rifle. The poem's only weapon, and it is selected for its intimacy — it is the instrument a man uses at his enemy's body, not at a distance. 「刺刀」写敌人用刺刀，是写刺刀之态的关键。「敌人用刺刀」着一「刺刀」，写刺刀——着一「刺刀」，写敌人用刺刀，见其刀之刺。两字写尽刺刀之态，是「以词写刀」的点睛之词。「刺刀」一字之用而全篇生色，与诗中情韵相为表里，正见诗人炼字之精与匠心之独运。读者于此等处若细细体会，自能领会其于平淡之中见功力、于寻常处见神奇之妙。
骨头 Bones: what a defeated man leaves behind. The word supplies the poem's permanence, since bones, unlike bodies, are what a conqueror can display and point at. 「骨头」写还要用手指着我们骨头说，是写骨头之态的关键。「还要用手指着我们骨头说」着一「骨头」，写骨头——着一「骨头」，写还要用手指着我们骨头说，见其头之骨。两字写尽骨头之态，是「以词写骨」的点睛之词。「骨头」一字之用而全篇生色，与诗中情韵相为表里，正见诗人炼字之精与匠心之独运。读者于此等处若细细体会，自能领会其于平淡之中见功力、于寻常处见神奇之妙。
奴隶 Slave: the term the poem puts in the enemy's mouth, and the poem's whole point. To be a 奴隶 is held to be a worse fate than death, which is why the conditional can动员 the reader. 「奴隶」写这是奴隶，是写奴隶之态的关键。「这是奴隶」着一「奴隶」，写奴隶——着一「奴隶」，写这是奴隶，见其隶之奴。两字写尽奴隶之态，是「以词写奴」的点睛之词。「奴隶」一字之用而全篇生色，与诗中情韵相为表里，正见诗人炼字之精与匠心之独运。读者于此等处若细细体会，自能领会其于平淡之中见功力、于寻常处见神奇之妙。

Related Reading

水调歌头·明月几时有 Shui Tiao Ge Tou: When Will the Moon Be Bright? 苏轼 · 同写家国感怀、警策旷达，一写人有悲欢离合、一写假使我们不去打仗敌人用刺刀，皆于家国之中见警策 Both are public verse for a group, but one consoles and the other conscripts

Su Shi's poem asks the sky about the human condition and ends by consoling the reader with the moon; this poem asks the reader about his own cowardice and ends by conscripting him. Both are written for an audience rather than for a private reader, and both use a single repeated frame — 我欲… yet, and 假使… then — to hold a long argument in a short space. The difference in register could not be greater: Su Shi's is literate and oblique, Tian Jian's is colloquial and imperative.

苏轼《水调歌头·明月几时有》「人有悲欢离合，月有阴晴圆缺，此事古难全」，写家国感怀、警策旷达，是宋词长调的名篇；田间《假使我们不去打仗》则以「假使我们不去打仗，敌人用刺刀」「看，这是奴隶」写用刺刀、是奴隶。两诗同写家国感怀、警策旷达：一写人有悲欢离合、以悲欢写离合，一写假使我们不去打仗敌人用刺刀、以刺刀写鼓动；一为苏轼之旷达、一为田间之警策，并读正可见诗写「家国感怀」的两种笔法，皆于家国之中见警策。

 八声甘州·对潇潇暮雨洒江天 Ba Sheng Gan Zhou: Over the Drizzling Evening Rain on the River 柳永 · 同写故土凝望、警策清丽，一写对潇潇暮雨洒江天、一写还要用手指着我们骨头说，皆于故土之中见凝望 One writes of a homeland longed for from afar, the other of a homeland about to be lost

Liu Yong's 故土 is seen from a distance and cannot be returned to; this poem's 我们 are told what they will become if they do not fight for it. The two places in the world are therefore the same, but the relation is inverted — one is already lost, the other is about to be. Liu Yong's 细雨 and 清秋 are indifferent weather; the bayonet and the bone are indifferent instruments, and the poem's urgency is entirely a matter of choosing which indifferent thing to obey.

柳永《八声甘州·对潇潇暮雨洒江天》「对潇潇暮雨洒江天，一番洗清秋」，写故土凝望、警策清丽，是宋词写羁旅的名篇；田间《假使我们不去打仗》则以「还要用手指着我们骨头说：看，这是奴隶」「杀死了我们」写骨头说、杀死了我们。两诗同写故土凝望、警策清丽：一写对潇潇暮雨洒江天、以暮雨写清秋，一写还要用手指着我们骨头说、以刺刀写鼓动；一为柳永之清丽、一为田间之警策，并读正可见诗写「故土凝望」的两种笔法，皆于故土之中见凝望。