Trauma and Transcendence in Early Qing Literature 0674017757, 9780674017757

Table of contents :
Front Matter
Contents
Introduction
Part I - Poetry
Introduction
History and Memory
Loyalism, Exile, Poetry
Qian Qianyi and His Place in History
Part II - Prose
Introduction
Mao Xiang and Yu Huai
Between Worlds
Novelty, Character, and Community in Zhang Chao's Yu Chu xinzhi
Fictional Reunions in the Wake of Dynastic Fall
Dreaming the Past
Part III - Drama
Introduction
"Crossing the Sea in a Leaking Boat"
Wu Weiye's Dramatic Works and His Aesthetics of Dynastic Transition
Music and Performance in Hong Sheng's Palace of Lasting Life
"I Don't Want to Act as Emperor Any More"
Index
Series List

Citation preview

Trauma and Transcendence in Early Qing Literature 7 Harvard East Asian Monographs 250

Trauma and Transcendence in Early Qing Literature 7 Edited by

Wilt L. Idema Wai-yee Li Ellen Widmer

Published by the Harvard University Asia Center Distributed by Harvard University Press Cambridge (Massachusetts) and London 2006

© 2006 by the President and Fellows of Harvard College Printed in the United States of America The Harvard University Asia Center publishes a monograph series and, in coordination with the Fairbank Center for East Asian Research, the Korea Institute, the Reischauer Institute of Japanese Studies, and other faculties and institutes, administers research projects designed to further scholarly understanding of China, Japan, Vietnam, Korea, and other Asian countries. The Center also sponsors projects addressing multidisciplinary and regional issues in Asia. Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Trauma and transcendence in early Qing literature / edited by Wilt L. Idema, Wai-yee Li, Ellen Widmer. p. cm. -- (Harvard East Asian monographs ; 250) Includes bibliographical references and index. isbn 0-674-01775-7 (cloth : alk. paper) 1. Chinese literature--Qing dynasty, 1644–1912--History and criticism. I. Idema, W. L. (Wilt L.) II. Li, Wai-yee. III. Widmer, Ellen. IV. Series. pl2297.t34 2006 895.1'090048--dc22 2005027848 Index by Mary Mortensen Printed on acid-free paper Last figure below indicates year of this printing 15 14 13 12 11 10 09 08 07 06

Acknowledgments 7 This volume has a rather unusual genealogy, being the fruit of two conferences, not one. Both were sponsored by the Harvard-Yenching Institute. The first took place in June 2000. Organized by Joanna Handlin Smith, its subject was the art, history, and literature of seventeenth-century China. The second took place in June 2001, organized by the current volume editors. The cast of participants was different, but only slightly, from that of the literature section of the first conference. Virtually all those giving papers were returnees. In addition, Lynn Struve, Robert Hegel, and Katherine Carlitz joined us as discussants. The second gathering was motivated by a sense that the first discussion on literature had cohered very nicely and produced a group of new ideas. This sense was confirmed by the lively discussions of the 2001 meeting, which built on but advanced beyond those of 2000. The theme of trauma and transcendence reflects a productive tension that focused discussion during the second meeting. Early Qing writers who looked back to the Ming or withdrew from the world reflected the traumas of that era, whereas writers that put the past to rest and helped to build the new literary order fit more easily under the rubric of transcendence. Both groups were interconnected; both expressed different aspects of the period under review. Grouped by genre and then chronologically, the papers here assembled touch on one or another side of this dichotomy, or, in a few cases, take up both sides. Collectively they offer an interpretation as to how poetry, fiction, and drama engaged with dynastic transition and, in the end, managed to break new ground. The conferences and the volume owe debts to several individuals and institutions. Without the financial support of the Harvard-Yenching Institute, this project would never have been born. We are grateful to Tu Wei-ming, the institute’s director, both for his support of our un-

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Acknowledgments

dertaking and for the gracious hospitality he offered at both of the June conferences. We are further grateful to Joanna Handlin Smith for devising the overall project in the first place, as well as for her organizational contributions. The Department of East Asian Languages and Civilizations at Harvard offered support in other ways. What distinguishes a conference volume from a conference is, of course, most evident in the transformation from talk to writing and from drafts to more permanent written form. These transitions reflect the value added by discussion, which means a great debt among editors and chapter writers to the conferences as happenings. Our gratitude to the above-mentioned individuals and institutions is based on their generous contribution of time and ideas, as well as on their financial and logistical contributions, which enabled a productive exchange of ideas. This is especially true of the three commentators, Struve, Hegel, and Carlitz, whose influence informs the end product even when it cannot readily be observed. It also includes Shang Wei and Joanna Handlin Smith, who attended the second conference and contributed papers but declined to have them included in the volume. Thanks as well to the many others who attended one or both of these meetings and contributed to their mission. Although we cannot mention them all by name, this volume is also the product of their energy and ideas. —Ellen Widmer

Contents 7 Contents Contributors

ix

Introduction Wai-yee Li

1 Part I Poetry

Confronting History and Its Alternative in Early Qing Poetry: An Introduction Wai-yee Li History and Memory in Wu Weiye’s Poetry Wai-yee Li

73 99

Loyalism, Exile, Poetry: Revisiting the Monk Hanke Lawrence C. H. Yim

149

Qian Qianyi and His Place in History Kang-i Sun Chang

199

Part II Prose Introduction Ellen Widmer

221

Mao Xiang and Yu Huai: Early Qing Romantic yimin Yasushi Ōki

231

Between Worlds: Huang Zhouxing’s Imaginary Garden Ellen Widmer

249

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Contents

Novelty, Character, and Community in Zhang Chao’s Yu Chu xinzhi Allan H. Barr Fictional Reunions in the Wake of Dynastic Fall Tina Lu Dreaming the Past: Memory and Continuity Beyond the Ming Fall Robert E. Hegel

282 310

345

Part III Drama Drama After the Conquest: An Introduction Wilt L. Idema

375

“Crossing the Sea in a Leaking Boat”: Three Plays by Ding Yaokang Wilt L. Idema

387

Wu Weiye’s Dramatic Works and His Aesthetics of Dynastic Transition Dietrich Tschanz

427

Music and Performance in Hong Sheng’s Palace of Lasting Life Judith T. Zeitlin

454

“I Don’t Want to Act as Emperor Any More”: Finding the Genuine in Peach Blossom Fan Stephen Owen

488

Index

511

Contributors 7 Allan H. Barr is Professor of Chinese at Pomona College. He has written extensively on Pu Songling and Liaozhai zhiyi, and his published articles on Ming and Qing literature include “Jiang Yingke’s Contribution to the Gong’an School” (2001) and “The Wanli Context of the ‘Courtesan’s Jewel Box’ Story” (1997). His current research focuses on prose and poetry relating to the Ming History Inquisition of 1663. Kang-i Sun Chang received her Ph.D. degree from Princeton University and is now Professor of Chinese Literature at Yale University. Her scholarly publications include The Evolution of Chinese Tz’u Poetry (Princeton, 1980), Six Dynasties Poetry (Princeton, 1986), and The Late Ming Poet Ch’en Tzu-lung: Crises of Love and Loyalism (Yale, 1991). She is the co-editor (with Ellen Widmer) of Writing Women in Late Imperial China (Stanford, 1997), and the compiler and co-editor (with Haun Saussy) of Women Writers of Traditional China: An Anthology of Poetry and Criticism (Stanford, 1999). She is also the co-editor (with Stephen Owen) of the Cambridge History of Chinese Literature (forthcoming). Robert E. Hegel is Professor of Chinese literature at Washington University in St. Louis. His research has taken him from the study of the art of fiction (The Novel in Seventeenth-Century China, 1981) and theater through book history and the reception of texts (Reading Illustrated Fiction in Late Imperial China, 1998) to more general considerations of writing during the Ming and Qing periods. His most recent work compares narrative and description in fiction and in crime reports; with Katherine Carlitz he has edited a collection of essays entitled Writing and Law in Late Imperial China.

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Wilt L. Idema studied Chinese language and culture at Leiden University in the Netherlands, where he also taught from 1970 till 1999. Since 2000 he has taught Chinese literature at Harvard. His primary research interest is the vernacular literature of the later dynasties. He has published extensively in English and Dutch. His most recent English-language book publication is The Red Brush. Writing Women of Imperial China (with Beata Grant). Wai-yee Li is Professor of Chinese literature at Harvard University. She is the author of Enchantment and Disenchantment in Chinese Literature (1993) and The Readability of the Past in Early Chinese Historiography (forthcoming). Her current projects includes a translation of the Zuozhuan (in collaboration with Stephen Durrant and David Schaberg) and a study of women and national trauma in late imperial Chinese literature. Tina Lu is Associate Professor of Chinese Literature at the University of Pennsylvania. She is the author of Persons, Roles, and Minds: Identity in Peony Pavilion and Peach Blossom Fan (2001), A Subject of the Empire: Space, Kinship, and Exchange in Late Imperial Chinese Literature (forthcoming), and a book-length contribution on the literary culture of the late Ming in the Cambridge History of Chinese Literature (forthcoming). Her current research concerns objects in late Ming literature. Yasushi Ōki is Professor at the Institute of Oriental Culture, University of Tokyo. He is the author of Fū Muryū sanka no kenkyū (A study of Feng Menglong’s shan’ge) and Minmatsu Kōnan no shuppan bunka (Publishing culture in late Ming Jiangnan). He is working on the culture of Jiangnan in the late Ming and early Qing, focusing on literature. Stephen Owen is James Bryant Conant University Professor at Harvard University, with joint appointments in the Departments of Comparative Literature and East Asian Languages and Cultures. His primary areas of research interest are premodern Chinese literature, lyric poetry, and comparative poetics. He has published nine books on Chinese literature, including. most recently, Readings in Chinese Literary Thought and The End of the Chinese “Middle Ages.” He has two books forthcoming in 2006: The Making of Early Chinese Classical Poetry and The Late Tang: Chinese Poetry of the Mid-Ninth Century (827–860).

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Dietrich Tschanz received his Ph.D. from Princeton University and is Assistant Professor of Asian Languages and Cultures at Rutgers University. His research focuses on traditional Chinese drama and theater, fiction and fiction criticism, seventeenth-century literature and culture, and late Qing and early Republican literature. Ellen Widmer is Professor of Asian Languages and Literatures at Wesleyan University. She is the author of The Margins of Utopia: Shuihu hou-chuan and the Literature of Ming Loyalism and The Beauty and the Book: Women and Fiction in Nineteenth-Century China; and the coeditor (with David Wang) of From May Fourth to June Fourth: Fiction and Film in Twentieth Century China, and (with Kang-i Sun Chang) of Writing Women in Late Imperial China. She is currently pursuing projects in late Qing literature, late Ming publishing, and the impact of educational missionaries in China and America. Lawrence C. H. Yim received his Ph.D. degree from Yale University and is now Assistant Research Fellow in the Institute of Chinese Literature and Philosophy at Academia Sinica in Taipei. He has published articles on Ming-Qing poetry and literary theory and criticism. He is completing a book on Qian Qianyi’s poetry during the Ming-Qing transition. Judith T. Zeitlin is Professor of Chinese Literature at the University of Chicago. She is the author of Historian of the Strange: Pu Songling and the Chinese Classical Tale and The Phantom Heroine: Ghosts and Gender in Seventeenth-Century Chinese Literature (forthcoming) and co-editor of Writing and Materiality in China: Essays in Honor of Patrick Hanan and Thinking with Cases: Specialist Knowledge in Chinese Cultural History (forthcoming). Her current research focuses on the history of Chinese drama, performance, and music.

Trauma and Transcendence in Early Qing Literature 7

Introduction 7 Wai-yee Li The traumatic Ming-Qing dynastic transition forced the domains of history and literature into a complex and riveting symbiosis. The end of the Ming dynasty is conventionally dated to the nineteenth day of the third month of 1644, when Beijing fell to rebels and the Chongzhen emperor hanged himself on Coal Hill. 1 However, the transition from Ming to Qing was a protracted and tortuous process impossible to pin to a single date. 2 Historians have long debated at what point the fall of the Ming dynasty became inevitable—when was the beginning of the end? Loyalist resistance, rump Ming courts, and remnant holdouts that lasted until 1662, or 1683 if we include Taiwan, have in turn raised questions on the finality of the ending—when was the end accepted as ————— 1. The nineteenth day of the third month became a code word in many early Qing writings lamenting the fall of the Ming; see Yan Dichang 嚴迪昌, Qing shi shi 清詩史 (Taipei: Wunan tushu chuban, 1998), pp. 178–79. Fang Wen 方文, for example, wrote several poems referring to the nineteenth day of the third month; see his Tushan ji 嵞山集 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1979; facsimile reproduction of 1689 ed.), 1.17a, 7.4a, 7.9b; Bei you cao 北遊草, 28a; Tushan xuji 嵞山 續集, 4.37b; see also Qian Zhonglian 錢仲聯 et al., Qingshi jishi 清詩紀事 (Hanjiang: Jiangsu guji chubanshe, 1987–89; hereafter cited as QSJS), 1: 422–23. Li Que 李確 was said to write poems about the nineteenth day of the third month every year (QSJS, 1: 40; Deng Zhicheng 鄧之誠, Qingshi jishi chubian 清詩紀事初編 [Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1984], 1: 252). Memory of the date’s symbolic quotient was tenacious enough for Leng Shimei 冷士嵋 to write about it in 1704, when the jiashen 甲申 year in the sixty-year cycle recurred (1644 was a jiashen year); see Yuan Xingyun 袁行雲, Qingren shiji xulu 清人詩集敘錄 (Beijing: Wenhua yishu chubanshe, 1994), 1: 276; Yan Dichang, Qing shi shi, p. 160. 2. See Lynn Struve’s illuminating discussion of this issue in the introduction to The Southern Ming, 1644–1662 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1984).

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real and irreversible? These and other questions of how and why the Ming dynasty fell dominated the early Qing 3 literary imagination, as literature assumed the mantle of history. Indeed, during this period history is often both the object of representation and the defining condition of literary production. The early Qing was an extraordinarily creative and vibrant period in Chinese literary history, in part because political disorder and the initial abeyance of centralized control made for greater freedom of expression testing the boundaries of political, moral, and formal constraints. The passage of time, the consolidation of Qing rule, and varying degrees of censorship determined how the fall of the Ming was remembered, imagined, and represented. All the writings discussed in this volume deal directly or indirectly with the Ming-Qing transition or can be understood as a recovery from and transcendence of it. This series of historical events was almost always described in apocalyptic terms of unspeakable rupture, violence, and devastation: “the time when heaven was filled entirely with blood” 濔天皆血之時; 4 “Earth broke apart, heaven crumbled, the sun and moon darkened” 地坼天崩日月昏; 5 “The blue seas turned in contrary currents, and kalpa ashes were swept up in a complete destruction” 滄海橫流，劫灰蕩掃. 6 The Manchu conquest was experienced as a crisis of culture and tradition; the writings of, among others, Yan Ermei 閻爾梅 (1603–79), Fang Wen 方文 (1612–69), Gu Yanwu 顧炎武 (1613–82), Wang Fuzhi 王夫之 (1619–92), Lü Liuliang 呂留良 (1629–83), and Qu Dajun 屈大均 (1630–96) are filled with anguished references to old distinctions between “Chinese” and “barbarians.” The decrees mandating changes of costumes and hairstyle were especially traumatic. Gui Zhuang 歸莊 (1613–73), for example, described his despair of “being Chinese and turned into a barbarian” 華人變為夷 when relatives and ————— 3. By “early Qing” I refer to the reigns of the first two Qing emperors, the Shunzhi (1644–61) and Kangxi (1662–1722) eras. 4. Fang Yizhi 方以智, “Lingqian gao ai wen” 靈前告哀文, in Fushan wenji houbian 浮山文集後編, j. 1 (facsimile reproduction of Kangxi ed.), in Xuxiu siku quanshu 續修四庫全書 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1997), 1398: 373. 5. Wan Shouqi 萬壽祺, “Jiashen ershou” 甲申二首; cited in QSJS, 1: 132. 6. Qian Qianyi 錢謙益, “Zeng Huang Jieling xu” 贈黃皆令序, in Youxue ji 有學集, ed. Qian Zhonglian (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1996), 2: 863. In Buddhism, kalpa ashes are ashes that remain from the periodic destruction of the world.

Introduction

3

friends forcibly shaved his head. 7 Qu Dajun lamented in his “Praise of the Long-Haired Beggar” 長髮乞人傳: I grieve that among us all now— Who isn’t a survivor of punishment? ................................ The guilt of ruining and harming our endowed being, Perhaps you are spared from incurring it .................................. One strand of Chineseness, Exists on your skin. 8

哀今之人 誰非刑餘

毀傷之罪 庶幾免諸 一絲華夏 在爾皮膚

Numerous accounts from the period document that men died resisting the change of hairstyle and costumes and that the decrees mandating such changes provoked widespread resistance, which in turn led to ruthless reprisals. 9

————— 7. See Gui Zhuang 歸莊, “Duanfa ershou” 斷髮二首, in Gui Zhuang ji 歸莊集 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1984 [1962]), pp. 44–45. 8. See Qu Dajun 屈大均, Qu Dajun quanji 屈大均全集 (Beijing: Renmin wenxue chubanshe, 1996), 3: 208. In the Manchu hairstyle men shaved the front of their head. Those who submitted to the change of hairstyle were termed “survivors of punishment.” For other references to the “punishment of shaving” (kunxing 髡刑), see Xu Fang’s 徐枋 letter “Da Wu Xian Fuyuan zhang xiansheng shu” 答吳 憲副源長先生書, in Juyi tang ji 居易堂集 (Shanghai: Xianfenlou, 1936, Sibu congkan ed.), 1.4a–5b. By preserving his hair, the beggar escapes the guilt of being unfilial, because “one’s body, hair, and skin are endowed by one’s parents, one should not dare to ruin or harm them. This is the beginning of filial piety” 身體髮 膚，受之父母，不敢毀傷, 孝之始也 (Xiaojing 孝經, 1, “Kaizong mingyi zhang” 開宗明義章). Qu Dajun wrote other pieces lamenting the change of costumes and hairstyles; see, e.g., “Zizuo yiguan zhong zhi ming” 自作衣冠塚誌銘, “Cang fa zhong ming” 藏髮塚銘, “Tu song” 禿頌, and “Cang fa fu you xu” 藏髮賦有序, in Qu Dajun quanji, 3: 146, 206, 213, 253. These references may in part account for the banning of his writings. 9. On the sufferings caused by these decrees and the subterfuges they sometimes inspired, see also Huang Zongxi 黃宗羲, “Liang yiren zhuan” 兩異人傳, “Yu Ruoshui Zhou Weiyi liang xiansheng muzhiming” 余若水周唯一兩先生墓誌銘, in Huang Lizhou wenji 黃梨洲文集 (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1959), pp. 79–80, 128–30; Qian Bingdeng 錢秉鐙, “Liufa sheng” 留髮生, in Deng Zhicheng, Qingshi jishu chubian, 1: 25; QSJS, 1: 19, 59; Zhao Yuan 趙園, Ming Qing zhi ji shidaifu yanjiu 明清之際士大夫研究 (Beijing: Beijing daxue chubanshe, 1999), pp. 308–17.

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The Existential Choices The authors discussed in this volume either survived the conquest or were born after the fall of the Ming. The dead cast their shadows, especially among the older survivors, as an unprecedented number of intellectuals chose to “perish with the country” (xunguo 殉國). 10 The contemporary chorus lamenting the failure of other scholar-officials to embrace martyrdom is but the obverse side of the same coin. Both the existence of martyrs and the perception of their rarity testify to the prevalence of the idea that survival was shameful and required justification, of which the most common was filial duty. Huang Zhouxing’s 黃周星 (1611–80) suicide is often described as “delayed” (see Ellen Widmer’s chapter in this volume) because of the expectation that he could or should have killed himself when the Ming dynasty fell. There were intense debates on the meanings of, and justifications for, martyrdom and survival. This may in part explain the popularity of the genres of “self-elegy”—the tomb epitaph inscription written for oneself (ziwei muzhi ming 自為墓誌銘), 11 the poem or essay on sacrificial offerings for oneself (ziji shi 自祭詩, ziji wen 自祭文), the tomb vault account prepared while one is still alive (shengkuang zizhi 生壙自 志), and the colophon on one’s final portrait (ziti yixiang 自題遺像). These writings often proclaim that survival is but a way of dying, but they also sometimes imply that survival ensures memory of a lost world and its continuation. Thus Fang Yizhi 方以智 (1611–71) wrote his “Essay on Sacrificial Offerings for Myself” in 1651, when, after becoming a Buddhist monk, he refused to succumb to pressure to surrender to the new regime: “Do you think that you are dying only now? You already died in the year jiashen [1644]!” 汝以今日乃死乎？甲 申死矣. 12 The famous painter Zhu Da 朱耷 (Bada shanren 八大山人; 1626–1705) emblematized death by refusing to speak and feigning madness. 13 Gui Zhuang and Chao Mingsheng 巢鳴盛 ( juren 1636) lived ————— 10. See Ho Koon-piu (He Guanbiao) 何冠彪, Sheng yu si: Ming ji shidaifu de jueze 生與死: 明季士大夫的抉擇 (Taipei: Lianjing chuban, 1997). 11. For a discussion of Zhang Dai’s “Epitaph for Myself,” see Robert Hegel’s chapter in this volume. 12. See Fang Yizhi, “Xinmao Wuzhou zi ji wen” 辛卯梧州自祭文, in Fushan wenji houbian, j. 1, in Xuxiu siku quanshu, 1398: 359. 13. Chen Ding 陳鼎, “Bada shanren zhuan” 八大山人傳, in Zhang Chao 張潮, Yuchu xinzhi 虞初新志 (Beijing: Wenxue guji kanxing she, 1954), pp. 160–61.

Introduction

5

in graveyards to dramatize their symbolic death. 14 Wang Fuzhi considered reclusion a way of dying: “Life and death are the affairs of heaven. How can humans intervene? Action and concealment are my way of living and dying” 死生，天事也，於人何預？行藏者，吾之 生死也. 15 Survival presented existential choices. To become a “remnant subject” (yimin 遺民), one who “refused to serve two dynasties” (bushi erxing 不仕二姓), was to take a path widely recognized as honorable. Of course, many did choose to serve. But the voices that dominate cultural and literary history tend to be those of remnant subjects or participants in the new order who shared their sentiments. The contexts and explanations of this phenomenon are discussed in the final section of this introduction. Suffice it to note here that the Qing dynasty could consolidate its rule because enough people accepted that development. There were obvious regional differences in attitudes toward the dynastic transition: The north was more ravaged by the insurrections of “roving bandits” and wars with the Manchus; the Ming dynastic crisis would have seemed more irrevocable and the restoration of order a more urgent issue. “The Han members of the early Qing government were likely to be predominantly northerners.” 16 Resistance lasted longer in the south, the west, and the southeastern coastal provinces. The major early Qing cases of persecution, such as the examination scandal (kechang an 科場案, 1657), the Ming history case (Mingshi an 明史案, 1661–63), the tax evasion case (zouxiao an 奏銷案, 1661), the collusion with maritime resistance case (tonghai an 通海案, 1661), and the Tianqi-Chongzhen poetry anthology case (Qi Zhen liangchao shi’an

————— 14. See QSJS, 1: 352–53; Niu Xiu 鈕琇 (1641?–1704; discussed in Allan Barr’s chapter in this volume), Gusheng 觚賸 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1986), p. 209. 15. Quoted in the account of Wang’s life by his son, Wang Yu 王敔, “Daxing fujun xingshu” 大行府君行述, in Wang Fuzhi 王夫之, Chuanshan quanshu 船山 全書 (Changsha: Yuelu shushe, 1989–92), 16: 75. The phrase xingcang alludes to the Analects 7.11: “Act when employed, conceal oneself when left behind [i.e., when the times are not right]” 用之則行，舍之則藏. 16. Frederic Wakeman notes that “among the relatively prominent military officers and civilian officials whose biographies were included in the Er chen zhuan, exactly 100 (80 percent) came from the provinces north of the Yangtze River” (The Great Enterprise [Berkeley: University of California Press, 1985], 2: 1129).

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啟禎兩朝詩案, 1667), were directed against Jiangnan-Zhejiang literati. 17 Not surprisingly, although yimin communities in the north included major cultural figures such as Fu Shan 傅山 (1607–84), Shen Hanguang 申涵光 (1619–77), Wang Hongzhuan 王弘撰 (1622–1702), Li Yong 李顒 (1627–1705), and Li Bo 李柏 (1630–1700), most famous remnant subjects came from the south, especially Jiangnan and Zhejiang; a fair number hailed from Anhui, Fujian, Guangdong, and Hunan. 18 In the aftermath of the fall of the Ming, there were self-conscious debates on the meanings and implications of the term yimin (variously translated as “loyalists” and “remnant subjects”). The modern scholar Xie Zhengguang 謝正光 notes that Records of Song Remnant Subjects (Song yimin lu 宋遺民錄, published in 1525) by Cheng Minzheng 程 敏政 (1445–99), the first compilation of its kind, did not attain much popularity until the early Qing. 19 Various records and histories of remnant subjects from the Song, the Ming, and throughout the ages were produced during this period. Most of them are no longer extant, but prefaces to these works are preserved in the writings of, among others, Gui Zhuang, Qian Qianyi 錢謙益 (1582–1664), Wang Youding

————— 17. Both the Ming history case and the poetry anthology case involved alleged offenses against the Qing dynasty in scholarly compilations. (Zha Jizuo 查繼佐, the protagonist in some of the stories discussed in Barr’s chapter in this volume, was implicated in the Ming history case.) Bribery was the ostensible cause for the draconian persecution of all involved in the Jiangnan civil service examination case. Suspicion of communication with Zheng Chenggong’s 鄭成功 (1624–62) forces was the basis of the maritime resistance case. Jiangnan bore a much heavier tax burden than other regions, and the families who failed to meet the demands were persecuted in the tax evasion case. 18. Yimin networks seem to have a certain regional identity, although some yimin, like Yan Ermei, Gu Yanwu, and Qu Dajun, traveled widely, in part to foster ties between different yimin communities. Scholars who used yimin culture to augment local pride no doubt contributed to the impression of regionalism—see, e.g., Chen Botao 陳伯陶 (1855–1930), Shengchao Yuedong yimin lu勝朝粵東遺民錄; idem, Song Dongguan yimin lu 宋東莞遺民錄; and Qin Guangyu 秦光玉 (1893 juren), Ming ji Diannan yimin lu 明季滇南遺民錄. 19. Xie Zhengguang 謝正光, “Qing chu suo jian yimin lu zhi bianzhuan yu liuchuan” 清初所見遺民錄之編撰與流傳, in idem, Qingchu shiwen yu shiren jiaoyou kao 清初詩文與士人交游考 (Nanjing: Nanjing daxue chubanshe, 2001), p. 1.

Introduction

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王猷定 (1598–1662), Wang Wan 汪琬 (1624–90), Gu Yanwu, and Li Kai 李楷 ( juren 1624). 20 The early Qing discourse on modes of surviving the fall of the Ming often maintained the distinction between “remnant subjects” and “eremitic subjects” ( yimin 逸民). 21 Thus Gui Zhuang wrote in his preface to Zhu Zisu’s 朱子素 (fl. 1645) The Records of Remnant Subjects Through the Ages (Lidai yimin lu 歷代遺民錄): Confucius honored eremitic subjects, ranking as highest Boyi and Shuqi. The Records of Remnant Subjects also begins with these two persons, but the intention is different. In the cases of those who encompass the Way, embrace virtue, and yet are not employed in the world, they are all called “eremitic subjects.” But remnant subjects exist only at the margins of decline and rise, [and the term] refers to those who are left behind by the former dynasty. . . . That is why the designation of remnant subjects hinges on the decision to leave or participate [in the new order] at the moment [of dynastic transition] and does not depend on the illustriousness or obscurity of a lifetime. 孔子表逸民，首伯 夷、叔齊；遺民錄亦始於兩人，而其用意則異。凡懷道抱德不用於世者， 皆謂之逸民；而遺民則惟在廢興之際，以為此前朝之所遺也。 . . . 故遺民 之稱，視其一時之去就，而不繫乎終身之顯晦。 22

In other words, Boyi and Shuqi are honored here as remnant subjects of the Shang rather than transcendent recluses. Extending this logic, early Qing authors sometimes expressed empathy for Confucius, who was descended from the Shang, as the “Shang person” (Yinren 殷人), im————— 20. Xie Zhengguang (ibid., pp. 1–31) documents the creation and circulation of Zhu Zixu’s 朱子素 Lidai yimin lu 歷代遺民錄, Li Changke’s 李長科 Guang Song yimin lu 廣宋遺民錄, Zhu Mingde’s 朱明德 Guang Song yimin lu 廣宋遺民錄, Huang Rong’s 黃容 Ming yimin lu 明遺民錄, and Chen Junning’s 陳均寧 Wu yimin zhuan 吳遺民傳. Huang Rong’s book exists in manuscript form in the Tōyō bunko in Japan; the rest are no longer extant. For prefaces to these works, see Gui Zhuang, “Lidai yimin lu xu” 歷代遺民錄序 (Gui Zhuang ji, 1: 170–71); Qian Qianyi, “Shu Guang Song yimin lu hou” 書廣宋遺民錄後 (Youxue ji, 3: 1607–8); Wang Youding 王猷定, “Song yimin guanglu xu” 宋遺民廣錄序 (Sizhao tang wenji 四照 堂文集, Siku weishou shu jikan [Beijing: Beijing chubanshe, 1997], 2.16b–20a); Gu Yanwu 顧炎武, “Guang Song yimin lu xu” 廣宋遺民錄序 (in Gu Yanwu shiwen xuan 顧炎武詩文選 [Nanjing: Jiangsu guji chubanshe, 2002], pp. 32–35); and Li Kai 李楷, “Song yimin guanglu xu” (Hebin yishu 河濱遺書 [Shanghai: Shanghai shudian, 1994] j. 4). 21. For an excellent discussion of such distinctions, as well as various aspects of yimin culture, see Zhao Yuan, Ming Qing zhi ji shidaifu yanjiu, pp. 257–468. 22. Gui Zhuang ji, pp. 170–71.

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plicitly claiming the authority of canonical definition and cultural creation attained despite, or perhaps because of, political disempowerment. 23 (The analogy is, of course, not pushed too far, for Confucius hailed the culture of the conquest dynasty, the Zhou, as foundational.) For early Qing yimin thinkers, the preservation of and critical retrospection on China’s cultural legacy, almost a compensatory gesture for the loss of country, resulted in a period of extraordinary energy and creativity in the history of Chinese thought. Although the lifestyles of eremitic subjects and remnant subjects may well overlap, such distinctions matter for various reasons. First, eremitism is a familiar ideal in the Chinese tradition—a defined niche in the ordering of reality. It summons visions of a world in which engagement and disengagement, service and withdrawal, are complementary attitudes, depending on whether one’s circumstances are straitened (qiong 窮) or conducive to action (da 達). 24 It implies equanimity, conscious choice, and a context that accepts this behavior as reasonable. Being a remnant subject, however, is a fate suffered when one is “left behind by the former dynasty” (qianchao zhi suoyi 前朝之所遺) rather than a decision to “leave the world and stand alone” ( yishi duli 遺世 獨立). The role implies unappeased longing for a lost world, as well as irrevocable alienation from the new order and inevitable tension with it. Second, whereas the eremitic ideal means unproblematic withdrawal from the world, remnant subjects are often deeply engaged with moral, social, and political issues. As we shall see, many remnant subjects of the Ming were involved in loyalist resistance, commented on social ills, debated moral and philosophical questions, or were deeply concerned with the definition and transmission of tradition. In other words, eremitism implies the rejection of politics and history, whereas being a remnant subject is by definition a political stance responding to a historical situation. In this connection, it is interesting to note that writers who wished to neutralize and depoliticize the term “remnant subject,” either because of political discretion or out of a sense of identification ————— 23. See Qu Dajun, “Maiwei ji xu” 麥薇集序, in Qu Dajun quanji, 3: 280–81; Wang Fuzhi, Du “Tong jian” lun 讀通鑒論, in Chuanshan quanshu, 10: 252. Both sources are cited in Zhao Yuan, Ming Qing zhi ji shidaifu yanjiu, p. 270. 24. “In straitened circumstances he cultivates alone the goodness of his person, having achieved his goal he seeks to extend goodness to all under heaven” 窮則獨 善其身，達則兼善天下 (Mengzi 13.9).

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of the new regime, often present “remnant subjects” as “eremitic subjects.” Thus Wang Shizhen 王士禛 (1634–1711) routinely praised the beautiful images and ineffable charm of the nonpolitical poems by his yimin friends, whom he characterized as lofty recluses. 25 With a similar sleight of hand, Zhu Yizun 朱彝尊 (1629–1709) described the lyricists lamenting the fall of the Song dynasty as “eremitic subjects” in his “Preface to the Supplementary Titles for the Music Bureau” (“Yuefu buti xu” 樂府補題序). 26 Pan Zongluo 潘宗洛 (1657–1716) implied similar distinctions in his biographical account of Wang Fuzhi, when he described Wang as “a remnant subject of the former Ming dynasty and an eremitic person of our dynasty” 故明之遺臣，我朝之逸民也. 27 There are also other instances when the terms “remnant subject” and “eremitic subject” seem to be used interchangeably without overtly ideological concerns. 28 Some remnant subjects proclaimed aspirations ————— 25. See, e.g., Wang Shizhen’s comments on Lin Gudu 林古度 (1580–1666), Qu Dajun, Chen Gongyin 陳恭尹, Chen Zisheng 陳子升, Wu Ruilong 伍瑞隆 ( juren 1621), Xiao Shi 蕭詩, Huang Zhouxing 黃周星, Xu Ye 徐夜 (b. ca. 1616), Kuang Lu 鄺露, Shen Hanguang 申涵光 (1620–77), Yu Huai 余懷, Sun Zhiwei 孫枝蔚, and Dai Benxiao 戴本孝 in Yuyang shihua 漁洋詩話, 1.15, 1.65, 2.9, 2.50, 2.51, 2.69, 3.3, 3.10, 3.25, 3.38, 3.39. 3.41, 3.47, 3.48; included in Ding Fubao 丁福保 (1874–1952), comp., and Guo Shaoyu 郭紹虞, ed., Qing shihua 清詩話 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1999). 26. On the relationship between Song loyalism and Yuefu buti, see Xia Chengtao 夏承燾, “Yuefu buti kao” 樂府補題考, in Tang Song ciren nianpu 唐宋詞人年譜 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1979); Kang-i Sun Chang, “Symbolic and Allegorical Meanings in the Yüeh-fu pu-t’i Poem Series,” in Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 46 (1986), pp. 353–85; Huang Zhaoxian 黃兆顯, Yuefu buti yanjiu jianzhu 樂 府補題研究箋註 (Hong Kong: Xuewan chubanshe, 1975).Yan Dichang compares the prefaces to Yuefu buti by Chen Weisong 陳維崧 and Zhu Yizun, noting how Chen’s use of the term “remnant subjects” and Zhu’s choice of “eremitic subjects” are consonant with their tones of impassioned lament and measured restraint, respectively. On the implications of the rediscovery of Yuefu buti in early Qing ci history, see Yan’s Qing ci shi 清詞史 (Nanjing: Jiangsu guji chubanshe, 1999), pp. 244–54; see also Li Kanghua 李康化, Ming Qing zhi ji Jiangnan cixue sixiang yanjiu 明清之際江南詞學思想研究 (Chengdu: Bashu shushe, 2001); and Zhang Hongsheng 張宏生, Qingdai cixue di jian’gou 清代詞學的建構 (Nanjing: Jiangxu guji chubanshe, 1998), pp. 32–59. 27. Pan Zongluo 潘宗洛, “Chuanshan xiansheng zhuan” 船山先生傳, in Wang Fuzhi, Chuanshan quanshu, 16: 86. 28. For example, Qu Dajun quoted Wang Youding’s line, “Those who preserved the Song dynasty were the remnant subjects” 存宋者，遺民也 but replaced the term “remnant subjects” with “eremitic subjects” 存宋者，逸民也; see “Shu yimin

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for eremitism and transcendence, turning the existential burden of being left behind into the gesture of leaving behind the desire for fame, profit, pleasure, or human connections. 29 If the apparent consensus on the distinction between “remnant subjects” and “eremitic subjects” begs to be qualified, it is because the term “remnant subjects” in fact encompasses many modes of existence. Of these, the active involvement in anti-Manchu resistance may be the most stirring and dramatic. Some, like Yan Ermei, Wan Shouqi (1603–52), Qu Dajun, Huang Zongxi 黃 宗羲 (1610–95), Qian Bingdeng 錢秉鐙 (also known as Qian Chengzhi 錢澄之, 1612–93), or Wei Geng 魏耕 (1614–62), carried on anti-Manchu activities with all the flair and romantic pathos of knights-errant (xiafeng 俠風). Among the authors covered in this volume, the monk Hanke 函可 (1612–59; Lawrence Yim’s chapter), Zhang Dai 張岱 (1597– 1679; Robert Hegel’s chapter), Xu Fang 徐芳 (1619–71; Allan Barr’s chapter), and possibly Qian Qianyi (Kang-i Sun Chang’s chapter) were engaged in loyalist resistance. Hanke became a monk in 1639, but there were many other remnant subjects who took the tonsure in the aftermath of the conquest. Some were doubtlessly moved by Buddhist convictions, but the mandated changes of hairstyle and costumes also contributed to this trend—the completely shaved pate and Buddhist robes obviated capitulation to those demands. Others, for example, Lü Liuliang, became monks to resist summons to office. 30 Intense debates developed over the viability and acceptability of such a choice, especially for vocal champions of Confucian integrity. New styles of “monasticism” evolved with these “conversions.” Some monks continued their political activism covertly (e.g., Qian Bangqi 錢邦芑 [1602–73] and Qian Bingdeng). Others cul————— zhuan hou” 書逸民傳後 (Qu Dajun quanji, 3: 394); cited in Xie Zhengguang, Qingchu shiwen yu shiren jiaoyou kao, pp. 6–7. 29. For example, Qu Dajun named his abode “Hall of Seven Persons” to embody the ideal of reclusion (qiyin 棲隱). (“Seven persons” refers to the seven recluses in the Analects 14.37.) See his “Qi ren zhi tang ji” 七人之堂記, in Qu Dajun quanji, 3: 32–33. 30. When Zhejiang officials tried to recommend Lü as a candidate for the special examination for “Outstanding Scholars of Vast Learning” (boxue hongru 博學鴻儒) in 1679, Lü reportedly fell ill from indignation, spat blood, and cut off his hair while bedridden, exclaiming, “Perhaps in this state they will leave me alone!” Lü Gongzhong 呂公忠 (Lü Liuliang’s son), “Xinglüe” 行略 (cited in Zhang Zhongmou 張 仲謀, Qingdai wenhua yu Zhe pai shi 清代文化與浙派詩 [Beijing: Dongfang chubanshe, 1997], p. 88).

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tivated social connections ( Jin Bao 金堡 [1614–80]), avowed Confucian convictions (Fang Yizhi), made a point of “being neither monk nor laity” 不僧不俗 (Lü Liuliang), or advertised their ambivalence, entering Buddhist orders only to leave them again (Yan Ermei, Qu Dajun). 31 For many of them, resignation was mixed with unresolved contradictions. Thus Jin Bao: “This is donning the monk’s garb, having donned the armored garb to the bitter end” 是鐵衣著盡著僧衣. 32 Hu Jie 胡介 (fl. 1640s–1650s), who left a series of paintings of himself as, successively, a literatus next to a beautiful woman, a soldier, and an old monk, addressed a friend who “has sought escape in Chan” 逃禪: On the monk’s bed, as dreams return, old regrets linger, Under the cassock, with the passing wind, a former self revealed. 33

禪榻夢回餘舊恨 袈裟風過見前身

Qian Bingdeng’s poem on Fang Yizhi’s life as a Buddhist captures the theatrical sense of shifting roles and identities: At fifth watch he rises and sits, familiarizing himself with sutras— It yet resembles the sound of studying to him who listens in the still night. He takes pride in being able to make likely Sanskrit chants— An old monk who has the actor’s authentic flair.

五更起坐自溫經 還似書聲靜夜聽 梵唱自矜能仿佛 老僧本 色是優伶

————— 31. On the relationship between yimin culture and the development of Buddhism in this period, see Chen Yuan 陳垣 (1880–1971), Ming ji Dian Qian fojiao kao 明季滇黔佛教考, in Chen Yuan’an xiansheng quanji 陳援菴先生全集 (Taipei: Xin wen feng chuban, 1995), 9: 173–499. 32. Jin Bao 金堡, song lyric to the tune “Man jiang hong” 滿江紅, titled “In a Great Storm, My Boat Was Anchored Beneath the Huang Chao Jetty” 大風泊黃巢 磯下. The line 鐵衣著盡著僧衣 is attributed to the tenth-century rebel Huang Chao. In this song lyric, Jin Bao compares himself to Huang Chao, but the implications of the analogy remain ambiguous with images of cosmic disequilibrium, heroic striving, and inevitable doom. 33. Hu Jie 胡介, “Zeng bie Jiang Shui’an” 贈別蔣誰庵, in Deng Zhicheng, Qingshi jishi chubian, 1: 256; QSJS, 1: 557–59. There are poems addressed to Hu Jie (cognomen Yanyuan 彥遠) in the collections of Wu Weiye and Gong Dingzi, among others.

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Qian explained in a note: “The Foolish Daoist, 34 having become a monk, practiced Sanskrit chants. I laughed at him for having the intonation of old monks on the stage of the theater” 愚道人既為僧，習 梵唱，予笑其是劇場中老僧腔也. 35 The term bense, 本色 “authentic flair” (or more literally, “original color”), often used in literary thought, above all drama criticism, is deeply ironic: this is truth filtered through the prism of impersonation and performance. Monkhood dramatizes how selves and roles are questioned and remade in the post-conquest era. On a more institutional level, Lynn Struve notes how Buddhist monastic communities “greatly aided the transmission of writings [by remnant subjects] that would otherwise have been lost.” 36 We tend to associate “remnant subjects” with ascetic nonparticipation in the new order, and there are indeed many accounts of poverty and uncompromising integrity (kujie 苦節). Xu Fang, discussed in Barr’s chapter, went with a friend “into the mountains and they became recluses together” 入山偕隱. 37 This is a generic formulation. There were much more extreme versions of withdrawal. Another Xu Fang 徐枋 (1622–94) was said to so abhor contact with society that he would put his calligraphy and paintings in a basket on his donkey, along with a list of items he needed, and let it go by itself to the city gate. Townspeople would espy the donkey and take his scrolls, putting into Xu’s basket in return items on the list. 38 Li Que 李確 (1591–1672) “did not enter the city for decades” 數十年不入城市 and if assistance “did not come from the right people, he would not accept it despite hunger” 非其人，雖饑勿受也. 39 After despairing of the chances of the loyalist ————— 34. This is one of Fang Yizhi’s sobriquets. 35. Qian Bingdeng, “Difficult Road” 行路難 (dated 1650–51), fifteenth quatrain in a series of sixty-four, in Tang Huaquan 湯華泉, ed., Cangshang ge ji 藏山閣集 (Hefei: Huangshan shushe, 2004), 15.327–28. Qian also wrote about Fang’s many disguises as a fugitive: “Hired for his writing at the seaside market, his accent completely altered, / Vending medicine in the mountain town, his art is already magical” 傭書海市音全變, 賣藥山城術已神 (“De Fang Mizhi xin jianji” 得方密之 信見寄, in Cangshan ge ji, 9.245). 36. Lynn Struve, The Ming-Qing Conflict, 1619–1683: A Historiography and Source Guide (Ann Arbor, MI: Association for Asian Studies, 1998), pp. 26–27. 37. Xijiang zhi 西江志, cited in QSJS, 2: 672. 38. See Xu Zi 徐鼒, Xiaotian jizhuan 小腆紀傳, in Taiwan wenxian congkan 台灣 文獻叢刊, no. 138 (Taipei: Taiwan yinheng, Jing ji yanjiu shi, 1963), pp. 800–801. 39. Shen Jiyou 沈季友, Zuili shixi 檇李詩繫, in QSJS, 1: 40. “Right people” refers to monks or other remnant subjects.

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resistance, Wang Fuzhi quit the rump Yongli court and devoted himself to scholarship in more remote places; he spent the last seventeen years of his life in a “mud hut” 土室 on Stone Boat Mountain 石船山, thereby implicitly comparing himself to a “recalcitrant stone” (wanshi 頑石). 40 Another famous Confucian thinker, Li Yong, professed even more stringent standards. He also called his abode “mud hut” and considered meeting old friends as “breaking the rules and setting a bad example to no small harm” 破戒壞例，為害不淺. 41 Eremitism has always encompassed different interpretations. During the Ming-Qing transition, it was common to have modes of eremitic existence that allowed a measure of accommodation with the new order. Those who believed in the betterment of society could not but become more involved. There were also lifestyles that precluded ascetic withdrawal. The poet Gu Youxiao 顧有孝 (1619–89), for instance, was nicknamed “Lord Mengchang with Pickled Vegetables” 齏菜孟嘗君 because of his famed hospitality and wide circles of friends, which included many Qing officials. His social connections were probably important for his activities as anthologist and publisher. 42 “In his old age he called himself ‘Fisherman of the Snowy Beach.’ Shen Guanguan, a woman from Songling, embroidered ‘The Picture of Snowy Beach Washing His Feet.’ Once this was mounted, gentlemen who crossed the [Yangzi] River regretted being denied the chance to inscribe colophons on it” 晚自稱雪灘釣叟，松陵女子沈關關，刺繡作雪灘濯足圖，一 經裝池，過江士人以不與題辭為恨. 43 Such socially active eremitism ————— 40. See “Chuanshan ji” 船山記, in Wang Fuzhi, Chuanshan quanshu, 15: 128–29. The fact that Wang Fuzhi shunned social contact and lived in remote places allowed him to resist the decreed change of hairstyle; see his “Xi yu zhen fu” 惜餘鬒賦, in Chuanshan quanshu, 15: 242–49. 41. Li Yong 李顒, “Da Zhang Boqin” 答張伯欽, in Erqu ji 二曲集 (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1996), p. 161. 42. Gu Youxiao published the popular Tang poetry anthology, Tangshi yinghua 唐詩英華, as well as several anthologies of contemporary poetry, which are no longer extant. For the titles of five early Qing anthologies compiled by Gu Youxiao, see Xie Zhengguang, Qingchu ren xuan Qingchu shi huikao 清初人選清初 詩彙考 (Nanjing: Nanjing daxue chubanshe, 1998), pp. 360–70. Lord Mengchang was one of the “four ducal sons of the Warring States” famous for their generosity and their recognition and gathering of talented retainers. 43. Zhu Yizun 朱彝尊, Ming shi zong shihua 明詩綜詩話, cited in Qing shi jishi, 2: 628.

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is reminiscent of the lifestyles of the late Ming “famous gentlemen” (mingshi 名士) or “mountain persons” (shanren 山人). There were intense debates in yimin communities on the appropriate extent of interaction with society. For some, “delayed dying” was justified only by uncompromising withdrawal and determined avoidance of fame and recognition. 44 Remnant subjects noted for their integrity sometimes reproached others for perceived compromises. Thus, Lü Liuliang implicitly criticized Huang Zongxi for his tacit acceptance of the new regime in his later years, and Wei Xi 魏禧 (1624–80) rebuked Fang Yizhi for being too connected to society. 45 These discussions and mutual judgments, however, testify to the prevalence of some degree of general social connections, or even consorting with Qing officials, especially for those intent on preserving ties in scholarly or literary communities. “Discourses on learning” ( jiangxue 講學) brought great social prominence to thinkers such as Huang Zongxi, Gu Yanwu, and Sun Qifeng 孫奇逢 (1585–1675). For Li Yong, fame was evidence of too much implication in social networks, and he expressed regret over becoming a teacher in the academies in Guanzhong. 46 But Li’s position seemed to represent a minority opinion—many felt that moral and philosophical discourses have to be embedded in community. Thus Gu Yanwu: “To learn alone without friends, one becomes ignorant and fails to achieve fruition; to stay for long in one corner, one becomes [adversely] influenced without being aware of it” 獨學無友，則孤陋而 難成，久處一方，則習染而不自覺. 47 ————— 44. See, e.g., Huang Zonghui 黃宗會 (Huang Zongxi’s younger brother), “Housi huowen” 後死或問, in Suozhai wenji 縮齋文集 (facsimile reproduction of handcopied version, Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1983), pp. 21–24. 45. See Lü Liuliang 呂留良, “Yu Wei Fanggong shu” 與魏方公書, cited in Bian Senghui 卞僧慧, Lü Liuliang nianpu changbian 呂留良年譜長編 (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 2003), pp. 285–88; and Wei Xi 魏禧, “Yu Damu shi shu” 與大木師書 (“Damu shi” was one of Fang Yizhi’s Buddhist names), in Wei Shuzi wenji 魏叔子 文集 (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 2003), 5.256–57. Even Fu Shan, who threatened to kill himself to resist a summons to office and yet had the title zhongshu sheren 中書 舍人 thrust upon him, was indirectly reproached by Gu Yanwu for bringing about the situation because of his fame; see Gu, “Yu Su Yigong” 與蘇易公, in Gu Tinglin shiwen ji 顧亭林詩文集 (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1983), p. 207. 46. Li Yong, “Da Fei Yunzhong” 答費允中, in Erqu ji, p. 201. 47. Gu Yanwu, “Yu youren shu” 與友人書, in Gu Tinglin shiwen ji, p. 90. In “Ye Yi Qi miao” 謁夷齊廟, Gu exalted Boyi and Shuqi as “teachers for a hundred generations” 百世師 because “they could not bear to be subjects to two lineages”

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Even more than moral and philosophical learning, literature thrives on ties and associations. Poetry societies formed by remnant subjects ( yimin shishe 遺民詩社), such as the Society of Hope (Wangshe 望社) of Huaiyang 淮陽 or the Society of Vigilant Withdrawal ( Jingyin shishe 驚隱詩社)—also called the Covenant of Escape (Tao zhi meng 逃之盟) or the Society of Escape (Taoshe 逃社)—of Wuzhong 吳中, and the West Lake Societies and South Lake Societies of Eastern Zhejiang 浙東, 48 combined literary and political activities. Poetry gatherings were sometimes turned into rites of commemoration for the fallen Ming. These networks may also have facilitated communication or provided refuge for those involved in resistance. As such, yimin poetry societies continued the tradition of late Ming organizations such as the Revival Society (Fushe 復社) and Society of Pivotal Beginnings ( Jishe 幾社). 49 In 1652, the Qing court issued an edict banning “the formation of covenants and societies” (limeng jieshe 立盟結社), but literary gatherings continued to have political implications in more amorphous ways. The “romantic remnant subjects of Jiangnan” ( Jiangnan fengliu yimin 江南風流遺民), the focus of Yasushi Ōki’s chapter, formed literary communities that were imbued with shades of loyalist sentiments but did not eschew sensuality and refinement. The term “romantic remnant subjects” draws attention to the thin and malleable line between romantic and political spheres, aesthetic and moral endeavors, and personal and public experiences. These unstable polarities operated across the divide of the Ming-Qing transition. Yu Huai 余懷 (1616–96) ————— 不忍臣二姓. In the same poem, however, he implicitly compared his own connections with the elite in the new order (“I, too, am a guest among the lords” 我亦 客諸侯) with Confucius’ modes of engagement; see Gu Tinglin shi jianshi 顧亭林詩 箋釋, ed. Wang Jimin 王冀民 (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1998), pp. 458–61. 48. On yimin shishe in Eastern Zhejiang, see Quan Zuwang 全祖望 (1705–55), “Hushang shelao Dong xiansheng muban wen” 湖上社老董先生墓版文, in Quan Zuwang ji huijiao jizhu 全祖望集彙校集註, ed. Zhu Zhuyu 朱鑄禹 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1999), pp. 850–52; Yan Dichang, Qing shi shi, p. 208. Both refer to the Society of the Eight Poets of West Lake 西湖八子社, Society of the Nine Poets of South Lake 南湖九子社, Society of the Seven Poets of West Lake 西湖七子社, and Society of the Five Poets of South Lake 南湖五子社 in the area. 49. See He Zongmei 何宗美, Mingmo Qingchu wenren jieshe yanjiu 明末清初文 人結社研究 (Tianjin: Nankai daxue chubanshe, 2003); Xie Guozhen 謝國楨, Ming Qing dangshe yundong kao 明清黨社運動考 (Taipei: Hanyuan chubanshe, 1975); and Yan Dichang, Qing shi shi, especially pp. 98–115, 208–15, 251–59.

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noted the close proximity in Ming Nanjing of the examination hall ( gongyuan 貢院) and the Qinhuai pleasure quarters ( jiuyuan 舊院), and examination candidates often gathered in the pleasure boats of Qinhuai for literary and political discussions. 50 Ōki reminds us that the literary gathering of 1640 that produced poems on yellow peonies was linked to the impeachment of Ruan Dacheng 阮大鋮 two years earlier. Thus, the identification of immersion in the romantic-aesthetic realm and nostalgia for the lost world of late-Ming courtesan culture with the political stance of nonparticipation in the new regime was simply a continuation of trends across the Ming-Qing divide. In contrast to the ascetic yimin discussed above, Mao Xiang 冒襄 (1611–93) and his coterie demonstrated that by persevering in the good life of the late Ming, they could make a political statement, because they were remnant subjects of a world that had an inevitable “romantic” ( fengliu) element. In addition, a lifestyle of refinement or sensual indulgence coexisted with covert political activism. Mao Xiang’s famous estate, Painted in Water Garden (Shuihui yuan 水繪園), provided refuge for yimin wanted by the Qing authorities, including Fang Zhongtong 方中通 (fl. 1661) and his brothers (Fang Yizhi’s sons) and Dai Benxiao 戴本孝 and Dai Yixiao 戴移孝 (Dai Zhong’s 戴重 [d. ca. 1644] sons). 51 Yu Huai’s nostalgic recollections of the late Ming courtesan world in Miscellaneous Records of the Plank Bridge (Banqiao zaji 板橋 雜記) have to be read in conjunction with his poems of explicit political lament. 52 Scholars have also speculated that Yu Huai’s constant travels from the 1640s to the 1660s might be related to an involvement in the loyalist resistance. 53 ————— 50. See Yu Huai 余懷, Banqiao zaji 板橋雜記, ed. Li Jintang 李金堂 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 2000), pp. 13–14; entry on Zhang Pu 張溥 (1602–41) in Huang Zongxi, Sijiu lu 思舊錄, Huang Zongxi quanji 黃宗羲全集 (Hangzhou: Zhejiang guji chubanshe, 1985), 1: 361. 51. Dai Zhong was a Ming police magistrate who starved himself to death when the Ming dynasty fell (QSJS, 2: 675–76). For Dai Benxiao and Dai Yixiao, see QSJS, 2: 688–94. Dai Yixiao’s collection, Biluo houren shi 碧 落 後 人 詩 , led to his great-grandson’s execution during the Qianlong literary inquisition. 52. See Yu Huai’s poems discussed in Yan Dichang, Qing shi shi, pp. 78–84; Huang Shang 黃裳, Yinyu ji 銀魚集 (Beijing, Sanlian shudian, 1985), pp. 32–59; Jiang Weitan 蔣維錟, “Yu Huai zhuzuo kaolüe” 余懷著作考略, Zhonghua wenshi luncong 中華文史論叢 1986: 3. 53. See Chen Yinke 陳寅恪, Liu Rushi biezhuan (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1980), p. 1082; Yan Dichang, Qing shi shi, p. 81.

Introduction

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The Mao clan of Rugao 如皋 (whose best-known member was Mao Xiang) preserved their wealth and influence through the dynastic transition (until about the 1670s), as did the Zha clan of Haining 海寧 (among its famous sons was Zha Jizuo 查繼佐 (1601–76), the historian and scholar featured in the stories discussed in Allan Barr’s chapter). However, many other illustrious clans suffered irreversible declines during this period—for example, the Ye, Shen, and Wen clans of Wuzhong, 54 the Chen clan of Yangxian 陽羨, 55 and the Mei clan of Xuancheng 宣城. 56 For families with vastly diminished resources, as well as for those humble to begin with, refusal to serve under the Qing meant seeking new means of survival. As Gu Mengyou 顧 夢 游 (1599–1660) wrote in “New Year’s Eve, 1645” 乙酉除夕: Fellow students of my youth, ask not about my news, The man in the wilds has discarded the Confucian’s cap. 57

同學 少年休問訊 野人今已擲儒冠

————— 54. The Ye clan gained literary fame through Ye Shaoyuan 葉紹袁 and his family. Ye’s wife, Shen Yixiu 沈宜修 (1590–1635), was the niece of the dramatist Shen Jing 沈璟 (1553–1610); several members of the Shen clan died as martyrs in 1645. Ye, Shen, and their seven sons and three daughters were all well known for their literary achievement. Ye Shaoyuan’s famous dairy, Jiaxing rizhu 甲 行 日 注 , chronicles his experiences during the Ming-Qing transition. The Wen clan could boast of a stream of statesmen, artists, poets, and connoisseurs since the mid-Ming—e.g., Wen Zhengming 文徵明 (1470–1559), Wen Zhenmeng 文震孟 (1574–1636), Wen Zhenheng 文震亨 (1585–1645). Many members of the Wen clan were martyred or became monks when the Ming dynasty fell. 55. This was the clan of Chen Zhenhui 陳貞慧 (1605–56), who together with Mao Xiang, Fang Yizhi, and Hou Fangyu 侯方域 (1618–55) (the protagonist of Peach Blossom Fan) were called the “four noble sons” (si gongzi 四公子). Chen Zhenhui was the father of the famous lyricist Chen Weisong. 56. The late Ming poet Mei Shouji 梅守箕 and dramatist Mei Dingzuo 梅鼎祚 came from this clan. Mei Dingzuo’s grandsons, Mei Langsan 梅朗三 and Mei Lei 梅磊, were close associates of Fang Yizhi and Chen Zhenhui. 57. Zhuo Erkan 桌爾堪, Ming yimin shi 明遺民詩 (Tokyo: Caihua shulin, 1971), 1.37. For more on Gu, see Yan Dichang, Qing shi shi, 84–88; and QSJS, 1: 103–7; and Deng Zhicheng, Qingshi jishi chubian, pp. 18–19; Yuan Xingyun, Qingren shiji xulu, 1: 26–27. Gu was a loyal friend. When Hanke was arrested in Nanjing in 1647 (see the chapter by Lawrence Yim in this volume), Gu tried unsuccessfully to secure his release and ended up being implicated and imprisoned. After Hanke’s death, he was responsible for preserving his corpus of works, Liaozuo zayong 遼左雜詠 (QSJS, 1: 104–5).

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To “discard the Confucian’s cap” is to turn one’s back on becoming a scholar-official, the major, if not the only, goal available to most literati. Widmer notes that Huang Zhouxing “supported himself through teaching, writing, and seal carving” after the fall of the Ming. Many biographical accounts of remnant subjects tell how they made a living as teachers or by selling their writings, paintings, and calligraphy. Zhou Lianggong’s 周亮工 (1612–72) Biographies of Seal Carvers (Yinren zhuan 印人傳) includes many remnant subjects who sustained themselves through this activity. Some turned to agriculture and justified it as a “return to fundamentals.” 58 There were also those who used their skills in medicine (most famously Fu Shan), divination, and geomancy (e.g., Xu Fang, discussed in Barr’s chapter) to make a living. Some other occupations were even more unconventional—the poet Xiao Shi 蕭詩 was a Ming zhusheng 諸生 (a low-level degree holder) who became a carpenter specializing in making coffins; 59 Li Que barely survived by making bamboo vessels and palm-fiber shoes; 60 Chao Mingsheng made symbolic capital of craftsmanship by selling utensils and vessels he carved out of the bitter gourd ( pao 匏) he planted around his house. 61 Some self-styled remnant subjects willing to accept the distinction between serving under the Qing and being connected to Qing officials made a living as their dependents, advisors, or unofficial secretaries (muke 幕客, menke 門客). The lively debates on appropriate ways of ————— 58. See, e.g., Zhang Lüxiang 張屢祥 (1611–74), in Deng Zhicheng, Qing shi jishi chubian, pp. 239–40. 59. Wang Yu 王豫 (1698–1738), Jiangsu shizheng 江蘇詩徵, cited in QSJS, 2: 1050; see also Niu Xiu, Gusheng, p. 14. 60. See QSJS, 1: 39–42. 61. See ibid., 1: 352–53; Chao Mingsheng, “Ti paobei” 題匏杯, in Zhuo Erkan, Ming yimin shi, 14.568; and Wu Mingdao’s 吳銘道 “Chao Duanming paobei ershou” 巢端明匏杯二首, entry on Wu Mingdao, cited in Deng Zhicheng, Qingshi jishi chubian, 1: 134; entry on Chao Mingsheng’s death, in Bian Senghui, Lü Liuliang nianpu changbian, pp. 268–70. According to Huang Zongxi, Chao wrote “Fu on the Great Bitter Gourd” to “make clear his intent” 為大匏賦以見志 (Sijiu lu, in Huang Zongxi quanji, 1: 373). The bitter gourd cannot be eaten and is sometimes used as a float (Guoyu, “Luyu” 2.3, in Guoyu jijie 國語集解, comp. Xu Yuangao 徐元誥, ed. Wang Shumin 王樹民, Shen Changyun 沈長雲 (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 2002), pp. 182–83. It came to symbolize a disconnection with the sociopolitical realm (Analects 17.7) or freedom from its constraints (Zhuangzi, “Xiaoyao you,” in Qian Mu 錢穆, comp., Zhuangzi zuanjian 莊子纂箋 [Hong Kong: Dongnan yinwu chubanshe, 1957], p. 6).

Introduction

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“making a living” (zhisheng 治生) and on the very legitimacy of the question in this period testify to the literati’s attempts at self-definition within the premise of nonparticipation in government. Some remnant subjects who depended on Qing officials directly or indirectly for survival moved closer to accepting the new order. Zhu Yizun, for example, active in the resistance and in flight from the Qing authorities until the 1650s, found protection as Cao Rong’s 曹 溶 (1613–85) unofficial secretary from about 1656 to 1666. In 1679 he became a successful candidate in the Outstanding Scholars of Vast Learning examination and officially ended his life as a Ming loyalist. (However, we should note that among Cao Rong’s long-time “guests” when he held the post of circuit intendant in Shanxi were also such adamant Ming loyalists as Gu Yanwu and Qu Dajun.) 62 Zhu Yizun was typical of a group that, according to traditional evaluation, “failed to preserve the integrity of their later years” (wanjie bubao 晚節不保). The decisive date was the special examination of 1679, which was designed to heal the remaining alienation between the Qing court and the intellectual elite. By then Qing rule was firmly in place, and the fallen Ming was a receding memory. A number of well-known remnant subjects, including Sun Zhiwei 孫枝蔚 (1620–87), Chen Weisong 陳維崧 (1625–82), Li Yindu 李因篤 (1631–92), Pan Lei 潘耒 (1646–1708), and Zhu Yizun, became candidates for the examination. (Pan Lei, being born after the fall of the Ming, was considered a “remnant subject” only because of his association with loyalists among family members, mentors, and friends. The others, among the examples cited here, were relatively young when the Ming fell, and thus remind us again of generational differences.) Guilt on their part was sometimes matched by implacable reproaches from staunch loyalists. Zhu Yizun wrote in a congratulatory essay on Huang Zongxi’s eightieth birthday: “That I came out to serve meant I have failed your honor” 余之出，有愧於先生. 63 After Pan Lei received office through the 1679 examination, he knelt outside ————— 62. See Xie Zhengguang, “Qing chu erchen Cao Rong ji qi yimin menke” 清初 貳 臣 曹 溶 及 其 遺 民 門 客 , in idem, Qingchu shiwen yu shiren jiaoyou kao, pp. 222–300. 63. Zhu Yizun, “Huang zheng jun shouxu” 黃徵君壽序, in Pushu ting ji 曝書 亭集 (Shanghai: Guoxue zhengli she, 1937), 41.501–2. By that time (1690), however, Huang had permitted his own son Huang Baijia 黃百家 (b. 1643) and his disciples Wan Yan 萬言 and Wan Sitong 萬斯同 (1638–1702) to join the Ming History Office 明史館.

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the door of his teacher Xu Fang 徐枋 for three days before being admitted with these words: “I did not expect you to come to this” 吾不圖 子之至于斯也. “Lei offered an inkstone. Xu did not accept it. He wept to entreat acceptance. Xu then ordered it to be hung from a beam, to show that it would not be used” 耒進一研，不受，涕泣以請，乃命懸 之梁上，示不用. 64 Long before the 1679 examination, there were decrees that “recluses” be recommended for office. The last scene of Peach Blossom Fan (Taohua shan 桃花扇), set in 1648, shows three remnant subjects being hounded off stage by a lackey rounding up recluses to serve the new dynasty. 65 Remnant subjects who “betrayed their integrity” (bianjie 變節, gaijie 改節) were sometimes suspected of using withdrawal to invite recommendation for office. Chu Renhuo 褚人檴 (ca. 1630–1703+), discussed in Hegel’s chapter, wrote of “a troop of Boyis and Shuqis coming down Shouyang Mountain” 一隊夷齊下首陽, their excuse being that “all the wild ferns of Western Mountain have been eaten up” 西山薇蕨已 66 精光. In a poem mourning Huang Zhouxing after his suicide, Wu Jiaji 吳嘉紀 (1618–84) contrasted him with other inconstant recluses: Once the decree seeking sages came down, Those of sparse eyebrows and white hair, in a flurry and hurry, riding carriages and astride horses, departed from Pine Pass. 67

一旦詔書下 龐眉皓髮紛紛乘 車騎馬別松關

————— 64. Deng Zhicheng, Qingshi jishi chubian, 1: 25. Pan Lei’s older brother, Pan Chengzhang, was executed in the Ming history persecution case of 1661–63. 65. The lackey is the aristocratic Xu gongzi mentioned at the beginning of the play (scene 2). A descendant of Xu Da 徐達, one of the key figures in the founding of the Ming dynasty, he appears in a number of early Qing works as the symbol of the Ming elite’s degradation; see, e.g., “Ting nü daoshi Bian Yujing tanqin ge” 聽女 道士卞玉京彈琴歌, in Wu Weiye 吳偉業, Wu Meicun quanji 吳梅村全集, ed. Li Xueying 李學潁 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1990), 1: 65–66; Yu Huai, Banqiao zaji, p. 58. 66. Chu Renhuo 褚人檴, Jianhu ji (wu ji ) 堅瓠集，戊集 (Hangzhou: Zhejiang renmin chubanshe, 1986), 3.10b. These lines also appear in various poems in a number of Qing biji, including “joke books” and “collection of sarcastic anecdotes,” see QSJS, 2: 1235–38. 67. Wu Jiaji 吳嘉紀, “Jie laoweng” 嗟老翁, in Louxuan shiji 陋軒詩集 (Taipei: Wenhai chubanshe, 1966, facsimile reproduction of the 1840 edition), 10.23a–23b. In his notes to the title, Wu explained his intent to mourn Huang Zhouxing, who had reportedly drowned himself on the fifth day of the fifth month in 1650 (弔黃周星 也,字九煙.汪扶晨云.九煙於庚申五月五日投錢塘江死).

Introduction

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In a transparent fable, “At Shouyang Mountain Shuqi Betrayed His Integrity” 首陽山叔齊變節 (a chapter in Idle Conversations Under the Pea Vines 豆棚閑話), Aina Jushi 艾衲居士 also satirized the “fake literati and disingenuous Confucian scholars” 假斯文，偽道學 lacking in the moral resolve to become genuine remnant subjects. Wang Wan, famous for his ancient prose, poetry, and scholarship, rose to high office under the Qing and, identifying with the new order, dismissed reclusion as posturing: “When the Ming dynasty fell, all those in Wuzhong who liked to take up causes abandoned the scarves and costumes [of the Confucian scholar] and became self-styled recluses. With peace having already come to all under heaven, there were indeed very few who were of the same integrity from beginning to end” 明亡吳中好事 者，皆棄巾服，以隱者自命。天下既平，初終如一，實無幾人. 68 Such satires and dismissals imply that the role of remnant subject was often taken up out of irresoluteness and confusion or, worse still, cynicism and opportunism. However, these disparagements as well as the instances of criticism from other remnant subjects notwithstanding, there was also sympathy with the dilemmas faced by those who decided to serve. Contemporaries as well as posterity have tended to be more forgiving toward the 1679 examination candidates than toward those who switched sides readily and apparently with little soulsearching during the dynastic transition. By the morals of dynastic order, however, what mattered was not so much the timing but service in the previous dynasty. The Qianlong emperor (r. 1736–95) invented the denigrating biographical category of “twice-serving officials” (erchen 貳臣) to describe Ming officials who served under the Qing. 69 Among the authors discussed in this volume are several famous “twiceserving officials”—Qian Qianyi, Wu Weiye 吳偉業 (1609–72), and Zhou Lianggong, the subjects of chapters by Kang-i Sun Chang, Waiyee Li, Tina Lu, and Dieter Tschanz. Zhou is better known as a scholar and a connoisseur and did not write much about his own political choices, although his poetry and prose do address the events and issues ————— 68. Wang Wan 汪琬, “Jin Xiaozhang muzhi” 金孝章墓志, cited in Yuan Xingyun, Qingren shiji xulu, p. 234. 69. These biographies were intended for eventual use in the standard history of the Qing but were later published separately as Qinding guoshi erchen zhuan 欽定國 史貳臣傳. See Struve, The Ming-Qing Conflict, p. 64; and Xie Guozhen 謝國楨, Zengding wan Ming shiji kao 增訂晚明史藉考 (Taipei: Yiwen yinshuguan, 1981), pp. 775–77.

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of his troubled times. Both Qian and Wu are major poets whose self-presentation and evaluation by later readers are very much bound up with their “loss of integrity” (shijie 失節). When the Southern Ming court in Nanjing fell to Manchu forces in 1645, Qian, then minister of rites, surrendered and served for about five months as a Qing official in 1646 before pleading sickness and resigning. Anecdotal literature also claims that Qian rounded up women who had been chosen to become consorts and palace women and offered them to Manchu commanders (QSJS, 3: 1436). As Kang-i Sun Chang notes, Qian’s “loss of integrity” accounts for the unjust dismissal and neglect of his poetry in later generations, although his contemporaries seemed to have been much more forgiving and sympathetic. 70 As is well known, the Qianlong emperor vilified Qian Qianyi and banned his writings, which contain numerous references, some more oblique than others, to the loyalist resistance and imply anti-Qing sentiments. Compilers of the Four Treasuries excluded Qian’s works and resorted to elisions and distortions of other early Qing writings to defame him. 71 Ironically, the Qianlong emperor’s vehement denunciation not only ensured the eclipse of Qian’s reputation for almost two centuries but also contributed to his resurgence in more recent assessments. As Chang shows in her chapter, the modern rehabilitation of Qian is built on substantiating Qianlong’s suspicion that he was in fact subversive. Jin Hechong 金鶴冲, Chen Yinke 陳寅恪 (1890–1969), Qian Zhonglian 錢仲聯, Pan Chonggui 潘重規, and others have tried to establish Qian’s involvement in the Ming resistance. 72 Some scholars further surmise that Qian’s later loyalist effort was not inconsistent with his surrender, which was not cowardice but a desire to spare Nanjing the carnage that Yangzhou suffered or to infiltrate the enemy’s ————— 70. See Xie Zhengguang, Qingchu shiwen yu shiren jiaoyou kao, pp. 60–108. Some of Qian’s contemporaries seemed to have been aware of his involvement in the loyalist resistance; more generally, the generation caught in the dynastic transition could better empathize with his dilemmas, uncertainties, and contradictions. 71. See ibid., pp. 88–100. For Qianlong’s edicts denouncing Qian Qianyi, see Qingshi gao 清史稿, j. 14 and 305. 72. See, e.g., Jin Hechong 金鶴冲, Qian Muzhai xiansheng nianpu 錢牧齋先生 年譜 (Beijing: Beijing tushuguan chubanshe, 2004); Chen Yinke, Liu Rushi biezhuan; QSJS, 3: 1252–345; Qian Zhonglian 錢仲聯, Mengtiao an shihua 夢苕盦詩話 (cited in QSJS, 3: 1274–75, 1277–80, 1340); and Pan Chonggui 潘重規, Toubi ji jiaoben 投筆集校本 (Taipei: Wenshizhe chubanshe, 1973).

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ranks. 73 Reinterpretations of Qian’s political choices often lead to more favorable literary evaluations, and he has been readmitted to the canon through poems that define him as the “inner,” hidden, or misunderstood remnant subject and Ming loyalist. Qian Qianyi, Wu Weiye, and Gong Dingzi 龔鼎孳 (1615–73) came to be known as the “three great masters of the lower Yangzi” 江左三 大家, a label confirmed by an anthology of their poetry, Poems by the Three Masters of the Lower Yangzi 江左三大家詩抄, compiled by Gu Youxiao and Zhao Yun 趙沄 in 1667. All three served as Qing officials, Gong’s career as a Qing official being the most prolonged and distinguished. Gong has generally been considered a lesser talent, but his greater equanimity and less tormented acceptance of the new order— compared to Qian and Wu—may have contributed to the impression of glibness. (Even Gong, however, expressed shame and self-loathing over his “fall” in a letter [dated 1650] to Wu Weiye.) Like Qian Qianyi, Wu Weiye, who held office under the Qing from 1654 to 1656, came to regret his service. Unlike Qian, however, his poetry received the enthusiastic endorsement of the Qianlong emperor, and he was placed first among Qing collections in the Four Treasuries. Posterity has been more forgiving toward Wu, and most people have accepted his version of events—that is, he unwillingly took up office because of pressure from his family and the Qing authorities. Wu’s post-1644 writings are suffused with lamentation for the fall of the Ming dynasty, nostalgia for the world before its collapse, and, after his journey north to take up office in 1653, regrets and anguish over his own irresolution and compromises. But his sense of guilt turned inward and did not translate into judgments on the conquest or the early Qing political situation. Neither in word nor deed did Wu offend the new dynasty by engagement in or sympathy with the forces of opposition and resistance, as Qian did. He also pruned his early poems of anti-Manchu references before

————— 73. For the Yangzhou massacre, see Wang Xiuchu 王秀楚, “Yangzhou shiri ji” 揚州十日記, in Ming ji baishi chubian 明季稗史初編, comp. Liuyun jushi 留雲居士 (facsimile reproduction of 1936 Shangwu edition; Shanghai: Shanghai shudian, 1988). For these interpretations of Qian’s actions, see Yang Jinlong 楊晉龍, “Qian Qianyi shixue yanjiu” 錢謙益史學研究 (M.A. thesis, Kaohsiung Normal College, 1989), p. 5; and Liu Shinan 劉世南, Qingshi liupai shi 清詩流派史 (Taipei: Wenjin chubanshe, 1995), pp. 72–94.

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including them in his collection. 74 At times Wu’s judgments are restrained and tempered by irony—he seems only too keenly aware of the individual’s helplessness and confusion as he or she is caught in cataclysmic turmoil. 75 Wu Weiye thus fits the Qianlong emperor’s program of accommodating sorrow over the fall of the Ming dynasty with acceptance of the Manchu conquest. Qian’s and Wu’s political choices aroused so much chagrin and controversy at the time and have continued to stir up debates because they were such prominent literati and scholar-officials. Qian was one of the leaders of the Donglin 東林 faction, the “pure elements” (qingliu 清流) representing the voice of righteous indignation in late Ming politics. Wu, although a generation younger, was a key member of the Revival Society; he gained early prominence as a poet and embarked on his official career with the Chongzhen emperor’s personal recognition of his talents. Thus, their decisions were perceived as more than simply personal choices; rather, they were laden with collective implications—their examples could sway others and set trends. 76 Often more neutral views of those who became Qing officials prevail, especially for Ming zhusheng. Having passed the examination as xiucai 秀才 at the prefectural ( fu 府) level without taking up office under the Ming, they cannot be classified as “twice-serving officials.” ————— 74. As an example of self-censorship, see Wu’s reference to the changes he made in “Linjiang canjun” 臨江參軍 (dated 1639) in his Meicun shihua 梅村詩話, in Wu Meicun quanji, 3: 1137. 75 . See, e.g., his perspectives on Hong Chengchou 洪 承 疇 (1593–1665) in “Songshan ai” 松山哀, Chen Yuanyuan 陳圓圓 in “Yuanyuan qu” 圓圓曲, and Princess Ningde 寧德公主 and her husband Liu Youfu 劉有福 in “Xiaoshi qingmen qu” 蕭史青門曲. In instances unrelated to the dynastic transition, Wu was also reluctant to condemn, as in “Yuanhu qu” 鴛湖曲, which mourns the demise of his friend Wu Changshi 吳昌時 (d. 1643), a Chongzhen official executed for his corruption and abuse of power. 76. See, e.g., Hou Fangyu’s 1652 letter to Wu Weiye (“Yu Wu Jungong shu” 與 吳駿公書) in which he listed the various reasons why Wu should not serve; in Hou’s Zhuanghui tang ji 壯悔堂集 (Shanghai: Shangwu yinshuguan, 1937), pp. 77– 79. Hou had been forced to take office a year earlier and deeply regretted his own compromise. From a comment (probably dated to 1653) by Jia Kaizong 賈開宗 (ca. 1566–ca. 1656) appended at the end of Hou’s letter, we know that Wu Weiye wrote a letter in reply in which he vowed: “I will certainly not betray the expectations of my good friend.” Jia added that Wu Weiye resolutely resisted compromises. Wu’s letter is no longer extant, and shortly thereafter he succumbed to the pressure to serve.

Introduction

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Ding Yaokang 丁耀亢 (1599–1669), the subject of Wilt Idema’s chapter, was a Ming zhusheng who served under the Qing. He might have briefly been involved in loyalist resistance, 77 but he became an instructor in official Manchu institutions and then accepted an appointment as a magistrate (although he resigned before taking up his post). We do not have a sense that his change of loyalties occasioned much guilt or recrimination. Participants in the new order also included those who never held office but seemed to accept the new regime without much anxiety—Li Yu 李漁 (1610–80), discussed in Tina Lu’s chapter, is a good example. The stories Lu analyzes do deal with the dynastic transition, and Li Yu wrote some political poems lamenting the fall of the Ming in 1644 and 1645, 78 but few works in his large corpus are explicitly concerned with social and political issues. As Idema points out in his introduction to the drama section, Li Yu has sometimes been underappreciated, especially from the late nineteenth to the mid-twentieth century, in part because he was perceived by and large to be oblivious to the sufferings of his tumultuous era. If refusal to serve the new dynasty broadly defines loyalism, one may wonder about the nature of political choices for women, who were excluded from participation in government. Issues of cultural identity were experienced differently by the sexes: the shift to Manchu costumes was universal, but whereas the haircutting decree was savagely enforced for men, the ban on foot-binding was halfhearted and lasted only for four years (1644–48). 79 Historical records and anecdotal ————— 77. Citing Ding Yaokang’s “Yue Xu Dazhuo Xuehong cao yougan” 閱徐大拙雪 鴻草有感, Deng Zhicheng surmises that Ding was involved in Xu Zhenfang’s 徐 振芳 (cognomen Dazhuo) attempt to undertake a northern expedition from the Huai area. See Deng’s entry on Xu Zhenfang in Qingshi jishi chubian, 1: 156. It seems safe to assume Ding’s sympathy with, if not actual participation in, the loyalist cause. 78. See, e.g., “Jiashen jiluan” 甲申記亂, “Bibing xing” 避兵行, “Jiashen biluan” 甲申避亂, “Yiyou chuxi” 已酉除夕, in Li Liweng yijiayan shici ji 李笠翁一家言詩 詞集, pp. 8–9, 42–43, 95, in Li Yu quanji 李漁全集 (Hangzhou: Zhejiang guji chubanshe), vol. 1. 79. Dorothy Ko suggests that the persistence of foot-binding at this juncture functions to re-emphasize racial-cultural difference (between Manchu and Han) and gender distinctions. Lynn Struve notes that from the Qing court’s perspective, the change in men’s hairstyle was the visible emblem of conquest, and foot-binding served to augment the distinctness of Manchu culture (comments at the Discourses

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literature are, however, replete with references to women who “perished with their country.” Many died resisting rape by Manchu soldiers or renegade Ming troops. The female body thus turned into a metaphor for the body politic, even as chastity converged with political integrity. Those who embraced martyrdom inspired loyalist endeavors, as Gu Yanwu claimed about his own mother. 80 Widows of martyrs commemorated the legacy of loyalism in their writings, well-known examples include Qi Biaojia’s 祁彪佳 (1602–45) wife, Shang Jinglan 商景蘭 (1604–ca. 1680), and Li Yin 李因 (1616–85), Ge Zhengqi’s 葛徵奇 concubine and a former courtesan. Women actively involved in the loyalist resistance transcended traditional gender roles, and some selfconsciously developed the trope of fluid gender boundaries in their writings, for example, Bi Zhu 畢著, Liu Shu 劉淑, and Liu Rushi 柳 如是 (1618–64). Fervently praised for their valor and strategic genius, they are often said to have put men to shame. Divergent political sympathies could introduce tensions in a marriage or undermine wifely submission. For the poet Xu Can 徐燦 (ca. 1628–ca. 1681), lament for the fallen dynasty, expressed through ubiquitous images of homelessness, implies a critique of her husband, Chen Zhilin 陳之遴 (1605–66), who rose to high office under the Qing before political troubles resulted in exile for him and his family. Gong Dingzi’s wife, Madame Tong 童 夫人, refused to accompany him to Beijing when he assumed office in the new regime, claiming that honorary titles from the Qing should be conferred instead on Gong’s concubine, the famous former courtesan Gu Mei 顧眉 (1619–64). 81 Gu Mei, for her part, was said to have encouraged Gong Dingzi in the support and protection of yimin. In other words, although the question of service or withdrawal is irrelevant, women sympathetic to the loyalist cause often dwell on their political convictions. ————— on Disorder in Sixteenth and Seventeenth-Century China workshop, May 2004, McGill University). 80. Gu was brought up by his adoptive mother, Madame Wang, who entered the Gu household after her betrothed husband, Gu’s uncle, died before marriage. She starved herself to death in 1645, leaving final injunctions that Gu should not serve the new dynasty; see Gu Yanwu, “Xianpi Wang shuoren xingzhuang” 先妣王 碩人行狀, in Tinglin yuji 亭林餘集, “Yu shiguan zhujun shu” 與史館諸君書, in Tinglin wenji 亭林文集, j. 3, both cited in Zhou Kezhen 周可真, Gu Yanwu nianpu 顧炎武年譜 (Suzhou: Suzhou daxue chubanshe, 1998), p. 85. 81. Yu Huai, Banqiao zaji, pp. 33–34.

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The designation “female remnant subject” 女遺民 placed a woman beyond gender-specific virtues. Deng Hanyi 鄧漢儀 (1617–89) wrote in his prefatory poem on Wu Shan’s 吳山 collection Qingshan ji 青山集 (Blue mountains): 82 Today, one lamp, beyond flowers and rain: Blue Mountains: She signs herself the female remnant subject.

今日一燈花雨外 青山自署女遺民

Wu Shan, like Li Yin and Huang Yuanjie 黃媛介 (ca. 1620–ca. 1669), another famous woman of letters from the period, apparently made a living by selling her paintings. She led an active social life in Jiangnan literati (especially yimin) circles. The same was true of Wang Duanshu 王端淑 (1621–ca. 1701), who expressed her loyalist sentiments even more broadly and overtly. 83 We may surmise that loyalism created a sense of common cause, which in turn encouraged a measure of independence and self-assertion for a select few writing women. As with men, loyalism did not necessarily translate into political action, nor did it preclude accommodation within the new order. Unlike their male counterparts, however, women writers are not routinely interpreted in terms of their political sympathies. Early Qing women poets like Ji Songshi 紀松實 or Du Yilan 杜漪蘭 writing about willow catkins, for example, are likely to be read as staying within the confines of traditional romantic-aesthetic topics, whereas a “twice-serving official” like Li Wen 李雯 (1608–47) or Song Zhengyu 宋徵輿 (1618–67) writing on the same topic would be regarded as expressing regret over his “loss of integrity” or comparing his own helplessness to willow catkins, whose very elevation must end in degradation. 84 ————— 82. See Yan Dichang, Qing shi shi, p. 770. 83. See Ellen Widmer, “Ming Loyalism and Women’s Voice in Fiction After Honglou meng,” in Writing Women in Late Imperial China, ed. Ellen Widmer and Kang-i Sun Chang (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997), pp. 147–217, 366–96; and Dorothy Ko, Teachers of the Inner Chambers (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1994), pp. 129–34. 84. All the song lyrics referred to here have the title “Yanghua” 楊花. Du Yilan, to the tune “Pusa man” 菩薩蠻; Ji Songshi, to the tune “Zhegu tian” 鷓鴣天, in Zhongxiang ci 眾香詞, comp. Xu Shumin 徐樹敏 and Qian Yue 錢岳 (Shanghai: Dadong shuju, 1933), Liji 9b, Sheji 30b–31a. Li Wen, to the tune “Lang tao sha” 浪淘沙; Song Zhengyu, to the tune “Yi Qin’e” 憶秦娥, in Qing ci sanbai shou 清詞 三百首, ed. Qian Zhonglin (Changsha: Yuelu shushe, 1992), pp. 1–2, 35.

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The very notion of “existential choices” loses urgency or relevance for those who came of age under the Qing or were born after 1644. In this volume, authors and anthologists who belong to this group include Chu Renhuo in Hegel’s chapter, Lu Ciyun 陸次雲 (1636–1702+) in Lu’s chapter, Zhang Chao 張潮 (1650–1707+) and Niu Xiu 鈕琇 (1641?–1704) in Barr’s chapter, Hong Sheng 洪昇 (1645–1704) in Zeitlin’s chapter, and Kong Shangren 孔尚任 (1648–1718) in Owen’s chapter. The transition from the generation who lived through the trauma of dynastic transition to the next one, who grew up to accept the Qing dynasty as incontrovertible reality, has inevitable literary implications. 85 In the introduction to the prose section, however, Widmer cautions against chronological determinism. Inasmuch as being a remnant subject meant stubbornly adhering to a vanished world, the passage of time could seem irrelevant, although of course in reality changing historical circumstances did matter. Occasionally “remnant subject” could become a hereditary status that spanned generations, as in the cases of Fu Shan’s son Fu Mei 傅眉 (1628–84), Yu Huai’s son Yu Binshuo 余賓碩, and Fang Yizhi’s sons Fang Zhongde 方中德 (b. 1632), Zhonglü 中屢 (1638–86), and Zhongtong 中 通 . 86 Zhuo Erkan 桌爾 堪 was born around 1655, but he appended his own collection, Jinqing tang shi 近青 堂詩, at the end of his anthology of yimin poetry. 87 He seems thereby to imply affinities of sensibility, although he was born a Qing subject. We should also consider the importance of “mediated nostalgia” or “secondhand memory” for the generation immediately following the conquest. Wang Shizhen, the early Qing poet who achieved canonical ————— 85. On various ways of thinking more precisely about generations in relation to dynastic changeover, see Lynn Struve, “Chimerical Early Modernity: The Case of ‘Conquest-Generation Memoirs,’ ” in The Qing Formation in World-Historical Time, ed. Struve (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Asia Center, 2004), pp. 335–72. 86. Xu Juanshi 徐狷石 expressed the more prevailing sentiment: “We cannot forever confine our descendants to remain hereditary remnant subjects” 吾輩不能 永錮子弟為世襲遺民也. See Quan Zuwang, “Ti Xu Juanshi zhuan hou” 題徐狷石 傳後, in Quan Zuwang ji huijiao jizhu, 2: 1365. On the debate over whether yimin should be a hereditary status, see Zhao Yuan, Ming Qing zhiji shidaifu yanjiu, 381–86. 87. Zhuo Erkan, Ming yimin shi, pp. 685–713. For a good analysis of Zhuo’s affinities and personal ties with yimin, see Pan Chenyu 潘承玉, Qing chu shitan: Zhuo Erkan yu “Yimin shi” yanjiu 清初詩壇: 卓爾堪與《遺民詩》研究 (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 2004).

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status for his style of harmony, dignity, and equanimity, was only ten when the Ming dynasty fell, and he had no personal memory of the Qinhuai pleasure quarters. That world became accessible to him through the mediation of the renowned Qinhuai musician Ding Jizhi 丁繼之, whom he befriended when he was police magistrate in Yangzhou from 1660 to 1665. 88 In Wang’s “Fourteen Miscellaneous Poems on Qinhuai” 秦淮雜詩十四首 (dated 1661), 89 he noted that Ding introduced him to the lost world of Qinhuai. Carefully tracing the process of imagining loss, Wang thereby participated symbolically in the romantic-aesthetic culture of the previous generation. Almost three decades later, Kong Shangren spent three years (1686–89) as overseer of river control in the Huaiyang area and associated with well-known yimin literati, including Mao Xiang, Du Jun 杜濬 (1611–87), Zong Yuanding 宗元鼎 (1620–98), Huang Yun 黃雲 (1621–1702), and the Daoist Zhang Yaoxing 張瑤星. He also befriended Deng Hanyi, a Qing official who had close ties with the yimin community. 90 We may surmise that their stories, memories, and perspectives provided part of the impetus for the creation of Peach Blossom Fan. (It is interesting to note that Wang and Kong, both natives of Shandong, were prompted by a sojourn in the lower Yangzi area to turn their creative energy to the memory and representation of Ming-Qing transition.) More generally, early Qing writers could feel affinities for and continue the tradition of late Ming culture without implying loyalty toward the fallen dynasty or sadness regarding the Ming-Qing transition. ————— 88. Ding Jizhi appears often in Qian Qianyi’s Youxue ji and, more generally, the Jiangnan “literature of remembrance.” He is presented as the musician who leads Hou Fangyu to enlightenment in Peach Blossom Fan. 89. See Wang Shizhen, Yuyang jinghua lu jishi 漁洋精華錄集釋, ed. Li Yufu 李毓芙, Mou Tong 牟通, and Li Wusu 李戊肅 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1999), 1: 227–35. 90. Mao Xiang is one of the offstage critics of Ruan Dacheng’s play in scene 4 of Peach Blossom Fan. Zhang Yaoxing, or Zhang Wei, is one of the “frame characters” who appears at the beginning, mid-point, and ending of Peach Blossom Fan. He tears the fan in scene 40 and urges Hou Fangyu and Li Xiang jun to give up passion and “enter the Way.” Kong Shangren wrote about visiting Zhang in a poem dated 1689, see Kong Shangren quanji jijiao zhuping 孔尚任全集輯校註評, ed. Xu Zhengui 徐 振貴 ( Ji’nan: Qilu shushe, 2004), 2: 1083. Deng Hanyi, Zong Yuanding, and Huang Yun commented on Kong’s poems dated 1686 to 1688, and Kong also addressed many poems to them, see Huhai ji 湖海集, in Kong Shangren quanji jijiao zhuping, 2: 696–1123.

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Barr notes that Chu Renhuo was compared to famous late Ming literati in the prefaces to his Jianhu ji ( T h e Hard Gourd Collections 堅瓠集, 1691–1703), and that Zhang Chao, born in 1650, self-consciously emphasized his empathy with late Ming sensibility in his remarks in Youmeng ying (Shadows of secret dreams 幽夢影). Zhang Chao’s close association with yimin is obvious from his collections of letters. There were also writers like Niu Xiu who, while affirming the new order, maintained a strong interest in the events of the Ming-Qing transition (see Barr’s chapter). Finally, although there is broad consensus that generational changes generally mean accommodation and reconciliation with the new order, such mental attitudes encompass a wide range of responses—from critical to nostalgic retrospection on late Ming culture, from direct confrontation with historical trauma to its displacement or transcendence. Indeed, the same may be said of other existential choices—they imply literary self-definition, but they also open up varying perspectives rather than simplistically predetermine literary choices.

The Literary Choices Attitudes toward the fall of the Ming dynasty command a broad range of emotions—including anger, denial, regret, despair, frustration, nostalgia for the bygone world, and reconciliation with the new order—that motivate literary creation. These complex and conflicting emotions are sometimes modulated through strategies of indirect expression because of political constraints or an inherent sense of contradictions. Although scholars continue to debate the extent and rigor of censorship in the early Qing, it seems fair to assume that our received texts may have suffered elisions and changes by authors, anthologists, publishers, or the academicians responsible for compiling the Four Treasuries during the Qianlong era. Many writers, especially in the Zhejiang area where there was strong loyalist resistance and consequent Qing reprisals, compiled their writings in separate “inner collections” (neiji 內集) and “outer collections” (waiji 外集), with the expectation that the former, which expressed their more uncensored thoughts and feelings, would be hidden or of very limited circulation. With texts that survived banning and distortions, we may find direct avowal of anti-Qing sentiments. In most cases, however, references to contemporary or recent history that might be deemed subversive were

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likely to be suppressed or else cloaked in indirectness, ambiguities, and polyvalencies. “Because of taboos and fears, there are things one dares not say. Having said them, one dares not give details” 諱忌而不敢語， 語焉而不敢詳. 91 For example, only eight poems (which make up the third of the thirteen series) from Qian Qianyi’s monumental poetic sequence of 108 poems, usually known under the title of “Later Autumn Meditations” (“Hou qiuxing” 後 秋 興 ) or Toubi ji 投 筆 集 (Throwing down the brush collection), are included—one may almost say hidden—without Qian’s notes and with some changes in the wording that render them politically more innocuous, in the middle of all but one extant editions of Youxue ji 有學集, which includes Qian’s writings from 1645 to 1663. 92 (The annotated edition by Qian Zeng 錢曾 [1629–1701], Qian Qianyi’s younger clansman, does not include these poems.) In Toubi ji, Qian chronicled the last gasps of Ming loyalist resistance from 1659 to 1663, as well as his own hopes, fears, and despair as he reacted to its ephemeral success and then inexorable defeat. Various clues indicate that Toubi ji was included in Youxue ji at one point but was removed even before Qian’s writings were categorically banned by the Qianlong emperor. The eight poems that remain in Youxue ji appear under the title, “Later Autumn Meditations: Written in Regret of Parting, After a Night Journey on a Small Boat on the Tenth Day of the Eighth Month” (“Hou qiuxing: bayue chushi ri, xiaozhou yedu xibie zuo” 後秋興八月初十日小舟夜渡惜別作). According to Chen Yinke, Qian Qianyi parted from his concubine, the famous former courtesan Liu Rushi, to join the remnants of Zheng Chenggong’s 鄭成功 navy near Changshu 常熟, but the journey was rendered irrelevant by the complete defeat of Zheng’s troops. Intended as a tribute to Liu Rushi, these poems celebrate her courage and tenacity as a heroic Ming loyalist. Laden with literary allusions and references to contemporary events, these poems become even more impenetrable in their altered state in Youxue ji. In general, Qian’s poems ————— 91. Fang Zhonglü 方中屢, “Wu Xiaoyin xiansheng muzhi ming” 吳孝隱先生墓 誌銘 (in his Hanqing ge wenji 汗青閣文集), cited in Yu Yingshi 余英時, Fang Yizhi wanjie kao 方以智晚節考 (Taipei: Yunchen wenhua, 1986), pp. 213–14. 92. See Qian Qianyi, Youxue ji, 1: 517–18. Lawrence Chi-hung Yim discusses “Hou qiuxing” in “The Poetics of Historical Memory in the Ming-Qing Transition: A Study of Qian Qianyi’s Later Poetry” (Ph.D. diss., Yale University, 1998). See also Wai-yee Li, “Heroic Transformations: Women and National Trauma in Early Qing Literature,” Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 59 (1999): 363–443.

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that allusively, and sometimes elusively, chronicle his involvement in the Ming resistance have come into the limelight only with the patient elucidation of scholars such as Jin Hechong and Chen Yinke. Indirectness and reticence pose special problems for the latter-day reader. When is it legitimate to infer political references? In some cases, contexts and literary conventions provide guidance—for example, we can with some confidence read the “fallen blossoms” (luohua 落花) poems by Wang Fuzhi and Gui Zhuang 93 as laments for the fall of the Ming dynasty because allegorical indices in the poems are supported by biographical contexts and literary precedents. 94 It may be that twentieth-century interpretations are more likely to err on the side of political allegory, especially with inferences of Ming loyalism and resistance. For the seventeenth-century writer and audience, it may well precisely have been indeterminacy that allowed the greatest freedom and resonance, both because of the protection it afforded and because of the conflicting emotions it addressed. Perhaps this explains the extraordinary impact of Wang Shizhen’s “Autumn Willows” 秋柳 poems. Composed in 1657 in an elegiac mode and sometimes construed as lamentation for the fallen Ming, these poems inspired hundreds of poetic responses (including many by women), some more political than others. Critical discussion of the “Autumn Willows” poems has revolved around two overlapping issues—are there any (specific) historical references? How deep is the poet’s nostalgia and lament for the fallen dynasty? 95 But perhaps what matters is not so much definitive answers to such questions, but Wang’s presentation of a poetic idiom that is resonant and flexible and can encompass diverse interpretations. Among the extant response poems, we find, for example, the gentle melancholy in Xu Ye’s 徐夜 poem, 96 unabashed pathos and nostalgia in poems by Pan Wenqi 潘問奇 and Mao Xiang, and heroic recalcitrance ————— 93. Wang Fuzhi wrote ninety-nine heptasyllabic regular verses on fallen blossoms, with the sequences grouped as “original,” “sequels,” “extensions,” “supplements,” etc.; see Chuanshan quanshu, 15: 565–84. For Gui Zhuang’s poems on fallen blossoms, see Gui Zhuang ji, 1: 119–23. 94. See, e.g., Xin Qiji’s 辛棄疾 famous song lyric, to the tune “Mo yu’er” 摸 魚兒 (first line: “How many more bouts of wind and rain can be borne” 更能消幾 番風雨). 95. For comments on these four poems, see Wang Shizhen, Yuyang jinghua lu jishi, pp. 68–72; QSJS, 4: 2022–37. 96. Zhuo Erkan, Ming yimin shi, 11.462.

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in Gu Yanwu’s poem, 97 replete with unmistakable historical and political references. At first sight it seems that indirectness and ambiguity will be less of an issue in works that purport to confront historical trauma by aspiring to historical veracity. Lynn Struve has extensively documented the range of writings chronicling and remembering the Ming-Qing conflict, and her analysis implies a great range of rhetorical choices. 98 Sometimes the line between history and fiction seems fluid indeed. Xu Fang’s “Tale of Divine Halberd” mentioned in Barr’s chapter, for example, is typical of anecdotal literature on the Ming-Qing transition—it tells of supernatural events, claims historical veracity, and purports to supply historical explanation by invoking karmic retribution. Contemporary and recent history is often filtered through direct representation, uncompromising judgments, and the yearning for moral clarity in the so-called novels on current events (shishi xiaoshuo 時事小說) and drama on current events (shishi ju 時事劇). 99 Among the twenty or so known novels on current events (of which sixteen or seventeen are extant), about eight were written during the Chongzhen (1628–44) era, and the rest from 1644 to the mid 1660’s. These works often choose to personalize evil and to fashion iniquitous protagonists, blaming dynastic decline (and, in post-conquest writings, the fall of the Ming) on arch-villains such as the eunuch Wei Zhongxian 魏忠賢 (1568–1627), whose abuse of power wrought much havoc in late Ming politics, or the rebel Li Zicheng 李自成 (d. 1645), who precipitated the ————— 97. On whether Gu’s poem is meant as a response to Wang’s and on the relationship between Gu and Wang in general, see Xie Zhengguang, Qingchu shiwen yu shiren jiaoyou kao, pp. 392–438. 98. See Lynn Struve, Voices from the Ming-Qing Cataclysm (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1993); and idem, The Ming-Qing Conflict. 99. Qi Biaojia 祁彪佳, in Yuanshan tang qupin 遠山堂曲品, mentioned in Qianshen ji 錢神記 and Guzhong ji 孤忠記 as plays with pointed allusions to current events. Kong Shangren wrote in an annotation to the eighth of his series of poems “Yantai zaxing sishi shou” 燕台雜興四十首: “The Garden of Peace is a section of the present Pear Garden. [Noteworthy] current events, whenever heard of, are set to new music” 太平園，今之梨園部也 。每聞時事，取譜新聲 (Kong Shangren quanji jijiao zhuping), 3: 1771. The Garden of Peace, mentioned in scene extra 21, one of the “framing scenes” of Peach Blossom Fan, is supposedly where the play is performed. Thus, the phenomenon of shishi ju was probably institutionalized by the early Qing. However, the terms shishi xiaoshuo and shishi ju did not seem to have been in use until modern times.

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final collapse of the Ming dynasty. Heroes pale in comparison, although there are attempts to lionize members of the Donglin Clique, the Revival Society, and late Ming military heroes in Liaodong like Xiong Tingbi 熊廷弼 (1573–1625), as in Calm Assessment of the Taowu Monster (Taowu xianping 檮杌閑評, attributed to Li Qing 李清 [1602– 83]) 100 and History According to the Woodcutter (Qiaoshi tongsu yanyi 樵史通俗演義; ca. 1650) by the Woodcutter of the Lower Yangzi 江左 樵子. Some of these writings have the immediacy and urgency of eyewitness accounts—for example, Remnant Accounts from the [Yangzi] Cape (Haijiao yibian 海角遺編) by the Roaming Unofficial Historian 漫遊野史 (preface dated 1648), and Remnant Accounts by the Seven Peaks [Recluse] (Qifeng yibian 七峰遺編) by the Woodcutting Daoist of the Seven Peaks” 七 峰 樵 道 人 (preface dated 1648), 101 both of which chronicle Manchu atrocities and anti-Qing resistance in the Changshu area in 1645. History According to the Woodcutter stands out among works in this genre as a sober yet vivid vernacularization of sources on Ming history from 1620 to 1645. 102 In a parallel development, a spate of plays by a group of dramatists associated with Suzhou address social issues and political developments from late Ming to early Qing. 103 The struggle between Wei Zhongxian and the “pure elements” in late Ming politics, the subject of various late

————— 100. Taowu 檮杌 was the monstrous son of the legendary ancient ruler Zhuanxu shi 顓頊氏 (Shiji 1, “Wudi ji”; Yang Bojun 楊伯峻, comp., Chunqiu Zuozhuan zhu 春秋左傳注 [Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 2000 (1981)], Wen 18.7, pp. 638–42). It is also the name of historical records in Chu (Mengzi, 8.21). The author may thus be comparing Wei Zhongxian to the monster Taowu, or he may be using Taowu to mean historical records. The dual references imply that history is “monstrous” or catastrophic. David Wang discusses the taowu trope and Taowu xianping in The Monster That Is History (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2004). See also H. Laura Wu, “Corpses on Display: Representations of Torture and Pain in the Wei Zhongxian Novels,” paper presented at the Discourses on Disorder in Sixteenth and Seventeenth Century China workshop. 101. The contents of these two works overlap. Struve translates portions of these texts in Voices from the Ming-Qing Cataclysm, pp. 75–92. See also Struve, The MingQing Conflict, p. 243. 102. Kong Shangren cites twenty-four entries from Chaoshi among the sources for Peach Blossom Fan. 103. See Li Mei 李玫, Ming Qing zhi ji Suzhou zuojiaqun yanjiu 明清之際蘇州作 家群研究 (Beijing: Zhongguo shehui kexue chubanshe, 2000).

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Ming and early Qing novels after Wei’s downfall, 104 is also widely enacted on stage, most notably in Li Yu’s 李玉 (cognomen Xuanyu 玄玉, ca. 1595–ca. 1671) Registers of the Pure and Loyal (Qingzhong pu 清忠譜). 105 Registers glorifies Zhou Shunchang 周順昌 (1584–1626), persecuted to death by Wei’s faction, and five plebeian heroes martyred for trying to defend Zhou in a popular uprising in 1626. 106 The “view from below” implied in the focus on “the five righteous men” is also borne out in Li Xuanyu’s Peace for the Myriad People (Wanmin an 萬民 安), which features as heroes the weavers of Suzhou driven by desperation to rise against tax collectors in 1601. 107 The same contemporary and topical focus persists in plays on the events of the Ming-Qing transition. Yan Ermei wrote a poem about watching a play on the Ming loyalist Shi Kefa’s 史可法 (1601–45) final heroic exploits. 108 In Cries of the Cuckoo in Shu (Shu juan ti 蜀鵑啼), Qiu Yuan 丘園 (1617–90), also ————— 104. Aside from the Taowu xianping mentioned above, we know also of Jingshi yinyang meng 警世陰陽夢 by The Daoist Guoqing of Chang’an 長安道人國清; Wei Zhongxian xiaoshuo chijian shu 魏忠賢小說斥奸書 by A Commoner from Wu-Yue 吳越草莽臣; and Huang Ming zhongxing sheng liezhuan 皇明中興聖列傳 by A Righteous Man from West Lake 西湖義士. Taowu was written during early Qing; the rest were late Ming creations. 105. On other plays dealing with Wei Zhongxian, see the modern edition of Qingzhong pu, ed. Zhang Qinghua 張清華 (Henan: Zhongzhou shuhua she, 1982), pp. 4–6. Wu Weiye’s preface to Qingzhong pu is dated 1659, but we cannot be certain whether the play was written before or after the fall of the Ming. Since the names of 李漁 and 李玉 are both romanized Li Yu, 李玉 is hereafter referred to by his cognomen, Li Xuanyu. 106. On these five men, see also Zhang Pu’s widely anthologized eulogy, “Wuren mubei ji” 五人墓碑記. In some ways they represent the late Ming ideal of untutored and spontaneous righteousness. 107. The play is no longer extant. A summary of the play appears in Huang Wenyang 黃文暘, Quhai zongmu tiyao 曲海總目提要 (facsimile reproduction of 1928 Dadong shuju edition; Tianjin: Tianjin guji shudian, 1992), p. 708. On other references to this event and plays on it, see Li Mei, Ming Qing zhi ji Suzhou zuojiaqun yanjiu, pp. 106–9. 108. Yan Ermei 閻爾梅, “Luzhou jian chuanqi you Shi gebu qinwang yi que gan er fu zhi” 廬州見傳奇有史閣部勤王一闕感而賦之, in Zhuo Erkan, Ming yimin shi, 3.111; QSJS, 1: 139; Zhao Shanlin 趙山林, Lidai yong ju shige xuanzhu 歷代詠劇詩 歌選注 (Beijing: Shumu wenxian chubanshe, 1988), pp. 251–52. Yan was Shi Kefa’s advisor and had urged him to launch expeditions toward Henan and Shandong, but Shi decided to defend Yangzhou; see Yan’s “Xi Yangzhou” 惜揚州, cited in Deng Zhicheng, Qingshi jishi chubian, 1: 92–93. After Yangzhou fell, Manchu troops carried on a rampage and massacre for six days.

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identified as one of the Suzhou playwrights, dramatized the martyrdom of Chengdu magistrate Wu Jishan 吳繼善 and his family when the city fell to the rebel Zhang Xianzhong 張獻忠. The play is no longer extant, but Wu Weiye watched it and apparently derived some consolation from the spectacle of Wu Jixian, his cousin and close friend, ascending to immortality after death. 109 With both fiction and drama, the rapid transition from historical reality to page and stage created a special sense of urgency, and perhaps the feeling that aesthetic illusion could augment or influence historical understanding. Drama, more than fiction, seems constrained by the rule of a happy ending. Thus Li Xuanyu’s Two with Beard and Brow (Liang xumei 兩 鬚眉) glorifies the success of a late Ming military commander, Huang Yujin 黃禹金, and his wife, Deng shi 鄧氏 (probably based on the historical Huang Ding 黃鼎 and his wife, neé Deng) in pacifying and repelling peasant insurgents. 110 The play thus features the restoration of order rather than the reality of chaos, devastation, and dynastic collapse. In Union over Ten Thousand li (Wanli yuan 萬里圓), Li Xuanyu celebrated the filial trek of Huang Xiang jian 黃向堅 as he journeys from Suzhou to Yunnan in search of his parents and returns with them. 111 Again we have an edifying story of virtue rewarded in the midst of cataclysmic historical events. Both plays avoid political dilemmas: Huang Yujin and Deng shi seek refuge in reclusion; Huang ————— 109. Wu Weiye, “Guan Shujian ti ju yougan sishou bing xu” 觀蜀鵑啼劇有感四 首并序, in Wu Meicun quanji, 1: 472–74. See also Huang Wenyang, Quhai zongmu tiyao, pp. 908–10. 110. On Deng shi, see also Qian Qianyi, “Liu’an Huang furen Deng shi” 六安黃 夫人鄧氏, in Youxue ji, 1: 429–30. According to some sources, Madame Huang was née Mei, and Chen Yinke suggests that the name change, based on the association of plum blossoms (Mei) with the Han recluse Deng Wei, may be designed to protect Madame Huang’s father (QSJS, 3: 1321–23). 111. Huang Xiang jian wrote Xunchin jicheng 尋親記程 (also called Huang xiaozi xunchin jicheng 黃孝子尋親記程), a memoir of his journey, which lasted from 1651 to 1653. He also left pictorial records of his journey. Struve translates portions of the memoir in Voices from the Ming-Qing Cataclysm, pp. 162–78. See also Struve, The Ming-Qing Conflict, pp. 286–87. Cf. Gui Zhuang, “Huang xiaozi zhuan” 黃孝子傳, in Gui Zhuang ji, 2: 409–10; Lu Shiyi 陸世儀, “Shu Huang xiaozi xunqin jicheng hou” 書黃孝子尋親記程後, in Futing xiansheng wenji 桴亭先生文集, in Xuxiu siku quanshu, 1398: 515. Yuan Xingyun mentions that Liang Qingbiao 梁清標 wrote a poem (“Yu zhong ting liyuan yan Huang xiaozi chuanqi” 雨中聽梨園演黃孝子 傳奇, in Jiaolin ji 蕉林集) about the performance of Li Xuanyu’s play (Qingren shiji xulu, 1).

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Xiang jian and his father change their hairstyle and dress without much ado. It is when contemporary events become history, as in Kong Shangren’s Peach Blossom Fan (1699), that the ambition of historical truth leaves more room for ambiguity, contradiction, and selfreflexivity. Nostalgia and deep ambivalence toward the late Ming legacy persist in the play, as Kong turned the stage into a site for historical reflection, ritualization of memory, and definitions of self, role, and agency in history. Perhaps even more than other genres poetry aspired to bear witness to, keep a true record of, and articulate emotional responses to the Ming-Qing dynastic transition. Wai-yee Li lays down the broad parameters of an early Qing poetics of history in her introduction to the poetry section and uses it as a framework for reading Wu Weiye’s poetry. 112 The burden of illuminating historical reality and transmitting historical knowledge is most obvious in early Qing poetry on the historical events and personages of the Ming-Qing transition. These poems sometimes have a deliberately explorative and investigative dimension, as the poet tries to define how an event or a character is to be remembered. There are also commemorative poems on heroes, martyrs, and victims, of the kind Lawrence Yim discusses in his chapter, which also abound in the oeuvres of Qian Qianyi, Wu Weiye, and many other early Qing poets. The control over historical interpretation has always been a bitterly fought battle, as evinced by the new regime’s suspicions and accusations during the compilation of the official Ming history. 113 There is a long tradition of conveying praise and blame through subtle yet pointed poetic language, but restraint and indirectness in early Qing poetry are sometimes also functions of political caution. More generally, the aspiration for historical veracity in poetry often occasions the self-conscious delineation of the processes of memory and historical reflection. To try to tell the truth is to ponder the margins between subjective truth and objective facts, the balance or tension between historical judgment and emotional response. Lyrical engagement with historical crisis presumes the fusion of historical under————— 112. Lawrence Chi-hung Yim discusses related issues in “The Poetics of Historical Memory in the Ming-Qing Transition.” 113. Lynn Struve gives an excellent account of this process in The Ming-Qing Conflict. See also Huang Meiyun 黃眉雲 et al., Ming shi bianzuan kao 明史編纂考 (Taipei: Xuesheng shuju, 1968).

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standing and self-understanding, as “poet-historians” (shishi 詩史) stake their truth claims on discursive clarity in probing the forces that shape events and their representation, as well as the burden of witnessing and remembering. The poetic genres of “meditations on the past” (huaigu 懷古) and “reflections on history” ( yongshi 詠史) extend the affective and intellectual space for coping with traumatic historical events. Poets also turn to literary figures that lost their country or were caught in dynastic transitions as models of self-definition. One example from the Ming-Qing transition, discussed by Kang-i Sun Chang in this volume, is Qian Qianyi, who referred to Tao Qian 陶潛 and Liu Ji 劉基. Tao Qian was so widely cited as a model during this period that Qian— quoting Su Shi’s 蘇軾 line, “Overnight the whole world is filled with Tao Yuanmings” 陶淵明一夕滿人間—felt the need to make distinctions: his Tao Qian is the Jin remnant subject with heroic aspirations, the Tao Qian who empathizes with the Han loyalist Tian Chou 田疇 in the second of his “Imitations of Ancient Poems” 擬古九首第二. 114 Zhu Yizun, by contrast, presented Tao Qian as transcendent recluse when he depoliticized the poetry of the loyalist Qian Bingdeng by defining his style as resembling Tao’s. 115 Liu Ji, who lived through the Yuan-Ming transition, is an interesting reminder of how the definitions of loyalism and remnant subject differ from the modern discourse of nationalism. The Yuan, a Mongol dynasty, was nevertheless considered a legitimate object of loyalist longings. Thus Liu Ji’s dilemma was real. By the same token, his contemporary poet Yang Weizhen 楊維楨 is often depicted sympathetically as a Yuan remnant ————— 114. See Qian Qianyi, “Tao lu ji” 陶廬記, in Youxue ji, 2: 1009–10. The essay was written for his friend Gu Mei 顧湄 (fl. 1653–83), who named his abode “Tao lu” out of admiration for Tao Qian. The idea that Tao Qian is to be admired for his empathy with doomed heroes and lost causes was a common sentiment among early Qing poets; see, e.g., Sun Zhiwei 孫枝蔚, “Shu Tao shi hou” 書陶詩後 (“Poets all know the greatness of Tao Qian’s poetry, / Yet who would cherish “Jing Ke”— they only admire the unworldly “Shus” 詩家盡解陶詩好，誰惜荊軻慕二疏), cited in Yuan Xingyun, Qingren shiji xulu, p. 191. (In “Yong Jing Ke” 詠荊軻, Tao Qian empathizes with the doomed assassin, and in “Yong er Shu” 詠二疏, he expresses admiration for the Han scholars Shu Guang and his nephew Shu Shou, imperial tutors who rejected worldly glory and chose timely retirement.) 115. Zhu Yizun, Jingzhi ju shihua 靜志居詩話 (Beijing: Renmin wenxue, 1990), 2: 671.

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subject in the writings of Qian Qianyi, Wu Weiye, and other early Qing writers. 116 Historical analogies also featured prominently in fiction and drama. Indeed, novels and plays on current events receded in importance by the 1660s, and for many writers the preferred medium for filtering the experience and memory of the Ming-Qing transition was the implied comparison with analogous moments of crisis in history. In this volume, we see how the fall of the Ming invited comparisons with other dynastic crises, such as the An Lushan Rebellion in Hong Sheng’s Palace of Lasting Life (Changsheng dian 長生殿) (Zeitlin’s chapter) and in Chu Renhuo’s Romance of the Sui and the Tang (Sui Tang yanyi 隋唐 演義) (Hegel’s chapter), the Jin invasions of the Southern Song in Ding Yaokang’s West Lake Fan (Xihu shan 西湖扇) (Idema’s chapter), or the Mongol invasion in Li Yu’s “Tower of Nativity” (“Shengwo lou” 生我 樓), 117 the tenth story from Shier lou 十二樓 (Lu’s chapter). The QinHan transition, a more common choice than one might presume, 118 is taken up in Ding Yaokang’s Ramblings with Red Pine (Chisong you 赤松游) (Idema’s chapter). The Southern Ming (1644–45), the shortlived and problematic sequel to the Ming dynasty, becomes the obvious referent in re-enactments of other “decadent” southern dynasties, for example, in Wu Weiye’s plays (Tschanz’s chapter). 119 ————— 116. See, e.g., Qian Qianyi, eighteenth poem in his “Xihu zagan” 西湖雜感 series, in Youxue ji, 1: 104; the last two lines of Wu Weiye’s “Pipa xing” 琵琶行, Zhu Yizun, “Yang Weizhen zhuan” 楊維楨傳, in Pushu ting ji, 64.742–43. Huang Zongxi, however, maintained that the poetry of Song yimin was more powerful than that of Yuan yimin (“Suozhai wenji xu” 縮齋文集序, in Huang Lizhou wenji, pp. 336–37). Cf. Zhao Yuan’s discussion of Yuanyi 元遺 in Ming Qing zhi ji shidaifu yanjiu, pp. 275–76. 117. Patrick Hanan translates the title as “Nativity Room” in A Tower for the Summer Heat (New York: Columbia University Press, 1998). 118. With the Qin-Han transition, chaos and tyranny are supposed to give way to order and legitimate government. As such, it may not seem appropriate for writers who wish to convey the experience of crisis and devastation. However, Zhang Liang 張良, Emperor Gaozu’s chief helper in founding the Han 漢 and the protagonist of Wanderings of Red Pine, is also sometimes presented as a loyalist of the Warring States Han 韓 kingdom in early Qing writings; see, e.g., Zha Jizuo’s preface to Wanderings of Red Pine. In other words, at issue is not the legitimacy of the Han dynasty but the role of Zhang Liang the loyalist in avenging the fall of his natal kingdom Han. 119. See also Dietrich Tschanz, “Early Qing Drama and the Dramatic Works of Wu Weiye” (Ph.D. diss., Princeton University, 2002).

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The favored historical analogy, however, was the fall of the Song dynasty, probably because both of its debacles involved foreign conquests (by the Jurchens in 1127, and the Mongols in 1279). The heroic martyrdoms of Wen Tianxiang 文天祥 (1236–82), Lu Xiufu 陸秀夫, and Zhang Shijie 張世傑; Tang Jue 唐玦 and the evergreen trees 冬青 he planted over the reburied remains from Song imperial tombs that had been violated; Zheng Sixiao 鄭思肖 (1241–1318) and his historical records of the fall of the Song, the History of the Heart (Xinshi 心史), encased in an iron box and buried at the bottom of a well; 120 Xie Ao 謝翱 (1249– 95) and his elegiac lament for Wen Tianxiang on the Western Terrace 西臺—these personages and events from the Song-Yuan transition become recurrent and potent points of reference in early Qing writings, especially prose and poetry. 121 The Song-Jin transition looms large in vernacular literature. Ding Yaokang’s A Continuation of Plum in a Golden Vase (Xu Jinpingmei 續金瓶梅) uses the collapse of the Song dynasty to create an apocalyptic mood, in which retribution is relentless and devastation universal. Several works inspired by Water Margin (Shuihu zhuan 水滸傳), which was set in the final years of the Northern Song, take up the idea that rebellion may embody loyalist strivings. In Chen Chen’s 陳忱 (1614?–66+) sequel to the book, Water Margin: Later Traditions (Shuihu houzhuan 水滸後傳; preface dated 1664), the surviving bandit-heroes fight Jin invaders, defend the Song dynasty, and escape to the distant utopia of Siam. 122 In Later Water Margin Traditions (Hou shuihu zhuan 後水滸傳; ca. 1650) by the Master of the Blue Lotus Chamber 青蓮室 主人, reincarnations of the Liangshan heroes continue their struggle against a corrupt Southern Song government capitulating to the demands of Jin invaders. In Qian Cai’s 錢采Complete Tradition of Yue Fei ————— 120. Xinshi was discovered at the bottom of a well at the Chengtian Temple in Suzhou in 1638. Many have questioned its authenticity. 121. In Mingshi, j. 274 (“Biography of Shi Kefa”), Shi Kefa’s mother is said to have seen Wen Tianxiang entering her abode at the moment of Shi’s birth. Early Qing vernacular literature that deals with the Song-Yuan transition includes Lu Shilian’s 陸世廉 Xitai ji 西臺記 and Qiu Lian’s 裘璉 (1644–1729) Nü Kunlun 女昆侖. 122. Ellen Widmer discusses the connection between these themes and Ming loyalism in her study of Shuihu houzhuan, The Margins of Utopia (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University, Council on East Asian Studies, 1987).

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Stories (Shuo Yue quan zhuan 說岳全傳; 1684), 123 Yue Fei 岳飛 (1103–41), the national hero who repelled the Jin armies, shares a teacher with the Liangshan rebels and encourages the bandit-rebels to join the common cause against the Jin; descendants of the Liangshan rebels eventually become leaders in Yue Fei’s army. Yue Fei is also the protagonist of various early Qing plays by Suzhou dramatists, including Li Xuanyu’s Bull Head Mountain (Niutou shan 牛頭山), Zhang Dafu’s 張大復 View It Thus (Rushi guan 如是觀), and Zhu Zuochao’s 朱佐朝 Winning the Autumn Prize (Duo qiukui 奪秋魁). These works explore the compass of heroic action—by contrast, the works discussed in this volume use historical analogies to dramatize the literati’s dilemma of reconciliation with the new order versus opposition to it (e.g., in Wu Weiye’s The Terrace of Communication with Heaven [Tongtian tai 通天台], Spring in Moling [Moling chun 秣陵春], and Ding Yaokang’s West Lake Fan), or to ponder the claims of the romantic-aesthetic realm to coherence and responsibility (as in Hong Sheng’s Palace of Lasting Life and Wu Weiye’s Facing Spring Pavilion [Linchun ge 臨春閣]). Beyond this interest in analogous moments of crisis, there is in early Qing writings a sober, steady gaze on the entire course of Ming history. The fall of the Ming allowed some previously tabooed subjects, such as the atrocities committed by the first Ming emperor or the flaws in the Ming political system, to be tackled. The extraordinary early Qing outburst of creative energy in historical writings had literary counterparts. Critical retrospection defines some literary surveys of Ming history, as in Liu Jingting’s 柳敬亭 song in the last scene of Peach Blossom Fan, Jia Fuxi’s (1589–1674) 賈鳧西 “Drum Song on History Through the Ages” (“Lidai shilüe guci” 歷代史略鼓詞) in his Songs of the Wooden Bark [Recluse] (Mupi ci 木皮詞), various series of ballads on Ming history (titled Mingshi yuefu 明史樂府 or Ming yuefu 明樂府) by You Tong’s 尤侗 (1618–1704), Pan Chengzhang 潘檉章 (1625–63), and Wan Sitong 萬斯同 (1638–1702). 124 In other cases anguished lament leaves little room for distance. Gui Zhuang’s “Sorrows of Ten Thousand Ages” (“Wangu chou” 萬古愁), for example, sustains an ironic and irreverent tone in its review of Chinese history until it reaches the Ming. Jia Fuxi’s ————— 123. Some scholars have maintained that the jiazi date in the preface refers to 1744. 124. Ming history persisted as topic of poetry for at least a couple more generations, a notable example is Yan Suicheng 嚴遂成’s (1694–ca. 1757) Ming shi zayong 明史雜詠.

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“Drum Song on History Through the Ages” unmasks stories of virtue and inevitable mandate and offers a stringent critique of most Chinese rulers through the ages (including the Ming emperors), but adopts a tone of lamentation with the Chongzhen emperor and the remembrance of Jinling after the fall of the Ming. (Kong Shangren excerpts that section and presents it as the music teacher Su Kunsheng’s 蘇崑生 song in the last scene of Peach Blossom Fan.) More generally, writing Ming history was integral to the broader project of defining the Ming legacy. Various early Qing compilations of Ming writings shaped the public memory of the fallen dynasty. Prominent examples include Qian Qianyi’s Anthology of Poetry from Arrayed Reigns (Liechao shiji 列朝詩集, discussed in Chang’s chapter), Zhu Yizun’s Anthology of Ming Poetry (Ming shi zong 明詩綜), and Huang Zongxi’s compilations of Ming prose and accounts of Ming Confucian thinkers, Ming wen an 明文案 (later expanded as Ming wen hai 明文海) and Mingru xue’an 明儒學案. Early Ming history is often glorified when perceived through the warm glow of historical distance—with one exception: Ming Emperor Chengzu’s 明成祖 violent usurpation of the throne in 1403. The Prince of Yan (later Emperor Chengzu) came from the north to Nanjing, at that point the Ming capital, ousted (and probably caused the death of) his nephew, the Jianwen emperor 建文帝, and killed officials loyal to Jianwen. Prince Yan’s usurpation became the subject of fervent historical discussions in the late Ming. 125 The Manchu conquerors from the north and the debacle of the Southern Ming court in Nanjing, as well as the associations of Nanjing with the imperial Ming tombs and early Ming glory, probably account for the continued and intensified interest in this earlier story of “north versus south.” Numerous Jianwen loyalists were among the Ming martyrs honored by the Southern Ming court as part of its rituals of self-legitimation. Some loyalists invoked the Jianwen emperor’s defenders as models. Other anecdotes appeal to the violent end of the Jianwen reign as historical explanation of the Ming fall, as Jianwen loyalists are reincarnated as the peasant insurgents of the Chongzhen era to exact karmic retribution. 126 Em————— 125. For an excellent account of the historical and philosophical discussions of the 1403 usurpation during the Ming-Qing transition, see Zhao Yuan, Ming Qing zhi ji shidaifu yanjiu, pp. 165–92. 126. See Li Qing 李清, Sanyuan biji 三垣筆記 (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1982), p. 245.

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peror Chengzu’s usurpation features prominently in some of the above mentioned Ming history ballads. One of the best-known literary representations of the subject is Li Xuanyu’s The Slaughter of the Thousand Loyal Ones (Qian zhong lu 千忠戮). 127 Other plays on the martyrs of the Jianwen court are Zhu Zuochao’s The Rock with Shadows of Blood (Xueying shi 血影石) and Ye Shizhang’s 葉時章 Doubts on Yielding the Throne (Xunguo yi 遜國疑). 128 Lü Xiong’s 呂熊 (ca. 1640–ca. 1722) novel Unofficial History of the Female Immortal (Nüxian waishi 女仙外史; 1711) tells a mythologized version of Prince Yan’s usurpation and the resistance against it—the Jianwen loyalists, who were ruthlessly eliminated, here continue their struggle and flourish in a kind of counter-government under the leadership of the “woman immortal” Tang Sai’er 唐賽兒, a rebel leader of a messianic cult according to official history and other biji sources. 129 The fact that a number of well-known literati, including Zhu Da, Wang Shizhen, Hong Sheng, and Liu Ting ji 劉廷璣 (1653–1715+) wrote chapter comments on the novel suggests the contemporary resonance of this episode in early Ming history. The confrontation with history shades into the imaginary realm of escape, notably in Ding Yaokang’s Ramblings with Red Pine and Chen Chen’s Water Margins: Later Traditions, among works mentioned above. 130 Cataclysmic upheavals challenge the decorum and boundaries of representation—the results are extravagant fantasies of destruction, survival, and recompense like Ding Yaokang’s Ramblings with Magi————— 127. Qian zhong lu also appears under homophonous titles as 千忠錄 (Record of a thousand loyal ones) and 千鍾祿 (A thousand bushels of official rewards). Quhai zongmu tiyao lists Li Yu 李玉 as the author of Qian zhong lu, but Chongding quhai zongmu 重訂曲海總目, Qu kao 曲攷, Jinyue kaozheng 今樂攷證, and Qulu 曲錄 give the play as “anonymous.” Various other sources attribute a play entitled Qian zhong hui 千忠會 (Gathering of a thousand loyal ones) to Li Yu. For an argument that Xu Zichao 徐子超 rather than Li Yu was the author of the play, see Zhou Miaozhong 周妙中, ed., Qian zhong lu 千忠錄 (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1989), pp. 1–5. 128. Xunguo yi, listed in Xin chuanqi pin 新傳奇品, is no longer extant. 129. See Ming shi 明史, “Basic Annals of Chengzu” 成祖紀; and Shen Defu 沈 德符, Wanli yehuo bian 萬曆野檴編 (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1997 [1959]), 29.749. 130. The connection between historical trauma and escape to an imaginary realm is perhaps most clearly spelled out in Tan Qian’s 談遷 (1592–1657) account of The Island of Immortals (Xianren dao 仙人島); see his Beiyou lu 北游錄 (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1997), pp. 344–45.

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cians (Huaren you 化人游), as Idema shows in his chapter. In these two plays by Ding, the immortals’ realm of bliss is precariously imposed on visions of rupture and disorder. In that sense they share the disquiet and sorrow implicit in early Qing poems on the quest for immortality (qiuxian 求仙) or wandering with immortals ( youxian 遊仙) by, among others, Qu Dajun, Wang Fuzhi, Feng Ban 馮班 (1604–71), and the painter Yun Shouping 惲壽平 (1633–90). Imagination provides access to a lost world, and the promise of inventing one’s own domain becomes ever more tantalizing in an alienating reality. The heightened awareness of the context and impetus for literary creation must account for the concern with the rival claims of truth and fiction and reality and illusion in apparent utopian escapes, such as Zhang Dai’s “Blessed Land of Langhuan” (“Langhuan fudi” 瑯 嬛 福 地 ) (Hegel’s chapter), and Huang Zhouxing’s play Joys in the Human and Divine Realms (Rentian le 人天樂) and his imaginary garden Jiangjiu yuan 將就園 (Widmer’s chapter). Illusion is also the particular province of the theater. It is perhaps no accident that Zhang Dai and Huang Zhouxing, both of whom wrote on gardens and other imaginary ideal spaces, were also connoisseurs or creators of drama. (Other examples of such dual interests include Wu Weiye, Qi Biaojia, and Li Yu.) For some, the very fact that actors on stage sport costumes and hairstyles forbidden in real life was enough to arouse envy, and the theatrical stage seemed to beckon as an escape to a vanished world. 131 Contending or dispensing with historical moorings results in a new poetics of space. The phrase “no place” (wudi 無地) recurs in writings from this period. Chen Zilong 陳子龍 (1608–47) used the image to lament the failure of his insurrection against the Qing: I do not believe that heaven exists, only to seem constantly inebriated. Most pitiable of all—there is no place to bury sorrow. 132

不信有天長似醉 最憐無地可埋憂

————— 131. See, e.g., Li Shengguang 李生光, “Guan ju” 觀劇: “Worthy of envy are those singing and dancing in the Pear Garden, / Imposing gowns and caps, the charm and refinement of old” 堪羨梨園歌舞儔，衣冠楚楚舊風流; cited in Deng Zhicheng, Qingshi jishi chubian, 1: 167. 132. Chen Zilong 陳子龍, “Qiuri zagan” 秋日雜感, second in a series of ten poems, in Chen Zilong shiji 陳子龍詩集 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1983), p. 526. These poems are dated to 1646. According to Li Shan’s 李善 annotation to

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Gu Mengyou wrote about his sense of homelessness in “New Year’s Eve, 1645”: Whence the expectation to have a home as the year comes to an end? Long have I known that there is no place to let down a fishing rod. 133

何意有家還卒歲 久知無地可垂竿

Xu Lingyu 許令瑜 (d. 1650) combined stubborn hopes with acknowledgment of defeat in the final couplet composed on his deathbed: Within one inch, there is sky for hanging sun and moon, Over nine continents, no place to bewail mountains and rivers. 134

一寸有天懸日月 九州無地哭山河

Qu Dajun imagined immortals sharing his mourning for a lost world: Just when in all under heaven there is no place for mountains and waters, The immortals should long for the realm of rulers and emperors. 135

天下正無山水地 仙人應念帝王州

Qu’s fellow Lingnan poet, Chen Gongyin 陳恭尹 (1631–1700), lamented the hopelessness of the loyalist cause at the temple commemorating the Song martyrs Wen Tianxiang, Lu Xiufu, and Zhang Shijie at Yamen 崖門 (literally, “Cliff Gate”) in a poem written in 1658: With the water of the seas, there is a gate that separates above and below,

海水有門分上下

————— Zhang Heng’s 張衡 Xijing fu 西京賦, the heavenly emperor in his inebriated state bestowed territories (in present-day Hubei) on Duke Mu of Qin (Wenxuan 文選, j. 2). 133. Zhuo Erkan, Ming yimin shi, 1.36. 134. Cited in Yuan Xingyun, Qingren shiji xulu, p. 12. Xu Lingyu died in 1650, when there were still faint hopes for a Ming restoration. “One inch” refers to the heart. “Sun” and “moon” make up the character for “Ming” and became a common code phrase in yimin poetry. “Mountains and rivers” (shanhe 山河) is a standard phrase referring to the country. “Nine continents” designates China and sometimes includes the world beyond. 135. Qu Dajun, “Ti Li sheng huace sheng shan hua qi caotang ming yue Luofu” 題李生畫冊生善畫其草堂名曰羅浮, in Qu Dajun quanji, 2: 823. “Mountains and waters” is another way to designate the country. The word “waters” (shui 水) is used instead of the word “rivers” (he 河) because of tonal requirement.

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江山無地限華夷

Chen claimed that, since distinctions within the realm between Chinese and barbarians had become lamentably blurred, it was left to Yamen to stand for the principle making that distinction clear. Yamen, the emblem of loyalist martyrdom at the far southern edge of empire, here defines the boundary between life and death, heroism and compromise, as it “separates above and below” by the sea. In the context of this ubiquitous sense of “no place,” to “have a place” was but to be aware of its imminent destruction. Thus Qian Qianyi: There is a place, but only for hearing the roaring of waves, With no sky, how can the flying frost be seen? 137

有地只因聞浪吼 無天那得見霜飛

Land about to be engulfed by waves recalls the familiar expression “inundated land” (luchen 陸沉), employed to refer to the loss of one’s country. Qian wrote this poem in despair in 1662, having received news that Prince Gui 貴王, leader of the last significant remnant Ming court, had been captured and executed by Wu Sangui 吳三桂. With all hopes of the anti-Qing resistance dashed, the awareness of having a place is produced by the threat of its obliteration and the fear of encroachment and persecution. To “have no place” means voluntary or involuntary exile, either physical or “inner.” Yim draws our attention to Hanke’s poems that bravely celebrate new horizons or domesticate the alien landscape of Manchuria. For many, however, exile was a kind of nonexistence. Wu Weiye lamented the fate of the poet Wu Zhaoqian 吳兆騫 (1631–84), who was exiled to Ningguta 寧 古 塔 , where “Mountains are not mountains, waters not waters, / Life is not life, and death not death” 山非山兮水非水，生非生兮死非死. 138 The Qing court relocated ————— 136. Chen Gongyin 陳恭尹, “Yamen ye san zhong miao” 崖門謁三忠廟, in Lingnan sanjia shixuan 嶺南三家詩選 (Guangzhou: Guangdong renmin chubanshe, 1980). Yamen on the coast of Xinhui county in Guangdong was where Lu Xiufu jumped into the sea holding the last heir of the Song house, the childemperor Zhao Bing 趙昺. 137. Qian Qianyi, third poem in the twelfth series in the “Hou Qiuxing” sequence; see Toubi ji. 138. Wu Weiye, “Beige zeng Wu Jizi” 悲歌贈吳季子, in Wu Meicun quanji, 1: 257. Wu Zhaoqian was a victim of the examination scandal of 1657. His exile is also

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thousands of Chinese to Manchuria to till the land left behind by Manchus who had “entered the Pass”; 139 in successive cases of persecution directed especially at the literati of Jiangnan, many more were exiled there. Some remnant subjects went into voluntary exile in Japan, Korea, and Southeast Asia, either to seek military assistance or to escape the reaches of the Qing government. 140 The fate of those exiled came to symbolize a more collective displacement. Wu Zhaoqian lamented the alienation provoked by post-conquest Jiangnan: The Gusu Terrace, overrun by deer, is not my land, East of the River are gowns and caps different those of former travelers. 141

胥臺糜鹿非吾土 江左衣冠異舊游

Zhu Yizun disguised the sense of spatial dislocation and disjunction between past and present as ethnographic curiosity when he wrote about viewing a dragon boat race in Guangdong: Summoning to mind the boats of battle, still from the days of Han— Suddenly startled: these are mores and customs different from those of my homeland. 142

想象戈船猶漢日 忽驚風土異鄉邦

————— remembered in literary history because of Gu Zhenguan’s 顧貞觀 (1637–1714) famous song lyrics, addressed to him when he was in Ningguta in 1676. On Wu Zhaoqian, see Li Xingsheng 李興盛, Shiren Wu Zhaoqian xilie 詩人吳兆騫系列 (1–3) (Harbin: Heilongjiang renmin chubanshe, 2000); QSJS, 3: 1949–70. As in Hanke’s case in Shenyang, exile also resulted in the dissemination of culture and the creation of new literary communities in Ningguta; see He Zongmei, Mingmo Qingchu wenren jieshe yanjiu, pp. 353–411. 139. See Li’s discussion of Wu Weiye’s “Lament for Mount Song” in her chapter in this volume. 140. Yan Dichang mentions some examples in Qing shi shi, p. 59; see also the entry on Zhu Zhiyu 朱之瑜 in QSJS, 1: 108–11. A group of “monk-loyalists” was active in the Obaku Zen colony at Uji; their activities were responsible for significant cultural and scientific advances; see Widmer, The Margins of Utopia, p. 17; and Stephen Addis and Kwan S. Wong, Obaku: Zen Painting and Calligraphy (Lawrence: University of Kansas, Helen Foresman Spencer Museum of Art, 1978). 141. Wu Zhaoqian, “Zeng Qi Yixi” 贈祈奕喜, cited in Li Xingsheng, Shiren Wu Zhaoqian xilie 1: Jiangnan caizi saibei mingren Wu Zhaoqian zhuan 江南才子塞北名 人吳兆騫傳 (Harbin: Heilongjiang renmin chubanshe, 2000), p. 48. The poem is dated to 1655. Yixi is the cognomen of Qi Bansun 祈班孫, son of Qi Biaojia. Wu and Qi belonged to the same Jiangnan literary circles. Exiled in 1657 and 1661, respectively, they continued their friendship “beyond the frontier.”

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For some the conquest had turned China into “barbarian territories,” and being in China was like being exiled. Fang Zhongtong lamented: Do not say that it is difficult to place your feet in the world, The central plains today have all become alien lands. 143

休道世間難著足 中原今日總他鄉

The same logic of “inner exile” obtains in a quatrain Qian Qianyi addressed to the courtesan Caisheng 彩生 in 1657. I quote the last two lines: Come closer: there is no need to sing the “Song of Going Beyond the Frontier,” The White Dragon Pool is already Brushing Clouds Mound. 144

促座不須歌出塞 白龍潭是拂雲堆

There is no need for Caisheng to sing Wang Zhaojun’s 王昭君 song of exile, because the reality of inner exile is all too pressing and its reminders are all too ubiquitous. The conquest has effaced the boundaries between Chinese and barbarian lands—White Dragon Pool in Song jiang (near present-day Shanghai), the heart of Jiangnan culture, is thus no different from distant Brushing Clouds Mound beyond the frontier. Inner exile is transformed from a condition of existence into a venue of escape through inner detachment and inner resistance. Such mental attitudes sometimes have a palpable correlative in styles of living, as evinced in the modes of eremitism discussed above. In their quest for ————— 142. Zhu Yizun, “Zhujiang wuri guandu” 珠江午日觀渡, in Zhu Yizun xuanji 朱彝尊選集, ed. Ye Yuanzhang 葉元章 and Zhong Xia 鍾夏 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1991), p. 70. The momentary confusion of the dragon boats with Han Emperor Wu’s fleet speaks of Zhu’s longing for the vanished glory of the fallen dynasty and may also be an allusion to the seventh poem in Du Fu’s “Autumn Meditations: Eight Poems.” The strangeness of Cantonese customs masks the alienating “foreignness” of the post-conquest world. Dated to 1657, this poem was written after Guangdong had been brought under Manchu control. 143. Fang Zhongtong 方中通, “Zeng Liu Aoshi” 贈劉鼇石, cited in Deng Zhicheng, Qingshi jishi chubian, 1: 130. If all of China has become “alien lands” (literally, “lands away from home”), there is no place one may call home, and venturing “into the world” should bring no greater disquiet than being “at home.” 144. Qian Qianyi, “Xiaolao leixi zhijiu Caisheng xianbie kouzhan shi jueju” 霞老累夕置酒彩生先別口占十絕句 (second quatrain), in Youxue ji, 1: 343. For the context of its composition, see Wai-yee Li, “Heroic Transformations,” pp. 418– 19n126.

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“alternative space,” writers often dwelled on the disconnection between their abodes and the outside world. Thus, Gui Zhuang justified the name “A Studio for Myself” ( Jizhai 己齋) with the comment “I am already sunken in the domain of barbarians and cannot extricate myself” 既已身淪左衽之邦，不能自拔. 145 He can only resort to the gesture of marking out his own space, willfully designating its rupture with political reality. The philosopher and poet Lu Shiyi 陸世儀 (1611–72) dug a big pond and built his abode Raft Pavilion (Futing 桴亭), in the middle of it, shunning all social contact and “taking the perspective of one adrift on the seas” 作浮海觀. 146 Wei Xi and his family and friends, the so-called Nine Masters of Yitang 易堂九子, formed a self-sufficient community of agriculture, philosophical inquiry, and moral self-cultivation, based on new definitions of learning and friendship, in what amounted to an experiment in alternative modes of social organization. 147 Gardens, as private aesthetic spaces, acquired new political meanings. As noted above, Mao Xiang’s Painted in Water Garden continued to be a place of refinement and pleasure while affording protection for some remnant subjects engaged in resistance. In 1655, Mao Xiang changed the name of the garden to “Painted in Water Convent” 水繪庵, thereby implying ascetic withdrawal or inward distance. However, various collections based on literary gatherings in the garden testify to the continued importance of the ornaments of elite culture. (Apparently at its height around the late 1650s, the garden had fallen into disrepair by the time Deng Hanyi visited it in 1684.) Qi Biaojia’s famous garden estate, Yushan 寓山, was the site of his martyrdom. Yushan also became a place for fostering loyalist activities in the early Qing, as Qi Biaojia’s sons, Qi Lisun 祁理孫 (1627–ca. 1663) and Qi Bansun 祁班孫 (b. 1632), offered refuge to Wei Geng and Qu Dajun. 148 In yet another incarnation, Yushan was the locus of a female ————— 145. Gui Zhuang, “Jizhai ji” 己齋記, in Gui Zhuang ji, 1: 451–52. 146. Xu Zi, Xiaotian jizhuan, p. 711; see Analects 5.7: “When the Way cannot be realized, I would take a raft and be adrift on the seas” 道不行，乘桴浮于海. 147. See Joanna Handlin Smith, “Wei Xi’s Social Horizons,” paper presented at the conference on seventeenth-century literature that resulted in the present volume. Zhao Yuan’s Yitang xunzong 易堂尋蹤 (Nanchang: Jiangxi jiaoyu chubanshe, 2001) reconstructs what we know about this community. 148. Qi Biaojia drowned himself at the pond beneath Plum Pavilion in Yushan in 1645. On the role of Yushan in yimin networks, see Quan Zuwang, “Qi liu gongzi mu jieming” 祁六公子墓碣銘, in Quan Zuwang ji huijiao jizhu, 1: 255–59. On Wei Geng and Qi Bansun, see also QSJS, 1: 504–26.

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literary community, the place where Shang Jinglan held poetic gatherings with other women in the family and her friends. 149 Yushan was a garden of dreams, rooted in the aesthete’s obsessive devotion, defined through shifting perspectives, and premised on the flux between reality and illusion, dreaming and waking states, as explained by Qi Biaojia in his exquisite essays “Notes on Yushan” (“Yushan zhu” 寓山注). 150 By the time Qu Dajun hid in Yushan in 1660 and dreamed of wandering with immortals or escaping through the world of books, 151 the late Ming interest in the boundary between reality and illusion had become politicized in new ways. The alternative space defined through imagination and memory became an answer to inner exile. As we have seen, this space may be similar to the immortal realm as traditionally imagined, or it may be concretized, theorized, and individualized in specific ways, as Hegel and Widmer show in their respective discussions of Zhang Dai’s “Langhuan fudi” and Huang Zhouxing’s garden, Jiang jiu yuan. Another favored topos was the romanticized image of the margins of Chinese civilization—its far southern and western borders, or distant

————— 149. Ko, Teachers of the Inner Chambers, pp. 228–29. 150. The Chongzhen edition of “Yushan zhu” includes Qi Biaojia’s descriptions as well as extensive poetic commentaries by his friends. This edition is preserved in the National Library in Taipei. “Yushan zhu” is found in Qi Biaojia ji 祁彪 佳集 (published during the Daoguang reign) and is included in many modern editions of xiaopin. For interesting discussions of Qi Biaojia and Yushan, see Mao Wenfang 毛文芳, Wu, xingbie, guankan—Mingmo Qingchu wenhua shuxie chutan 物、性 別、觀看—明末清初文化書寫初探 (Taipei: Xuesheng shuju, 2001), pp. 162–88; Cao Shujuan 曹淑娟, “Qi Biaojia yu Yushan—yige zhutixing kongjian de jiangou” 祁彪佳與寓山—一個主體性空間的建搆, in Li Fengmao 李豐楙 and Liu Wanru 劉宛如, ed., Kongjian, diyu, yu wenhua—Zhongguo wenxue yu wenhua shuxie 空間、地 域、與文化—中國文學與文化書寫 (Taipei: Academia Sinica, 2002); Craig Clunas, Fruitful Sites: Garden Culture in Ming Dynasty China (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1996); and Joanna Handlin Smith, “Gardens in Qi Biaojia’s Social World: Wealth and Values in Late-Ming Kiangnan,” Journal of Asian Studies 51 (1992): 55–81. 151. Qu Dajun, “Ti Shanyin Qi Wu Qi Liu cangshu lou” 題山陰祁五祁六藏 書樓 and “Ke Shanyin zeng er Qi zi” 客山陰贈二祁子, in Qu Dajun quanji, 1: 140, 177. Cf. Wang Zongyan 汪宗衍, Qu Wengshan xiansheng nianpu 屈翁山先生年譜, in Ming Qing shiliao huibian qi ji 明清史料彙編七集 (Taipei: Wenhai chubanshe, n.d.), pp. 44–51.

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and foreign kingdoms beyond the seas. 152 This privileged space provided a utopian escape; it might also become the source of cultural renewal or loyalist resurgence. The vitality and innocence of the margins supposedly corrected the effeteness, the decadence, and the momentum of decline and fall at the center. The fact that the remnants of the loyalist resistance were pushed to the far edges of the country (the south, the west, and Taiwan), as well as vague hopes of succor from foreign kingdoms, probably contributed to these romances of the margins: Qian Bingdeng’s poems on the landscape and landmarks of southwest China, especially Guilin 桂林, are notable examples. For others writing at the edges of empire, such as the Lingnan poets in the far south, asserting the centrality of the margin—on account of traditions of defiance as well as a presumably corrective “primitivism”—was also to define an emergent regional identity. The conquerors from the north turned the south into another privileged space to be guarded in dreams and memory. The Chuci corpus and the figure of the poet Qu Yuan, canonical symbols of loyalty, political integrity, and hopeless longing, were frequently invoked for their southern associations in early Qing writings. The death of the legendary sage-king Shun during his “southern tour,” another recurrent reference in early Qing poetry drawn from the Chuci, fit the allusive purpose of poets wishing to refer to the demise of various remnant Ming courts. A host of Ming martyrs drowned themselves—for example, Chen Zilong, Xia Yunyi 夏允彝 (1596–1645), Qi Biaojia, Yu Huang 余煌 (d. 1646), 153 and Fang Yizhi 154 —and Huang Zhouxing intended to do likewise in his “delayed suicide.” 155 Commemorative writings ————— 152. Widmer analyzes this phenomenon in relation to Shuihu houzhuan in Margins of Utopia. I discuss “the romance of the margins” in Wu Weiye’s Facing Spring Pavilion in “Heroic Transformations.” 153. See Wang Duanshu 王端淑, Yinhong ji 吟紅集 (1651, in Naikaku bunko, Tokyo), j. 21, “Jishi shang,” 6b–7b. 154. There are conflicting versions of Fang Yizhi’s death, but Yu Yingshi has argued convincingly that Fang drowned himself at the Bank of Fear and Bewilderment (Huangkong tan 惶恐灘), a place associated with Wen Tianxiang. See Yu Yingshi, Fang Yizhi wanjie kao. 155. Huang is said to have drowned himself on the fifth day of the fifth month, the festival commemorating Qu Yuan’s death; see note 67 and Zhu Yizun, Jingzhi ju shihua, 2: 648. However, this is contested, and he seems not to have died immediately; see Ellen Widmer’s chapter in this volume. Huang compared himself to Qu Yuan (“An exiled Qu Yuan, to the end defiant and unbending, / A homeless

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mourning their deaths invariably invoke the model of Qu Yuan. 156 Self-definition through Chuci symbolism is especially prevalent in the writings of Wang Fuzhi and Qu Dajun. Wang’s provenance from Hunan allows assertions of geographical affinities; the happy accident of Qu’s surname facilitates ubiquitous assertions of descent from Qu Yuan, both in his own works and in works addressed to or written about him. In general, “the south” became a movable entity in the writings of Lingnan poets, who were adept at merging the imagery of the south in Chuci with their own geographical location in the far south. The elegiac memoirs that retrace the life of refinement, pleasures, and passions in Jiangnan also underline the symbolism of the south. More generally, memory was a resource for inner resistance. In her chapter, Li analyzes how encounters with persons, places, and objects from the world before the fall allow that world to be relived through remembrance and writing in Wu Weiye’s poetry. Early Qing writings are full of such examples; what is of interest is how the contours of “mindscape” differ in the literature of remembrance. The figure of the mourner and “the person who remembers,” as well as objects that trigger memory and historical ruminations of a lost world, recur in many works discussed in this volume, including Wu Weiye’s The Terrace of Communication with Heaven and Spring in Moling, Hong Sheng’s Palace of Lasting Life, and Kong Shangren’s Peach Blossom Fan. Ōki and Hegel, in their discussions of memoirs from this period— Zhang Dai’s Dream Memories of Tao’an (Tao’an Mengyi 陶庵夢憶), Yu Huai’s Miscellaneous Records of the Plank Bridge, and Mao Xiang’s Reminiscences of the Plum Shadows Convent (Yingmei an yiyu 影梅庵 憶語)—explore the claims of memory. Zhang Dai claimed that his remembrances and writing could be redemptive because of their under————— Li Bo who would only feign madness” 去國屈原終婞直，無家李白只佯狂) in “Qiuri yu Du zi guo Gaozuo si deng Yuhua tai” 秋日與杜子過高座寺登雨花臺; see Zhuo Erkan, Ming yimin shi, 1.11–12. 156. That is, except in the case of Fang Yizhi, whose suicide is referred to only obliquely. But even in this case, one of the elegiac poems by Pan Jiang 潘江 compares Fang to Qu Yuan, thereby implicitly alluding to the fact that Fang drowned himself (“Qu Yuan reborn, again in the gengyin year” 再世屈庚寅; in “Li sao,” attributed to Qu Yuan, the lyrical subject declares that he descended to earth on the gengyin day; Fang Yizhi also took the tonsure in the year gengyin [1650]), see Yu Yingshi, Fang Yizhi wanjie kao, p. 226.

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lying mood of “repentance.” His is a paradoxical repentance, however. The book is for the most part devoted to summoning and savoring visions of a lost world, with scant regard for irony or critical distance. Hegel notes Zhang Dai’s merciless gaze on the less than glamorous life of some Yangzhou prostitutes. 157 But neither this nor the intermittently considered theme of retribution 158 suffices as counterpoint to Zhang Dai’s pervasive nostalgia or his implicit invitation to the reader to empathize with his “dream memories.” As Zhang Dai defiantly declared in the preface to another of his books, The Quest for Dreams at West Lake (Xihu mengxun 西湖夢尋), the West Lake of his dreams was much more real and compelling than the devastated West Lake of the post-conquest period. Yu Huai’s memoir of the Qinhuai pleasure quarters, Miscellaneous Records of the Plank Bridge, dispenses with the idea of repentance altogether, a somewhat perfunctory reference to the function of his book as a warning in the preface notwithstanding. Yu Huai claimed that the vicissitudes of the pleasure quarters were an index to mutability in general and, more specifically, to the glories and decline of the Ming dynasty. Indeed, numerous poems remembering the pleasures and passions of Qinhuai purport to be serious historical retrospection and elegies for the Ming, a prominent example being Du Jun’s “Song on Having First Heard the Drums and Flutes on the Lantern Boats” 初聞 燈船鼓吹歌, written in 1647 when he was on a boat on Qinhuai River. 159 More generally, accounts of writings by and about women become the dominant strain in the nostalgic literature of remembrance in this period; examples are the works of Mao Xiang, Yu Huai, and Chen Weisong. Indeed, the same tropes persist in the “mediated nostalgia” of the next generation, as evinced by the poetic anecdotes in Xu Qiu’s (1636–1708) 徐釚 Sequel to Poems in Their Original Contexts (Xu ————— 157. See the entries “Romantic Life on the Twenty-four Bridges” 二十四橋風月 and “Lean Horses of Yangzhou” 揚州瘦馬 in Zhang Dai 張岱, Tao’an mengyi, ed. Tu Youxiang 屠友祥 (Shanghai: Shanghai yuandong, 1995), pp. 118–19, 160–62. 158. See Zhang’s preface to the Tao’an mengyi, as well as his observations on how past extravagance leads to present devastation in “The Incense Market of West Lake” 西湖香市 and “The Yue Custom of Visiting Ancestral Grave” 越俗掃墓, in Tao’an mengyi, pp. 24–25, 189–90. 159. Zhuo Erkan, Ming yimin shi, 2.57–60. The poem is also included in Xu Qiu 徐釚, Xu benshi shi 續本事詩, in Meng Qi 孟棨 et al., Benshi shi/Xu benshi shi/ Benshi ci 本事詩續本事詩本事詞, ed. Li Xueying 李學潁 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1991), pp. 235–37.

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benshi shi 續本事詩, author’s prefatory “General Principles” dated 1672, published in 1704). As Yu Huai dwelled on the links between courtesan culture and early Ming history, 160 he also implied that nostalgia for the Qinhuai world was a mode of loyalism. The context to this implied assertion may be understood through the widespread use of idioms of romantic passion to lament the fall of the Ming dynasty. 161 Some obvious examples come to mind—a number of Chen Zilong’s song lyrics, 162 Wang Fuzhi’s song lyrics on “withering willows” 衰柳 and on reading the final words of the Song philosopher Shao Yong 邵雍 (1011–77), 163 Shen Shizhu’s 沈士柱 (d. 1659) “Twenty-four Palace Poems” (“Gongci ershisi shou” 宮詞二十四首), 164 and Qian Qianyi’s poems written in response to Wu Weiye’s “Thoughts of the Past at Qin River: Four Poems” (“Qinhe ganjiu sishou” 琴河感舊四首). 165 Wu’s “Qin River” poems are ————— 160. Yu Huai observed that courtesan quarters known as “sixteen towers” were instituted by the first Ming emperor, and elite women were driven into prostitution in the bloody aftermath of Emperor Chengzu’s seizure of power. 161. Of course, the allegorical connections between the romantic and the political realms have deep roots in the tradition. 162. For example, Chen Zilong’s song lyrics to the tunes “Jiangcheng zi” (Bing qi chun jin) 江城子: 病起春盡 and “Dian jiangchen” (Chunri fengyu yougan) 點絳 唇: 春日風雨有感. Chen concluded his anguished lament over the crumbling of the rump Ming court with an image of the poet holding the goddess’s hand and asking questions of heaven (“I should only hold hands with the goddess of Sunlit Terrace, / And with ink splashed on the walls of Chu, ask questions of heaven” 惟應攜手陽臺女，楚壁淋漓一問天; these lines allude to the goddess figure and “Heavenly Questions” in the Chuci and “Fu on Gaotang,” which develops from the Chuci tradition); see his “Dujuan xing” 杜鵑行 (Chen Zilong shiji, 1: 300). Li Kanghua notes the similarities of diction between Chen’s love lyrics and his political lyrics (Ming Qing zhi ji Jiangnan cixue sixiang yanjiu, pp. 81–84); see also Kang-i Sun Chang, The Late-Ming Poet Chen Tzu-lung: Crises of Love and Loyalism (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1990). 163. Wang Fuzhi, song lyrics to the tune “Die lian hua” and “Qiluo xiang,” respectively, in Chuanshan quanshu, 15: 763, 788. 164. Some examples are cited in Huang Zongxi, Sijiu lu, Huang Zongxi quanji, pp. 351–52. See also the combination of political and romantic references in his “Untitled Poems” (“Wuti” 無題), which were probably written before the fall of the Ming, cited in QSJS, 1: 57–58. Shen Shizhu is better known by his sobriquet Kuntong 崑桐. 165. See Qian Qianyi, “Du Meicun gongzhan yanshi yougan shu hou sishou” 讀梅村宮詹艷詩有感書後四首, in Youxue ji, 1: 116–18; Wu Weiye, “Qinhe ganjiu,” in Wu Meicun quanji, 1: 160. Qian wrote in the preface to his poems that Wu also

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not political, but other poems Wu Weiye wrote about Bian Sai 卞賽 (cognomen the Daoist Yujing 玉京道人, ca. 1620s–ca. 1660s) after the fall of the Ming 166 fuse regrets for lost love with his guilt over his own compromises with the new regime. Song Zhengyu also used the topos of betraying a woman’s love as an implied analogy for his change of loyalties. 167 The language of romantic love could thus express longing and lament for the fallen dynasty as well as convey guilt, regrets, and confusion over one’s political decisions. Mao Xiang did not claim any political significance for his reminiscences of his concubine, the former courtesan Dong Bai 董白 (cognomen Xiaowan 小宛), despite Yu Huai’s suggestion to the contrary in an essay celebrating Mao Xiang’s birthday. 168 However, the fact that passion is on public display in Reminiscences of the Plum Shadow Convent, and even more so in Collected Writings of Kindred Spirits (Tongren ji 同人集) points to the fluid boundary between private and public sentiments. The union between Mao Xiang and Dong Bai was brought about by the intervention of Mao’s literati and official friends, 169 and her death was mourned in a similarly collective fashion. Ōki notes how the commemoration of a beloved concubine, whose death was caused at least in part by her sufferings during the years of dynastic transition, involved a web of literary gatherings and social connections. As scholars such as Xie Guozhen and Xie Zhengguang have shown, such associations often have political implications. 170 ————— used romantic-erotic imagery to express political anguish, following late Tang models such as Li Shangyin 李商隱 (813–58) and Han Wo 韓偓 (844–923). Wu Weiye for his part protested that his own “Qin River” poems, which mourn the end of his relationship with the courtesan Bian Sai 卞賽, were not political and allusive like Qian’s poems; see Wu’s Meicun shihua 梅村詩話, in Wu Meicun quanji, 3: 1139–40. 166. Aside from “Qin River,” dated 1650, these include “Ting nü daoshi Bian Yujing tanqin ge” (1651) and “Guo Jinshulin Yujing Daoren mu bing zhuan” 過錦 樹林玉京道人墓并傳 (1660s). For a discussion, see my “Heroic Transformations,” pp. 412–23. 167. See Song’s song lyric “Autumn Chamber” 秋閨, to the tune “Die lianhua” 蝶戀花. 168. For translations from this essay, see the chapter by Yasushi Ōki in this volume. 169. Such interventions made Mao appear like a passive and irresolute lover, although Mao seemed quite impervious to the irony. 170. See Xie Guozhen, Ming Qing dangshe yundong kao; and Xie Zhengguang, Qingchu shiwen yu shiren jiaoyou kao.

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Yu Huai asserted the connection between the romantic and the political spheres of experience more boldly. Fang Yizhi and Jiang Gai 姜 垓 (1614–53), the self-indulgent pranksters of Qinhuai, became staunch loyalists. Ōki points out the inclusion of politically sensitive anecdotes on Ming martyrs in Miscellaneous Records. Indeed, the idea that heroism and moral integrity can accommodate romantic liaisons or that apparently indulgent behavior actually masks or perhaps even encourages moral resolve is a constant refrain in early Qing literature. The martyrdom of the courtesan Ge Nen 葛嫩 and her lover, the late Ming official Sun Lin 孫臨 (cognomen Kexian 克咸, 1611–46), told of in Miscellaneous Records is echoed, for example, in the heroic image of courtesans like Liu Rushi in poems penned by her admirers and of Li Xiang jun 李香君 in Peach Blossom Fan. The same logic of the defense of the romantic-aesthetic realm accounts for the transformation of traditional femmes fatales into redemptive, self-sacrificing figures, as in the representation of Prized Consort Yang in Palace of Lasting Life and of Zhang Lihua 張麗華 in Wu Weiye’s Facing Spring Pavilion. 171 Facing Spring Pavilion also features the martial hero Lady Xian 洗 夫人 from the far south. Like the female Yao 猺 general Yunduo niang 雲嚲娘 in Kuang Lu’s 鄺露 (1604–50) Chiya 赤雅 and another heroic woman in late Ming history, Qin Liangyu 秦良玉, wife of a local chieftain from the distant mountains of Sichuan, Lady Xian embodies the fantasy of rectification or perhaps even salvation coming from the margins of civilization. At first glance, heroic endeavor would appear to be the opposite of victimhood, yet literature from this period often turns victims into heroes. The female protagonists in Ding Yaokang’s West Lake Fan, Song Xiangxian 宋湘仙 and Song Juanjuan 宋娟娟, suffer abduction and displacement, yet they manage to defend their chastity. By inscribing poems on the walls of a post station at the mid-point of the play (scene 16), they claim their moment of self-expression. Like other displaced women described in poetic anecdotes about the Ming-Qing transition, they bear witness and represent the injunction to remember and to comprehend that historical moment. In a sense the displaced woman becomes the historian—she crosses the boundary of private and public space, self-revelation and self-effacement. Normally secluded within the ————— 171. For a detailed discussion of Wu Weiye’s plays, see Tschanz, “Early Qing Drama and the Dramatic Works of Wu Weiye.”

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inner chambers, her story is now available for public view and empathy. Suffering her fate as a victim, she yet claims moral superiority and the authority of protest and historical judgment. As prefatory material, Ding Yaokang included the account that inspired his play—a courtesan, Song Juan, wrote poems with an autobiographical preface on the walls of an inn as she was being abducted and taken north. 172 Song Xiangxian’s poems are also based on the poems attributed to one Song Huixiang, variously identified as a palace lady from Jinling ( Ji Liuqi’s 計六奇 Ming ji nanlüe 明季南略, completed in 1671; Wang Duanshu’s Yinhong ji 吟紅集) or a Qinhuai courtesan (Yu Huai’s Banqiao zaji; Chen Weisong’s Furenji 婦人集). 173 The numerous accounts of victimized women leaving poetic testimonies on walls and inspiring poetic responses, as well as male poets who assume the identity of such women, 174 testify to the resonance of this recurrent topos. 175 ————— 172. Ding Yaokang 丁耀亢, Ding Yaokang quanji 丁耀亢全集, ed. Li Cengpo 李 曾坡 and Zhang Qingji 張清吉 (Zhengzhou: Zhongzhou guji chubanshe, 1999), 1: 743–44. Song Luo 宋犖 (seventeenth c.) wrote a quatrain on reading Song Juan’s poem in the Qingfeng dian; see Xu Qiu, Xu benshi shi, p. 294. Curiously enough, Song Juan is also the name of the woman who wins a contest of talent and beauty—the contest, like similar competitions in courtesan quarters, parodies the civil service examination—during the Jurchen occupation of Yangzhou in Ding’s Xu Jinpingmei, chap. 53; Ding Yaokang quanji, 2: 427–28. 173. See QSJS, 22: 15625–27; and Wang Duanshu, Yinhong ji 13.10b–15a. Song Huixiang’s story is also told in Xu Qiu, Xu benshi shi; Shi Runzhang 施閏章, Huozhai shihua 蠖齋詩話; Jin Yan 金燕, Xianglian shihua 香奩詩話; and Wang Yu, Jiangsu shizheng. Those who wrote response poems include You Tong, the famous loyalist Zhang Huangyan 張煌言 (1620–64), and the woman poets Wang Duanshu (Yinhong ji) and Wu Qi 吳琪 (fl. 1630–70) (Shiyuan ba mingjia ji 詩媛八名家集, “Wu Ruixian shixuan,” 吳蕊僊詩選, 15b–16a). In Zhongxiang ci, the first of Song’s poems is attributed to Wu Fanghua 吳芳華, a woman from Qiantang. The different versions of Song Huixiang’s story and various attributions of the poems suggest oral transmission. Her shifting identities as palace lady and courtesan imply that cataclysmic disaster is in effect a relentless “equalizer.” 174. The most famous example was Wu Zhaoqian, who, under the name Liu Susu 劉素素, wrote twenty quatrains on the walls of the temple of Huqiu with an “autobiographical preface” telling of abduction and virtual imprisonment under “barbarian tents.” These poems, dated to the late 1640s, invited numerous response poems (QSJS, 4: 1958–60). During his trek to Ningguta in 1657, Wu wrote a hundred quatrains on the walls of a post station at Zhuozhou and signed himself “Wang Qianniang, a woman from Jinling” 金陵女子王倩娘; see Xu Qiu, Xu benshi shi, p. 374.

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The term for uncompromising political integrity of remnant subjects, kujie, was also used in the cult of chastity, especially for widows who resisted remarriage and endured long years of hardship and loneliness. The political implications of the discourse on chastity are obvious, from Meng Chengshun’s 孟稱舜 (1599–1684) eulogy of absolute chastity in The Story of Chastity and Talent (Zhenwen ji 貞文記) 176 to Li Yu’s 李漁 ironic defense of compromised chastity in “The Seven Ruses of the Female Chen Ping” 女陳平計生七出, a story in Silent Opera (Wusheng xi 無聲戲). In sum, various versions of womanly virtues and vices are allegorized in terms of national destiny in this period. 177 In the examples above, men allegorize women. To arrive at a fuller picture of women’s agency and self-representation, we need to examine the rich corpus of women’s writings from this period, the subject of several recent studies. 178 Many dwell on the meaning of writing in troubled times with a new sense of mission. Discontent with gender roles sometimes became the precondition and impetus for, or the consequence of, political engagement. This was true of the heroic women involved in loyalist resistance mentioned above as well as “concerned onlookers,” such as Gu Zhenli 顧貞立 (1628–99) and Zhou Qiong 周瓊. ————— 175. On the genre of “poems inscribed on walls,” see Judith Zeitlin, “Disappearing Verses: Writing on Walls and Anxieties of Loss,” in Writing and Materiality in China: Essays in Honor of Patrick Hanan, ed. Zeitlin and Lydia Liu (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Asia Center, 2003), pp. 73–132. 176. The full title of Zhenwen ji is Zhang Yuniang guifang sanqing yingwu mu zhenwen ji 張玉娘閨房三清鸚鵡墓貞文記. It is included in Guben xinqu congkan er ji 古本戲曲叢刊二集. Wilt Idema discusses the play in “Female Talent and Female Virtue: Xu Wei’s Nü zhuangyuan and Meng Chengshun’s Zhenwen ji,” in Ming Qing xiqu guoji yantaohui lunwenji 明清戲曲國際研討會論文集, ed. Hua Wei 華瑋 and Wang Ailing 王璦玲 (Taipei: Academia Sinica, 1998), pp. 549–72. 177. See Wai-yee Li, “Heroic Transformations.” Li also discusses Facing Spring Pavilion and The Story of Chastity and Talent in that essay. 178. See Ellen Widmer, “The Epistolary World of Female Talent in SeventeenthCentury China,” Late Imperial China 10, no. 2 (1989): 1–43; Ko, Teachers of the Inner Chamber; Kang-i Sun Chang, “Ming and Qing Anthologies of Women’s Poetry and Their Selection Strategies,” Maureen Robertson, “Changing the Subject: Gender and Self-inscription in Authors’ Prefaces and ‘Shi’ Poetry,” Widmer, “Ming Loyalism and Women’s Voice in Fiction After Honglou meng” in Writing Women in Late Imperial China, pp. 147–70, 171–217, 366–96; Kang-i Sun Chang, “Modai cainü di liluan shi” 末代才女的亂離詩, in idem, Wenxue di shengyin 文學的聲音 (Taipei: Sanmin shuju, 2001), pp. 41–72; and Grace Fong, “Herself an Author: Gender, Writing, and Agency in Late Imperial China” (book manuscript).

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The fusion of private and public, romantic and political, sentiments, so prevalent in the poetic tradition and so frequently the basis of allegorical interpretations, was often self-consciously manipulated in women’s writings, notably the poetry of Liu Shu, Liu Rushi, Xu Can, and Li Yin. The images and narratives produced in male representations of women encompass the authors’ apology and regrets, nostalgia and critical distance, self-justification and self-indictment and are inseparable from their memories of and reflections on the traumatic dynastic transition. In other words, there is a deepening of subjectivity and self-scrutiny. During the early Qing, great thinkers such as Wang Fuzhi and Gu Yanwu criticized late Ming intellectual trends and literary styles for what they saw as misguided and inflated concerns with genuineness and subjectivity. 179 At the same time, early Qing writings that purport to bear witness to and remember the traumatic dynastic transition and to represent how selves and identities were shattered and reconstituted obsessively insist on the genuineness of experience and expression. This is true of the memoirs discussed in this volume, as well as some wellknown diaries, such as Daily Records Beginning with the Journey on the Day Jia ( Jiaxing rizhu 甲行日注) by Ye Shaoyuan (1539–1648). 180 On the philosophical front, Chen Que 陳 確 (1604–77) defended selfinterest (si 私 ) as the fundamental impetus to moral action; while Huang Zongxi treats self-interest almost as a nascent consciousness of rights and a bulwark against the claims of absolute sovereignty: in a surprisingly pragmatic twist to an utopian vision, justice is realized as a balance of self-interests through negotiations and mutual limits. 181 In this period, a rich corpus of writings on the discourse of the self— diaries, letters, prefaces, and biographical and autobiographical accounts as well as the memoirs and genres of self-elegy mentioned above—chart new dimensions in the rhetoric of interiority, genuine————— 179. See, e.g., Wang Fuzhi, Chuanshan quanshu, 12: 9–13, 478, 483–89, 557–60, 569–70, 625, 632, 640–42, 648; Gu Yanwu, Rizhi lu jishi 日知錄集釋, ed. Huang Rucheng 黃汝成 (Zhengzhou: Zhongzhou guji chubanshe, 1990 [1936]), pp. 429–45. 180. On Ye Shaoyuan’s diary, see Grace Fong, “Reclaiming Subjectivity in a Time of Loss: Ye Shaoyuan and Autobiographical Writing in the Ming-Qing Transition,” paper presented at the Discourses on Disorder in Sixteenth and Seventeenth Century China workshop. The translation of the title is Fong’s. 181. See Huang Zongxi, “Yuanjun” 原君, in Mingyi daifang lu 明夷待訪錄; and Chen Que 陳確, “Si shuo” 私說, in Chen Que ji 陳確集 (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1979), 1: 257–59.

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ness, and role-playing. In surveying existential choices, we have seen how roles and identities are taken up, transformed, or discarded. This phenomenon can be seen in all genres, but the role-playing and illusionism of the theater may render it particularly suited to such ruminations, as shown in the drama section. 182 To ponder the contours of self and role as defined through words and enacted illusion is to consider the claims of art. Early Qing writers developed various versions of aesthetic transcendence, as they reflected on the uses and abuses of the arts and explored the burden of confronting historical trauma. Before claims of transcendence, however, came accusations of self-indulgence. The Southern Ming court could with some justification have claimed literary and artistic prominence 183 —the Hongguang emperor was interested in painting, calligraphy, and, more problematically, the theater; and Grand Secretary Ma Shiying 馬士英 ( jinshi 1619, d. ca. 1646) was a gifted painter, Grand Academician Wang Duo 王鐸 (1592–1652) a famous calligrapher, and Minister of War Ruan Dacheng 阮大鋮 (1587–1646) a talented poet and playwright. 184 Instead, these accomplishments, especially those associated with the theater, contributed to the perception of the Southern Ming’s frivolity and decadence. There are thus inherent anxieties and conflicts in the assertion of aesthetic transcendence. Of the arts, painting seems to have afforded the most unproblematic escape. A group of renowned yimin artists, including Zhu Da, Yun Shouping, Hongren 弘忍 (1610–63), Gong Xian 龔賢 (ca. 1618–89), and Shi Tao 石濤 (1642–1708), expressed through images and words the notion that paintings open up the world of dreams, memories, and private symbolism. Numerous poems on paintings articulate the same idea. Zhu Da infused the painted image with nostalgia: “The one peak yet paints the mountains and rivers of Song” 一峰還寫宋山河. 185 For Leng Shimei 冷士嵋 (1628–1710), memory merged effortlessly with dreams. ————— 182. See also Tina Lu, Persons, Roles, and Minds: Identity in “Peony Pavilion” and “Peach Blossom Fan” (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2001). 183. See Xia Wanchun 夏完淳 (1631–47), Xu xingcun lu 續幸存錄, in Xia Wanchun ji jianjiao 夏完淳集箋校, ed. Bai Jian 白堅 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1991), p. 475. 184. Castigations of Ruan Dacheng’s political maneuverings sometimes accompany appreciation of his talent as a playwright; see, e.g., Zhang Dai 張岱, Tao’an mengyi, p. 221. 185. Zhuo Erkan, Ming yimin shi, 11.459.

Introduction Do not regard paintings as merely painted, The mountains in the painting are the mountains in dreams.

61 莫把畫圖看作畫 畫中山是夢中山

Sometimes the painted realm seemed to promise an escape that is tantalizingly close but ultimately unattainable, as in Wang Fuzhi’s song lyrics on paintings of the Xiao and Xiang Rivers: Even with ten thousand falling petals, And several curves of a flowing stream, This is not the road escaping Qin. 186

便萬點落英 幾灣流水 不是避秦路

In the last act of Peach Blossom Fan, the Daoist Zhang Wei 張薇 tears the fan with peach blossoms that Yang Wencong 楊文驄 (d. 1646)— historically a heroic martyr but in the play a morally dubious character—had painted with Li Xiang jun’s spilled blood, and then he returns to his mountain retreat, which is decorated with Lan Ying’s 藍瑛 (1585– 1660+) paintings of the immortal realm, possibly reminiscent of the Peach Blossom Spring. 187 The symmetry is deceptively simple: the painting implicated in romantic and political passions is destroyed, and the ones that beckon as an escape from history continue to exert their power offstage. However, the solution is merely provisional. Unappeased longing and anguish resurface again in the epilogue to the play. In the epilogue, the guardians of memory come back. The Master of Rituals 老 贊 禮 , the storyteller Liu Jingting, and the musician Su Kunsheng 蘇崑生 come together to remember and commemorate the fall of the Ming dynasty. Musicians and performers as purveyors of memory are also featured in Wu Weiye’s poetry and his play Spring in Moling, as Li and Tschanz note in their chapters. Through repetition ————— 186. Wang Fuzhi, “Dongzhou taolang Xiao Xiang xiao bajing ci zhi san” 東州桃 浪蕭湘小八景詞之三, to the tune “Mo yu’er” 摸魚兒, in Chuanshan quanshu, 15: 794. In Tao Qian’s account, the world at the end of the Peach Blossom Spring was founded by people fleeing the tyranny of Qin. 187. Lan Ying paints screens with scenes from the Peach Blossom Spring for Zhang Wei’s Pine Wind Pavilion (scene 28). It is not clear if Zhang Wei takes them with him as he leaves with Cai Yisuo for the mountains (scene 30)—although the fact that he has taken Cai Yisuo’s “five cartloads of classics and histories” (scene 40) suggests that the painted screens might have been brought along. More to the point, although Pine Wind Pavilion is presented as an inadequate Peach Blossom Spring, Zhang’s retreat in the mountain, where he can study and “recline as his spirit wanders” among Lan Ying’s paintings, is the implied “real” Peach Blossom Spring.

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and the workings of memory, music becomes reflective, sometimes even redemptive. Zeitlin in her study of Palace of Lasting Life and Hegel in his of Romance of the Sui and Tang Dynasties demonstrate the concern with the transmission, reproduction, and representation of music that supposedly symbolizes sensual indulgence and court decadence in the lore of Consort Yang and Tang Emperor Xuanzong. Anxieties are thereby transmuted into claims of transcendence in the retrospective apology for the life of pleasures and passions and for the role of art in Palace of Lasting Life. In comparison, Chu Renhuo treated the idea of “musical transcendence” with irony and ambivalence in Romance of the Sui and Tang Dynasties. More generally, the mediatory and cathartic functions of the theater are self-consciously explored in all the plays discussed in this volume, with the uses and the abuses of the theater especially crucial concerns in Peach Blossom Fan. The premises of fiction, especially the relationships between history and fiction and between experience and imagination, are likewise probed in the memoirs and stories examined here (Barr’s chapter). In some ways, literary artifice manifests itself as a strategy for comprehending and coping with momentous events and chaotic circumstances. Thus in Peach Blossom Fan, for example, meticulous attention to historical accuracy and an abiding anxiety about disorder are subsumed under a deep concern with formal symmetry and theatricality. In this sense, the play shares a secret affinity with Li Yu’s improbable stories on families shattered and reunited in the turmoil of history (Lu’s chapter). The extravagant coincidences in Li Yu’s stories foreground issues of fictionality, even as the careful juxtapositions in Peach Blossom Fan draw attention to theatrical self-consciousness. Ultimately, all versions of aesthetic transcendence are about imposing form and meaning on traumatic experience, although often with a deep awareness of the flaws and repressions that such attempts must involve. Aesthetic mediation apart, transcendence may also be conceived as the object of representation. The theme of reconciliation runs through many of the chapters in this volume. Yim notes how Hanke’s poems on his life in exile in the distant northeast point to a kind of acceptance of his fate and perhaps also reconciliation—at times rueful and ironic—with the new regime. Tschanz suggests that Wu Weiye’s plays may be understood in terms of the shifts in his attitude “from defiance to resignation and finally to accommodation.” Tina Lu posits “fictional reunions in the wake of dynastic fall” as the paradigm for imagining

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how familial, social, and political order is undermined, destroyed, or re-established. As such, fictional reunions may be related to “happy endings” in more conventional romantic plots that affirm personal happiness, familial order, and acceptance of a potentially alienating political order, such as obtained in West Lake Fan and Spring in Moling, discussed in the chapters by Idema and Tschanz, respectively. Fictional reunions sometimes call for heartbreaking compromises. The “remarkable woman” in Xu Fang’s 徐芳 eponymous tale has to sacrifice her chastity and abandon her child in order to be reunited with her husband (Barr’s chapter). Lu shows that it is precisely the tensions and fissures brought on by compromises that motivate the creation of ingenious and elaborate systems of inversions and exchange in the stories by Li Yu, Zhou Lianggong, and Lu Ciyun. These stories, which have a parallel in Li Yu’s play Unexpected Reunion (Qiao tuanyuan 巧團圓), as well as in anecdotal literature and poetic accounts, such as Shi Runzhang’s 施閏章 (1618–83) “Reunited Mirror” (“Wanjing pian” 完鏡篇) and “The Dodder and the Duckweed” (“Tusi fuping pian” 菟絲浮萍 篇), 188 dramatize the necessity of a reconstituted, albeit compromised, order, even as they toy with the idea of their own implausibility. In this sense, they are different from the accounts of filial sons in search of their parents, such as the versions of Huang Xiang jian’s story mentioned above. In those cases, the affirmation of familial order as recompense for the breakdown of political order is presented as less problematic. Perhaps more typical, however, are the accounts in which shattered families emblematize a more general disintegration. Lu Xinxing 陸莘行, for example, chronicled how her father Lu Qi 陸圻 (b. 1614) became a monk and then disappeared in the aftermath of the Ming history case in “How My Old Father Came to Wander Off Like a Cloud” (“Laofu yunyou shimo” 老父雲游始末). According to Lu, her brother died from anguish after an unsuccessful filial trek in search of their father. 189 The redemptive effect of the passage of time sometimes resulted in a mode of transcendence that dissolved the particularities of a traumatic historical moment into perennial universals. Barr points out, for ex————— 188. Shi Runzhang 施閏章, Shi Yushan ji 施愚山集 (Hefei: Huangshan shushe, 1992–93); QSJS, 3: 1729; Yan Dichang, Qing shi shi, pp. 516–22. 189. Lu Xinxing 陸莘行, Qiusi caotang yiji 秋思草堂遺集, in Lidai biji xiaoshuo xuan (Qing) 歷代筆記小說選 (清) (Taipei: Shangwu yinshuguan, n.d.), 1: 65–72; Deng Zhicheng, Qingshi jishi chubian, 1: 257.

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ample, how the political context is repressed in Niu Xiu’s “Encounter in the Snow” (“Xue gou” 雪遘). The relationship between Zha Jizuo and Wu Liuqi 吳六奇, whose talents were recognized by Zha when Wu was destitute and who rises to become a general and eventually saves Zha when he is in distress, is presented through old topoi of recognition, recompense, and reciprocity. No mention is made of Zha’s status as a well-known yimin, his interest in the history of Ming-Qing transition, the details of his implication in the Ming history case, or Wu’s defection from the Southern Ming to the side of Manchu invaders. This is the fictional equivalent of poetic meditations on the past—many of Wang Shizhen’s poems in this subgenre, for example—that embrace vicissitudes through the ages rather than focus on a specific historical moment. In some ways, works as varied as Romance of the Sui and Tang Dynasties, Palace of Lasting Life, and Peach Blossom Fan draw on the same universalizing impulse, despite the meticulous historical references in Peach Blossom Fan and the obvious historical resonance of dynastic crisis and courtly decadence in the other two works. Hegel argues that historical trauma is displaced as nostalgia for other historical moments in Romance and as critical appraisal of them. Zeitlin shows how Hong Sheng’s presentation of the creation and transmission of the “Rainbow Skirt and Feathered Coat” tunes compels reflections on the playwright as creator of words and music and of chuanqi drama as spectacle, as well as mediated and unmediated musical performances. Owen takes us beyond the usual nexus of historical problems in the critical literature on Peach Blossom Fan and demonstrates how the perimeters of self and role, as well as the boundaries between the political and the theatrical and between reality and illusion, summon persistent questions of theatricality. With both Hong Sheng and Kong Shangren, one may say that the universalizing impulse converges seamlessly with meta-theatrical consciousness and implicit claims of aesthetic transcendence.

The Interpretive Choices I will conclude with a review of some persistent biases in the study of early Qing literature and culture and a brief excursus on how interpretive habits correlate with existential and literary choices and cultural value. Foremost among these is the tendency to valorize the writings of martyrs and “remnant subjects.” This is no doubt justified by the in-

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trinsic merits of such writings, as evinced by the towering intellectual achievement of thinkers such as Wang Fuzhi, Gu Yanwu, Huang Zongxi, and Li Yong; or the literary interest of, among many others, Chen Zilong, Wu Jiaji, Fang Wen, Qu Dajun, and other yimin writers discussed in this volume. But there are also extrinsic factors. The traditional emphasis on “political integrity” (qijie 氣節) can be useful for the reigning dynasty, as the Qianlong emperor realized. 190 It also turns martyrs and remnant subjects into inspirational figures, especially during moments of national crisis. Lynn Struve notes the irony of mid-nineteenth-century scholar-officials using “the seventeenthcentury anti-Qing resistance saga to reinforce dedication to the Qing state and social order” during the Taiping Rebellion. 191 Political integrity can be universalized and adapted to serve different narratives. During the late Qing, as the new dynastic crisis fused with the old one, those opposed to the regime sought prototypes of traitors, heroes, and martyrs from the Ming-Qing transition. The fall of the Qing dynasty did inspire laments that mourned its demise with conscious references to early Qing writings on the Ming (e.g., in some poems by Wang Guowei 王國維 [1877–1927]). Far more pervasive, however, was the sense of deep alienation from the regime, perceived as corrupt, anti-modern, and, after all, “foreign.” In due time the emphasis on political integrity merges with the discourse of nationalism, as qijie becomes minzu qijie 民族氣節 (the political integrity of a people). Stories of Ming loyalist resistance fanned the flames of anti-Qing sentiments in the last years of the Qing dynasty, inspired the broader quest for national identity in the Republic, and became a rallying cry during the Sino-Japanese War (1937–45). Sun Jing’an 孫靜庵 compiled The Records of Ming Remnant Subjects (Ming yimin lu 明遺民錄) during the late Qing, and it was published, significantly, in 1911. Struve documents how Chen Qubing 陳去病 (1874–1933), Zhang Binglin 章炳麟 (1868– 1936), and Liu Shipei 劉 師 培 (1884–1919) of the National Essence (Guocui 國粹) movement published extensively on Ming loyalists be————— 190. While banning writings that contained anti-Manchu sentiments, the Qianlong emperor also canonized Ming martyrs. For an illuminating analysis of the Qianlong emperor’s guidelines on how the conquest was to be remembered, see Struve, The Ming-Qing Conflict, pp. 60–68. 191. Ibid., p. 74. As Struve points out, Wang Fuzhi’s oeuvre was resurrected and published through the efforts of his fellow Hunanese, the Qing loyalist Zeng Guofan 曾國藩 (1811–72).

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tween 1905 and 1912. 192 A generation later, Zhu Xizu 朱希祖 (1879– 1945), Liu Yazi 柳亞子 (1887–1958), Xie Guozhen, and others continued to write on the Ming-Qing conflict, implicitly addressing issues of national destiny as China suffered the chaos and destruction of the Warlord period (1916–27) and the Sino-Japanese War. Many modern editions of writings by martyrs and yimin, as well as writings deemed to express loyalist sentiments, date to the late Qing, the early Republican era, and the Sino-Japanese War; these periods also produced a steady stream of literary representations of the Ming-Qing transition. 193 Beyond nationalism, there is fascination with the spirit of remnant subjects ( yimin jingshen 遺民精神), which is taken to represent opposition to oppression and authoritarianism. 194 Because remnant subjects chose not to participate in government, often while remaining committed to political struggle, social justice, intellectual endeavor, and the transmission of culture, they have spurred questions on the literati’s self-definition and on the justification of power structures. There is also the excitement of “archeology”—the fact that their writings were suppressed and often did not survive intact (if at all) makes the task of retrieval more difficult and poignant, as the literary historian combats the forces of repression, recovers traces, and rescues works from oblivion. Finally, looming over all such concerns are the modern nostalgia for lost worlds and lost causes and our empathy with the romantic idea of creative power embedded in alienation and disempowerment. Such empathy has a compelling historical context. The cataclysmic turmoil of the twentieth century produced drastic ruptures in the Chinese cultural tradition. Cultural nostalgia for a lost world destroyed by modernity, wars, and revolutions has often found metaphors of loss and retrieval from the fall of the Ming, the collapse of the Qing dynasty being too recent, messy, and implicated in forces of destruction. The great historian Chen Yinke devoted his final years, as he suffered blindness, deprivation, and persecution, to a monumental biography of ————— 192. See ibid., pp. 87–127, for a review of twentieth-century historiography on the Ming-Qing conflict. 193. For examples, see Wai-yee Li, “The Late Ming Courtesan: Invention of a Cultural Ideal,” in Writing Women in Late Imperial China, pp. 17–47. 194. Sometimes this view seems to be rooted in a more general sense of rancor against perennial and contemporary repressive forces in Chinese political culture. This is my impression of the long section on poetry by “remnant subjects” in Yan Dichang’s masterful study, Qing shi shi.

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the courtesan-poet Liu Rushi. It is perhaps his own sense of being the “remnant of a culture” (wenhua yimin 文化遺民) that accounts for his empathy with Ming loyalists, “remnant persons” who died for or survived a lost world. A corollary of the valorization of “remnant subjects” is the clear line of demarcation between them and the participants in the new order. There are indeed many examples of how seriously political choices divided friends and family. Zhu Yizun’s apology to Huang Zongxi and Xu Fang’s rejection of Pan Lei have already been mentioned. There are other well-known cases—Gu Yanwu, for example, was thought to be implicitly lampooning Qian Qianyi when he attacked those who “deceive the world with their rhetoric,” 195 and the loyalist poet Fang Shou 方授 (cognomen Ziliu 子留, 1627–53) became estranged from his father Fang Yingqian 方應乾 (1590–1660+), a Qing official who pressured his son to serve the new regime. 196 “Remnant subjects” and “conformers” were not, however, two radically separate camps; both categories encompassed many different shades of choices and inclinations. Often ties of kinship and friendship, webs of literary and social connections, sometimes dating back to the late Ming, persisted across a spectrum of groups with varying political allegiances. 197 Later readers have tended to miss the subtleties and nuances of these relationships and painted categories of “loyalists” and “conformers” with broad strokes. Even a cursory survey of the collections of writings by remnant subjects shows that social interactions between them and Qing officials were common, although there were also many who shunned such contacts (e.g., Xu Fang 徐枋, Xing Fang 邢昉 [1590–1653], Wang Fuzhi). High-ranking Qing officials such as Cao Rong, Gong Dingzi, Zhou Lianggong, and Liang Qingbiao 梁清標 (1620–91), all of them important literary figures in their own right, offered support and refuge to ————— 195. See Gu Yanwu, “Wenci qiren” 文辭欺人, Rizhi lu jiaoshi, 19.451–52. However, Fu Shan, in an annotation to the poem “Wei Li Tiansheng zuo” 為李天生作, cited Gu’s praise of Qian as the leader of the Jiangnan literary community in his lifetime; see Fu Shan 傅山, Shuanghong an ji 霜紅盦集 (Taiyuan: Shanxi renmin chubanshe, 1985), 1: 236; the poem is also cited in Deng Zhicheng, Qingshi jishi chubian, 1: 165. 196. See Fang Wen, Tushan ji; and Xie Zhengguang, Qingchu shiwen yu shiren jiaoyou kao, pp. 109–81. 197. This point is extensively documented in Xie Zhengguang’s study of literary and social connections among early Qing literati, Qingchu shiwen yu shiren jiayou kao.

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remnant subjects, who became their dependents, “literary guests,” or unofficial secretaries. Sometimes remnant subjects being hunted down by the Qing authorities were spared through the intercession of friends serving as Qing officials, whose efforts and resources also on occasion allowed collections of yimin writings to be preserved and published, albeit sometimes in censored versions. Above I noted the existence of yimin poetry societies, but during this period there were also many literary gatherings and associations encompassing persons of all political persuasions. Wang Shizhen’s literary activities in Yangzhou in the 1660s, when he consorted widely with remnant subjects and other Qing officials, provide a good example. 198 The Icy Sky Poetry Society 冰天詩社 in Manchuria, of which Hanke was a member, included remnant subjects and exiled Qing officials; it was presided over by Gaosai 高塞, also called The Master Respecting Oneness 敬一主人 or The Daoist Respecting Oneness 敬一道人, the Manchu prince heading the “branch court” in Sheng jing 盛京 (Shenyang 瀋陽 or Mukden, the pre-conquest capital of the Manchus). 199 Collections of writings also suggest interactions between different political groups. Thus, Mao Xiang’s anthology of writings by himself and his friends, Collected Writings of Kindred Spirits, mentioned in Ōki’s chapter, includes works by remnant subjects and Qing officials and points to the evolution of new literary communities. As Tobie Meyer-Fong notes, early Qing anthologies such as Deng Hanyi’s Shiguan 詩觀 represent “the ongoing construction of a dynamic contemporary sensibility which encompassed both the traumas of the immediate past and the reality of Qing control.” 200 ————— 198. See Jiang Yin 蔣寅, Wang Yuyang shiji zhenglüe 王漁洋事跡徵略 (Beijing: Renmin wenxue chubanshe, 2001), pp. 50–143; and Tobie Meyer-Fong, Building Culture in Early Qing Yangzhou (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2003). 199. In 1621, Nurhaci (1559–1626, posthumous title Emperor Taizu) took Shenyang and four years later set up his capital there. Gaosai was the sixth son of Hong taiji 皇太極 (Abahai, r. 1627–43, eighth son of Nurhaci, posthumous title Emperor Taizong) and the uncle of the Kangxi emperor. His poem mourning Hanke’s death and Yan Ermei’s lines comparing him to the princely literary patron Liang Xiaowang 梁孝王 are included in QSJS, 3: 1521. For more on Gaosai and the literary communities that developed around Manchu princes, see Yan Dichang, Qing shi shi, pp. 21–27. He Zongmei also discusses the Icy Sky Poetry Society in Mingmo Qingchu wenren jieshe yanjiu, pp. 370–96. 200. Tobie Meyer-Fong discusses Shiguan in “Packaging the ‘Men of Our Times’: Literary Anthologies and Political Accommodation in the Early Qing,”

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Another bias is to presume that literary responses to the Ming-Qing conflict are likely to be more moving and forceful if the poets are tortured, anguished, in despair, or driven by contradictory emotions and perspectives (hence the preference for “remnant subjects” and those who served under the Qing with guilt and misgivings). Thus we emphasize loyalism to the exclusion of other perspectives in the writings of remnant subjects, and we look for the elusive, hidden, inner remnant subjects even among those who participated in the new order, even among those born too late. Conversely, suspicion of indifference to or repression of the Ming-Qing conflict can lead to reservations about a writer, as implied in some modern evaluations of Wang Shizhen. 201 This propensity to infer anti-Qing sentiments or to valorize lament and nostalgia for the fallen Ming can be limiting. Yim’s study of Hanke shows how commemorative poems mourning martyrs of the fallen Ming—the usual fodder for those who wish to claim Hanke as one of China’s nationalist or patriotic poets—constitute but one facet of his rich corpus. Hong Sheng’s Palace of Lasting Life and Kong Shangren’s Peach Blossom Fan definitely address the fall of the Ming, but simplistic formulations of lament, nostalgia, or, even more ill advised, “nationalist spirit” (aiguo zhuyi 愛國主義) do not do justice to their complexity. Other important issues in these great plays are explored in the chapters by Zeitlin and Owen and in Idema’s introduction to the drama section. More generally, all the contributors to this volume have shown how engagement with or contextualization by the traumatic dynastic transition can be realized in a wide array of literary choices. Finally, evaluation of literary works from this period often coalesces with moral judgments pertaining to political choices. As Chang shows in her discussion of Qian Qianyi, the rise and fall of Qian’s literary reputation have depended on the interpretation of his attitudes and activities during the Ming-Qing transition. In general, poets who became “twice-serving officials” are credited with a kind of self-redemption if they can be shown to be tortured and shamed by their compromises with the new regime, to sym————— Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 64 (2004): 5–56. As Meyer-Fong notes, poets of diverse political sympathies are included in the Shiguan. For other examples of inclusiveness in early Qing anthologies of contemporary poetry, see Xie Zhengguang, Qingchu ren xuan Qingchu shi huikao. 201. See, e.g., Yan Dichang’s implicit criticism of Wang Shizhen in Qing shi shi, pp. 411–81.

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pathize with the loyalist resistance, or even secretly participate in it. The history of the reception of Qian Qianyi and Wu Weiye is a case in point. The issue, however, is not that they are “justified” by the correct sentiments (explicitly or indirectly expressed). Rather, their works testify to how compromises and hesitations may produce equally compelling or more complex literary creations—to accept such premises is to avoid the moralistic judgments that automatically conflate political integrity with literary achievement. Our challenge, then, is to examine whether moral and literary judgment can and should be separated and, if so, how and to what ends. In other words, it behooves us as latter-day readers to be keenly aware of the evolving conditions of exegesis and evaluation, including our own.

part i

Poetry 7

Confronting History and Its Alternatives in Early Qing Poetry An Introduction

7 Wai-yee Li As we saw in the general introduction to this book, historical trauma foregrounds political, moral, and ideological considerations in interpretations of early Qing literature. The three poets discussed in this section demonstrate how such concerns shape literary evaluations. More precisely, our reconstruction of the attitudes and intentions behind political choices conditions our readings to varying degrees. For Hanke 函可 (1612–60), the focus of Lawrence Yim’s chapter, this means privileging the image of a loyalist monk suffering exile in distant Manchuria. With both Qian Qianyi 錢謙益 (1582–1664) and Wu Weiye 吳偉業 (1609–72), the subjects of Kang-i Sun Chang’s and my chapters, respectively, the premise is often the possibility of recovering the inner, misunderstood loyalist hidden in his apparent compromises with the new regime, although in Qian’s case there is greater resistance to this perspective. These three chapters attempt to analyze the motives and reasoning behind such portrayals and to go beyond them to explore the complexity of poetic responses to troubled times. With Qian, Wu, and Hanke, as with many other early Qing poets, the depth of lyrical engagement with the historical crisis often determines for the modern reader their place in the canon. For the last century, nationalism has merged with a valorization of opposition and the more traditional emphasis on political integrity to elevate the writings of martyrs and “remnant subjects” who engaged in resistance or at least did not participate in the new regime. As noted in the general

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introduction, however, political compromises could also become the impetus for intriguing and powerful poetic expression. The issue is thus not simply whether there is a genuine commitment to loyalism, although that is indeed the implied criterion in some literary histories, but how these writings illuminate the relationship between history and literature. In contrast to the later emphasis on each writer’s response to the Ming-Qing transition, what emerged as canonical for the early Qing arbiters of taste, once relative stability had been restored, was poetry that denies or transcends historical trauma. As these shifts in values illustrate, divergent attitudes toward history translate into changing conditions for literary judgment and canonization. The discourse on canonization often adopts the rhetoric of unmasking as it restores timeless masterpieces to history, pits an era’s self-definition against later perceptions, or reveals the entanglements of aesthetic criteria in sociopolitical considerations. In this view, a longaccepted canonical status indicates perennial adaptability, a capacity for eliciting important questions in successive generations rather than immutable, essential qualities of excellence. More often than not, however, the fortunes of literary works wax and wane. Such changes underline how literary production and interpretation are resolutely embedded in history. Perhaps this is why historical upheavals give rise to interesting questions about the canon—violent ruptures usually result in radical juxtapositions of different criteria of judgment. The onset of modernity in China and twentieth-century attempts to write different versions of Chinese literary history represent a case in point. The Ming-Qing transition presents no such radical cultural discontinuity, although the trauma of foreign conquest did create an intense interest in the relationship between history and literature, in contradistinction to some late Ming trends emphasizing subjectivity and spontaneous expression. Yet three or four decades after the conquest, the dominant schools in both shi 詩 and ci 詞 showed a decided preference for looking beyond history for poetic inspiration. The three chapters in this part focus on shi. Suffice it to note that developments in ci parallel those analyzed here for shi: Chen Weisong 陳維崧 (1625–82) was an extremely prolific lyricist and wrote many ci lamenting and reflecting on the dynastic transition and sociopolitical disorder, but his Yangxian 陽羨 school was much less influential than Zhu Yizun’s 朱彝尊 (1629–1709) Zhexi 浙西 school, whose emphasis on “decorous refinement” ( yachun 雅醇) and “reticent resonance” (kongling 空靈) soon rose to orthodoxy

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and canonical stature. To explore the analogous transition in shi, I first delineate in broad terms the parameters and implications of a poetics of historical engagement and then turn to the canonization of poetic styles that bypass such concerns.

The Poetics of Historical Engagement Memory, historical reflection, and poetic self-consciousness converged in new ways in early Qing poetry. The continuum of poetry and history was set forth long before in Mengzi: “When the wooden clappers of the sage-kings ceased, the Odes perished. When the Odes perished, the Spring and Autumn Annals was created” 王者之跡息而詩亡，詩亡 而後春秋作. 1 This well-known formulation reverberated in early Qing discourse on poetry, which repeatedly asserts that poetry assumes the functions of historiography by bearing witness, presenting accurate records (shilu 實錄), and articulating historical judgments. Poetry’s ability to do these things through subtle and indirect language (weiyan 微言) fulfills a long-cherished ideal in historical writings and has special relevance to the early Qing because the contemporary political situation often required circumspection. 2 Thus, the Confucian thinker and scholar Huang Zongxi 黃宗羲 (1610–95) declared: “Poetry and history form the inside and outside of each other” 詩與史相為表裏. 3 Qian Qianyi claimed that “the meaning of poetry cannot but be based on

————— 1. “Lilou xia” 離婁下, Mengzi 8.21. The word 跡 is glossed in the Shuowen jiezi 說文解字 as the wooden clappers a herald (qiuren 遒人) used when recording or collecting songs; cited in Yang Bojun 楊伯峻, Mengzi yizhu 孟子譯注 (Hong Kong: Zhonghua shuju, 1984), pp. 192–93. The herald recording or collecting songs and opinions of the land is mentioned in Yang Bojun, comp., Chunqiu Zuozhuan zhu 春秋左傳注 (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 2001 [1981]), Xiang 14.6, p. 1018. The literal rendering of ji 跡 as “traces” would also make sense in the present context. 2. The ideal of “great significance conveyed through subtle language” (weiyan dayi 微言大義) is associated with the Chunqiu. See Chunqiu Zuozhuan zhu, Cheng 14.4, p. 870: “Such is the import of the Chunqiu—subtle yet clear, forceful yet indirect, restrained yet rich, exhaustive yet not excessive, chastising evil and encouraging goodness. Who but the sage could have created it?” There is a similar passage in Zuozhuan, Zhao 31.5, p. 1513. 3. Huang Zongxi 黃宗羲, “Yao Jiangyi shi xu” 姚江逸詩序, in Huang Lizhou wenji 黃梨洲文集, ed. Chen Naiqian 陳乃乾 (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1959), p. 375.

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history” 詩之義不能不本于史. 4 According to Wu Weiye, “In ancient times poetry and history shared the same concerns” 古者詩與史通, for scribes collected and set forth all the odes “connected to the rise and decline of the fortunes of an era, the rights and wrongs of the policies of the times” 有關於世運升降，時政得失者. 5 Another poet, Du Jun 杜濬 (1611–87), implied that poetry is more apt to fulfill the function of history: “Poetry can correct the errors of official historiography” 詩可 以正史之譌 . 6 And the Lingnan poet Qu Dajun 屈大均 (1630–96) reiterated Mengzi: “For the Spring and Autumn Annals is that whereby the Odes is saved from perishing. A scholar and a gentleman who happens to be born in an age of disorder and who aspires to textual labor of creation and compilation should first chronicle what has perished and only then what remains. If he cannot chronicle it with historical writings [literally, with the Spring and Autumn Annals], he should do so with poetry” 故春秋者，詩之所以賴以不亡者也。士君 子生當亂世，有志纂修，當先紀亡而後紀存，不能以春秋紀之，當 以詩紀之. 7 The traumatic Ming-Qing transition was the impetus behind these and other reflections on the parameters of a poetry dealing with history. The starting point is often the meaning of poetry writing in the midst of chaos and destruction. In countless contemporary prefaces to poetry collections from the mid- to late seventeenth century, the poet is praised for confronting dynastic collapse and the end of the world he or she knows by writing poetry. The idea that great writing is rooted in frustrations and sufferings is at least as old as Sima Qian 司馬遷 ————— 4. Qian Qianyi 錢謙益, “Hu Zhiguo shixu” 胡志果詩序, in Youxue ji 有學集, annot. Qian Zeng 錢曾 and ed. Qian Zhonglian 錢仲聯 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1996) (hereafter cited as YXJ ), 2: 801. Qian began his preface with the passage quoted above from Mengzi. 5. Wu Weiye 吳偉業, “Qiepu zhai shigao xu” 且樸齋詩稿序 (1660), in Wu Meicun quanji 吳梅村全集, ed. Li Xueying 李學潁 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1990) (hereafter cited as WMC ), 3: 1205–6. Wu made similar assertions in “Fu lun ji xu” 扶輪集序 (WMC, 3: 1204–5) and “Guanshi shiji xu” 觀始詩序 (WMC, 2: 660). 6. Du Jun 杜濬, “Chengzi Muqian fangge xu” 程子穆倩放歌序, in Bianya tang yiji 變雅堂遺集, 1.18b, in Xiuxiu siku quanshu, 1394: 15. (Cheng Sui 程邃 [cognomen Muqian] was a well-known yimin artist and poet.) 7. Qu Dajun 屈大均, “Dongguan shiji xu” 東莞詩集序, in Wengshan wenchao 翁山文鈔, j. 1, in Qu Dajun quanji 屈大均全集 (Beijing: Renmin wenxue chubanshe, 1996), 3: 297.

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(145?–90? bce). Early Qing discourse on poetry gives the personal element in this proposition a specifically historical dimension. In his letter to Ren An 任安, Sima Qian described how, motivated by moral convictions, the desire for truth, and pent-up emotions, he found the writing of history an involuntary act, something that “cannot be helped” (bu de yi 不得已). Peng Shiwang 彭士望 (1610–83) revisited this logic in terms of the contemporary historical situation: For the age has come to this, and writing changes accordingly. The intent and purpose of those who write become ever more unrelenting and thus ever more bent, ever more bent and thus ever more forceful. This is like heaven and earth belching out breath that is pent up and is not allowed to be let out—it is roused as wrathful thunder; condensed as anomalous hail; stirred and swept away as floodwater; crushed and shattered as collapsing mountains. For why would one not wish to be auspicious clouds, morning sun, sweet rain, and gentle wind? This is the irreversible momentum of extreme distress—it cannot be helped. 世則有然，文從而變，而作文者之用心彌苦彌曲，彌曲彌厲，如天 地之噫氣，鬱不獲舒，激為雷霆，凝為怪雹，動蕩摧陷，為水溢山崩。夫 豈不欲為卿雲旦日，甘風融雨，勢有所窮，不得已也。 8

There are ubiquitous references to Xie Ao 謝翱 (1249–95) and other Song yimin 遺民 poets and recurrent suggestions that the greatness of their poetry is a function of their historical situation as they witnessed and lamented the fall of the Song dynasty. Huang Zongxi argued, for example, that eras of decline and chaos (shuaishi luanshi 衰世、亂世) produce great poetry: the absolute disjunction between the poet and his historical reality leads to extreme emotions of anguish and despair, and these in turn make for compelling, involuntary poetic expression. 9 ————— 8. Peng Shiwang 彭士望, “Yu Wei Bingshu shu” 與魏冰叔書, in Shulu wenchao 樹廬文鈔, j. 2; cited in Zhao Yuan 趙園, Ming Qing zhi ji shi dafu yanjiu 明清之際 士大夫研究 (Beijing: Beijing daxue chubanshe, 1999), p. 450. The analogy between “heaven and earth belching” and human expression is taken from Zhuangzi, “Qiwu lun.” 9. See Huang Zongxi, “Xie Gaoyu nianpu youlu zhu xu” 謝皋羽年譜遊錄注序, “Suozhai wenji xu” 縮齋文集序, “Huang Fuxian shi xu” 黃孚先詩序, “Chen Wei’an nianbo shi xu” 陳葦庵年伯詩序, “Wan Lü’an xiansheng shi xu” 萬屢安先 生詩序, “Ma Xuehang shixu” 馬雪航詩序, in Huang Lizhou wenji, pp. 320–21, 336–37, 343–44, 345–47, 363–64. Similar formulations are ubiquitous in writings from the period; see, e.g., Qian Qianyi, “Huang Tao’an xiansheng quanji xu” 黃陶庵先 生全集序, “Haoqi yin xu” 浩氣吟序, “Tang Zuming shigao xu” 唐祖命詩集序, in YXJ, 2: 741–43, 789–90; Gui Zhuang 歸莊 (1613–73), “Luohua shi xu” 落花詩序, in Gui Zhuang ji 歸莊集 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1984), 1: 119–20; and Zhu

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Huang described such poetry as the primal breath ( yuanqi 元氣) or yang breath ( yangqi 陽氣), whose essence and power are revealed when it is pitted against the repressive forces ( yin breath, yinqi 陰氣) of dark times. 10 Poetry is in this view a mode of effective action in the cosmic struggle of light and darkness 11 —it is part of the same project that poetry should be elevated as a supplement to historical writings or even a substitute for them. Huang Zongxi took issue with the idea of poetic history or the poet-historian (shishi 詩史) in his preface to his friend Wan Tai’s 萬泰 (cognomen Lü’an 履安) poetry collection: “However, those who annotate Du Fu’s [712–70] poems use historical events only to verify poetry; they have not heard of using poetry to supplement what is lacking in historical records. Although [Du’s poetry] is called poetic history, still history [in that case] does not depend on poetry” 然註杜者但見其 以詩證史，未聞以詩補史之闕。雖曰詩史，史固無藉乎詩也. Poetry takes the place of historical writings at cataclysmic moments of dynastic collapse and foreign conquest: “The reasons that heaven and earth were not destroyed and that moral teachings were preserved against all odds were mostly because those who had lost their country let flow their hearts’ blood [in their poetry], even as they perished with the morning dew. For at this juncture historical records had perished” 而天地之所以不毀，名教之所以僅存者，多在亡國之人物，血心流 注，朝露同晞, 史於是而亡矣. Reversing the dictum from Mengzi, Huang declared, “How little is it known that when historical records ————— Heling 朱鶴齡 (1606–83), “Xielin ji xu,” 纈林集序 in Yu’an xiaoji 愚庵小集 (Yanjing daxue tushuguan, 1940), 8.8a–b. 10. See Huang Zongxi, “Xie Gaoyu nianpu youlu zhu xu” and “Suozhai wenji xu,” in Huang Lizhou wenji, pp. 320, 337. By contrast, Qian Qianyi in some poetic prefaces disparages “the sounds of death” 死聲 and “owls screeching and ghosts speaking” 鴞啼鬼語 in the writings of Song loyalists (“Xu Jizhong shigao xu” 徐季 重詩稿序, “Pang Dasheng Huinong cao xu” 彭達生晦農草序, YXJ, 2: 796–97, 810–11). 11. In Huang’s preface to his brother Huang Zonghui’s 黃宗會 posthumous poetry collection (“Suozhai wenji xu,” 1674), he presented the writings of Song loyalists as the yang breath enveloped by the yin breath of foreign conquest and moral turpitude. “Before a hundred years elapsed [the conflict] manifested itself as swift thunder” 未百年而發為迅雷—the implication being that the Song loyalists’ writings are somehow linked to the fall of the Yuan dynasty (Huang Lizhou wenji, pp. 336–37).

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perished, poetry was created” 庸詎知史亡而後詩作乎 12 —poetry saves from oblivion what is defeated and destroyed, often what is missing, suppressed, or distorted in the official historiography compiled by the victors. If poetry is presented as assuming the mission of historical writings, the model may be Sima Qian’s Shiji, whose emphasis on the historian’s authority vis-à-vis the existing sociopolitical order was not always realized in the tomes of Chinese dynastic histories. Like the highest examples of historiography, poetry rectifies a flawed reality and preserves a lost world as “all under heaven perish” (wang tianxia 亡天下). 13 The epithet “poet-historian” recurs in comments on and by early Qing poets (regarding themselves, other contemporary poets, and earlier poets). It is conferred on, or self-consciously taken up by, among many others, Qian Qianyi, Wu Weiye, Gu Yanwu 顧炎武 (1613–82), and Wu Jiaji 吳嘉紀 (1618–84)—as such the category transcends divisions based on political choices. It is worth recalling the earliest usages of the term. Meng Qi 孟棨 ( jinshi 875) wrote in Poems in Original Contexts (Benshi shi 本事詩; 886): “Du Fu encountered the calamity of the An Lushan Rebellion and drifted from one place to another in the Long-Shu area. All these he fully sets forth in his poetry, probing and reaching toward what is most hidden, hardly leaving out any [important] events; that was why at the time he was called a ‘poet-historian’ ” 杜逢祿山之難，流離隴蜀，畢陳於詩，推見至隱，殆無遺事，故當 時號為詩史. 14 The making of the poet-historian thus involves a personal experience of significant (usually traumatic) historical events, the writing of a full account of those experiences and of events as observed, ————— 12. Huang Lizhou wenji, pp. 346–47. 13. Gu Yanwu 顧炎武 (1613–82) dwelt on the difference between the fall of a dynasty (wangguo 亡國) and the collapse of all moral constraints (wang tianxia 亡 天下), which he described elsewhere as the “loss of shame” (wuchi 無恥); see Rizhi lu jishi 日知錄集釋, ed. Huang Rucheng 黃汝成 (1936; reprinted—Zhengzhou: Zhongzhou guji chubanshe, 1990), 13.307 (“Zhengshi” 正始) and 13.314–15 (“Lianchi” 廉恥). 14. Meng Qi 孟棨, Benshi shi 本事詩 (“Gaoyi” 高逸), in Benshi shi / Xu benshi shi / Benshi ci 本事詩/續本事詩/本事詞 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1991), p. 17. For a perceptive discussion of the idea of shishi, see Gong Pengcheng 龔鵬程, Shishi bense yu miaowu 詩史本色與妙悟 (Taipei: Taiwan xuesheng shuju, 1993), pp. 19–92. Meng’s observation suggests that Du Fu was already called shishi in his time, but Meng’s passage is the earliest extant record of the use of that term regarding Du Fu.

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the critical acumen to proceed from surface to meaning, and the ability to evoke a world (usually a lost world) with a sense of totality. The Song scholar-poet-statesman Song Qi 宋祁 (998–1091) reiterated this point in New Tang History (Xin Tang shu 新唐書) and added a formal aspect to the idea of “poetic history”: “Du Fu also excelled in setting forth a full account of contemporary events. He was deeply versed in tonal and metrical intricacies, persisting for thousands of words without flagging. His generation called him a ‘poet-historian’ ” 甫又善陳時 事，律切精深，至千言不少衰，世號詩史. 15 The word chen 陳 (setting forth) suggests a full, elaborate account, akin to the principle of fu 賦 (exposition and elaboration) in traditional poetics. Song Qi implied that Du Fu’s longer poems are particularly suited to this purpose. The emphasis on Du Fu’s metrical virtuosity brings to mind Du’s extended regulated verses ( pailü 排律), but more significant and influential may be the incorporation of narrative (xushi 敘事) and discursive ( yilun 議 論) elements in his longer ancient-style poems ( gushi 古詩) and ballads ( gexing 歌行). A contemporary focus and extensive presentation reflect the ambition of early Qing poets to “write poetry as history” ( yi shi wei shi 以詩 為史). For his ruminations on contemporary events and personages, Wu Weiye often chose to write longer ancient-style poems and ballads, forms that lend themselves to descriptive and narrative details, unfolding arguments, and shifts of perspectives. This so-called Meicun style (Meicun ti 梅村體) combines political and historical engagement (in the tradition of Du Fu and the new yuefu ballads [xin yuefu 新樂府] by Yuan Zhen 元稹 [779–831] and Bai Juyi 白居易 [772–846]), romantic mythmaking (echoing Bai Juyi’s “Song of Lasting Sorrow” [“Changhen ge” 長恨歌]), and an ornate diction reminiscent of the early and late Tang masters. 16 Wu Jiaji also chose Du Fu and Bai Juyi as models and ————— 15. Gong Pengcheng (Shishi bense yu miaowu, pp. 19–20) quotes the passages by Meng Qi and Song Qi and rightly notes the divergence in emphasis on content and form. 16. “Meicun” is Wu Weiye’s cognomen. On the delineations of Meicun ti, see comments by Wang Shizhen 王士禛, Shen Deqian 沈德潛, Zha Weiren 查為仁 (1694–1749), Cheng Muheng 程穆衡 (1703–93), Yang Jichang 楊際昌, Yuan Mei 袁枚 (1716–98), Zhao Yi 趙翼 (1727–1814), Zhu Tingzhen 朱庭珍, Zhang Ertian 張爾田, cited in Qian Zhonglian 錢仲聯 et al., Qingshi jishi 清詩紀事 (Hanjiang: Jiangsu guji chubanshe, 1987–89; hereafter cited as QSJS ), 3: 1409–25. For modern discussions of the subject, see Wu Fumei 伍福美, Wu Meicun shige yishu yanjiu 吳梅

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favored ancient-style poems and yuefu modes, but he eschewed allusive and elaborate diction in his stark depictions of the sufferings of the people in the turbulent years of Ming-Qing transition. 17 Regulated verses and quatrains, less likely to evoke a sense of a full account because of their brevity, are sometimes grouped into poetic sequences to create a mood of sustained meditation, as in Qian Qianyi’s “Thoughts on the Dragon Boat Festival in the Year Jiashen (1644), Fourteen Poems” (“Jiashen duanyang ganhuai shisi shou” 甲申端陽感 懷十四首), or Wu Weiye’s “Miscellaneous Thoughts on Reading History, Sixteen Poems” (“Dushi zagan shiliu shou” 讀史雜感十六首, WMC, 1: 96–102), 18 and his “Miscellaneous Thoughts, Twenty-one Poems” (“Zagan ershiyi shou” 雜感二十一首, WMC, 1: 162–69). 19 The most impressive example is perhaps Qian Qianyi’s Toubi ji 投筆集 (1659–1663), which has thirteen series of eight septasyllabic regulated verses each, modeled after Du Fu’s famous “Autumn Meditations, Eight Poems” (“Qiuxing bashou” 秋興八首)—hence the alternative title “Later Autumn Meditations” (“Hou qiuxing” 後秋興)—plus four poems in which Qian commented on his own act of creation. The series can jointly be read as one long poem chronicling Qian’s hopes,

————— 村詩歌藝術研究 (Wuhan: Huazhong shifan daxue, 1998); and Ye Junyuan 葉君遠, Wu Meicun pingzhuan 吳偉業評傳 (Beijing: Shoudu shifan daxue, 1999). 17. Lu Tinglin 陸廷掄 praised Wu Jiaji for “writing poetry as history” ( yi shi wei shi 以詩為史) and compared his work to Du Fu’s “Bing ju xing” 兵車行 in his preface to Wu’s Louxuan shi 陋軒詩 collection (see QSJS, 1: 591–92). Wu Weiye wrote some long poems in this mode, some notable examples are “The Song of Seizing Boats” (“Zhuochuan xing” 捉船行, WMC, 1: 86), “The Song of Horse Fodder” (“Macao xing” 馬草行, WMC, 1: 86–87), “Child of Jinshan” (“Jinshan er” 堇山兒, WMC, 1: 89), “Officer of Zhixi” (“Zhixi li” 直溪吏, WMC, 1: 244), and “Child of Lindun” (“Lindun er” 臨頓兒, WMC, 1: 245). Although not the dominant voice in his oeuvre, the descriptions here complement Wu’s poems on decisive events and famous personages to give a total picture of the era. 18. The “Reading History” poems use copious historical allusions to depict Southern Ming history, which is not explicitly mentioned. 19. Included in Qian Qianyi, Kuhai ji 苦海集, and in QSJS, 3: 1277–80. These poems were written shortly after the Chongzhen emperor’s suicide in 1644. Qian’s Chuxue ji includes his work up to 1643, and the Youxue ji collects his writings written from 1645 on. None of his writings from 1644 are included in either collection.

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fears, disappointments, and anguish as he witnessed the final suppression of resistance against Manchu rule. 20 Chen Yinke praised Qian Qianyi’s Toubi ji as perhaps even more compelling, or at least historically more significant, than Du Fu’s “Autumn Meditations”: “The Toubi collection is indeed the poetic history of the Ming and Qing dynasties. Its achievement exceeds even Duling’s [Du Fu]. This counts as a great work of crucial importance from the last three hundred years” 21 投筆一集實為明清之詩史，較杜 陵尤勝一籌，乃三百年來之絕大著作也. Chen based his judgment on the fact that Qian played a major role in the political and military decisions of the Southern Ming and secretly supported the loyalist cause under the Qing. The sense of being a player or an agent in history, or at least being privy to some otherwise suppressed and distorted truths, is implied both in Qian’s poems and in his own annotations. Both Qian Qianyi and Wu Weiye perceived themselves as compilers of Ming history, and both authored various works with a historical interest. 22 In some ways, their poetry continues this sense of mission—poetry as history becomes a mode of action or intervention that “makes good” (buguo 補過) their inglorious compromises in reluctantly serving the new regime. ————— 20. For the contexts of and comments on the “Hou qiuxing” poems, see QSJS, 3: 1328–42; Chen Yinke 陳寅恪, Liu Rushi biezhuan 柳如是別傳 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1980); Yim Chi-hung, “The Poetics of Historical Memory in the Ming-Qing Transition: A Study of Qian Qianyi’s Later Poetry” (Ph.D. diss., Yale University, 1998); Pei Shijun 裴世俊, Qian Qianyi shige yanjiu 錢謙益詩歌研究 (Yinchuan: Ningxia renmin, 1991), pp. 167–83; Pan Chonggui’s 潘重規 preface and postscript in Qian Qianyi, Toubi ji jiaoben 投筆集校本 (Taipei: Wenshizhe chubanshe, 1973). Toubi is an obvious allusion to Ban Chao 班超 (1st c. ce) who threw down his brush to undertake military ventures; see Fan Ye 范燁 (398–445), Hou Han shu 後漢書 (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1965), 47.1571. The poems in Toubi ji record, among other things, the involvement of Qian Qianyi and Liu Rushi in loyalist activities. For a brief discussion of the poems related to Liu Rushi in the “Hou qiuxing” series, see my “Heroic Transformations: Women and National Trauma in Early Qing Literature,” Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 59 (1999): 399–404. 21. Chen Yinke, Liu Rushi biezhuan, 3: 1169. 22. The drafts of Qian Qianyi’s Ming history were unfortunately destroyed in a fire. His Liechao shiji xiaozhuan 列朝詩集小傳 ties the appraisal of Ming poets to the shape of Ming history. Wu Weiye wrote accounts of the Revival Society (Fushe jishi 復社記事; see WMC, 2: 579–607) and of late Ming rebel movements and their suppression (Suigou jilüe 綏寇記略).

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Aside from Qian Qianyi, many other poets, such as Hanke, Qian Bingdeng 錢秉鐙 (1612–93), Wang Fuzhi 王夫之 (1619–92), Xu Can 徐燦 (ca. 1610–78), and Wu Zhaoqian 吳兆騫 (1631–84), modeled their poetic responses to the contemporary crisis on Du Fu’s “Autumn Meditations,” a set of poems famous for allusive complexity and lyrical involutions. This fact alone should attest to the importance of indirect expression ( jituo 寄托), metaphorical and allegorical references (bixing 比興), and affective intensity (shuqing 抒情) in the idea of “poetry as history.” Indeed, critics of the idea of “poetry as history,” such as Yang Shen 楊慎 (1488–1559), decry its discursive explicitness but affirm its realization through “subtle and restrained expression” (hanxu yunji 含蓄蘊藉). 23 Likewise, Wang Fuzhi surmises that the epithet “poethistorian” implies artistic flaws, because in Du Fu’s direct, extensive, elaborate presentation of his contemporary crisis “there is more than enough history and not enough poetry” 於史有餘，于詩不足. 24 Nevertheless, Wang heaps praise on poetry (including Du Fu’s) that conveys historical insights and laments through reticence, and the same modes of indirect expression characterize his own corpus. 25 Early Qing advocates of the late Tang style, among them Wu Qiao 吳喬 (1611– 96+), Qian Zeng 錢曾 (Qian Qianyi’s younger clansman and annotator of Qian’s writings), and the brothers Feng Shu 馮舒 (1593–1649) and Feng Ban 馮班 (1614–81) (Qian Qianyi’s disciples), champion the affective power and historical significance of an allusive and indirect (shenqu 深曲) diction. During this period, there was intense interest in Li Shangyin 李商隱 (813?–58?); among early Qing commentaries on Li’s works are two by Qian Qianyi’s friends Zhu Heling 朱鶴齡 (cognomen Changru 長孺, 1606–83) and the monk Yuanshi 源師. Qian’s prefaces to these commentaries emphasize how the perilous situation in which Li Shangyin found himself and his reactions to the late Tang crisis call for a densely allusive style. 26 Obviously the totality of ————— 23. See Yang Shen 楊慎, Sheng’an ji 升庵集 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1993), 57.533 (“Yong Wang Anshi” 詠王安石), and 60.569 (“Shishi” 詩史). 24. Wang Fuzhi, comment on “Shangshan cai miwu” 上山採糜蕪, in Gushi pingxuan 古詩評選, Chuanshan quanshu, 14: 651. 25. For some examples, see Wang Fuzhi’s comments on Du Fu’s “Liren xing” 麗人行, “Qianxing” 遣興, “Qian chusai” 前出塞, and “Qiuxing,” Li Bo’s “Deng gaoqiu er wang yuanhai” 登高邱而望遠海, and “Su Wu” 蘇武 in Tangshi pingxuan, Chuanshan quanshu, 14: 916, 956, 957, 1093–95, 909, 953. 26. See You xue ji, pp. 703–6.

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elaborate presentation (as outlined by Meng Qi) is no longer the only or even the prime concern. Qian Qianyi discoursed on how subtle expression (wei 微) marks the continuity between history and poetry. 27 Possible tensions between surface and meaning account for the polemics surrounding the interpretation of the three poets discussed in this part, as well as many others from this period. How much irony do we read into Hanke’s poems on reconciliation with the new order? Or do we regard the “positive sentiment” of accommodation as literal? How do ambiguities in Hanke’s corpus match up to his image as a loyalist monk? What are the frames of reference for Qian Qianyi’s densely allusive poems? How do we untangle accusations and selfjustification, intention and retrospective construction? What is the margin between nostalgia and judgment in Wu Weiye’s poetry? Does lament imply tacit acceptance of or questioning of the new order? Indirect or allegorical expression often calls for mediation through literary and cultural knowledge. The idea that poetry has a special role in illuminating historical reality and transmitting historical knowledge thus issues in a renewed emphasis on the moral burden of poetry and on the importance of learning and experience (xueli xueshi 學力、學識) in shaping poetic craft. 28 This emphasis is linked in some cases (notably Huang Zongxi and Qian Qianyi) to a renewed interest in Du Fu and the revival of so-called Song-style poetry. 29 From another perspective, ————— 27. Qian Qianyi, “Hu Zhiguo shixu,” in Youxue ji, p. 801. 28. See, e.g., Gu Yanwu 顧炎武 (1613–82), Rizhi lu jishi, 19.445–60, 21.482, 495–96; Wu Weiye, “Gong Zhilu shi xu” 龔芝麓詩序, in WMC, 2: 664–66; Huang Zongxi, “Gao Danzhong muzhi ming” 高旦中墓誌銘, “Lunwen guanjian” 論文管見, and “Nanlei shili tici” 南雷詩曆題辭, in Huang Zongxi quanji (Hangzhou: Zhejiang guji chubanshe, 1985), 10: 314, 10: 649, 11: 203; Qian Qianyi, “Tang shi yinghua xu” 唐詩 英華序 (YXJ, 2: 706–7), “Wang Yishang shixu” 王貽上詩序 (YXJ, 2: 765–66), “Tang Yireng xiansheng wenji xu” 湯義仍先生文集序 (Chuxue ji 2: 905–6), “Xu Yuantan shixu” 徐元歎詩序 (Chuxue ji, 2: 924–25). 29. For early Qing interest in Du Fu, see Jian Ending 簡恩定, Qingchu Dushixue yanjiu 清初杜詩學研究 (Taipei: Wenshizhe chubanshe, 1986). Qian Qianyi wrote extensive commentaries on Du Fu’s poetry. For discussions of Qian Qianyi’s literary thought, see Jian Ending’s study; Wu Guoping 鄔國平 and Wang Zhenyuan 王鎮遠, Qingdai wenxue piping shi 清代文學批評史 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1995), pp. 110–31; Pei Shijun, Qian Qianyi shige yanjiu, pp. 184–223; Liao Meiyu 廖美玉, “Qian Muzhai jiqi wenxue” 錢牧齋及其文學 (Ph.D. diss., Taiwan National University, 1983), pp. 141–257. On the early Qing rediscovery of Song poetry, see Zhang Zhongmou 張仲謀, Qingdai wenhua yu Zhe pai shi 清代文化與 浙派詩 (Beijing: Dongfang, 1997), esp. pp. 9–136; Gong Pengcheng, Shishi bense yu

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the poetics of historical engagement bypasses debates of Tang versus Song styles. Thus both Chen Zilong 陳子龍 (1608–47) and Wang Fuzhi criticized Du Fu’s later style and would have deemed the idea of the “poet-historian” as defined by Meng Qi “compromised lyricism.” Yet their poems responding to the dynastic transition have also invited the epithet of “poet-historian.” If the poetics of historical engagement defines any common ground, it may be the idea of the poet staking his truth claim on the burden of witnessing and remembering, discursive clarity in probing forces that shape events and their representation, and the fusion of historical understanding and self-understanding. His visionary intensity as he confronts the disjunction of past and present often results in a self-conscious delineation of the processes of memory and historical reflection. In this sense poetry and poetics dealing with history test the boundaries of representation and poetic subjectivity. This may explain why the poets who engaged with their contemporary historical crisis have gained canonical status in modern appraisals of early Qing poetry.

Beyond History Poetry and poetics confronting history cannot accommodate too much equanimity. This is a poetic endeavor that rises from ruins, a response to loss and destruction. However, what became canonical in the early Qing as the poetic ideal was precisely equanimity. I have in mind the rise and prolonged dominance of Wang Shizhen’s 王士禛 (1634–1711) school of “ineffable essence and resonance” (shenyun 神韻). This apparently abstract term was given some substance in an early characterization: Qian Qianyi used four words, dian 典 (the qualities of dignity rooted in filiation to the canonical classics and histories), yuan 遠 (distance), xie 諧 (harmony), and ze 則 (decorous beauty), to describe Wang’s poetic style in his 1661 preface to Wang’s collection. 30 The ————— miaowu, pp. 59–60; and Zhu Zejie 朱則傑, Qing shi shi 清詩史 (Nanjing: Jiangsu guji chubanshe, 1992), pp. 55–56. The Tang-Song dichotomy in Chinese poetry and poetics postulates contrasts of feeling versus thought and learning, ineffability versus structure, and immediacy versus mediation. Many scholars have noted how Tang and Song here refer to stylistic differences rather than literal dynastic distinctions; see, e.g., Qian Zhongshu 錢鍾書, Tanyi lu 談藝錄 (Hong Kong: Zhonghua shuju, 1986), pp. 1–5. Du Fu’s late works are often classified as “Song style.” 30. See Wang Shizhen 王士禛, Yuyang jinghua lu jishi 漁洋精華錄集釋, ed. Li Yufu 李毓芙, Mou Tong 牟通, and Li Wusu 李戊肅 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji

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emphasis on harmony and contemplative distance is hardly surprising, given the new regime’s need to legitimize itself through “cultural authority” (wenzhi 文治) and to suppress or neutralize opposition—for the ideal of ineffability negates or transcends history, and it implies the balance and decorum proper to an age of “good government” (zhishi 治世). Wang Shizhen was only ten when the Ming dynasty fell. He was more than fifty years younger than Qian Qianyi, and more than twenty years younger than Wu Weiye and Hanke. His rise thus signaled a generational shift in the arena of early Qing poetry. In alluding to shenyun, Wang Shizhen invoked familiar formulations from Sikong Tu’s 司空圖 (837–908) Twenty-four Categories of Poetry (Ershisi shipin 二十四詩品) and Yan Yu’s 嚴羽 (twelfth century) Canglang’s Remarks on Poetry (Canglang shihua 滄浪詩話). 31 Here again there are intimations of a link between poetry and a kind of Daoist and Buddhist understanding that is beyond language and conceptual thought: “Obtain the meaning and forget the words” 得意忘言; “the words have limits, but the meanings cannot be exhausted” 言有盡而意 無窮; “the taste beyond taste” 味外味; “the wonder exists beyond sourness and saltiness” 妙在酸鹹之外; “the meanings lie beyond brush and ink” 意在筆墨之外; “a naturalness that is seamless and unanchored” 天然不可湊泊; “ without applying a single word, / the spirit’s flow is totally obtained,” 不著一字，盡得風流. 32 In poetic rumina————— chubanshe, 1999), 3: 1975–76; YXJ, pp. 765–66. Qian also addressed a poem to Wang, fervently praising him as the next leader among poets. Fifty years later, Wang Shizhen was to look back gratefully to the older man’s recognition, see his Fen’gan yuhua 分甘餘話 (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1988), 3.66. 31. See Sikong Tu 司空圖, Shipin xinshi 詩品新釋, ed. Zhao Futan 趙福壇 (Guangzhou: Huacheng chubanshe, 1986); Yan Yu 嚴羽, Canglang shihua jiaoshi 滄浪詩話校釋, ed. Guo Shaoyu 郭紹虞 (Beijing: Renmin wenxue chubanshe, 1983); and Stephen Owen, Readings in Chinese Literary Thought (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Council on East Asian Studies, 1992), pp. 299–358, 391–420. Various scholars have questioned the attribution of Twenty-four Categories to Sikong Tu. For a good account of the genealogy of Wang Shizhen’s poetics, see Richard John Lynn, “Orthodoxy and Enlightenment: Wang Shih-chen’s Theory of Poetry and Its Antecedents,” in The Unfolding of Neo-Confucianism, by Wm. Theodore de Bary and the Conference on Seventeenth Century Chinese Thought (New York: Columbia University Press, 1975), pp. 217–69; see also Lynn’s “Tradition and Synthesis: Wang Shih-chen as Poet and Critic” (Ph.D. diss., Stanford University, 1970). 32. Wang Shizhen cited these as his “eight favorite words” in Twenty-four Categories of Poetry and upheld the implied poetic ideal; see Xiangzu biji 香祖筆記

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tions in the last years of his life, Wang Shizhen compared a few poems “written in his youth in Yangzhou” to Tang five-character quatrains that “enter the state of Chan meditation” (ruchan 入禪). 33 Wang compared his poetic ideal to “what painters call the transcendent mode” 畫家所謂逸品: 34 “I have contemplated Jing Hao’s [fl. 907–23] discourses on mountains and waters and found illumination on fundamental principles for poets, thus ‘From afar people have no eyes, from afar water has no waves, from afar mountains have no craggy lines’ ” 余嘗觀荊浩論山水，而悟詩家三昧，曰遠人無目，遠 水無波，遠山無皴. 35 This is a poetic style reminiscent of Tang masters such as Wang Wei 王維 (699–759), Meng Haoran 孟浩然 (689–740), or Wei Yingwu 韋應物 (741–830). Indeed, Wang noted that his oldest brother, Wang Shilu 王士祿 (1626–73), taught him poetry when he was eight sui using a Tang anthology that included these poets. 36 Wang’s influential Collection of Intense Contemplation of the Tang Sages (Tangxian sanmei ji 唐賢三昧集; 1688) anthology gives pride of place to Wang Wei and Meng Haoran, 37 although the common perception that it elevates only the style of “balance, calmness, and distance” (chonghe ————— (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1982), 8.148; and Fen’gan yuhua, 4.86. Shen Deqian observed that Wang Shizhen used formulations from Yan Yu and Sikong Tu to define his vision of poetry in Tangxian sanmei ji 唐賢三昧集 (Shuoshi zuiyu 說詩晬語, in Ding Fubao 丁福保 [1874–1952], comp., and Guo Shaoyu 郭紹虞, ed., Qing shihua 清詩話 [Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1999 (1983)], p. 557). See also Yan Dichang 嚴迪昌, Qing shi shi 清詩史 (Taipei: Zhonghua fachan jijin guanli weiyuanhui, 1998), pp. 452–57; Zhu Zejie, Qing shi shi, pp. 190–95; and QSJS 4: 1978–79, 1987. 33. See Xiangzu biji, 2.24. Xiangzu biji was written after 1701. Wang was police magistrate in Yangzhou 揚州推官 from 1660 to 1664; see “Yuyang shanren zi zhuan nianpu” 漁洋山人自撰年譜, appended to Yuyang jinghua lu jishi 漁洋精華錄 集釋,), 3: 2015–21. 34. Wang Shizhen, Fen’gan yuhua, 4.86. 35. Wang Shizhen, Xiangzu biji, 6.109; cited in Yan Dichang, Qing shi shi, p. 455. Wang refers to the “paintability” of his poems in Yuyang shihua 漁洋詩話, 1.6, 1.99, 2.42, in Qing shihua, pp. 165, 183, 191–92. 36. See “Yuyang shanren zi zhuan nianpu,” in Yuyang jinghua lu jishi, 3: 2008. 37. Tangxian sanmei ji contains 448 poems by 42 poets, of which 112 are poems by Wang Wei and 48 are by Meng Haoran. In an age of many competing anthologies, Tangxian sanmei ji emerged as one of the most prominent. For different perspectives on “the canonical poetic corpus” in early Qing, see Pauline Yu, “Canon Formation in Late Imperial China,” in Culture and State in Chinese History, ed. Theodore Huters, R. Bin Wong, and Pauline Yu (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997), pp. 83–104, esp. pp. 94–97.

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danyuan 沖和淡遠) 38 is not totally justified, since it also features poets with more heroic and expansive diction, such as Cen Shen 岑參 (715– 70) and Li Qi 李頎 (690–751). 39 The poetic ideal of shenyun is particularly suited to the quatrain form. 40 It is an aesthetics of the moment and cannot readily accommodate duration and discursive momentum. For all the emphasis on Chan-like meditative moods, reticence, and artless ineffability, Wang’s poems are also defined by a kind of aestheticism, a sense of deliberately self-effacing craft, perhaps because of his constant reminders of poetic models and painterly effects in his discussions of poetry. This is especially evident when the complexity and contradictions of history and ideology are condensed as beautiful images. 41 There is implicit faith that these lovely and suggestive images embody refinement, balance, and decorum that can mediate opposites and that valorized perception can efface differences and submerge incongruities. Displacement of ————— 38. Commenting on Du Fu’s “Danqing yin” 丹青引, Weng Fanggang 翁方鋼 (1733–1818) raised the question of why Li Bo and Du Fu were not included in Tangxian sanmei ji: “For it only regards the style of balance, calmness, and distance as most important and does not wish to uphold as canonical the style of heroism, forcefulness, profundity, and breadth” 蓋專以沖和淡遠為主，不欲以雄鷙奧博 為宗; see Weng Fanggang, “Qiyan shi sanmei ju yu” 七言詩三昧舉隅, in Qing shihua, pp. 290–91. 39. For illuminating discussions of Wang Shizhen’s poetics and his Tang anthologies, see Jiang Yin 蔣寅, Wang Yuyang yu Kangxi shitan 王漁洋與康熙詩壇 (Beijing: Zhongguo shehui kexue chubanshe, 2001); and Zhang Jian 張健, Qingdai shixue yanjiu 清代詩學研究 (Beijing: Beijing daxue chubanshe, 1999). 40. See Zhao Yi’s 趙翼 (1727–1814) comment in Oubei shihua 歐北詩話, j. 10, in Guo Shaoyu comp., Fu Shousun 富壽蓀 ed., Qing shihua xubian 清詩話續編 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1999 [1983]), 1: 1299. Zhao Yi criticized the flaws of Wang Shizhen’s longer poems: “He was in the end inadequate to the task of confronting enemies on eight sides to become a great master” 終不足八面受敵為大 家也. Wang Shizhen was keenly conscious of the potential of quatrain form. He recorded with obvious satisfaction that he took four lines from an ancient-style poem by his friend, the Cantonese poet Cheng Keze 程可則 (1623–73), and made them into a superior quatrain. He also claimed that Liu Zongyuan’s 柳宗元 (773– 819) famous poem “Yu weng” 漁翁 would be greatly improved if the first four lines were taken to form a quatrain; see Yuyang shihua, 1.24, in Qing shihua, p. 169. 41. Perhaps this accounts for the famous comment by Zhao Zhixin 趙執信 (1662–1744), Wang’s dogged critic: “Zhu [Yizun] is greedy about breadth; Wang [Shizhen] loves [to excess] the beautiful” 朱貪多，王愛好; see Tanlong lu 談龍錄, no. 30, in Qing shihua, p. 316.

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violence and bloodshed in recent memory is evident, for example, in “Lovely Spring: Twelve Quatrains, No. 9” 冶春絕句十二首其九 42 In yesteryear iron cannons breached the city walls, On broken halberds sunk in sand, wild moss grows. By the Plum Peak the green, green grass Calmly sends off travelers, riding their horses and returning.

當年鐵炮壓城開 折戟沉沙長野苔 梅花嶺畔青青草 閑送遊人騎馬回

Wang Shizhen wrote this series of quatrains at a literary gathering at Vermilion Bridge in 1664, when he was serving as police magistrate in Yangzhou. 43 The massacre at Yangzhou in 1645 was one of the most horrifying episodes of the conquest, but the poet dispenses with the carnage of nineteen years earlier in one line—flying cannonballs make the siege of the city sound swift, faceless, inevitable. All memories of destruction are to be erased. The second echoes Du Mu’s 杜牧 (803–53) poetic meditation on the Battle of Red Cliff (208): “On the broken halberd sunk in sand, the metal was not yet worn” 折戟沉沙鐵未消—in Du’s quatrain recognition of the “former dynasty” is still possible, and one can ponder historical causation and question historical inevitability. 44 In Wang’s poem the memory of war and destruction is resolutely erased—“wild moss” has grown on the broken halberd. Plum Peak is the burial site of the ceremonial gown of Shi Kefa 史可法 (1601–45), who died defending Yangzhou. Pleasure and leisure have returned to ————— 42. Yuyang jinghua lu jishi, 1: 389–90. 43. See “Yuyang shanren zi zhuan nianpu,” in Yuyang jinghua lu jishi, 3: 2021. On the significance of Vermilion Bridge in early Qing cultural history, see Tobie Meyer-Fong, Building Culture in Early Qing Yangzhou (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2003). 44. Du Mu, “Red Cliff” 赤壁: “On the broken halberd sunk in sand, the metal is not yet worn, / Polish and wash it, to recognize the former dynasty. / Had the east wind not given Master Zhou expeditious victory, / The two Qiao sisters would have been locked in the spring splendor of the Bronze Bird Tower” 折戟沉沙鐵未 消，自將磨洗認前朝。東風不與周郎便，銅雀春深鎖二喬. Historical anecdotes and fiction tell of Cao Cao’s (155–220) designs on the beautiful Qiao sisters, married to Sun Quan and Zhou Yu, the ruler and chief minister of Wu, respectively. The second half of the quatrain thus proposes a historical “what if”: the Qiao sisters would have been shut in Cao Cao’s tower had Zhou Yu been defeated in the Battle of Red Cliff.

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Yangzhou, and Plum Peak is divested of its historical role as the emblem of martyrdom. The sense of meditative harmony also dominates Wang’s numerous poetic meditations on the past, as in “Temple of the Lady on Spirit Marshes at Jiao Cliff: Two Poems, No. 2” 蟂 磯 靈 澤 夫 人 祠二 首 (其二), 45 dated to 1685: The hegemon’s spirit east of the river has long since sunk in lonely silence, At the Palace of Eternal Peace were soughing and desolate brambles. The endless sorrows of family and country have been taken And entrusted to the rising and ebbing waves of the Xunyang River.

霸氣江東久寂寥 永安宮殿莽蕭蕭 都將家國無窮恨 分付潯陽上下潮

The temple honors Lady Sun, younger sister of Sun Quan (182–252) and consort of Liu Bei (161–223). Legend has it that Lady Sun drowned herself at Jiao Cliff upon hearing of Liu’s death. It is also said that, pained by the enmity between her husband’s kingdom of Shu and her brother’s kingdom of Wu, she killed herself at Jiao Cliff, on her way back to Wu. 46 The conflict of loyalties may well speak to the historical sensibilities of an early Qing poet. Wang was, however, more concerned with the melancholy of inevitable loss. From a distance of fourteen centuries, Lady Sun’s grief is submerged in the rhythm of relentless mutability—Sun Quan’s hegemonic ambitions represent only a forgotten memory, and brambles choke the Palace of Eternal Peace, where Liu Bei died. Such distancing allows the acceptance of loss. Wang Shilu once described Gong Dingzi’s 龔鼎孳 (1615–73) line “Flowing water and blue mountains send off the Six Dynasties” 流水青山送六朝 as “a talented scholar’s words” 才子語 and deemed Chen Weisong’s “Waves engulf the former dynasty, bearing it away” 浪擁前朝去 “a hero’s words” 英雄語. 47 Gong’s line acknowledges dynastic upheavals as inevitable and mixes wistfulness with serene contemplation. Chen’s image, on the other hand, suggests violence and unappeased anguish. By Wang Shilu’s logic, Wang Shizhen’s “Temple of the Lady” is crafted ————— 45. Yuyang jinghua lu jishi, 3: 1762. 46. Hui Dong 惠棟 (1607–1758) cited Zhu Guozhen’s 朱國楨 (1557–1632) Yongchuang xiaopin 涌幢小品 as the source of these stories, see ibid., p. 1762. 47. Cited in Yuyang shihua 2:22, in Qing shihua, p. 188.

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from “a talented scholar’s words”—they reconcile contradictions as the “endless sorrow of family and country” is dissolved in the timelessness of rising and ebbing waves. The canonization of a style that displaces history and politics thus has profound historical and political implications. As is well known, Wang Shizhen’s canonical status enjoyed the seal of imperial approval. Wang had a distinguished official career spanning more than four decades, and his championship of decorum and orthodoxy (zhengzong 正宗) was an integral part of his privileged position in the new order. In 1678, Wang was promoted from his position as a minor official in the Ministry of Finance in Sichuan 戶部四川司郎中 to the Hanlin academy because of “his excellence in both poetry and prose.” 48 He became one of the compilers of Ming history the following year. Imperial recognition was apparently based on the consensus that the Kangxi emperor (r. 1662–1722) gleaned from consultation with various highranking officials. (There is a distinct sense of deliberate “cultural policy” rather than any specific affinity of poetic sensibilities.) The promotion of a widely recognized literary talent, like the special Outstanding Scholars of Vast Learning examination in 1679, was obviously designed to heal any remaining alienation between the Qing court and the intellectual elite. The Kangxi emperor’s approval of Wang’s style extends to his personality: “His majesty instructed the academicians: ‘Men from Shandong are mostly wrongheaded, stubborn, combative, and vindictive. Wang Shizhen alone is not like that. His poems are quite good. At home, he only reads books.’ ” 上諭大學士曰﹕「山東 人性多偏執，好勝尋仇，惟王士禎無之。其作詩甚佳。居家惟 讀書」. 49 Wang Shizhen himself was keenly aware of the link between literary style and personality, between poetic choices and political choices. He liked to cite Yan Yu’s famous comparison of poetry’s ineffable essence to “antelopes that hang by their horns, leaving no traces that can be sought.” He also extended the metaphor from poetics to politics: The Buddhists say, “The antelopes hang by their horns, leaving no traces that can be sought.” There is an ancient saying: “Antelopes have no odor at all, and

————— 48. The Kangxi emperor’s decree to the Ministry of Civil Personnel on Wang’s promotion; see “Yuyang shanren zi zhuan nianpu,” in Yuying jinghua lu jishi, 3: 2031. 49. Qingshi gao 清史稿, “Basic Annals of Emperor Shengzu,” Kangxi 40.

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tigers and leopards can never find them. [They are like] dragons hiding in nine abysses, phoenixes soaring above a thousand ren.” This is an annotation for the previous lines. Not only is this a metaphor for poetry, it can also be regarded as the way for a superior man to conduct himself and deal with the world. 釋氏 言﹕「羚羊掛角，無跡可尋。」古言云﹕「羚羊無些子氣味，虎豹再尋他 不著，九淵潛龍，千仞翔鳳乎。」此是前言注腳。不獨喻詩，亦可為君子 居身涉世法也。 50

To “leave no traces” is to avoid danger (like the hidden dragon) and to achieve worldly advancement (like the soaring phoenix). “Leaving no traces” also alludes to the transcendence of history and politics or their recession into the distance, like mountains and rivers in a painting. The chorus of acclamation that established Wang Shizhen as “the canonical poet of the era” implied parallels between literary and political history. Xu Qianxue 徐乾學 (1631–94), in his preface to Sequel to Yuyang’s Collection of Poetry (“Yuyang xu shiji xu” 漁洋續詩集序), addressed Wang’s relationship to various literary styles in history: Although in [Wang’s] discussions [of poetry] he commands a broad range and encompasses poems by various masters from the Northern and Southern Song, Yuan, and Ming, he is vigilant and cautious in his selections and tempering and still adheres to the rhythm and style of the Tang poets. . . . Reading the master’s poetry, there is the pleasure of calmness, generosity, and easy access, and no pain of suffering over difficulties and rugged terrains. How could it have achieved this if it were not the music of an era of good government? 雖持論廣 大，兼取南北宋、元、明諸家之詩，而選練矜慎，仍墨守唐人之聲格。。。 讀先生之詩有溫厚平易之樂，而無崎嶇艱難之苦，非治世之音能爾乎？ 51

In a retrospective survey of his own development as a poet, Wang claimed: “In my middle years I went beyond the three Tang eras [of early, high, and late] to apply myself to [the styles of] the two Song [dynasties]” 中歲越三唐而事兩宋. 52 In his quatrains of poetic criticism 論詩絕句 (1663), he also validated Song and Yuan poetry. Canonical status often depends on the ability to encompass different styles ( ji dacheng 集大成), and it is not surprising that Wang should claim to adopt different poetic models. However, Wang’s final allegiance was to the Tang masters. This may be more than a matter of poetic tem————— 50. Xiangzu biji, 1.20. 51. QSJS, 4: 1983. 52. Wang Shizhen’s description of his own development as a poet; cited by Yu Zhaocheng 俞兆晟 in his 1725 preface to Yuyang shihua, in Qing shihua, p. 163.

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perament. Period styles came to acquire political meanings. Shi Runzhang 施閏章 (1619–83), in his preface to Feng Pu’s 馮溥 (1609–92) collection of poetry, Jiashan tang ji 佳山堂集, cited Feng Pu himself: excessive respect for the Song tradition results in poetry that is “not the pure and uplifting sounds of a great era” 非盛世清明廣大之音也. 53 The Kangxi emperor “thought, moreover, that poetry must uphold the Tang as canonical” 而猶以詩必宗唐. 54 Mao Qiling 毛奇齡 (1623–1716) declared the Tang style “the high style for canonical tomes” 此正高文 典冊也. He then recorded that one academician was demoted to the second rank for using twelve rhymes in the Song poetic style. 55 It was perhaps no accident that some of the most famous recalcitrant remnant subjects were advocates of the Song style, including Huang Zongxi and Lü Liuliang 呂留良 (1629–83). 56 The elevation of equanimity implies opposition to yimin poetry and poetics. Thus, in Chen Weisong’s (ca. 1680) preface to Wang’s poetry collection (“Wang Ruanting shiji xu” 王阮廷詩集序), Chen contrasted the “balance, harmony, and moral beauty” 沖融懿美 of Wang’s style with trends in “the past fifty or sixty years,” when “the notes of those caught in fantasies and falsehoods mix in the tones of war and desolation (shang jue); 57 and the sounds of the self-righteous and perverse ones are unmistakably matched with the jingles of sword sheaths and military bells. Excessive and shrill, hurried and fading 58 —one can play these [notes], and no musical sounds will be formed” 幻渺者調既雜於商 角，而亢戾者聲直中夫鞞鐸，淫哇噍殺，彈之而不成聲. 59 One may ————— 53. Zhang Zhongmou, Qingdai wenhua yu Zhepai shi, p. 42. 54. Zhang Yushu 張玉書 (1642–1711), “Preface to the Imperially Sanctioned Complete Tang Poetry” 御定全唐詩錄後序; cited in Jiang Yin, Wang Yuyang yu Kangxi shitan, p. 35. 55. Mao Qiling, Xihe shihua 西河詩話, j. 5, cited in Zhang Zhongmou, Qingdai wenhua yu Zhepai shi, p. 42. 56. See Zhang Zhongmou, Qingdai wenhua yu Zhepai shi. 57. Shang is associated with metal, autumn, and yin and is sometimes identified as the note of sadness. Jue is the sound of war. 58. “Record of Music” in Liji 禮記: “hurried and fading” 噍殺 music marks political decline. 59. The preface is included in Jialing wenji 迦陵文集 and cited in Yan Dichang, Qing shi shi, p. 413. Yan dates the preface to some point between 1679 when Chen took the special examination and 1682, when he died. Qian Qianyi employed a similar rhetoric in praising Shi Runzhang’s 施閏章 (1618–83) harmonious style, which he contrasted with “the jue tones” 角聲 and “hurried and fading, seething

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legitimately associate “excessive and shrill, hurried and fading” music with the poetry of remnant subjects. Where Wang Shizhen emphasized balance and harmony, yimin poets valorized wrath, anguish, and extreme emotions as the impetus for poetry. Thus according to Huang Zongxi, “only when soaring pathos is pitted against harmony can [the consequent tension] be called gentleness and restraint” 激揚以抵和 平，方可謂之溫柔敦厚也. 60 Likewise, Du Jun upheld chen 嗔 (rage) as the basis of poetic creation and considered “hurried and fading music” the mark of genuineness. 61 Flouting traditional precepts that poetry should express “rancor without anger, grief without injury” 怨而不怒, 哀而不傷, yimin poets pour forth “rancor that resembles anger, grief that extends to injury” 怨而近怒, 哀而至傷. 62 Chen’s preface may thus imply a decisive parting of ways between Wang and yimin poets. In actuality, however, Wang Shizhen’s relationships with these (mostly) older poets who refused to participate in the new regime were complex. In his twenties in Yangzhou, he actively sought their friendship. Throughout his life he maintained a broad web of ties with them as friend, patron, or protector, although in Juyi lu 居易錄, a late retrospective on his career, he was deliberately reticent about such connections. In some ways Wang’s canonical status, at least initially, depended on the approval and support of yimin poets, members of an intellectual elite whose very lack of political power conferred moral authority and “cultural capital.” Wang’s “Autumn Willows” poems, mentioned in the general introduction, are examples of how he negotiated (consciously or otherwise) the conflicting demands and expectations of the new regime and ————— and angry sounds” 噍殺恚怒之音 responding to political disorder (“Shi Yushang shiji xu” 施愚山詩集序, in YXJ, 2: 760–61). 60. See Huang Zongxi, “Wan Zhenyi shixu”萬貞一詩序, in Huang Lizhou wenji, p. 363. “Gentleness and Restraint” 溫柔敦厚 are traditionally associated with the Shijing (Liji, “Jingjie” 經解) and come to define the ideal mode of expression for poetry. 61. See Du Jun 杜濬, “Ba Huang Jiuyan Hubu jueming shi” 跋黃九煙戶部絕命 詩 and “Xi Su Ling shi xu” 奚蘇嶺詩序, cited in Yan Dichang, Qing shi shi, p. 73. 62. “Rancor without anger, grief without injury” are said to characterize the Shijing (Analects 3.20, Shiji 84). The late Qing poet and critic Tan Xian 譚獻 (1830– 1901), noting affinities of sensibility between yimin poets and his own sense of national crisis, offered judgments of their “anger” and “injury,” see his “Ming shi lu xu” 明詩錄序 (Futang Leiji 復堂類集 [Taipei: Huawen shuju, 1979, facsimile reproduction of the 1899 edition], 1.16a–17b).

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the generation of poets who had lived through the dynastic transition as adults, especially the yimin. In 1657, when Wang Shizhen was twenty-four sui, he traveled to Lixia in Shandong, organized a literary gathering at Lake Ming 明湖, and formed the Autumn Willow Poetry Society 秋柳社. Wang’s “Autumn Willows” poems, which conflate feminized images of longing with historical lament, elicited hundreds of poetic responses. 63 There are tantalizing “allegorical indices”—a lake named “Ming”; ubiquitous references to Jinling, capital of the first two Ming emperors and the Southern Ming court (although the poems were written in Lixia); and numerous literary antecedents that link fallen blossoms or withering leaves to the decline and fall of dynasties. On the other hand, there are no specific contemporary references. It is entirely plausible to read the poems as speaking to perennial sources of regret—the disjunction of past and present, the failure of heroic endeavor, and the inevitability of change. The innumerable response poems encompass shades of nostalgia, sadness, anger, or reconciliation. In this sense, Wang’s elusive, melancholy diction made for affinities with diverse literary communities. More generally, Wang Shizhen absorbed yimin into his scheme by presenting them as apolitical recluses who often embodied the poetic ideal of shenyun. 64 There were, however, inevitable elisions and even suppressions in this apparent inclusiveness and harmony. The literary gathering at Vermilion Bridge in 1664, for which Wang wrote the “Lovely Spring” quatrain discussed above, included a number of well-known yimin. In Wang’s chronicle of that event, he mentioned Lin Gudu (1580–1666), Du Jun, Zhang Gangsun 張綱孫, and Sun Zhiwei 孫枝蔚 (1620–87). Also present was Wu Jiaji, whose quatrains reverse the logic of Wang’s, beginning with images of apparent serenity that are duly dismantled by the repressed violence of unappeased ————— 63. Wang Shizhen mentioned the immense popularity of the “Autumn Willows” poems in various places, including “Caigen shiji xu” 菜根詩集序, Yuyang shihua, and “Yuyang shanren zi zhuan nianpu”; see QSJS, 4: 2022–23. 64. When Wang quoted lines from yimin poets in his remarks on poetry, he favored the mood of tranquility and ineffability. When he published an anthology by Lin Gudu, he left out poems from Lin’s last forty years, presumably for political reasons, and instead praised his early poetry as “the style of Six Dynasties”; see Yuyang shihua, 1.15, in Qing shihua, p. 167. See also note 25 to the Introduction to this book.

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memories. It is not surprising that Wang Shizhen did not mention Wu in his chronicle. 65 Wang’s voluminous writings give ample clues as to how he gathered disciples and students. In his remarks on poetry, he liked to congratulate himself on felicitous lines and to offer self-conscious, positive appraisals of his own role in literary history. These aspects of his career substantiate Kang-i Sun Chang’s insights into Wang’s “selfcanonization.” 66 Ironically, having developed a style that denies or transcends history conferred canonical status on Wang Shizhen as the voice of a great age, but in the end his perceived historical role of writing “the poetry of a great age” led to criticism that he “lacked genuineness”—he was too pleasing, too decorous, too impersonal. 67 Shen Deqian 沈德潛 (1673–1769), defending Wang against charges of overrefinement, had to concede that Wang may indeed have been more refined than compelling, more allusive than affective: “But has it not been said that it is hard to write wonderful things in gladness and that it is easy to excel with literary creation in sorrow? How can we make someone who lived through a great age of peace and prosperity force himself to moan and groan when he was not sick?” 然獨不曰懽娛難 功，愁苦易好，安能使處太平之盛者強作無病呻吟乎？ 68

————— 65. See Yan Dichang, Qing shi shi, pp. 135–37. Eleven of Wu’s “harmonizing compositions” (hezuo 和作) are found in his collection. The tenth quatrain, for example, is a stark reminder of how surreal apparent harmony can be: “North of the mound, south of the mound, a spring day, / Fallen blossoms, travelers on horseback, all abustle. / How is it that the clumps of earth beneath the pines, / See not descendants coming to sweep the graves?” 崗北崗南上朝日，落花遊騎亂紛 紛。如何松下幾抔土，不見兒孫來上墳？ (Wu Jiaji, “Yechun jueju he Ruanting xiansheng” 冶春絕句和阮亭先生, in Louxuan shiji 陋軒詩集 [Taipei: Wenhai chubanshe, 1966, facsimile reproduction of the 1840 edition], 4.14b–15b). 66. See Sun Kang-i 孫康宜, Wenxue de shengyin 文學的聲音 (Taipei: Sanmin shuju, 2001), pp. 105–42. 67. Among the best-known critiques of Wang Shizhen is that of Zhao Zhixin, who charged that “there is no [sincere and genuine] person” 詩中無人 in Wang’s poetry; see Zhao’s Tanlong lu 談龍錄, in Qing shihua, p. 311. Yuan Mei 袁枚 (1716– 98) also faulted Wang for “not emphasizing true feelings” 不主性情 and for professing emotions that are “not genuine” 不真; see his Suiyuan shihua 隨園詩話. 68. Shen Deqian, Qingshi biecai ji 清詩別裁集 (Hong Kong: Zhonghua shuju, 1977, facsimile reproduction of 1769 Jiaozhong tang edition), 4.1a., entry on Wang Shizhen.

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Afterthoughts If we take a broad overview of late Ming and early Qing poetics, it becomes obvious that mid-seventeenth-century ruminations on the nature of poetry are politicized responses to the literary debates of the preceding century. Thus, the “revival of the ancients” ( fugu 復古) is no longer a matter of imitating earlier poetic styles; it is bound up with the project of preserving cultural continuity against all odds. By the same token, the ideal of individual expression, on one hand, is criticized for self-indulgence and, on the other, takes on the urgency of political and historical self-definition. Literary judgments are more than ever moral-historical judgments. Wu Weiye, for example, linked Chen Zilong’s advocacy of returning to Tang poetic style to his martyrdom. 69 Qian Qianyi and, later, Zhu Yizun decried Zhong Xing’s 鍾惺 (1574–1625) poetry as “an evil omen” (shiyao 詩妖), “the sign of warfare” (bingxiang 兵象), and “the music of a fallen state” (wangguo zhi yin 亡國之音), thereby implying that his Jingling 竟陵 school of poetry played a role in the collapse of the Ming dynasty. 70 Perhaps the Jingling school’s perceived overemphasis on individual expression, dissonance between self and society, and disengagement from history accounts for this severe condemnation. 71 In contrast to such polemicized and politicized judgments, Wang Shizhen tended to be more temperate and conciliatory, as when he tried to mediate the differences between Chen Zilong’s Huang Ming shixuan 皇明詩選, which upholds the style of the Ming “Earlier and Later Seven Masters” and their advocacy of “return to the ancients” and Qian Qianyi’s Liechao shiji, which categorically dismisses the Seven Masters. 72 He also praised the judiciousness of Zhong Xing’s poetic and ————— 69. Wu Weiye, “Peng Yanyou Oucun cao xu” 彭燕又偶存草序, in WMC, 2: 670–71. 70. Qian Qianyi, the entry on Zhong Xing 鍾惺 in Liechao shiji xiaozhuan 列朝 詩集小傳 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji, 1983), 2: 571–74; Zhu Yizun, entry on Zhong Xing and Tan Yuanchun 譚元春, in Ming shi zong 明詩綜, 17.18. Gu Yanwu also gave a similarly negative appraisal of Zhong Xing; see his Rizhi lu 日知錄, 18.440. 71. Poets in the Jingling school, however, did write about their times, and some of them, including Huang Daozhou 黃道周 (1585–1646) and Ni Yuanlu 倪元璐 (1593–1644), were famous martyrs when the Ming fell. The criticism of the Jingling poets’ immorality is a bit puzzling to the modern reader. 72. See Wang’s comment in Gufu yuting zalu 古夫于亭雜錄 (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1988), 5.121; Yan Dichang discusses these differences in Qing shi shi, pp. 40–42.

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historical criticisms. 73 As always, Wang was trying to forge an orthodoxy that can both claim inclusiveness and insist on poetic decorum. His critics dismiss him for being no more than “a pure, graceful Li Yulin” 清秀李于麟, 74 thereby implying that his contemplative style and aura of cultural authority merely echo the classicism of the Seven Masters. (Li Panlong 李攀龍 [1514–70; cognomen Yulin] was one of the leaders of the Later Seven Masters and, like Wang, hailed from Shandong.) More surprising is Qian Zhongshu’s 錢鍾書 assertion that Wang shared a secret affinity with Zhong Xing—he describes him as “a subtle, restrained Zhong Bojing” 蘊藉鐘伯敬, pointing to a common aspiration for a purer interiority. 75 All these apparently contradictory assertions—after all Zhong Xing’s Jingling school is commonly thought to be rebelling against the classical revival of the Seven Masters—can be reconciled if we think of a position “beyond history.” Both mid-Ming classicism and late Ming interiority can serve a poetic voice that transcends the trauma of political turmoil, harking back, on one hand, to the confident orthodoxy predating the disorder of dynastic decline and conquest and, on the other, to an inward distance that promises an escape from history.

————— 73. Wang Shizhen, Gufu yuting zalu, 5.119–20. 74. Wu Qiao 吳喬, “Da Wan Jiye shiwen,” 答萬季野詩問, in Qing shihua, p. 26; Zhao Zhixin, Tanlong lu, in Qing shihua, p. 312. 75. Qian Zhongshu, Tanyi lu, p. 105.

History and Memory in Wu Weiye’s Poetry 7 Wai-yee Li The mid-Qing historian and poet Zhao Yi 趙翼 (1727–1814) once wrote of Yuan Haowen 元好問 (1190–1257), a poet who lived through the Mongol conquest of the Jin 金 dynasty: Misfortune for the country was good fortune for the poet, Coming upon cataclysmic upheavals, his words achieve perfection.

國家不幸詩家幸 一到滄桑語便功

The nineteenth-century critic Zhu Tingzhen 朱庭珍 cited these comments as particularly pertinent to Wu Weiye 吳偉業 (1609–72) and suggested that Wu might not have risen above his early propensity for ornate, sensuous diction had he not been forced by the contemporary crisis to turn his attention to politics and history. 1 The “what if” is ultimately as intractable in literary history as in other kinds of history. Moreover, Wu’s creative period overlapped so much with the chaos and destruction of the Ming collapse that it would be difficult to isolate an “early period” untouched by political concerns. Zhu’s observation, however, does draw attention to how the language of pleasure and ————— 1. Zhu Tingzhen 朱庭珍, Xiaoyuan shihua 筱園詩話, see Qian Zhonglian 錢 仲聯 et al., Qingshi jishi 清詩紀事 (Hanjiang: Jiangsu guji chubanshe, 1987–89; hereafter cited as QSJS ), 3: 1420. Zhao Yi himself implied the same judgment in his extended commentary on Wu Weiye’s poetry in Oubei shihua 甌北詩話, in Qing shihua xubian 清詩話續編, ed. Guo Shaoyu 郭紹虞 and Fu Shousun 富壽蓀 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1983), pp. 1282–98. See also the summary of his style in Siku quanshu zongmu 四庫全書總目 (QSJS 3: 1414).

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passion may be “redeemed” by an engagement with history. Indeed, the merger of a highly wrought diction (and, by extension, romantic-aesthetic values) with the need to lament, ponder, or reflect on contemporary events came to define Wu Weiye’s style of mournful beauty (aigan wanyan 哀感頑艷). In Zhao Yi’s logic, traumatic historical events add an epic dimension to the poet’s empathy and imagination. As personal and national destinies converge, the poet’s role as chronicler and illuminator of tumultuous times comes to the fore. It is in such a context that one may speak of a new imaginativediscursive space defined by memory, historical reflection, and poetic self-consciousness.

Writing History in Poetry The mid-Qing annotator of Wu Weiye’s poetry Jin Rongfan 靳榮藩 ( jinshi 1748) frequently used the phrase shishi 詩史 to describe Wu’s works. In Jin’s characterization, Wu “used poetry to examine history and drew on history to verify poetry” 以詩考史，以史證詩. 2 Wu’s idea of “writing history in poetry” (yishi weishi 以詩為史) is decidedly “interventionist” in his earlier poems: for him, poetry supplements what is lacking or missing in historical records. Wu Weiye commented on his own poem on the late Ming official and poet Yang Tinglin 楊 廷麟 ( jinshi 1631) (“Linjiang canjun” 臨江參軍 [The military advisor ————— 2. See Jin Rongfan 靳榮藩, comp., Wushi jilan 吳詩集覽 (Shanghai: Zhonghua shuju, 1930s, Sibu beiyao edition), 4B.4b, 4B.6b, 6A.9b; Zhao Yi, Oubei shihua, in Qing shihua xubian, pp. 1288–91. Wei Xian 魏憲 (fl. 1671) praised Wu as “a Dong Hu [a famous ancient historian] among poets” (shi zhong Dong Hu 詩中董狐); see Wu Meicun quanji 吳梅村全集, ed. Li Xueying 李學潁 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji, 1990; hereafter cited as WMC ), 1: 63. Wei also commended “The Song of Yonghe Palace” 永和宮詞 as “poetic history” (WMC, 1: 55). Hu Weiyuan 胡薇元 ( jinshi 1877) praised “Yuanyuan’s Song” 圓圓曲 for its “modes of expression in the tradition of the Spring and Autumn Annals” (Chunqiu bifa 春秋筆法) (WMC, 1: 80). Lu Ciyun 陸次雲 (1630–1702+) and Deng Hanyi 鄧漢儀 (1617–89) compared Wu Weiye to Sima Qian (comments on “The Song of the Minister of War from Yanmen” [雁門 尚書行, WMC, 1: 295]). Deng Hanyi claimed that “Silver Spring Mountain” 銀泉山 exemplifies “the use of the historical method in poetry” ( yi shifa wei shi 以史法 為詩; WMC, 1: 304). Cheng Muheng 程穆衡 ( jinshi 1737) opined that “The Blue Gate Song of Xiaoshi” 蕭史青門曲 “suffices to supplement history” 真堪補史 (QSJS 3: 1450). See also comments by Zheng Fangkun 鄭方坤 ( jinshi 1723), Li Ciming 李慈銘 (1830–94), Xu Shichang 徐世昌 (1858–1939), and Hua Binghe 花病鶴 in QSJS, 3: 1414, 1421, 1425; comments by Cheng Muheng, in WMC, 3: 1505.

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from Linjiang; dated 1639; WMC, 1: 2–5]) in his discussion of Yang’s poetry in Meicun shihua 梅村詩話: “Jibu 機部 [Yang Tinglin] and I had the deepest mutual understanding, and I had the longest association with him in his position as military advisor. That is why my poem was closest to the truth, and its discussion of the event most apt. Even the appellation ‘poetic history’ can be borne without shame” 余與機部相 知最深, 於其為參軍周旋最久, 故於詩最真, 論其事最當, 即謂之詩史 可勿愧 (WMC, 3: 1136–38). Yet he also alluded to self-censorship: “Because many words are tabooed, I am not recording the poem in its entirety” 以文多忌, 不全錄 (WMC, 3: 1137). Wu Weiye was in effect appealing to posterity to read a deeper truth, greater anguish, and a sharper critique in his poetic history. As the modern critic Ye Junyuan 葉君遠 points out, the version preserved in Meicun shihua was further “tamed” upon inclusion in Wu’s collected writings—references to Manchu soldiers as “wolves and jackals” (chailang 豺狼), to the destruction wrought by the Eastern Army (“In hunger and satiation, a rampage unrestrained” 饑飽恣馳突), and to the specific locale of the battle (Jiazhuang 賈莊, Zhending 真定) were removed. 3 The most obvious aspect of history in poetry is perhaps the choice of important historical events and personages as subjects. Some of Wu Weiye’s most famous poems deal with military commanders, officials, princes and princesses, and imperial consorts and relatives, whose fates were intertwined with the fall of the Ming dynasty. In these works, the poet traced decisive moments in Ming history by elaborating scenes of ————— 3. The Kangxi edition of Wu’s writings (Meicun ji 梅村集, dated 1670) was the one included in Siku quanshu. Li Xueying’s Wu Meicun quanji, the edition used in this chapter, is based on Meicun jiacang gao 梅村家藏稿 (published in 1910), which incorporates about a hundred titles not found in Meicun ji. This modern edition is collated with various Qing and Republican editions, and includes Wu’s writings found in other sources. Deng Zhicheng 鄧之誠 referred to a Shunzhi edition (dated 1660) that contains sixty poems not included in Meicun jiacang cao (Qingshi jishi chubian 清詩紀事初編 [Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1984], p. 394), but it seems to be no longer extant. Wu Weiye wrote four other poems on Yang Tinglin, the Battle of Julu, and the Ming-Qing conflict at this juncture (1638–39), of which three were not included in Meicun ji for political reasons; see Ye Junyuan 葉君遠, Wu Weiye pingzhuan 吳偉業評傳 (Beijing: Shoudu shifan daxue, 1999), pp. 57–58. For these three poems, “Du Yang canjun ‘Bei Julu shi’ ” 讀楊參軍悲鉅鹿詩, “Zaiyi Jibu” 再憶機部, and “Qiangzi lu” 牆子路, see WMC, 3: 1181, 3: 1193, and 3: 1197, respectively. These poems celebrate the “eastward expedition” 征東 and refer to the Manchus as “Xiongnu” 匈奴 and “barbarians” 虜.

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battles, palace life, and court intrigues. He also offered historical judgment as he inquired into causes and consequences and pondered the elliptical boundary between contingency and inevitability. Beyond praise and blame, Wu was interested in the forces shaping the momentum of events and the memory of them. “The Military Advisor from Linjiang,” for example, commemorates the martyrdom of the late Ming military commander Lu Xiangsheng 盧象昇 (1600–39), who died fighting the Manchus in the Battle of Julu 鉅鹿 in 1639. The poem is structured as an account of the battle told in letters from Lu’s military advisor, Yang Tinglin, to Wu Weiye, who pays tribute to Yang for staunchly defending Lu’s memory. 4 In thus battling the suppression and distortion of Lu’s story, Yang also reveals the factionalism of late Ming politics behind the defeat. The poem thus sustains dual foci, “using Yang as warp and Lu as woof” ( Jin Rongfan’s comment, Wushi jilan, 1A.5b). It begins with an account of Yang Tinglin’s uncompromising probity. At the time the court was divided between pacifists, chief among them Minister of War Yang Sichang 楊 嗣昌 (1588–1641), 5 and advocates of resistance, such as Lu Xiangsheng and Yang Tinglin. In his memorial to the throne, Yang Tinglin severely criticized Yang Sichang, who in retaliation maneuvered to have him sent to the battlefront as military advisor. The middle section of the poem consists of Yang’s two letters to Wu Weiye. The first tells of Lu’s perilous isolation—“Then I saw the various great commanders, / Their arrogance and cowardice were indeed without peer” 次見諸大帥，驕懦固無匹—and ends with a declaration of intent: “Success and defeat cannot be known, / Death and life are what I hold” 成敗不可知，生死予所執. The second letter is a retrospective account of Lu’s martyrdom. It unfolds with shifts in temporal perspectives, beginning with Yang’s final lamentation: “I regret not to have died with him, / Grief and anguish suffuse my heart” ————— 4. For the biography of Lu Xiangsheng, see Ming shi 明史, juan 261, 22: 6759–66. Yang Tinglun’s funerary biography of Lu is included in editions of Lu Xiangsheng’s memorials, Ming da sima Lu gong zouyi 明大司馬盧公奏議. For bibliographical information on these memorials, see Lynn Struve, comp., The Ming-Qing Conflict, 1619–83: A Historiography and Source Guide (Ann Arbor: Association of Asian Studies, 1998), pp. 212–13. 5. For Yang Sichang’s perspectives on the military problems of the time, see Yang Wenruo xiansheng ji 楊文弱先生集, discussed in Struve, The Ming-Qing Conflict, pp. 218–19.

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顧恨不同死，痛憤填胸臆. It then summarizes Lu’s desperate situation before the battle, with few supplies and no reinforcements, emphasizing his equanimity and moral conviction as he faces almost certain death. At that juncture Lu sent Yang to Zhending to transport supplies, 6 and Yang’s account of Lu’s heroic death is recreated from imagination and oral accounts. That night the horse he rode, Neighed in desolate anguish. They beat drums—the drumbeats of lamentation, And pulled out blades—of blades’ edge slowed. He knew it was all for his sake, And sang in grief, his heroic heart overflowed. He must for the various commanders, Wave his halberd, vowing to penetrate the enemy’s ranks. With the setting sun the arrowheads were exhausted, His aides gathered with swords for close combat. Under the army tent some urged him to flee, He shouted: I am dying for my country. His office could control ten thousand li, His years did not reach forty.

是夜所乘馬 嘶鳴氣蕭瑟 椎鼓鼓聲哀 拔刀刀芒澀 公知為我故 悲歌壯心溢 當為諸將軍 揮戈誓深入 日暮箭鏃盡 左右刀鋋集 帳下勸之走 叱謂吾死國 官能制萬里 年不及四十

These lines deliberately echo the account of Xiang Yu’s 項羽 death from Shiji: the empathy between the doomed hero and his cherished steed; comradeship vindicated in a final demonstration of valor; a man cut down in his prime. However, Wu Weiye also emphasized Lu Xiangsheng’s superior stature—he is “dying for his country” (siguo 死國), making the tragic irony of his situation more wrenching. As commander-in-chief, he supposedly “could control ten thousand li”; yet in the end, because of the conspiracy of the advocates of appeasement, he headed an army of a few hundred soldiers. The poem is as much concerned with Lu’s martyrdom as with the truthful account of Yang Tinglin. Yang’s memorial to the throne refuted Yang Sichang’s ————— 6. Lu Xiangsheng intended thereby to spare Yang Tinglin. “By that time those at court and at the frontier were of different minds, and the military situation steadily worsened. Lu thought he would certainly die, and deemed it pointless for the military advisor, a scholar, to die with him. He thus schemed to have him summoned away, and Jibu did not know about it” 已而中外異心, 兵勢日蹙, 盧自 謂必死, 顧參軍書生, 徒共死無益, 乃以計檄之去, 機部不知也 (Meicun shihua, in WMC, 3: 1136).

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attempts to deny that Lu had died as a martyr. It might have cost Yang Tinglin his life but for intervention from his friends, who removed damning references to the eunuch Gao Qiqian 高起潛 (who failed to respond to Lu’s call for help), much to Yang’s chagrin: “If his great integrity were not made clear, / Later ages would blame my brush” 大節苟不明，後世謂吾筆. Even with this blunted critique, however, Yang was punished for slander. “This intent must have reached gods and spirits, / The august one consented to his slight demotion” 此意通 鬼神，至尊從薄謫. There is bitter irony in this juxtaposition. The truth and moral fervor of Yang’s memorial can move the gods and spirits but not the emperor—that Yang suffers only “slight demotion” is proof of the spirits’ favor. The poem ends by defining Yang in terms of his defense of Lu’s memory: “In life and death no words of shame, / Great righteousness shines through his face” 生死無愧辭，大 義照顏色. 7 Like historical writings, “The Military Advisor of Linjiang” is concerned with the “rectification of names” (zhengming 正名). Yang Tinglin and Wu Weiye became good friends as fellow Hanlin academicians. In 1638, Yang was serving as tutor of the imperial heir apparent. He had little knowledge of military affairs, and Yang Sichang made him Lu’s military advisor to stifle his criticism and to put him in danger. The recurrent use of the title “military advisor” (canjun 參軍) in the poem thus points to Yang Sichang’s devious conspiracy and late Ming factionalism, as well as Yang Tinglin’s staunch loyalty to Lu Xiangsheng. The poem does not show Yang acting in the capacity of “military advisor”; instead the post is redefined as the vantage point of testimony, for it is in that role that Yang could ensure the memory of Lu’s martyrdom. Wu Weiye depicts Yang Tinglin as the historian keeping truthful record upon reading Yang’s own poem about the Battle of Julu: “Although he survives like the great useless gourd, unable to match his good friend, / Heaven has preserved him to keep credible ————— 7. According to Ye Junyuan, “in life and death” refers to Yang Tinglin and Lu Xiangsheng, the living and the dead (Wu Meicun shixuan 吳梅村詩選 [Beijing: Renmin wenxue chubanshe, 2000], p. 12). But this can also be read as alternatives for Yang Tinglin. Yang blamed himself for failing to die with Lu and to brave death by fully exposing the treachery of Yang Sichang and Gao Qiqian. Wu maintained that by choosing to live Yang was able to fulfill his responsibility as a friend. The last section of the poem describes how Yang had taken care of Lu’s family before he met Wu.

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records of unswerving loyalty” 身雖濩落負知交, 天為孤忠留信史 (“Reading Military Advisor Yang’s ‘Lament of Julu’ ” 讀楊參軍悲鉅 鹿詩, in WMC, 3: 1181–82). Lu Xiangsheng is referred to as “minister” (shangshu 尚書), although by then Yang Sichang had replaced him as minister of war—Wu Weiye thereby conveyed his judgment as to who was the rightful minister and further implied that the disastrous defeat at Julu could have been avoided had Lu retained his position, since the war effort was primarily undermined by Yang Sichang. Perspectives shift as the poem veers between the ties of Yang and Lu and the friendship of Yang and Wu. Lu’s story is told by Yang; in the process, Yang defines and presents himself, even as both voices are selfconsciously filtered through Wu’s empathy and anxieties. The ensuing discontinuities and the interplay of direct and indirect, detailed and summary, presentation are also characteristic of historical narratives. 8 The issue is not simply one of totality and complexity: the shifts of perspectives in “The Military Advisor from Linjiang” show how the forces shaping the course of events often also struggle to define its memory and representation. For all his courage and tenacity of purpose, Yang Tinglin’s memorial to the throne omitted the damning account of Gao Qiqian’s cowardice and betrayal, and it was left to Wu Weiye to include it as he wrote of attempts to modulate Yang’s account of Lu. There is added irony that Wu censored his own poem in early Qing. In the winter of 1639, eight or nine months after the Battle of Julu, Yang Tinglin met Wu Weiye, Zhang Pu 張溥 (1602–41), Cheng Jiasui 程嘉燧 (1565–43), and Qian Qianyi 錢謙益 (1582–1664) in Louzhong 婁中, after seeking out Lu Xiangsheng’s children at Yixing. The gathering produced “The Portrait of the Bearded Military Advisor” 髯 參 軍 圖 (painted by Cheng) and another poem about him (by Qian) in addition to “Military Advisor of Linjiang” (WMC, 3: 1137). The reference to Yang ————— 8. In another context, Shen Deqian 沈德潛 (1673–1769) commented on apparent discontinuities in long pentasyllabic poems: “But there are also instances of meaning that seems to unfold continuously yet with apparent discontinuities: before the narrative is completed, suddenly it is abruptly cut off, a discursive aside is thrust in, and suddenly the associations are continued. Shifts and links without signs, beginnings and clues difficult to fathom—this is to use the methods of Zuozhuan and Shiji in rhymed words, one cannot confine such examples to customary models” (Shen Deqian, Yuan shi / Yipiao shihua / Shuoshi zhuiyu 原詩/一瓢詩話/說詩晬語 [Beijing: Renmin wenxue chubanshe, 1979], p. 206).

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as “The Bearded Military Advisor of Linjiang” 臨江髯參軍 in the first line and to his face in the last line (“Great Righteousness shines through his face”) may indicate that the poem was inscribed on the painting (ti hua shi 題畫詩) or at least written with reference to the painting of Yang’s portrait. This was a typical Revival Society meeting in which Lu Xiangsheng and Yang Tinglin could be openly vindicated. The 1639 version of Wu’s poem, however, did not survive intact. By the time he cited it with “tabooed words” removed in Meicun shihua, Yang Tinglin had died as a martyr in anti-Qing resistance in 1646 (WMC, 3: 1138). As noted earlier, further changes were made in the 1660 edition. Even as Wu Weiye celebrated Yang Tinglin’s battles against the silencing and distortions of “the true story,” he himself had to resort to elisions and indirectness to preserve it. Wu posed the entwined questions “How it might have been?” and “How it is remembered?” again and again in poems on significant events marking the crumbling of the Ming dynasty. “The Song of the Minister of War from Yanmen” (“Yanmen shangshu xing” 雁門尚書行, WMC, 1: 292–95) eulogizes the martyrdom of Sun Chuanting 孫傳庭 ( jinshi 1620) and his family in the battle against the roving bandits at Tong Pass 潼關 in 1643. Wu identified the military debacle as a critical moment in the fall of the Ming but absolved Sun from blame: “He died and hopes for the country went with him. But his defeat was due to pressure to engage in battle. Moreover, with heavy rain food supplies dwindled. This was, of course, the will of heaven. Or perhaps this was due to the court’s decrees; his honor should not bear all the blame” 公死而天下事 以去, 然其敗由趣戰, 且大雨絕糧, 此固天意, 抑本廟謨, 未可專以責 公也 (preface to the poem). Wu depicted Sun Chuanting as a military hero steeped in learning, imperturbable (chizhong 持重), and biding his time (chenji 沉機), waving his feather fan in the manner of Zhou Yu 周瑜 or Zhuge Liang 諸葛亮. 9 Rash military action went against his character, even as it betrayed the defensive advantage of Tong Pass. His tragic defeat was overdetermined from the beginning. As a result of the disconnect between the court and the battlefront, he was made to execute doomed orders. ————— 9. I am referring to the image of Zhou Yu in Su Shi’s 蘇軾 (1026–1101) song lyric to the tune “Niannu jiao” 念奴嬌 (“Meditations on the Past at Red Cliff” [“Chibi huaigu” 赤壁懷古]) and the image of Zhuge Liang in Sanguo yanyi 三國演義.

History and Memory in Wu Weiye’s Poetry Suddenly there came news of envoys from the capital Racing like comets, in the middle of the night, their horses sweating. Tracks of overturned chariots—how to bear their resemblance to last year’s? Urging battle, they still used the arrows from Mount Song. 10 The minister received the decree and first hesitated, Then he rose, sword slanting, and suddenly heaved a long sigh. If for now I fail to die, I cannot be a hero— From ages past, who can plan success and failure?

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忽傳使者上都來 夜半星馳馬流汗 覆轍寧堪似往年 摧軍還用松山箭 尚書得詔初沉吟 蹶起橫刀忽長嘆 我今不死非英雄 古來得失誰由算

The pathos of “Yanmen” arises from the sense of unnecessary sacrifice and avoidable disaster. Half the poem traces Sun’s legacy—his son returns and obtains his mother’s corpse (whose undecayed state testifies to her heroic martyrdom), and he reunites with his younger brother, who had been sent away by his mother as she led the women of the family in collective suicide. By contrast, Wu wonders about the dearth of fellow martyrs in the ranks (“To this day they speak only of military advisor Qiao” 至今惟說喬參軍). Writing in the mid-1650s during his two-year tenure as a Qing official (1654–55) in Beijing, 11 Wu Weiye mourns Sun Chuanting as a half-forgotten memory—the rebel armies are no more, and the commemorative stone is covered with moss. But the poet invokes Sun’s unappeased spirit as he looks back on Tong Pass and insists on remembering Sun as the emblem of unrealized possibility. I turned my head—the abandoned ramparts are high on Tong Pass,

回首潼關廢壘高

————— 10. The Ming army suffered a disastrous defeat at the battle of Mount Song the year before. 11. Wu Weiye mentions in the preface his disciple Feng Yunxiang’s 馮雲驤 ( jinshi 1655) “Song of Tong Pass” (“Tongguan xing” 潼關行). (Feng and Sun Chuanting were from the same town [Daizhou 代州].) Both Wu and Feng were in Beijing in 1655 (when Wu wrote “Addressed to Feng Nasheng jinshi, as he took up the office of instructor at Yunzhong” 贈馮訥生進士教授雲中 [WMC, 1: 297]), which suggests that “Yanmen” might have been written around that time.

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wa i - y e e l i I know you are buried among these weeds and brambles. White bones submerged in sand—the spirit should remain, Battle wounds washed by rain—sorrow not yet dispelled.

知君於此葬蓬蒿 沙沉白 骨魂應在 雨洗金瘡恨未消

All of Wu Weiye’s battle poems have a reflective, almost investigative, dimension, as he inquires into causes and consequences, turning battles into nodal points for ruminations on why and how the Ming dynasty fell. Whereas poems on Ming martyrs, such as “Yanmen,” have a more straightforward commemorative intent, the condemnatory accounts of traitors are often modulated by irony and ambiguities. An important example is “The Lament of Mount Song” (“Songshan ai” 松山哀, dated 1655, WMC, 1: 307), which mourns the Ming defeat in the battle of Mount Song in 1642. This was a decisive battle that paved the way for the Manchu conquest of China. The Ming commander, Hong Chengchou 洪承疇 (1593–1665), surrendered to the Manchus and became one of the architects of the new Qing order, undertaking various military expeditions against the loyalist resistance in the south. The poem begins with a dramatic image of doomed failure and then merges perception, imagination, and memory. One has drawn his sword, the other was leaning against the pillar—limitless woe, 拔劍倚柱悲無端 For you I sing, in heroic abandon, of Mount Song. 為君慷慨歌松山 The Lulong Mountains, winding, march eastward, as if plunging into the sea— 盧龍蜿蜒東走欲入海 Straight and relentless, the pillar of support guards the awesome pass. 屹然搘拄當雄關 Linked outposts, an array of defensive ramparts, stretch without end— 連城列障去不息 This mountain alone rises abruptly, gathering misty peaks. 茲山突兀煙峰攢 In its midst is an army base piled with stones, 中有壘石之軍盤 Where white bones, in jagged heaps, tower over the steepest heights. 白骨撑距凌巑岏 A hundred and thirty thousand soldiers died on the same day, 十三萬兵同日死 The River Hun, for blood flowing, rushed in swifter currents. 渾河流血增奔湍

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The first line re-enacts a dramatic moment from the well-known account of Jing Ke’s 荊軻 attempted assassination of the king of Qin (soon to become the First Emperor) from Shiji and Zhanguo ce. The king carries a sword but fails to pull it out, and while that moment lasts, it seems Jing Ke may succeed. Then the king finally unsheathes his sword and strikes Jing Ke, who throws his dagger at the king but misses. Wounded and doomed, Jing Ke leans against a pillar and delivers his final words of defiance. The moment summons the despair and woe that give impetus to the poet’s song, but it may also allude to the circumstances of Hong Chengchou’s surrender. The Ming troops had suffered a crushing defeat, but, unlike Jing Ke, Hong could not embrace martyrdom. Mount Song becomes the malleable symbol of both redoubtable defense and unredeemable destruction. It stands as a veritable pillar of support for the country, guarding the Shanhai Pass. As Li Bo wrote about another strategic stronghold, “One man guards the pass, / Ten thousand fail to go through” 一夫當關，萬夫莫開. Mount Song merges with Hong Chengchou as the would-be defender of the realm guarding the pass (dangguan 當關). In an extensive mountain range, Mount Song stands out, but we soon learn that its height is created by jagged heaps of white bones, and the adjacent River Hun is fed by torrents of blood. Wu Weiye evoked Du Fu’s image of stark violence in a line from “Lament of Chentao” (悲陳陶): “Forty thousand righteous troops died on the same day” 四萬義軍同日死. What should be a symbol of hope and security is submerged in visions of death and despair. Instead of a simple condemnation of Hong Chengchou, Wu Weiye imagined Hong’s regrets and marveled at the vicissitudes of his fortunes. Why should circumstances and experiences not differ? 豈無遭際異 Transformations obtain in a mere instant. 變化須臾間 He served, anxiously toiling, and became commander and minister, 出身憂勞致將相 Vanquished the barbarians, received tallies, and again ascended the altar. 征蠻建節重登壇 And yet he still remembered his former subordinates, 還憶往時舊部曲 Heaved deep sighs, as grief crushed him within. 喟然嘆 息摧心肝

Jin Rongfan observed that this section depicts lament from the perspective of Hong Chengchou. He is credited with grief and remorse,

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and his new allegiance to the Manchus is presented as an odd mixture of agency and circumstantial constraints (zaoji 遭際). 12 The irony is savage and muted at the same time. The poet deliberately adopted the Manchu view of the conquest. The phrase “anxiously toiling” ( youlao 憂勞), usually used to describe the labors of sage-rulers, here refers to the cause of unification under the new dynasty but in effect sums up Hong’s self-serving maneuvers. Hong had fought the Manchus as erstwhile barbarians beyond the frontier; now, he has launched punitive expeditions against the southern Chinese, newly defined as barbarians. He “again ascended the altar”—not only is this a reminder of Hong’s double investiture under both the Ming and the Qing, it also alludes to his position as a martyred spirit honored on sacrificial altars. News of the military debacle at Mount Song was accompanied by rumors of Hong Chengchou’s martyrdom, and sixteen altars were built to offer sacrifices to him. 13 Then the poet probes “lament” in his own vision of history. Alas, on the city walls of Xuantu, the night horns were blown, Breath of killing and cries of war shook the high heavens. The day finally came—great task accomplished, they all entered the Pass. In brocade and furs, astride horses, the battling men rejoiced. They turned their heads—weeds and brambles grew on the Heavenly Mountains. Smoke and fire were sparse in a land cultivated by few. The sun sets on the abandoned ramparts—no one is seen, Only thousands of ghosts remain to fill in the silence and the void. If mountains and rivers were to be thus untended,

嗚呼玄菟城頭吹夜角 殺氣軍聲振寥廓 一旦功成盡入關 錦裘跨馬征夫樂 天山回首長蓬蒿 煙火蕭條少耕作 廢壘斜陽不見人 獨留萬鬼填寂寞 若使山川如此閑

————— 12. Hong Chengchou seemed to have been initially successful in keeping the Manchu army at bay but misguided court orders to step up the offensive proved disastrous; see Ming shi, “Cao bianjiao zhuan” 曹變蛟傳 ( juan 272) and Qing shi gao 清史稿, “Hong Chengchou zhuan” 洪承疇傳 ( juan 237). 13. Jin Rongfan’s annotations in Wushi jilan, 6B.10b.

History and Memory in Wu Weiye’s Poetry I know not for what ends were these wars and struggles. I have heard: the court longed for the old capital, And decreed recruitment of laborers for spring tilling. On two sides of the river, young and strong men have all been taken, From around the capital were those sent away, for them home meant little. Farmers on the backs of oxen were sent off in droves, At cockcrow, officers at the Pass called up men often. Had they known of this day, why would they have toiled to prosper? Pity indeed the tillers and soldiers of the central plains.

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不知何事爭強弱 聞道朝廷念舊京 詔書招募起春耕 兩河少壯丁男盡 三輔流移故土輕 牛背農夫分部送 雞鳴關吏點行頻 早知今日勞生聚 可惜中原耕戰人

Through a complex shifting of perspectives between being inside and being outside the Shanhai Pass, Wu Weiye subsumes the issue of Hong’s guilt to a broader vision of wanton, meaningless destruction in a history that can claim no ultimate purpose or design. A world out of joint is depicted through the dislocation of peoples. All the triumphant bannermen have entered the Pass, leaving their land of origin in neglect and desolation. The Heavenly Mountains ranging across present-day Gansu and Xinjiang were associated with the Xiongnu; here it refers either to the erstwhile front of war or the original territories of the Manchus, now overgrown with weeds and brambles. To rectify this situation, the Qing court sent vast numbers of Chinese beyond the frontiers to the “former capital” of Shengjing 盛京 (present-day Shenyang 瀋陽). In the midst of these massive displacements, the abandoned battlefield has an eerie calm. Only the ghosts of dead soldiers, numbering tens of thousands, fill up the void. If mountains and rivers are thus left untended (xian 閑), what is the justification for struggles pitting one people against another? The poet could only lament the ruthlessly uprooted and the dead, “the tillers and soldiers of central plains.” The conquest is implicitly presented as a betrayal of origins, as the poet sets forth a vision of history unfolding as the violent disjunction between peoples and places.

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Wu Weiye’s famous “Yuanyuan’s Song” (“Yuanyuan qu” 圓圓曲, dated mid-1650s, WMC, 1: 77–80), which weaves Wu Sangui’s passion for the courtesan Chen Yuanyuan 陳圓圓 with his betrayal of the country, shares the same underlying concern for the individual’s perspective and the shape of history found in “Lament of Mount Song.” 14 “Yuanyuan’s Song” combines subtle, pointed castigation and deft unmasking of Wu Sangui with measured empathy for Chen Yuanyuan as an inadvertent and uncomprehending femme fatale. The focus on Chen’s role in the dynastic transition goes beyond specific critique of Wu Sangui; it demonstrates how the concatenation of events that culminated in the Manchu conquest of China was fortuitous and avoidable, tied to accidental passions and obsessions. Although the embedded love story is brought up only for ironic disparagement, it also makes for a sensuous and ornate diction that links “Yuanyuan’s Song” to Wu’s poems lamenting the fate of the imperial consorts and princesses, such as “Song of Yonghe Palace” (“Yonghe gong ci” 永和 宮詞, dated 1645, WMC, 1: 52–55), “The Blue Gate Song of Xiaoshi” (“Xiaoshi qingmen qu” 蕭史青門曲, dated ca. 1651, WMC, 1: 74–76), “Silver Spring Mountain” (“Yinquan shan” 銀泉山, dated ca. 1650s, WMC, 1: 303–4), and “Elegy for Princess Siling [Changping]” (“Siling zhang gongzhu wanshi” 思陵長公主輓詩, WMC, 1: 186–90). These poems combine longing and nostalgia for the splendor of palace life, a stark contrast between past glory and present desolation, and deep sympathy for the sad fate of the imperial family. There are unmistakable echoes of literary antecedents such as Bai Juyi’s “Song of Lasting Sorrow” and Yuan Zhen’s “Song of Lianchang Palace” (“Lianchang gong ci” 連昌宮詞), with the added emphasis that, compared to the An Lushan Rebellion and Tang decline, the fall from grace here is more traumatic, and the death and destruction more devastating. “The Song of Yonghe Palace” begins by comparing Consort Tian 田 貴妃 to Zhang Lihua 張麗華, favored consort of the last ruler of Chen (Chen Houzhu, r. 583–89) and then to Zhao Feiyan 趙 飛 燕 , the scheming beauty beloved by Han Emperor Chengdi (r. 32–6 bce). She belonged, like them, to the pleasures of the south—Yangzhou, where ————— 14. I discuss “Yuanyuan’s Song” and other accounts of Chen Yuanyuan in “Women as Emblems of Dynastic Fall in Qing Literature,” in Dynastic Crisis and Cultural Innovation: From the Late Ming to the Late Qing and Beyond, ed. David Wang and Shang Wei (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Asia Center, 2005): 93–150.

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Tian grew up, is associated with Zhang and Zhao. Wu Weiye proceeds to tell her story with implicit references to the Yang Yuhuan 楊玉環 lore—the Chongzhen emperor (r. 1627–44) and Consort Tian pledged their love with “inlaid box and hairpin of gold” 鈿合金釵, just as Tang Emperor Xuanzong (r. 713–56) and Yang did in “The Song of Lasting Sorrow”; the Tian family’s abuse of power recalls the misdeeds of Yang Guozhong 楊國忠 (Yang Yuhuan’s brother); Consort Tian’s desire for “the tea of Yangxian” 陽羨茶 is a tamer version of Consort Yang’s fabled fondness for litchi; and the rivalry between Consort Tian and Empress Zhou is reminiscent of that between Consorts Yang and Mei (the latter first appears in “Meifei zhuan” 梅妃傳 attributed to Cao Ye 曹鄴 [ jinshi 850]). Wu Weiye is careful to point out, however, that he is not telling a story of passions and pleasures undermining duty and vigilance. In “The Song of Lasting Sorrow,” Emperor Xuanzong regrets that the nights are too short and avoids the dawn meetings with his ministers. By contrast, here “Late into evening, the emperor had no thoughts of pleasure, / Through the palace gates, in the middle of the night, came urgent messages” 君王宵旰無歡思，宮門夜半傳封事. In the Tang story, Yang’s brother and sisters abuse their power with impunity, here the Chongzhen emperor distanced himself from Tian for three months upon report of her father’s corruption. Consort Tian is no city-toppling femme fatale. Her solicitous empathy with the tormented emperor prompts her to introduce pleasures and refinements from Yangzhou, 15 but these are presented as decorous distractions in the frugal and abstemious imperial household. The jealous rivalry between Consort Tian and Empress Zhou is also no murderous intrigue. After Tian falls from imperial favor, Empress Zhou brings about a reconciliation by inviting both the emperor and Tian to a flower-viewing party. 16 The pathos of the poem lies precisely in the irrelevance of the parallels with Consort Yang. Palace intrigues, bereavement, and Consort ————— 15. The poem mentions that Tian brought styles of fashion and furniture from Yangzhou into the palace. 16. According to Ming shi, “Zhou hou zhuan” 周后傳, the flower-viewing episode took place at the Yonghe Palace gate (cited in Jin Rongfan, Wushi jilan, 4A.11a). The title of the poem thus alludes to a turning point in the relationship between the Chongzhen emperor and Consort Tian. Another source, Rixia jiwen 日下記聞, maintains that Yonghe Palace was where Tian lived ( Jin Rongfan, Wushi jilan, 4A.11a).

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Tian’s death pale beside the tragedy of the fall of the Ming dynasty. Tian entered the palace in 1628 (the first year of the Chongzhen reign) and died in 1642. Her short life overlaps with the transition from tentative hopes to imminent destruction. The connections are symbolic rather than causal. Her younger son died just as Henan was lost to the rebels. She herself died from grief and sickness shortly thereafter. Her timely demise saves her from the violent deaths suffered by the empress, consorts, and princesses when the capital falls to rebels in 1644. White-haired palace maids were quietly distressed and mournful, How would they know that being morning dew might have been good fortune? In the following year, palace grass would reek with the blood of war, At that time none would weep facing the Western grave mounds.

頭白宮娥暗顰蹙 庸知朝露非為福 宮草明年戰血腥 當時莫向西陵哭

Unlike the romantic quest for reunion in “The Song of Lasting Sorrow,” the poet imagines Consort Tian inquiring after the fate of her elder son, Prince Yong (who disappeared in the chaos following the fall of the capital), when she encounters the Chongzhen emperor in the underworld. “Yonghe Palace” thus reverses the logic of “The Song of Lasting Sorrow”—in the latter the focus shifts from political crisis to the emperor’s longing, while in “Yonghe Palace” the protagonists’ emotions and fate are increasingly subsumed by historical trauma. If Wu Weiye studiously avoids any inference of pleasures and passions undermining the polity as he mourns Consort Tian, he pointedly brings up the theme in references to the Southern Ming court in the last four lines of the poem. At the Zhao grave mound, pines sough in sorrow with the north wind, In the depths of spring in the Southern Inner Palace, he embraced Yelai. Play not the Tianbao tunes of Rainbow Skirt, Into the Jingyang palace well, leaves from the autumn ash trees will fall.

昭丘松檟北風哀 南內春深擁夜來 莫奏霓裳天寶曲 景陽宮井落秋槐

“Zhao grave mound” (Zhaoqiu 昭丘) refers to the grave of King Zhao of Chu in Hubei. Ye Junyuan suggested that the sudden geographical shift

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draws attention to the looming threat posed by Li Zicheng’s rebel army in the Hubei area. 17 “North wind” 北風 designates the Shijing poem traditionally associated with anguished concern for troubled times. There is a dense web of allusions to decadent and pleasure-loving rulers. The “Southern Inner Palace” was a Tang palace in Chang’an, but in Wu’s poems it consistently refers to Ming palaces in Nanjing. Yelai 夜來 (literally, “night comes”) evokes images of favored consorts— according to Shiyi ji 拾遺記 (attributed to Wang Jia 王嘉, fourth century), she was beloved by Emperor Wen of Wei (r. 220–27). “The Tianbao tunes of Rainbow Skirt” obviously summon images of Yang Yuhuan and doomed pleasures. According to the History of Southern Dynasties (Nan shi), Chen Houzhu, last ruler of the short-lived Chen dynasty, hid with his favored consorts Zhang and Kong at the bottom of the Jingyang palace well when the Sui army marched in. The falling leaves from autumn ash trees also ring with echoes of Tang poems and stories on desolation in the wake of the An Lushan Rebellion. 18 The last couplet is an implied conditional structure through which the poet delivers his warning. Dated to 1645, the final lines of the poem capture the sense of impending catastrophe. In other words, although Consort Tian may be compared to Zhang Lihua and Yang Yuhuan in the poem, the allusions are tentative and halfhearted, marked as the standard diction of palace poetry. It is only when Wu Weiye moves to the Southern Ming that irony takes over, as heedless self-indulgence and doomed pleasures come under critical scrutiny. Almost all of Wu Weiye’s poems on the imperial family are intensely elegiac. He engages our sympathy by dwelling on the raw human emotions of supposedly exalted personages and the ordinariness of their relationships, while romanticizing his subject with sensuous, ornate diction and mythic allusions. “The Blue Gate 19 Song of Xiaoshi,” ————— 17. In Suikou jilüe 綏寇記略 ( juan 9), Wu Weiye described how, after being defeated by the Manchu army at Xian, Li Zicheng moved to Wuchang and occupied the area for about two months. It is on this basis that Ye Junyuan (Wu Weiye pingzhuan, p. 112) dated the poem to the second or third month of 1645. 18. For example, “Leaves of autumn ash trees fall in empty palaces” 秋槐葉落空 宮里 ( Wang Wei 王維 (699–759), “Ningbi chi” 凝碧池); “leaves from the ash trees in the palace fell in autumn” 宮槐秋落 (Chen Hong 陳鴻 (ca. eighth–ninth c.), “Chang hen ge zhuan” 長恨歌傳). 19. Blue Gate (Qingmen 青門) was the southeastern gate of Chang’an during the Han dynasty. During the early Han, Zhao Ping 召平, formerly Lord of Dongling under the Qin dynasty, made a living by growing melons at the Blue Gate. Blue

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for example, begins with images of mythic resonance: “At Blue Gate Xiaoshi gazed at the bright moon, / The tail of the jade-colored phoenix swept wide open the River of Heaven” 蕭史青門望明月，碧鸞尾掃銀 河闊. According to the Biographies of Immortals (Liexian zhuan 列仙 傳), Xiaoshi 蕭史 is a flute player who marries Nongyu 弄玉, daughter of Duke Mu of Qin 秦穆公, only to fly away with her a few years later on the backs of phoenixes. Here Xiaoshi probably refers to Zhou Xian 周顯, 20 who married Princess Changping 長平公主, daughter of the Chongzhen emperor. The tragic story of Changping is well known: “When Princess Changping was sixteen, the emperor chose Zhou Xian as her husband. They were about to be married, when alarms of rebel advances stopped the preparations. As the capital fell, the emperor entered the Shouning Palace. The princess clutched the emperor’s clothes and cried. The emperor said, ‘Why did you have to be born in my family!’ He waved his sword and hacked her, cutting off her left arm. . . . Five days later, Princess Changping revived.” 21 (The idea that death was preferable to dishonor was so prevalent that the Chongzhen emperor was one among many who killed the women of the family or ordered them to commit suicide.) In the aftermath of the conquest, the princess begged to become a nun, but the Qing court decreed her marriage to Zhou Xian. She died the following year (1646). Zhou Xian, or possibly an unspecified narrator, begins his remembrances of the imperial princesses in the silence and desolation of the world after the fall. Scenes of imperial marriages unfold in his mind—the pomp and splendor of the marriage of Princess Le’an 樂安 ————— Gate thus refers to the life of someone who had previously enjoyed glory and privilege as a commoner or a recluse. Jin Rongfan (Wushi jilan, 5B.12a) suggests that Qingmen might also have been the name of a musical tune. 20. Many Qing and modern commentators (e.g., Jin Rongfan, Cheng Muheng, Ye Junyuan) maintained that Xiaoshi here refers to Liu Youfu 劉有福, who was married to Princess Ningde 寧德. Of the four imperial sons-in-law mentioned in this poem, Liu and Zhou were the only two who survived the fall of the Ming. Since major portions of the poem describe the shameful survival of Liu Youfu and Ningde, it is possible that Xiaoshi refers here to Liu. I believe that it is more likely that Xiaoshi refers to Zhou Xian because Princess Changping’s early death is compared to Nongyu’s flight as immortal later on in the poem: “All sighed that the Zhou lad was once chosen, / Only to be shocked, too soon, by the Qin maiden’s immortal ascension” 盡歎周郎曾入選，俄驚秦女遽登仙. 21. Ming shi, juan 121, “Gongzhu zhuan” 公 主傳, cited in Jin Rongfan, Wushi jilan, 5B.14a–14b.

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公主 with Gong Yonggu 鞏永固, and, going further back in time (xianshi 先是), that of Princess Ningde with Liu Youfu. (Both Le’an and Ningde were daughters of the Taichang emperor [r. 1620] and sisters of the Chongzhen emperor.) In a conversation between the sisters Le’an and Ningde, Princess Rongchang 榮昌公主, daughter of the Wanli emperor (r. 1572–1620), is mentioned. The death of Princess Le’an heralds the sense of an ending, fulfilled the following year with the fall of the capital to the rebel army. The poem turns to the degradation of Princess Ningde and her husband, its supposed focus according to many readers, 22 only to trace accounts of Princesses Changping and Le’an as remembered and dreamed by Ningde. Even such a brief summary allows glimpses into the complex shifts of perspectives, as the unfolding poetic narrative is filtered through various voices and loci of consciousness. Engagement with the personae’s dreams, imaginations, and memories results in the quotidianization of imperial family relationships. The Chongzhen emperor was close to his sisters in part because of the bereavements they suffered together: “Alas, the former emperor lacked brothers, / The imperial princesses could be called his closest kin” 嗚呼 先皇寡兄弟, 天家貴主稱同氣. There is no disparagement of the extravagant wedding of Princess Le’an; instead it is presented as fitting indulgence for a youngest daughter and sister. The emperor is called by his informal title guanjia 官家. The princesses Le’an and Ningde were “sisters of two families” 兩家姊妹, who naïvely delighted in their finery. They spoke affectionately about their aunt, Princess Rongchang, who was close to the imperial household because “all the Six Palaces adhered to the rituals of the family” 六宮都講家人禮. The death of Le’an draws the emperor and Ningde closer. As of then, from the same womb there was none other. When Ningde came to court, the laughing words were real.

此時同產更無人 寧德來朝笑語真

————— 22. Jin Rongfan, Wushi jilan, 5B.14a; Xu Qiu 徐釚 (1636–1708), Xu benshi shi in Meng Qi 孟棨 ( jinshi 875) et al., Benshi shi / Xu benshi shi / Benshi ci 本事詩/續本事 詩/本事詞, ed. Li Xueying 李學潁 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1991), p. 256; Zhao Yi, Oubei shihua, cited in Qing shihua xubian, p. 1289; comments by Cheng Muheng and Qian Zhonglian (QSJS 3: 1450).

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wa i - y e e l i His concerns extended to four directions as he toiled into the night, Brother and sister of the same family spoke of their pain and sorrow.

憂及四方宵旰甚 自家兄妹話艱辛

The early Qing poet Qian Lucan 錢陸燦 (1612–97) criticized the vernacular style here, deeming it common enough “to be given to blind singing girls for their ballads” 可付盲女彈詞. 23 One may argue, however, that quotidianization heightens the sense of personal perspective and deepens sympathy for the all-too-human plight of the princesses. The focus shifts to Ningde after 1644; she was the only princess who survived the fall of the Ming. Paradoxically, subjective illumination makes for both mythological and mundane turns in the diction. The iron hordes burnt the palaces in the following year, The emperor and the empress in anguish bid each other farewell. From the tower of immortals, looking at ashes flying, By the Weaver Maid Bridge, listening to blood flowing. Lacking heroic abandon, it was hard for him to follow Master Gong in death, In chaos and confusion, she was fearful of parting from the Liu lad. Husband and wife held on to each other in the midst of battles, Surviving the change of dynasties to this day.

明年鐵騎燒宮闕 君后倉皇相訣絕 仙人樓上看灰飛 織女橋邊聽流血 慷慨難從鞏公死 亂離怕與劉郎別 扶攜夫婦出兵間 改朔移朝至今活

Destruction takes on surreal qualities, even as the all-too-human instinct for survival makes martyrdom seem too daunting. The decisions of Princess Ningde and Liu Youfu to continue living despite shame and degradation are contrasted with the martyrdom of Gong Yonggu, husband of the deceased Princess Le’an, who killed himself and his children when the capital fell. (A fuller account of that story is told in “Encountering Liu Xuefang at Wumen” [“Wumen yu Liu Xuefang” 吳門遇劉雪舫], WMC, 1: 14–16.) Instead of directly disparaging Liu Youfu and Princess Ningde, the poem traces how Ningde remembers the death of Princess Changping. ————— 23. See Deng Zhicheng, Qingshi jishi chubian, 1: 393.

History and Memory in Wu Weiye’s Poetry With painful memories of the former emperor, her tears streamed down: Changping was the youngest, and should have been most cherished. On the Qingping sword was jasper blood that will bear fruit in another life, Purple Jade’s soul returns for karmic ties in a different era. All sighed that the Zhou lad had already once been chosen, Only to be shocked, too soon, by the Qin maiden’s immortal ascension.

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苦憶先皇涕淚漣 長平嬌小最堪憐 青萍血碧他生果 紫玉魂歸異代緣 盡歎周郎曾入選 俄驚秦女遽登仙

Zhuangzi tells the story of the Zhou minister Chang Hong 萇弘, whose blood turned to jasper three years after his death in battle. “Jasper blood” is shed for loyalty or love of country; here its uncertain meaning is to be fulfilled in another life. As told in Soushen ji 搜神記, Purple Jade, the daughter of Wu king Fucha 夫差, died for love. Love and life that cannot be continued in another existence under a new dynasty is symbolized by Changping’s short and tragic life. In death her mythic role takes over—she becomes the Qin princess Nongyu (echoing the beginning reference to Xiaoshi), who flies away on a phoenix to become an immortal. Even when the mundane displaces the mythic, there is little room for irony. Following her remembrance of Changping, Ningde dreams of her “little sister” 小妹 Le’an in the midst of a palace feast, which is described with the standard diction of palace poetry. “The Blue Gate Song of Xiaoshi” is often read as indirect criticism of Princess Ningde and her husband, Liu Youfu, for their failure to commit suicide when the Ming dynasty fell. 24 However, Wu Weiye focused on the pathos of their poverty and shame rather than the stringent standards of honorable death. Their undignified survival is too much a part of the dynastic collapse to be singled out for blame. The poem concludes with images of vicissitudes and indifferent nature: Where are the pipes and music that come upon the great avenues?

何處笙歌臨大道

————— 24. See Cheng Muheng’s comment in Wu Meicun shiji jianzhu 吳梅村詩集箋注 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1983), facsimile reproduction of the Baoyun lou manuscript, 7.455.

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wa i - y e e l i Whose families’ grave mounds face the setting sun? Look only, on this night of jade towers in heaven, How black magpies fly on unconcerned, year after year.

誰家陵墓對斜暉 只看天上瓊樓夜 烏鵲年年它自飛

In poetic accounts of the imperial family, criticism is almost invariably mixed with pity. Even Consort Zheng 鄭貴妃, whose intrigues wrought much havoc in the Ming court from the 1580s to the 1620s and who is consistently vilified in Qing fiction and tanci 彈詞, is not really condemned in the poem devoted to her memory, “Silver Spring Mountain.” Instead her desecrated grave becomes a site for mourning the fall of the dynasty. There are also instances of deliberately laudatory treatment of Ming court ethos, even when the subject hardly warrants it, as in “The Song of Loyang” (“Loyang xing” 洛陽行, dated 1643). “The Song of Loyang” laments the murder of the Ming prince Zhu Changxun 朱長洵 and the fall of his domain, Loyang, to Li Zicheng’s rebel army in 1643. Zhu Changxun, son of the Wanli emperor and uncle of the Chongzhen emperor, was corrupt and extravagant, yet Wu Weiye refrained from overt criticism in his poem, despite passing references to the Wanli emperor’s partiality and the opulence of Changxun’s palaces. Instead the Chongzhen emperor’s generosity toward his uncle is regarded as evidence of superior “rules of conduct in the family” ( jiafa 家法). (The Wanli emperor had hoped to make Changxun, son of his favored Consort Zheng, the imperial heir, but had to give up because of opposition from his officials. Chongzhen thus rose above jealousies and earlier intrigues in his liberality toward his uncle.) 25 Jin Rongfan discerns implied criticism of Changxun’s son, the new Prince of Fu, whose escape was unaccounted for and who appears only at the end of the poem to inherit the fiefdom. The evidence of censure here is inconclusive; the Prince of Fu only comes in for pointed criticism as the unworthy, pleasure-loving successor of the martyred Chongzhen emperor at the end of “The Song of Yonghe Palace.” 26 In ————— 25. This is comparable to what in historiography is called “respectful concealment of the truth regarding superior persons” (wei zunzhe hui 為尊者諱). The poem suppresses references to Consort Zheng’s intrigues to have Changxun made the heir apparent. 26. See Jin Rongfan, Wushi jilan, 4B.3b–4b; 4A.15b–16a.

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general, members of the imperial family are depicted as victims, and their sad fate is told as half-forgotten stories. The issue is less inquiry into historical causation than lament for and commemoration of these most spectacular emblems of the fall of the Ming.

Poetic Encounters with the Past: Places, Persons, Possessions The idea of “writing history in poetry” foregrounds narrative and discursive elements and may inspire elaborate accounts and a concomitant sense of totality. There are as well poetic encounters with the past that focus on traces and fragments and the vagaries of the remembering self, and these sometimes issue in self-conscious delineations of the processes of memory and historical reflection. The interest in perspectives that characterize Wu’s poems on history becomes even more important. Meditations on the past at sites laden with memories of historical vicissitudes, often mediated through earlier literary expressions, recur frequently in Chinese literature. Early Qing poets revisiting political and cultural centers in the Lower Yangzi area in the wake of the dynastic transition wrote some of the best poems in this genre—prominent examples include Qian Qianyi’s “Miscellaneous Poems on West Lake: Twenty Poems” (“Xihu zagan ershi shou” 西湖 雜感二十首), 27 and Wu Weiye’s nine poems on Jinling (WMC, 1: 176–79) 28 and four poems on Yangzhou (WMC, 1: 395–97). The West Lake poems were written in 1650, when Qian passed through Hangzhou on his way to secure the support of Ma Fengzhi 馬逢知, military commander of Jinhua 金華, for the loyalist cause. Elegiac longing for the life of pleasure and passion is transmuted into political statement as Qian juxtaposed past glory and present desolation, fusing personal memory with “literary memory”—i.e., images of the West Lake from ————— 27. See Qian Qianyi 錢謙益, Youxue ji 有學集, with annotations by Qian Zeng 錢曾, ed. Qian Zhonglian 錢仲聯 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1996), 1: 89–106. 28. The first eight poems (“Deng shangfang qiao yougan” 登上方橋有感, “Zhongshan” 鍾山, “Taicheng” 臺城, “Guoxue” 國學, “Guanxiang tai” 關象臺, “Jiming si” 雞鳴寺, “Gongchen miao” 功臣廟, “Xuanwu hu” 玄武湖) focus on specific landmarks. The ninth one, “Moling kouhao” 秣陵口號, appears in WMC, 3: 1149. Jin Rongfan (Wushi jilan, 12A.13b–14a) appends other seventeenth- and early eighteenth-century poems on Jinling that lament the fate of the Southern Ming.

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different historical periods remembered through allusions to earlier literature. Wu Weiye’s four Yangzhou poems, written in 1653 during his reluctant journey northward to Beijing to serve the new regime, frame historical reflections with self-conscious references to the process of memory. Famous for its pleasures and refinement, Yangzhou was the site of a horrifying massacre in 1645 at the entry of the Qing armies (as told in the well-known “Record of Ten Days in Yangzhou” [“Yangzhou shiri ji” 揚州十日記]). Wu’s poems pit memories of bloody destruction against their deliberate erasure. Yangzhou (first poem) With drumbeats and fife tunes come rowing songs, The oarsmen sing loudly “Guangling Autumn.” Willows by the official canal—by whom newly planted? Orioles and flowers in imperial gardens—are they the same as in visits of old? Ten years of west wind—white bones all in vain, Twenty-four bridges with the bright moon— unconcerned vermilion towers. For naught was the imperial carriage of the Southern Dynasty welcomed here, It could not even win a mound of earth at Leitang.

疊鼓鳴笳發棹謳 榜人高唱廣陵秋 官河楊柳誰新種 御苑鶯花豈舊游 十載西風空白骨 廿橋明月自朱樓 南朝枉作迎鸞鎮 難博雷塘土一丘

Yangzhou has reverted to refined pleasures and oblivious good cheer. The boatmen’s songs, newly planted willows, and apparently unchanging orioles and flowers suppress memories of violent conquest. Lines five and six employ a standard juxtaposition in parallel couplets—the words kong 空 (in vain, for nothing) and zi 自 (on its own, by itself, unaffected). The bridges and vermilion towers, emblems of sensuous pleasures, remain defiantly a world unto themselves. All traces of the massacre have been erased—is there any meaning then to its remembrance? The indictment of the Southern Ming court in the last two lines constitutes Wu’s poetic response to the implicit logic of the preceding couplet. The Hongguang emperor does not even measure up to Emperor Yang of Sui 隋煬帝, another pleasure-loving last ruler, who built the canals and lined them with willows in order to gain easy access to Yangzhou. (Emperor Yang was buried at Leitang, but the Hong-

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guang emperor could not even win a grave there.) The poet tries to counter erasure by lingering over and offering judgments on events of the Southern Ming. The second and third poems re-examine the major military and political decisions of the Southern Ming—Shi Kefa’s 史可法 (1601–45) thwarted petition for a northern expedition, divisions among the “four commanders north of the Yangzi River” 江北四鎮 and their conflicting interests, Gao Jie’s 高杰 treachery, Zuo Liangyu’s 左良玉 eastward march against the Southern court, among others. The fourth poem veers away from particular strategic and political concerns and refers specifically to the abduction of Yangzhou women by Manchu troops. They played, to the bitter end, strings of pipa on horseback, By the Jade Hook Slanting Way, women wept. On purple camels’ backs, they left Agate Flowers Courtyards, From the green grave, souls returned to boats of brocade masts. Budding maidens of twelve, cardamom pods on branch tips of spring, By Magnolia Bay, roads of three thousand miles. Sui embankment, jade-disc moon, and pearl curtain dreams— Du Mu was once here, and remembers yesteryears.

撥盡琵琶馬上絃 玉鉤斜畔泣嬋娟 紫駝人去瓊花院 青塚魂歸錦纜船 豆蔻梢頭春十二 茱萸灣口路三千 隋堤璧月珠簾夢 小杜曾游記昔年

There are two sets of imagery here. One belongs to the Wang Zhaojun 王昭君 lore—pipa played on horseback, purple camels, green grave, and returning soul. (These are standard associations, but there are more specific allusions to Du Fu’s poem on Wang Zhaojun, in a series of “Meditations on Ancient Sites” 詠懷古跡: “Her green grave still remains to face the setting sun” 仍留青塚向黃昏, “In vain did the soul return on the music of pendants in the moonlit night” 環珮空歸月 夜魂.) The palace lady sent beyond the frontiers to forge good relations with the Xiongnu is a ubiquitous figure in early Qing writings on and by displaced, abducted, and victimized women. She merges with the woman on horseback taken north by Manchu captors or their Han collaborators, another recurrent image. (For example, the female protagonists use such associations in their poems in scene 16 of Fan of West Lake, discussed in Wilt Idema’s chapter.) The other set of images evoke

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decadent southern dynasties and the pleasures of courtesan quarters— Jade Hook Slanting Way is where Sui palace ladies were buried; Agate Flower Courtyards, boats of brocade masts, the Sui embankment, and the jade-disc moon recall pleasure tours and the literary pretensions of Sui and the southern dynasties; cardamom pods and pearl curtain dreams refer to the courtesan world, specifically to the late Tang poet Du Mu’s (803–ca. 853) ten-year “dream of Yangzhou”—“For ten years, one dream of Yangzhou, / Winning the name of heartless lover in the blue towers” 十年一覺揚州夢，贏得青樓薄幸名. Yangzhou has suppressed the first and capitalizes on the second set of images. Their conjunction here, however, is a reminder that they cannot be separated. The women of Yangzhou who symbolize its pleasures were once associated with loss, abduction, and the shame of conquest. For all its gaiety (as told in the first poem), Yangzhou cannot repress the memories of violence and destruction. On a personal level, this also means that Wu Weiye’s historical reflections have to be modulated by recollections of his own immersion in the romantic-aesthetic world of the Lower Yangzi. He compares himself to Du Mu. To what extent does this implicate him in a kind of collective guilt? Do those memories make him a better or worse observer and judge of his times? Whereas the Yangzhou poems focus on Southern Ming history while alluding to other doomed southern dynasties, the Jinling poems, written a few months earlier when Wu Weiye was still trying to avoid serving the new regime on the grounds of ill health, tie historical reflections to well-known landmarks. Wu’s Jinling poems dwell on the founding of the Ming dynasty, the early Ming emperors, the shape of Ming history, and the fall of the Ming. The specific sites mentioned in the Jinling poems are also recalled in “Encountering the Gardener at the Southern Wing, I Was Moved to Compose Eighty Rhymes” (“Yu nanxiang yuansou ganfu bashi yun” 遇南廂園叟感賦八十韻, WMC, 1: 24–27, dated 1653). But in “Encountering the Gardener,” the act of remembrance is more personal and deliberate, jolted by sudden encounters and utterances at the right moment. At the beginning of the poem, Wu claims to have forgotten or at least taken refuge in the repression of memories. The places I visited in the course of my official career— Their traces were all forgotten. By the wayside I encountered a gardener, He asked from whence I came.

平生游宦地 蹤跡都遺忘 道遇一園叟 問我來何方

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Hesitant, I yet recognized the former attendant— Coming to events past was enough to break my heart. He opened the door and invited me to sit down, Within dilapidated walls and low enclosures. But then he pointed to the midst of briars and thorns— This was none other than the Southern Wing.

猶然認舊役 即事堪心傷 開 門延我坐 破壁低圍 牆 卻指灌莽中 此即為南廂

Wu Weiye served as administrator (siye 司業) of the Nanjing academy (Guozi jian 國子監) in 1639. “I therewith visited old sites, / Every step brought new ruminations” 我因訪故基，步步添思量. Personal recollections of his life in the academy merge with historical memories of the rise and decline of the Ming dynasty. Memories acquire the immediacy of an unfolding vision, as the mind lingers over aspects of the Southern Wing and the surrounding scene. Historical retrospection is also defined through particular moments. “I turned my head and gazed at the Chicken Coop Mountain” 回頭望雞籠—the word “gazed” (wang 望) implies vision willfully summoned. The poet “sees” the Temple of Meritorious Officials on the mountain, dedicated to key figures in the founding of the Ming dynasty; the Tongtai Temple 同泰寺 and the grandiose piety of the first Ming emperor; the observatory where an astrologer divined inauspicious signs of war and chaos; and himself offering sacrifices to the first Ming emperor at the Nanjing palaces. In line with the logic of the poem, there is sharp visual focus on the particular symbols of the fall of the Ming. Of the ten thousand pines at the imperial tombs at Mount Zhong, The big ones rivaled heaven in height. Their roots and knots were like bronze, Bent and gnarled, their dark bark was taut and hard. These things from distant eras—we know not which— In the same day met with destruction by the axe. For the hundreds and thousands of years before the present, How could rise and fall of dynasties be uniquely absent? Moreover, the trees were cut down by the people— Who among them was not tilling land or growing mulberries? Myriad beings, as well as grass and trees, Owed their existence and nourishment to our emperor.

鍾陵十萬松 大者參天長 根節猶青銅 屈曲蒼皮僵 不知何代物 同日遭斧創 前此千百年 豈獨無興亡 況自百姓伐 孰者非耕桑 群生與草木 長養皆吾皇

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人理已澌滅 講舍宜其荒 獨念四庫書 卷軸誇縹緗 孔廟銅犧尊 斑剝填青黃 棄擲草莽間 零落誰收藏

The pines at the imperial tombs date to a distant past—no one quite knows what era 29 —and seem to have acquired the appearance and ritual status of ancient bronze vessels. They had survived the rise and fall of dynasties until now. The acts of violence that destroyed them are presented as avowedly gratuitous but actually unavoidable—gratuitous because the common people (baixing 百姓) who cut down the trees were supposed to have the usual means of sustenance by agriculture and sericulture, unavoidable because of the devastation of the dynastic transition, here couched in ritual language: “our emperor” who gives rise to all things and sustains them is no more. Violence against nature is mirrored in the destruction of culture—the obliteration of norms and principles of human conduct (renli 人理), the dispersal of books and ritual vessels. The poet gives us emblems of destruction that go beyond the fall of a dynasty—he conveys the sense of cataclysmic rupture and traumatic upheavals as “all under heaven perished” (wang tianxia 亡天下, to borrow Gu Yanwu’s 顧炎武 phrase). Yet despair is framed, and perhaps contained, by the gardener’s narrative. The gardener triggers the unfolding of memories, but Wu’s visions are also followed by the gardener’s account of the chaos and destruction he experienced. Of the two, the gardener suffered greater physical hardships during the dynastic transition, yet he concludes his account with measured optimism and implied acceptance of the new regime. The poem ends with Wu’s re-examination of his own situation. ————— 29. According to Gujin tushu jicheng 古今圖書集成 (Shanchuan dian 山川典, Zhongshan bu 鍾山部), the pine trees were planted during the Eastern Jin and Liu-Song dynasties (fourth–fifth centuries); cited in Wang Tao 王濤, ed., Wu Meicun shi xuan 吳梅村詩選 (Hong Kong: Sanlian shudian, 1987), p. 216n1.

History and Memory in Wu Weiye’s Poetry I envy this old man, Who bears his hoe and sings “Canglang.” Toiling and restless, I grieve for my lot in the dust-stained world, In vain do heaven and earth seem vast and limitless.

127 顧羨此老翁 負耒歌滄浪 牢洛悲風塵 天地徒茫茫

“Canglang” is the song of the fisherman in the eponymous poem attributed to Qu Yuan. In that poem, Qu Yuan proclaims to the fisherman his rejection of compromise: he would rather drown himself in the Xiang River than allow his purity to be sullied by the grime and dust of the world. “The fisherman smiled serenely, drummed his rowing sweep and left, singing, ‘The water of Canglang is clear, I can wash my capstrings with it; the water of Canglang is muddy, I can wash my feet with it.’ He thus left and did not speak more with him.” 30 Like the fisherman, the gardener in the poem seems to rise above his troubled times. His adaptability and detachment are more labored, however, for his proclamation comes on the wake of his graphic description of misery and devastation. Or perhaps his equanimity is the poet’s projection: as one who “bears the hoe” the gardener can continue his old occupation without qualms, as a scholar-official on his way to serve the new dynasty, Wu Weiye felt much greater guilt and anguish. In “Encountering the Gardener,” the visionary intensity of the poet’s memories of past glory and recent destruction is modulated by the gardener’s more prosaic account of the sufferings he lived through and witnessed. This empathetic mode of filtering the complexity, confusion, and contradictions of the moment through the perceptions and sufferings of an individual obtains in other poems on “meeting the person who remembers,” such as “Encountering Liu Xuefang at Wumen.” The same principle underlies poems narrated from the perspective of an individual fusing personal experiences with historical vicissitudes, as in “Song of the Aged Entertainer from Linhuai” (“Linhuai laoji xing” 臨淮老妓行, WMC, 1: 285–87, dated 1655), and the cluster of poems dealing with Wu Weiye’s encounters with and remembrance of his former lover, the famous courtesan Bian Sai (“The ————— 30. “Yufu” 漁父, in Zhu Xi 朱熹 (113o–1200) comp., Chuci jizhu 楚辭集註 (Hong Kong: Zhonghua shuju, 1987), pp. 116–17. In Wu Weiye’s poetry, “Canglang” as a symbol of escape from history and politics is attained only by other people; it remains an elusive goal for himself, see especially “Donglai xing” 東萊行, “Song He Xingzhai” 送何省齋, “Fanqing hu bingxu” 樊清湖并序, “Zeng Wulin Li Liweng” 贈武林李笠翁 (WMC, 1: 69–71, 221–24, 226–29, 454).

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Song on Listening to the Daoist Bian Yujing Playing the Qin” 聽女道 士卞玉京彈琴歌 [WMC, 1: 63–65, dated 1651] and “Passing by the Grave of the Daoist Yujing at Brocade Forest, With Appended Biography” 過錦樹林玉京道人墓并傳 [WMC, 1: 250–53, dated 1660s]). 31 Such poems often play on the tensions between being inside and outside momentous historical events. In “Aged Entertainer,” for example, the narrator Dong’er 冬兒 was a singing girl in the household of Liu Zeqing 劉澤清, one of the “four commanders north of the [Yangzi] River” during the Southern Ming. He surrendered to the Qing after a disastrous defeat and was executed in 1649 for alleged treason. As an entertainer in Liu’s household, Dong’er is party to the reason for his downfall: “He vied for excellence not in martial prowess but in singing and dancing” 不鬥身強鬥歌舞. Indulgence in sensual pleasures is an insistent refrain throughout the poem—Liu Zeqing’s troupe of singers and dancers had so displaced his army in importance that military readiness can be gauged only in terms of the antics of his beautiful horse-riding and bow-wielding entertainers; after crushing debacles on the battlefield, his only thought is to escape with his women: “In a boat with Xishi, seeking shelter in the southeast” 西施一舸東南避. Heedless self-indulgence is pervasive, and Dong’er tells of similar offenses in families related to the emperor by marriage, chiefly Tian Hongyu 田 宏遇, Consort Tian’s father. However, Dong’er transcends her historical role by judging and lamenting the licentious excesses of the likes of Liu Zeqing and Tian Hongyu. This is in part accomplished through an emphasis on Dong’er’s agency and peripatetic energy. After Beijing fell, she went to the capital on horseback to learn the fate of the Ming princes 32 —she was thus able to behold as an outsider Tian Hongyu’s ————— 31. For discussions of these poems, see Kang-i Sun Chang, “Listening to the Daoist Priestess Bian Yujing Playing the Qin” in “The Idea of the Mask in Wu Wei-yeh (1609–71),” Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 48, no. 2 (1988): 289–320; Wai-yee Li, “Heroic Transformations: Women and National Trauma in Early Qing Literature,” Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies, 59, no. 2 (1999): 412–23. 32. Tan Qian 談遷 (1594–1657) reported Wu Meicun’s account of Dong’er as he showed Tan his recent poem: “With the national calamity of Jiashen (1644), Zeqing wished to investigate whether the two princes still lived. Dong’er asked to undertake the mission, changed into military garb, and went north. She arrived at the Tian household, learned of the misfortune that befell the two princes, and returned to report to Zeqing” 甲申國變,澤清欲偵二王存否, 冬兒請身往, 易戎飾而北. 至 田氏, 知二王不幸, 還報澤清; see Tan Qian’s Beiyou lu 北游錄 (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1960), p. 110. Liu Zeqing might have been interested in using the Ming

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oblivious and decadent lifestyle (although she had been once a singing girl in Tian’s household). When she returned south and saw Liu’s army in hasty retreat, she again observed and judged the event as one who had witnessed the extent of disorder and suffering in the realm. Although Liu is ironically referred to as a “wandering knight-errant” ( youxia 游俠), 33 it soon becomes apparent that the real knight-errant is Dong’er. As a martial entertainer fashioned by Liu Zeqing, Dong’er emblematizes the spiritual malaise that undermines the polity, and she maintains a kind of empathetic understanding of Liu Zeqing’s fate as an example of the ephemerality of human glory. As one who exploits her role and transcends it, however, her voice merges with the poet’s. Her martiality is transformed from mere decorative performance into instrumental action that facilitates witnessing, remembering, and clearsighted judgment. Encounters with characters who then function as poetic narrators or the poet’s personae often explore perspectives on empathy and historical understanding, the individual’s freedom and responsibility, and the meanings of heroism and victimhood in troubled times. There are analogous encounters with objects in Wu’s poetry: as remnants of the fallen dynasty, these objects are traces that inspire longing for a lost world or provoke critical inquiry into causation and the momentum of historical events. As possessions, they also lead to ruminations on ownership, power, and mutability: examples are “Palace Fan” (“Gongshan” 宮扇, WMC, 1: 60–61), “Song of the Tian Family’s Iron Lions” (“Tianjia tieshi ge” 田家鐵獅歌, dated mid-1650s, WMC, 1: 304–5), “On Camellias in the Garden of Inept Government, with Preface” (“Yong Zhuozheng yuan shancha hua bing yin” 詠拙政園山茶花并引, WMC, 1: 262–63, dated 1660), and “Song of Emperor Xuanzong’s Gold Inlaid Cricket Pan” (“Xuanzong yuyong qiang jin xishuai pen ge” 宣宗御用戧 金蟋蟀盆歌, WMC, 1: 61–63, dated 1654–55). ————— princes to legitimize his own ambitions. Tan Qian’s account makes it clear that Dong’er’s mission was totally her own initiative. Wu Weiye and Tan Qian were together in Beijing from 1654 to 1656, and “Aged Entertainer” can thus be dated to that period. 33. “The wandering knight-errant of Linhuai rose in Shandong” 臨淮遊俠起 山東—the appellation does not imply that Liu corresponds to the ideal of the knight-errant who dispenses justice and rights wrongs. Rather, it indicates his dubious social station, roving career, and probable defiance of the law.

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As traces and possessions, these objects define concerns quite different from those traditionally enshrined in “poetry on objects” ( yongwu shi 詠物詩), which tend to focus on the essential and generic traits of objects rather than their particularities and histories. The objects in the enumerated examples encapsulate specific moments of Ming history, define changes endured through dynastic upheavals, and, through imagistic and allusive associations, address forces shaping the momentum of events. The palace fan in the eponymous poem was bestowed on Wu Weiye as a token of imperial favor. The poet recalled the occasion of the gift in 1637 in the middle of the poem: Wu was lecturing on the “Airs of Bin” from Shijing in his capacity as tutor of the Eastern Palace (Donggong jiangdu 東宮講讀), and the sweating emperor “with heavenly words personally decreed the gift for his close attendant” 天語親傳賜近臣. This moment of recognition seals the bond between ruler and subject. The image of the Chongzhen emperor as an attentive student who loves and respects learning also evokes memories of a more hopeful era, when the tide might still have been turned. More generally, the palace fan comes to symbolize imperial refinement and splendor—hence the beginning references to the Xuande emperor’s (r. 1425–35) interest in acquiring exquisite fans, and the web of allusions to fans taken from the literature on consorts, palace ladies, and court life. The fan acquires new meanings with personal disillusionment and historical crisis. It becomes a “face screen” (bianmian 便面) with which the poet emphasizes his desire for anonymity and withdrawal. With spreading chaos, “Qi silk and Chu bamboos 34 lost color” 齊紈楚竹無 顏色. The Southern Ming fell in the fifth month of 1645, and devastating wars merge imagistically with the heat of summer (“Pomegranates spit fire, lighting up the imperial city” 石榴噴火照皇都), which the fan cannot ameliorate. In his account of the fall, Wu may be punning on the homophones shan 扇 (fan) and san 散 (dispersion, loss). 35 For Wu Weiye, the faded fan in his empty casket, encountered years later, represents both continuity and rupture—it belongs to an irrevocably lost world; yet unlike other unused fans in the literary tradition, it does not symbolize rejection and abandonment. Instead, it embodies the poet’s tenacious ties to the fallen dynasty. ————— 34. The materials for making fans. 35. See Wang Jiansheng 王建生, Wu Meicun yanjiu 吳梅村研究 (Taipei: Wenjin chubanshe, 2000), 145.

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The transformations and changing meanings of the fan are typical of this group of poems. “Song of the Tian Family’s Iron Lions” uses these objects to lament the fate of Tian Hongyu’s clan and, by extension, the Ming. The iron statues guarding the gates of Tian’s mansion are replicas of “extraordinary objects from the far west” 先朝異物來西極 sent as tribute to the emperor. As such, they participate in the appropriation of exotic objects for the expansion of imperial glory. The statues, Tian Hongyu, and the emperor’s gift of horses (“mottled lions”) coalesce in images of unbridled power. Tian’s death and the eroded, overgrown statues turn lions into symbols of futility and illusion. “In vain were the seventy-two crouching lions carved” 枉刻壿獅七十二 on the bridge at Lugou; they were not able to avert defeat for the Ming army. Lions may retain power only in the Buddha’s city of illusion (huacheng 化城). “Cricket Pan” epitomizes the complex interplay of past and present, glory and degradation, illusion and historical fact, in these poems. The Xuande emperor’s obsession with cricket fights should invite ironic disparagement—such unseemly frivolity symbolizes the disastrous neglect of government and dynastic decline. 36 Yet this critical perspective is at first deliberately muted. The poem begins thus: When Emperor Xuanzong ruled, in those early years of peace and prosperity, The “Airs of Bin” painting was presented for his perusal at the informal palace. Palace ladies in secluded chambers caged crickets, And, in long days unoccupied, watched them for pleasure.

宣宗在御昇平初 便殿進覽豳風圖 暖閣才人籠蟋蟀 晝長無事為歡娛

————— 36. The story “Crickets” (“Cuzhi” 促織) in Pu Songling’s 蒲松齡 Liaozhai zhiyi 聊齋誌異 describes the sufferings of the people as a consequence of the nationwide search for wonder crickets to satisfy the Xuande emperor’s wayward passion. (In a manner typical of some Liaozhai stories, the sociopolitical criticism gives way to a magical solution—in this case the temporary metamorphosis of a small boy into a mettlesome cricket to save his father.) According to Shen Defu 沈德符 (1578–1642), the Xuande emperor rewarded the catcher of special crickets with military honors, and Xuande cricket pans were much prized during the Wanli period (Wanli yehuo bian 萬歷野獲編 [Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1997]), p. 625. See also accounts from Ming xiaoshi 明小史 and Wang Shizhen’s 王士貞 (1526–90) Guochao cong ji 國朝 叢記, cited in Wu Yifeng 吳翌鳳 (1742–1819), comp., Wu Meicun shiji jianshu 吳梅 村詩集箋疏 (Hong Kong: Guangzhi, n.d.), p. 106.

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The poem introduces the subject of crickets through the emperor’s perusal of the Scroll of the Airs of Bin 豳風圖 painted by Zhao Mengfu 趙孟頫 (1254–1322)—“Seventh Month” (“Qiyue” 七月) in “Airs of Bin” in Shijing mentions “crickets under my bed” 蟋蟀在我床下. The aura of refinement and decorum persists in the ensuing description of palace ladies amusing themselves with “caged crickets.” Hints of impropriety and excess creep in only with the extravagant paraphernalia for keeping crickets, starting with the Dingzhou porcelain ware, their “enfeoffed land” (tangmu 湯沐). The dissonance becomes ever more marked as the emperor contemplates cricket fights with the “deep intention” (shenyi 深意) appropriate to real battles. With allusive and metaphorical virtuosity, and spinning endless insect puns, Wu conflates images of fighting crickets with memories of the first Ming emperor and his capable military strategists and warriors. The Xuande emperor’s passion is apparently thereby dignified and justified, but the crickets also become grotesque echoes of early Ming military glory. When Wu turns his focus to more recent military disasters, he persists with the insect metaphors. For two hundred years there were no heroes. Among the ruins of the former palaces, chirps in the autumn wind. For one inch of territory, the Man and Zhu peoples struggled, Five thousand armored soldiers turned into insects and grains of sand.

二百年來無英雄 故宮瓦礫吟秋風 一寸山河鬥蠻觸 五千甲士化沙蟲

In a famous parable on relativism, perceptions, and perspectives in Zhuangzi, the kingdoms of Man 蠻 and Zhu 觸, situated on the right and left tentacles of a snail, respectively, fight for land, resulting in the death of tens of thousands in the process. In Ge Hong’s (284–364) Master Embracing Simplicity (Baopu zi 抱樸子), we are told about the magical transformations of King Mu of Zhou’s 周穆王 army—the gentlemen into gibbons and cranes, the common people into insects and grains of sand. The couplet thus juxtaposes hypothetical philosophical detachment with all too real violence and destruction. The emperor may have imagined early Ming military glory as he contemplated cricket fights, but defeats in real battles mean reducing humans to insects. Pushing the metaphor of cricket fight to its limits, the Ming collapse is presented as a calamitous yet avoidable series of events, comparable to the gratuitous

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cruelty exhibited toward crickets “by mistake falling into the hands of children” 捉生誤落兒童手. Dehumanizing insect analogies leave little room to mourn even the heroism of martyrs: “Ants as bandits pierced walls and bore rotten flesh, / Bones of battle, though fragrant, decayed all too soon” 蟻賊穿墉負敗胔，戰骨雖香嗟速朽. Yet ultimately, specific criticism of the emperor or of trivial pursuits yields to anguished lament. Even the ceasing of cricket fights, insofar as it is part of a general collapse and indiscriminate destruction, occasions deep sadness. (The favored pastime of the new regime is falconry.) The irrelevance of cricket fights is conflated with the chaos and devastation of the dynastic transition: The books of secluded imperial chambers met with the fires of battle, Guoyuan lacquer boxes and Xuande porcelain are worthless as mud. Few continue the hundred amusements in the famed capital— Noble relatives with a thousand pieces of gold— to whom can they offer bets?

祕閣圖書遇兵火 廠盒宣窰 賤如土 名都百戲少人傳 貴戚千金向誰賭

The empty, displaced cricket pan, now in the possession of Wu’s collector-friend Sun Chengze 孫承澤 ( jinshi 1631), symbolizes the fall of the Ming dynasty. Alas, the lacquered city, all smooth and even,is empty, without a soul. Grieving insects, with urgent cries, lament the fate of princes. Poor scholars, men at war, all shed tears— What great pity that the Flying General should meet with no recognition.

嗚呼漆城蕩蕩空無人 哀螿切切啼王孫 貧士征夫盡流涕 惜哉不遇飛將軍

The autumnal cries of insects, the symbol of desolation and death in the Chinese literary tradition, here gain pathos and urgency because of the curious identification of crickets (xishuai 蟋蟀, also called wangsun 蚟 孫 in Southern Chu dialect, according to Fangyan) with Ming princes (wangsun王孫), made possible by a pun. With a further twist, Wu Weiye compares the crickets that had vanished from the bowl to Li Guang, the Han Flying General who met with no recognition in his era. The topos of “recognizing worth” recalls the problem of misman-

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aged talents in the last years of the Ming, as well as the mood of confusion as princes sank to anonymity (if they survived) and claimants to the throne multiplied during the dynastic transition. The crickets’ worth is no longer recognized and all lament their devaluation. But the last line can also be read in the opposite way: “What a pity that they have not encountered the Flying General.” The martial prowess of crickets had been cultivated because of imperial delusions, and as a result the real “Flying General” was not to be found. The only acts of recognition still possible are the labor of Sun Chengze as a collector and that of Wu Weiye as poet-historian. Sun Chengze passed the examination the same year as Wu Weiye, rose to high office under the Qing, and retired in 1653. Although he had scholarly aspirations, he is better remembered as a collector and a connoisseur. In Record of Dispelling Summer Heat in the Year Gengzi (Gengzi xiaoxia ji 庚子消夏記), he wrote about collecting books, paintings, calligraphy, and objects of art that had belonged to the Ming imperial collection and other great families but had been dispersed and displaced during the chaos of dynastic transition. In the 1660 preface to Record of Dispelling Summer Heat, he styled himself “The Reclusive Old Man of the Valley of Retreat” 退谷 逸叟 and describes a life of unhurried refinement and lofty detachment. Wu’s “Song of the Valley of Retreat” (“Tuigu ge” 退谷歌, WMC, 1: 300–302), also addressed to Sun, is a rhapsodic praise of Sun’s decision to retire to his estate, the Valley of Retreat. 37 Written when Wu was serving in Beijing, the poem contrasts the freedom and escape symbolized by the Valley of Retreat and Wu’s own sense of entrapment. Sun the collector commands a space of cultural continuity wherein political differences can be (at least temporarily) displaced and social-cultural ties can persist. (Sun Chengze’s social-literary exchanges with the famous literati of the period, including Qing officials as well as yimin, are recorded in many early Qing writings.) Wu Weiye also ruminated on the implications of collecting and connoisseurship in the upheavals of dynastic transition in poems such as “Reading in Mao Zi————— 37. Both “Cricket Pan” and “Valley of Retreat” were probably written during Wu’s stay in Beijing, around 1654 or 1655. Sun’s “Valley of Retreat” was widely celebrated in early Qing poetry. Other poets who wrote poems about being entertained there include Wang Shizhen 王士禛 (1634–1711), Cao Rong 曹溶 (1613–85), Wang Chong jian 王崇簡 (1602–78), and Gong Dingzi 龔鼎孳 (1615–73). On Sun Chengze’s literary and social ties, see Xie Zhengguang, Qingchu shiwen yu shiren jiaoyou kao, pp. 330–91.

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jin’s Studio Xie Ao’s Record of Grief and Lament at the Western Terrace, handcopied by Wu Pao’an [Wu Kuan, 1435–1504]” (“Mao Zijin zhai zhong du Wu Pao’an shouchao Song Xie Ao Xitai tongku ji” 毛子晉齋 中讀吳匏庵手抄宋謝翱西臺慟哭記, WMC, 1: 10–12, dated 1648), “Song of the Pavilion of Imbibing from the Ancients” (“Jigu ge ge” 汲古閣歌, WMC, 1: 68–69), and “Viewing the Calligraphic Piece from the Tang Empress Wu’s Collection at Xiang Huangzhong’s Abode” (“Xiang Huangzhong jia guan Wansui tongtian fatie” 項黃中家觀萬歲通天 法帖, WMC, 1: 73–74). 38 The collector battles dispersal and destruction and guards cultural continuity in the midst of the “kalpic fire” ( jiehuo 劫火) of dynastic collapse. Collecting and connoisseurship become the refuge for withdrawal in a period when disengagement is an elusive and problematic ideal, as Wu shows in his “Poem on White Swallows” (“Baiyan yin” 白燕吟, WMC, 1: 217–18). All possible reproaches of self-indulgence vanish as Wu presents the collector’s domain as a place for those who have suffered the traumatic dynastic transition to commune with one another and, in the case of “Reading in Mao Zijin’s Studio Xie Ao’s Record,” with loyalists from other eras.

Aesthetic Mediation Encounters with performers, artists, and aesthetic objects in Wu Weiye’s poetry involve special dimensions of irony and self-reflexivity. Various poems on landscape paintings 39 dwell on the desire for escape and political disengagement and on the painted realm as the longed for, albeit inadequate and illusory, substitute for a ravaged world. Examples are “Inscribing the Painting River Sandbanks, Seeing off Hu Yanyuan on His Southward Return” (“Ti Hezhu tu song Hu Yanyuan nangui” 題河渚圖送胡彥遠南歸, WMC, 1: 221–22), “Lu Qian’an shijun Re————— 38. References to Xie Ao and his work are ubiquitous in the writings of Ming loyalists. Mao Jin 毛晉 (zi Zijin, 1599–1659) was a famous collector, bibliophile, and publisher, and “Jigu ge ge” is addressed to him. Xiang Dingxuan 項鼎鉉 (zi Huangzhong, jinshi 1601) came from a family famous for its collection of paintings and calligraphy. On the fate of this piece of calligraphy and the Xiang family’s collection, see Zhu Yizun’s 朱彝尊 (1629–1709), “Wansui tongtian tie zeng Wang sheren Zuolin” 萬歲通天帖贈王舍人作霖 and “Shu Wansui tongtian tie jiushi” 書萬歲通天帖舊事, in Pushu ting ji 曝書亭集 (Shanghai: Guoxue zhengli she, 1937), 4.54 and 53.625–26, respectively. 39. Wu Weiye was a gifted painter and befriended the famous painters of his time; see his “Hua zhong jiu you ge” 畫中九友歌, WMC, 1: 289–90.

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quested a Song on a Painting of Yushan by the Recluse of Yunjian, Lu Tianyi, in Twenty-seven Rhymes” (“Lu Qian’an shijun yi Yunjian shanren Lu Tianyi suo hua Yushan tu suo ge de ershiqi yun” 魯謙庵使 君以雲間山人陸天乙所畫虞山圖索歌得二十七韻, WMC, 1: 266–67), and “Song of Viewing a Landscape Painting by Wang Shigu” (“Guan Wang Shigu shanshui tu ge” 觀王石谷山水圖歌, WMC, 1: 270–71). More than the above-cited examples, “Song of the Painting Parting for the Distances at River Jing” (“Jing jiang songyuan tu ge” 京江送遠 圖歌, WMC, 1: 271–74) promises escape and transcendence by appealing to its own history, which is told in the preface. The famous painter Shen Zhou 沈周 (1427–1509) painted this scroll in 1492 for Wu’s greatgreat-grandfather Wu Yu 吳愈 ( jinshi 1475), when the latter left Nanjing to take up office at Xuzhou 敘州 (in Sichuan). The scroll is inscribed with a poem by Shen Zhou, a preface by the calligrapherpainter Zhu Yunming 祝允明 (1460–1526), a colophon by Wen Zhengming 文徵明 (1470–1559), and poems by various mid-Ming poets. The very creation of this scroll testifies to the familial-social-cultural ties among the great families in the Wu area. Wu Yu’s son-in-law, Wen Zhengming, had studied painting with Shen Zhou and was also a close associate of Zhu Yunming. Wu Weiye describes the making of the scroll as a collective effort, and focuses especially on Wen’s mediatory role. Wu wrote this poem in 1670, upon reacquiring this long-lost scroll, presented here as the symbolic condensation of Wu’s family history, mid-Ming glory, and the fate of the literati culture in the Wu area. The world behind the creation of the scroll is presented as the ideal political and artistic community. Wu Weiye compares the reign of the Hongzhi emperor (r. 1488–1505) to the sagely ruler of the early Zhou kings Cheng and Kang 嗚呼孝宗之世真成康. In that glorious era, the margins of civilization are tamed and assimilated to the center. Wu reminds us that his ancestor’s destination, Xuzhou, was called in Tang times a “barbarian domain” 戎州, but under the Hongzhi emperor’s enlightened reign “Qutang Gorge and Jian’ge Pass lost their forbidding danger, / Upon leaving home, there are ten thousand miles of broad roads” 瞿塘劍閣失險阻，出門萬里皆康莊. The subject of the scroll is separation, yet it affirms community. It anticipates great distance to be traversed, but Wu maintains that in a peaceful and well-governed Ming empire, “broad roads” unify margin and center.

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Wu Weiye proclaims the uncontested superiority of cultivation and refinement in the Wu area for generations 吾吳儒雅傾當代. However, “with endlessly passing months and years, mores have changed” 歲月悠 悠習俗非. Wu sees a diminishing cultural heritage in an alienating landscape, wherein Shu regains its threatening aspect—“This domain is distant, obscured by floating clouds” 此州迢遞浮雲礙. In a kind of symmetrical inversion, Xuzhou’s remoteness and alienness invade the lower Yangzi area. The traveler can only find solitude and grief: “Who can be made to send off the parting one? / Ascend the heights and find heartbreak at the Dark Barbarian Frontier” 正使何人送別離, 登高腸 斷烏蠻塞. (The Dark Barbarians 烏蠻 were usually associated with the western and southwestern frontiers of China and could designate Xuzhou.) Wu might have been referring to the scars of battles that Jingjiang (present-day Jingkou) endured during the early Qing. With the prevalent sense of exile and homelessness—Manchu conquest has turned China into a foreign land—the poet turns to the scroll for escape: “For ruined paper and fragments of silk, a plaintive and resounding song, / A sky of poetic thought lies beyond rivers and mountains” 廢楮殘縑發浩歌，一天詩思江山外. Wu also paid homage to the painter Cui Zizhong 崔子忠 (zi Qingyin 青 蚓 ) and the idea of aesthetic transcendence in “Inscribing Washing Elephants by Cui Qingyin” (“Ti Cui Qingyin Xi xiang tu” 題崔青蚓洗象圖, dated 1654, WMC, 1: 305–7). Cui died of starvation during the chaotic years of Ming-Qing transition, 40 and most of his works perished in the “fires of war.” This surviving painting captures for posterity a resplendent spectacle in late Ming Beijing. Wu regretted that Cui did not have the chance to see and paint the war elephants from Yue: a painting of warring elephants would have meant the rectification of late Ming military weaknesses. The perennial question of “what could have happened” is imagined through the painted realm. Musicians, singers, performers, entertainers, and courtesans inspired some of the most important works in Wu’s corpus. Typically, the poet knew these characters before the fall of the Ming, re-encountered them ————— 40. Wu gives an account of Cui’s death both here and in another poem, “Inscribing Liu Banran’s Painting Pavilion of Rising Mist” (“Ti Liu Banruan Lingyan ge tu bing xu” 題劉伴阮凌煙閣圖并序, WMC, 1: 275–77). Washing Elephants is found in the Palace Museum in Taipei. For an account of Cui Zizhong, see Zhu Yizun, “Cui Zizhong Chen Hongshou hezhuan” 崔子忠陳洪綬合傳, in Pushu ting ji, 64.750–51.

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after the fall, and addressed poems to them. Examples include “Song of Two Men from Chu” on the storyteller Liu Jingting 柳敬亭 and the musician Su Kunsheng 蘇崑生 (“Chu liangsheng xing” 楚兩生行, dated ca. 1660s, WMC, 1: 246–48), “Extemporaneous Rhymes, to Su Kunsheng” (“Kouzhan zeng Su Kunsheng” 口占贈蘇崑生, dated ca. 1660s, WMC, 2: 513–14), “Song of the Wang Lad” on the singer Wang Zijia 王 紫稼 (“Wang lang qu” 王郎曲, dated 1654, WMC, 1: 283–85), and “To Kou Baimen, Six Poems” (“Zeng Kou Baimen liushou” 贈寇白門六首 [Kou Baimen was a famous courtesan], dated 1653, WMC, 1: 210–13). Sometimes the poet was the audience of their musical performances on the occasion of these re-encounters, as in “Song of Pipa, with Preface” (“Pipa xing, bing xu” 琵琶行并序, WMC, 1: 55–60, dated ca. late 1640s to early 1650s), “Listening to Zhu Lelong Singing, Six Poems” (“Ting Zhu Lelong ge liushou” 聽朱樂隆歌六首 , WMC, 1: 207–9, dated ca. 1650–51), and “Song of Listening to the Daoist Priestess Bian Yujing Playing the Qin.” With the poems on the famous courtesan Dong Bai’s portrait and the fans she painted, the painted image, like musical performance elsewhere in Wu’s corpus, inspire historical reflection through nostalgia. The topos of performance allowed Wu Weiye to present remembrance as cathartic ritual, spiritual communion, and aesthetic communication. A good example is “Song of Pipa.” Here the poet carefully set up the spatial context of performance in the preface—it takes place in Wang Shimin’s 王時敏 (zi Xunzhi 遜之, hao Yanke 煙客, 1591–1680) garden, which is enclosed, hidden, and metaphorically removed. 41 Wang Shimin, one of the famous “four Wangs” in early Qing painting, was the scion of a distinguished scholar-official family. 42 He did not serve under the new dynasty. ————— 41. On spatial metaphors in Wu Weiye’s drama and poetry, see Dietrich Tschanz’s chapter in this volume. 42. His grandfather, Wang Xijue 王錫爵 (1534–1611), was Grand Academician during the Wanli period. Wang Shimin is one of the painters Wu Weiye rhapsodized in “Nine Friends in Painting” (畫中九友歌, WMC, 1: 289–90). Both in this poem and in his congratulatory essay on Wang’s seventieth birthday, “Wang Fengchang Yanke qishi shou xu” 王奉常煙客七十壽序, Wu compared Wang to the great Ming painter Dong Qichang 董其昌 (1555–1634). For Wu Weiye’s other poems about or addressed to Wang Shimin, see WMC, 1: 17–19, 138–41, 412–13. The famous garden architect Zhang Nanyuan 張南垣, for whom Wu Weiye wrote a biography (WMC, 3: 1059–62), designed gardens for both Wang Shimin and Wu Weiye (WMC, 3: 1453; Ye Junyuan, Wu Meicun pingzhuan, pp. 84–86).

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One li from Plum Village [Wu Weiye’s own estate] was the Southern Garden of Wang Yanke, junior minister of ritual affairs. 43 This spring, when the plum blossoms were blooming gloriously, I accidentally walked there. Suddenly I heard pipa music wafting out from behind low walls and clumps of bamboo. I edged the walls and listened intently. Coming to the excellent parts, I forgot myself and clapped my hands. The master opened the gates and invited the guest to come in. I asked who had played a short while before—it turned out to be Yuru, son of Bai Zaimei of Tongzhou. 44 Father and son excel at pipa and love to make new music. In a moment wine was set forth beneath the flowering trees. Spiritedly, Mr. Bai played for me a song, an account of events since the seventeenth year of the former emperor. Telling of chaos and separation, the music was forceful, urgent, and mournful. 去梅村一里，為王太常煙客南 園。今春美梅花盛開，予偶步到此，忽聞琵琶聲出于短垣叢竹間。循牆 側聽，當其妙處，不覺拊掌。主人開門延客，問向誰彈，則通州白在湄子 彧如，父子善琵琶，好為新聲。須臾花下置酒，白生為余朗彈一曲，乃先 帝十七年以來事，敘述亂離，豪嘈淒切。

The idea of chance encounter is repeated in the poem: “Listening quietly and forgetting myself, I cried out: how wondrous! / The master invited me to view flowers with the company” 悄聽失聲叫奇絕，主人 招客同看花. Chance encounter and entrancement by music establish aesthetic necessity as the raison d’être of the meeting. The pipa music seems also to have been an encoded communication—the outsider becomes insider because he recognizes its mournful intensity. Retracing memories seems inevitable despite, or perhaps because of, the emphasis on chance (ou 偶)—in place of deliberate plans, unconscious or at least unstated emotions compellingly shape apparent chance occurrence. ————— 43. “Junior minister of ritual affairs” 太常寺少卿 was Wang’s title under the Ming dynasty. 44. Another possible reading is “Bai Zaimei of Tongzhou and his son Yuyu.” However, the phrase “Bai sheng” suggests a single player. (That phrase is omitted in one handwritten copy.) In Xu Benshi shi 續本事詩, Xu Qiu 徐釚 identified Bai Jue 白玨 (zi Bishuang 璧雙) as the pipa player in Wu Weiye’s poem, see his notes on Wang Shilu’s 王士祿 (1626–73, Wang Shizhen’s oldest brother) poem, “Ting Bai Bishuang pipa” 聽白璧雙琵琶 (p. 296); Chen Weisong’s 陳維崧 (1626–82) “Ting Baisheng tan pipa” 聽白生彈琵琶 and his song lyric on the subject (Xu Benshi shi, pp. 371–72). Zhang Ruzai 張如哉 concluded that Bai Jue refers to Bai Zaimei ( Jin Rongfan, Wushi jilan, 4A.16b), as did Ye Junyuan in his modern edition, Wei Meicun shixuan 吳梅村詩選. But if the player here is Bai Yuyu, then Bai Jue should refer to him.

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wa i - y e e l i By chance speaking of the former emperor as we sat together, He held the sandalwood pipa, tears streaming down. Embracing it in front of the company, he spoke of bygone events, At that moment the moon darkened in blurred haze.

偶因同坐話先皇 手把檀槽淚數行 抱向人前訴遺事 其時月黑花茫茫

Momentarily removed from the pressures of sociopolitical reality, the gathering within the enclosure of the garden can engage in rites of remembrance and mourning. 45 The structure of repetition in the poem underlines the burden of communication in articulating memories. Bai’s pipa music is transformed through the poet’s diction into a narrative of the fall of the Ming. The music inspires one of the guests present, a eunuch named Yao formerly in the service of the Chongzhen emperor, to relate the emperor’s interest in music and theater, which dissipated as crisis and chaos engulfed the country. In response, Wu Weiye gives his own account of the musical associations of the final years of the Ming dynasty. The fall of the Ming is thus told three times in terms of musical performance and its reception. Repetition affirms the sense of communion and interlocking responses, as fragmented memories are transformed into rites of commemoration. References to Bai Juyi’s famous “Song of Pipa” are ubiquitous—in the preface, the title, the length, 46 verbal echoes, and self-conscious comparisons. Wu Weiye invoked Bai’s poem to dramatize how personal frustrations and sorrow in the earlier work are transformed into ————— 45. In another poem on a chrysanthemum-viewing party at Wang Shimin’s garden, Wu wrote, “We wish to use the occasion of eating petals to ask about Shouyang” 欲借餐英問首陽. The Li Sao contains a line about “in the evening eating the fallen petals of autumn chrysanthemums” 夕餐秋菊之落英. Boyi and Shuqi pick ferns at Shouyang Mountain and eventually die of starvation, after declaring themselves subjects of the Shang and refusing to “eat the grains of the Zhou” (SJ 61). Wu thus endowed the chrysanthemum party in the garden with a distinctly elegiac tone, linking it to topoi of exile, being dispossessed of one’s country, remembrance of the fallen dynasty, and meditation on historical antecedents. See “Wang Yanke zhaowang Xitian tong Huang Er Sheliu Wang Da Ziyan ji jia jiushi Zhu Zhao Li Ergong Binhou xiongdi shangju er shou” 王煙客招往西田同黃二攝六王大子彥及 家舅氏朱昭李爾公賓侯兄弟賞菊二首, WMC, 1: 138. 46. Wu’s poem runs to 602 characters (eighty-six lines), Bo’s poem to 616 characters (eighty-eight lines), as both poets mention in their respective prefaces.

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anguished laments over the dynastic collapse in his own poem. For Bai Juyi, pipa music was the emblem of elite culture in Chang’an and a reminder of his political disappointments and demotion to Jiujiang, where the only music available was uncouth “mountain songs and village flutes” 山歌與村笛. For the pipa player he encountered in the poem, the instrument signified the heedless pleasures and ephemeral glory of her lost youth. Bai’s poem celebrates the moment of communion; when player and listener, “both lost souls at the edge of the world” 同是天涯淪落人, find solace in their mutual empathy and in revisiting their respective pasts. Pipa music and personal vicissitudes acquire distinctly political and historical dimensions in Wu Weiye’s poem. The beginning section of the poem is a historical and geographical survey of pipa music in the Ming dynasty. The tone of studied impersonality here endows pipa music with broad culturalhistorical significance. It plays a crucial role in the demarcation of northern and southern styles and literati and popular tastes. The musical tradition exemplified by the Bai family seems to converge mysteriously with the fate of the Ming. The “chance encounter” thus allays fears of the death of a tradition: “The proper methods have been completely lost to those born too late, / Who could have known that ‘Joys South of the River’ is being sung?” 盡失傳頭誤後生，誰知卻唱 江南樂. In Bai Juyi’s poem, pipa music is very much the province of the entertainer and the singing-girl. By contrast, the boundaries between the scholar-official and the musician-performer are erased in Wu’s poem. Literati such as Kang Hai 康海 (1475–1540) and Wang Jiusi 王 九思 (1468–1551) were also renowned pipa players who used music to lament demotion and exile. By a happy coincidence, the pipa players in Wu’s poem share the same surname as Bai Juyi—the poet and the performer, the scholar-official and the musician-entertainer, metaphorically merge. 47 Not only are Bai Zaimei and Bai Yuru “figures among the like-minded” (wobei zhong ren 我輩中人), but they seem to have dealt with their historical situation with greater integrity. The Bais are from Tongzhou 通州 (in present-day Jiangsu), not far from Wu’s native ————— 47. This point is brought up in some other poems on Bai Zaimei or Bai Yuru. See, e.g., Wang Shilu’s “Ting Bai Bishuang pipa”: “Who has with four strings pierced the gloom of evening mist? / It is none other than the progeny of old Xiangshan [Bai Juyi]” 四絃誰破夕煙昏，恰是香山老裔孫; see Xu Jiu, Xu benshi shi, p. 296.

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Taicang 太倉 (also in Jiangsu), but Bai Yuru advertises his sartorial difference: “In newly donned Uighur costumes of tied trousers, / Curly Beard can be mistaken for a Qiuci man” 褶新更回鶻裝，虯鬚錯認龜 茲客. Since Han “caps and gowns” are banned, Bai dons the costumes of “western barbarians” in order to avoid wearing Manchu clothes. Exotic costumes are a privilege open only to the performer. Jin Rongfan cited “Account of Cui Yan” (“Cui Yan zhuan” 崔琰傳) in History of the Three Kingdoms (Sanguo zhi 三國志) as the source for “Curly Beard” 虯鬚. But it is more likely that “Curly Beard” refers to the eponymous Tang tale 虯髯客傳, in which Curly Beard makes way for the Tang emperor and leaves to become the ruler of the distant Fuyu kingdom 扶餘國. As such, the figure evokes associations of knight-errantry and utopian escape. Wu Weiye mentioned in his preface that the music consisted of an account of events since the seventeenth year of the former emperor (1644), which seems to suggest that there was an accompanying narrative song. In the poem, however, the expressive and representational power of the performance is delineated solely in terms of the pipa music. Whereas Bai Juyi lingered on the emotive quotient of the performance and attempted to capture the sound of music in words, Wu Weiye presented the performance as a re-enactment of wars, chaos, and devastation. 48 Music acquires a distinctly historical “objective correlative.” It mimics the sounds of battle: He first brushed the kun 49 strings—dripped drops of autumn rain. Swords clashed, wheels knocked against each other. Stirred up sand swept against faces, as war drums drone. A splitting sound of flying thunder— Rocks on Southern Mountains cracked, Yellow River burst forth,

初撥鵾 弦秋雨滴 刀劍相磨轂相擊 驚沙拂面鼓沉沉 砉然一聲飛霹靂 南山石裂黃河傾

————— 48. Contemporary poems about Bai often emphasize his role as historian. Chen Weisong wrote: “This is the Grand Historian with a pipa” 此是橝檀太史公; “He is the one who can speak of the rise and fall of dynasties” 能說興亡是此人 (“Ting Baisheng pipa,” in Xu Qiu, Xu benshi shi), p. 371. 49. Jin Rongfan (Wushi jilan, 4A.18a) cited Youyang zazu 酉陽雜俎, which contains accounts of ancient pipas whose strings were made from tendons of kun birds.

History and Memory in Wu Weiye’s Poetry Horse hoofs scattered, chariots moved to no purpose. Iron phoenixes and pillars supporting bronze basins collapsed, 50 From aloft four strings smoke and dust rose.

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馬蹄迸散車徒行 鐵鳳銅盤柱摧塌 四條弦上煙塵生

When desolation is conveyed through slower and quieter music, expression seems to supersede representation. All of a sudden crushed and hidden like withered wood— 51 In the empty, desolate city, crows pecked at corpses. 52 Pulleys at wells unexpectedly groan in the middle of the night. Swallowing sobs noiselessly, noble ladies wept. Among crushed pendants and clustered bells, a sporadic wind blew,

忽焉摧藏若枯木 寂寞空城烏啄肉 轆轤夜半轉咿啞 嗚咽無聲貴人哭 碎珮叢鈴斷續風

————— 50. Iron phoenixes are a type of decoration on the ridge of a roof. Bronze basins refer to the Basin for Collecting Dew 承露盤 held by the bronze immortals perched on top of twenty-zhang-high bronze pillars built by Emperor Wu of the Han in the Jianzhang Palace. The dew was collected for the purpose of making immortality elixirs. In the Three Kingdoms era following the fall of the Han, Emperor Ming of Wei ordered the bronze pillar, figures, and basin taken apart and moved to Ye 鄴, the capital of Wei. The ironic disjunction between the illusion of permanence and the pathos of mutability turns this episode into a favored topic and allusion in classical poetry; see, e.g., Li He’s 李賀 (790–816) “The Song of the Bronze Immortal Taking Leave of the Han” 金銅仙人辭漢歌. 51. The phrase cuicang 摧藏 (crushed and hidden) may have been taken from the poem “On the Pipa” (“Yong pipa” 詠琵琶) by Tang emperor Taizong 唐太宗: “Crushed and hidden, the manner suggests infinite distance, / Concealed and suppressed—how many layers of sorrow?” 摧藏千里態，掩抑幾重悲; see Ji Yougong 計有功, Tang shi jishi jiaojian 唐詩紀事校箋, comp. Wang Zhongyong 王仲鏞 (Chengdu: Bashu shushe, 1989), p. 6. “Withered wood” (kumu 枯 木) alludes to Zhuangzi, “Qiwu lun” 齊物論—whereas the state of being like “withered wood” indicates Daoist enlightenment, the comparison here suggests that the pipa player is so overcome with emotion that he appears devoid of feelings. 52. Recall the yuefu poem, “Battles South of the City” 戰城南: “The dead lay unburied in the wilds—the crows could eat them” 野死不葬烏可食, and also Du Fu’s “Song of the Emaciated Horse” 瘦馬行: “By dusk not taken in—crows pecked at its sores” 日暮不收烏啄瘡.

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wa i - y e e l i From icy springs and chilled caverns, water gurgled and flowed. 53 Bright pearls, blue and green, have been tossed to total oblivion— All encompassed by the light pressing and slow teasing of the strings. 54

冰泉凍壑瀉淙淙 明珠瑟瑟拋殘盡 卻在輕籠慢撚中

The final third of the account of the performance uses music to describe the fall of Nanjing and the perilous fate of the remnant courts in southwestern China. (The poem is dated to the late 1640s or early 1650s, when the loyalist cause appeared increasingly hopeless.) In the midst of slanted brushing and gentle strumming—a sharp plucking— In fear and trembling, a soughing, cutting wind pierced flesh and bone. Iron hordes, gags in mouths, let their horses drink at Sanggan River. Among white grass and yellow sand, night flutes sounded. Pity indeed how wind and snow filled mountain passes— Magpies flew south, it was hard traveling. Gibbons whistled, squirrels wailed, mountain sprites spoke. Over the thousand feet of Qutang Gorge, waves resounded against banks.

斜抹輕挑中一摘 漻慄颼飀憯肌骨 銜枚鐵騎飲桑乾 白草黃沙夜吹笛 可憐風雪滿關山 烏雀南飛行路難 狷嘯鼯啼山鬼語 瞿塘千尺嚮鳴灘

Not only is Bai’s music charged with historical memory, all the musical metaphors in the poem either ring with echoes of a lost world or address present dilemmas. Eunuch Yao recalls how the Chongzhen emperor lost interest in music and theater as crisis loomed over the ————— 53. These two lines describe the more hesitant and mournfully melodic notes of pipa music. Following the line on “noble ladies,” the images here may also evoke fleeing aristocratic women and nature coldly indifferent to human plight. Cf. Wen Tingyun 溫廷筠 (812–ca. 870): “Crushed pendants and clustered bells fill mist and rain” 碎珮叢鈴滿風雨 (“Guo chushi ji ou ge” 郭處士擊甌歌). 54. Both lines echo Bai Juyi’s poem: “Big pearls and small pearls fell on the jade plate” 大珠小珠落玉盤 and “Lightly pressing, slowly teasing, she brushed and then strummed” 輕籠慢撚抹復挑. The same movements of hands create a much deeper sense of loss in Wu’s poem, as falling pearls gathered in a jade plate become tossed and scattered.

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country. (The preface mentions a gold inlaid pipa in the palace. Elsewhere Wu Weiye alluded to the emperor’s decorous interest in qin [“To Wen Guo” 贈文園公, in WMC, 1:302]). There is a deliberate contrast here with the decadent music of pleasure-loving rulers, such as the tune of rainbow skirt, the barbarian drum ( jiegu 羯鼓), or the vertiginous huxuan 胡旋 dance in the court of the Tang emperor Xuanzong. 55 Wu Weiye recalled the ritual court music of drums and bells (“the music of drums played ‘Gate of Clouds’ ” 鼓樂奏雲門), soon to be interrupted by war drums (pigu 鼙鼓) and replaced by mournful fife (beijia悲笳). 56 The last Ming emperor may be absolved from all figural connection with Tang Xuanzong, but in describing how Bai’s music evokes memories of the world before the fall, Wu had recourse to standard references to encounters with musicians in the aftermath of the An Lushan Rebellion. Changes of tunes and scales must need be heartbreaking, In the river village, with flowers falling, we listened to the Song of Rainbow Skirts. 57 Li Guinian, swallowing sobs, sang of lasting pain, Gao Lishi, in deep grief, spoke of the former emperor. 58

換羽移宮總斷 腸 江村花落聽霓裳 龜年哽咽歌長恨 力士淒 涼說上皇

Dynastic transition is often described metaphorically as “changes of tunes and scales”—here defying transformations of musical scales is Bai’s performance, which summons memories of the fallen dynasty for a community of mourners, following the model of Du Fu’s encounter ————— 55. Jiegu is also called Huanu gu 花奴鼓, after a Tang prince (informal name Huanu) adept at playing these drums during the reign of Emperor Xuanzong. Wu praised the Chongzhen emperor for his avoidance of such decadent music: “During lantern festivals, the beats on Huanu drums ceased” 燒燈罷擊花奴鼓. The huxuan dance became a metaphor for the excesses and loss of balance in government leading up to the An Lushan Rebellion; both Bai Juyi and Yuan Zhen 元稹 (779–831) wrote poems about “The Girl Dancing the Huxuan” 胡旋女. 56. For the barbarian fife as a possible symbol of the Manchu conquest, see my “Heroic Transformations,” pp. 418–19. 57. Both this and the following line echo Du Fu’s “Encountering Li Guinian South of the River” 江南逢李龜年. 58. Gao Lishi was the famous eunuch attendant of Tang Xuanzong, who became a former emperor when his son ascended the throne as Suzong. Here Lishi refers to Eunuch Yao.

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with the musician Li Guinian south of the river. The poem ends with musical images associated with loyalist hopes and tenacious memories: On rivers and lakes, to the ends of the earth, the tune of “Southern Homeland,” The song of lament on the iron flute—where is it to be found?

江湖滿地南鄉子 鐵笛哀歌何處尋

“Southern Homeland” (“Nanxiangzi”) is a standard tune in song lyrics. But Jin Rongfan suggested that since Nanxiang also refers to Fujian, the line may well allude to the last hopes for the remnant Ming court of Prince Tang in the Fujian area. “Southern Homeland” may also simply evoke images of how Jiangnan, as the epitome of culture and refinement in the late Ming, became the scene of savage devastation during the Manchu conquest. The term “iron flute” comes from a famous poem by Yang Weizhen 楊維楨, a “remnant person” ( yimin 遺民) of the Yuan who refused to serve the Ming dynasty. In thus elevating the powers of music, Wu may also be selfreflexively claiming a special place for poetry in troubled times. Du Fu’s quatrain “Encountering Li Guinian South of the River” (“Jiangnan feng Li Guinian” 江南逢李龜年) and his longer ancient-style “Song of Watching Gongsun Daniang’s Disciple Dance the Jianqi Dance” (“Guan Gongsun daniang dizi wu jianqi xing” 觀公孫大娘 弟子無劍器行) 59 come to mind as the prototypes for such selfreflexivity as well as the use of performers and artistic performance to contrast past glory and present desolation. But there are new twists to this old topos. Li Guinian was a master musician who played in the halls of the rich and noble before the An Lushan Rebellion. Bai Yuru in “Song of Pipa” is an analogous figure. But many of the characters in these poems were also specifically denizens of the pleasure quarters in the Lower Yangzi area. Wang Zijia was a great musician and singer, but many of the poems addressed to him by contemporary literati are distinctly homoerotic in tone. 60 Wu ————— 59. “Jianqi” is probably a kind of sword dance; for the debates on this term, see Xiao Difei 蕭滌非, comp., Du Fu shi xuanzhu 杜甫詩選註 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1983), pp. 309–10. 60. Various examples are cited in Xu Qiu, Xu benshi shi. Meng Sen 孟森 discusses some of these writings in “Wang Zijia kao” 王紫稼考, in Ming Qing shi lunzhu jikan zhengxu bian 明清史論著集刊正續編 (Shijiazhuang: Hebei jiaoyu chubanshe, 2000), pp. 419–34.

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was deeply connected to and retained great empathy for this entertainment and courtesan culture: the romantic liaison of Wu Weiye with Bian Sai is well known. 61 These poems are not just indices to cataclysmic historical changes; they mark Wu Weiye’s awareness of defining himself (or perhaps his former self) in romantic-aesthetic terms. Further, he depicts musicians and storytellers as poet-historians who share his own powers of empathy and observation and who engage in the same quest for historical understanding. More than Du Fu’s Li Guinian or Gongsun Daniang, the performers here are capable of heroic action, as told in the poem about Bian Sai, Dong’er, Liu Jingting, and Su Kunsheng. 62 Their musical performances also bear witness to and commemorate the turmoil of the dynastic transition, as in “Song of Pipa” and “Listening to the Daoist Priestess Bian Yujing Playing the Qin.” In thus granting these figures the role of poet-historian, Wu Weiye intimated how one can achieve self-redemption through immersion in the romantic-aesthetic realm. The idea that aesthetic mediation plays a role in historical understanding and self-understanding implies new possibilities for romantic, ornate, and sensuous poetic diction and for the modes of indirect expression and allegory (bixing 比興). It is not surprising, therefore, that Wu Weiye’s poems on lost love, “Thinking of the Past at Qin River, with Preface” (“Qinhe ganjiu bingxu” 琴河感舊并序, dated 1650, WMC, 1: 159–61), should invite a poetic response from Qian Qianyi that used love poems reminiscent of Li Shangyin to allegorize the history of the Southern Ming (“Moved on Reading Imperial Tutor Meicun’s Romantic Poems, I Wrote the Following Four Poems” [“Du Meicun gongzhan yanshi shu hou si shou” 讀梅村宮詹艷詩書後四首]). 63 Wu Weiye ————— 61. “The Song of Painting Orchids” (“Hualan qu” 畫蘭曲, dated ca. 1650, WMC, 1: 42–44), addressed to the courtesan Bian Min 卞敏 (Bian Sai’s sister, like Bian Sai she was a painter of orchids), also suggests a romantic relationship. Other Qinhuai courtesans who become the subject of Wu’s poetry include Chen Yuanyuan, Kou Baimen, Dong Bai 董白, and Chuyun 楚雲. 62. Wu also pays tribute to Liu Jingting in various prose pieces, see WMC, 2: 646–47, 3: 1055–59, 3: 1078–79. There are numerous poems and essays on Liu and Su from this period; some examples are cited in Xu Jiu, Xu benshi shi. 63. Qian Qianyi, Youxue ji, 1: 116–18. Wu Weiye held the post of imperial tutor during the Chongzhen reign and also briefly during the Southern Ming. “Qinhe ganjiu” mourns how his relationship with Bian Yujing had come to naught. Wu Weiye protested that his own “Qinhe” poems are not allusive and political like

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himself rarely employed the bixing mode, however. He set forth the idea of aesthetic mediation more directly and also implied ambiguities by presenting himself as the humbled audience given to tortured retrospection and self-questioning. The portrait of the artist as a performer who remembers is thus laden with irony.

————— Qian’s matching poems; see Meicun shihua, in WMC, 3: 1139–40. Wu Weiye himself used the bixing mode only infrequently; a good example is the “Difficult Road” (“Xing lu nan” 行路難, WMC, 1: 33–40) series. Cf. Jin Rongfan’s comments on Wu’s romantic “Untitled” poems in Wushi jilan, 12B.2b. Reassessments of Li Shangyin at the time capitalize on the political-allegorical dimensions of his work; see Qian Qianyi, “Zhu Li Yishan shiji xu” 註李義山詩集序, and “Zhu Changru jianzhu Li Yishan shi xu” 朱長孺箋注李義山詩序, in Youxue ji, 2: 703–6.

Loyalism, Exile, Poetry Revisiting the Monk Hanke

7 Lawrence C. H. Yim My Master incurred a punishment due to his poetry, but then he won poetry owing to the punishment. The punishment was extraordinary, in that it was incurred from writing poetry. The poetry was even more extraordinary, in that it was won from the punishment. 吾師以詩得罪, 復以罪得詩. 以詩得罪, 罪奇; 以罪得詩, 詩愈奇. —Jinhe 今何, “Preface” to Hanke’s poetry collection

In October 1647, a Buddhist monk attempted to leave Nanjing. Manchu forces stationed at the gates of the city pulled him aside for questioning. It was three years after the Chongzhen emperor of the Ming dynasty had hanged himself from a tree, and two years after the Southern Ming had crumbled and the Hongguang emperor had fled Nanjing. The monk produced a passport authorizing his return to Lingnan, his place of origin. The passport was issued by Hong Chengchou 洪承疇 (1593– 1665), one of the Manchus’ major Chinese collaborators during the conquest period. Found in the monk’s possession were several politically sensitive documents: a draft of a letter from the Southern Ming emperor to Ruan Dacheng 阮大鋮 (1587–1646?), another well-known Chinese collaborator; letters revealing contact between Ming loyalists in south China and Hong Chengchou; and a private history of the occupation of Nanjing written by the monk himself. 1 ————— 1. For a general account of Hanke’s arrest and Hong’s involvement, see Frederic Wakeman, Jr., The Great Enterprise: The Manchu Reconstruction of Imperial Order in Seventeenth-Century China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1985), pp. 758–59.

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This monk was Hanke 函可 (1612–60). 2 The designation “Han” registers his seniority in the Caodong 曹洞 school of Chan Buddhism. 3 Before he entered the order, his name had been Han Zonglai 韓宗騋. He was born into a prominent official’s family in Lingnan. His father was Han Rizhuan 韓日纘 (1578–1635), a minister of rites in the late Ming period and the supervisor of Hong Chengchou’s jinshi examination. Hanke bore a doubly southern identity, embodying the cultural traditions of both Lingnan and Jiangnan. He was a native of Guangdong but had traveled extensively since his youth, when he accompanied his father on assignments to different parts of China. Elite circles in Jiangnan knew Hanke as a highborn, talented young man. (One of Hanke’s cousins, Han Ruhuang 韓如璜, was a prominent member of the reformist Fushe 復社, the Revival Society.) In 1639, the famous thirty-second patriarch of the Caodong school, Daodu 道獨 (d. 1661), ordained Hanke. Hanke became one of Daodu’s closest disciples. More important, Daodu placed Hanke second in succession to the patriarchate. The Caodong patriarch was based in Lushan in northern Jiangxi, ————— 2. Most of the firsthand biographical sources on Hanke are included in the two collections of his writings: Hanke’s collection of sermons, Qianshan shengren chanshi yulu 千山剩人禪師語錄 (1690, Huanghua si 黃華寺 [Guangzhou 廣州] ed.; reprinted—Hong Kong: Bujiaozhai 不膠齋, 1970; Beijing: Beijing chubanshe, 1999, in the Siku jinhuishu congkan 四庫禁燬書叢刊, Zi bu 子部, 35: 607–701; hereafter cited as Yulu); and Hanke’s poetry collection, Qianshan shiji 千山詩集 (1703, Huashoutai 華首臺 [Guangzhou] ed.; reprinted—Hong Kong: Zhilelou 至樂樓, 1971; Beijing: Beijing chubanshe, 1999, in the Siku jinhuishu congkan, Ji bu 集部, 144: 443– 612; hereafter cited as Shiji ). The Hong Kong and Siku jinhuishu congkan editions of the Shiji and Yulu are the same. However, the Siku jinhuishu congkan edition of the Shiji has a table of contents, which is missing in the Hong Kong edition, and the quality of the reproduction is far better than that of the Hong Kong edition. The following accounts were written by Hanke’s contemporaries: Beili Qiaoren 北里樵人 (Zuo Maotai 左懋泰), “Shengren heshang yulu xu” 剩人和尚語錄序; Muzhai 木齋 (Li Chengxiang 李呈祥), “Shengren heshang yulu xu” 剩人和尚語 錄序; Hanshi 函昰, “Qianshan shengren heshang ta ming” 千山剩人和尚塔銘; Hao Yu 郝浴, “Fengtian Liaoyang Qianshan shengren kechanshi ta beiming” 奉天 遼陽千山剩人可禪師塔碑銘 (all found in Yulu); Gu Mengyou 顧夢游, “Xu” 序 (to Shiji ); and Han Lütai 韓履泰 (Hanjing 函靜), “Xu” 序 (to Shiji; both in Shiji ). Recently, Xie Zhengguang 謝正光 and Fan Jinmin 范金民 included some of these accounts in their Ming yimin lu huiji 明遺民錄彙輯 (Nanjing: Nanjing daxue chubanshe, 1995), pp. 1285–92. 3. Around this time, three generations of Caodong monks were active: the generation senior to Hanke shared the name Dao, and the generation junior the name Jin. Most of the Jins appeared in the post-1644 era.

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but he spent considerable time in south China since he hailed from Dongguan in Guangdong which was also Hanke’s hometown. After joining the clergy, Hanke was active in both Lingnan’s and Jiangnan’s Buddhist and literary circles. The transition from the Ming to the Qing bound Hanke’s fate more closely to Jiangnan, and his hopes of returning to Lingnan were doomed to disappointment. For two years, from 1645 to 1647, Hanke stayed at Gu Mengyou’s 顧夢游 (1599–1660) mansion in Nanjing and mingled with such famous literati as Lin Gudu 林古度 (1580–1666), Xing Fang 邢昉 (d. 1659), Yu Huai 余懷 (1616–96), Gong Xian 龔賢 (ca. 1618–89), and Du Jun 杜濬 (1611–87). His reaction to the fall of Nanjing was suited more to an impassioned Confucian than to a monk: [Hanke] donned white mourning apparel. Holding a staff, he wailed outside the houses [of those Southern Ming officials who were now hiding]. He cried: “You must not surrender your will; you must not miss the right moment [to die]!” Those who heard his words and were moved to committing suicide numbered more than ten. Hanke reflected on all these sufferings and wrote poems to mourn them all. 服縞練衣, 持拄杖痛哭其門, 大呼: “志不可降, 時不 可失!” 聞而感激殉節者十數人. 函可痛定思痛, 咸作為詩歌以挽之. 4

Hanshi 函昰 (1608–85), Hanke’s “elder brother” in the clergy and a close friend, 5 noted: It happened when Qing troops crossed the [Yangzi] river. When [Hanke] heard so-and-so had met his doom, or so-and-so had committed suicide, he wrote an elegy for each of them. [The poems are] brimming over with emotions and are critical of current affairs. Those [who knew Hanke] were worried for him, but the Master was undisturbed. 會清兵渡江. 聞某遇難, 某自裁, 皆 有挽, 過情傷時, 人多危之, 師為之自若. 6

————— 4. Ding Peng 丁澎, “Puji sheng chanshi ta beiming” 普濟剩禪師塔碑銘, Fulitang wenji 扶荔堂文集, juan 12; quoted in Zhang Yuxing 張玉興, “Qiren qiyu qishi qiyu—ping Shi Hanke jiqi Qianshan shiji yu Qianshan yulu” 奇人奇遇奇詩奇語— 評釋函可及其《千山詩集》與《千山語錄》, in He Lingxiu 何齡修 et al., eds., Siku jinhuishu yanjiu 四庫禁毀書研究 (Beijing: Beijing chubanshe, 1999), p. 212. Ding Peng (1622–ca. 1686) was banished to Shangyangbao 尚陽堡 in 1658. See the introduction to Ding’s poems in Zhang Yuxing 張玉興, Qingdai Dongbei liuren shi xuanzhu 清代東北流人詩選注 (Shenyang: Liao-Shen shushe, 1988), p. 181. I have not had the opportunity to consult Ding’s writings, which are not available in North America or Taiwan. 5. Hanshi later became the thirty-third patriarch of the Caodong school. 6. Hanshi, “Qianshan shengren heshang ta ming.”

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Besides poems on the deaths of Ming loyalists, Hanke is believed to have composed a historical account of the fall of Nanjing entitled Zai bian ji 再變紀 (The second catastrophe). This book, however, is not extant. Hong Chengchou himself, then governor-general of Jiangnan, had to conduct Hanke’s trial. After interrogating Hanke’s disciples but not Hanke himself—one can imagine Hong’s embarrassment—Hong memorialized the throne. He acknowledged his personal connections to the Han family and admitted that he had granted Hanke a restricted passport. Hong wisely requested that Hanke’s case be transferred to the concerned board in Beijing. Consequently, Hanke was tried in Beijing and exiled for life to Shenyang 瀋陽, in Liaodong 遼東 (then known as Shengjing 盛京 and now the capital of Liaoning province). Hanke arrived in Shenyang in the spring of 1648 and died in exile in early 1660 at the age of forty-nine sui. 7 Had Hanke been summarily beheaded in Beijing, history would remember him as one among the many victims of the Ming-Qing transition. However, nothing truly momentous would be said of him, nor would he have become a subject of criticism for the Qianlong emperor (r. 1735–96) in the latter part of the eighteenth century. The extraordinary narrative of Hanke stems from Hanke’s reinvention of himself in exile. The “criminal monk” became the most revered Chan master in the northeast in the 1650s, and he revived Chan Buddhism in the region. He interacted with Tibetan Buddhist authorities and fought folk Buddhist sectarianism. He strove to restore monastic discipline in the temples where he stayed and preached. His success enriched the history of the Caodong school of Chan Buddhism in late imperial China. Hanke left behind more than 1,500 verses, most of which date from the years of his exile, in his poetry collection, Qianshan shiji 千山詩集. Hanke’s Lingnan, Jiangnan, and Liaodong experiences find expression in unusual poetic language. His poems provide a window on the inner feelings of an unusual survivor of political turmoil. This sizable corpus of poetry is of great literary value and supplies an invaluable cultural, social, and political record of the Ming-Qing transition. Regrettably, Hanke’s poetic works have never been critically studied. ————— 7. For a chronological biography of Hanke and related materials, see Wang Zongyan 汪宗衍, Mingmo shengren heshang nianpu 明末剩人和尚年譜 (Taipei: Taiwan Shangwu yinshuguan, 1986).

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In the subsequent critical tradition, Hanke’s “recorded sayings” ( yulu 語錄) and his poetry are read through the prism of Ming loyalism. This reading has the advantage of interpreting Hanke in relation to important Ming loyalist historical and literary traditions. However, it does not address other aspects of Hanke’s work. Besides lingering memories of his checkered fortunes, his family, his friends, and the vanished Ming empire, we find in Hanke’s poetry a sense of joy and rebirth deriving from his love for his adopted city, the enchanting scenery of the northeast, the friendships he cultivated with fellow exiles and locals in Shenyang, and the freedom to practice his faith, to write poetry, and, simply, to live on. His verses reveal a process of healing and reconstructing his life and a gradual coming to terms with the reality that the Ming empire was no more. This chapter focuses on Hanke’s poetry. (I analyze Hanke’s religious activities in Shenyang elsewhere.) 8 It first examines the development of the conventional image of Hanke as a Ming loyalist and explores the role of loyalism in Hanke’s poetry. It then introduces a group of Hanke’s poems that bears on his new experiences away from the “Central Plain.”

Hanke as a Ming Loyalist Portrayals by His Contemporaries Hanke’s contemporaries cast Hanke in a Ming loyalist mold, and more than a century later the Qianlong emperor’s condemnation of Hanke unwittingly fortified this image. Hanke’s friend Gu Mengyou spoke of a collection of Hanke’s poetry called Sheng shi 剩詩, which a mutual friend had brought him from Liaodong. Gu observed that Hanke “never ceased to speak of the deaths [of those loyal to the Ming]” 于諸死事絡索不休. Gu mused on the power of Hanke’s poetry: When reading the Master’s poetry, love for the emperor and father wells up in one’s heart. Such is the moving power of his voice. When reading the Master’s poetry, one comes to realize that the words of loyalty and filial piety cannot be taken lightly. If he did not understand the meaning of life and death, he could not excel in writing. If his writing did not divine the truth, it would not par-

————— 8. “Political Exile and the Chan Buddhist Master: A Lingnan Monk in Manchuria During the Ming-Qing Transition” (forthcoming in Journal of Chinese Religions).

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take of the meaning of life and death. Such is the moving power of his person. 讀大師詩而君父之愛油然以生, 聲教也. 讀大師詩而知忠孝之言不可苟. 生 死不了, 無以為文字, 文字不徹, 無以為生死, 身教也. 9

Gu clearly saw Hanke as a paragon of loyalty and filial piety and suggested that Hanke could inspire the same qualities in the reader. Hanjing 函靜 (Han Lütai 韓履泰), Hanke’s cousin and a Caodong monk of the same generation, wrote: When he [Hanke] incurred punishment because of his writings, he escaped almost certain death only narrowly. Then he realized that his tongue was still there, and old habits were hard to break. Again he expressed his feelings in poems. He longed tenderly for the old clan and country, and he sorely missed his like-minded friends. He sang in the same tone as “Picking Ferns,” and he wrote in the mode of “Summons of the Soul.” Contemplating the present and the past, he sighed with deep emotion. 及其以文字獲罪, 脫萬死於一生. 視吾 舌尚在, 習氣未除. 復寄情於吟詠. 睠懷宗國, 篤念同氣. 或和採薇之歌, 或擬 招魂之些. 撫今追昔, 感慨繫之. 10

Hanjing characterized Hanke’s poetry by comparing it to two classical exemplars. “Picking Ferns” (“Cai wei zhi ge” 采薇之歌) was believed to be the last utterance of the brothers Boyi 伯夷 and Shuqi 叔齊, the two Shang loyalists who refused to accept the newly established Zhou royal house. 11 Symbols of fidelity and integrity, Boyi and Shuqi have figured prominently in loyalist writings throughout Chinese history. “Summons of the Soul” (“Zhaohun” 招魂) from the Chuci associates Hanke with Qu Yuan, the icon of undying loyalty for the ruler and the state. 12

Qu Dajun’s Canonization of Hanke Qu Dajun’s 屈大均 (1630–96) characterization of Hanke, which would become the canonical one, developed from Gu’s and Hanjing’s views. Qu was a younger contemporary, fellow landsman, and great admirer of Hanke. When Qu was still a Caodong monk—his master was ————— 9. Gu Mengyou, “Xu.” 10. Han Lütai, “Xu.” 11. They retreated to Mount Shouyang 首陽山, where they found only ferns to eat and died; see “Boyi liezhuan” 伯夷列傳 in Shiji 史記. 12. See Hong Xingzu 洪興祖, Chuci buzhu 楚辭補注 (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1983), p. 197; and David Hawkes, The Songs of the South (Harmondsworth, Eng.: Penguin, 1985), pp. 53–54.

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Hanshi—he traveled from Lingnan to Liaodong to visit Hanke. Qu wrote: [Hanke] was exiled to Shenyang. When the pain subsided, he moaned. He sang and he cried; he composed poems in the tens, perhaps over a hundred. He named the collection Sheng shi. Hanke was pained by the catastrophic change that had befallen humankind and was saddened by the demise of family and country. He possessed a uniquely sensitive soul, in a certain way even the Confucians could not match. When reading his poetry, love for the emperor and father wells up in one’s heart. It is all because even though he had renounced the mortal world, since the time of great chaos, he always felt ashamed for dragging out an ignoble existence, not having died for the country and joined the various gentlemen in the nether world. . . . Alas! The Sage did not rise. The great Way is lost. We have to seek for it in Chan Buddhism. There are not many loyal officials or filial sons, the great principles are lost, and we have to find loyal officials and filial sons among the monks. The Spring and Autumn Annals is no more, and we have to seek for “praise and blame” in poetry. We have to take Chan as the Way; this is the misfortune of the Way. We have to find loyal officials and filial sons among monks; this is the misfortune of the Confucians. We have to employ poetry as Spring and Autumn; this is the misfortune of history. 充戍瀋陽. 痛定而哦, 或歌或哭, 為詩數十百 篇, 命曰《剩詩》. 其痛傷人倫之變, 感慨家國之亡, 至性絕人, 有士大夫之所 不及者, 讀其詩而君父之愛油然以生焉. 蓋其人雖居世外, 而喪亂以來, 每以 淟涊苟全, 不得死於家國以見諸公於地下為憾. . . . 嗟夫, 聖人不作, 大道失 而求諸禪, 忠臣孝子無多, 大義失而求諸僧, 春秋已亡, 褒貶失而求諸詩. 以 禪為道, 道之不幸也, 以僧為忠臣孝子, 士大夫之不幸也, 以詩為春秋, 史之 不幸也. 13

Qu portrayed Hanke the monk as more Confucian than the Confucians. He eulogized Hanke as a model of the “loyal official and filial son” (zhongchen xiaozi 忠臣孝子) and an exemplar of the great Way and principles. Qu claimed that Hanke wished to die for the Ming house and was plagued by shame and guilt in his last years. Most important, Qu linked Hanke’s poetry to the tradition of the Spring and Autumn Annals, which was supposed to be imbued with “praise and blame” (baobian 褒貶). Qu did not explain the substance of Hanke’s praise and blame. Hanke’s extant poems clearly celebrate the heroic deeds of a group of Ming loyalists who sacrificed their lives, and some seem to contain social criticism. For example, he wrote about the sufferings of ————— 13. Qu Dajun 屈大均, “Seng Zuxin shi” 僧祖心詩, in Guangdong xinyu 廣東新 語 (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1985), pp. 351–52. Zuxin is Hanke’s zi.

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Chinese exiles and emigrants in Liaodong. But Qu’s comparison of Hanke’s works to the Spring and Autumn Annals seems to imply something stronger than social criticism, something much more political. In other words, Qu would have us believe that Hanke’s poetry expresses Ming loyalist and anti-Manchu sentiments. This portrayal of Hanke as a Ming loyalist became the definitive version. Few later critics failed to invoke Qu when treating Hanke. However, there is reason to question the objectivity of Qu’s followers. Hanke’s poetry collection, known variously as Sheng shi, Shengren shi 剩人詩, and Jinling ta 金鈴塔, was not published during his lifetime. Critics before 1703 based their readings on different manuscript versions of Hanke’s poetry. It is not even known whether Sheng shi, Shengren shi, and Jinling ta shared the same contents. After Hanke died, his friends in Liaodong kept copies of his poetry. Hanke personally entrusted Li Chengxiang 李呈祥 (1617–88) with a copy. Several Caodong monks in Lingnan—such as Jinwu 今無 (Ah Zi 阿字; 1633–81), Jinbian 今辯 (Leshuo 樂說), and Hanjing—also possessed copies. 14 After being pardoned and returning to Shandong, Li showed his copy to Wang Shizhen 王 士禛 (1634–1711) and Du Shuang 杜漺 (1622–85), in an unsuccessful attempt to enlist their help in publishing the manuscript. 15 In 1703, the Huashoutai 華首臺 Monastery in Lingnan assembled the various versions of Hanke’s poetry into one volume. This resulted in the publication of Qianshan shiji in twenty juan with an addendum in one juan. 16 It is a handsome volume of more than 1,500 verses. Qianshan shiji remains the only edition of Hanke’s poetry available to readers. Gu Mengyou’s, Hanjing’s, and Qu Dajun’s comments are based on pre-1703 manuscripts of Hanke’s poetry. The difference between the manuscript versions and Qianshan shiji must be huge, at least in terms of numbers: Qu mentioned that Sheng shi contained around a hundred pieces. 17 Hao Yu 郝浴 (1623–83), another of Hanke’s close friends in Liaodong, wrote that Sheng shi consisted of three juan. 18 Li Chengxiang stated that Jinling ta ————— 14. See the editor’s note in Shiji, “juanshou” 卷首, 5a. 15. For Li’s account, see Wang, Nianpu, p. 40. 16. See the editor’s note in Shiji, “juanshou,” 5a. 17. Qu Dajun, “Seng Zuxin shi.” 18. Hao Yu, “Fengtian Liaoyang Qianshan shengren kechanshi ta beiming.” The Shiji and Yulu versions of Hao Yu’s essay differ slightly. See the Yulu version for this information.

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had “several” (shu 數) juan. 19 It appears that the editors of Qianshan shiji aspired to be as comprehensive as possible. However, in the face of possible Qing censorship, they may have omitted the more politically sensitive pieces. A comparison of the critics’ comments, pre- and post-1703, might help determine whether Qianshan shiji retains the spirit of Sheng shi as Gu, Hanjing, and Qu wrote of it. However, between 1703 and the end of the Qing dynasty, there was only one significant comment, that of the Qianlong emperor.

Posthumous Criticism by the Qianlong Emperor In 1775, the Qianlong emperor found a copy of Hanke’s poetry amid the books submitted by provincial authorities to be examined for improprieties. Hanke’s poetry aroused the wrath of the emperor. In Qianlong’s opinion, it contained “a good many preposterous words” ( yu duo kuangbei 語多狂悖). Qianlong must have read the 1703 edition of Qianshan shiji since he mentioned Hanke’s poetry in its published form. The emperor instructed his officials in Shenyang: The monk Hanke of Mount Qian was a native of Boluo, Guangdong. He committed a crime and was sentenced to exile in Shenyang. His collection of poems was published. I fear that naïve people will think that he was an eminent cleric, and that people in the Shenyang area may even regard him as the founder of [Chan] Buddhism there. [This misconception] affects the morals and the minds of the people greatly. I hereby order Hongshang and Fuchashan to conduct a thorough investigation, to see whether Hanke expropriated any temple property when he was in Shenyang, whether there is any cult that inherited his joss sticks and candles, and whether there is any tablet dedicated to him or any inscription of his handwriting. Investigate thoroughly and report all the facts to me. 千山僧函可, 廣東博羅人. 因獲罪發遣瀋陽. 刻有詩集. 恐 無識之徒, 目為緇流高品. 並恐瀋陽地方, 或奉以為開山祖席. 於世道人心, 甚有關係. 著宏晌, 富察善確查函可在瀋陽時, 曾否占住寺廟, 有無支派流傳, 承襲香火, 及有無碑刻字蹟. 查明據實覆奏. 20

————— 19. Wang, Nianpu, p. 40. 20. See “Fuchashan zhuan” 富察善傳, Qixian leizheng 耆獻類徵 78, quoted in “Dashi” 大事 34, “Qing” 清 8, “Gaozong” 高宗 3, in Fengtian tongzhi 奉天通志 (1943 ed.; reprinted—Liaoyang: Dongbei wenshi congshu bianji weiyuanhui, 1983), 34.26b–27a (pp. 685–86). Fuchashan was then governor (府尹) of Fengtianfu 奉天府 and vice-president of the Board of Works of Shengjing. According to two officials’ report to the throne, Hanke was not survived by any significant cult: “His remote disciples such as Fazhen are only stupid folk, farming monks in the moun-

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Hanke’s books were eventually banned. 21 During Qianlong’s literary inquisition, writings from the Ming-Qing transition that expressed strong Ming loyalist or anti-Manchu sentiments or that were considered seditious and derogatory were condemned and censored. The proscription of Hanke’s books created the impression that Hanke’s writings shared these qualities. However, we cannot ascertain which elements in Hanke’s poetry aggravated the throne. The vague kuangbei and beimiu 悖謬 were Qianlong’s favorite phrases for condemning books. Using almost the same wording, yu duo beimiu 語多悖謬, Qianlong criticized another famous Caodong monk, Jinshi 今釋 (Dangui 澹歸, Jinbao 金堡; 1614–81). 22 Perhaps something other than poetry irritated the emperor, for example, Hanke’s religious activities in Shenyang. Qianlong alluded to Hanke’s reputation as a Buddhist master; he must have read the biographical accounts of Hanke in the front matter of Qianshan shiji. Whatever the cause, Qianlong’s criticism of Hanke fortified, rather unintentionally, the status of Hanke as a Ming loyalist.

The Modern Reception of Hanke Modern scholars such as Chen Botao 陳伯陶, Xie Guozhen 謝國楨, Chen Yinke 陳寅恪, Wang Zongyan 汪宗衍, Chen Rong 陳融, Wang Zaimin 王在民, Chen Cisheng 陳此生, and Zhang Yuxing 張玉興 underscore Hanke’s loyalty toward the Ming and hostility toward the Qing. In 1916, Chen Botao produced a lengthy biographical entry on Hanke in his Shengchao Yuedong yimin lu 勝朝粵東遺民錄. Chen did not question Hanke’s status as a Ming loyalist. A large portion of Qu ————— tains.” The two officials, however, did discover at Shuangfeng Monastery tablets and pagodas dedicated to Hanke and inscriptions of his sayings and poems. The officials recommended that “all the tablets and pagodas associated with him at Shuangfeng Monastery be torn down, and that all the accounts concerning him in the Sheng jing tongzhi be eradicated.” Indeed, I could find no account of Hanke in a reprint of the 1736 edition of the Sheng jing tongzhi (in the rare book collection of the Columbia University Asian collections), but there are spaces between certain entries in the sections where I expected to find Hanke that may represent expurgated accounts of Hanke. 21. Officially in 1788; see Wang, Nianpu, p. 42. It is likely that after Qianlong’s criticism of Hanke in 1775, Hanke’s books would no longer have circulated freely. 22. See Jiang Boqin 姜伯勤, “Dangui Jinbao yu Bianxingtang ji” 澹歸金堡 與《遍行堂集》, in He Lingxiu, Siku jinhuishu yanjiu, pp. 232–49. Jinshi was a disciple of Hanshi.

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Dajun’s comments on Hanke found their way, verbatim, into Chen’s account. Published in 1948, Xie Guozhen’s Qingchu liuren kaifa Dongbei shi 清初流人開發東北史, a study of early Qing exiles and the development of the northeast, begins with a short chapter on Hanke, “Seng Hanke zheshu Shenyang” 僧函可謫戍瀋陽. Xie relied heavily on Chen Botao for source material. Nevertheless, Xie gave Hanke’s historical role a new twist by situating Hanke among a group of exiles who helped develop the culture and society of the northeast in the early Qing. Besides its avowed historiographical purpose, Xie’s book promoted national integrity during the civil war between the KMT and CCP in Manchuria. Chen Yinke’s Liu Rushi biezhuan 柳如是別傳, written in the 1960s, contextualizes Hanke in terms of the Ming restoration movement. A marvelous display and interpretation of circumstantial evidence, Chen’s treatment of Hanke remains the most extensive survey of the political activities behind Hanke’s arrest in 1647. Chen casts Hanke as a secret agent for the Southern Ming Yongli emperor. Occasioned by the inclusion of Hanke’s two books in the recently published Siku jinhuishu congkan 四庫禁燬書叢刊 (1999), Zhang Yuxing’s study of Hanke expands on the anti-Qing sentiments in Hanke’s poetry and “recorded sayings.” 23 In the past century, most of Hanke’s readers have been intellectuals in southern Chinese cultural centers such as Canton, Hong Kong, and Macau. Hanke’s “recorded sayings” and poetry were reprinted in Hong Kong in 1970 and 1971, respectively. The Macau-based scholar Wang ————— 23. See Chen Botao, “Hanke zhuan” 函可傳; Chen Rong, “Du Qianshan heshang shi jueju” 讀千山和尚詩絕句; Wang Zaimin, “Nanming shiseng Hanke shikao” 南明詩僧函可事考; idem, “Hanke heshang yu kao” 函可和尚餘考; Chen Cisheng, “Zhengzhi heshang Hanke” 政治和尚函可; Wang Zongyan, “Qingdai diyizong wenziyu Hanke heshang Zaibian ji an” 清代第一宗文字獄函可和尚再變 記案; idem, “Qianshan shengren heshang Yulu jiqi yishi” 千山剩人和尚語錄及其 逸事 (all included in Yulu, 1970 Hong Kong ed.); and Wang Zongyan, “Qianshan shengren heshang zhuan” 千山剩人和尚傳 (included in Shiji, 1971 Hong Kong ed.); Xie Guozhen, “Seng Hanke zheshu Shenyang,” in his Qingchu liuren kaifa Dongbei shi (Shanghai: Kaiming shudian, 1948), pp. 10–15; Chen Yinke, Liu Rushi biezhuan (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1980), pp. 933–44; and Zhang Yuxing, “Qiren qiyu qishi qiyu.” For a critical account of modern Chinese historians’ changing interests in and approaches to Lingnan and Liaodong in the context of twentiethcentury historical and political situations, see Lynn Struve, The Ming-Qing Conflict, 1619–1683: A Historiography and Source Guide (Ann Arbor, MI: Association for Asian Studies, 1998), pp. 99–100.

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Zongyan oversaw the reproduction of Hanke’s collected poetry and composed a useful chronological biography of Hanke. Before 1999, the Hong Kong reprints were the only copies of Hanke’s books in circulation. Hanke was read and admired as part of Lingnan’s cultural heritage and as an inspiration for regional resistance to foreign invasion. The release of Siku jinhuishu congkan in 1999 made Hanke’s writings available to a larger readership for the first time. Hanke has been rediscovered; he should be re-examined as well.

Loyalism in Hanke’s Poetry Like many of his contemporaries, Hanke certainly wrote about the fall of the Ming and life under the Qing. Famous figures of the Ming-Qing transition such as Qian Qianyi 錢謙益 (1582–1664), Huang Zongxi 黃 宗羲 (1610–95), Lü Liuliang 呂留良 (1629–83), Qu Dajun, and Jinshi were harshly criticized by the Qinalong emperor. 24 As I demonstrate below, however, Hanke’s loyalist sentiments were in comparison very mild, and his writings would not seem to warrant suppression on that account. Are his writings anti-Qing? In the following, I discuss several groups of Hanke’s poems on the anti-Qing resistance and martyrdom. My purpose is to bring out the shades of loyalism in Hanke’s poetry.

The Fall of the Hongguang Court By autumn 1645, the Hongguang court in Nanjing was gone. Two poems in the series entitled “Autumn Somniloquies, Eight Poems, Written During My Jinling [Nanjing] Sojourn in the Yiyou Year” (“Qiu yi bashou Yiyou yu Jinling zuo” 秋囈八首乙酉寓金陵作 ) focus squarely on the fall of Nanjing in June 1645 and its aftermath. These two poems convey Hanke’s criticism of the Hongguang court and his hope for Ming perseverance: No. 1 An iron-clad horse tore in, delivering the news from the seas— Red clouds gathered, 25 gloomy autumn in the general’s camp.

鐵騎飛傳海上音 彤雲靄靄幕秋陰 26

————— 24. For recent studies on this subject, see the various essays collected in He Lingxiu, Siku jinhuishu yanjiu. 25. A description associated with battles and warfare.

Loyalism, Exile, Poetry The supreme commander has become a caged tiger, The yellow pavilions 27 in vain preserve the gold in the well. Half the country is gone—haunting pain of a conquered nation— The feathered flag cannot maintain the old officials’ morale. Pitiful are those hoaryheaded wives of the merchants! They pluck the pipa again, tears soak the collars of their dresses. (Shiji, 9.1b)

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元戎已作檻中虎 黃閣空留井底金 半壁久添亡國恨 翠華難繫老臣心 獨憐白首商人婦 重撥琵琶淚滿襟

At a fast pace, lines 1–4 recreate the despair of the collapse of the Ming defense and the chaos following the dissolution of military and civil offices in Nanjing. Lines 5–6 refer to the emperor’s flight from Nanjing. In the face of the advancing Qing forces, Hongguang fled his capital on the night of June 3, without informing his ministers and generals. The “feathered flag” is part of the emperor’s insignia. The ministers swiftly abandoned their posts, either fleeing the city or readying themselves to pledge allegiance to the Manchus. On June 16, the Qing forces entered the surrendered city. The last two lines of this poem bear on the terrible tragedy in the city following the disintegration of the court. This tragedy can be read at two levels. Realistically, many wives or concubines of Jiangnan merchants—women who had once been courtesans—were abandoned by their men. Even though they were no longer young (“hoaryheaded”), they had no choice but to resume their old trade to make a living. Symbolically, these women might stand for the “old officials” of line 6. They had to “pluck the pipa again,” to please and serve their new masters, the Manchus, now that the Hongguang court has crumbled and they are left to their own devices to survive.

————— 26. It is noteworthy that this poem uses the same rhyme as the first poem in Du Fu’s “Autumn Meditations, Eight Poems” (“Qiuxing bashou” 秋興八首). It is likely a self-deprecatory comparison of his poems with Du Fu’s. 27. The offices of the ministers. Since Han times they had been painted yellow. This line seems to be an indictment against the rapaciousness and inefficacy of the Southern Ming generals. I thank Wilt Idema for suggesting this reading to me.

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l aw r e n c e c . h . y i m No. 6 I look up at the vast sky, the evening chill is thickening; Once [the emperor] journeyed into Cangwu, there was no return. The wailing spirit wishes to imitate the midnight moon; To regain life, he first needs the fivecolored ribbons. 28 In front of Tianshou Hill 29 clouds gather; In the Stone City grass grows luxuriantly. After all the jade leaves withered sadly, The eldest branch remains in the south sky. (Shiji, 9.2a–b)

翹首長空動晚颸 蒼梧一去失歸期 啼魂欲擬三更月 續命先傳五色絲 天壽山前雲漠漠 石頭城上草離離 傷心玉葉凋零後 猶剩天南第一枝

This gloomy poem is framed by the presumed death of the Hongguang emperor and demise of the Ming imperial house. The journey to Cangwu in line 2 refers to the ancient Emperor Shun’s southern tour of the Cangwu area, where he died. Here it is used to characterize Hongguang’s situation. 30 Lines 3–4 liken Hongguang to the mythic ancient emperor Du Yu, whose ghost takes the form of a cuckoo. Thinking of the old kingdom, the bird weeps its heart out and spits blood. But unlike Du Yu, who misses his old kingdom from the netherworld, the “wailing ghost” here desires to regain his life. This longing is worked into line 4, which describes a life-prolonging ritual. During the Dragon Boat Festival, the emperor gave out five-colored ribbons to his officials to wish them longevity. The Hongguang court is dead, but its survivors do not believe that it will rest easy. The second half of the poem moves from fate of the Hongguang court to that of the Ming house. Located in Beijing, Tianshou Hill was the cemetery of the imperial family. The Stone City, Nanjing, witnessed both the birth and the death of the Ming. The natural images in ————— 28. Fengsu tong 風俗通: “五月五日賜五色續命絲, 俗說益人命”; quoted in Taiping yulan 太平御覽, juan 814. See also Li zhi 禮志 15 in Song shi 宋史. 29. Located northeast of Changping county in Beijing. Beginning with Chengzu, all the Ming emperors were buried here. 30. Hongguang did not actually die in this breakout. He was captured by Qing forces in mid-June and brought back to Nanjing on June 18. Later, he was transferred to Beijing, where he was executed in the autumn. See Lynn A. Struve, The Southern Ming, 1644–1662 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1984), pp. 58–59.

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lines 5–6 create the impression that the lot of the Ming house is anything but promising—gathering clouds block the vision of the Ming ancestors, and grass flourishes in subjugated Nanjing. Yet the last two lines of the poem register a faint hope for its continuation. After the Hongguang court collapsed, two Ming princes were established in south China to continue the Ming line. Prince Lu accepted the title of regent and began to lead the Ming resistance in the Zhejiang areas. Further south in Fuzhou, Prince Tang was enthroned as the Longwu emperor (the “south sky” and the “eldest branch” of the last line). 31 As a matter of fact, almost all the poems discussed in this section focus on figures in the Longwu court, which had the closest ties to Lingnan.

Huang Daozhou, Tragic Hero of the Longwu Court As noted above, Hanshi wrote that Hanke has poems that are “brimming over with emotions and are critical of current affairs” ( guo qing shang shi 過情傷時). Chen Yinke, in his Liu Rushi biezhuan, cites as concrete examples three poems written for Huang Daozhou 黃道周 (Shizhai 石 齋 ; 1585–1646): “Ku Shenghai xiansheng” 哭 繩 海 先 生 , “Guangling ganfu” 廣陵感賦, and “Wen Huang Shizhai zhi” 聞黃石 齋至. 32 An esteemed scholar-official, Huang was one of the most famous martyrs of the Longwu court. In September 1645, Huang led a force of 4,600 untrained men out of Fujian to retake Nanjing. They met their inevitable, tragic end at Wuyuan in Jiangxi. Huang was captured and taken to Nanjing, where he was executed in April 1646. 33 A native of Fujian, Huang spent substantial time during the late Ming in the southeast lecturing on the classics and philosophy when he was not in court service. The elite circles in Lingnan knew him as a close friend and mentor. Here, Hanke wrote about him as a Ming martyr and friend: “Hearing of Huang Shizhai’s Arrival” (“Wen Huang Shizhai zhi” 聞黃石齋至; 1646) It shocked me to hear your horse reached the riverside;

驚傳一騎到江干

————— 31. See ibid., pp. 75–77. 32. Chen Yinke, Liu Rushi biezhuan, p. 936. 33. For Huang’s service during the Longwu reign, see Struve, The Southern Ming, pp. 89–92.

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l aw r e n c e c . h . y i m Shed already all over the plum flowers, my tears have not dried up yet. Like Deng Yu, you almost managed to revive the Han house; Same as Zhong Yi, you tenaciously clung to the southern hat. You are survived only by your short sword, its dragon pattern faint; Fitting for your ruined body was the cold horsehide. It is not only for our great friendship that I now cry for you; Between the sea and the sky, wind and rain are sweeping. (Shiji, Addendum.3b)

繞遍梅花淚未乾 鄧禹幾能扶漢室 鍾儀終不改南冠 空餘短劍龍文暗 好付殘軀馬革寒 豈為綈袍今哭汝 澥天風雨正漫漫

The expansive vision of the river, the plum flowers, the wind and rain between the sky, and the unstoppable crying in the first and last couplets of this poem bespeak the great sorrow that strikes Hanke. In line 3, Hanke compared Huang to Deng Yu (2–58 ce), who assisted in the founding of the Latter Han dynasty. Zhong Yi (line 4) was known from early times for his adherence to his native southern customs during his captivity. Zhong Yi’s “southern hat” suggests something poignant in the context of Southern Ming history: the loyalty of an official for the imperial house. Line 2 has a reference in the same vein. Lingnan people love plum blossoms. Hanke quite naturally chose this image to epitomize his sadness for Huang. But in 1645, this flower acquired a new nuance. After Shi Kefa 史可法 (1601–45), minister of war and grand secretary of the Hongguang court, sacrificed his life fighting Qing forces in Yangzhou, the locals built a tomb for Shi’s personal effects on Meihualing 梅花嶺, Plum Flower Ridge. (Shi’s body could not be found.) 34 The reference to plum blossoms hints at a comparison between Huang and Shi. Historically, Huang’s achievements were far more modest than those of Deng Yu and Shi Kefa—as a scholar, philosopher, and teacher, of course, he surpassed the two—but he was regarded as a paragon of loyalty and integrity among Ming loyalists. Lines 5–6 glorify Huang’s martyrdom and express pessimism about the future of the Longwu court. On the sword that Huang left behind, the dragon pattern, a symbol of the emperor, is faint. ————— 34. See Xie Guozhen 謝國楨, Nanming shilüe 南明史略 (Shanghai: Shanghai renmin chubanshe, 1957), p. 71.

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Resistance in Jiangxi and Li Suiqiu Hanke composed a eulogy for Li Suiqiu 黎遂球 (Meizhou 美周; 1602– 46), another famous martyr of the Longwu court and a close friend. Li was Hanke’s neighbor in Guangzhou. In early 1646, Jiangxi showed great potential as a Ming offensive base, and the Longwu court sent reinforcements from Fujian. (Zhang Jiayu 張家玉 [1616–47], who would become one of the “Three Loyalists of Guangdong,” played an important role in this operation.) However, for various reasons, by May 1646 the Ming resistance in Jiangxi was reduced to one defensive post in Ganzhou prefecture. The Longwu court had to protect southern Jiangxi, a strategic site containing all the major overland routes to and from Fujian. The Longwu emperor ordered Li Suiqiu to train Guangdong naval forces and use them to relieve Ganzhou. Unfortunately, a great many of Li’s boats were stranded, on route and upon arrival, in the shallow waters leading to the city of Ganzhou. They were burned by the Qing forces. Li eventually brought his remaining men into the city and fought alongside the defenders of the city. On November 9, Qing forces penetrated the city. Over a hundred Ming officials lost their lives as the inhabitants of the city were slaughtered and enslaved. Li fought hard and fell in the bloody battle. 35 A native of Panyu in Guangdong, Li served the Longwu court as a secretary in the Ministry of War’s Bureau of Operations. He held the honorific title of Grand Coachman. Literary traditions, however, remember him as a brilliant late Ming poet who won admiration in both Lingnan and Jiangnan literary circles. His collection of poetry is called Lianxuge ji 蓮鬚閣集 (Lotus Whisker Pavilion collection). 36 Hanke wrote respectfully and nostalgically about Li Suiqiu: “Crying for Meizhou from Afar” (“Yao ku Meizhou” 遙哭美周; 1651) You gave your life to the country, courage unparalleled;

一身許國氣無前

————— 35. See Struve, The Southern Ming, pp. 69–70, 84, 98–99; The Ming-Qing Conflict, pp. 287–88. 36. See Qu Dajun’s biographical account of Li in Huang Ming sichao chengren lu 皇明四朝成仁錄 (reprinted—Jiangsu Guangling guji keyinshe, 1989), 9.329a–31a; Haiyun chanzao ji 海雲禪藻集 (reprinted—Hong Kong: n.p., 1987), 4.4a–b; and Struve, The Ming-Qing Conflict, pp. 287–88.

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l aw r e n c e c . h . y i m In the large waves of Gan River, your boiling blood spattered. The Bodhisattva’s way failed, you willed for the horsehide; The Xiaolian boat capsized, gone the Longquan sword. Your family reduces to one old mother— the Western Paradise’s tears; Dreams of you haunt this lone monk— the Northern frontier’s mist. Integrity, writings—all vanished like a bubble’s shadow; Lotus Whisker, meet me again in our next life. (Shiji, 9.10b)

貢 37 水波漫熱血濺 菩薩道窮皈馬革 孝廉船覆失龍泉 家餘老母西方淚 夢遶孤僧北塞煙 節義文章渾泡影 蓮鬚重結後生緣

This sadly beautiful poem celebrates Li as a loyal official and a filial son. It does not do so abstractly through Confucian clichés (save perhaps the first line); rather, it works through a sequence of gripping images of flesh and blood. It also intimates an aspect of Li’s life that has escaped the attention of most historians: his religious piety. Lines 1–2 are relatively easy as they present, with large strokes, the last sacrifice of Li on Gan River. Even though Li died in combat inside the city, Li’s original charge was to command a navy. Lines 3–4 further develop Li’s tragedy. Line 3 ends with the martyr wrapped in a horsehide, a traditional image for a hero who dies in action. (This image also appears in the Huang Daozhou poem above.) Line 4 uses the capsized boat and the lost sword to symbolize the ill fortune that befell Li’s flotilla and the failed mission. What is truly wonderful about this couplet is the introduction of “the Bodhisattva’s way” ( pusa dao 菩薩 道) and “the Xiaolian boat” (xiaolian chuan 孝廉船). They speak volumes for Li’s life and character. “The Bodhisattva’s way” refers to Li’s religion. Li was a lay devotee of Chan Buddhism. In fact, Li and Hanke had the same master, Daodu, who gave Li the Buddhist name Hanmei 函美. 38 The Buddhist reference here creates the impression that Li’s devotion to the restoration campaign arises from his compassion for humankind, compassion like that of a Bodhisattva. Xiaolian 孝廉 is another term for juren 舉人, a second-degree graduate in the ————— 37. Read 贛. Ganshui or Ganjiang is the main river running through Jiangxi. Gan is used as the short form of Jiangxi. 38. See Haiyun chanzao ji, 4.4a–b.

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civil examination system of Ming and Qing times. Li attained that status in 1627. The literal meaning of the word xiaolian, “filial and incorrupt,” praises Li. There are yet more layers of meaning. “The Xiaolian boat” comes from the “Letters and Scholarship” section (“Wenxue” 文學) of the Shishuo xinyu 世說新語 (A new account of tales of the world): Zhang Ping, after having been recommended for the Xiaolian degree, took a boat to visit Intendant Liu Dan of Danyang. The intendant was so impressed by Zhang’s talents in “pure conversation” (qingtan 清談) that he recommended Zhang for the post of Grand Ordinary Erudite under the general controlling the army, Sima Yu. 39 Invoking the “Xiaolian boat” does more than place Li in the class of high-minded and talented people. It also refers to another episode in Li’s life. The late Ming Chongzhen emperor (r. 1628–44) decreed that worthy men of the country be recommended to him for official appointments. Chen Zizhuang 陳子壯 (1596–1647), who later became one of the “Three Loyalists of Guangdong,” responded to the edict by nominating Li. Li nevertheless declined official appointment since his mother was old, and he wanted to stay home to serve her. 40 Li is worthy of his title, the Filial and the Incorrupt. The next couplet, lines 5–6, is as beautiful as it is sad. It is beautiful because “tears” is modified by “the Western Paradise,” and “mist” by “the Northern frontier.” It acquires a spiritual and visionary quality. It is sad because the filial son Li is survived only by an old mother, and because Hanke can see his old friend only in dreams. The “bubble’s shadow” ( paoying 泡影) in line 6 is borrowed from the verse at the end of the Diamond Sutra ( Jin’gang jing 金鋼經): All phenomena created by causation Are like the illusion of a dream, or the bubble’s shadow; Are like dew drops, and are like a lightning flash— One should view them like these.

一切有為法 如夢幻泡影 如露亦如電 應作如是觀 41

————— 39. Yu Jiaxi 余嘉錫, Shishuo xinyu jianshu 世說新語箋疏 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1993), pp. 235–36; Richard Mather, trans., Shih-shuo Hsin-yü: A New Account of Tales of the World (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 1976), p. 119. 40. Qu Dajun, Huang Ming sichao chengren lu, p. 329. 41. Jin’gang jing jizhu 金鋼經集注 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1984), p. 287.

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As typified by this poem, Buddhism advises emotional detachment. Mortal life is but an illusion. Seen in this light, “integrity” ( jieyi 節義) and “writings” (wenzhang 文章), markers of human value and achievement, are illusory. One should view life and death in the same terms. Just when this understanding lessens the terrible sadness surrounding Li’s death—construed so emotively in the preceding lines—comes the startling ending of the poem. Hanke seeks reunion with his old friend in their next incarnations. 42 As a monk, Hanke should know how undesirable emotional attachment is. This unbridled moment bespeaks how much Hanke cares for Li. Hanke was most vocal about loyalism when he wrote about figures from Lingnan. Loyalism—not necessarily Ming loyalism—is spoken of as an identifying characteristic of Lingnan, a value ascribed to Lingnan’s officials, literati, and even commoners. Another poem Hanke wrote for Li spells this out: “Reading the Poem Liang Weiyang Presented to Huo Jiesheng, I Was Touched. I Composed This Using Liang’s Original Rhymes” (“Du Liang Weiyang zeng Huo Jiesheng shi yougan yong yuan yun” 讀梁未央贈霍階生詩有感用原韻) The day the Grand Coachman sacrificed his life, He was followed by a line of geese. In the lotus pond, his heart and bones are purified; In the gold cabinet, 43 his names are recorded. All of Lingnan knows the duties of an official; For a thousand autumns we honored the right way of conduct. I was left to live with shame; In the wind and snow, I cannot suppress all this emotion. (Shiji, 7.12a)

太僕捐軀日 相隨雁一行 蓮池心骨淨 金櫃姓名藏 五嶺明臣節 千秋重義方 餘生愧我在 風雪思難忘

————— 42. An alternative reading of the last line is that even though Li’s “integrity” and “writings” vanish like the shadow of a bubble in the present life, they will be remembered by posterity through his collection of writings, the Lotus Whisker Pavilion Collection. 43. Repository for official histories. This association started with Sima Qian’s Shiji.

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The Resistance in Guangdong and Hanke’s Family Qing forces captured and killed the Longwu emperor in October 1646. The following winter was harsh for the many Ming princes taking refuge in Guangdong. Longwu’s younger brother was enthroned in Guangzhou on December 12 as the Shaowu emperor. Shortly after, in the same province a different loyalist group established another prince as the Yongli emperor. Neither Shaowu nor Yongli would defer to the other. Two battles resulted in the Guangzhou delta in early January 1647 and left Yongli’s flotilla almost completely destroyed. Yet Shaowu’s good luck did not last long; on January 20, Qing cavalry crushed Guangzhou’s defenses. Shaowu attempted to flee but was captured and later killed, as were a number of Ming princes who had sought haven in Guangzhou. 44 The scene was so heartrending that the Caodong patriarch, Hanshi, personally collected and buried the remains of the princes. 45 Victory came too easily to the Qing forces. They disregarded the safeguarding of Guangzhou, and Ming loyalists in the delta region organized several armed uprisings in other parts of Guangzhou prefecture. A series of attacks and restorations followed from mid-March through November 1647, led by the Three Loyalists of Guangdong: Chen Zizhuang of Nanhai, Zhang Jiayu of Dongguan, and Chen Bangyan 陳邦彥 (1608–47) of Shunde. 46 Of the three, Zhang Jiayu stood out as the most fiery fighter and the most able military commander. Chen Zizhuang and Chen Bangyan orchestrated their operations to the west of the Pearl River estuary, taking control of the riverways of Shunde district. In late March, forces under their command besieged Guangzhou City but failed to capture it. Meanwhile, Zhang Jiayu had taken new ground east of the Pearl River estuary by restoring the seat of his home district, Dongguan, to Ming rule. There, Zhang was aided by Hanke’s family. Han Ruyan 韓如琰 (Runji 潤季; d. 1647), Hanke’s cousin, led the Han family and a troop of 5,000 men to join Zhang’s cause. On August 10, Zhang and Han took Boluo, the Hans’ hometown. However, on August 26, Qing reinforcements arrived and con————— 44. Struve, The Southern Ming, pp. 102–3. 45. Xie Guozhen, Nanming shilüe, p. 140n40. 46. As Lynn Struve (The Southern Ming, p. 123) points out, their efforts to undercut the Qing hold on Guangdong were pursued independently of authorization or assistance from any Ming court.

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quered the town. Hanke’s two brothers, one uncle, and two nephews fought and fell with Han Ruyan; two sisters and two sisters-in-law died in the midst of the chaos. Many family servants died with their masters. Boluo was laid waste. 47 (Hanke did not know that this calamity had visited his family until five years later, when he received a letter from Daodu.) In August, the two Chens made another attempt to seize Guangzhou City. They were captured in October and November, respectively, and were publicly executed in Guangzhou. In November, Zhang Jiayu was cornered at Zengcheng, where he was fatally wounded in a furious battle. Zhang died a martyr by casting himself into a canal. 48 The following two poems, one written for Zhang Jiayu and one for Han Ruyan, bear witness to the Guangdong resistance and the Hans’ involvement. “Crying for Xuanzi from Afar” (“Yaoku Xuanzi” 遙哭玄子; 1651) Once the dragon shed its beard, you hated that your own body lasted; Barred by ten thousand rugged li, you cried remembering the lord’s bounty. Unlike Deng Yu, you could not rush to Yexia; Like Xiufu, you were fated to die a martyr at Yamen. Among men of letters, your writings’ vigor still resounds; In this sand desert, I summon and summon your loyal, righteous spirit. In the thousand autumns to come, on the blue sea, Stormy waves will roll with anger, bearing your unyielding blood. (Shiji, 9.10a–b)

龍髯一墜恨身存 萬里崎嶇哭主恩 鄧禹未能追鄴下 秀夫終合殉崖門 詞林尚吐文章氣 沙磧頻招忠義魂 從此千秋滄海上 風濤怒捲血猶渾

————— 47. See ibid., pp. 122–24; Qu Dajun, “Wenlie Zhang gong xingzhuang” 文烈張公 行狀, appended to Yang Baolin 楊寶霖, ed., Zhang Jiayu ji 張家玉集 (Guangdong: Guangdong gaodeng jiaoyu chubanshe, 1992), pp. 194–214; Yang Baolin, “Zhang Jiayu nianpu jianbian” 張家玉年譜簡編, appended to Zhang Jiayu ji, pp. 215–23; Qu Dajun, “Seng Zuxin shi”; and Qu Dajun’s biography of Han Ruyan in Huang Ming sichao chengren lu, pp. 10, 370–71. 48. Struve, The Southern Ming, p. 124.

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Unlike the poem on Li Suiqiu, Hanke’s poem for Zhang Jiayu does not dwell on the major events of Zhang’s Guangdong campaign. Rather, it recalls Zhang’s undying loyalty for the Longwu emperor. The emperor was known to be particularly fond of Zhang. In a March 23, 1646, edict that Longwu sent Zhang, the emperor wrote: “You are so young and brilliant, I treat you as if you were my son” 爾以少年英俊, 朕以猶子 視之. 49 Under the Longwu reign, Zhang was assigned a number of important civil and military tasks. In late September 1646, the Longwu emperor decided that he should move his base to Ganzhou to strengthen the Jiangxi resistance. His entourage left Yanping on September 29–30 and in no time found itself pursued by Qing forces. The emperor escaped to Dingzhou, where he was overtaken by a Qing contingent. When the “dragon shed its beard”—a literary idiom for the demise of the emperor—Zhang Jiayu was in southeastern Guangdong raising supplies and reinforcements for the defense of Ganzhou. Lines 1–2 of this poem picture the anguish Zhang suffered at not being able to save his lord. This leads to line 3, where Hanke contrasts Zhang with Deng Yu, a historical figure we met in the poem on Huang Daozhou. Line 3 alludes to another episode involving Deng Yu. When Deng Yu heard that Liu Xiu (the founding emperor of the Latter Han dynasty) was in Hebei, he hurried there. It was at Ye (Yexia in Hanke’s rendering) that Deng overtook Liu and put forward his proposal for reviving the Han house. Liu was greatly impressed and relied on Deng for advice thereafter. The two eventually built the Latter Han. 50 Line 3 laments that Zhang could not join the Longwu emperor and save the situation. Line 4 compares Zhang to the Southern Song martyr Lu Xiufu who drowned himself at Yamen. Lu sacrificed his life with the child-emperor Bing as the Mongols were closing in on them. Line 5 suggests that Zhang will also be remembered for his literary talents. One of Zhang’s posts was Hanlin Lecturerin-Waiting. On Huang Daozhou’s recommendation, Longwu also charged Zhang to write the court diaries. 51 Zhang also penned some of Longwu’s edicts. 52 Line 6 shows that Hanke misses his old friend ————— 49. “Chi Jiayu mubing Hui-Chao” 敕家玉募兵惠潮, appended to Zhang Jiayu ji, p. 176. 50. Hou Han shu 後漢書, 16. 51. “Chi Jiayu zhang qijuzhu” 敕家玉掌起居注, appended to Zhang Jiayu ji, p. 167. 52. Zhang Jiayu ji contains thirteen such edicts.

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sorely. The powerful image in the last two lines of the poem develops out of the reference to Lu Xiufu. The Song and Ming loyalists converge in a heroic, loyalist spirit. The “unyielding blood” in the “stormy waves” belongs to the Song as well as the Ming martyrs. Hanke immortalizes Zhang by writing him into the “loyal and righteous” (zhongyi 忠義) canon. This historical sense also informs the poem Hanke wrote for Han Ruyan. “Matching the Poem My Brother 53 Runji Wrote at the Point of Death” (“He Runji xiong linsi shi” 和潤季兄臨死詩) You had sung for Jinmen, but your tears would not stop; Battle formations crossed Zhuhai—the order: no return! At Yamen, this very night turbulent waves rampaged; In Chaishi, the spirit of righteousness lives for a thousand years. You have returned your hair and skin to your father and mother; What’s more, you left your heart and courage to the Spring and Autumn. Your “iron case” is said to be buried under Mount Luo; When will be the day I knock it open with my staff? (Shiji, 13.8a)

賦罷金門淚未收 陣連珠海誓無休 崖門一夜洪波接 柴市千年正氣留 已把髮膚還父母 更將心膽寄春秋 鐵函聞說埋羅嶽 何日敲開柱杖頭

Artistically, this poem does not compare with the poems discussed above. 54 Hanke departed from his successful technique of employing concrete images and events to represent personages. Instead, he tried to impart to this poem something larger than the sorrow caused by Han Ruyan’s death and to ascribe a historical meaning to the terrible loss of the Han family. In the first half of this poem, Hanke named the locations of famous battles, setting a heroic tone and hailing martial virtues. The placenames associate the resistance in Guangdong with the Southern Song loyalist movement. Lines 1–2 refer to Jinmen in Fujian and Zhuhai in ————— 53. Han Ruyan is Hanke’s congxiong 從兄, “cousin-brother.” 54. It is possible that Hanke limited the content of his poem to match Han Ruyan’s original. Unfortunately, Han’s poem is not available for comparison.

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Guangdong. Fujian is where the Longwu emperor met his doom, and Zhuhai, the Pearl River, represents Guangzhou City, which the loyalists failed to hold. Mention of Yamen (line 3) compares the Ming loyalist movement to its predecessor in the Song-Yuan dynastic transition. In Chaishi (line 4) the Mongols executed the Song loyalist Wen Tianxiang 文天祥 (1236–83), who becomes an icon of adamant loyalty and resistance to foreign invasion. The Guangdong martyrs are compared to Wen. The second half of this poem focuses on the Han family and its native place. The sense of history continues to grow. Line 5 relates the death of Han Ruyan and suggests that the Han family has always championed integrity and loyalty. Hanke believes that history books like Confucius’s Spring and Autumn Annals will remember the Hans (line 6). The last couplet of this poem suggests that Han Ruyan leaves behind a work “buried under Mount Luo.” Hanke links it to the Song loyalist Zheng Sixiao’s 鄭思肖 (1206–83) Xin shi 心史, a spirited loyalist writing discovered in the late Ming. Hanke has already given his cousin’s deeds a grand, historical gloss. Finally, he vows to make Han Ruyan’s writings known to the world. Even though intense in its feelings, this is actually a very restrained poem. Since Hanke wrote it to match Han Ruyan’s last poem, he might well have succumbed to sentimentality and copious tears. But Hanke’s emotion is not effusive. The following poem is radically different from the previous one in mood. Hanke’s indignant grief at learning the doom of his family fills the poem. This is also one of the few places in which Hanke unreservedly expresses loyalty to the old dynasty: “Letters Received from Luofu, Three Poems” (“De Luofu xin sanshou” 得羅浮信三首), no. 1 (1651) For eight years I saw no letters from Loufu, Now I am devastated to hear my whole town has been reduced to dust. For the former emperor they all sacrificed their lives, Leaving but a sick brother 55 to cry at the riverbank. The White Mountains and Black River 56 pain this lonely cassock;

八年不見羅浮信 闔邑驚聞一聚塵 共向故君辭世上 獨留病弟哭江濱 白山黑水愁孤衲

————— 55. Only Hanke’s youngest brother survived the Bolou massacre.

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l aw r e n c e c . h . y i m The country is lost, my family ruined, and I am an old official in exile. 57 Although I am alive, my heart hurts even more; All-ruling Heaven! Where can I ask, Why? (Shiji, 10.6a)

國破家亡老逐臣 縱使生還心更苦 皇天何處問原因

In Qianshan shiji, Hanke’s poems concerning Ming martyrs date almost exclusively to two periods of time: from 1645 to 1647, in the wake of the fall of Nanjing; and in 1651 and 1652, when news about the catastrophe in Lingnan reached him. These poems were written mostly for friends (particularly for those involved in affairs in Lingnan) and for his own family members. By my count, there are less than thirty such pieces out of the 1,500 poems in Qianshan shiji. Except for the two periods mentioned above, Hanke was reticent about the political events of the Ming-Qing transition. When he wrote of loyalism, he celebrated it as a cross-dynastic, time-honored value. We find few places where Hanke associated it specifically with the Ming house and viewed events through the prism of Ming loyalism. Only rarely, especially in poems written in Liaodong, did Hanke express anti-Manchu sentiments bluntly. When he did address the Ming-Qing transition, we are likely to find poems like these two, from his Liaodong verses.

Loyalism in Hanke’s Liaodong Poetry “Letter to Ah Who” (“Ji A Shui” 寄阿誰) I once had a pair of old shoes 58 sent to Ah Who; Throughout my life I trust only Ah Who to understand me. In my shabby studio wind and rain accompanied our midnight talk; In this turbulent time, our hearts responded to the calling of all ages. Your brush and ink have prowess to survive the kalpic destruction of raging fire; 59

敝履曾將寄阿誰 平生端許阿誰知 破齋風雨三更話 亂世心肝萬古期 筆墨有神裂火劫

————— 56. Baishanheishui 白山黑水 in the original refers to Changbaishan 長白山 and Heilongjiang 黑龍江, the mountain and river in Manchuria famously associated with the Manchus’ origin. 57. Hanke was never an official, under either the Ming or the Qing. Strictly speaking, zhuchen 逐臣 refers to an official banished by order of the emperor. But loosely, it can mean persons banished for various reasons. 58. Symbol for letters in the Chinese literary tradition.

Loyalism, Exile, Poetry Your hair and skin suffer no calamity at the bank of the great river. In the white snow of Wu and Lü, 60 by the shaky pavilion stands the willow; The old remnant, this lone monk, night after night thinks of you. (Shiji, 9.4a)

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髮膚無恙大江湄 巫閭白雪卮亭柳 遺老孤僧夜夜思

“Another Letter to Ah Who” (“Zai ji A Shui” 再寄阿誰) Three hundred years, one old official, Sleeves fluttering, his silk kerchief white. A few white hairs, kept for the former dynasty, A painting of the country halved, to be passed to the next generation. The various masters in Passing the Lamp 61 would agree— Your courtyard fills with flowing water, your efforts are not in vain. I know from afar the plum flowers by the bridge must have blossomed; I gaze far from the cold frontier, I wish you could send me some spring. (Shiji, 9.4a–b)

三百年來一老臣 蹁躚雙袖白綸巾 數莖霜雪留前代 半幅江山付後人 諸祖傳燈能共證 滿庭流水未全貧 遙知橋畔梅花發 極目寒邊欲寄春

We do not know who Ah Who was. In the Caodong lineage, there were a few people named Ah in the generation following Hanke. 62 (We meet Ah Zi below.) Although Hanke’s juniors in the clerical hierarchy, they were not necessarily junior in age or status outside the priesthood. In “Another Letter to Ah Who,” Hanke associated Ah Who with plum flowers, perhaps an indication that Ah Who was involved with affairs in Lingnan. In the last line of “Letter to Ah Who,” Hanke presented himself as an “old remnant” ( yilao 遺老). One is tempted to understand this as a “leftover subject” or “loyalist” ( yimin 遺民), particularly a Ming loyalist. The problem with this interpretation is that the appellation yilao ————— 59. In Buddhist thought, jiehuo 劫火 is the conflagration at the end of an age that consumes the physical universe. Here it is used as a metaphor for the calamities caused by the political transition. 60. Names of mountains in the Liaodong area. 61. Jingde chuandenglu 景德傳燈錄, composed by Daoyuan 道原 of the Song dynasty. 62. See Haiyun chanzao ji.

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could connote a survivor of a political transition who is nostalgic for the fallen dynasty but not necessarily hostile to the new regime. It is more a cultural and psychological disposition than a political one. “Another Letter to Ah Who” accords better with the idea of yimin. In line 1 of “Another Letter,” the “three hundred years” (sanbai nian 三百年) stands for the approximately three centuries that the Ming house endured. 63 It is a favorite symbol for the fallen empire in Ming loyalist writings. The “three hundred years” is juxtaposed with the “old official”—the Ming dynasty and this official thus define one another. In line 3, the description of hair is politically sensitive. The Qing dynasty demanded that its conquered subjects shave their heads in the Manchu fashion to show submission. To keep one’s hair for “the former dynasty” was a rebellious act, subject to the penalty of having the hair chopped off with the head. Line 4’s “painting of the country halved” is equally poignant, for it symbolizes the wish of a Ming restoration (a wish “to be passed to the next generation,” if need be). Theoretically, the Southern Ming did not end until the Yongli court vanished in the early 1660s. Before that, the various fugitive Ming courts still represented, at least symbolically, part of the country under a rule they claimed was legitimate. But who is the subject of “Another Letter to Ah Who”? Ah Who, or Hanke himself? Line 2’s description of the graceful and elegant manners of the subject defies a direct association with Hanke (such self-portrayal is rare in Chinese poetry). Herein lies the art of ambiguity that Hanke cultivated in his Liaodong poetry. Hanke eulogized different figures, lionized them as Ming loyalists, but refrained from registering himself openly among their ranks. (In the translation of this poem, I deliberately keep the subject unidentified and the sentences disjointed, as in the original, until the last two lines, which clearly refer to Hanke.) This aesthetic finds its most dramatic and beautiful expression in the following four poems. Hanke finds his “objective correlative” in an old sculpture, engaging it in a dialogue about the fallen dynasty: “Asking the Stone Man” (“Wen shiren” 問石人) “My bow and greetings, may I humbly ask, Stone Man— Since what year have you reclined in this desolate grove, this wind and rain?

————— 63. To be precise, 276 years.

半揖低聲問石人 何年風雨臥荒榛

Loyalism, Exile, Poetry Your awesome bearing seems to be of the former dynasty, You do not know the imperial house has new decrees.”

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威儀恍惚猶前代 不識皇家制令新

“A Reply” (“Da” 答) “Since I reclined on this deserted hill I don’t remember the years, I have seen fields and seas changed into morning mist. Old monk, why do you bother to ask? Your heart might not be as firm as mine.”

一臥荒丘不記年 眼看田海變朝煙 老僧何事勞相問 未必君心似我堅

“Asking Again” (“You wen” 又問) “I heard that in those years this marked the farthest frontier, Now the exuberant white grass has merged with the sky. With you I’d better not talk about those drastic changes of the world, I fear that in so much sadness even stone would split.”

見說當年此極邊 芊芊白草已連天 憑君莫話滄桑事 只恐愁多石也穿

“Replying Again” (“You da” 又答) “I have long renounced emotion, practiced the dry Chan, But when you mentioned those heartrending events I, too, felt sad. My strong bones are used to ice and frost, nevertheless I can’t help weeping copiously in the autumn rain.” (Shiji, 17.18b–19a)

無情久矣學枯禪 話到傷心我亦憐 骨勁冰霜雖已慣 不禁秋雨淚漣漣

If Hanke was, as Gu Mengyou put it, once eloquent about Ming martyrdom, how do we explain the change of tone—from audacity to restraint—in Hanke’s poetry? It is natural to think that Hanke learned his lesson and hence refrained from commenting on politically sensitive issues. Yet, Hanke’s silence might have come from a deeper, more profound understanding of one’s duty during different times and in different situations—at the death of the Ming, one should cry, but afterward one should mourn quietly. Talking too casually about Ming martyrdom is disrespectful. On one occasion, a convocation on the day

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of the Dragon Boat Festival commemorating Qu Yuan, Hanke was pressed to speak on the sacrifice of the Ming loyalists. His reaction is revealing: A monk asks: “Qu Yuan drowned himself in the lake, but let’s not talk about that for now. In recent times, what can we do to redeem the loyal ghosts of the great earth?” The Master says: “Nanwu-Guangshiyin-pusa.” 64 The monk then says: “Sure enough, BUT, what is the use of these empty words?” The Master raises his whisk, saying: “Is this empty words, or is this not?” The monk then says: “That is a whisk. I insist, WHAT do we do to redeem the loyal ghosts?” The Master gives a shout and says: “You do not know what loyal ghosts are.” He then says: “If you desire to know the meaning of Buddha nature, you must contemplate the appropriate moment and cause.” 僧問: 屈子沉江即不問, 祗如 邇日, 大地忠魂如何濟度? 師云: 南無觀世音菩薩. 進云: 爭奈空言不當喫何? 師舉拂子云: 者個是空言不是空言? 進云: 者個是拂子. 畢竟忠魂如何濟度? 師喝一喝, 云: 汝不識忠魂. 乃云: 欲識佛性義, 當觀時節因緣. 65

When Nanjing fell, Hanke urged Ming officials not to cave in, “not to miss the right moment [to die]” (shi bu ke shi 時不可失). Here, Hanke reproved the interrogator for not knowing that the “loyal ghosts” (zhonghun 忠魂) had died at the “appropriate moment” for the “appropriate cause” (shijie yinyuan 時節因緣). In a sense, Hanke himself belonged to that moment and cause. It was painful for him to recall those experiences. How to “redeem” the loyal ghosts? Hanke must have considered any utterance as “empty words.”

Hanke’s New Voices in Liaodong Adopting the Adopted City Crossing the Liaodong border, Hanke journeyed into a new self. If Hanke gave Shenyang a new religious and cultural outlook, Shenyang repaid Hanke with a rare opportunity to ponder his own cultural, political, and ethnic identity. The distress at the beginning of Hanke’s ————— 64. Nanwu (namas in Sanskrit) means to take refuge in the Three Treasures. Guanshiyin pusa is the Avalokiteśvara bodhisattva. The evocation of these words here might not partake these meanings. 65. Yulu, 2.35b–36a, in Siku jinhuishu congkan, 35: 650. The final reply Hanke made—“If you desire to know the meaning of Buddha nature, you must contemplate the appropriate moment and cause”—appears quite often in Chan discussions. The idea is usually associated with personal cultivation and enlightenment. This connotation, however, does not fit the context here.

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exile soon dissolved, and he expressed a strong feeling of belonging in the adopted city. Not only did Hanke enjoy his religious and literary activities and the arresting northeastern scenery, he also formed genuine friendships with the natives, foreign immigrants, and fellow Chinese expatriates. The following poems testify to this psychological process. At the beginning of his banishment, traveling to Shenyang, Hanke lamented in a tone typical of a suffering exile: “Reaching Yongping (Formerly Guzhuyuan)” (“Zhi Yongping” 至永平 [舊孤竹園]) Only three days past, we left the capital; 66 Tomorrow morning we will approach the [Shanhai] pass. All my old friends hereafter I will see no more; My temples, already thinned, begin to gray. I hate to see the horses are as swift as wind; My heart tightens, as hard as a rock. Lowering my head I think of the “two hermits”; I look up and there is Mount Shouyang. (Shiji, 6.1b)

去國剛三日 明朝欲到關 故人從此盡 禿鬢自今斑 馬恨如風疾 心拚似石頑 低頭思二士 一望首陽山

This bitter and self-pitying image of the emotive poet is familiar from Chinese exilic verses. The final allusions to the “two hermits” (Boyi and Shuqi) 67 and Mount Shouyang are a favorite trope in the poetry of the Ming-Qing transition, as we have already seen. Many Ming loyalists identified with the “two hermits” who starved themselves to death at Mount Shouyang rather than accept the legitimacy of the newly established Zhou imperial house. Whether or not Hanke harbored any anti-Manchu sentiments, it is clear that at the Shanhai pass, the symbolic boundary between China proper and the outer reaches of the empire, he was plagued by a sense of his impending estrangement from his past. Indeed, the traditional image of exile is one of sadness and lamentation, of alienation and homesickness. Of course, all this lingers in Hanke’s Shenyang writings. Nine years into his exile, Hanke could still write: ————— 66. Guo 國, “country,” in the original, but it most likely refers to Beijing, the capital, here. 67. The name Guzhu in the title of the poem can also be read as an allusion to Boyi and Shiqi, since Boyi and Shuqi were sons of the lord of Guzhu 孤竹君.

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l aw r e n c e c . h . y i m “Bingshen Birthday, Two Poems” (“Bingshen shengri ershou” 丙申生日二首), no. 2 (1657) 68 Every time this day arrives, snow and wind go on a rampage; My tears for Mounts Luo and Kuang, again, quicken. The waterfall [of Mt. Kuang] splashes my early evening dream into pieces; The plum flowers [of Mt. Luo] have stirred my heart for ten years. My courtyard is almost bare, yet regrets ample; The sky is high, and the earth cold, I chant poems, all alone. How I wish I could add my climbing prints on the stone steps; Joining others to humbly offer incense to the lofty mountains. (Shiji, 12.13a)

每當此日雪風侵 羅嶽匡廬淚又深 瀑水傾殘初夜夢 梅花撩亂十年心 門庭淡薄空多愧 天地高寒只獨吟 安得石梁添屐齒 共拈一瓣禮孤岑

Mount Luo 羅嶽 is Luofu 羅浮 in Lingnan, and Mount Kuang 匡廬 is Mount Lu 廬山 in Jiangxi. They were Hanke’s homes: Luofu was his birthplace, and Mount Lu was where he was reborn as a monk in 1639 (the Caodong school was based on Mount Lu). Hanke’s yearning for his homes and his past in China proper is shaped into the sadly beautiful couplet of lines 3–4. Memories of Mount Lu’s waterfall and Lingnan’s plum flowers haunt Hanke. This poem is suffused with nostalgia, melancholy, and solitude. There must have been times when Hanke, an outsider, found himself rudely rejected in the new city. His “An Impromptu Poem” (“Jishi” 即事) tells of the feeling of alienation: When the ice tastes sweet, a new year has, again, arrived; I never distinguish who is dear and who is casual to me. Let them spit on my face, let them mock me, I won’t change, a southern barbarian with a tongue like a twittering bird! (Shiji, 15.10b)

食得冰甜歲又新 曾無好意別疏親 從他唾面從他笑 不改南蠻鴃舌人

————— 68. Hanke was born on the fourth day of the twelfth month of the Chinese lunar year. In converting his birthday to the modern usage, we should add one more year to the usual equivalent of the jiazi year in most cases.

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And he easily waxed sentimental over food from Lingnan, for the stomach and for the ethnic memory: “Bitter Gourds” (“Kugua” 苦瓜) Bitter gourds grow all over Lingnan; We eat them to stay the poisonous heat. They flourish on the frontier as well, Yet cannot please the eye of the people. Here I came, having no old friends, I see the bitter gourds as kin. Human nature finds the bitter unpleasant; I believe I am the only one who tastes sweetness in them. (Shiji, 4.5a)

苦瓜生五嶺 賴以解炎毒 塞外亦繁生 不能悅群目 我來無故人 見之等骨肉 畏苦乃常情 甘茲信予獨

Having said that, what is perhaps less expected is that Hanke developed a deep love for Shenyang almost as soon as he arrived. His first reaction to this strange land was calm: “Arriving in Shenyang” (“Chu zhi Shenyang” 初至瀋陽) Opening my eyes I see the city walls, People say this is the former capital. Oxcarts still hustle about; But human dwellings are half deserted. Fortunately a thousand families remain; Who cares, if I have only one alms-bowl? As long as they let me be at ease with staff and sandals, My coming may have been a good design. (Shiji, 6.1b)

開眼見城郭 人言是舊都 牛車仍雜沓 人屋半荒蕪 幸有千家在 何妨一缽孤 但令舒杖履 到此亦良圖

A sense of relief permeates this poem. The poem begins with the impression that Hanke is reluctant even to look at the city, but ends with Hanke promising himself that everything will be fine. We see Hanke eager to observe and explore. The angst that shaped “Reaching Yongping” fades. When he arrived at the monastery to which he was banished, he wrote with a wild ecstatic happiness: “Entering Cien Monastery” (“Chu ru Ciensi” 初入慈恩寺) Fortunately, even though finding neither oxen nor horses around, I can still see the pagoda.

幸無牛馬後 仍許見浮屠

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l aw r e n c e c . h . y i m I prostrate myself humbly before the Buddha, delighted as in the past; Every monk I encounter I greet with a smile and hello. Husked sorghums I chew heartily; The mud berth is perfect to cross my legs on, to meditate. Lowering my head for some time, musing, I find my old self is still with me. (Shiji, 6.1b–2a)

禮佛歡如舊 逢僧笑盡呼 膏粱恣噉嚼 土榻任跏趺 半晌低頭想 依然得故吾

Hanke loved mountains. In the end he would be known as Qianshan 千山, Thousand Mountains, after the area he repeatedly visited and where he spent his last days. Soon he found himself enchanted by the scenery of Liaodong. “Looking at Mounts Yi, Wu, and Lü” (“Wang Yi, Wu, and Lü” 望醫巫閭) A sheet of bright clouds hangs among ten thousand valleys, The traveler halts his horse, face cannot help glowing. Amidst the wind and sand there is yet wonderful scenery; My old mountain does not have to be in Luofu. (Shiji, 17.17a)

一片晴雲萬壑閒 行人立馬自開顏 風沙此際還留勝 豈必羅浮是故山

Hanke may still be aware that he is a sojourner in Liaodong, but he takes no less pleasure in the mountains there. In 1656, Jinwu 今無 (Ah Zi), a Caodong monk one generation younger than Hanke, came from Mount Lu to pay Hanke a visit. 69 Hanke enjoyed his company immensely. In the autumn of the following year, Jinwu had to return. Hanke urged him to stay: “Matching ‘Living in Mount Qixian’ Poems [by Ah Zi]” (“He ‘Qixian Shanju’ yun” 和栖賢山居韻), no. 1 As for mountains and rivers, inner and outer do not differ; Floating cloud, why must you return?

山水無中外 飄雲何必歸

————— 69. For Jinwu, see Haiyun chanzao ji, 1.1a; Wang, Nianpu, pp. 30–33. Besides the one discussed here, Hanke wrote Ah Zi quite a few other poems, such as: “Xi A Zi zhi” 喜阿字至, Shiji, 12.12b; “Jiuri song A Zi” 九日送阿字, and “Chong song A Zi” 重送阿字, Shiji, 13.9a–b.

Loyalism, Exile, Poetry What I hate to see are the geese on the islet; One after another they all fly south. My crime is great, all hope thus dead; Plagued by illness my strength steadily leaves me. Who, holding the tears from Mount Kuang, Came and shed them on my tattered cassock? (Shiji, 7.7a)

183 最嫌沙上雁 一一向南飛 罪大心方死 病多力漸微 誰持匡嶽淚 來洒破僧衣

The “floating cloud” and “geese” are symbols of travelers in the Chinese lyrical tradition; here they refer to Jinwu, who will soon depart for the south. If in “Looking at Mounts Yi, Wu, and Lü” Hanke was still fixated on Loufu, his native place, here his perspective became grander. He spoke of the inner and the outer, China proper and the outer reaches of the empire. In his newly gained vision, there is no distinction between the two. 70 Hanke’s ties to Shenyang would not have been so strong had he not found a group of new friends. Among Hanke’s closest friends in Shenyang were banished officials from the Qing court, such as Zuo Maotai 左懋泰 (Mr. Beili 北里, Snow Studio 雪齋; 1597–1656), 71 Li Chengxiang, Wei Guan 魏琯 ( jinshi 1637), and Hao Yu. 72 In “Gathering at the Snow Studio the Whole Day Again” (“Zai ji Xuezhai jingri” 再集 雪齋竟日), Hanke wrote about the fun they had: How could you! Sending the cold wind ahead to greet me! I haven’t arrived, but can hear, astonished, how clamorous that tiny room is. Past are the three hundred years—what is left is but one laugh?

如何先遣朔風迎 未到驚聞斗室轟 三百年來剩一笑

————— 70. An alternative reading of this poem is that Hanke is pleading with the clouds and geese not to go south, since he cannot go with them. Even if we prefer this interpretation, we can still assert that Hanke is trying to overcome his homesickness by equalizing things in a larger perspective. 71. When Zuo died in 1656, Hanke not only conducted a formal Buddhist funeral ceremony for him but also wrote their common friends to set up a fund for Zuo’s children. 72. Hanshi, “Qianshan shengren heshang ta ming.” Besides the Chinese expatriates, Hanke also befriended many local monks (most of them Buddhist, but some Daoist, too). Hanke was particularly fond of one lama who came from Central Asia (Xiyu 西域). On the lama’s death, Hanke composed two moving elegies for him. They bespeak the amity between these two monks from very different Buddhist orders and ethnic origins. For the poems, see Shiji, 13.6b–7b.

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l aw r e n c e c . h . y i m Exiled several thousand li away—we pass our remaining days together. Younger and older brothers in this ice and snow, our friendship is warm; Heaven and earth’s dragons and snakes, 73 our old manners run amuck. For such a day needs not even half a teardrop; Let’s leave behind an interesting story for this frontier city. (Shiji, 9.12a)

幾千里外共餘生 弟兄冰雪交情熱 天地龍蛇老氣橫 此日不須半點淚 且留佳話付邊城

Readers who prefer to see Hanke as a Ming loyalist will find line 3 of this poem disturbing. The expression “three hundred years,” as mentioned above, stands for the Ming house. This otherwise serious expression is used lightly here. The Ming is treated as a past event, to be put in the realm of memory, something that should not unceasingly pain its survivors. Hanke rallies his friends and himself to live on, to create new and “interesting” stories ( jiahua 佳話) for their adopted city. Birthday poems tend to be introspective, reflective, and sentimental. During his extended stay in Liaodong, Hanke wrote poems entitled “Birthday” almost every year. The following two poems are from his dingyou (1658) birthday. Hanke reflected on his past in Lingnan and Jiangnan in the first poem and divulged his contentment in being in Liaodong in the second: “Dingyou Birthday, Two Poems” (“Dingyou shengri ershou” 丁酉生日二首; 1658), No. 1 I regained my life and body ten years ago; Lingnan plum blossoms, Jiangnan moon, they belong to the past life. So why should I tell only tales of my former existence? The snowy sky east of the pass makes no difference to me.

重復生身一十年 嶺梅江月總生前 如何只說前生話 不分關河白雪天

No. 2 A survivor of punishment, I have no reason to complain; I chew the ice and snow long, the taste is really sweet.

————— 73. Symbols for unusual figures in Chinese literary tradition.

總是刑餘更莫嫌 嚼窮冰雪味真甜

Loyalism, Exile, Poetry Always because of my birthday I know a new year nears; I am adding another sui to my floating life. (Shiji, 17.3a)

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每因生日知年近 又得浮生一歲添

A few weeks later, he wrote a New Year’s Day poem: “Wushu New Year’s Day” (“Wushu yuandan” 戊戍元旦; 1658) Every white hair that remains I owe to the emperor’s mercy; Besides, year after year I enjoy the spring of the emperor’s homeland. Dawn atop the thousand mountains brims over from the clouds; The kingly aura of the two mausoleums 74 glows in the snow. Long banishment has made this place my native land; Getting old I turn carefree, in spite of my sick body. This place has mountains that tolerate my presence; The peach blossoms turn around and laugh at those inside the cave. (Shiji, 13.15a)

一莖白髮荷皇仁 況值年年帝里春 千頂曙光雲外出 二陵王氣雪邊新 放流久已成鄉土 老大無拘只病身 是處有山容我住 桃花翻笑洞中人

Hanke has given up hope of return and considers his pre-Liaodong life a thing of the past. The lovely memories of Lingnan’s plum blossoms and Jiangnan’s moon now appear distant, and he appreciates the simple joys of life that the adopted city offers. He reflects on his sentence of life in exile obliquely, without showing anger or resentment. The imperial presence—the Manchu emperor’s homeland, the mausoleums of the pre-Beijing Manchu emperors—are glorified in the New Year’s Day poem. It might sound ironic, but one does feel a genuine tone of gratification, of thankfulness for the opportunity of coming to Liaodong. Hanke’s sojourn, he says in the poem, is better than living in the Chinese utopia, the Peach Blossoms Spring 桃花源, envisioned by the Eastern Jin poet Tao Qian 陶潛 (365–427). At any rate, as Hanke sees it, the Peach Blossoms Spring is unattainable, and there is no escape from history. So he will enjoy his place of exile. ————— 74. Those of Nurgaci and Hong Taiji.

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The sense of being accepted and belonging—appearing in line 7 here—was crucial for Hanke’s sense of feeling at home in Liaodong. A humorous poem illustrates this: “A Random Verse” (“Ou cheng” 偶成) The Central Plain had no place where I could take refuge; Beyond the Great Wall, I regained my life, and the Way is manifest. They call me, whom everybody wanted to kill, “an understanding friend”; I of course humble myself, saying: “No, a real criminal.” Half my bed is filled with sunbeams; I continue to sleep; One ladle of poetic lines; I am not completely broke. The old man next door is quite odd, very foolish indeed; When the rice is done, he often calls me over, delighting in my frequent visits. (Shiji, 10.8b)

中原無地可容身 塞外還生有道瞋 世惟欲殺稱知己 我亦自嫌真罪人 半榻日光還是睡 一瓢詩句未全貧 鄰翁頗怪癡呆甚 飯熟時招喜過頻

In the end, Hanke spoke of his life in Lingnan as a sojourn and would have us believe that he was “native” to Liaodong: “Entering the Mountain, Twenty Miscellaneous Poems” (“Rushan zayong ershi shou” 入山雜詠二十首), no. 6 I have eaten my fill, blissful, blissful; happiness overflows, The host is not different from me, nor I from him. This makes me think of affairs twenty years ago; The emerald curtains, the resplendent hall— were just a guest lodge. (Shiji, 15.19a)

一飽欣欣樂有餘 主人猶我我猶渠 翻思二十年前事 翠幙華堂是客居

“Self Mockery” (“Jiechao” 解嘲) In my past life I must have been a native here; Only I was banished to Lingnan for thirtysix springs. I am glad I returned to my homeland more than ten years ago; Every single grain of sand is an old relative. (Shiji, 17.3a)

夙生原是此中人 嶺海遷流四九春 已幸還鄉踰十載 黃沙點點舊姻親

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Poetry and Community Art proved to be another source of strength for Hanke in surviving exile in Liaodong. Hanke wrote poetry fervently: After the Double Ninth at the Gold Pagoda Temple, I sent everybody away. Often I stood alone, the bright moon high above in the sky, the cold wind soughing. I could not help circling the pagoda and singing out loud. It was the same as the bell in the pagoda ringing when the wind blows; nothing was deliberate. 重陽後于金塔, 盡遣諸子. 每自佇立. 明月在天, 寒風習習. 輒不自禁 繞塔高歌. 正如風吹鈴鳴塔, 又何曾經意耶. 75 (Shiji, “juanshou” 卷首, 4a)

Writing was second nature to Hanke. Jinxiu 今羞, Hanke’s disciple and the original editor of Hanke’s poetry, recounted Hanke’s reaction when Hanke was advised to give up the art: Mr. ____ 76 came up to the Master and remonstrated with him, saying: “Master, where did your trouble come from? You should have uprooted it resolutely; instead, you are nourishing its shoots again.” The Master said: “Right, right.” Then there was an eminent monk who reproached the Master with a stern countenance, saying: “Folks like us have our own preoccupations. Shouldn’t you be reading the sutras, or counting the beads? What’s the use of occupying yourself with this trivial thing?” The Master said: “Right, right.” Xiu waited for an opportune moment and put in a word, saying: “The eminent monk is simply opinionated. But Mr. ____ spoke with some truth, didn’t he?” The Master gave a faint smile. With ease he said: “Didn’t you see that black-haired-long-eared creature [a donkey]? Even when weighed down by frost and snow, driven from behind by the swinging whip, it still can’t help shaking its hair and giving out a cry. Shengren’s writing poetry is just like that.” 先生前而諫曰: 師胡為乎來禍根? 慎不速鋤, 乃復滋其苗耶? 師唯唯. 大 僧復厲色而呵曰: 吾儕自有本業. 貝葉之弗翻, 木槵之弗數, 而安事此毛錐 為? 師唯唯. 羞伺間而進曰: 大僧下矣. 先生之言或有當歟? 師微哂. 從容而語

————— 75. This is from Hanke’s own preface to his collection of poetry, most likely Jinling ta. After early 1657 until his death in 1660, Hanke stayed at Gold Pagoda Temple, Jintasi 金塔寺, on different occasions and for different durations. Since this was written just a couple of years before his death, it appears that Hanke’s later collection of poetry was called Jinling ta. For Hanke’s affiliations with different temples in Liaodong, see my “Political Exile and the Chan Buddhist Master: A Lingnan Monk in Manchuria During the Ming-Qing Transition,” unpublished manuscript. 76. Two characters were deleted from the text. It is impossible to tell who this person was.

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曰: 而不見夫黑毛而長耳者乎? 雖霜雪在背, 鞭策在後, 而猶不禁振鬣而鳴也. 剩人之為詩, 亦若是而已矣. 77 (Shiji, “juanshou,” 4b)

Poetry became an obsession. When Hanke fell ill, an attendant urged him to stop writing for a while. He responded by writing a poem: 78 If I die, I won’t have any regrets; To live, to tell you the truth, is more arduous. If I do not get lines frequently, How can I cast off my sad face? 79 (Shiji, 14.10a)

我死終無恨 我生良獨艱 不因頻得句 何以破愁顏

Hanke placed writing poetry on a par with healing. He wrote a friend who voiced concerns about Hanke’s health: 80 Chanting 81 can also yield the effect of reading sutras; Lines of poetry are really the same as lifeprolonging elixir. (Shiji, 11.6b–7a)

呻吟亦可參清梵 詩句真同續命丹

Versifying provided Hanke with a familiar, reassuring world to which he could withdraw from exile. Through poetry he reconnected with like-minded souls, recovered a cultural identity that was disrupted by his banishment, and gained a sense of continuity with his past. In Shenyang, Hanke founded the Bingtian shishe 冰天詩社, the Icy Sky Poetry Club, which was certainly the most significant literary activity in the area during the 1650s. The Icy Sky Poetry Club boasted thirty-three members (including Hanke himself), representing a mix of local and expatriate poets. Among them were four Buddhist and two

————— 77. This is related in Jinxiu’s preface to Hanke’s collection of poetry. 78. “My Attendant Urged Me to Stop Writing Poems When I Was Sick. I Wrote This To Show Him” (“Shizhe quan yu bingzhong ba yin fu ci shi zhi” 侍者勸予病 中罷吟賦此示之). 79. This line alludes to Du Fu’s 沉飲聊自適, 放歌頗愁絕 in “Zi jing fu Fengxian xian yonghuai wubai zi” 自京赴奉先縣詠懷五百字. For Du’s poem, see Qiu Zhao’ao 仇兆鰲, Du shi xiangzhu 杜詩詳註 (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1979), p. 266. 80. “I Returned Sick and Mr. Li Sent His Concerns by a Poem. I Gratefully Replied with the Same Rhyme” (“Bing gui cheng Li gong yi shi jian xun yong yun fengda” 病歸承李公以詩見訊用韻奉答). 81. Shenyin 呻吟, in the original, also means “moaning.” Hanke is playing with the double meaning of the word in the context of his own illness.

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Daoist monks; the rest were literati. 82 Most of the eighty-four poems appended to Hanke’s Qianshan shiji (in juan 20) were occasioned by two gatherings of the Icy Club in 1651. Regrettably, since all the members of the club adopted highly codified style names—for instance, Hanke referred to himself as Kesa 83 Heshang 搕和尚—it is difficult to identify who is who. Nevertheless, we do know that among them were such banished Qing officials as Li Chengxiang, Wei Guan, Ji Kaisheng 季開生 (1627–59), Li Yin 李裀, and Chen Xinjian 陳心簡. 84 Hanke wrote in the preface to Poems from the Icy Sky Poetry Club (Bingtianshe shi 冰天社詩): The White Lotus is long gone; firm ice has arrived. The sky is shrouded in cold clouds; the vast land turns gloomy. Alas, all the frontier grass has withered; what fortune the ferns still remain! My cotton monk’s robe is threadbare, not unlike that of Elder Gao who migrated to Meizhou. A lone official sent far into exile, my anguish is even more intense than that of Han Libu [Yu], who was banished to Chaoyang. [Han said to the monk Dadian:] “Please come visit in the evening” and “Take good care of yourself”; three letters [we have from Han], all desolate. 85 With my staff alone, I often chant aloud as if crying. Although I have no one to match me, my songs remain even more lofty. The orchid is relocated to a deep valley 86 but not to isolate itself and be narcissistic. Pines grow on Thousand Mountains; 87 they are known to become more

————— 82. Of the four Buddhist monks, Hanke himself was from Lingnan, one was from Zhejiang, and the other two were Liaodong locals. The two Daoist monks came from Nanzhili. Seven of the literati were from Shandong, five from Shaanxi, three from Nanzhili, one from Zhejiang, and one from Jiangxi. The others came from the vicinity of Shenyang. There was even one Korean by the style name of Kuangfeng 狂封 in the club. See the list of members in Bingtianshe shi, Shiji, 20.1b–2b. 83. This literally means “rubbish” or “human excrement.” These connotations appear less shocking when considered against Chan eccentric rhetorical devices. 84. See the list of members in Bingtianshe shi, Shiji, 20.1b–2b; and Hanshi, “Qianshan shengren heshang ta ming.” 85. During his exile in Chaozhou, Han—himself an ardent opponent of Buddhism—befriended a monk named Dadian 大顛. The letters mentioned here were for Dadian. See Han Changli ji 韓昌黎集 (Hong Kong: Shangwu yinshuguan, 1964), 7.72–73. For Han’s account of this relationship, see “Yu Meng shangshu shu” 與孟 尚書書, ibid., 4.83–86. 86. The orchid is a recurrent metaphor for a lofty character in the poems of Qu Yuan, the father of Chinese exilic literature. 87. Qianshan 千山 in the original, but here it can also be taken more liberally to refer to the many mountains in the area.

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luxuriant during the winter. Our sadness is deeper than [the sentiments that people die and become] gibbons and cranes; 88 our pains fill heaven and earth. Let us gather all the souls of the ice 89 from the east, the west, the south, and the north to chill the warm blood of the past and present. After all, we do not want to waste the wine that Master Yuan has saved up for us. And of course we will not admit impure souls like [Xie] Lingyun. 90 It won’t hurt to use our remaining years in this snowy land to continue the joyful event of Donglin [Monastery]. We have accumulated more than fifty poems already, and we have not even met thrice. Kesa casually notes this. 白蓮久荒, 堅冰既至. 寒雲 羃羃, 大地沉沉. 嗟塞草之盡枯, 幸山薇之尚在. 布衲毶, 匪獨杲長老之梅 州; 遠逐孤臣, 憔悴尤甚韓吏部之潮陽. 夕遷珍重, 三書蕭條. 隻杖每長歌以 當泣, 寧寡和而益高. 蘭移幽谷, 非無人而自芳. 松植千山, 實經冬而彌茂. 悲 深猿鶴, 痛溢人天. 盡東西南北之冰魂, 洒古往今來之熱血. 既不廢遠公蓄酒, 亦豈容靈運雜心. 聊借雪窖之餘生, 用續東林之勝事. 詩逾半百, 會未及三. 搕漫題. (Shiji, 20.1a-b)

This introspective essay captures the dreadful emotions afflicting the exiles: dislocation, alienation, bitterness, and haplessness, as experienced by Han Yu 韓 愈 (768–824) and Dahui Chanshi 大 慧 禪 師 (Zonggao 宗杲; 1089–1163) in earlier times. Both Han Yu and Dahui were exiled to Lingnan, the former to Chaozhou by the Tang court and the latter to Meizhou by the Southern Song. Han Yu is better known as a great writer than as a court official, and Dahui was a famous monk. 91 Hanke compared himself—and by extension, other club members—to these two figures. Han’s and Dahui’s identities, writer and monk, resemble Hanke’s own. The yearning for a sense of continuity and self-assurance is palpable. Hanke forges a community among the exiles, reassuring them (and himself) that the powers of culture and literature will sustain their bleak existence in the strange land. He invokes the celebrated Bailianshe 白蓮社, the White Lotus Club, formed by the famous monk Huiyuan 慧遠 (334–419) of the Jin dynasty. Members of the White Lotus Club, all elite ————— 88. The Chinese believed that upright persons who died on the battlefield became cranes and gibbons; see the Baopuzi 抱朴子, quoted in Yiwen leiju 藝文類聚, juan 90. 89. A symbol for purity in the Chinese lyrical tradition. 90. The famous poet Xie Lingyun (385–443) adored Huiyuan and requested to be allowed to join the club. Huiyuan rejected him because Xie’s heart was, in Huiyuan’s opinion, “impure.” 91. For Dahui, see Puji 普濟, Wudeng huiyuan 五燈會元 (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1984), 9. 1271–78.

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cultural figures of the time, convened at Donglin Monastery 東林寺 for discussions of the Pure Land doctrines. Huiyuan is also remembered as one of the finest early Chinese Buddhist poets. 92 The second gathering of the Icy Sky Poetry Club was occasioned by Hanke’s birthday, and all the members presented poems to Hanke. Moved, Hanke wrote thankfully: The butcher’s knife and chopping board spared me, but my life is long destroyed; Undeserving am I for you gentlemen to bestow these pearl-like words on me. The spring breeze, newly arrived in this sandy desert, startles us; In the year’s last month, savoring a tray of ice together seems fairly good. My hometown ten thousand li away has been my dream in these three years; My cotton robe of seven jin 93 becomes the fifth watch’s chill. After lingering all day long when you return it will be late; I fear it will not be easy for you to come again. (Shiji, 20.15b–16a)

刀俎遺餘生久殘 漫勞諸子摘琅玕 春風沙磧驚新至 臘月盤冰好共餐 萬里鄉關三歲夢 七觔布衲五更寒 淹留竟日歸須晚 只恐重來事又難

Written in 1650—before Hanke’s status as a Buddhist master became widely recognized 94 —this poem reflects Hanke’s depression: self-pity and nostalgia fill it with sentimentality. The essay and poem cited above were written in a tone of exilic self-lament. However, we have seen already that not all of Hanke’s poetry is as dark as the frontier sky he described. This is also true of the Icy club members more broadly.

————— 92. See Jan Yün-hua, “Buddhist Literature,” in William Nienhauser, ed., The Indiana Companion to Traditional Chinese Literature (Taipei: Southern Materials Center, 1986), pp. 2, 9. 93. When asked where dharma is, the famous Chan monk Zhaozhou (Zhaozhou Congshen 趙州從諗; 778–897) of the Tang dynasty replied: “This old monk [Zhaozhou] has a cotton robe made in Qingzhou that weighs seven jin” (老僧在青 州作得一領布衫, 重七斤); see Wudeng huiyuan, 4.205. Hanke’s usage of the image here has nothing to do with the original import. 94. See my “Political Exile and the Chan Buddhist Master.”

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Among the birthday poems the club members wrote for Hanke was one by Ah Xuan 阿玄: 95 What good karma I have meeting him these days; At leisure he frequents this bamboo courtyard, with a bowl of rice. Sima Qian’s castration, Sunzi’s losing his legs, Guishan’s water buffalo, Zhaozhou’s donkey. 96 He does not sever the lingering feelings but yearns to be Buddha; It is hard for him to forget the great principles, he likes to read. Give it a laugh, the punishment is not so terrible after all; It allows him to come and talk freely in this deserted town. (Shiji, 20.13a–b)

何緣此日得逢渠 竹院閒過飯一盂 遷史腐刑孫子刖 溈山水牯趙州驢 餘情未剖貪成佛 大義難忘每讀書 卻笑鍼錘終未惡 又容饒舌到荒墟

Retrospectively, Hanke would certainly appreciate the note of humor and optimism at the end of the poem. Hanke was by no means unique in his fervor for poetry. The following series of four poems vividly depicts Hanke and another exile’s indulgence in the poetic art. Snow Studio and Beili are style names of Zuo Maotai, who was exiled to Liaodong in 1649 with his entire family,

————— 95. Wang Zongyan (Nianpu, p. 22) suggests that Ah Xuan was Zuo Maotai’s cousin. 96. Both Guishan (Guishan Lingyou 溈山靈祐; 771–853) and Zhaozhou (see note 93) were famous Chan monks of the Tang dynasty. In conversation, Guishan once said: “After this old monk [Guishan] has lived for a hundred years [died], I will turn into a water buffalo at the foot of the hill” (老僧百年後, 向山下作一頭水 牯牛); see Wudeng huiyuan, 9.526. Zhaozhou, on one occasion, compared himself to a donkey; see ibid., 4.202. These two images are generated by the references to Sima Qian and Sun Bin in the preceding line to form a structurally symmetrical couplet. Sima Qian was castrated by order of Emperor Wu of the Han dynasty, and Sun Bin of the Warring States period was sentenced to lose his legs after being framed by a competitor. The references in line 3 suggest that Hanke shares the sense of being unjustly punished. The only sense, however, we can make of the two Chan masters’ cases in line 4 is that both lower themselves to the status of animals. But that is hardly the message of the original Chan stories. Ah Xuan is being humorous here, juxtaposing the tragic and the lighthearted. At any rate, this unexpected comic moment foreshadows the optimism at the end of the poem.

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a household of over a hundred people. 97 Zuo was Hanke’s closest friend in Shenyang. “Treading the Ice to Visit Snow Studio” (“Ta bing guo Xuezhai” 踏冰過雪齋) Seek wind! Seek snow! Who am I seeking? Mr. Beili! He who likes to get up late. A thousand slices of cold cloud have sunk into the earth’s crust; One square of clear mirror—I see the monk’s eyebrows in it. My straw sandals constantly slip now that my muscles have shrunk; My supporting staff abruptly halts the moment a poem spins out. If I am not forbidden, I am willing to die for it; And my skeleton for all eternity will soak in a pond of ice. (Shiji, 9.14a)

尋風尋雪欲尋誰 北里先生睡起遲 千片凍雲沉地骨 一方清鑑照僧眉 草鞋易滑肌羸後 柱杖忽停詩到時 便使不禁死亦得 枯骸千古浸冰池

“Reading Snow Studio’s New Poems” (“Du Xuezhai xinshi” 讀雪齋新詩) When I reached his house, his two fences were completely white; He was alone, wrapped in a sheepskin coat; I earned a curious look on sight. The lone monk, whirling in snow, faltered; We went over a few new verses together, despite the cold. There are places where ghosts would be startled to tears; I truly feel envious; When blood drips, Buddha turns even sadder. If we continue to do this for another three days, we will freeze to death; Turning into a poem of weeping for the snow. (Shiji, 9.14a–b)

到門白盡兩邊籬 獨擁羊裘一見疑 半個孤僧連雪倒 數篇新句忍寒披 鬼當哭處予偏妒 血到漓時佛更悲 三日下來應凍死 早成一首哭冰詩

————— 97. See the introduction to Zuo Maotai’s poems in Zhang Yuxing, Qingdai Dongbei liuren shi xuanzhu, p. 50.

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l aw r e n c e c . h . y i m “Sitting Long at Snow Studio” (“Jiu zuo Xuezhai” 久坐雪齋) Time long past snowflakes drooped on our eyebrows; We sat into the dusk, neither of us noticed it. Rid of eccentricities, I just want to be myself; 98 Maintaining your integrity, you can certainly inspire your sons. 99 You always beat the spoon just when the monk feels hungry; For a long while silence falls upon us, then comes another arresting line. From now on, when your door opens without a knock; You know it is me arriving with my alms bowl. (Shiji, 9.14b–15a)

蚤過疏雪掛雙眉 坐到斜陽兩不知 撒盡風顛寧作我 留得氣骨自教兒 一匙每節僧方餓 半晌無言句又奇 從此板扉無剝啄 便知托砵到來時

“Returning from Snow Studio” (“Cong Xuezhai gui” 從雪齋歸) Just one step past the door we started missing one another; Still the same rugged path, I braved the cold all alone. One solitary goose arrived from the desert, frost on its back;

出門一步即相思 依舊崎嶇冷獨支 隻雁負霜沙上至

[note in original: Mr. Guang happened to come from the fort 時光公從堡中來.]

This uncouth monk’s staff followed it, taking advantage of the moonlight. It is true, you came to this snowy land where you go unbridled;

野僧將月杖頭隨 總來雪窖堪長逞

————— 98. This alludes to Shishuo xinyu: “When Huan Wen was young, he and Yin Hao were of equal reputation, and they constantly felt a spirit of mutual rivalry. Huan once asked Yin, ‘How do you compare with me?’ Yin replied, ‘I’ve been keeping company with myself a long time; I’d rather just be me’ ” (桓公少與殷侯齊名, 常 有競心. 桓問殷: “卿何如我?” 殷云: “我與我周旋久, 寧作我”); see the “Classification According to Excellence” (“Pinzao” 品藻) section in Yu Jiaxi, Shishuo xinyu jianshu, p. 520; and Mather, A New Account of Tales of the World, p. 258. 99. This alludes to the entry about Xie An’s wife instructing her sons (謝公夫人 教兒) in the “Virtuous Conduct” (“Dexing” 德行) section of Shishuo xinyu. See Yu Jiaxi, Shishuo xinyu jianshu, p. 38; and Mather, A New Account of Tales of the World, p. 18.

Loyalism, Exile, Poetry Why, once you saw the dragon ford didn’t you want to leave? When we returned to my hut, I idly left the door ajar, With cold birds chirping and chattering, we discussed poems. (Shiji, 9.14b–15a)

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那見龍津更不離 歸到柴扃閒未掩 啾嘈寒雀共論詩

For Hanke and Mr. Beili, poetry is the medium for forgetting and transcending. It is almost self-torture for someone as fragile as Hanke to brave the snow and ice to visit Snow Studio, yet he seems to forget the terrible cold when a poem takes shape in his mind. When Hanke and Beili sit down to write and read poems, they forget time, hunger, and even one another. Poetry becomes a haven for the two to flee cruel reality. In lines 3 and 4 of “Sitting Long at Snow Studio,” “I just want to be myself” (ning zuo wo 寧作我) and “you can certainly inspire your sons” (zi jiao er 自教兒) allude to Shishuo xinyu and imply that Hanke and Snow Studio, as exiles, can aspire to the freedom and unrestraint of celebrated Wei-Jin figures and enjoy “pure conversations” on poetry. 100 Their pursuit of poetry is almost art for art’s sake; they are obsessed with form and with the processes of reading and writing. The image of ghosts being “startled to tears” (line 5 of “Reading Snow Studio’s New Poems”) comes from Du Fu’s “A Letter to Li Bo the Twelfth, Twenty Couplets” (“Ji Li Shier Bo ershi yun” 寄李十二白二十韻), which begins with these four lines: 101 I knew this mad fellow from the past; He is styled “the banished immortal.” When he sets out to write, he startles the wind and rain; As soon as his verse is done, ghosts and gods weep.

昔年有狂客 號爾謫仙人 筆落驚風雨 詩成泣鬼神

Du Fu’s poem extravagantly praises his fellow poet and dear friend, Li Bo. The images of the “mad fellow” and the “banished immortal” from Du Fu’s poem befit Hanke and Beili. The second half of “Returning from Snow Studio” is more sophisticated. Hanke moves from the poetic realm back to the physical world and, in the last two lines, blurs the boundary of the two. In Hanke’s poetic vision, the “snowy land” (xuejiao 雪窖) becomes an alluring, ————— 100. I thank Wai-yee Li for suggesting this reading to me. 101. For the poem, see Qiu Zhao’ao, Du shi xiangzhu, pp. 660–64.

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unbridled realm, and the “dragon ford” (long jin 龍津), the imperial homeland, beckons attractively. The “snowy land” and “dragon ford” define the area of Hanke’s real exile, Hanke’s “prison” in reality. Yet, Hanke internalizes this confinement as his inspiration for writing; he transcends the physical world through the powers of literature. The birds are a metaphor for Hanke and his visitor, Mr. Guang. 102 They are “cold,” to be sure, but they chirp and chatter freely. We can imagine that people in Shenyang gathered around Hanke most often on religious occasions, when he served as a Buddhist master. The Icy Sky Poetry Club, nonetheless, offered Hanke a smaller but more intimate community where Hanke and the other members were equals, bonded to the art of poetry. Poetry or literary clubs were an integral part of the cultural, social, and political life of late Ming and early Qing literati. 103 Hanke certainly belonged to a poetry club in Nanjing—as indicated in “Sent to My Fellow Club Members in Jiangnan, Four Poems” discussed below—but which club is not known. Forming a poetry club in Liaodong connected him to his past cultural identity. What is more significant, given Shenyang’s history and political situation, by founding a poetry club, Hanke introduced a late Ming phenomenon to the former capital of the Manchus. But even as the Chinese expatriates in the club were reclaiming a cultural identity and past, the natives and emigrants in the club were appropriating a Chinese cultural construct. Hanke’s Icy Club was modest in size—its counterparts in Jiangnan and other cultural centers could easily boast memberships of hundreds or even thousands of people—yet its spirit was high. Hanke wrote his old friends in Jiangnan, entreating them to visit Shenyang: “Sent to My Fellow Club Members in Jiangnan, Four Poems” (“Ji Jiangnan zhu tongshe sishou” 寄江南諸同社四首), No. 1 In the bright day, sounds of singing fill the vast wilderness; Now the Dao [of poetry] belongs to Liaoyang.

白日歌聲滿大荒 于今斯道屬遼陽

————— 102. Mr. Guang was a member of the Icy Sky Poetry Club who came from Shandong. Nothing else is known about him. 103. See Xie Guozhen 謝國楨, Ming Qing zhi ji dangshe yundong kao 明清之際 黨社運動考 (Taipei: Taiwan Shangwu yinshuguan, 1967), pp. 204–55; and Qian Hang 錢杭 and Cheng Zai 承載, Shiqi shiji Jiangnan shehui shenghuo 十七世紀江南 社會生活 (Hangzhou: Zhejiang renmin chubanshe, 1996), pp. 36–90.

Loyalism, Exile, Poetry We regret, instead, that Li Bo returned from his exile too early, Not having the chance to sing out loud in Yelang. 104

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翻嫌李白歸來早 不得長吟向夜郎

No. 2 Who said in the snowy desert this monk is all alone? Fluttering white whisks are causing a stir on the edge of the sea. Had Zheng Xia been born to our time, He would surely paint the Lotus Society in the bamboo grove.

誰言雪磧一僧孤 白拂交橫沸海隅 鄭俠若令生此日 竹林蓮社總應圖

No. 3 Starved for so long, even full, I still feel restless; The true joy of Motai is now on West Hill. Brothers present each other with verses, countless pieces; In vain has the song of ferns come down to the human world.

餓到今稱飽亦頑 墨臺真樂在西山 兄酬弟唱知多少 空使薇歌落世間

No. 4 Even if you have committed no crime, you should come to the frontier; Our old club house in the Stone City must be overgrown with weeds. Retreats like that of Yu in Guiji, you may have visited them all; But unless you have been to Tianshan, your eyes are still closed. 105 (Shiji, 15.15b–16a)

無罪還應出塞來 石頭舊社長蒿萊 會稽禹穴饒探遍 不到天山眼不開

The first poem in this series looks positively at the exile of Hanke and the others: the displacement provides much inspiration for poetry and a rare opportunity to unite with fellow poets. In the second couplet of Poem no. 2, Hanke refers to Zheng Xie 鄭俠 ————— 104. Implicated in the secondary revolt of the Prince of Yun during the An Lushan Rebellion, Li Bo (701–62) was exiled to Yelang (in present-day Guizhou). On his way to Yelang, he received a pardon. 105. The idea that exile is eye-opening recalls Su Shi’s 蘇軾 lines, “九死南荒吾不 恨, 茲游奇絕冠平生,” written when he was banished in Lingnan; see “Liuyue ershiri ye duhai” 六月二十日夜渡海, in Huang Renke 黃任軻 et al., eds., Su Shi shiji hezhu 蘇軾詩集合注 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 2001), p. 2218. I thank Wai-yee Li for suggesting this connection to me.

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(1041–1119) of the Northern Song era but empties out the original import associated with Zheng. During Wang Anshi’s political reforms, Zheng was moved by the great hardship and suffering of refugees (liumin 流民). He had paintings of them made and presented them to the emperor. In Hanke’s poetic vision, a contemporary Zheng would have the merriment of the poetic community in Shenyang painted, rather than the suffering. In Poem no. 3, Hanke alludes to Boyi and Shuqi, whom we have encountered already. Boyi and Shuqi’s family name was Motai 墨臺, and West Hill 西山 was another name for Mount Shouyang. Hanke, however, gives the original a hopeful twist. He uses the allusion to characterize the poetic community in Shenyang, but only the element of seclusion is echoed. Moreover, the “hermits” in Liaodong are not as desperate as the two brothers. (According to Poem no. 2, these “hermits” are many.) Food is scarce, but they manage to get by. They survive banishment in the harsh environment to find true joy in writing poetry. Poem no. 4 compares the poetic community in Liaodong to Hanke’s old club in Nanjing, whose sun, Hanke laments, has already set. Hanke urges his Jiangnan friends to “come to the frontier,” chusai 出塞. To chu 出 is to cross over the boundary separating the inner and the outer, the native and the foreign. A new, broader vision is promised.

Qian Qianyi and His Place in History 7 Kang-i Sun Chang Qian Qianyi’s 錢謙益 (1582–1664) place in history is the subject of contention. During much of his lifetime, Qian was recognized as a distinguished poet and an influential leader of the literary world. His Yushan pai (虞山派) was prominent among the many contemporary schools of poetry, and his hundreds of disciples never ceased to seek instruction from him. 1 Were it not for the fall of the Ming dynasty, his reputation in Chinese history would have been towering. Fate suddenly turned against him in 1645, however, when Manchu troops took the city of Nanjing. Then serving as president of the Board of Ceremonies under the Ming Prince of Fu, Qian Qianyi promptly surrendered to the Qing. Despite Qian’s subsequent regretting of his defection, and in spite of his retirement to his native place in 1646, many Chinese critics and historians have never been able to forgive (or forget) Qian’s brief act of “disloyalty” to the Ming. To them, Qian Qianyi has always symbolized a person who “lost his integrity” (shijie zhe 失節者). 2 Ironically, the first person to condemn Qian Qianyi officially was the Manchu emperor Qianlong (r. 1736–95). In 1769, more than one ————— 1. See Hu Youfeng 胡幼峰, Qing chu Yushan pai shilun 清初虞山派詩論 (Taipei: Guoli bianyi guan, 1994). 2. For example, as late as 1998 the renowned scholar Yan Dichang still read Qian Qianyi’s work from an extremely biased perspective; see Yan Dichang 嚴迪昌, Qingshi shi 清詩史 (Taipei: Wunan tushu, 1998), 1: 353–61. Although highly sympathetic to Qian, Zhao Yuan nonetheless called him a shijie zhe; see Zhao Yuan 趙園, Ming Qing zhi ji shidaifu yanjiu 明清之際士大夫研究 (Beijing: Beijing daxue chubanshe, 1999), p. 305.

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hundred years after Qian’s death, the emperor called Qian “deficient in moral integrity” and said that he “was not worthy of belonging to the human race” (大節有虧，實不齒於人類). 3 Qianlong ordered that Qian Qianyi’s works be banned and burned. Later he instructed that “not a single copy [of Qian’s works] shall remain” (無使稍有存留). 4 Qian Qianyi had, in the emperor’s view, violated the principle of loyalty by serving under both the Ming and the Qing; he was also furious that Qian had openly “slandered” the Manchus in his writings even after his surrender to the Qing. In a poem written in 1770 Qianlong criticized Qian Qianyi for “having no principle in service or in retirement” (進退都無據). 5 Qianlong’s insistence on the “principle” of patriotism led him to honor the heroes of the anti-Manchu resistance at the end of the Ming. Even during the large-scale literary inquisitions of the 1770s, 6 the emperor rarely denounced those who had died defending the previous dynasty against the Manchus. As J. D. Schmidt has correctly pointed out, the Qing government “hoped that contemporary officials would be equally loyal to it.” 7 These concerns lay behind Qianlong’s 1776 decision to rehabilitate the Ming loyalist Chen Zilong 陳子龍 (1608– 47). 8 Qianlong lauded Chen’s “upright spirit” and awarded him the posthumous name of Zhongyu 忠裕 (Loyal and noble). 9 In contrast, the emperor opted to punish those who had served both the Ming and the Qing courts. In 1777 Qianlong announced that a new ————— 3. Qingshi liezhuan 清史列傳, ed. Wang Zhonghan 王鍾翰 (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1987), 79: 6577. For an English translation of this edict, see Lawrence Chihung Yim, “The Poetics of Historical Memory in the Ming-Qing Transition: A Study of Qian Qianyi’s (1582–1664) Later Poetry” (Ph.D. diss., Yale University, 1998), pp. 254–56. 4. Qingshi liezhuan, 79: 6577. 5. Ibid., p. 6578. 6. See Luther Carrington Goodrich, The Literary Inquisition of Ch’ien-lung (1935; reprinted—New York: Paragon, 1966); and Wu Zhefu 吳哲夫, Qingdai jinhui shuming yanjiu 清代禁燬書名研究 (Taipei: Jiaxin shuini gongsi, Wenhua jijinhui, 1969), pp. 45–46. 7. J. D. Schmidt, Harmony Garden: The Life, Literary Criticism, and Poetry of Yuan Mei (1716–1798) (London: Routledge Curzon, 2003), p. 382. 8. Kang-I Sun Chang, The Late-Ming Poet Ch’en Tzu-lung: Crises of Love and Loyalism (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1991), p. 4. 9. For the Qianlong emperor’s edict, see Chen Zilong 陳子龍, Chen Zhongyu quanji 陳忠裕全集, ed. Wang Chang 王昶 (n.p., 1803), 1a–3a.

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section called “Erchen zhuan” 貳臣傳 (Biographies of twice-serving officials) was to be added to the Qing official history for “disgraced” officials like Qian Qianyi. Qian Qianyi especially deserved, according to Qianlong, to be included in this category because of his “wavering, covetous, and shameless” behavior. 10 In 1781, Qianlong had Qian Qianyi and a few other twice-serving officials placed in the inferior yi 乙 class (as distinguished from the superior jia 甲 class) in the “Erchen zhuan.” According to Qianlong’s edict, Qian and others who had behaved in a similar fashion had “surrendered only halfheartedly [to the Qing] for the purpose of saving their skins.” 11 As a punishment, Qian Qianyi’s works were omitted from the monumental Siku quanshu collection. Not everyone in the category of erchen received the same treatment. The works of the poet Wu Weiye 吳偉業 (1609–72), for example, were never singled out for censorship; indeed, they were included in the Siku quanshu. As Wai-yee Li points out in her chapter in this volume, Wu Weiye’s poetry often dwells on his loyalty to the Ming—his four Yanzhou poems, written in 1653 during a reluctant trip to Beijing to serve the new Manchu regime, are poignant expressions of loyalism to the Ming. But apparently the Qianlong emperor was not offended by Wu Weiye’s works, perhaps because, as Andrew Hsieh has written, Wu “had always remained careful in his words and action” (始終謹言 慎行) 12 and never involved himself in anti-Manchu movements. In fact, it was perhaps a good strategy for Qianlong to show that people like Wu Weiye, despite their twice-serving status, differed from Qian Qianyi in that they did not openly “insult” the Manchus. Or, Wu Weiye might simply have been fortunate; other, similar individuals easily became victims of Qianlong’s literary inquisition. For instance, Lawrence Chi-hung Yim shows in his contribution to this volume how the Buddhist monk Hanke 函可 (1612–60) eventually became an object of harsh posthumous criticism from the Qianlong emperor even though Hanke’s writings were not particularly anti-Qing. ————— 10. Qingshi liezhuan, 79: 6578. For a translation, see Yim, “The Poetics of Historical Memory,” p. 274. 11. Gaozong Chunhuangdi shilu 高宗純皇帝實錄, in Qing shilu 清實錄, Qianlong 46 [1781] (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1985–86), 1142.293–94. 12. Andrew Hsieh (Xie Zhengguang 謝正光), “Tanlun Qingchu shiwen dui Qian Qianyi pingjia zhi zhuanbian” 探論清初詩文對錢謙益評價之轉變, in [Xianggang] Zhongguo wenhua yanjiusuo xuebao [香港]中國文化研究所學報 21 (1990): 277.

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The real tragedy of Qian Qianyi is that he disappointed not only the Manchus but also the Chinese. The common Chinese expectation that high officials would commit suicide at the fall of their dynasty has always haunted Confucian scholars. Thus, despite great admiration for Qian Qianyi’s distinguished literary accomplishments, his contemporaries often criticized Qian for surrendering to the Qing. For instance, seventeenth-century Ming loyalists such as Cao Erkan 曹爾堪 (1617– 79), Peng Shiwang 彭士望 (1610–83), and Tang Xiuye 湯修業 lamented Qian Qianyi’s failure to remain loyal to the Ming. 13 In the first postconquest generation, the famous writer Zha Shenxing 查慎行 (1650– 1727), despite his admiration for Qian Qianyi’s poetry, once wrote a satirical poem that mocks Qian’s “changing into a new outfit and costume” (點妝巾帽俱新樣), a line that suggests Qian had shamelessly surrendered to the Manchu. 14 Nonetheless, some readers respected Qian enough to risk their lives by preserving his writings. As a result, most of Qian’s works survive today. However, Qianlong’s literary inquisition had lasting effects; Qian’s reputation suffered for over a century. According to the Qing scholar Qian Yong 錢泳 (1795–1844), Qian’s tomb in Changshu was left unattended for this reason. 15 In contrast, the tomb of Qian Qianyi’s concubine, Liu Rushi 柳如是 (1618–64) which was only a few feet away, ————— 13. See Cao Erkan 曹爾堪, “Qian Muzhai xiansheng wanci” 錢牧齋先生挽詞; Peng Shiwang 彭士望, “Du Yushan Meicun shi hou” 讀虞山梅村詩後; Tang Xiuye 湯修業, “Shu mou gong shiji hou” 書某公詩集後; cited in Andrew Hsieh, “Tanlun Qingchu shiwen,” pp. 266–67. For information concerning Peng Shiwang and his collected works Chi gong tang wenchao 恥躬堂文鈔 and Chi gong tang shichao 恥躬 堂詩鈔, see Deng Zhicheng 鄧之誠, Qingshi jishi chubian 清詩紀事初編 (Hong Kong: Zhonghua shuju, 1976), 1: 209–10. 14. I thank Professor Wu Chengxue for calling my attention to Zha Shenxing’s poem. See Zha Shenxing 查慎行, “Jinling zayong” 金陵雜詠, quoted in Yuan Mei 袁枚, Suiyuan shihua 隨園詩話, juan 14, in Yuan Mei quanji 袁枚全集, ed. Wang Yingzhi 王英志 (Nanjing: Jiangsu guji chubanshe, 1993), 3: 478. For the Ming loyalists’ reaction to the issue of adopting Manchu dress and the new hairstyle, see Zhao Yuan, Ming Qing zhi ji shidaifu yanjiu, pp. 308–17. Despite occasional criticisms of Qian’s political position, however, Zha Shenxing was one of Qian’s great admirers; on this point, see Andrew Hsieh, “Tanlun Qingchu shiwen,” p. 270. 15. Qian Yong 錢泳, Lüyuan conghua 履園叢話, juan 24; cited in Liao Meiyu 廖美玉, “Qian Muzhai jiqi wenxue” 錢牧齋及其文學 (Ph.D. diss., National Taiwan University, 1983), pp. 126, 443. Among Liu Rushi’s admirers was Chen Wenshu 陳文述 (Yunbo 雲伯), then magistrate of Changshu, who was responsible for rebuilding Liu Rushi’s tomb.

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continued to attract admirers from all over China. Since all of Qian Qianyi’s descendants were dead, Qian Yong erected a marker in front of Qian Qianyi’s grave that read “The Tomb of the Dongjian Old Man”; for this act Qian Yong unfortunately met with ridicule. 16 Deeply saddened by the experience, Qian Yong lamented that Qian Qianyi had not died at the time when people most expected him to: “Master Qian, the old man of Yushan, was renowned for his talent the world over. Yet for the single death that he owed the world, he has acquired a wretched reputation for a thousand years.” 17 Years later, in 1902, the Japanese poet Kan’ai Shūhin 金井秋蘋 (1864–1905) visited Qian Qianyi’s tomb in Changshu and composed a revealing and moving poem in Chinese: The Wutai Poetry Trial and the Wucheng arrest, 18 How the immensely gifted are destined for misfortune! If one were to consider the permanence of literature— Master Dongjian is as great as Dongpo. 19

烏台詩案烏程獄 才大其如命蹇何 若說文章千古事 只應東澗似東坡

According to Kan’ai Shūhin’s preface to the poem, this jueju poem was inspired by the tombstone built by Qian Yong (Shanghu yuzhe 尚湖 漁者), for each of the characters (namely, “Dongjian laoren mu” 東澗 老人墓) written on the tombstone came from one or another of the ————— 16. See Liao Meiyu, “Qian Muzhai jiqi wenxue,” p. 443. For information on Qian Yong, see Yuan Mei, Suiyuan shihua, juan 14, in Yuan Mei quanji 袁枚全集, 3: 455–56. 17. Qian Yong, Lüyuan conghua, juan 24; as cited in Liao Meiyu, “Qian Muzhai jiqi wenxue,” p. 126. 18. The Wutai Poetry Trial refers to the 1079 trial in Huzhou during which Su Shi was convicted of writing poems criticizing government officials. Su Shi was put in prison for four months following the trial. The “Wucheng arrest” refers to a series of accusations made by Wen Tiren against Qian Qianyi, especially to Qian Qianyi’s imprisonment in 1637—when one of Wen Tiren’s conspirators brought charges against Qian Qianyi (it may have been called the “Wucheng arrest” because Wen Tiren was a native of Wucheng). 19. Kan’ai Shūhin 金井秋蘋, Shūhin ikō 秋蘋遺稿 (1905), 35b–36a. I am indebted to Sachiko Hasegawa, librarian at Ritsumeikan University Library in Kyoto, for providing a photocopy of Shūhin ikō for me. For a discussion of Kan’ai Shūhin’s poem on Qian Qianyi, see Kanda Kiichirō 神田喜一郎, Riben tianci shihua 日本填 詞史話, trans. Cheng Yuzhui 程郁綴 and Gao Yexue 高野雪 (Beijing: Beijing daxue chubanshe, 2000), p. 429.

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Song poet Su Shi’s 蘇軾 calligraphic works. 20 In comparing Qian Qianyi to the talented Su Shi, Kan’ai read Qian in a new way, quite different from the conventional Chinese approach of making moral judgment the center of a poetic interpretation. The emphasis is on the talented poet’s misfortune (才大其如命蹇何); it recognizes that chaotic times can bring undeserved fates to innocent people. 21 Like Su Shi, Qian Qianyi also faced political danger and was more than once sent to prison for political reasons. Although Qian Qianyi was perhaps no match for Su Shi in terms of poetic talent, he has nonetheless been dealt with more harshly by history. On the other hand, before Qianlong’s condemnation, Qian Qianyi’s reputation was extremely high and had been so for over a century. 22 For example, Qian was regarded as one of the Three Great Masters of the Lower Yangzi (江左三大家)—the other two being Wu Weiye and Gong Dingzi 龔鼎孳 (1615–73) 23 —and the entire community of Ming ————— 20. Apparently Kan’ai Shūhin did not know that “Shanghu yuzhe” was one of Qian Yong’s other names. “Shanghu Yuzhe” is misprinted as “Shangchao yuzhe” (尚潮漁者) in the Shūhin ikō, 35b. In addition, “Dongjian laoren zhi mu” should read “Dongjian laoren mu.” 21. According to Kanda Kiichirō, Kan’ai Shūhin’s deep sympathy for Qian Qianyi might have come from his own sense of helplessness as someone who was poetically gifted but failed to have a successful career (Kanda Kiichirō, Riben tianci shihua, p. 429). During his nine years of study in Germany (majoring in economics), Kan’ai Shūhin’s main interest was composing Chinese poems under the direction of the Chinese poet Pan Lanshi 潘蘭史, who was in Germany at the time. After his return to Japan in 1893, Kan’ai had much difficulty finding a good position. He then served as a lecturer in German at a senior high school. In the spring of 1902, he went to China to assume the position of main instructor at a local school in Changshu, which happened to be Qian Qianyi’s hometown. It was perhaps not a coincidence that Kan’ai Shūhin chose to live near the Yushan area, where Qian Qianyi’s old home was located. In any case, it was convenient for Kan’ai to visit Qian Qianyi’s tomb. Several of Kan’ai Shūhin’s poems were composed during his one-year residence in Changshu. 22. Of course, this does not mean that Qian Qianyi was not criticized. In an article on the “changing appraisals” of Qian Qianyi in the early Qing, Andrew Hsieh (“Tanlun Qingchu shiwen,” pp. 261–81) mentions that, despite the overwhelming devotion and support on the part of Qian’s former disciples and associates, there were also scholars who were rather critical of Qian’s surrender to the Qing. 23. The term “Jiangzuo san dajia” first came from the anthology entitled Jiangzuo san dajia shichao 江左三大家詩鈔 (1667), a collection published three years after Qian’s death. But there is no doubt that Qian was regarded as one of the greatest poets of the time long before the publication of the anthology. The

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loyalists looked up to him as a role model in the art of poetry writing. In particular, the younger poet Wang Shizhen 王 士 禛 (1634–1711) proudly considered himself one of Qian Qianyi’s disciples. 24 Another example was the poet Wu Zuxiu 吳祖修 (1737?–94), who in one of his poems compared Qian Qianyi to the Han poets Yang Xiong 揚雄 and Cai Yong 蔡邕, both of whom refused to take their life when others expected them to; they chose to live on for the sake of completing great works in literature and history. 25 According to Zou Shijin’s 鄒式金 1664 preface to Qian Qianyi’s Youxue ji 有學集 (also printed in 1664), early Qing readers expressed unreserved admiration for Qian’s writings and even secretly appreciated his loyalist poems—although for fear of political censorship, Zou Shijin had to make references to the Manchu Shunzhi emperor (r. 1644–61) in order to explain away the political significance of Qian’s loyalist sentiment. 26 Then, in 1699 Lu Can 陸燦 (1611?–98), one of Qian Qianyi’s descendants, decided to publish Qian’s Liechao shiji xiaozhuan 列朝詩集小傳 (a collection of more than 2,000 biographical entries taken from Qian Qianyi’s anthology Liechao shiji) ————— common view was that compared to Qian Qianyi and Wu Weiye, Gong Dingzi was a much inferior poet. See, e.g., Shen Deqian 沈德潛, Qing shi bie cai ji 清詩別 裁集 (reprinted—Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1975), juan 1, 1: 20. See also Yan Dichang, Qingshi shi, 1: 346, 362. It appears that such evaluations were based largely on aesthetic criteria rather than on political considerations. 24. See also my article in Chinese, “Cheng wei dianfan: Yuyang shizuo ji shilun tanwei” 成為典範: 漁洋詩作及詩論探微, Wenxue pinglun 文學評論 2001, no. 1: 79–90. In his later years, Wang Shizhen seems to have developed a different taste in poetry and hence became quite critical of Qian Qianyi. For example, several decades after Qian’s death, Wang Shizhen blamed Qian Qianyi for his idea of “partisan schools” (menhu 門戶) and even questioned the literary value of Qian’s Liechao shiji. For a discussion of this, see Jiang Yin 蔣寅, Wang Shizhen yu Kangxi shitan 王士禛 與康熙詩壇 (Beijing: Zhongguo shehui kexueyuan chubanshe, 2001), pp. 15–25. 25. Wu Zuxiu 吳祖修, “Shu Muzhai shi hou” 書牧齋詩後, in his “Liutang shiji” 柳塘詩集, Qian Zhonglian 錢仲聯, Qingshi jishi 清詩紀事 (Nanjing: Jiangsu Guji chubanshe, 1989), 2: 934–35. See also Andrew Hsieh, “Tanlun Qingchu shiwen,” p. 269. 26. I am indebted to Tao Yang of the Sterling Library at Yale University for calling my attention to the fact that it was Zou Shijin, rather than Zou Zi, who authored this preface. Some editions of Qian Qianyi’s Youxue ji give the wrong information. See also Qian Qianyi, Qian Muzhai quanji 錢牧齋全集, commentary by Qian Zeng 錢曾, ed. and punctuated by Qian Zhonglian 錢仲聯 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 2003), p. 5, for more information.

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in response to the enthusiastic demands of readers of the time. 27 Finally, and most important, the fact that the Qing court poet Shen Deqian 沈德潛 (1673–1769) placed Qian Qianyi’s poems at the beginning of his 1760 anthology, Guochao shi biecai ji 國朝詩別裁集, is evidence of Qian’s high literary position during the eighteenth century. As Shen Deqian commented: “All the people of Qian’s day subscribed to his views with much praise and admiration. It has been a hundred years [since his death] now, but the lingering influence of Qian is till strong enough to overwhelm our generation.” 28 Unfortunately, Shen Deqian’s high opinion of Qian Qianyi had the unexpected consequence of infuriating Emperor Qianlong, who then decided to destroy all of Qian Qianyi’s works. (Shen Deqian, who had always been Qianlong’s favorite poetry master and was then ninety-six years old, was subjected to a humiliating house search soon after the incident and died shortly afterward.) 29 The point is that up to and even during Qianlong’s time, most readers thought highly of Qian Qianyi’s writings. Qian’s poetic voice was intensely personal, and for the Han Chinese—especially those who had experienced the war and its traumas—Qian’s writings helped readers remember the painful era of the Ming fall. Those who lived through and survived the dynastic transition found themselves with an almost inexpressible experience. Thus, Qian Qianyi’s vivid descriptions of the lives of the Ming loyalists and of their diverse responses to the devastating impact of the dynastic transition became especially poignant. Most important, Qian reminded his readers of the difficult choices an intellectual had to make in the face of the national crisis. However, Qian often opted to demonstrate this idea in writing through the use of historical allusions—or more precisely, allusions used as topical allegories, in which the true meaning can be understood ————— 27. See Lu Can’s preface (dated 1699) to the Liechao shiji xiaozhuan; in Qian Qianyi 錢 謙 益 , Liechao shiji xiaozhuan 列 朝 詩 集 小 傳 (reprinted—Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1983 [1959]), p. 4. 28. Translation from Yim, “The Poetics of Historical Memory,” p. 251. 29. As J. D. Schmidt (Harmony Garden, p. 371) has pointed out, Shen Deqian was later “posthumously stripped of all titles and honors given to him by the Qianlong emperor” for having written a biography of Xu Shukui 徐述夔 in what became one of the most serious cases of literary inquisition during Qianlong’s time. But I suspect that Qian Qianyi’s case also contributed to Shen Deqian’s posthumous punishment, since both cases happened at about the same time.

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only by reading between the lines. A case in point is the Liechao shiji anthology, in which he carefully created a section called “Jia qian ji” 甲 前集 (Section prior to section 1) for those early Ming poets who lived under the Yuan—that is, those who, like many Ming loyalists, had managed to survive a dynastic transition and had also (for various reasons) served the new dynasty. Although they chose not to die for their dynasty, those Yuan loyalists produced literary works that glorified both the cultural achievements of the Yuan and their reclusive existence as yimin 遺民 (literally “left-over people”) writers and historians. Among the Yuan loyalists who resisted serving under the Ming were such recluses as Wang Feng 王逢, Li Qi 李祁, Zhu Xihui 朱希晦, Xu Fang 徐舫, Guo Wan 郭完, and Shu Daoyuan 舒道原, whom Qian praised for their uncompromising virtue. 30 In their difficult position as yimin, these people had demonstrated integrity that demanded immediate respect. Thus the “Jia qian ji” begins with Qian Qianyi’s remarkable portrayal of the poet Liu Ji 劉基 and his works. There are several similarities between Liu Ji’s experience and Qian’s own. First, Liu Ji divided his collected works by two distinct periods: those written before the fall of the Yuan, published under the title Fu pou ji 覆瓿集 (Collection of writings for covering a pou container); 31 and those completed after the dynastic fall, entitled Limei gong ji 犁眉公集 (Collected works of Master Limei). Qian Qianyi also divided his works in a similar manner: those written before the fall of the Ming appear in the Chuxue ji 初學集; the later works in the Youxue ji. Naturally, Qian Qianyi’s loyalist poems are found in the Youxue ji. This unique approach of “before versus after” shows a conscious desire on the part of the loyalist writer to record the poignant, soul-searching experiences of dynastic change. It also expresses the feeling of someone who, after witnessing a bloody war that killed millions and nearly destroyed the cultural foundations of China, wanted to live a “second life” so that he could continue to observe this world. The words of Czeslaw Milosz, the Nobel laureate in 1980, are pertinent here: ————— 30. Liechao shiji xiaozhuan, pp. 14, 17, 66, 67, 68, 69. 31. Traditional Chinese poets often used the term fu pou ( literally “covering a pou container”) to refer humbly to their own works—suggesting that their writings were so “inferior” and useless that they could only be used for covering a pot.

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kang-i sun chang Not enough. One life is not enough. I’d like to live twice on this sad planet, In lonely cities, in starved villages. 32

In a similar way, Qian’s focus on his own sufferings made him more sensitive to greater tragedies; he did not wish to shut his eyes to the rest of the world, and so he continued to produce poems after the fall of the Ming. Qian Qianyi portrays Liu Ji as a frustrated scholar-official who suffered even before the dynastic fall. Liu Ji experienced several political setbacks; he “repeatedly served in the [Yuan] government and yet almost always ended up resigning from the office” (累仕皆投劾去). 33 Qian Qianyi’s description of Liu Ji’s experience of hardship under the Yuan is especially vivid and heartfelt: During the Fang Guzhen rebellion, Liu Ji was told, in his position as assistant secretary at the Branch Secretariat, to search for and arrest the rebel Fang. But the provincial authorities, having been bribed by Fang, dismissed Liu Ji from office instead and had him detained in confinement in Shaoxing. Liu Ji was in despair, became angry, and wanted to take his own life. But a disciple named Milisha grabbed him by his arms and so he was unable to kill himself. . . . Liu Ji was endowed with great talent, but he unfortunately lived during the final years of the Yuan. He was forced to assume minor offices and frequently had disputes with his superiors when offering advice. He lamented the times, raged against the world, and almost wanted to retreat to the wilds and shut his door forever. . . . But later when serving as an assistant, he was able to live through difficult and dangerous times with Shimo [Yisun]; 34 thus he finally found an understanding superior under whom he could serve. 35

Qian Qianyi’s experiences as an official before the fall of the Ming recall those of Liu Ji. Qian Qianyi had suffered so many political setbacks that, from 1610 (when he first passed the jinshi degree and was appointed a Hanlin compiler) until 1645 (in his position as president of ————— 32. Czeslaw Milosz, New and Collected Poems (1931–2001) (New York: Ecco, 2001), p. 16. See also Charles Simic, “A World Gone Up in Smoke,” New York Review of Books, Dec. 20, 2001, p. 14. 33. Liechao shiji xiaozhuan, 13. 34. For information about Shimo Yisun 石抹宜孫 (d. 1360), see L. Carrington Goodrich and Chaoying Fang, Dictionary of Ming Biography (New York: Columbia University Press, 1976), 1: 91, 932. Shimo Yisun was then assistant prefect of Chuzhou 處州. 35. Liechao shiji xiaozhuan, p. 13.

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the Board of Ceremonies under the Prince of Fu), he served a total of less than four years in the Ming government. Ironically, the length of time Qian was detained or imprisoned (over three years) almost equaled his tenure in office. 36 Indeed, the political persecutions against him seemed a never-ending series of misfortunes. For example, in the early 1620s, he was dismissed from office because of his involvement in the Donglin faction’s activities, during the so-called yan huo 閹禍 (eunuch calamity). A few years later, in 1628, Qian was slandered by a political enemy, Wen Tiren 溫體仁 (?–1638), who accused Qian of being connected to a bribery case, known as ge song 閣訟. Qian was subsequently dismissed from office, and he retired to his home in Changshu the following year. Then in 1637, Zhang Hanru 張漢儒 (?–1630), a native of Changshu colluding with Wen Tiren’s faction, brought a charge against Qian Qianyi that resulted in Qian’s imprisonment for several months. Eventually, however, the accusation was proven false, and Wen was forced to resign from his post and Zhang was put to death. 37 By this time Qian was already accustomed to being a recluse, and he looked to the earlier farmer-poet Tao Qian 陶潛 as a model, as may be seen in his poems written in response to Monk Xiu’an’s 朽庵 “Joy in Returning to the Farmland, Ten Poems” (樂歸田 園十詠). 38 In Poem no. 8, Qian Qianyi compared himself to Tao Qian (who chose to remain poor as a recluse) and to the later followers of Tao Qian—including the Song poet Su Shi and Xiu’an himself: A nonconformist, my nature resembles that of [Tao’s]— A former Hanlin Academician, now a farmer plowing. I match rhymes to [Yuanming’s] poems, as Dongpo did in exile, Deeply moved, I secretly compare myself to Monk Xiu’an.

我生捽尢略相似 玉堂今作扶犁手 和詩敢效儋耳翁 感懷竊比朽庵叟

————— 36. See Yang Jinlong 楊晉龍, “Qian Qianyi de shi xue he xingge shulun” 錢謙 益的史學和性格述論, in Zhou Hulin xiansheng liuzhi rongqing lunwen ji 周虎林先 生 六 秩 榮 慶 論 文 集 , ed. Zhang Gaoping 張 高 評 and Zheng Buwu 鄭 卜 五 (Kaohsiung: Fuwen tushu chubanshe, 1999), p. 100. 37. See also Arthur W. Hummel, Eminent Chinese of the Ch’ing Period (1644–1912) (Washington, D.C.: Government Printing Office, 1943), pp. 149, 220. 38. I thank Kang Zhengguo 康正果 for discussing this poem series with me and for checking the allusions used in Qian Qianyi’s poems.

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kang-i sun chang On my return, I built a sacred hall to worship Jinjie, 39 With Bai [ Juyi’s tablet] on the left, and Su [Shi’s] on the right. I proffered the mountain pine and chrysanthemum from my old town, And entertained the spirits with clear lute music and unstrained wine. (lines 11–18) 40

歸來築室祀靖節 左白右蘇配以偶 故山松菊當蘋藻 薦彼清琴侑濁酒

In writing this series, Qian Qianyi was perhaps hoping that future historians would remember him as a poet-recluse who, like Tao Qian, unfortunately lived in the wrong time: Tao Qian—a man who kept away from the earthly crowd, Poor and obscure—this was not his true nature. Alas! Time was not with him, As an overflow of evil tides pervade the country. ..................................... I match Xiu’an’s poems, It is both an act of play and a literary exercise. In the distant future, in thousands of years to come, There will be lofty ones who will understand. 41 (Poem no. 10) 42

陶潛避俗翁 枯槁非本色 惜哉時不偶 橫流汜邦域 我和朽庵詩 遊戲并筆墨 悠悠千載後 會有高人識

In 1641, Qian Qianyi married the talented courtesan Liu Rushi, and in 1643 he built for her the famous Jiangyun lou 絳雲樓 Library, where they kept their great collection of books. It seems that by this time both Qian Qianyi and Liu Rushi had resigned themselves to a life of reclusion. But suddenly their life was interrupted again by external forces—for soon after the fall of Beijing, Qian Qianyi was invited to serve as a high official in the court of the Prince of Fu in Nanjing. ————— 39. Tao Qian was also known as Master Jingjie. 40. Qian Qianyi, Chuxue ji 初學集, juan 7, in Muzhai chuxue ji 牧齋初學集, commentary by Qian Zeng, ed. and punctuated Qian Zhonglian (Shanghai: Shanghai Guji chubanshe, 1985), p. 224. 41. I am grateful to Pauline Lin for improving my translations of these lines and also for sharing her insights into the world of Tao Qian; see her “A Separate Space, a New Self: Representations of Rural Spaces in Six Dynasties Literature and Art” (Ph.D. diss., Harvard University, 1999). 42. Muzhai chuxue ji, p. 226.

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What Qian Qianyi regretted most was that he had not died for the Ming. Even as late as 1659. Qian said in one of his poems in the Toubi ji 投筆集: “Sadly I regret that this lone official did not die an earlier death” (苦恨孤臣一死遲). 43 In another poem, which he wrote about a year before his death, Qian lamented: I sing my sad tunes into the long night, all alone, Filled with grief and indignation, which I brought to myself. To contend with the star of calamity, one can count only on Uncle Wine; To destroy the fort of sorrow, one turns to the Poetry Spirit. Whoever runs into me will ask, “Sir, are you through yet?” Looking at my own shadow, I would shout, “But what can you do?” How I wish I could laugh heartily with the old fisherman, Consulting him on where to find a bountiful place in the water and sky. 44

漫漫長夜獨悲歌 孤憤填胸肯自磨 敵對災星憑酒伯 破除愁壘仗詩魔 逢人每道君休矣 顧影還呼汝謂何 欲共老漁開口笑 商量何處水天多

It was this sense of “grief and indignation” that Qian Qianyi found it difficult to communicate with his friends, especially other Ming loyalists. In Liechao shiji, Qian Qianyi wrote that he felt ashamed on reading his friend Fan Jingwen’s 范景文 (Mengzhang 孟章; 1587–1644) final words, in which Fan asked Qian to write an epitaph for him. 45 Qian Qianyi eventually composed the epitaph, but Fan’s heroic martyrdom put Qian to shame. While reviewing the details of Fan Jingwen’s life, Qian could appreciate how solitary and yet how heroic Fan’s act was. But Qian also realized that his less-than-heroic behavior at the dynastic fall nonetheless preserved his integrity by glorifying the Ming in a different way. In the preface to the Liechao shiji, Qian Qianyi described the reason for his continued existence: “I regret that I did not die earlier, that I did not follow Mengyang to the netherworld. Now, as I ————— 43. See no. 12 of the “Hou Qiuxing” 後秋興, in Qian Qianyi Toubi ji jiaoben 錢謙益投筆集校本, ed. Pan Chonggui 潘重規 (Taipei: Wenshizhe chubanshe, 1973), p. 52. 44. See Qian Qianyi Toubi ji jiaoben, pp. 60–61; trans. (modified) from Yim, “The Poetics of Historical Memory,” p. 78. 45. Liechao shiji xiaozhuan, p. 558.

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survive—this drifting soul with the last of lingering energy—it is to fulfill the legacy of [Yuan Haowen’s] Unofficial History Pavilion. If even crying and weeping are of no use, of what avail is sighing ?” 46 Clearly he envied his friend Mengyang 孟陽 (Cheng Jiasui 程嘉燧, 1565–1643), who had the great fortune to die before the fall of the dynasty. Mengyang had been his collaborator on the Liechao shiji project, and the two men’s goal was to include as many Ming poets as possible. But now that the Ming dynasty had fallen and Mengyang had passed away, Qian Qianyi could only follow in the footsteps of the loyalist Jin poet Yuan Haowen 元好問 (1190–1257) by devoting himself to the continuation of the compilation. 47 Just as Yuan Haowen had compiled a collection of Jin poetry called Zhongzhou ji 中州集 after the fall of his country, so Qian Qianyi wished to complete the Liechao shiji as a way of redemption. Moreover, since Yuan Haowen had done research in his Unofficial History Pavilion 野史亭, Qian Qianyi also wanted to work on his anthology of Ming poetry in his elegant library, the Jiangyun lou. He completed the Liechao shiji in 1652, but the library was partially destroyed by fire in 1650. The fire apparently destroyed Qian Qianyi’s monumental Ming shi (Ming history) manuscript, which he had been writing since the fall of the Ming. Thus, in a sense, the Liechao shiji anthology became a replacement for his Ming shi project. As far as Qian was concerned, writing a dynastic history that would do justice to the Ming was a loyalist’s first and foremost responsibility. As mentioned above, Qian Qianyi deliberately placed the Yuan loyalist Liu Ji’s poems at the beginning of the Liechao shiji. Regarding Liu Ji’s works composed after the fall of the Yuan, Qian Qianyi has this to say: Through his poetry, he lamented his poverty in his old age. He sighed with deep sorrow and melancholy. The heroic spirit of his younger days was all gone. . . . Alas, how sad! Mencius once instructed that in reading the Shi jing and the Shu jing, one must understand the social contexts and the people involved. And thus for this reason I will put [Liu Ji’s earlier works] Fu pou ji in the section prior to Section 1 proper, while [his later works] Limei ji will head

————— 46. Ibid., p. 819. 47. Wang Shizhen, in his old age, began to think that Qian Qianyi had overrated the literary and historical value of Yuan Haowen’s Zhongzhou ji; see Jiang Yin, Wang Yuyang yu Kangxi shitan, p. 19.

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the poetry of our Ming dynasty. There will certainly be someone a hundred generations later who will understand the mind of Liu Ji. 48

This is clearly Qian Qianyi’s own autobiographical voice, too. He is obviously hoping that, despite the dark forces surrounding his era, someone in the future will “understand” his mind. As it turns out, fewer people in history have been more misunderstood than Qian Qianyi. Of course, most of Qian Qianyi’s loyalist friends involved in Qian’s underground resistance activities against the Qing (such as Huang Zongxi 黃宗羲 [1610–95], Qu Dajun 屈大均 [1630–96], and Lü Liuliang 呂留良 [1629–83]) could well understand the depth of Qian’s loyalism. 49 They respected Qian greatly, for they knew that Qian had risked his life by involving himself in Huang Yuqi’s 黃毓祺 resistance movement in 1648 (which led to Qian’s arrest by Qing officials during the same year) and had participated in Zheng Chenggong’s 鄭成功 (1624–1662) plot to attack Qing troops in 1654 and 1659. Thus, many Han Chinese in the early Qing period could sympathize with Qian’s predicament, despite occasional criticism from people who continued to blame Qian for his “betrayal” of the Ming. Yet it was Qianlong who was ultimately responsible for destroying Qian Qianyi’s reputation. The greatest damage came from Qianlong’s claim in his 1769 edict that Qian’s loyalist writings did not arise from sincere feelings but were merely a means “to cover up the shameful disgrace of his surrender [to the Qing]” (以掩其失節之羞). 50 This seems an unfair judgment, but many Chinese critics, when commenting on Qian Qianyi’s literary works, adopted Qianlong’s opinion without questioning its validity. For example, the famous literary critic and historian Zhao Yi 趙翼 (1727–1814) said that Qian Qianyi “used his loyalist sentiment about the fall of the Ming to mask his true feelings of shame at serving the two dynasties.” 51 According to the late Qing ————— 48. Liechao shiji xiaozhuan, pp. 13–14. I am grateful to Huang Hongyu for sharing her thoughts concerning Liu Ji. 49. For Qian’s loyalist activities, see Chen Yinke 陳寅恪, Liu Rushi biezhuan 柳 如是別傳 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1980), chap. 5; Pei Shijun 裴世俊, Qian Qianyi shige yanjiu 錢謙益詩歌研究 (Ningxia: Ningxia renmin chubanshe, 1991), pp. 24–29; and Yim, “The Poetics of Historical Memory.” 50. Qingshi liezhuan, 79: 6577. 51. From Zhao Yi 趙翼, Oubei shihua 甌北詩話, juan 9; see Qing shihua xubian 清 詩 話 續 編 , ed. Guo Shaoyu 郭 紹 虞 , punctuated by Fu Shousun 富 壽 蓀 (Shanghai: Shanghai Guji chubanshe, 1983), p. 1282.

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scholar Zhang Binglin 章炳麟 (Taiyan 太炎, 1869–1936), this biased view of Qian Qianyi had prevailed for a long time. Zhang sighed when writing in defense of Qian: “Many people assumed that in whatever Qianyi wrote he was merely using his words to conceal his misdeeds and was not revealing his true feelings.” 52 These “people” perhaps included Liang Qichao 梁啟超 (1873–1929), who once described Qian as “a person not worthy of mention” (其人不足道). 53 But the wheel of history eventually began to turn, and Qian Qianyi was finally rehabilitated at the end of the Qing dynasty when Han Chinese began to express anti-Manchu sentiments again. Zhang Binglin was one of the first revolutionary scholars at the time to call the readers’ attention to Qian Qianyi’s important Toubi ji manuscript. The Toubi ji contains many of Qian’s politically sensitive poems, including the 108 “Hou qiuxing” 後秋興 (“Later Autumn Meditations”) poems written after Zheng Chenggong’s 1659 battle against the Qing, using Du Fu’s 杜甫 (712–70) “Qiuxing” as a model. The Toubi ji collection was first published in 1910, for no publisher during the Qing (even before the Qianlong emperor condemned Qian Qianyi) would have dared to print such a work for fear of challenging the state. Even Qian Zeng 錢 曾 (1629–1701), a nephew of Qian Qianyi, did not at first have the courage to copy the Toubi ji poems (in his words, “shen bugan chao” 慎 不 敢 抄 ) and omitted them from his first edited edition of Qian Qianyi’s Youxue ji. 54 But, at the end of the Qing dynasty, Zhang Binglin could speak openly about Qian Qianyi’s Toubi ji: Qian was inspired to compose a series of poems imitating Du Fu’s “Autumn Meditation”; these were songs of triumph in which he sang of a new Son of Heaven who will come and lead the Ming back to its former glory. . . . However, Zheng Chenggong was defeated, and two years later Wu Sangui killed the last [Ming] emperor in Yunnan. Thus, to express his deep sorrow, Qianyi again wrote songs to match the “Autumn Meditation” poems. The

————— 52. Entry no. 61, in Zhang Binglin 章炳麟, Qiushu chongding ben 訄書重訂本, in Zhang Taiyan quanji 章太炎全集 (Shanghai: Shanghai renmin chubanshe, 1984), 3: 339. 53. Liang Qichao 梁啟超, Zhongguo jin sanbai nian xueshu shi 中國近三百年學 術史 (Taipei: Huazheng, 1984), p. 300. See also Yang Jinlong 楊晉龍, “Qian Qianyi shixue yanjiu” 錢謙益史學研究 (M.A. thesis, Kaohsiung Normal College, 1989), p. 5. 54. Pan Chonggui 潘重規, “Du Qian Qianyi Toubi ji” 讀錢謙益投筆集, in Qian Qianyi Toubi ji jiaoben, p. 66.

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poems, new and old, totaled about a hundred, and they are collected in a volume called Toubi ji. 55

For nearly a century now, Chinese scholars have been involved in rereadings of the Qian Qianyi story. If we can learn something from the experience, it would be that history changes because of how people weave their stories, even if they are woven from the same facts. 56 Much depends on the temperament of the critic, and how each interprets the story by his or her own cultural situation. Thus in 1940 Xu Xudian 徐 緒典 confirmed Qian Qianyi’s historical role as a Ming loyalist and condemned Qianlong’s “evil” deeds. 57 Several years later, the eminent historian Chen Yinke 陳寅恪 (1890–1969) devoted many years of his life to writing a monumental biography of Liu Rushi, in which nearly 400 pages were devoted to Qian Qianyi’s and Liu Rushi’s political activities (which involved numerous other loyalists) following the fall of the Ming. 58 Although Chen Yinke was somewhat critical of Qian Qianyi’s weak personality, the larger political and cultural contexts Chen Yinke examined in his book formed a convincing historical narrative that would ultimately transcend previous moralistic readings of Qian Qianyi’s works. Still, Chen Yinke claimed that future historians “should forgive [Qian’s] earlier breach of virtue and should instead honor him for his desire for redemption in his later years” (應恕 其 前 此 失 節 之 愆 ， 而 嘉 其 後 來 贖 罪 之 意 ). 59 More recently, the Ming-Qing expert Qian Zhonglian 錢仲聯 came to Qian Qianyi’s defense and argued that some “recent” scholars were being unfair when they “accused Qian Qianyi of writing poems that lack true emotions” (誣錢為文造情). 60 ————— 55. Zhang Binglin, Qiushu chongding ben, in Zhang Taiyan quanji, 3: 339; trans. (modified) from Yim, “The Poetics of Historical Memory,” pp. 285–86. 56. See also Lee Chi-hsiang 李紀祥, Shijian, lishi, xushi 時間．歷史．敘事 (Taipei: Maitian chuban, 2001). 57. Xu Xudian 徐緒典, “Qian Qianyi zhushu bei jin kao” 錢謙益著述被禁考, Shixue nianbao 史學年報, Dec. 1940, pp. 101–9. For later works on this topic, see Zhuang Jifa 莊吉發, “Qing Gaozong jinhui Qian Qianyi zhushu kao” 清高宗禁燬 錢謙益著述考, Dalu zazhi 大陸雜誌 47, no. 5 (Nov. 1973): 22–30. 58. Chen Yinke, Liu Rushi biezhuan, pp. 827–1224. 59. Ibid., p. 985. 60. Qian Zhonglian, Qingshi jishi 1: 1275. See also Yan Dichang, Qing shi shi, 1: 408n5.

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Similarly, contemporary scholars in Taiwan have brought about a significant rereading of Qian Qianyi through their research. In the 1960s, Liu Zuomei’s 柳作梅 short “New Biography” of Qian Qianyi prompted scholars to rediscover the life of Qian Qianyi. Elsewhere, Liu Zuomei studied how the Siku tiyao 四庫提要 encyclopedia misrepresented Qian Qianyi and how the editors of the Siku tiyao (apparently on Qianlong’s orders) slandered Qian Qianyi throughout the text. 61 Then, in 1973, Zhuang Jifa 莊吉發 published an article in Dalu zazhi 大陸雜誌 on the literary inquisition of Qianlong and its impact on the study of Qian Qianyi. 62 Most important, beginning in the 1980s, there have been a series of M.A. theses and Ph.D. dissertations on Qian Qianyi from Taiwanese academic institutes. 63 Among the recent rereadings of Qian Qianyi in Taiwan, Yang Jinlong’s 楊晉龍 strikes me as particularly innovative. 64 In his study of the reception of Qian Qianyi, Yang Jinlong points to an underlying problem in the Chinese evaluation of people in general. In evaluating an individual, says Yang, the Chinese historian tends to adopt a kind of “group prejudice” (a term borrowed from W. H. Walsh), so that people easily became stereotyped. 65 In the case of Qian Qianyi, since he had already become a common object of attack, the great majority of people began to “see through Qianlong’s eyes and to speak with Qianlong’s mouth” (以乾隆 ————— 61. Liu Zuomei 柳作梅, “Zhu Heling yu Qian Qianyi zhi jiaoyi ji qi zhu Du zhi zheng” 朱鶴齡與錢謙益之交誼及其注杜之爭, Donghai xuebao 東海學報 10, no. 1 ( Jan. 1969): 47–58. In a 1990 article on Qian Qianyi, Andrew Hsieh (“Tanlun Qingchu shiwen,” pp. 272–77) called attention to the Siku officials’ persistent editorial strategy of defaming Qian Qianyi. According to Hsieh’s research, the Siku editors took the liberty of deleting (and changing) the name of Qian Qianyi from the contents of Zhu Heling’s poems—contents that were in the original edition of Zhu’s collected works, the Yuan xiaoji 愚庵小集. These efforts were designed to contrive a story concerning hostile relations between Zhu and Qian. 62. Zhuang Jifa, “Qing Gaozong jinhui Qian Qianyi,” pp. 22–30. 63. Aside from the Ph.D. dissertation by Liao Meiyu 廖美玉 (entitled “Qian Muzhai jiqi wenxue”) and the M.A. thesis by Yang Jinlong 楊晉龍 (“Qian Qianyi shixue yanjiu”) mentioned above, there are theses by, among others, Jian Xiujuan 簡秀娟, Fan Yiru 范宜如, and Lian Ruizhi 連瑞枝. For detailed bibliographical citations for these works, see Yang Jinlong, “Qian Qianyi de shixue he xingge shulun,” p. 94n9. 64. Yang Jinlong, “Qian Qianyi shixue yanjiu.” See also idem, “Qian Qianyi de shixue he xingge shulun,” pp. 91–145. 65. Yang Jinlong, “Qian Qianyi shixue yanjiu,” pp. 7, 29.

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之眼為眼，以乾隆之口為口). 66 Yang Jinlong’s deconstruction of the historical image of Qian Qianyi is illuminating. First, Yang cites fifteen reasons, supported by historical sources, to argue that Qian Qianyi was in fact a courageous person who dared to make independent decisions under drastic circumstances—this contrasts sharply with the conventional view that Qian was a coward, a view shared even by the eminent historian Chen Yinke. 67 In Yang’s reading, even Qian Qianyi’s surrender to the Qing in 1645 is a brave act: his courage in making an unpopular decision at a critical moment eventually saved millions of lives in the Nanjing area. Moreover, as a young official at the Ming court Qian Qianyi was already daring enough to support Zhang Juzheng 張居正 at the risk of offending the emperor. Further, although familiar with the danger of literary inquisition in the Qing—for he obviously knew about the imprisonment of his friends Huang Yuqi 黃 毓祺 (?–1648) and Feng Shu 馮舒 (1593–1649)—Qian still had the courage to express his loyalty to the Ming in his poems. Most important, Yang Jinlong disagrees with Chen Yinke’s idea that Qian Qianyi was merely a passive participant in the underground loyalist movement after 1646. Chen argued that Liu Rushi was the active player in the loyalist movement and Qian was not, but Yang Jinlong believes that Qian Qianyi must also have possessed considerable audacity. In the United States, Andrew Hsieh (Xie Zhengguang 謝正光) has researched the “changing appraisals” of Qian Qianyi after Qian’s death as reflected in early Qing poetry, and Chi-hung’s Yim’s Ph.D. dissertation (1998) was the first critical study in English of Qian Qianyi’s Toubi ji. 68 This trend toward rereading Qian Qianyi is most illuminating, as it seems to be part of contemporary culture’s urge to re-evaluate earlier perceptions. Indeed, in rereading Qian Qianyi, one encounters what the Song poet Su Shi described as the “Lu Mountain” syndrome, in which one tends to see the mountain from different angles: From the side, a whole range; from the end, a single peak; Far, near, high, low, no two peaks alike.

橫看成嶺側成峰 遠近高低總不同

————— 66. Ibid., p. 6. 67. Yang Jinlong, “Qian Qianyi de shixue he xingge shulun,” pp. 106–45. 68. Andrew Hsieh, “Tanlun Qingchu shiwen,” pp. 261–81; Yim, “The Poetics of Historical Memory.”

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kang-i sun chang Why can’t I tell the true shape of Lushan? Because I myself am in the mountain. 69

不識廬山真面目 只緣身在此山中

The renowned modern scholar Qian Zhongshu 錢鍾書 was most perceptive when he argued that all views about Qian Qianyi to date— either pro or con—were largely one-sided, as are all judgments of historical figures. In other words, it all depends on whether we like the person or not. 70 But in Qian Qianyi’s own view, “The gods have eyes, and so does Heaven” (神有目，天有眼), 71 and he believed that one day the truth would emerge. In any case, a good reader should be inspired to look at all things in their totality and should try to discover things that have been overlooked and never look at history as mere partial facts. In Qian Qianyi’s own words, the world should be envisioned as a chessboard (棋局). If we envision the whole Spiritual Continent [i.e., China] as a chessboard, history will be its squares. . . . A good player always takes the whole game into consideration. A good reader will also read the entire book. This was the way the ancients read history; this was also their method for learning. 72

Perhaps we should extend the analogy: those caught up in the historical game can be excused if they make errors under the pressure of events; but those who come later and have the advantage of hindsight can hardly offer the same defense. It is in this spirit that I have tried to contribute to the study of a great writer caught in the turmoil of his times.

————— 69. The poem’s title is “Ti Xilin bi” 題西林壁. The translation is from C. Matthew Towns, “Literary Immortality and the Art of Play in the Writings of Su Shi” (Senior essay, Yale University, 2000), p. 20. 70. Qian Zhongshu, Guanzhui bian 管錐編 (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1979), 4: 1519–20. 71. Muzhai Youxue ji 牧齋有學集, Sibu congkan ed., p. 258b. 72. See also Yim, “The Poetics of Historical Memory,” p. 264.

part ii

Prose 7

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Introduction 7 Ellen Widmer The five chapters on fiction, memoirs, and other kinds of prose that follow offer as many approaches to our understanding of the transition between 1644 and 1700. Focusing on the lives of Mao Xiang 冒襄 (1611– 93) and Yu Huai 余懷 (1616–96), Ōki Yasushi develops portraits of these two “romantic Jiangnan loyalists,” who clung to patterns of late Ming feeling and aestheticism long after the Ming had fallen. The image of loyalism as romantic is in striking contrast to starker images of loyalist experience. Both Mao and Yu are best known for their memoirs, which focus prominently on women, one of the new ways of figuring nostalgia and resistance in male writings of the early Qing. Robert Hegel’s “Dreaming the Past” is similarly concerned with the individual, focusing on Chu Renhuo 褚人穫 (ca. 1630–1705+), as well as his novel, Sui Tang yanyi 隋唐演義 (ca. 1675), but it extends well beyond Chu and his work in contemplating how “the past” (the Tang past in particular) shaped imaginative literature in an era when the present offered little solace. In the process, Hegel offers insights into how the first and second post-conquest generations diverge. Ellen Widmer’s study, too, is organized biographically, but it offers yet another perspective on Ming loyalist experience. Huang Zhouxing’s 黃周星 (1611–80) disconsolateness in that role was anything but “romantic.” Like Chu, he withdrew from reality, not so much into history as into questions of what selfhood was. The long delay between the end of the Ming and his loyalist suicide led him to distinguish between a truer, less visible, and more principled self and one that accommodated itself to post-conquest reality. His reflections on self were closely related to his reflections on fictionality: in what sense might it be said that a famous literary character really lived?

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All three of these chapters take up writers who worked in a variety of genres. Focused mainly on prose works, their secondary attention to poetry and to drama is a reminder that too stark a division between literary categories fails to capture the full complexity of the conditions under which most early Qing literati lived their lives. Moreover, all three depict the span between 1644 and 1700 not so much via dramatic contrasts but in terms of a slow and often painful process of accommodation. The high quotient of daydreams and abstractions produced in the process of adjustment became the stuff of which memoirs and fiction were made. The other two chapters in this section—those by Tina Lu and Allan Barr—take fiction itself, rather than individual writers, as their points of departure. Lu’s piece is about a type of plot, involving family reunions. By looking at short stories from the Ming through the end of the seventeenth century, she identifies a process of accommodation as the century wears on. Whether a story is vernacular or classical, it is demonstrably more interested in the social network, as opposed to the individual family, by the time the series concludes. Lu hypothesizes that this evolution points to a process of social repair, whether imposed from above or occurring naturally, that gradually smoothed over the chaos and disruption of the early Qing. Somewhat analogously, Barr measures the distance between immediate post-conquest and later fictions via a pair of writers, both of whose classical language stories appear in Zhang Chao’s 張潮 (1650–1707+) Yu Chu xinzhi 虞初新志 (preface 1683, postface 1700), a collection encompassing Ming loyalist as well as later writers. His comparison of works by Xu Fang 徐芳 (1619–71) and Niu Xiu 鈕琇 (1641?–1704) uses criteria such as whether judgments by a Han official loyal to the Manchu regime are deemed good or bad to draw a distinction between earlier and later phases of the period. Yet even as he develops this contrast, he identifies the consistently high quality of fiction in classical Chinese as one of the most important features of the early Qing. Without offering a reason for this development, he brings it to our attention and points out the esteem in which Yu Chu xinzhi was held throughout the rest of the dynasty. One possible reason for the development Barr observes may be found in Ōki’s, Hegel’s, and Widmer’s analyses, which emphasize fiction, fantasy, and memory as means of escaping a difficult reality, if not as ways of evading censors. Yet this rather simple diagnosis needs to be complemented by other explanations before it can fully address the

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high achievement of the second half of the seventeenth century in classical prose. One important factor, certainly, was Zhang Chao himself, whose Yu Chu xinzhi and other collections had the effect of preserving writings long withheld from public view by their authors—writings turned out at various times during the fifty years in question—and may also have stimulated new writings. Whether it merely preserved or also stimulated, Zhang’s important relationship to the classical fiction of this era cannot be denied. Coincidentally, each of the five chapters in this section relies on Zhang for at least one of its source materials. Both of the key pieces in Ōki’s study, Mao Xiang’s Yingmei an yiyu 影梅庵憶語 and Yu Huai’s Banqiao zaji 板橋雜記, appeared in Zhang Chao’s edited collection Zhaodai congshu 昭代叢書 (1697); and Banqiao zaji made its debut there. Hegel takes up several works edited by Zhang, again including Banqiao zaji. Widmer finds seven of Huang Zhouxing’s writings in works edited by Zhang: Yu Chu xinzhi, Tanji congshu 檀几叢書 (1695, co-edited with Wang Zhuo 王晫), and Zhaodai congshu. Lu analyzes Zhou Lianggong’s 周亮工 (1612–72) “Shu Qi Sanlang shi” 書戚三郎事 from Yu Chu xinzhi. And Allan Barr’s chapter is entirely about works collected by Zhang. As these studies implicitly demonstrate, Zhang’s works link writers of quite different political persuasions: Ming loyalists like Huang Zhouxing, men of divided loyalties like Zhou Lianggong, and men who served only the Qing like Niu Xiu. They also bridge a generational divide, ranging from authors born in the first decade of the seventeenth century to men of Zhang’s own time. Tobie Meyer-Fong has argued in another context that the healing process that restored a sense of well being in the post-conquest period is important precisely because it bridges differences of these kinds. Particularly after the Outstanding Scholars of Vast Learning (boxue hongci 博學宏詞) examination of 1679, even former loyalists were less likely to identify themselves in opposition to the Qing, and by the 1680s a new generation, one with no memory of the conquest, came into its own. 1 This process of accommodation was in part a matter of time. It can be observed through contrasting fictions, as in Tina Lu’s formulation, which hypothesizes that pieces written later are more or less identifi————— 1. Tobie Meyer-Fong, “Packaging the Men of Our Times: Literary Anthologies, Friendship Networks, and Political Accommodation in the Early Qing,” Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 64, no. 1 (2004): 5–56.

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able as late by the specifics of what draws families apart in the first place and how they are reunited. It can also be viewed through contrasts in the writings of individuals, as seen in Barr’s study, which demonstrates that later writers take less exception to Qing rule. It is, of course, also possible that some individuals, including Huang Zhouxing or Chu Renhuo, adjusted and changed within a single lifetime. Although one would expect such men’s reactions to the fall of the Ming to differ from those of a writer like Hong Sheng 洪昇 (1645–1704) who did not experience it, a blanket determinism in which date of birth conditions a writer’s entire viewpoint would be unwarranted. And 1644 was not a watershed for everyone. As we learn from the Ōki chapter, well into the 1680s and even 1690s, Mao Xiang and Yu Huai made artistic capital out of their nostalgia for the Ming. There are also writers who, despite an early date of birth, seem relatively unaffected by the political crisis. Li Yu 李漁 (1611–80) is the best example here. When Tina Lu points out that “both normal family relations and usual literary conventions are inverted” in Li’s work, she underscores the inventiveness that defines him generally and the humorous touch that makes his true loyalties difficult to pin down. Li’s role in Widmer’s piece exemplifies another force affecting later seventeenth-century literature, the pursuit of commercial gain. Both Huang Zhouxing and Li Yu strove for a striking freshness in their writing. For Huang and certainly for Li, this could be a selling point with readers. We cannot as yet correlate commercial/noncommercial modes of circulation with the language (vernacular or classical) in which a piece was written. Whereas some vernacular novels and stories circulated commercially, others may not have, as Robert Hegel has argued in another context; 2 it is also not impossible that certain classical tales were bought and sold. But marketability has to be included among the factors shaping fictional output at this time. This is not to say that commerce influenced every genre or subgenre in identical ways. Some highly marketable fictions, such as pornography, may have continued into the Qing with little if any difference from Ming patterns, 3 whereas at least one apparently commerce-driven ————— 2. Robert E. Hegel, Reading Illustrated Fiction in Late Imperial China (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1998). 3. Shang Wei’s unpublished essay, “The Production of Erotic Fiction in the Early Qing,” is a first step toward exploring this question.

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subgenre, the “scholar-beauty romance,” developed de novo during the early Qing. To Ming loyalists out of a job the possibility of selling writing was welcomed, but it is far from clear that loyalists had even minimal connections to either of these two subgenres. At least as powerful a factor may have been the reading public, who sought escape or titillation as the Qing restored political control. Perhaps this public expanded to include new readers, among them women, at this time. The chaste scholar-beauty romance, in particular, seems suitable for female readers, as Keith McMahon has observed. 4 The growth in published writings by women is one of the outstanding features of this period, and it makes sense that a new type of fiction would have emerged around their reading tastes. Another new type of fiction from this era, the sequel, is linked much more directly to political change. Sequels that come up for discussion in this volume, such as Dong Yue’s 董說 (1620–86) 5 Xiyou bu 西遊補 (1641), Ding Yaokang’s 丁耀亢 (1599– 1669) Xu Jinpingmei 續金瓶梅 (1660?), and Chen Chen’s 陳忱 (1614?– 66+) Shuihu houzhuan 水滸後傳 (1664), can plausibly be understood as reactions to the traumas of the end of the Ming. It is only a slight stretch to put Chu Renhuo’s slightly later Sui Tang yanyi into the same category. Although less visibly about succession, it is equally concerned with describing contemporary realities by analogy to the Tang and Song. Genres other than fiction come up directly or by implication in these chapters. The relationship between fiction and drama is sometimes presented contrastively. Tina Lu’s paper uses the conventional happy ending of chuanqi drama as a foil to the “flawed reunions” of fiction, whether classical or vernacular, in which families are reconstituted but with disturbing irregularities and changes. Robert Hegel embarks on a similar contrastive move when he aligns the role of the musician Li Mo 李謨 in Hong Sheng’s drama Changsheng dian 長生殿 of 1688 with the same character’s role in the novel Sui Tang yanyi, of about a decade earlier, yet his focus is not on generic contrast per se but on the difference between experiencing trauma directly or at second ————— 4. Keith McMahon, Misers, Shrews, and Polygamists: Sexuality and Male-Female Relations in Eighteenth Century Chinese Fiction (Durham, NC: Duke University Press, 1995), p. 102. 5. Xiyou bu may instead have been authored by Dong’s father; see David L. Rolston, ed., How to Read the Chinese Novel (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990), p. 70.

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hand. To Ellen Widmer, on the other hand, drama and fiction are not contrasted. She is interested more in how Huang Zhouxing drew on his own fiction in creating the autobiographical portrait in his chuanqi drama Rentian le 人天樂 of 1675. Perhaps because the category “prose” is inherently eclectic, these chapters are more about minimizing than maximizing generic contrast. Taken together, they imply that one should not overstate differences between the reality-based memoir literature described in the Ōki chapter and the more purely fictional focus of the other studies. After all, both appear side by side in Zhang Chao’s collections. It is further interesting that the other chapters make so little effort to contrast vernacular and classical fiction. In Hegel’s chapter, it is the similarities between Sui Tang yanyi and various classical language pieces that are emphasized. In Tina Lu’s treatment, too, the fact that Zhou Lianggong wrote in the classical language and Li Yu in the vernacular is virtually immaterial. Both Zhou and Li aim for a happy resolution of imbalances. Concentrating as they do on classical tales and memoirs, these chapters find more continuity than change in Chinese literature of the first half of the seventeenth century. Yet to look at the situation from another angle would reveal more uneven terrain. If one concentrated only on vernacular fiction, the period between about 1644 and 1680— the heyday of such iconoclastic writers as Li Yu and such fiction critics as Zhang Zhupo 張竹坡 (1670–98), Mao Zonggang 毛宗崗 (1630?– 1700+), and Jin Shengtan 金聖歎 (1610–61)—would appear as one of almost unbridled experimentation. In contrast, the final decades of the century, with their combination of a strong emperor, the boxue hongci examination, and resurgent daoxue orthodoxy appear to have inhibited this creative drive. Had our volume been differently constituted, it might have had more to say about the great masterworks of Chinese fiction or about fiction critics. It is true that Huang Zhouxing turned out a critical edition of Xiyou ji 西遊記, but as Widmer’s chapter explains, this does not appear to have been as dear to his heart as his other writings, and it strays from the patterns laid down by the leading critics of vernacular fiction. 6 (Huang Zhouxing’s critical work on drama, published as a preface to Rentian le, does, however, have much in common with the ————— 6. Ibid., p. 452.

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drama criticism of Li Yu.) Zhang Chao was personally acquainted with Zhang Zhupo, 7 but when it came to writing prefaces for the classical works assembled in Yu Chu xinzhi and other collections, he did not use the type of critical apparatus developed by Jin, Zhang, and Mao. Thus, fictional criticism and fictional output do not link up identically in vernacular and classical fiction. Here it is worth recalling the obvious, that the three great vernacular fiction criticisms were devised around earlier masterpieces, not contemporary writings, and that the novels on which Jin, Zhang, and Mao based their criticisms were massive—far too large to be included in still larger compendia. In fact, these three interrelated criticisms concerned themselves in part with the huge size of Shuihu zhuan 水滸傳, Jin Ping Mei 金瓶梅, and Sanguo zhi yanyi 三國之 演義. Furthermore, these novels were received as works of dubious virtue, which meant that a reputation for unconventionality, even iconoclasm, attached itself to critics who dared to take them seriously. Thus they were vastly different from the slim and dignified, though equally nonconformist works of which Zhang Chao’s compendia were composed. Even as these compendia diverge in method and focus from vernacular fiction criticism, the editorial acumen and critical taste Zhang Chao brought to prose writing show commonalities with those found in other compilations of the second half of the seventeenth century. In addition to classical stories and memoirs, letters are another area in which important collecting activity can be found. Collections like Zhou Lianggong’s Chidu xinchao 尺牘新潮 and Wang Qi’s 汪淇 (fl. 1630–70) Chidu xinyu 尺牘新語—both of the early Kangxi period—are obliquely related to Zhang’s collecting activities, even though the genre in question was different. In fact, Zhang referred to both collections of letters in the preface to Yu Chu xinzhi. 8 And certain of the principles around which letters were gathered, such as newness and the name recognition of the author, bear a connection to the principles around which Zhang’s classical anthologies were planned. Another common denominator is the many individuals whose writings are represented. Thus, all but the youngest of the authors represented in Zhang’s collections appear in the letter collections too. This overlap implies a literary elite whose star power extended to their prose writ————— 7. Ibid., p. 196. 8. See the copy held in the Peking University Library.

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ings, whatever the genre and whatever the political orientation of the author. Still another factor in the process were the bookshops that served as depots for collections in the making and the use of the post as one means of gathering materials. Zhang’s personal correspondence, published under the titles Chidu yousheng 尺牘友聲 and Chidu oucun 尺牘偶存, shows him to be in touch by letter with a variety of individuals and social networks from whom this type of literature emerged. This kind of networking makes an extratextual parallel to the community-based patterns of exchange from later in the seventeenth century to which Tina Lu’s chapter refers. Collecting is also seen in the field of poetry. Qian Qianyi’s 錢謙益 (1582–1664) Liechao shiji 列朝詩集 of 1649 and Deng Hanyi’s 鄧漢儀 (1617–89) Shiguan 詩觀 of the 1670s are poetical equivalents of Zhang Chao’s fiction collections and of letter collections by Zhou and Wang. Again, the authors represented are substantially the same. A similar observation could be made about collections of women’s poetry, a relatively new development in this period. Whether the editor was male or female, these, too, required considerable organizational skills, reliance on bookshops and mail to collect materials, access to social networks, and the editor’s ability to write good prose. There is considerable overlap between the women writers represented in Qian’s and Deng’s collections, and many were sisters, wives, or daughters of the most celebrated men. When it comes to collections devoted solely to women writers and edited by a woman, such as Wang Duanshu’s 王端淑 (1621–ca. 1701) Mingyuan shiwei 名媛詩緯 of 1667, new names do crop up, since Wang made a point of retrieving the work of unknowns. But many of the people represented in her work can be found in Qian’s and Deng’s collections. That collecting generally is a prominent feature of early Qing literature on a variety of fronts, including drama, strongly suggests that there was something about the dynastic transfer that led people to this type of activity, whether as a form of escapism or an outlet for nostalgia. For some loyalist sympathizers, Zhang Chao among them, the collecting, editing, and writing of classical prose may also have answered a need for alternatives to government service like that played by evidential scholarship, as Allen Barr observes. Another concern, surely, was a wish to preserve rare and fragile materials against the disruptions of the time. But in contrast to collections made at the end of the Qing dynasty, early Qing collections are as likely to concentrate on living

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authors as on dead ones and as prone to look for novelty as to salvage what is old. This may reflect the changing face of publishing as much as the personal proclivities of editors and the trauma of the times. Where these five chapters break new ground is in their collective willingness to look beyond the more striking and familiar ups and downs of vernacular fiction and fiction criticism. Their shared interest in Zhang Chao and the collections he sponsored point to an alternative way of configuring the latter half of the seventeenth century, less as a time of intense creativity followed by repression than as one of gradual evolution. The period began with the pain-filled stories and memoirs of the immediate aftermath of conquest and was succeeded by more transcendent works of later in the century, as well as by milestones of collecting in all genres.

Mao Xiang and Yu Huai Early Qing Romantic yimin

7 Yasushi Ōki Among the memoirs written in the early Qing period, two stand out: Mao Xiang’s 冒襄 (1611–93) Reminiscences of the Plum Shadows Convent (Yingmei an yiyu 影梅庵憶語) and Yu Huai’s 余懷 (1616–96) Miscellaneous Records of the Plank Bridge (Banqiao zaji 板橋雜記). Both writers were residents of late Ming Nanjing, where they engaged in political activities and participated in life in the pleasure quarters of Qinhuai 秦淮. When Mao Xiang was thirty-four and Yu Huai twenty-nine, the Ming dynasty collapsed. Following the Manchu conquest, both men abandoned the pursuit of an official career and began their lives as yimin 遺民 (Ming loyalists). Mao Xiang wrote Reminiscences of the Plum Shadows Convent, an account of his concubine Dong Xiaowan 董小宛, in 1651, and Yu Huai wrote Miscellaneous Records of the Plank Bridge, a report on courtesans in the Qinhuai district. In this chapter, I examine the life and thinking of these two great writers of memoir literature.

1 Mao Xiang (zi Piqiang 辟疆; hao Chaomin 巢民 and Puchao 樸巢) came from a distinguished family of Rugao 如皋 county near Yangzhou, and his father was a high official. Mao Xiang’s epitaph was written by Han Tan 韓菼 (1637–1704), who passed first in the metropolitan civil service examination of 1673 and was a high official under the Qing government. The epitaph begins: In the Tianqi era [1620–27], when the eunuch Wei Zhongxian 魏忠賢 exercised power, many officials were imprisoned and killed by Wei. The six gentlemen

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were the most eminent among them. 1 Sons from distinguished families gathered together and protested against Wei Zhongxian. The four young gentlemen, Fang Yizhi 方以智 from Tongcheng 桐城, Chen Zhenhui 陳貞慧 from Yangxian 陽羨 [Yixing 宜興], Hou Fangyu 侯方域 from Guide 歸德, and Mao Xiang were the most eminent. Mao Xiang was quite young and talented. His words touched many people. Once Mao Xiang held a party at Qinhuai in Nanjing, inviting orphans of the six gentlemen of the Tianqi era, and almost all the prominent figures at that time took part. At the height of the party, Mao harshly accused Ruan Dacheng 阮大鋮, who was a henchman of Wei Zhongxian. 故明熹廟時、璫禍大作。黃門北寺之獄興、諸賢相繼逮繫笞掠死。六 君子、其最著者也。當是時、四公子之名籍甚。四公子者、桐城方密之以 智、陽羨陳定生貞慧、歸德侯朝宗方域與先生也。先生少年負盛氣、才特 高、尤能傾動人。嘗置酒桃葉渡、以會六君子諸孤、一時名士咸在。酒酣 以往、輒狂以悲、共訾懷寧。懷寧故奄黨也。 2

As Han Tan says, Mao Xiang was known as one of “four young gentlemen” of the late Ming. Although Mao Xiang never passed the civil service examination, he did enjoy the privileges of birth. According to the chronological biography of Mao Xiang edited by Mao Guangsheng 冒廣生, 3 Mao’s party took place in 1636, after Wei Zhongxian’s death, in Qinhuai, an area Mao Xiang had frequented since his youth. In 1638, two years after the party, some 140 persons signed a statement of impeachment against Ruan Dacheng, among them Mao Xiang. This movement was launched by the Fushe 復社, or Revival Society, an influential late Ming literary and political circle. Mao Xiang took part in the activities of the Fushe. By the time Mao Xiang promoted the Yellow Peony Poetry Contest in 1640 at Zheng Yuanxun’s 鄭元勳 (1604–45) private garden, Yingyuan 影園, in Yangzhou, he had become one of the most important persons in the late Ming Jiangnan literary society. 4 According to Mao’s “Preface to Zheng Maojia Zhonghuan shiji”: ————— 1. According to Ming shi明史, juan 305, the six gentlemen were Zhou Qiyuan 周起元, Miao Changqi 繆昌期, Zhou Shunchang 周順昌, Zhou Zongjian 周宗建, Huang Zunsu 黄遵素, and Li Yingsheng 李應升. Huang Zunsu was the father of the famous Ming loyalist Huang Zongxi 黄宗羲. 2. Han Tan韓菼, Youhuai tang wen gao 有懷堂文稿 (1703), 16.1a; also in Bei zhuan ji 碑傳集, 126.1a. 3. Mao Guangsheng冒廣生, Mao Chaomin xiansheng nianpu 冒巢民先生年譜, 15a. 4. Ōki Yasushi 大木康, “Kōbotan shikai” 黃牡丹詩會, Tōhōgaku 99 (2000): 33–46.

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I organized a literary society with Mr. Zheng Yuanxun, and many eminent figures visited Zheng’s Yingyuan garden. In 1640, a yellow peony blossomed in Yingyuan garden, and many poems on this flower were sent to Zheng. I gathered these poems, concealed the names of the poets, and sent them to Qian Qianyi 錢謙益 to ask him to judge their merit. 余與超老絡繹東南、主持文 事、海内鴻鉅、以影園為會歸。庚辰影園黄牡丹盛開、名士飛章聯句。余 為徵集其詩、緘致虞山定其甲乙。 5

Eight members of the Fushe participated in this literary gathering, 6 including Mao Xiang, Zheng Yuanxun, the owner of the garden, and Li Suiqiu 黎遂球 (1602–46), who won the first prize at this poetry contest. Zheng Yuanxun also signed the memorial calling for Ruan Dacheng’s impeachment. The poetry party was a literary activity, but this juxtaposition shows us how close literary and political activities could be. After the Manchu conquest, according to Han Tan, Mao Xiang’s leisurely pursuits continued: Chen Zhenhui and Hou Fangyu died young, and Fang Yizhi became a priest and went far away, while only Mao Xiang remained as before. But he gave up the idea of entering on an official career. He had a beautiful garden in his home, and he loved to have guests every day. He showed them great hospitality. Mao Xiang’s death brought an end to the romantic ( fengliu 風流) echoes of the old yimin of the southeast. 既而定生、朝宗相繼歿、密之棄官為僧以去。 而先生獨存、亦無意於世矣。家故有園池亭館之勝、歸益喜客、招致無虚 日。館餐惟恐不及。蓋自先生没而東南故老遺民之風流餘韻於是乎歇絕矣。

After the Manchu conquest, Mao Xiang remained an important literary figure, and many of the most celebrated poets of the time visited his house and garden, Shuihui yuan 水繪園 in Rugao, and often held poetry gatherings there. Mao Xiang’s Collected Writings of Kindred Spirits (Tongren ji 同人集) contains verses and pieces of prose written to him by his friends. These give us a sense of his large circle of acquaintances. Wang Shizhen 王士禛 (1634–1711), a prominent poet of the Qing dynasty, was one such guest. Wang passed the civil service examina————— 5. Mao Xiang冒襄, “Zheng Maojia Zhonghan shiji xu 鄭懋嘉中翰詩集序,” in Tongren ji 同人集, Siku quanshu cunmu congshu 四庫全書存目叢書, Jibu 集部; vol. 385 ( Ji’nan: Qi Lu shushe, 1997), 1.47a. 6. Ono Kazuko 小野和子, Fukusha seishi sakuin 復社姓氏索引 (Kyoto: Kyōto daigaku, Jinbun kagaku kenkyūsho, 1995). Ono’s index is based on Lu Shiyi’s 陸 世儀Fushe jilüe 復社紀略, Wu Zeng’s 吳曾羽 Fushe xingshi lu 復社姓氏錄, and Wu Yingji’s 吳應箕 Fushe xingshi 復社姓氏.

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tions in 1658 and arrived in Yangzhou in 1660 as a provincial official. Wang Shizhen was already famous for his “Autumn Willows” poem, which he composed in 1657, and he established a poetry circle in Yangzhou. He also visited Mao’s Shuihui yuan garden in Rugao, evidence enough that Mao Xiang was still regarded highly in literary society. 7 I would like to highlight Han Tan’s expression, “the romantic echoes of the old yimin of the southeast.” In my opinion, the word fengliu here refers to all of Mao’s romantic activities—his love of courtesans and actresses, his writing of the memoirs of his concubine, and so on. These factors can also be seen in the activities of Yu Huai. Building on Han Tan’s expression, we can coin a term, “romantic yimin” ( fengliu yimin), to describe both men. Through them, we can observe what it was like to be a romantic yimin in the early Qing.

2 Dong Xiaowan, the subject of Mao Xiang’s Reminiscences of the Plum Shadows Convent, was a courtesan in the Qinhuai district. 8 She became Mao Xiang’s concubine in 1642 but died an early death in 1651. Mao Xiang wrote Reminiscences soon after she died. This work, which circulated widely, caused a sensation among literati at that time. The term “reminiscences” captures the approach of the book. At the end of the book, Mao wrote: Every year on New Year’s Day, I would draw lots before the shrine of Guan Di 關帝 to divine my affairs for the coming year. In the renwu year [1642], when I was rather ambitious in my pursuit of literary honors [success in the civil service examinations], after making obeisance to the god, I beheld that the first character in the lot I drew was yi 憶[recall], which began the sentence,

————— 7. Aoki Masaru青木正兒, “Shishu gashū” 詩酒雅集, Aoki Masaru zenshū, 7: 269–72; Hashimoto Jun 橋本循, “Yōshū ni okeru Ō Gyoyō” 揚州における王 漁洋, Ritsumeikan bungaku, no. 245 (1965): 45–65; Tobie Meyer-Fong, Building Culture in Early Qing Yangzhou (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2003). 8. Pan Tze-yen, trans., The Reminiscences of Tung Hsiao-wan (Shanghai: Commercial Press, 1931); Martinne Vallette-Hémery, trans., Mao Xiang, la dame aux pruniers ombreux (Paris: Philippe Picquier, 1992); Ōki Yasushi, trans., “Bō Jō Eibaian okugo yakuchū” 冒襄影梅庵憶語譯注, 3 pts., Tōyō bunka kenkyūjo kiyō, nos. 136–38 (1999–2000). On Dong Bai (Xiaowan), see Marsha Weidner et al., Views from Jade Terrace: Chinese Women Artists, 1300–1912 (Indianapolis: Indianapolis Museum of Art; New York: Rizzoli, 1988), pp. 98–99.

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“Recalling to mind the dividing of hairpins into halves in the orchid chamber in the past, she wonders why her lover has suddenly stopped all communication. In her obsessive love, she wishes only to be united with him like intertwined branches. Who could have known that the union would not be fulfilled?” I read over the sentence but could make no sense of it, and the oracle, taken as a whole, seemed to have nothing to do with my literary ambitions. Some time thereafter, I met my concubine, and on the last day of the fourth month, she departed from me at Jinshan 金山 [in Zhenjiang 鎮江]. After returning home and becoming a vegetarian, she visited a fortuneteller at the temple of Guan Di on Tiger Hill 虎丘 [in Suzhou] about her wish to become my concubine and got the same oracle. On seeing me at Qinhuai in Nanjing in the autumn, she told me of this incident and of her fear that our affair might not end happily. On hearing of this coincidence, I expressed my surprise and told her that I had received the same oracle on New Year’s Day. A friend who was sitting beside us at the moment proposed to seek another fortune on our behalf at the temple at Xihuamen gate 西華門; and, strange to relate, the same oracle turned up once more. Thereupon, she grew even more suspicious, and fearing that I might be inspired by the oracle to change my mind, she turned pale with grief. Her cherished hope was, however, fulfilled at last. The words on the lot in question, such as “orchid chamber” and “hairpins into halves,” “obsessive love” and “intertwined branches,” are words natural to the feminine spirit; and the clause “Who could have known that the union would not be fulfilled?” has now come true. Alas! I will give myself up to recalling her past during the remaining years of my life. The uncanny word recall has proved so prophetic! 余每歲元旦、必以一歲事卜一籤於關帝前。壬午名心甚劇。禱看 籤首第一字、得憶字。蓋憶昔蘭房分半釵、如今忽把音信乖、癡心指望成 連理。到底誰知事不諧。余時占玩不解。即占全詞、亦非功名語。比遇姬、 清和晦日、金山別去、姬茹素歸。虔卜於虎疁關帝君前、願以終身事余。 正得此籤。秋過秦淮、述以相告。恐有不諧之歎。余聞而訝之。謂與元旦 籤合。時友人在坐曰、我當為爾二人、合卜於西華門、則仍此籤也。姬愈 疑懼、且慮余見此籤中懈。憂形於面。乃後卒滿其願。蘭房半釵、癡心連 理、皆天然閨閣中語。到底不諧。則今日驗矣。嗟乎。余有生之年、皆長 相憶之年也。憶字之奇、呈驗若此。 9

The oracle recall meant that she would die before Mao Xiang and would live only in his memory. This is the history of the book’s title. Her beautiful image remained only in his mind. Here I would like to point out the great importance that Mao Xiang attached to the past or to the lost subject. ————— 9. Translation based on Pan Tze-yen, The Reminiscences of Tung Hsiao-wan, pp. 86–88.

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Another example of Mao’s way of recalling the past can be seen in the biography of his concubine Wu Koukou 吳扣扣 written by Chen Weisong 陳維崧 (1625–82), a son of Chen Zhenhui, one of the “four young gentlemen.” 10 This biography consists of a monologue by Mao Xiang. Ten years after Dong Xiaowan’s death, Mao lost Wu Koukou. Mao expressed to Chen Weisong his detailed recollections of Wu Koukou, such as walking with her along the pond in the Shuihui yuan garden in spring to view the peach blossoms. Chen reported all of this in detail. Mao’s patterns of recalling Wu Koukou and Dong Xiaowan are quite similar. Mao Xiang’s Reminiscences of the Plum Shadows Convent consists of ten parts devoted to (1) their first encounter, (2) their travels and sightseeing, (3) her calm character, (4) her modesty, (5) her talents in poetry, history, calligraphy, and painting, (6) her taste in incense, flowers, and the moon, (7) her taste in foods and beverages, (8) hardships during the early Qing, (9) her nursing of Mao Xiang during a serious illness, and (10) fortunetelling (forebodings of her death). Mao’s memoir begins with his recollection of their first meeting in Suzhou. After he had visited her house several times and not been able to see her, Fang Yizhi, one of “the four young gentlemen,” introduced them. None of the four young gentlemen was indifferent to courtesan houses and romantic love affairs. Hou Fangyu, for example, is famous for his romance with Li Xiangjun 李香君, another prominent courtesan in the Qinhuai district; they became the two protagonists of Kong Shangren’s 孔尚任 (1648–1718) play Peach Blossom Fan (Taohua shan 桃花扇). At their second meeting, Dong Xiaowan expressed a willingness to become Mao’s concubine and follow him to Rugao. As the Reminiscences describes: There were dice on the table, and one of my friends said to her jokingly: “Should your desire be gratified at last, the dice would, after being tossed, all land on the same side.” She then solemnly bowed at the window of the boat, and after praying to Heaven, she seized the dice and cast them. When the dice fell, lo and behold, six came up on all of them. All on board expressed their surprise. I then said to her: “Should Heaven be really in favor of our affair, I’m

————— 10. Chen Weisong 陳維崧, “Wu ji Koukou xiaozhuan” 吳姬扣扣小傳, in Chen Jialing wenji 陳迦陵文集, Sibu congkan 四部叢刊, 5.21a.

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afraid we might bungle the whole thing if we proceed too hurriedly. So you had better leave me temporarily, and let us see what we can do by and by.” Thus against her wishes she bade me adieu, burying her face in her hands and breaking out into tears, which prevented any further utterance. Though pitying her lot, for me to be able to return by myself made me feel as if I were relieved of a heavy burden. 11 時五木在几。一友戲云、卿果終如願、當一擲 得巧。姬肅拜於船窗、祝畢、一擲得全六。時同舟稱異。余謂果囑天成、 倉卒不臧、反僨乃事。不如暫去、徐圖之。不得已。始掩面痛哭失聲而別。 余雖憐姬、然得輕身歸、如釋重負。

Dong was bold enough to choose her lover and chase him. This was scarcely imaginable among Chinese women of that time. She could do this because she was a courtesan, not the daughter of an ordinary family. Mao also recorded his difficulties in raising money to set her free, because her “employer” (the courtesan house) raised her “ransom.” In this difficult situation, Qian Qianyi, the most prominent figure in the literary world of Jiangnan, helped resolve these difficulties. The Reminiscences records: My concubine was left in an awkward position, forlorn and helpless; she could hardly find a way out of the difficulty. On hearing of her trouble, the eminent scholar Qian Qianyi of Yushan 虞山 [Changshu 常熟] went to Bantang 半塘 [in Suzhou] himself and brought her to his boat. He approached her creditors, from the gentry to the common folk, and within three days managed to clear all of her debts, whether the amount involved was big or small, as the bills redeemed piled up almost one foot in height. This done, he ordered a farewell banquet to be served in a pleasure boat and entertained her at the foot of Tiger Hill. He then hired a boat and sent someone to see her safely through to Rugao. On the evening of the fifteenth day of the eleventh month, when I was taking a cup of wine with my father in our Zhuocun Hall 拙存堂, I was suddenly informed that my concubine had arrived at the jetty. Upon reading Qian Muzhai’s detailed and heartfelt letter, I began to be aware of what had brought her hither. I also learned that Muzhai had written to his student Zhang of the Board of Sacrifice, asking him to redeem her bondage as a singing-girl at once. Her minor affairs at Suzhou were later settled by His Excellency Zhou of the Board of Rites, while His Excellency Li, formerly attached to the Board of Rites, also rendered her great assistance in Nanjing. 姬孤身維谷、難以收拾。 虞山宗伯聞之、親至半塘、納姬舟中、上至薦紳、下及市井、纖恐大小、

————— 11. Translation based on Pan Tze-yen, The Reminiscences of Tung Hsiao-wan, pp. 21–22.

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三日為之區畫立盡、索券盈尺。樓船張宴、與姬餞於虎疁、旋買舟送至吾 皋。至月之望、薄暮侍家君飲於拙存堂、忽傳姬抵河干。接宗伯書、娓娓 灑灑、始悉其狀。且即馳書貴門生張祠部立為落籍。吳門後有細瑣、則周 儀部終之。而南中則李總憲舊為禮垣者與力焉。 12

Dong Xiaowan came to Mao’s house in the winter of 1642, two years after the Yellow Peony Poetry Contest, which Mao Xiang promoted and of which Qian Qianyi (1582–64) was a judge. Qian Qianyi is known for his relations with the famous courtesan Liu Rushi 柳如是 (1618–64). Qian Qianyi and other literati in the late Ming period did not hide their friendships with courtesans. It was a kind of fashion then. Dong and Mao lived together in Rugao, and Mao wrote at length of their elegant leisure activities. He spoke elegantly about her special talents, such as calligraphy, painting, tea, and incense, her knowledge of the Classics, her poetic abilities, and her kindness to Mao’s mother, his wife, and other family members. He also detailed their escape and survival during the difficult times of the Manchu conquest. He lovingly recorded her dedicated nursing when he fell seriously ill, and finally he implied her death. When we read the Reminiscences, we are touched with the purity of Mao Xiang’s lament for Dong Xiaowan. Because of its great detail, attention to private life, and, of course, its great literary merit, the Reminiscences is essential reading for those who wish to understand the daily life of intellectuals during the late Ming and early Qing.

3 When the Reminiscences was privately published in 1651, it evoked admiration among intellectual circles frequented by Mao. He recorded thirty-six friends’ responses to the Reminiscences in Collected Writings of Kindred Spirits, an anthology he edited. On the basis of this book, we can examine how Reminiscences was written, circulated, and read by the author’s contemporaries. Dong Xiaowan died on the second day of the first month in 1651 at the age of twenty-nine. Sixty-five days after her death, Mao Xiang composed an “elegy for Dong Xiaowan” and then wrote the Reminiscences. ————— 12. Translation based on ibid., pp. 28–29.

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In “The Colophon to the Reminiscences” in the Collected Writings of Kindred Spirits, Chen Hongxu 陳宏緒 wrote: This spring Mao Piqiang [Mao Xiang] sent his newly published books to me, and Reminiscences of the Plum Shadows Convent was among them. . . . Now I am two thousand miles away from Piqiang. How can I visit him, read Dong Xiaowan’s writings with him under emerald roofing tiles and red parapets, pour wine on the fragrant path, think of her, and sob for her there? As I lay in bed in the mountains, I wrote down some thoughts and sent them in order to console Piqiang. 13 今年春、雉皋冒子辟疆、馳其新刻數種見寄。中一帙題 曰、影梅庵憶語。予閱之、紀其亡姬董君小宛事、至四十条。(中略)今距辟 疆樸巢二千里、安得遄至其下、展讀於碧甍朱欄間、相與瀝酒埋香之徑、 顧影而一欷歔乎。臥病山中、因書數語遙寄、以慰辟疆、並附姓字於憶語。

Chen Hongxu was in Jiangxi province at that time. His remarks indicated that Mao Xiang printed Reminiscences privately and sent copies to his friends. In Zhou Jixian’s 周積賢 “In Memoriam Ode,” 14 Zhou noted: “Piqiang grieved and composed an elegy for Dong Xiaowan. He ordered his friends to compose verse and prose to mourn her. So I wrote for Dong Xiaowan.” Another friend, Zhao Erbian 趙而汴, wrote after the title of his poem: 15 “In the autumn of the renchen year [1652], complying with Piqiang’s request, I composed seven poems mourning Wanjun [Dong Xiaowan].” Mao Xiang seems to have asked his friends to respond to him by writing a poem or short prose piece upon receiving his “elegy” and Reminiscences. Most of his friends’ verse and prose, in a sense, can be taken as letters of thanks for Mao’s gift of his books, and most of them quote a sentence or use an expression from the book. For example, Zhang Xun’s 張恂 “Short Preface to Poem and Picture” says: In the xinmao year [1651], Dong Xiaowan went far away on a phoenix back. Piqiang wrote the Reminiscences in sorrow. He asked me to illustrate it. Seeing the pictures, he would continue to weep? So I painted four scenes and composed poems for each scene. I presented them to Mao Piqiang and asked him to

————— 13. “Yingmei an yiyu tici” 影梅庵憶語題詞, in Tongren ji, 3.57a. 14. “Daowang fu” 悼亡賦, in Tongren ji, 3.99a. 15. “Renchen qiumo Ying Piqiang ming dao Wanjun, fude qi que” 壬辰秋末、 應辟疆命悼宛君、賦得七闕, in Tongren ji, 6.27a.

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comment. 辛卯春、忽焉乘鸞長往。辟疆哀不勝情、有憶語一帙。屬余作畫、 豈看畫亦可以當泣耶。爰選圖四則、各七字句一章、奉請教政。 16

Mao Xiang ordered Zhang Xun to draw illustrations for the Reminiscences, and Zhang Xun wrote poems using the chapter titles of the Reminiscences. A series of poems by Mei Lei 梅磊 and Xu Taishi 徐泰時, which follow Zhang’s poems in the Collected Writings of Kindred Spirits, also seem to have been composed to go with the pictures. A short preface to the poem by Liu Zhaoguo 劉肇國 also mentions pictures. These pictures circulated in Mao Xiang’s literary circle and their poems probably were originally written down in the volume of pictures. Wu Weiye 吳偉業 (1609–72), one of the most eminent poets of the early Qing, wrote “Eight Quatrains for Dong Xiaowan’s Portrait.” 17 These are among the most famous of the poems concerning her. Mao Xiang seemed to be so proud to receive poems from Wu Weiye that he asked his friends Du Jun 杜濬 and Wang Shilu 王士祿 to compose poems using the same rhymes as those of Wu’s poems. 18 The head note of Wang Shilu’s poems says: Mr. Chaomin [Mao Xiang] showed me Wu Meicun’s [Wu Weiye’s] poems on Dong Xiaowan and asked me to compose poems using the same rhymes as those of Wu’s poems. I worked hard to comply with his request, but I am sorry that the poems are still “unpolished.” 19

Mao Xiang intentionally gathered verse and prose from his friends. His Collected Writings of Kindred Spirits is a conscious editorial effort on Mao’s own part. The circulation of the Reminiscences, the vivid reports on his private life with courtesans and concubines, and the exchange of verse and prose among his acquaintances were romantic activities that had something in common with those of other late Ming literati, such as Qian Qianyi. ————— 16. “Shi hua xiaoxu” 詩畫小序, in Tongren ji, 6.14b. 17. “Ti Dong Wanjun xiaoxiang ba jueju” 題董宛君小像八絕句, in Tongren ji, 6.28a. 18. Du Jun 杜濬, “He Meicun fuzi diao Wanjun shi jue,” 和梅村夫子弔宛君 十絕, in Tongren ji, 6.30a–31b. 19. Wang Shilu王士祿, “Chaomin xiansheng chu Wu Meicun jijiu diao Dong Shaojun shi jue suo he. Miancheng yingjiao, shu can qianshuai ye” 巢民先生出吳 梅村祭酒弔董少君十絕索和。勉成應教、殊慚牽率也, in Tongren ji, 6.30b–31b.

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4 Most of the verse and prose in the Collected Writings of Kindred Spirits praise Dong Xiaowan’s beauty and virtue, along with Mao Xiang’s beautiful writing of the Reminiscences. What specifically interested Mao’s friends in the Reminiscences? Two points stand out: its detailed description of women’s lives and its “sentimentality.” Chen Hongxu’s “Colophon to the Reminiscences” says: I think the character of eminent women in the past and present was different from those of ordinary women. Their attitudes, words, foods, tastes, clothes, utensils, and skills must have been different from others. The authors of their biographies concentrate on their grand achievements and cut out the details of their daily life; they often summarize the life of eminent women with only one word, “chastity.” So, the image of eminent women in past and present seems monotonous and repetitious. I think that is a real disappointment. 念古今奇婦 人女子、賦性既與人異、其起居言笑、飲食嗜好、服飾器用、技藝之屬、 必俱有以甚異於人。当其大節未著、既忽略而不之詳察、及其轟然一旦、 但以節烈一二語竟其平生。遂使古今奇夫人女子行蹟、千百人如一人、若 抄錄舊文然。予悲之。 20

Chen Hongxu pointed out that the Reminiscences, in contrast, does describe details of daily life. This is an important point. Each of the poems focuses on one of her qualities, abilities, or experiences such as her beauty, her modesty, her literary abilities, her refined taste, and so on. Among those, the poets most commonly praise her beauty and her literary talents. Second, it is apparent that they thought highly of the Reminiscences because of its qing 情, “sentiment” or “emotion of love.” Li Mingrui 李明睿 in his “Comment at the End of the Reminiscences” remarked: “Reading Mao Piqiang’s Reminiscences, I was deeply touched by his qingchi 情癡 [foolish sentimentalism]” 讀冒辟疆影梅庵憶語、而嘆文 人韻士之饒有情癡也. 21 Mao Xiang’s uncle Mao Chaochu 冒超處 wrote in his “Colophon to Piqiang’s Elegy for Dong Xiaowan”: “This elegy epitomizes sentimental writing (qingwen 情文). But it is different from that of young boys and girls. It is elegance without flirtation” 斯亦情文之極致已。 ————— 20. “Yingmei an yiyu tici” 影梅庵憶語題詞, in Tongren ji, 3.57a. 21. “Shu Yingmei an yiyu hou” 書影梅庵憶語後,” in Tongren ji, 3.60a.

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然非兒女之多情、了無膏馥之妮態。雅韻高懷、難為具述. 22 Qing was not necessarily a good word until late Ming writers such as Feng Menglong 馮夢龍 (1574–1646) made it honorable. In Feng’s writings, qing as romantic passion is the supreme compliment. 23 Mao Xiang’s Reminiscences is a clear example of the popularity of qing in the late Ming and the early Qing. After the death of Dong Xiaowan, Mao took other concubines, Wu Koukou, Cai Han 蔡含, and Jin Yue 金玥. 24 Many of Mao Xiang’s friends wrote letters to celebrate their birthdays, 25 and Wang Maolin 汪懋麟 (1640–88), a famous man of letters of Yangzhou, wrote an epitaph for Cai Han. 26 Well into the Qing, Mao’s lifestyle was an echo of late Ming atmosphere. But it was particularly because of Mao Xiang’s romantic life as described in the Reminiscences and its broad circulation that Han Tan described his death as the end of the romantic ( fengliu) echoes of the old yimin of the Southeast.

5 Collected Writings of Kindred Spirits presents much detailed information on Mao Xiang’s patterns of association and his network. He often held poetry parties with his friends in his garden or at some other place. Volume 8 of Collected Writings of Kindred Spirits includes nine poems by Yu Huai, composed from the tenth month of 1677 through the fourth month of 1678. Beginning in the early winter of 1677, Mao Xiang stayed in Suzhou, where Yu Huai then lived. Mao Xiang, Yu Huai, and other friends often met and composed poems together around New Year’s Day, 1678. Yu Huai was born in Putian 莆田, Fujian, but he spent most of his life in Jiangnan, mainly in Nanjing. About 1640, at the age of twenty————— 22. “Ba xiaoruan Piqiang dao Dong ji aici” 跋小阮辟疆悼董姬哀辭, in Tongren ji, 3.72a. 23. Patrick D. Hanan, The Chinese Vernacular Story (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1981), p. 79; Kang-i Sun Chang, The Late-Ming Poet Ch’en Tzu-lung: Crises of Love and Loyalism (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1991), chap. 2. 24. Jin Yue’s painting, Melons and Flowers, is now held in Chōkaidō Art Museum, Yokkaichi City, Japan. Her painting skills seem quite excellent. See Ōki Yasushi 大木康, “Shindai joryū shijin to Ryū Nyoze” 清代女流詩人と柳如是, Chōkai 3 (2002): 7–18. 25. Tongren ji, 12.65a–76a. 26. Ibid., 3.51a.

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five sui, he became a secretary of Fan Jingwen 范景文 (1587–1644), a grand marshal in the Nanjing government. At that time, he saw many courtesans in the Qinhuai district. 27 Yu’s famous Miscellaneous Records of the Plank Bridge records his early history as follows: “I was born at the close of the Wanli reign period [in 1616], and formed friendships with visitors from every region. By the time I joined the staff of Grand Marshal Fan Lianhua as a capital secretary, it was after 1640–41” 余生萬 曆末年、其與四方賓客交游、及入范大司馬蓮花幕中為平安書記者、 乃在崇禎庚、辛以後 (板橋雜記, 卷中). 28 He often visited the Qinhuai district in Nanjing and met a number of famous courtesans. In 1644, when Yu was twenty-nine sui, the Ming dynasty fell. Fan Jingwen was executed in Beijing because of his loyalty to the Ming dynasty. During the disturbances of the Manchu conquest, the Qinhuai district was destroyed by fire. Thus, Yu Huai lost his reminders of the past when he was young and full of dreams. Like Mao, Yu Huai refused to serve the Qing government. Writing his memoirs was the one and only salvation and pleasure of his life. Accordingly, Yu composed a series of poems on the ruins of Nanjing. In 1660, when Wang Shizhen came to Yangzhou, Yu Huai sent him a series of poems recalling Nanjing, and Wang composed two poems in answer to Yu. 29 In the next year, 1661, Wang Shizhen went to Nanjing. He stayed in the Qinhuai district and composed a famous series of poems on it. Wang’s visit and his poems might have been the result of Yu Huai’s poems. The preface to Yu’s most important work, Miscellaneous Records of the Plank Bridge, relates: Someone asked me: “Why are you composing Miscellaneous Records of the Plank Bridge?” “ I have my reasons for composing it,” I replied. He further said:

————— 27. On the life of Yu Huai, see Iwaki Hideo 岩城秀夫, “Hankyō zakki,” “Soshū gabō roku” 板橋雜記・蘇州画舫錄 (Tokyo: Heibonsha, 1964); Kozuka Yoshihiro 小塚由博, “Minmatsu Shinsho bunjin kenkyū: Yo Kai to sono kōyū kankei o chūshin ni shite” 明末清初文人研究: 余懷とその交遊關係を中心にして, Chūgokugaku ronshū, no. 17 (2000): 27–50. 28. A Feast of Mist and Flowers: The Gay Quarters of Nanking at the End of the Ming, annotated trans. Howard S. Levy (Yokohama: Howard S. Levy, 1966), pp. 47–48. 29. Wang Shizhen 王士禛, Ganjiu ji 感舊集 (Taipei: Guangwen shuju, 1968), 7.1a; and Wang Shizhen, Yuyang shanren jinghua lu 漁洋山人精華錄, Sibu congkan, 5.7b.

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“What limit is there to what you can sing and record about the rise and fall of a dynasty and the feelings and sighs of a thousand autumns? But you merely make statements about narrow side-lanes [i.e., the pleasure quarters] and transmissions about bewitching beauties. Aren’t you being profligate?” I laughed aloud, saying: “All this is connected with the rise and fall of a dynasty and the feelings and sighs of a thousand autumns; it is not merely statements about narrow side-lanes and transmissions about bewitching beauties.” 或問余 曰、板橋雜記何為而作也。余應之曰、有為而作也。或者又曰、一代之興 衰、千秋之感慨、其可歌可錄者何限、而子唯狭邪之是述、艷冶之是傳、 不已荒乎。余乃听然而笑曰、此即一代之興衰、千秋之感慨所繫、而非徒 狭邪之是述、艷冶之是伝也。 30

After discussing the history of Nanjing and its pleasure quarters, Yu Huai continued with his explanation: “I was born late and didn’t get to see the mist and flowers of the south or the disciples of the Palaces Suited to Spring, but I was still fortunate in having grown up in a time of peace [and in having been able to] stroll about the pleasure quarters. I hummed and chanted poetry in the vicinity of Long Plank Bridge, gazing about with self-satisfaction. And I heard the songs and poems circulated by singing-girls passing from mouth to mouth. Eminent singing-girls looked at me and led me on with their posturings and allure. I too boasted of being like the profligate Secretary Du [Du Mu 杜牧] of a peaceful era in the Tang dynasty. Since the advent of the Qing dynasty, times have shifted and things have changed. My dreams of yore have for ten years adhered fast to the glorious past of Yangzhou; but in Nanjing every single strip of the pleasure quarters is now overgrown with weeds. The wondrous dances and the pure melodies of the hand castanets of carmine ivory and the green-stringed [musical instruments] can no longer be heard; the figured silks of the nuptial chambers and the embroidery of the speckled bamboo screens can no longer be seen; the famed flowers and fragrant grasses, the brocade-adorned zithers and the rhinoceros-horn girdle ornaments, can no longer be appreciated. “I pass by now and then. Weeds and brambles filled my eyes; the brothels have been reduced to ashes, and the beauties to dust. How could anything exceed the depth of my lamentations over these matters of rise and fall? I hadn’t yet gotten over my pent-up feelings, when suddenly there was a ruinous rebellion. I quietly thought of setting forth incidents now long gone and remembered past events without reason. I have tried to record what I have seen and heard, and am weaving together these writings. I have made known the names of emperors and delights, imitating the Record of Dreaming of Splendors

————— 30. A Feast of Mist and Flowers, pp. 33–35.

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at the Eastern Capital 東京夢華錄. How can these merely be statements about narrow side-lanes and transmissions about bewitching beauties?” The other party leaped to his feet and said: “If that is how it was, then you must compile the record.” Consequently I composed Miscellaneous Records of the Plank Bridge. 余生也晚、不及見南部之煙花、宜春之弟子。而猶幸少長 承平之世、偶為北里之遊。長板橋邊、一吟一詠、顧盼自雄。所作歌詩、 傳誦諸姬之口、楚潤相看、態娟互引、余亦自詡為平安杜書記也。鼎革以 來、時移物換。十年舊夢、依約揚州、一片歡場、鞠為茂草。紅牙碧串、 妙舞輕歌、不可得而聞也。洞房綺疏、湘簾繡幕、不可得而見也。名花瑤 草、錦瑟犀毗、不可得而賞也。間亦過之、蒿藜滿眼、樓館劫灰、美人塵 土。盛衰感慨、豈復有過此者乎。鬱志未伸、俄逢喪乱、静思陳事、追念 無因。聊記見聞、用編汗簡、效東京夢華之錄、標崖公蜆斗之名。豈徒狭 邪之是述、艷冶之是傳也哉。客躍然而起、曰、如此、則不可以不記。於 是作板橋雜記。

Here, using the conceit of a dialogue between the author and a friend, Yu explains his purpose in writing this record. We can observe that Yu clearly felt a gap between past and present. His comment “I was still fortunate in having grown up in time of peace” refers to the shining past, the time of the Ming dynasty, whereas “weeds and brambles filled my eyes; the brothels had been reduced to ashes, and the beauties to dust” refers to the black present, the time of the Qing. In his text, the courtesans of Qinhuai district become the symbol of the brilliant past, the Ming dynasty. Now the beautiful buildings and beauties exist only in his memory, and he has no choice but to record what he had seen and heard and weave these writings together. It was quite dangerous to state that everything had been bright under the Ming and that everything was dark in the time of the Qing. Like Mao Xiang, his mind was on romantic moments in the past, and he used romance as an expression of political sentiments, but he took more risks than Mao. Miscellaneous Records of the Plank Bridge includes a biography of Ge Nen 葛嫩, a Qinhuai courtesan who was devoted to the Ming dynasty and died as a result. She had been a concubine of Sun Kexian 孫克咸. When the dynastic change of 1644 occurred, Sun moved his family to Yunjian 雲間 [Songjiang 松江 in Jiangsu]. When he entered Fujian along the way to his new quarters, he was appointed to take charge of military affairs for Supervisory Inspector Yang Wencong 楊文驄. Sun was defeated in battle, seized and bound, together with Ge Nen. The Manchu general dispatched her with his own sword. When Sun saw her die in defense of chastity, he laughed aloud and

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said: “Today Sun the Third ascends to the realm of the Immortals!” He too was killed, on a day in which Yang Wencong and his two sons sacrificed their lives for the nation. 甲申之變、移家雲間、間道入閩、授監中丞楊文驄軍事。兵 敗被執、并縛嫩。主將欲犯之。嫩大罵、嚼舌磼、含血噴其面。將手刃之。 克咸見嫩抗節死、乃大笑曰、孫三今日登仙矣。亦被殺。中丞父子三人同 日殉難。(板橋雜記, 卷中) 31

This was a very audacious statement as far as the Qing government was concerned. In Miscellaneous Records of the Plank Bridge, reporting on courtesans is closely connected with reporting on the Ming dynasty. The disappearance of beautiful buildings and ladies was equivalent to the disappearance of Yu’s own political dream of being an official under the Ming. 32

6 In 1680, Mao Xiang’s seventieth birthday party was held, and many friends of his wrote in celebration. 33 Yu Huai was among them. Yu Huai’s preface begins by relating the history of his friendship with Mao. They first became acquainted around 1640 when Yu was a secretary of Grand Marshal Fan Jingwen. In the preface, Yu recalled their political activities (impeachment of Ruan Dacheng) and their high spirits and self-confidence. In the provisional government in Nanjing after the fall of the Ming, Ruan Dacheng held real power and persecuted those who had accused him. Mao Xiang and Yu Huai were among Ruan’s accusers, and they were nearly arrested and punished. They next met in Suzhou in 1677. I could have never imagined we would have a chance to meet again under the new dynasty. Thinking about past and present, I feel deep regret. After the change of dynasties, Mr. Chaomin [Mao Xiang] fell into a series of difficulties, while I, losing my property and home, led a vagabond life in my later years. I believe it was quite lucky that we could meet again under such difficult

————— 31. Ibid., p.55. 32. Wai-yee Li, “The Late Ming Courtesan: Invention of a Cultural Ideal,” in Writing Women in Late Imperial China, ed. Ellen Widmer and Kang-i Sun Chang (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997), pp. 46–73. Li discusses writings on late Ming courtesans from the point of view of cultural nostalgia. 33. Tongren ji, 2.24a–47a.

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circumstances. 豈知異代之後、我兩人復持面目相見。撫今追昔、痛定思痛、 豈不重可感哉。即易代之後、巢民屢經禍患、僅而得免、余亦破產喪家、 流離他郡。憂愁遲暮之年、我兩人猶得持面目相見、不可不謂之天幸也。34

Yu continued: Chaomin is always with beautiful ladies, and he supports actors and musicians. He loves beautiful gardens, flowers, and birds. He has a lot of calligraphy and paintings. He especially likes to entertain guests. With both the Shuihui an 水繪庵 and the Xiaosanwu 小三吾 gardens in his house, he is not satisfied unless he keeps guests for tens of days, drinking wine and composing poems. However, his companionship with beautiful ladies is not because of lasciviousness. His supporting of actors and musicians is not because of an obsession with music. His love of flowers, birds, gardens, wine, and poems is not for gaining a reputation. They are intended as compensation. In ancient times, when people felt anger or discontent, they used to find some tangible goods through which to express their feelings. Examples are the Lord of Xinling’s 信陵君 obsession with wine and ladies, Ji Shuye’s 嵇叔夜 [ Ji Kang 嵇康] metallurgy, Liu Xuande’s 劉玄德 [Liu Bei 劉備] friendships, Liu Bolun’s 劉伯倫 [Liu Ling 劉伶] shouldering a hoe, and Mi Yuanzhang’s 米元章 [Mi Fu 米芾] love of stones. Chaomin also expresses his feelings through his obsessions. 巢民生平多擁麗人、愛蓄聲樂、園林花鳥、法書名畫、充牣周旋。尤好賓 客、家有水繪庵小三吾。客至必留連數十日、飲酒賦詩、淋漓傾倒而後去、 有玉山清閟之風。然自我觀之、巢民之擁麗人、非漁於色也。蓄聲樂、非 淫於聲也。園林花鳥、飲酒賦詩、非縱酒泛交、買聲名於天下也。直寄焉 爾矣。古之人胸中有感憤無聊不平之氣、必寄之一事一物、以發洩其堙曖、 如信陵君之飲醇酒、近婦人、嵇叔夜之鍛、劉玄德之結託、劉伯倫之鍤、 米元章之拜石、皆是也。巢民寄意於此、著為詩歌、盈篇累帙、使天下後 世、讀其書、想見其人、即以為信陵元章何不可者。 35

Here Yu articulated my main point about Mao. Mao Xiang’s love of women and the aesthetic life were more than the pleasures of an idle man. They were a kind of compensatory activity. Yu Huai himself asserted that his purpose in reporting on the courtesans of Qinhuai was to recall the Ming Dynasty. Both Yu and Mao had quite similar careers and tastes. Thus, it is quite natural that Yu Huai understood that Mao Xiang’s obsession with women was connected with his inability to realize his political dreams after the Manchu conquest. ————— 34. “Mao Chaomin xiansheng qishi shouxu” 冒巢民先生七十壽序, in Tongren ji, 2.42b. 35. Ibid.

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The Qinhuai district burned in the early Qing, and nothing remained of it. And prostitution was strictly prohibited in the early Qing. Thus the courtesans of Qinhuai became a symbol of the Ming dynasty for both Mao and Yu. Han Tan’s comment about the last “romantic yimin” emerged from this background.

Between Worlds Huang Zhouxing’s Imaginary Garden

7 Ellen Widmer The life of Huang Zhouxing 黃周星 (1611–80) yields much insight into the ramifications of the fall of the Ming. As a loyalist who delayed suicide—in his words, “stole life” (tousheng 偷生)—until 1680, he helps demonstrate how Ming “remnants” weathered the early Qing. As a man who supported himself through teaching, writing, and seal carving, he illuminates the realities of earning a living through such activities. As a creator of an escapist, utopian fantasy, he provides insight into how fictionality and loyalism might be intertwined. These three themes can be used to introduce his life story, and they connect him to fellow Ming loyalist writers, such as Dong Yue 董說 (1620–86), Wang Qi 汪淇 (fl. 1630–70), and Chen Chen 陳 忱 (1614?–66+). Other prominent writers of the time, such as Li Yu 李漁 (1610–80), Zhang Chao 張潮 (1650–1707+), and You Tong 尤侗 (1618–1704), also interacted with Huang. The imaginary garden Jiangjiu yuan 將就園, which figures prominently in Huang’s writings, has a bearing on all three themes. It provided solace after the fall of the Ming, it was the inspiration for several popular writings, and it illuminates the link between loyalism and fictionality. At the same time, Jiangjiu yuan transcends the specifics of the life and concerns that led to its creation. Detached from the loyalist context, Huang’s garden pieces look back as far as Chuci 楚辭 to earlier musings on fictionality and identity and anticipate writings later in the Qing.

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Huang’s Life and Literary Concerns At first glance, Huang’s life follows familiar Ming loyalist lines. These are detailed in a biography by his friend Ye Mengzhu 葉夢珠 (b. 1624), which appears in Ye’s biji, Yueshi bian 閱世編. 1 Ye was one of the last of Huang’s loyalist friends to see him alive. 2 Huang was twenty-three when he passed the juren (1633) and thirty when he received the jinshi degree (1640). When the Ming collapsed in 1644, Huang served briefly in the financial office during the short-lived Hongguang 弘光 regime in Nanjing. After the fall of this regime, Huang withdrew from public life altogether. Friends offered to find him employment under the Qing, but he declined. A year or two spent roaming the mountains of Fujian gave way to more settled habits and to the seal carving, teaching, and publishing that would sustain him financially for the rest of his life. Having refused to serve the Qing and without an independent income, he had no alternative but to rely on his talents. Some of this activity took place in Huang’s home city, Nanjing, although he is known to have worked and lived with Hangzhou publisher Wang Qi during part of the 1660s. The local histories of Changsha (Hunan), Jiaxing and Nanxun (Zhejiang), Taiping and Sizhou (Anhui), and Nanjiang (Sichuan) reveal that he stopped long enough in each of these places to be listed as a temporary sojourner. 3 Another region in his background was Huguang (Hubei), the ancestral home of the Zhous, his adoptive family, whose surname he eventually added to the Xing 星 that had been his original given name. The surname Huang was that of his natural parents, from Nanjing. After the death of his father, the clan had him adopted out, and he assumed a new surname and place of residence (Huguang). Later, when the Huangs found out that he was a jinshi and an official of the Hongguang regime, they reclaimed him. The chief point of interest in this story lies in Zhouxing’s sympathy for his natal family, who still lacked ————— 1. Ye Mengzhu 葉夢珠, Yueshi bian 閱世編 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1981), pp. 104–8. 2. Zhang Huijian 張慧劍, Ming Qing Jiangnan wenren nianbiao 明清江南文人 年表 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1986), p. 818. 3. Zhao Jingshen 趙景深 and Zhang Zengyuan 張增元, eds., Fangzhi zhulu Yuan Ming Qing qujia zhuanlüe 方志著錄元明清曲家傳略 (Beijing; Zhonghua shuju, 1987), pp. 176–80.

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a male heir, when they re-encountered him later in life. Emotional sincerity and generosity were touchstones of Huang’s life and career. The debt Huang felt to his real family is used by biographers to explain his failure to commit suicide in 1644 and his decision to “steal life” for thirty-five more years. 4 Said to be extremely straightforward and moral, he felt obligated to continue the Huang family line. It was not until 1667 and 1669, when he was fifty-seven and fifty-nine, that he finally had male children. Once they reached marriageable age, he saw no further reason to continue living. A contributing factor may have been a case of slander, apparently groundless, that arose in his final year. 5 According to at least one source, this same year was also marked by an invitation to take the Outstanding Scholars of Vast Learning (boxue hongci 博學宏詞) examination, which he declined. 6 One of his many style-names, Banfei daoren 半非道人, or Half-Absent Man of the Way, conveys his sense of living on borrowed time. His suicide, when it finally took place, was proclaimed the end for which he had longed for decades. After two attempts at drowning himself (both thwarted), he refused all food and drink and died in the summer of 1680, at the age of seventy sui. 7 The bare facts of this story do not convey Huang’s feelings of shame and sadness at “stealing life” under alien rule. He associated mainly with loyalists, men with whom such emotions could be shared. These associations appear to have required a considerable amount of travel, as the ————— 4. The issues of how and when a loyalist chose to die are explored in He Guanbiao [Ho Koonpiu], 何冠彪, Sheng yu si: Ming ji shidafu de jueze 生與死: 明季士大 夫的抉擇 (Taipei: Lianjing, 1997). I am grateful to Lynn Struve for her insights into the difference between immediate and delayed loyalist suicide. 5. Zhang Huijian, Ming Qing Jiangnan wenren nianbiao, p. 818. 6. Shanghai yishu yanjiusuo 上海藝述研究所 and Zhongguo xijujia xiehui, Shanghai fenhui 中國戲劇家協會上海分會, eds., Zhongguo xiqu quyi cidian 中國戲 曲曲藝詞典 (Shanghai: Cishu chubanshe, 1981), p. 271. 7. The biographical data are drawn mainly from Ye Mengzhu, Yueshi bian. See also Zhang Huijian, Ming Qing Jiangnan wenren nianbiao. There are many different versions of Huang’s death. See, e.g., Zhuang Yifu 莊一拂, ed., Gudian xiqu cunmu huikao 古典戲曲存目彙考 (Shanghai: Guji chubanshe, 1982), pp. 699–700. In this version, Huang died by drowning. According to some accounts, the date of death was the fifth day of the fifth month. See, e.g., Li Zunduan 李嶟瑞, “Fen yu gao” 焚餘稿, 4.1b, in Houpubian niangao 後圃編年稿 (1689–1730); copy in the Library of Congress. I am indebted to Allan Barr for pointing this source out to me. In my view, the version by Ye Mengzhu is more nuanced and more persuasive.

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individuals in question were quite far-flung. Some of these, such as Dong Yue, Xu Song 徐崧 (1617–90), Xu Fang 徐芳 (1619–71), Lü Liuliang 呂留良 (1629–83), Deng Hanyi 鄧漢儀 (1617–89), Gui Zhuang 歸莊 (1613–73), and Jiang Cai 姜埰 (1607–73), were nationally famous intellectuals, 8 whereas others like the Hangzhou merchant/publisher Wang Qi were known more for their commercial involvement. Forty years his junior, Zhang Chao was another of Huang’s important acquaintances. Too young to be a loyalist in the traditional sense, Zhang was sympathetic to loyalists, and his collections, Yu Chu xinzhi 虞初 新志 (preface dated 1683, postface 1700), Zhaodai congshu 昭代叢書 (1697), and Tanji congshu 檀几叢書 (1697; coedited with Wang Zhuo 王晫), contain many of their writings. Huang and Zhang exchanged letters during Huang’s final years, and Wang Zhuo is the subject of Huang’s Xihua bao 惜花報, a zaju of uncertain date. Its contents are discussed in more detail below. A second means of understanding Huang’s life is in terms of his struggle to support himself. In its connection to market forces and to survival, this aspect of his life runs somewhat counter to his loyalist side. Huang’s talents as a seal carver were widely recognized, and his services were much sought after. In addition, many people wished to study literature with him; yet he was often unable to make ends meet and had to depend on the kindness of friends. One reason for his poverty was the seemingly senseless acts of charity he performed toward those still needier than he. As we will see, the thinking behind ————— 8. Huang’s relationships with Xu Song and Xu Fang are mentioned in Zhang Huijian, Ming Qing Jiangnan wenren nianbiao. For his rich correspondence with Lü Liuliang, see Wang Qi 汪淇 and Xu Shijun 徐士俊, eds., Chidu xinyu 尺牘新語, first collection (Fenlei 分類 Chidu xinyu; 1663), second collection (Chidu xinyu erbian 二編; 1667), and third collection (Chidu xinyu guangbian 廣編; 1668). A first edition of the first collection is held in the Nanjing Library; of the second collection in the Beijing University Library; and of the third collection in the Zhejiang Library. Huang’s preface to Jiang’s Jingting ji 敬 亭 集 is mentioned in Wang Zhongmin 王重民, Zhongguo shanbenshu tiyao 中國善本書提要 (Shanghai: Guji chubanshe, 1983), supplement, p. 21. His work on Deng Hanyi’s Shiguan 詩觀 is noted in the edition held in the Naikaku bunko. Shi guan chuji 詩觀初集, an important collection of men’s and women’s poetry, came out in 1672. See Gui Zhuang, Gui Zhuang ji 歸莊集 (Shanghai: Guji chubanshe, 1984), p. 438, for an entry about Huang entitled “Shu Huang Zhouxing shi” 書黃周星事. This source mentions that Gui used to get together often with Huang in Jiaxing. I am indebted to Joanna Handlin Smith for alerting me to this account.

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such acts is related to the state of mind from which Jiang jiu yuan emerged. This verse from a poem by You Tong portrays him at age sixty. It suggests some of the precariousness of life under the conditions of employment available to Huang. Today already a respected elder. Thirty years ago a resplendent jinshi. In his old age, he became a teacher in a remote village, His hermit’s cap now inverted as he fills up on coarse food. 9

如今已是古先生 三十年前雁塔名 老向荒村作教授 角巾顛倒飽藜羹

Initially conceived as means of supporting himself, Huang’s various endeavors led to a certain measure of fame. Although he regarded his seal carving as a minor skill (xiao ji 小技), his achievements have been noted by modern art historians. 10 Huang was also known as a teacher whose commitment to students was deep and altruistic. Even when his own resources were extremely limited, he refused students’ gifts of food unless he felt he deserved them. He was also famous for the diligence with which he corrected the poems of those who sought his help, “striving for greatest excellence before he stopped” 務俾盡善而止. 11 Undertaken in the spirit of “nurturing his integrity” ( yang lian 養廉), 12 Huang’s writings were probably at least as lucrative as his teaching. Details of the early decades are hard to come by, but we know that he lived intermittently in Hangzhou during the 1660s, working on several major projects with the publisher Wang Qi. Together these two produced one of the most famous editions of Xiyou ji, Xiyou zhengdao shu 西遊證道書 of 1663, for which Huang wrote all or most of the commentary. Additionally, he is the likely author of the novel’s Chapter 9, which was new with this edition. This chapter, which fills in the life of the monk Sanzang, has become an accepted part of the novel as it is known today. Huang worked with Wang on several other projects, most notably a collection of letters, Chidu xinyu 尺牘新語, which was ————— 9. Kanyun caotang ji 看雲草堂集, 6.5a–6a (Changzhou: You shi, 1662), copy in Harvard Yenching Library. 10. Yu Jianhua 俞劍華, Zhongguo meishujia renming cidian 中國美術家人名 辭典 (Shanghai: Renmin yishu chubanshe, 1981), p. 1144. 11. Ye Mengzhu, Yueshi bian, pp. 105–6. 12. Ibid., p. 106.

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published in three sets in 1663, 1667, and 1668. 13 After the final collection was published, Wang Qi retired and returned to Huizhou, his hometown. Huang probably moved to Nanxun, Zhejiang, soon after this project’s end. To loyalists like Lü Liuliang of Zhejiang, Huang’s stint in Hangzhou was financially motivated. A poem written by Lü for Huang refers to the books he wrote for Wang as “conforming to popular taste” (xiesu shu 諧俗書) and implies that Huang’s connection with a certain Hangzhou publisher was all about money. 14 Huang’s name is always subordinated to Wang’s in their joint publications, but the collaboration may well have contributed to his contemporary fame. During the next decade, if not earlier, Huang turned out a number of publications under his own name. These were perceived as fresh and original, both attributes of great concern to Huang. One example is the wenyan story “Bu Zhang Ling Cui Ying he zhuan” 補張靈崔塋合傳, whose subject is an ill-fated love affair between the mid-Ming scholar Zhang Ling 張靈 (1497–1531) and an imaginary beauty. According to his preface, Huang used material that had previously circulated in the oral tradition for this story. The tale enjoyed an extensive afterlife in theater, tanci, and other popular literature. 15 We do not know how it first reached its audience—whether it was initially published as a single composition or made its debut in Zhang Chao’s Yu Chu xinzhi. 16 In ————— 13. I have written more extensively on the collaboration between Wang and Huang in “The Huanduzhai of Hangzhou and Suzhou: A Study in SeventeenthCentury Publishing,” Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 56, no. 1 ( June 1996): 77–122. For more on Chidu xinyu, see note 8 to this chapter. 14. See Widmer, “The Huanduzhai of Hangzhou and Suzhou,” p. 87. The lines in question read: 聞道新修諧俗書，文章賣買價何如? 15. For chuanqi versions, see Zhuang Yifu, Gudian xiqu cunmu huikao, pp. 1363, 1487. For tanci, see Tan Zhengbi 譚正璧 and Tan Xun 譚尋, Tanci xulu 彈詞敘錄 (Shanghai: Guji chubanshe, 1981), pp. 35, 180–82. According to a personal note from Wu Xiaoling 吳曉鈴 that I received in the 1980s, the story also appears in baojuan 寶卷, Chaozhou ge 潮州歌, and Wenzhou guci 溫州鼓詞. See also Tan Zhengbi 譚正壁 and Tan Xun 譚尋, Muyu ge, Chaozhou ge xulu 木魚歌潮州歌敘錄 (Beijing: Shumu wenxian chubanshe, 1982), p. 162. 16. The preface of Yu Chu xinzhi is dated 1683; the postface 1700. See the edition in Peking University Library. Huang’s story appears in this collection. The source given is Huang’s posthumous collection Xiaweitang bieji 夏為堂別集, which is held in the Beijing Library. Xiaweitang bieji’s preface is dated 1688. Note that a second collection, Xiaweitang ji, is also in the Beijing Library. It has the same editor and preface date but differs in some respects. For example, Rentian le appears in the

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any event, new versions were generated throughout the Qing. Of particular interest for our purposes are Huang’s Jiang jiu yuan [hua] ji 將就 園畫記 of 1674 and the drama Rentian le 人天樂 of 1675. 17 Both are discussed below. These are the most centrally concerned with the imaginary garden, although others of Huang’s writings take up the garden theme. We know from Ye Mengzhu’s account that Huang’s writings were much in demand: “The moment he would finish, they were bought by booksellers and published, thus entering circulation” 脫稿後每為坊刻 購去梓以行示. 18 By means of this output, Huang built up a reputation, such that “people revered his name as if he were an extraordinary man of the past” 海內仰公名如慕上古異人. 19 Those who met him were said to be awestruck and often failed to perceive his total lack of guile. According to the literatus Li Zunduan 李嶟瑞 (fl. 1671), “Whether a person knew him or not, there was no one who did not esteem his integrity and admire him” 識與不識莫不高其界節而慕之. 20 After Huang’s death, Li gathered Huang’s writings in the hopes of creating a literary legacy for a man he had much admired. Several other contemporaries reinforce Ye’s comment about the profound impression Huang could make on those who knew him only by reputation. A letter to Huang by the celebrated woman writer Wu Shan 吳山 reports that word of Huang reached her even behind the closed doors of the women’s quarters. 21 His long poem about West Lake, “Hushang chunyu” 湖上春雨, in twelve stanzas, 22 filled her ————— second but not the first of these collections. Xiaweitang ji must be a later version of Xiaweitang bieji. Its date of publication is 1834. 17. For the dates of these two works, see Zhang Huijian, Ming Qing Jiangnan wenren nianbiao, pp. 781, 784. Ye Mengzhu (Yueshi bian) uses the term Jiang jiu yuan huaji for Jiang jiu yuan ji. Huang’s own references to the work use the title Jiang jiu yuan ji. Maps of the garden can be found in Huang’s collected works Xiaweitang bieji, held in the Beijing Library (see Fig. 1). 18. Ye Mengzhu, Yueshi bian, p. 107. 19. Ibid. 20. Li Zunduan, “Fen yu gao.” 21. For more on Wu, see Kang-i Sun Chang and Haun Saussy, eds., Women Writers of Traditional China: An Anthology of Poetry and Criticism (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1999), pp. 383–86. 22. The poem does not, to my knowledge, survive. Many of Huang’s works were lost in bandit attacks and other misadventures. On the attacks by bandits, see

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imagination with thoughts of beauties, scholars, heroes, and spirits. She noted, as well, that she had long been aware of his talents as a seal carver and poet. She compared him favorably to writers of the Qin and Han, yet ended by apologizing for her breach of decorum in approaching him with her praise. 23 On a different occasion, Huang wrote a pair of poems to Wu. 24 Younger by some forty years, Zhang Chao is another who knew of Huang by reputation before he met him. A poem to Huang looks back many years to Zhang’s purchase of Chidu xinyu in a book market: To my elder Huang [Zhouxing], In writing and learning you are always my teacher. I remember buying Chidu in a book market, The New Collection, the Enlarged Collection, in all several volumes. Whenever I read a letter in them by you, Your profound ideas and high-minded words animate the page. 25

九煙先生老前輩 文 章才藝皆吾師 憶昔書林買尺牘 新編廣編若干軸 就中每讀先生文 奧義高辭動盈幅

Very likely, Zhang had not yet met Huang when he made this purchase. The poem goes on to detail Zhang’s impressions of Huang’s later writings and to talk about an impending visit between them. Since the last collection of Chidu xinyu appeared in 1668, this would situate their first meeting during or after that year. The two apparently first met face-to-face when Huang approached Zhang about finding a publisher for his anthology of Tang poems, Tangshi kuai 唐詩快. The level of reverence in Zhang’s letter supports Ye Mengzhu’s view that contemporaries were overwhelmed by Huang. 26 ————— Zhuang Yifu, Gudian xiqu cunmu huikao, pp. 699–700. This source is incorrect when it says that his two zaju do not survive. They are found in Xiaweitang bieji. 23. Chidu xinyu, 3: 24.1b–2a. 24. Gu Youxiao 顧有孝, ed., Lizhuji 驪珠集 (n.d.), 3.12a. Original in Academy of Sciences Library, Beijing. The poem is dated 1649. See also Huang Zhouxing, Zhou Jiuyan ji 周九煙集, ed. and pub. Tang Zhaolian 唐昭儉 (1853), 1.14b. 25. Zhang Chao 張潮, Xinzhai shiji 心齋詩集, in Ming jia shichao 名家詩鈔 (n.d.; original in Beijing Library), 8a. 26. Zhang’s three letters to Huang are found in Zhang’s Chidu oucun 尺牘偶存, juan 1. Chidu oucun was published in 1684, along with a companion volume Chidu yousheng 尺牘友聲. The latter volume contains letters from friends to Zhang. Huang has four letters in juan 1 of the companion volume. A copy of the set is held in the Library of Congress.

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There is other evidence of Zhang’s regard for Huang. Some versions of Jiang jiu yuan ji carry a preface and colophon by Zhang, probably initially written for Zhaodai congshu of 1697. 27 (Although censored, Zhaodai congshu was reprinted in 1833.) 28 Zhaodai congshu, Yu Chu xinzhi, and Tanji congshu contain seven texts by Huang all told. Zhang’s relationship to Huang’s work may be contrasted with Wang Qi’s in several ways. Wang employed Huang to work on Wang’s own projects and provided him with a means of making a living; Zhang focused on writings Huang had already completed and helped him find ways to preserve his works. It is unlikely that Huang would have left a literary legacy based only on what he published with Wang, but Zhang was clearly instrumental in developing a lasting reputation for Huang. Jiang jiu yuan ji’s inclusion in Zhaodai congshu meant that it was accessible to readers throughout much of the Qing. Rentian le’s publication was a little different. Apparently circulated commercially in the first instance, it was republished in Huang’s collected works Xiaweitang ji 夏為堂記 (preface dated 1688) 29 and later reprinted in the modern collection Guben xiqu congkan 古本戲曲叢刊. I have found no record of Rentian le’s performance. It may have been written as a desktop drama, to be read rather than performed. In Zhiqu zhiyu 製曲枝語, Huang’s preface to Rentian le, he discusses principles of drama writing. This essay was reprinted in Zhaodai congshu and thus circulated far more widely than Rentian le. Huang was never wealthy, but his ability to support himself through writing can be combined with evidence from the life of Li Yu to show that there was a market for entertaining writings during the early Qing. Indeed, Li Yu’s experience parallels Huang’s in several respects, not only in the nearly exact coincidence of their life spans but also in their common emphasis on originality in writing. 30 The relative accessibility ————— 27. See Zhou Jiuyan ji (1894), juan 2. See also Zhaodai congshu, juan 3. 28. On censorship, see Okamoto Sae 岡本さえ, Shindai kinsho no kenkyū 清代 禁書の研究 (Tokyo: Tōkyō daigaku, Tōyō bunka kenkyūjo, 1996), p. 622. On reprinting, see Shanghai tushuguan 上海圖書錧, Zhongguo congshu zonglu 中國 叢書縱錄 (Shanghai: Guji chubanshe, 1986), 1: 71. 29. Much of this collection was published by Huang himself in 1656, with the financial help of friends. See Xiaweitangshi lüeke 夏為堂詩略刻; original in Nanjing Library. 30. On Li Yu’s inventiveness, see Patrick Hanan, The Invention of Li Yu (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1988).

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of some of Huang’s writings to a popular readership is another point in common. Like Li, Huang depended on sales for some of his income; hence it made sense for him to write in fresh and easily comprehended ways. The broad range of Huang’s writings is another similarity. Huang’s surviving works include numerous accounts of his own dreams, two zaju and one chuanqi drama, narratives of mountain travel, several short stories in classical Chinese, and an anthology of Tang poems. Li’s writings similarly covered a wide range of genres. 31 Huang’s work of drama criticism, Zhiqu zhiyu, may have been inspired in part by Li’s Xianqing ouji 閑情偶記 of 1671. 32 In any event, it mentions Li by name. Even the amusing tone of Li’s work is paralleled in the apparently playful spirit in which Huang’s writings were conceived. Readers seemed to enjoy this playfulness, even when it struck his friends as masking considerable pain. It is interesting, finally, that Li Yu and Wang/Huang used the same illustrator, Hu Nianyi 胡念翊. 33 Yet Li Yu was not a Ming loyalist, and the issues of fictionality and identity that preoccupied Huang seldom interested him. 34 After loyalism and publishing, Huang’s writings on utopia constitute a third theme around which his life can be organized and linked to larger trends. Utopian in spirit, Jiang jiu yuan is the subject of the prose piece Jiang jiu yuan ji. Other prose pieces, such as the short sketch Yudanyue song 鬱單越頌, take up the garden, as does the chuanqi drama Rentian le. As a literatus, Huang might have owned a private garden had he been wealthy. Jiang jiu yuan ji is Huang’s attempt to create in words the space he was too poor to actually possess. It begins with a provocative statement: “Since ancient times, gardens have been transmitted by men, but men have also been transmitted by gardens” 自古園以人傳人亦以 園 傳 . This playful beginning hints at Huang’s yearning for fame ————— 31. Among other genres, essays, drama, poetry, short stories, and a novel; see ibid. 32. Huang referred to Li’s work several times in his writings. See, e.g., Zhiqu zhiyu, where he praised Li’s dramas; and a letter in Chidu xinyu (3: 22.6a–b), where he used one of Li’s short stories to make a point about how fate can be changed. 33. See Li’s Liweng chuanqi shizhong 笠翁傳奇十種 and Wang Qi and Huang’s Xiyou zhengdao shu of 1663. See also Wang’s Lüzu quanzhuan 呂祖全傳 of 1662, introduced below. It, too, has illustrations by Hu. 34. Wai-yee Li, Enchantment and Disenchantment: Love and Illusion in Chinese Literature (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993), p. 155.

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through writing, a theme articulated more clearly in the preface to Rentian le. Jiangjiu yuan ji describes the garden in great detail. As vividly imagined by Huang, Jiangjiu yuan is two separate gardens, surrounded by mountains. The two gardens are connected by a bridge but are not always accessible to each other, since the gates separating them are sometimes closed (see Fig. 1). Other than Huang himself, the master of the pair of gardens, the inhabitants include beautiful women and students who have come to study there. The compound also contains shrines to Lord Guan 關夫子 and the Daoist saint Lü Dongbin 呂洞賓. 35 All the inhabitants are unusually virtuous, and the garden itself is calmer and cleaner than the rest of the world. Jiang jiu yuan ji ends by asserting, to an audience of imaginary guests, Huang’s satisfaction that he is no longer garden-less. Rentian le builds on the ideas developed in Jiangjiu yuan ji. The hero, Xuanyuan Zai 軒轅載, is introduced as a virtuous man who has missed the opportunity to give expression to his talent and has been sad all his life as a result. In other respects, too, Xuanyuan Zai is an autobiographical character. He is given to charitable deeds, even when he cannot afford them; he is interested in double surnames and adoption; he has worked in popular literature; he had two sons very late in life, and he is the author of a work called Jiangjiu yuan ji. In the first half of the drama, the action alternates between two theaters. The first is earth, on which the hero practices his good deeds and tries to convert those around him to virtue. The second is the Buddhist utopia of Beijulu zhou 北俱廬洲 (also known as Yudanyue 鬱單越), where there is no distinction between poor and rich, food and clothing are abundant, men and women enjoy equal status, pregnancy requires only eight days, nursing takes place through the finger, and maturation is accomplished in a week’s time. Another comfort is that death comes only after a thousand years. In the second half of the drama, the hero is able to see this land for himself. This encounter takes place after a series of conversations with heavenly beings, mostly carried out in dreams or divination, in which his goodness and talent are ————— 35. Lü Dongbin, one of eight Daoist saints, is known for closing his home and disappearing during the rebellion of Huang Chao 黃巢 during the Tang dynasty. This parallel to Huang Zhouxing’s situation as a loyalist may be one reason Lü became such an object of interest for Huang.

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Fig. 1 Illustrations of the Jiangjiu yuan (from Jiangjiu yuan ji, in Xiaweitang bieji; copy in the Beijing Library).

recognized. In the end, he becomes even happier than the residents of Beijulu zhou. This is because the God of Literature (Wenchang dijun 文昌帝君) builds him his own Jiangjiu garden on Mount Kunlun, which is situated somewhere in the sky above Beijulu zhou. His family joins him there, and he is honored to meet his Daoist hero, Lü Dongbin, now an admirer of Jiangjiu yuan ji. Whereas Jiangjiu yuan ji only briefly mentions Lü as an object of worship, Rentian le develops the fantasy of Lü’s involvement in the garden far more extensively. Lü is a character in the drama; he has read Jiangjiu yuan ji, and he aims to settle in the garden after it is built on Mount Kunlun. Not only that, he likes the drama so much that he agrees to write a preface for it. The preface was printed with the first edition of the play. Lü is naturally highly approving of Xuanyuan Zai and the good deeds he aims to perform.

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Fig. 1, cont. Illustrations of the Jiangjiu yuan: the Jiang yuan.

The themes of loyalism and imaginary worlds connect to the garden in the details of Huang’s death. As recounted in Ye Mengzhu’s biography, Huang’s final poem (“Jietui yin” 解蛻吟), written just before his several attempts at suicide, contains the following stanza: In vain for seventy years have I crossed a sea of bitterness. My writings, my honor, have all been for naught. Buoyed by Daoist winds, I laughingly take my leave this morning. I may not ascend in flight, yet my destination is still Heaven. 36

————— 36. Ye Mengzhu, Yueshi bian, p. 108.

苦海空過七十年 文章節義總徒然 今朝笑逐罡風去 縱不飛升也上天

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Fig. 1, cont. Illustrations of the Jiangjiu yuan: the Jiu yuan.

According to Ye Mengzhu, not long before this, a Shanghai diviner had conjured up an image of Lü Dongbin, who conveyed the news from Heaven that Huang’s name headed a registry of eight hundred Daoist immortals. Word of this was soon reported to Huang. Ye concluded his biography by wondering whether Jiangjiu yuan ji and Rentian le should be seen as divinely inspired omens, or whether Huang himself had a premonition of the future when he devised their otherworldly themes. Whereas the fact of Huang’s death makes perfect sense in a Ming loyalist context, the way it took place directs us back to the imaginary world of the garden and its relationship to loyalism, publishing, and immortality. Simply put, the happiness promised by the garden and its heavenly surroundings function as the antidote to Ming loyalist pain. Huang’s preface to Rentian le articulates the point clearly. 37 Here he ————— 37. The preface is found in the reprint of the original edition of the play in Guben xiqu congkan 古本戲曲叢刊; on which, see Zhuang Yifu, Gudian xiqu cun-

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explains that he has loved literature all his life but has, of late, become more interested in the world of spirits. His decision to write a drama ties into his need to support himself through writing. As recounted in this preface, Rentian le was motivated by Huang’s hope of reaching a broad audience. In contrast to higher levels of literature, which are easily forgotten, dramas such as Xixiang ji are so famous that even women and children can quote from them long after the death of the author. Huang is ultimately hopeful that particularly skilled readers will hear of him first through his drama and then turn to his “higher” writings. Yet even if this does not happen, the “immortality” provided by his popular readership has value. In the first place, it satisfies his craving for recognition. Second, Xuanyuan Zai’s good deeds will inspire readers to emulate him. This emphasis on spreading goodness through popular literature is also found in Huang’s commentary to Xiyou zhengdao shu. 38 Because of its power to inspire goodness in others, Rentian le becomes Huang’s ticket to a more literal kind of immortality. This power to inspire is one of the reasons that Lü Dongbin and others are willing to take note of the work. Thus, what at first glance appears as a rather playful drama, perhaps commercially motivated, turns out to have a serious purpose: to establish the author as unusually good and talented and to compensate for his ruined life in the human world. Dong Yue wrote of the related work Yudanyue song: “Those who do not know think [Huang Zhouxing] is being playful, but I know how grief stricken he is” 不知者以九煙居士為遊戲而余知其悲. 39 By this he meant that Huang’s playful fantasy of life after death was a response to the highly unsatisfactory conditions of his real life. In Huang’s case, being a Ming loyalist meant many sorts of discomfort, not the least of which was the lingering dream of the successful political career that might have been. Another was the condescension of contemporaries who had adjusted to the new reality and saw his proud loyalism as odd. This is implied in Xuanyuan Zai’s complaint that he was generally despised on earth, despite his superior ————— mu huikao, pp. 1191–92. It is also found in Xiaweitang ji. For a modern reprint of all the prefaces to the drama, see Cai Yi 蔡毅, Zhongguo gudian xiqu xuba huibian 中國 古典戲曲序跋彙編 ( Ji’nan: Jilu shushe, 1989), pp. 1486–93. 38. See the commentary to Chapter 100. The original of this text is found in the Naikaku bunko and the Beijing Library. 39. Dong’s preface is found in Xiaweitang bieji.

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virtues. Sadly, only Heaven knows how good he really is. 40 Yet even some of Huang’s loyalist contemporaries appear to have been startled by the fervor of his conviction that goodness would lead him to Lü Dongbin. Ye Mengzhu’s comments about Huang’s final poem convey the incredulity, even derision, of Huang’s acquaintances at his ability to convince himself of “illusions” (huan 幻) of this kind. 41 Huang himself was well aware of the skepticism of many of his contemporaries. A letter to Wang Qi begins, “As for the way of the spirits, many men today think of it as ridiculous 神仙一道世人多以為荒唐. 42 Ye and other contemporaries resolved their doubts about Huang by imposing a more Confucian reading on the situation: only loyal and pious (zhong, xiao 忠孝) individuals could receive Daoist honors of the sort Huang claimed. 43 Doubts may also have been provoked by Huang’s decision to become an occultist ( fangshi 方士) during his final years, 44 a term that may refer to his habit of making divinations. 45 Yet no effort was made to obscure Huang’s interest in spirits in Xiaweitang[bie] ji 夏為堂 別集, some of which was published during Huang’s lifetime, the rest of which came out eight years after the death of the author, under the editorship of his son. 46 Huang would certainly not have protested Ye Mengju’s Confucian reading of his utopian fantasy. On the contrary, his hero Xuanyuan Zai proudly practices virtues from all three of the major religions. 47 But a less intellectualized reading is also possible. As will become apparent shortly, Wang Qi would have understood Huang’s death more straightforwardly, in terms of the Daoist faith that he and Huang shared. 48 Also not to be discounted is Huang’s complex understanding of the truth of literary illusion. This, too, is explored below. Huang need not have taken his garden as a literal reality in order for it to provide shelter from a hostile world. The name Jiangjiu yuan, which on one level im————— 40. See, e.g., Rentian le, scene 30. I use the text in Xiaweitang bieji. 41. Ye Mengzhu, Yueshi bian, p. 108. 42. Chidu xinyu, 1: 21.3b. 43. Ye Mengzhu, Yueshi bian, p. 108. 44. Li Zunduan, “Fen yu gao.” 45. Huang wrote about his divinations in such places as Xianji jilüe 仙乩紀略, which is reprinted in Xiaweitang bieji. 46. For more on Huang’s collected writings, see notes 16 and 29. 47. Scene 17. 48. Xu Shijun noted this shared devotion in an editorial comment; see Chidu xinyu, 1: 21.3b.

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plies a makeshift arrangement, can also be read to mean “the garden to which I will go.” In the second reading lies a hint that Huang’s invented garden was to be his residence after death.

Contemporary Influences Jiangjiu yuan ji and Rentian le were not created in a vacuum. The Ming loyalist writer Dong Yue was an important source of inspiration for Huang’s imaginary world. Surviving records give ample evidence that he and Huang were friends. Poems by both men dating from 1671 establish that the two were in direct contact by that time, and it is clear that this is just the most easily datable moment in a much longer friendship. Because Dong resided in Nanxun, Zhejiang, a township Huang frequented during his final years, they could easily have met face to face during the 1670s. 49 And a note by Dong to an undated poem observes that Huang was especially taken with Zhaoyang mengshi 昭陽 夢史, Dong’s short and somewhat obscure account of his dreams of 1643. 50 Dong’s preface to Huang’s Yudanyue song makes a similar connection, claiming that this work was Huang’s answer to Dong’s work. 51 This preface appears in the version of Huang’s collected works that came out under his own editorship in 1656. 52 Added together, this evidence establishes that the two were friends for three decades, if not longer. We also know that Huang asked Dong to write a preface to Jiangjiu yuan ji, a request Dong parried by turning out a critical appreciation of the garden. 53 Finally, another undated poem by Dong ————— 49. Huang’s suicide took place in Nanxun. See Zhang Huijian, Ming Qing Jiangnan wenren nianbiao, p. 818. Further, his autobiographical character Xuanyuan Zai identifies himself as a resident of Jiaxing. Jiaxing prefecture contains Nanxun zhen. Also see Liu Fu劉復, “Xiyou bu zuozhe Dong Ruoyu zhuan” 西遊 補作者董若雨傳, appended to Xiyou bu西遊補 (Beijing: Zuojia chubanshe, 1955), pp. 48–49. See also Huang’s collection Pu’an shiji 圃痷詩集, 2.21b–22a. This collection is held in the Seikado bunko. Huang’s poems to Dong and his sons are dated 1671. For more on Dong, see Frederick Brandauer, Tung Yueh (Boston: Twayne, 1978). 50. Dong Ruoyu shiwenji 董若雨詩文集 (Wuxing: Liushi Jiayetang, 1914), “Xihuang bian” 西荒編, 3a; copy in Harvard-Yenching Library. 51. Yudanyue song and its preface are also found in Xiaweitang bieji. It is one of several works taking the garden as its subject. Zhaoyang mengshi was, by Dong’s own description, a work of 1643. 52. See note 29. 53. Dong’s critical appreciation is reprinted in Xiaweitang bieji.

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mentions that Huang told him he was about to write a chuanqi drama on Beijulu zhou. 54 This certainly refers to Rentian le. 55 This evidence leaves no doubt that Dong and Huang were in conversation about Jiangjiu yuan in both its fictional and its dramatic forms and that the garden derives in part from their exchanges of ideas. In addition, Dong’s Zhaoyang mengshi anticipates some of Huang’s key literary themes. Although the issue of dynastic change is scarcely visible in this short history of dreaming, its timing is suggestive, coming just one year before the fall of the Ming. According to Dong, Huang’s favorite entry was one about a rainstorm when cloud characters formed in the sky. These were like white flowers when they first appeared and then changed to black fists. Before he could get a proper prognostication, a young man ran outside to celebrate the great event, but to Dong it was merely an “Ode on Return,” namely, an injunction to retire. Despite its indirection, this entry seems to firm up a connection between literary artistry and retirement in the face of dynastic change. The preface to Zhaoyang mengshi, which describes Dong’s dream visit to Mount Kunlun, is another common denominator between Dong’s work and Huang’s, in that Rentian le would later situate Jiangjiu yuan in the sky between Tibet and Xinjiang. Finally, Huang’s Mengxuan lüeke 夢選略刻, an undated record of his own dreams, can probably be taken as evidence of Zhaoyang mengshi’s strong impact on him. Whether by Dong or his father, Dong Sizhang 董斯張, as is sometimes argued, Xiyou bu 西遊補 (1640) may also have been an influence on Huang. 56 Its central preoccupation with sexual longing is not so much at issue in Huang’s garden writings, but its use of dreams to convey a message could have inspired Huang. 57 Moreover, Huang’s work on Xiyou zhengdao shu, especially the added Chapter 9, is likewise a supplement to Xiyou ji. ————— 54. Dong Ruoyu shiwen ji, “Xihuang bian,” 3b–4a. 55. An alternative name for Rentian le is Beijulu; see Zhuang Yifu, Gudian xiqu cunmu huikao, p. 1191. 56. For serious doubts about Dong’s authorship of Xiyou bu, see David Rolston, Traditional Chinese Fiction and Fiction Commentary: Reading and Writing Between the Lines (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997), p. 276. However, if the work was written by Dong’s father, as is suspected, one would need to decide why Dong would have claimed he wrote it in one of his poems. For more on Dong, see Liu Fu, “Xiyou bu zuozhe Dong Ruoyu zhuan.” 57. See the brief mention of Xiyou bu in Wai-yee Li, Enchantment and Disenchantment, p. 155.

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One other point links the two men’s views. The idea that poor people resort to dreaming to make up for deprivations is found in Dong’s Mengshe yue 夢社約, another work about dreams. Dong maintains that rich people do not dream, because dreaming implies wishing, and there would be nothing for them to dream of except what they do not have, namely, poverty and pain. If those who have everything were to dream of such things, their dreams would soon come true and they would be pained and poor. This is why only the poor dream. 58 Dong’s way of thinking is directly relevant to the rationale behind the creation of Rentian le: namely, as a poor man’s compensation for a life of unfulfilled desires. In Dong’s logic, an imaginary garden like Jiangjiu yuan could have been created only by someone like Huang who had suffered deprivations. Despite such signs of influence, there is still a large gap between Dong’s general interest in dreams and fantastic landscapes and the detailed elaboration of Jiangjiu yuan. For example, when Huang drew on popular religion to establish a correspondence between this-worldly merit and otherworldly reward, he departed from the themes of Zhaoyang mengshi and Xiyou bu. One way of accounting for this emphasis is to return to Huang’s relationship with Wang Qi, for it is quite clear that he and Wang shared a belief in the reality of the spirits, especially Lü Dongbin. Wang’s devotion to Lü found its fullest expression in his Lüzu quanzhuan 呂祖全傳 of 1662, a book of anecdotes about Lü. The book was motivated by Wang’s gratitude to Lü for rescuing him from life-threatening illness when he was a child. 59 Correspondence between Huang and Wang leaves no doubt of their shared interest in Lü. A letter from Huang to Wang, reprinted in 1663, shows that over a decade before Jiangjiu yuan ji was written Huang was already working out some of its ideas. This letter sets forth Huang’s view that there are three necessary conditions (more precisely, three “difficulties” 三難) that must be fulfilled (or overcome) before one can see spirits such as Lü. These are natural inclination (根器), meritorious ————— 58. Brandauer, Tung Yueh, p. 97. This ancient idea goes as far back as the Liezi; see Wai-yee Li, “Dreams of Interpretation in Early Chinese Historical and Philosophical Writings,” in Dream Cultures: Explorations in the Comparative History of Dreaming, ed. David Shulman and Guy G. Stroumsa (New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1999), p. 37. 59. Preface to Lüzu quanzhuan; original in Harvard Yenching Library.

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deeds (功行), and opportunity (機緣). 60 This argument is repeated in Rentian le, scene 32, in precisely the same terms. Wang may have been involved in the Buddhist side of Huang’s escapist fantasy as well. His preface to Section 18 of the first edition of Chidu xinyu concerns the Buddhist utopia Beijulu zhou, which it describes in the same terms used in Rentian le. Whether these ideas were initially Wang’s or Huang’s or came from another source, their expression in Chidu xinyu demonstrates further that by 1663, twelve years before Rentian le was written, Huang was already developing some of its themes. A comment to Wang’s letter by editor Xu Shijun asserts that Huang’s and Wang’s common interest in immortality was one basis of their friendship. This comment is confirmed by another letter from Huang to Wang in the same collection, which mentions how happy he is to have found in Wang a man who shares his belief in the spirits and in Lü Dongbin. 61 Together, these writings support a picture of two men whose beliefs in immortality drew them together and, at the same time, separated them from a number of elite contemporaries, who regarded such thinking as absurd. One final point of interest lies in Wang’s views on fiction and drama. Wang Qi is not known as a literary artist, but it is clear he was interested in fictionality, just as Huang Zhouxing was. His letter on the subject, to an unnamed friend, is worth quoting in detail: Wang [Siren] once said: “There are no lies in this world.” He meant that as soon as you tell a lie, it comes to be an accepted matter. For instance, Tang Xianzu’s dream plays are, for the most part, made up; but when he writes that Du Liniang dreams of Scholar Liu and dies, hasn’t she already come into existence? When he writes that Huo Xiaoyu meets the Yellow-Robed Knight and is reunited with her lover, hasn’t the Yellow-Robed Knight already come into existence? Yes, indeed, “there are no lies in this world!” The fiction and drama of today are all lies. . . .Take the characters in the best of them—it’s like hearing them with your own ears and seeing them with your own eyes, like sitting side by side and talking face to face, so that it seems if you call them, they’ll come out, or if you summon them, they’ll get up, so that if they laugh, there’s actually sound, and if they weep, there are actually tears. Readers today only

————— 60. Chidu xinyu, 1: 21.2b–3a. 61. Ibid., 1: 11.9a–b.

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realize how wonderful they are but don’t realize they are all lies. How remarkable that literary technique can reach such heights! 62

This depiction of the magic of literature could help to account for Wang’s and Huang’s shared belief in the reality of Lü Dongbin. Without insisting that they had lost track of what was realistically possible, we can still assert that they were greatly taken with the power of literary fantasy to conjure up “real” people and scenes. We know that Huang was a great reader of fiction and was greatly moved by it; You Tong reported, for example, that his rude home was papered with illustrations from Xixiang ji. 63 Wang’s observations on “lying” strengthen the possibility that Huang consciously took refuge in wish-fulfilling fictions even though he knew they were not real. The link between early Qing alienation, wish-fulfilling fantasy, and literary experimentation is clearly illustrated in the association of Huang and Wang. Chen Chen’s Shuihu houzhuan 水滸後傳 of 1664 is a third possible source of influence on Huang’s imaginary garden. The Houzhuan’s relevance to the topic is suggested more by personal connections than by obvious textual similarities. Chen was a Ming loyalist and a longtime resident of Nanxun. He and Huang shared friends, 64 although no surviving written materials link the two directly. Like Rentian le, Shuihu houzhuan is utopian, but its utopia differs in several important respects from Rentian le’s: it is situated not in Heaven, but in an idealized version of Siam; it has a different type of relationship to political repression, in that it provides refuge for a large cast of characters who could no longer stay in China because of their intense opposition to the politics of the Southern Song; it has nothing to do with merits accumulated through individual acts of goodness, such as those of Xuan————— 62. Ibid., 1: 3.10b–11a. The translation is based on that of Judith Zeitlin in Historian of the Strange: Pu Songling and the Chinese Classical Tale (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1993), p. 165, which, in turn, follows a translation of mine. 63. On Huang’s reading of fiction, see note to Chapter 100 of Xiyou zhengdao shu. On Xixiang ji illustrations, see You’s Kanyun caotang ji, 6.5a–6a: 老僧四璧畫西廂. 64. See Hu Shi 胡適, “Shuihu xuji liangzhong, xu” 水滸續集兩種序, in Hu Shi gudian wenxue yanjiu lunji 胡適古典文學研究論集 (Shanghai: Guji chubanshe, 1988), p. 873. The friend to whom Hu refers was a loyalist and Buddhist priest named Cishan heshang 此山和尚. The poet Gu Youxiao is listed as a subeditor to Huang’s Pu’an shiji. For Gu’s relationship to Chen Chen, see my Margins of Utopia: “Shui-hu hou-chuan” and the Literature of Ming Loyalism (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University, Council on East Asian Studies, 1987), p. 17.

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yuan Zai; nor is it set forth in Buddhist and Daoist terms. 65 Form is another important difference, for Shuihu houzhuan is a vernacular novel, not drama or classical prose. Yet despite these contrasting features, the Houzhuan similarly qualifies as an escapist work born of Ming loyalist emotion, and it is not impossible that Huang took a cue from Chen’s overall design. The clearly defined spatiality of Huang’s garden, as demonstrated by its easy mappability, is another feature shared by “Siam” and Jiangjiu yuan. 66 Alongside their mappability and their utopianism, Chen’s and Huang’s utopian works have yet another point in common—the playfulness and whimsy (遊戲 or 戲作) that caught the attention of contemporaries, despite evidence of underlying loyalist despair. 67 The Houzhuan’s loyalism is indirect, the shift from Ming to Song being but one of several acts of camouflage; and there is no evidence that the work was ever censored. For the most part, Huang’s work, too, is circumspect about its Ming loyalism. However, in Rentian le, Xuanyuan Zai’s negotiation with the spirits over how and where to situate the garden is preceded by a brief section in which dead compatriots make known their hope that Xuanyuan will write their biographies. One of these dead figures is a man who fought against having his hair cut by barbarians and paid a high price for his resistance (scene 27). This potentially subversive episode may have been among the reasons for the subsequent objections of the censors to Huang’s works. 68 In any event, the combination of playfulness and seriousness is another link between the works of Huang and Chen. External influences on Huang’s garden writings need not have been confined to the writings of direct acquaintances. Certain of Ding Yao————— 65. I have written at length on the Houzhuan and its utopianism; see The Margins of Utopia. 66. On how Jiang jiu yuan lends itself to mapping, see Fig. 1. Shuihu houzhuan similarly describes its imaginary Siam in highly mappable terms; see, e.g., Chapter 12. 67. Both works are described in such terms by traditional readers. Dong Yue’s comment to this effect is cited above. Rentian le’s central character, Xuanyuan Zai, himself describes Jiang jiu yuan ji in similar terms; see scene 29. On the Houzhuan, see Hu Shi, “Shuihu xuji liangzhong, xu,” p. 871. 68. Wu Zhefu 吳哲夫, Qingdai jinhui shumu yanjiu 清代禁燬書目研究 (Taipei: Guoli zhengzhi daxue, Zhongguo wenxue yanjiusuo, 1979), p. 332; Okamoto, Shindai kinsho no kenkyū, p. 590.

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kang’s 丁耀亢 (1599–1669) writings have utopian overtones. 69 These and other escapist writings by loyalists could have affected the shape of Jiangjiu yuan ji and Rentian le. 70 In addition, the reclusive loyalists of the early Qing must have provided inspiration. When such individuals had money, as was the case with the poet Mao Xiang 冒襄 (1611–93), they might simply retreat into their gardens. 71 Another example is the guwen writer Wei Xi 魏禧 (1624–81), whose refuge was a mountain fastness named Yi tang 易堂, to which he retired with his family in 1646. 72

Huang Zhouxing’s Imaginary Garden as a Foil to Honglou meng’s To demonstrate Huang’s debts to Dong Yue and Wang Qi and the possible tie to Chen is not to cast doubt on his originality. The rendering of the garden is highly imaginative and powerfully evocative of contemporary feelings and concerns. At the same time, this fantasy is complex and multivalent, operating differently in different worlds. Thus, despite some highly personal, even inscrutable moments, Huang’s writings on utopia had enough currency to be snapped up by publishers for sale to a general readership. And despite the redemptive value Jiangjiu yuan may have held for Huang during his dying days, his dream-like plots make their fantastic nature clear. It is in its less explicitly loyalist and less individualized attributes that Jiangjiu yuan transcends its time and invites comparison with other literary creations, among them the garden of Honglou meng. 73 A comparison between the two literary gardens is best approached via the descriptions of the garden in Jiangjiu yuan ji and Rentian le. Jiangjiu yuan ji is divided into four main sections and is followed by two appendixes that detail outstanding features of the Jiang and Jiu ————— 69. E.g., Chujie jilüe 出劫紀略. On this source, see Wilt Idema’s chapter in this volume. 70. See, e.g., Lawrence C. H. Yim’s chapter in this volume. 71. See Yasushi Ōki’s chapter in this volume. 72. See Joanna Handlin Smith’s unpublished essay “Wei Xi’s Social Horizons.” 73. See also Britta Erikson, “Zhou Xian’s Fabulous Construct: The Thatched Cottage of Fan Lake,” in Art at the Close of China’s Empire, ed. Ju-hsi Chou (Tempe: Arizona State University, 1998), pp. 67–93. This is about an imaginary garden of the mid-nineteenth century. I do not know if it was in any way inspired by Huang’s garden.

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gardens. The first section situates the entire compound in a beautiful spot “both in and outside of the everyday world” 亦在世間亦在世外. It then becomes more specific about the garden’s external surroundings and about the ways the garden is entered—via a complex series of passages that make it difficult to find. In size, it is relatively large—the enclosed lake alone is 20 mu in area, and a river that encircles the mountainous area as a whole extends for ten or more li. A series of diagrams reproduced in Huang’s collected works gives a sense of how these relationships should be viewed (see Fig. 1). Other than the slightly utopian feel to this garden, there is nothing in the first section that particularly resembles Daguan yuan. Neither do the second and third sections, which lay out first the Jiang and then the Jiu garden, offer anything particularly noteworthy in this regard. Only with the fourth section’s comparisons of the Jiang and Jiu gardens does one encounter language mildly reminiscent of the contrasts around which Honglou meng revolves. The two gardens are said to be “divided but actually unified,” and “unified but actually divided” 分而寔合，合而寔分. These contrasts are spelled out in a series of antitheses: Jiang garden has more water, Jiu garden is more hilly; Jiang garden is bright, Jiu garden is shaded; Jiang garden is more diffuse, Jiu garden is more focused; Jiang garden is more stylish, Jiu garden is more solemn; Jiang garden is more lavish, Jiu garden is more lofty; Jiang garden favors summer, Jiu garden favors winter, and so forth. Yet Huang makes it clear that these contrasts are not absolute: although Jiang is a summer and Jiu a winter garden, the Jiang garden has attributes that make it “not unsuitable for winter” 亦未嘗不宜冬, and the Jiu garden attributes that make it “not unsuitable for summer” 亦未嘗 不宜夏. In this sense, the two gardens imply and inhere in each other. One can easily note here the type of “bipolar complementarity” that would later be evoked in describing Honglou meng. 74 However, because both gardens draw on a broad body of garden principles, this area of similarity between Jiangjiu yuan and Daguan yuan is less remarkable than might at first appear. Another point about Jiangjiu yuan ji’s garden layout is suggestive. A scenic highlight called Yuyue tang 鬱越堂 is mentioned in Section 2 and amplified in the appendixes, which elaborate on outstanding sites. ————— 74. See Andrew Plaks, Archetype and Allegory in the “Dream of the Red Chamber” (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1976).

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Here we are informed that Yuyue tang is meant to refer to the Buddhist utopia Yudanyue zhou, or Beijulu zhou, which is then briefly described. Although not particularly emphasized in Jiangjiu yuan ji, this site takes on much greater importance in Rentian le, where it provides a bridge between the version of Jiangjiu yuan that will be constructed on Mount Kunlun and the utopian community of Beijulu that is the site of the action in alternating scenes. The geographical and temporal connections between these utopias are not developed in the drama, but it is possible to see them as analogous to the relationship between Daguan yuan and Taixu huanjing. Not only does Taixu huanjing hover over Daguan yuan, it also mirrors and reflects it in some of its architectural details. 75 Speaking more broadly, the layering of levels and the linkages between them are features that Jiangjiu yuan ji and Honglou meng share. Apart from laying out its own version of Jiangjiu garden and articulating the relationships described above, Rentian le offers other points of comparison with Honglou meng. The first emerges from the transition from the text authored by the lead character, Jiangjiu yuan ji, to the realized version of the garden on Mount Kunlun. On several occasions, characters comment on the relationship between the “falseness” of the garden in its written states versus its “true” state in Heaven; for example: “Who would have thought that in creating something false [Xuanyuan Zai] actually created something true” 誰知弄假卻成真 (scene 29); “The false garden suddenly took shape as a true garden” 假園忽作真園建 (scene 30); and “False or true, who will care about this?” 假假真真有甚人相問 (scene 35). Artistically speaking, these comments describe a process that is less complex than the one in Honglou meng. In Rentian le, the transition from the false, or literary, to the real operates in one direction only. Once the heavenly garden is created and Xuanyuan Zai and family have arrived, there is no turning back to an earthly existence. Thus, truth and falsehood are not the subject of constant negotiation as they are in the later novel. Nor are Huang’s works interested in dystopia, as Honglou meng is. Yet the general types of question Huang asks about truth, falsehood, and utopia are reminiscent of later developments in Honglou meng. Another comparative point brought out by the drama has to do with the names of various scenic highlights. In scene 29 we are told that the ————— 75. Yu Yingshi, “The Two Worlds of Hung-lou meng,” trans. Diana Yu, Renditions, 1974, pp. 5–21.

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name of Lüzu ge 呂祖閣 in the literary version has been changed to Sanqing ge 三 清閣 in Heaven. Similarly, Guanmou ge 關某閣 is changed to Yudi ge 玉帝閣. These and other changes were made in response to divinations Huang personally performed after writing Jiangjiu yuan ji. 76 Although demonstrating Rentian le’s faith in two-way communication between man and spirits, the changes of name may also have hidden loyalist overtones. This comes out in one of the biographies Xuanyuan Zai is charged with writing, when a request to change a phrase describing the subject as a “former jinshi,” qian jinshi 前進士, is changed to “Ming loyalist,” Ming chushi 明處士, at the request of the subject, whom the author encounters in a dream. 77 Even when they seem completely innocent (as this particular one does not), such name changes may have had political resonance for Huang’s contemporaries, echoing the many changes in personal names after the Ming fell. (Huang himself is an example of this tendency; he changed his personal name to Huang Ren 黃人 after 1644, the first of many changes of name.) 78 Although Ming loyalism is never an issue in Honglou meng, the name changes in Huang’s works offer an analogy to the naming and renaming of the sites in the garden in Chapters 17 and 18, as well as Stone’s long note about names immediately thereafter and the imperial concubine’s revision of Baoyu’s nomenclature in Chapter 18. One final feature of Jiangjiu yuan is more a contrast than a similarity to Daguan yuan. This is the inclusion of fish ponds, aviaries, orchards, pastures, breweries, medicinal plots, and other sources of food and drink. These mostly appear in Jiang garden. They are both mentioned in Jiangjiu yuan ji and illustrated in Huang’s sketches accompanying the text. Here Huang’s vision has more in common with another eighteenth-century fiction, Yesou puyan 野叟曝言, than with Honglou meng, for Chapter 59 of Yesou puyan describes a mountain retreat full of useful flora and fauna that sustain the hero and his family during difficult times. As for Honglou meng, Daguan yuan’s suitability for practical use is not emphasized throughout most of the novel. However, beginning in Chapter 56, Tanchun and Baochai do propose that garden plots be laid out. The baleful consequences of this change have no counterpart ————— 76. See Huang’s Xianji jilüe 仙乩紀略, reprinted in Xiaweitang bieji. 77. Scene 27. 78. Another example is Dong Yue, whose scores of name changes are well known; see Liu Fu, “Xiyou bu zuozhe Dong Ruoyu zhuan,” pp. 31–32.

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in Huang’s writings on gardens, which, as we have seen, are not interested in decline. To say that Huang Zhouxing’s works anticipate Honglou meng is by no means to prove a direct influence. It would be easy to overemphasize the parallels between Huang’s works and Honglou meng. It is only that, when added together, the points of similarity between Huang’s and Cao Xueqin’s 曹雪芹 imaginary gardens create a pattern that sometimes seems suggestive and at other times works as a handy framework for introducing Jiangjiu yuan. Moreover, in view of Jiangjiu yuan ji’s potential availability to Cao Xueqin via Zhang Chao’s reprint edition or, more directly, in Xiaweitang ji, it is not impossible that Jiangjiu yuan figured in the nexus of influences and sources from which Daguan yuan was derived. 79 It is also possible to set the relationship between Jiangjiu yuan and Daguan yuan in a broader context. As Wai-yee Li has argued, Honglou meng can be seen as one in a series of dramatic and fictional writings on “enchantment and disenchantment” transcending the Ming-Qing divide. This series has origins as far back as Chuci, and its outstanding manifestations include Tang Xianzu’s 湯顯祖 (1550–1616) dramas, as well as Zhang Dai’s 張岱 (1597–1679) Tao’an meng yi 陶庵夢憶, Pu Songling’s 蒲松齡 (1640–1715) Liaozhai zhiyi 聊齋誌異, and Honglou meng. 80 What Huang’s writings add is a sense of how the “late Ming moment” was modified in the early Qing. Huang’s writings could be used to show that a late Ming conversation about emotion and illusion turned darker and more political during the beginning of the Qing. What was mostly fun or romantic in Tang Xianzu’s construction now serves as a vehicle for expressing political despair.

Fictionality, Identity, and the Ming Loyalist Predicament In Huang’s case, the painful introspection brought about by his thirtysix post-Ming years of “stolen life” was translated into an artistic vision in which no one reality—literary, dream, biographical, autobiographical, Daoist or Buddhist, false or true—claims full priority over any ————— 79. We do not know how much the censoring of this compendium may have interfered with its circulation. 80. Wai-yee Li, Enchantment and Disenchantment, chaps. 1–2.

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other. Literary works might seem like lies, but they were capable of “creating” their authors and of extending the life spans of other human subjects. Biographical time was not as real as might at first appear under the painful circumstances of Ming loyalism, in that deaths by suicide or execution were subject to literary exhumations that could extend a biological life span. Meanwhile, such exhumations were subject to the approval or disapproval of the loyalist in question, who could communicate with the author in séances or in dreams. The same process obtains in Huang’s commentary to Chapter 100 of Xiyou zhengdao shu. There he invites the supposed author, Qiu Chuji 邱處機, to appear to him in a dream if he thinks the commentary says anything wrong. As for the specific contours of utopia, these might seem to exist only in the imagination or on paper, but they were just a step away from fiction in offering real solace for disappointing lives. A few more examples will help pin down the relationship between Huang’s artistry, his sense of self, and the realities through which he lived. One is the influential wenyan story “Bu Zhang Ling Cui Ying he zhuan.” The story concludes with an ironical aside about whether a historical scholar, Zhang Ling, could truly have met a beauty worthy of his talent. This discussion reads, in part, as follows: [The author] says: Alas. Only when I read [the popular narrative] “Pictures of Ten Beauties” did I know that there were really scholars and beauties on this earth. As always, truth and falsehood are combined in about equal measure in the works of popular writers. As far as [Zhang] is concerned, his name comes up frequently enough in [Tang Yin’s] Liuru ji, but there is no way of researching the matter of Cui Ying. If such an affair did indeed take place, why must there not have been such a person? 略史氏曰，嗟乎。蓋吾閱十美圖編而後知 世閒真有才子佳人也。從來俾官家言真。大抵真贗參半。若夢晉之名既章 章於六如集中，但素瓊之事無從考證，雖然，有其事，何必無其人？ 81

Huang then detailed the reasons that “the author” might have found it necessary to invent an archetypical beauty to match an archetypical scholar, such as Zhang. Here again the issue of truth in fiction is prominently and ironically put forward. Another example is found in Huang’s zaju drama Xihua bao 惜花報. The plot revolves around the historical figure Wang Zhuo, Zhang Chao’s collaborator in the compilation of Tanji congshu. Wang’s love of ————— 81. This story appears in Yu Chu xinzhi (Shanghai: Shanghai shudian, 1986), p. 201

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flowers, as demonstrated in two essays he wrote on the subject, attracts the attention of one Madame Wei (Huacun) 魏夫人 (華存), a legendary figure of the Jin 晉 dynasty now holding forth as the leading spirit in her own Daoist realm. 82 Wei needs an assistant, and Wang comes to her attention and eventually wins the job, entering her service as an “envoy for protecting flowers” 護花使 in the fourth and final scene. The issue of false and true is raised here implicitly, as with Zhang and Cui, in the interjection of real people into fanciful situations. It also comes out more explicitly in the final line of the play: “If people on earth do not believe in Daoist flower spirits, please take a look at how Mr. Wang was rewarded for cherishing flowers” 世人不信花神仙，請看王郎惜花報. Here again we find Huang insisting, however playfully, that fact and fiction are less separate than might seem. A particularly interesting feature of Huang’s work is the way irony, contradiction, truth, and falsehood interact in discussions of himself. A compact manifestation of this concern is found in the self-portrait (see Fig. 2) that accompanies Huang’s drawings of the garden. Its caption reads: “Who are you? A bookworm. What garden are you? A piece of paper. The earthly garden is illusory, the garden of immortals is real. Where is it now? In Kunlun. Encomium by the master of Jiangjiu yuan” 爾何人？書獃子。爾何園？一幅紙。世園幻，仙園真。今何 在？在崑崙。將就園主人自簪. 83 Apropos of the garden, these lines playfully assert that whereas its literary version is nothing more than a piece of paper, there is an actual garden of immortals near Kunlun. And apropos of Huang personally, this passage sets up a contrast between a physical image and the real man. The false Huang Zhouxing that lived on after the Ming collapse versus the true Huang Zhouxing that wished to die when the dynasty fell is one of the most important ways in which the author splits himself analytically; yet another is between his contrasting experiences with the Huang and Zhou families. Then, too, there is the true Huang Zhouxing of reputation, who is lofty and soaring, versus a false Huang Zhouxing, who must struggle to make ends meet. 84 “False Huang Jiuyan” ————— 82. Madame Wei may or may not have been a historical individual. For more on her, see Hu Wenkai 胡文楷, Lidai funü zhuzuo kao 歷代婦女箸作考 (Shanghai: Guji chubanshe, 1985), p. 11. 83. I am indebted to Mei Chia-ling 梅家玲 for help with this translation. 84. See note 79.

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Fig. 2 Self-portrait of Huang Zhouxing (from Jiangjiu yuan ji, in Xiaweitang bieji; copy in the Beijing Library).

(假黃九煙; Jiuyan was Huang’s literary name) is the main subject of several writings, including Chugou zhai shiji 芻狗齋詩集, whose preface is entitled “A Song About False Huang [Zhouxing].” It contains such lines as the following: “Since people of today take the false to be true, why is it strange to take the true as false?” 世人既認假為真，以真為假 何怪? 85 Here again Honglou meng comes to mind, albeit indirectly, in its dichotomy between false and true Baoyus and other such pairings. ————— 85. For “Chugou zhai shiji” 芻狗齋詩集 and its preface “Jia Huang Jiuyan ge” 假黃九煙歌, see Xiaweitang bieji. A rather similar passage is found in another section of Xiaweitang bieji entitled “Weixiao ji” 薇呺集. It contains a poem called “Huang Ren yao” 黃人謠. This poem sets up a contrast between “true” 真 Huang Zhouxing and “common” 俗 Huang Zhouxing.

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Perhaps the best example of an ironical self-portrait is the character Xuanyuan Zai in Rentian le. This character is clearly fictional, and yet many biographical details link it firmly to Huang’s own lived reality, as well as to his hopes and dreams. This use of drama for autobiographical purposes no doubt drew on contemporary practice, including You Tong’s Juntian yue 鈞天樂 of 1657, recently described by Judith Zeitlin. 86 You’s central character is clearly autobiographical, yet he performs imaginary feats that You could not have done. Juntian yue’s combination of heavenly and earthly spheres is another likely source of inspiration for Rentian le’s location in both earthly and heavenly realms. These examples give us grounds from which to view Huang’s work as more than just a look back to Tang Xianzu or an anticipation of Honglou meng or other imaginary gardens. His explorations of selfhood may have been prompted by his highly questioning nature, but they were also born of the circumstances of his life during the early Qing. Even as they anticipate later literature, they have their own story to tell. Huang’s self-descriptions are not identical to his musings on fictionality, but they intersect with them at many points. Both depend on dreams, divination, and other evidence of life beyond the human pale. For Huang, literature was one of several ways of extending and testing the boundaries of the human world. He was deeply entranced by the power of fiction and drama to create believable reality and its utility as an escape from unhappy times.

Conclusion: Between Worlds Huang Zhouxing’s imaginary garden takes shape around a series of dualities. Some of these come out directly in Jiangjiu yuan ji and Rentian le; the others emerge from the literary contexts in which these two works were created, whether it be Huang’s other writings or the writings of his friends. The most concrete duality in these writings is between the Ming and the Qing. Although Huang commented only rarely on dynastic transition in Rentian le and not at all in Jiangjiu yuan ji, it would be impossible to make sense of these writings without reference to the fall of ————— 86. “Spirit Writing and Performance in the Work of You Tong (1618–1704),” T’oung Pao 84 (1998): 102–35.

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the Ming. A second duality, between the this-worldly and the otherworldly, helps situate these two pieces in the post-traumatic mentality of the early Qing. In response to trauma, as well as to the resulting poverty, Huang created an imaginary garden, thus giving himself the peace and happiness that would otherwise have escaped him. The Jiangjiu yuan of Jiangjiu yuan ji is an act of imagination, “neither in this world or outside it.” With Rentian le, the duality between this world and another is likewise fundamental to the plot, which alternates between theaters in this and the other world. It is not just that the conclusion takes place in Heaven, a not too unusual device in chuanqi. It is that the comparison between earthly and unearthly existence that is under way from the outset implies how unbearable “stealing life” could be. This difference between earthly and unearthly spheres is partly but not fully subsumed under a distinction between waking and dreaming. Figures in the other world can communicate with those in this world through dreams, among other methods (divination is another), but this does not mean that the other world is itself a dream. Thus, Beijulu zhou continues to exist even after Xuanyuan Zai wakes up, as he does in scene 27. As for the garden, it is more dreamlike than Beijulu zhou, in that it is specific to Huang Zhouxing and his surrogate Xuanyuan Zai. Others do not dream about Jiangjiu yuan. But it is consistently presented as an act of imagination rather than as a product of a sleeping mind. It is thus closely related to the “lying” power of fiction to which Wang Qi referred in his letter, without ever being described in precisely those terms. And it has something in common with Xiyou bu, where the fictional plot is ultimately shown to be a dream. 87 Factual and fictional thus become another way of dichotomizing Jiangjiu yuan. The contrast between fact and fiction can also be rephrased as a contrast between truth and falsehood. Rentian le distinguishes between writing or painting, both false, and the fantasy of the fully realized garden, which is in some sense real. Ironically, however, the supposedly true garden, to which writing gives rise, is situated in the other world and is hence inaccessible to those who have not read about Jiangjiu ————— 87. For more on the slippery complexity of Xiyou bu, see Wai-yee Li’s “The Fantastic as Metaphor: Tung Yüeh’s Hsi-yu pu and Todorov’s Theory of the Fantastic,” in Essays in Commemoration of the Golden Jubilee of the Fung Ping Shan Library (1932–1982), ed. Chan Ping-leung (Hong Kong: Hong Kong University Press, 1982), pp. 242–80.

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yuan. This contrast between false and true pertains not just to the garden but to Huang himself. Several of his writings build on the contrast between the true Huang of reputation and the falser, more ordinary Huang. The idea that Huang “stole life” by living on as a loyalist creates another dichotomy between his two selves. By either type of reckoning, the “true” Huang Zhouxing exists only in the imagination, yet he is more real and more acceptable than the false Huang. By the same logic, the “real” Jiangjiu garden is not the one on paper but the one that takes shape in the sky above Mount Kunlun. It transcends the tangibility of the drawing to take root in another, more real world. With this contrast, we come full circle, returning to our first dichotomy, that between the Ming and the Qing. It is this dichotomy that engenders all the others, including that between the false and the true Huang. Had the Ming not been sundered, Huang could have continued as a jinshi, and he would not have needed to conjure up other worlds. If one takes Huang Zhouxing’s imaginary garden at face value, it is a playful demonstration of the evocative power of words. His wordplay is intended to be amusing, but it also feeds into the author’s darker, more alienated side. These various facets are part and parcel of the Ming-loyalist predicament—the need to write entertainingly for profit, alongside the compulsion to reveal and yet conceal one’s shame in being alive. Under such circumstances, the garden’s divisions into real and utopian facets, false manifestations and true, and factual versus fictional aspects serve a variety of ends. Jiangjiu yuan fits easily (if complexly) into its seventeenth-century setting, even when its artistic ramifications transcend its own time.

Novelty, Character, and Community in Zhang Chao’s Yu Chu xinzhi 7 Allan H. Barr Most scholarship on the classical tale in the early Qing has concentrated on Liaozhai zhiyi 聊齋志異 (Strange tales from make-do studio), the outstanding collection of stories by Pu Songling 蒲松齡 (1640–1715). This emphasis is natural, for Liaozhai has enjoyed acclaim since its publication in the eighteenth century, and given its richness and quality, Pu’s collection rewards study from a variety of perspectives. At the same time, the work of other late seventeenth-century authors has largely been neglected. In part this may be because these writers were less prolific, and their works less accessible and less readily classifiable and understood as creative literature in the same way as Pu’s most celebrated tales. But an almost exclusive focus on Liaozhai inevitably generates an incomplete picture of the contemporary literary scene. Pu Songling was, after all, a rather isolated figure, a village licentiate in rural Shandong, and his tales, so famous today, were in his own lifetime little known outside his home prefecture. In his day, in fact, it was the now largely forgotten writers of Jiangnan whose classical tales attracted editors and commanded the attention of readers. Two such writers figure prominently in the pages that follow: Xu Fang 徐芳 (1619–71) and Niu Xiu 鈕琇 (1640–1704). A comparative discussion of this pair of writers, from successive generations, allows us to monitor cultural changes over the course of the Kangxi era. A joint treatment of these authors also seems fitting, since both are showcased in Zhang Chao’s 張潮 (1650–1707+) Yu Chu xinzhi 虞初新志 (Yu Chu’s new records), a collection that provides the most convenient entry into the large body of informal classical narrative that circulated

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in the late seventeenth century. This anthology and its editor, who did so much to promote an appreciation of the classical tale, also deserve introduction. Zhang Chao, a son of Zhang Xikong 張習孔 ( jinshi 1649), was a native of Huizhou, but spent most of his adult life in Yangzhou, where he mingled with a wide circle of acquaintances and devoted himself to writing and publishing. About thirty titles are attributed to him, including a miscellany devoted to informal writings, Zhaodai congshu 昭代叢書 (Collectanea of a luminous age); two collections of letters, Chidu yousheng 尺牘友聲 (Correspondence: friendly voices) and Chidu oucun 尺牘偶存 (Correspondence fortuitously preserved); and an anthology of bons mots entitled Youmeng ying 幽夢影 (Hidden dream shadows). He is probably best known, however, as the editor of Yu Chu xinzhi, a book that was frequently reprinted during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries and inspired several sequels. Yu Chu xinzhi was one of several significant anthologies of anecdotal writings assembled during the Kangxi era. Other titles of note include Jin Shishuo 今世說 (A contemporary Tales of the World; 8 juan, preface dated 1683), by the Hangzhou literatus Wang Zhuo 王晫 (1636–1710+); Jianhu ji 堅瓠集 (The hard gourd collections; 66 juan, published in serial form from 1691 to 1703), by the Suzhou bibliophile Chu Renhuo 褚 人 獲 (ca. 1630–1703+); Jiyuan ji suoji 寄 園 寄 所 寄 (Tales from Temporary Garden; 12 juan, 1696), compiled by the Huizhou scholar-official Zhao Jishi 趙吉士 (1628–1706); and Shuoling 說鈴 (Bell of stories; 81 juan, preface dated 1705), compiled by Wu Zhenfang 吳震 方 ( jinshi 1679), a native of Hangzhou. Such works were the products of extensive cross-fertilization among members of the Jiangnan and Zhejiang scholarly community. Zhang Chao and Wang Zhuo, for example, collaborated in the preparation of an anthology of informal writings by Qing literati, Tanji congshu 檀几叢書 (Sandalwood table miscellany), and Wang supplied Zhang with material for Yu Chu xinzhi. Zhang Chao was also a friend of Chu Renhuo and wrote a preface for Jianhu ji, as did many contributors to Yu Chu xinzhi. A notable feature of some of these early Qing works is their quite unabashed identification with late Ming culture. One preface to Jianhu ji, for example, compliments Chu Renhuo by likening him to the celebrated Ming editor Feng Menglong 馮夢龍 (1574–1646), and another compares Chu with the late Ming literatus Chen Jiru 陳繼儒 (1558–

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1639). 1 Zhang Chao’s feeling of affinity with late Ming culture comes across clearly in many of his remarks in Youmeng ying. In a passage speculating on his social contacts in previous lives, he wrote, “I wonder how many famous courtesans I befriended in the pleasure quarters during the Longqing and Wanli periods? How many times did I chat and joke with Meigong 眉公 [Chen Jiru], Bohu 伯虍 [Tang Yin 唐寅 (1470–1524)], Ruoshi 若士 [Tang Xianzu 湯顯祖 (1550–1617)], and Chishui 赤水 [Tu Long 屠隆 (1542–1605)]?” 2 Another of his aperçus reflects his allegiance to the values championed in the late Ming: “Love must verge on folly to be genuine; talent must combine with fancy to be creative.” 3 The title that Zhang Chao chose for his anthology of stories is itself a telling example of his identification with certain Ming cultural icons. The original Yu Chu zhi, a collection of notable Tang chuanqi, was the work of a sixteenth-century Ming editor. Yu Chu zhi went through numerous printings in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, accompanied by laudatory prefaces by such eminent literary figures as Ou Daren 區大任 (1516–95) and Xie Zhaozhe 謝肇淛 (1567–1624). Late in the Wanli period, an expanded edition of Yu Chu zhi was published, with a foreword and commentary by Tang Xianzu. Yet another edition included marginal comments attributed to such luminaries as Li Zhi 李贄 (1527–1602), Tu Long, Yuan Hongdao 袁宏道 (1568–1610), and others. Zhang Chao, who cited Tang Xianzu’s preface in his introductory remarks to Yu Chu xinzhi and attached postscripts commenting on individual entries along the lines of Tang’s commentary to Yu Chu zhi, clearly was interested in establishing a conscious link with this Ming title. 4 Yu Chu xinzhi, as we know it today, is a work of 20 juan and carries a preface dated 1683 and a postface dated 1700. The book was assembled in stages over more than twenty years, with the first edition (in eight juan) printed soon after the preface was written, an enlarged second ————— 1. See the preface by Tang Chuanju 湯傳矩 to Jianhu geng ji 堅瓠庚集 and the preface by Lu Ciyun 陸次雲 to Jianhu guang ji 堅瓠廣集, in Chu Renhuo 褚人獲, ed., Jianhu ji 堅瓠集 (Hangzhou: Zhejiang renmin chubanshe, 1986). 2. See Youmeng ying 幽夢影, in Xiaochuang youji (wai erzhong) 小窗幽記 (外 二種) (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 2000), p. B.197. 3. Ibid., p. A.182. 4. In Yu Chu xinzhi, Zhang also alluded to a number of Ming fiction titles, including Shuihu zhuan 水滸傳, Yanyi bian 艷異編, and Pai’an jingqi 拍案驚奇.

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edition (twelve juan) published in 1700, and the expanded final edition completed in 1704. 5 Inadvertently, perhaps, the anthology therefore reflects generational changes during the Kangxi era. Chapters 1–8 are largely devoted to work by literati who had reached adulthood under the Ming, men such as Wang Youding 王猷定 (1598–1662), Wu Weiye 吳偉業 (1609–72), and Hou Fangyu 侯方域 (1618–55). Later chapters give prominence to pieces by a younger generation of writers, men such as Wang Shizhen 王士禛 (1634–1711), Lu Ciyun 陸次雲 (1636– 1702+), and Chen Ding 陳鼎 (1650–1711+). Many of the stories seem to have been selected by Zhang Chao from early Qing editions of these and other authors’ prose works; others, sometimes in manuscript form, were recommended to him by friends. The editorial principles guiding Zhang’s choice of what to include in Yu Chu xinzhi may be inferred from his 1683 preface: The episodes are mostly set in recent times, and they were recorded largely by contemporary authors of talent. The stories are remarkable but authentic, the writing unconventional but accomplished. The portraits are vivid, the descriptions lifelike—it’s a case of modern times not necessarily lacking things that were found in ancient days, and modern times not necessarily not having things that were absent in ancient days; and things that appear to lack reason turning out actually to play a role in events. Reading them makes one unaccountably happy, unaccountably astonished, unaccountably tempted to sing or to weep—for they truly capture what is real rather than just an imitation. How could they possibly be equated with those clumsily cobbled together works of fiction that fail to make you laugh no matter how hard they try to be humorous, that fail to make you sad no matter how much they put on a show of grief? 6

“Remarkable but authentic” is the key phrase in this passage. Only pieces rooted in actual lived experience qualified for inclusion in his Zhang Chao’s anthology, and when acquaintances nominated stories ————— 5. Modern editions include several items added when the work was reprinted later in the eighteenth century, such as works by Fang Bao 方苞 (1668–1749) and Sun Jiagan 孫嘉淦 (1683–1753). For a pioneering study of the formation of Yu Chu xinzhi, see Deng Changfeng 鄧長風, Ming Qing xiqujia kaolüe xubian 明清戲曲家 考略續編 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1997), pp. 157–69. Deng’s review of relevant correspondence in Zhang’s Chidu yousheng and Chidu oucun overlooks a letter by Zhang that enables us to date the completion of Yu Chu xinzhi to 1704: see Chidu oucun (copy dated 1780 in Library of Congress), 10.13a. 6. “Zixu” 自序, in Yu Chu xinzhi (Shijiazhuang: Hebei renmin chubanshe, 1985).

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for his consideration, he politely declined those that did not conform to his standards of veracity. This focus on real-life events was in turn a key aspect of the book’s appeal to contemporary readers. 7 With selections from the works of over seventy early Qing authors, Yu Chu xinzhi does not lend itself to simple generalizations. Yet certain common threads emerge. Novelty is one of the unifying themes of the collection: unexpected turns of events, astonishing feats, uncanny coincidences—these are among the recurring elements in the book. Some pieces describe the performances of ventriloquists or acrobats, and there is an account of the seven wonders of the Western world by Jesuit missionary Ferdinand Verbiest 南懷仁 (1623–88). Many tales turn the spotlight on remarkable individuals of humble status: actors, craftsmen, flower vendors, hermits, servants and maids, woodcutters, yamen clerks, men (and women) of action—unsung heroes who perform acts of extraordinary courage, skill, and ingenuity. Some pieces are close to what we might think of as fiction; others are really biography, offering portraits of such historical figures as the storyteller Liu Jingting 柳敬亭 (ca. 1587–1670) and the artist Chen Hongshou 陳洪綬 (1599–1652), or autobiography (such as the celebrated reminiscence by Wang Jie 汪价 [1611–83+]). 8 Although the book as a whole is not specifically Ming loyalist in orientation, many pieces commemorate those who distin————— 7. For correspondence relating to these questions, see Chidu yousheng, ding ji 丁集 (copy dated 1780 in Library of Congress), 29b; guiji 癸集, 37a; Chidu oucun, 2.13a, 8.10a. Fan mail received by Zhang testifies to the popularity of Yu Chu xinzhi in the Kangxi period. In a letter to Zhang dating from the 1690s, one friend wrote: “Governor Bian 卞 of Fujian kept asking Mr. Zipang about it, saying: ‘In Jiangnan there is a newly published book entitled Yu Chu xinzhi, full of unusual stories. Lots of people praise it, but unfortunately I have not yet seen it. Have you? Next time you go back to Hangzhou, if you see a copy, I beg you to buy it for me and bring it back with you—please don’t forget!’ Last night Zipang mentioned this to me, and I told him the anthology was your work. He was delighted to hear this and asked me to let him have a look. He stayed up until late in the night reading it” (see Chidu yousheng, xinji 辛集, p. 20b). 8. For a discussion of Wang’s autobiography, see Pei-yi Wu, The Confucian’s Progress: Autobiographical Writings in Traditional China (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990), pp. 166–72. I derive Wang’s dates from the Jiaqing edition of Wang Jie’s writings, Sannong xiaozhi chuchao 三儂嘯旨初鈔 (Nanjing Library). For further discussion of Yu Chu xinzhi, see Hou Zhongyi 侯忠義 and Liu Shilin 劉 世林, Zhongguo wenyan xiaoshuo shigao 中國文言小說史稿 (Beijing: Beijing daxue chubanshe, 1993), pp. 186–97; and Xue Hong ji 薛洪勣, Chuanqi xiaoshuo shi 傳奇小 說史 (Hangzhou: Zhejiang guji chubanshe, 1998), pp. 304–20.

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guished themselves during the turmoil and confusion attending the change of dynasties. In this respect, Yu Chu xinzhi is related to the larger picture of Chinese historiography at the time, with its interest in “how people of all kinds and backgrounds had shown their true colors under duress.” 9 Within the limited frame of this chapter, it is not possible to do justice to the full range of tales in Yu Chu xinzhi, but I hope to open a window on this anthology by offering a preliminary assessment of the work of two lesser-known authors whose work is prominently featured in Yu Chu xinzhi, one representative of the early Kangxi era, and the other a more typical scholar of the mid-Kangxi period. The first of these is Xu Fang (zi Zhongguang 仲光; hao Zhuo’an 拙案 and Yushanzi 愚山子), 10 a Ming loyalist about whom little has been written. A shift away from moral cultivation to pragmatic and precise scholarship has often been identified as a key element in the response of Chinese literati to the collapse of the Ming dynasty, but as a study of Xu Fang’s work shows, evidential scholarship was obviously not the only recourse for disaffected Ming loyalists: anecdotal writings offered an alternative outlet for the expression of frustrations generated by the fall of the Ming and the institution of Qing authority. A metropolitan graduate of 1640, Xu Fang served briefly as a department magistrate under the Ming and took an active role in the Southern Ming resistance. Returning home to his native Jiangxi after the suppression of the loyalist movement in Fujian in 1647, he declined to serve in the Qing administration, devoting the rest of his life to his writing. 11 The traumatic upheavals of the 1640s left him deeply disillusioned, as critical of the late Ming society into which he had been born as of the new regime to which he felt no allegiance. A letter he wrote to a friend in 1664 conveys much of his character: People such as you and I belong to some bitter species that dwells between Heaven and Earth, like the endive among vegetables, the gourd among fruit, the thistle among herbs, the cypress among trees. Our nature has already been

————— 9. Lynn Struve, The Ming-Qing Conflict, 1619–1683 (Ann Arbor: Association for Asian Studies, 1998), p. 38. 10. Not to be confused with another Ming loyalist whose name has the same romanization—Xu Fang 徐枋 (1622–94), a native of Suzhou. 11. For details on Xu Fang, see Nancheng xianzhi 南城縣誌 (1871 ed.), 8.1.11a–12a, 9.5.56a. The tomb inscription he wrote for his wife is also informative about his own life: see Xuanta bian 懸榻編 (Kangxi ed.), 6.4a–7b.

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determined, and there is nothing we can do to change it. In a catastrophe unprecedented for centuries, under the attack of jackals and tigers and the onslaught of wind and frost, it is impossible to catalogue all the losses and injuries suffered. Yet the two of us have managed to cling to life, and our two families have not yet been utterly decimated; so just on this score we should be grateful for Heaven’s protection. All the other difficulties and hardships, the countless setbacks and tragedies, are naturally our destiny and do not call for any great surprise. The plum by the roadside is spared plucking simply because its skin and flesh are so sour and astringent as to be uneatable. If it insists on competing for glory with the vermilion cherry and the scarlet lychee, this will not only conflict with its true nature but will also attract attention—first from people’s fingers, then from their teeth. 12

Consciously distancing himself from the power networks of early Qing society, Xu adopted a reclusive lifestyle in his home district and eked out a living as a geomancer, mingling mainly with other kindred spirits. Cangshan gao waibian 藏山稿外編 (Stored away collection, outer volume), Xu’s collection of anecdotes, bears comparison with Pu Songling’s Liaozhai zhiyi in scale, for it consists of well over four hundred pieces. The complete work was never published and survives today only in a single manuscript copy. 13 Selections, however, were included in Xuanta bian 懸榻編 (Suspended couch collection), an anthology of Xu’s prose works in six juan, edited and annotated by Miao Fan 苗蕃 (d. 1674) and published in 1668. 14 It was most likely through this publication that Zhang Chao came into contact with Xu’s work. Clearly an admirer of Xu’s tales, Zhang included a generous selection in his Zhaodai congshu, as well as in Yu Chu xinzhi. Xuanta bian itself gives considerable prominence to Xu Fang’s stories. As the Siku quanshu editors put it: “Although this collection consists entirely of miscellaneous prose writings, eight tenths of the work involves incidents of ghosts, anomalies, and dream experiences, and in ————— 12. Zhou Lianggong 周亮工, ed., Laigutang chidu xinchao: Jielin ji 賴古堂尺牘新 鈔結鄰集 (Qing ed.), 3.5a–b. 13. A manuscript dating from the Kangxi period is preserved in Nanjing Library in 24 unpaginated volumes. 14. It carries prefaces by Qian Qianyi 錢謙益, Fang Yizhi 方以智, Li Mingrui 李明睿, Wen Deyi 文德翼, and Miao Fan. I have used a microfilm of the copy preserved in the National Central Library, Taiwan. I derive the date of publication from Fang Wen 方文, Tushan xuji 嵞山續集 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1979), 3.22b.

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fact it amounts to a work of fiction.” 15 Although no preface by Xu to these tales survives, Xu’s attitude toward his writing can be discerned from his preface to Shuying 書影 (Book shadows), the miscellany compiled by his friend Zhou Lianggong 周亮工 (hao Liyuan 櫟園, 1612–72), another jinshi graduate of 1640. Here he argued that previous anecdotal collections were of no real significance, lacking the erudition, discernment, and moral substance of Zhou’s work. “Books in modern times that can claim individuality and merit transmission must possess these qualities,” he concluded, linking Zhou’s achievement to his misfortunes in life: What to other men would be tragic disappointments have been inspirations for Liyuan’s fertile brush. In ancient times Sima Qian suffered in his cell and Shiji was written, Yu Qing forsook the seals of ministerial office and Chunqiu appeared: writers of olden days often composed their books in sorrow and distress. Liyuan suffered an unexpected calamity, and from it emerged this book. 16

The title Xu gave to his collected writings—Cangshan gao—also reveals something of his priorities. The title alludes to the final lines in Sima Qian’s postface to Shiji (Historical records): “I stored it in a famous mountain . . . to await the sages and worthies of later generations” 17 and suggests the importance that Xu Fang attached to his work and his hope that it would eventually receive the favorable reception denied it under the circumstances of the day. 18 It would thus seem that the novelty of the anecdotal material is not so much Xu’s concern as its moral implications. In keeping with the importance he attached to these narratives, Xu Fang wrote in a polished literary style rather than the casual and offhand style so often found in Ming anecdotal collections, and his tales deservedly are given a prominent place in Xuanta bian. ————— 15. See Shen Jin 沈津, “Jiaoli Siku quanshu zongmu tiyao can’gao de yidian xin faxian” 校理《 四庫全書總目提要》殘稿的一點新發現, Zhonghua wen shi luncong 中華文史論叢 1982, no. 1: 174. 16. Zhou Lianggong 周亮工, Shuying 書影 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1981), p. 4. 17. Shiji 史記 (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1959), 130.3320. 18. In his obituary, Miao Fan also describes Xu Fang in words first used by Sima Qian: “He wrote his book having experienced the full extent of sorrow” (Nancheng xianzhi, 9.5.56b).

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Xu’s anecdotal writings possess a number of notable features. The first is an emphasis on animal behavior as a vantage point for considering human actions. Xu Fang’s work introduces a veritable menagerie of creatures, including the rhinoceros, squid, pangolin, orangutan, heron, and cormorant. The activities of frogs, mice, dogs, and spiders are recorded in detail and pointedly contrasted to events in the human world. Some stories, such as “The Sentinel Goose” 雁奴說, 19 are metaphors for late Ming history; others offer an ironic commentary on contemporary conduct in the early Qing. Xu’s tale of a loyal dog that avenges the murder of its benefactor ends with a long postscript comparing the dog favorably with heroes of antiquity. “Everybody understands the notion of loyalty,” Xu remarked, “but when confronted by disaster, people forsake loyalty; everybody relies on his ability, but when confronted by crisis, people go to pieces.” “I feel sorry for the murdered trader,” he concluded, “but I very much envy him for having a dog that is superior to men.” Although there is no direct reference to seventeenth-century history in the story, there is little doubt that it is a commentary on the self-serving compromises that Xu saw as characterizing many people’s adjustment to the Qing invasion. 20 Second, tales of karmic retribution are a prominent feature of Xu’s work, as they are of other contemporary collections. The Ming loyalist Lu Qi 陸圻 (1614–72+), for example, collected a set of such tales under the title Mingbao lu 冥報錄 (Records of unseen recompenses), and an anonymous Ming licentiate who became a monk after 1644 assembled a similar anthology entitled Xianguo suilu 現果隨錄 (Extemporaneous records of manifest consequences) in the 1660s. 21 Xu Fang was equally absorbed by questions of causality. The widespread interest among early Qing literati in karmic retribution reflected their horror at the collapse of the Ming dynasty and the atrocities that accompanied the ————— 19. Xuanta bian, 1.57a–b. 20. Ibid., 4.48; Yu Chu xinzhi, 7.132. Xu’s interest in animals was shared by other early Qing literati: included in Yu Chu xinzhi is Sheng shi lu 聖師錄, a work by Wang Yan 王言 (son of Wang Zhuo), which collects anecdotes about animals thought to be committed to loyalty, righteousness, and reciprocity and seemingly conscious of the bonds between sovereign and subject, parent and child, and husband and wife; see Yu Chu xinzhi, 18.354–68. 21. See Maeno Naoaki 前野直彬, “Shindai shikaisho kaidai” 清代志怪書解題, in his Chūgoku shōsetsu shikō 中國小說史稿 (Tokyo: Akiyama shoten, 1975), for a discussion of these works.

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establishment of Qing control. In a letter to a friend written about 1650, after five years of almost unremitting devastation in northern Jiangxi, Xu Fang confessed his loss of faith in the Confucian concept of a Heaven that favored the good: When I observe recent events, I can hardly disavow the view that Heaven is cruel. It is as though Heaven is constructing a dark prison here and insidiously manipulating the sentencing process, determined to punish us all for its own delight. I have tried without success to identify the offense that justifies this punishment and have to conclude that Heaven has an insatiable passion for slaughter. If you argue that it is not Heaven that does the killing, then you are faced with the question as to what virtue the killers possess which allows them alone to run amok with impunity, so that the callous live and the weak perish. If you insist that Heaven is not cruel, then you have to concede that Heaven is blithely indifferent to the good and evil in the world and is perfectly content to let people live and die at random. If that is the case, why accord Heaven any respect? If you follow a third line of reasoning and suppose that Heaven is aware that some people do not deserve to be killed but cannot itself save them and is aware that other people deserve to die but cannot itself destroy them, this is tantamount to saying that Heaven is no different from man in its pusillanimous indolence and servile deference to authority. If Heaven is idly observing the aggressor as he takes up position and does nothing to stop him, permitting innocent people to meet their deaths without making any effort to save them, then there is even less reason to accord Heaven any respect. No matter how eloquently you present those exonerating arguments, there is no way to avoid reaching one of these conclusions. 22

The Buddhist belief in karmic retribution provided an alternative way of accounting for apparent injustices and served as a welcome rationale for the upholding of moral conduct. This explains in part the pronounced emphasis on karmic factors in the work of Xu Fang and other writers of his generation. In a story such as “The Divine Army” 神兵記, we can observe Xu Fang striving to make sense of the tumultuous events of the 1640s by drawing on such notions: ————— 22. “To Nie Guihou of Sui’an” 寄綏安聶桂侯, in Zhou Lianggong 周亮工, ed., Chidu xinyu 尺牘新語 (Changsha: Yuelu shushe, 1986), 6.204–5. Xu Fang was not alone in raising such issues at the time. The contemporaneous author of the vernacular collection Doupeng xianhua 豆棚閒話 had similar concerns, as Patrick Hanan points out in The Chinese Vernacular Story (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1981), p. 195.

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During the shen and you years [1644–45], all kinds of strange things happened in the world, but none more strange than the divine army of Rushui. When Jin Shenghuan 金聲桓 led his troops to Jiangzhou and demanded the surrender of Nanchang, all officials from the governor down fled and the city was left without a leader, but Jin hesitated to enter. At this point a sly clerk in the employ of the grain intendant, a man by the name of Hao Defu 郝德甫, led a crowd of people to welcome the approaching army. Jin appreciated his assistance and appointed him to a position of authority. Now that his power was in the ascendance, Hao took a decisive role in coordinating all the atrocities that were perpetrated. One Zhan Liaoyi 詹廖一, a native of Chongren, was a servant of Commissioner Zhang Guangyue 章光岳 of Linchuan and had often been engaged in criminal activities in the local district. When his conduct was discovered, he had managed to escape punishment through the intercession of one of Zhang’s retainers, but because of his insubordinate and unruly behavior he was loathed by Zhang’s son, who wanted to have him punished according to the law. For this reason he had a grudge against his master, and when Jiangzhou fell, Liaoyi stirred up a crowd one thousand strong, broke into the commissioner’s house and personally slew his master. After bribing General Jin with a large sum of money, he was appointed as a drill instructor and thereafter was free to follow his own instincts. Many of the established gentry families were decimated, and within a few months the people of Linchuan hated Liaoyi even more intensely than the people of Xichang hated Defu. A man named Zhao 趙 was a tenant farmer of the provincial graduate Wang Bingqian 王秉乾. A skilled carpenter, he earned a living in Woyuan county in Huizhou. One day he threw down his ax and returned home as though a spirit possessed him. Once back, he addressed his community as follows: “I am General Zhao. The two rogues Zhan and Hao are wicked men, and the emperor has ordered me to destroy them. Will you join me?” Those who responded he taught to master a particular art and had them recite incantations behind closed doors. Before long each could perform a dance, charge and attack, advance and withdraw in perfect order. They numbered several hundred and were known as the Divine Army. At this time Defu and the others were concentrating their forces in Fuzhou. Angered by reports, they sent out a force a thousand strong to attack Zhao, but he was already forewarned and led his men to cut down trees to use as fortifications. When Defu’s troops arrived, their advance was impeded by the stockade. Zhao sprang out on the offensive and, raising his lance, struck Defu a blow in the midriff, knocking him off his horse and impaling him on the point of his weapon. When Liaoyi approached, again Zhao struck, killing him instantly with a blow to the chest, and the attackers were routed. Someone in the [Qing] army knew of Zhao’s supernatural gifts and, quickly slaughtering a dog, spattered him with its blood. As a result, he lost his powers and could

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not continue the fight. His troops fell into disarray, and the bulk of them were killed, Zhao too. This happened in the tenth month of yiyou [November 1645]. Throughout history, there have been many who have mastered devilish arts, but there has never been a coarse and uneducated carpenter who was able suddenly to rise up and, without either master or accomplice, roam hundreds of miles to make soldiers out of hoe-wielding farmers and achieve total victory over the marauders, striking blows with unerring accuracy. A victory of this kind deserves to be called divine. Those two upstarts were convinced that they were in full control and that nothing could stop them, but little did they know that in the darkness the spirits hated them. What is more, vengeance was exacted by none other than a simple carpenter. Within a short time, both villains came like lambs to the slaughter, spilling their blood on the ghosts’ axes. How speedily did Heaven’s vengeance fall on the villains! However, if the spirits could kill Zhan and Hao, why could they not protect Zhao? The explanation is fate. What he said was, “Heaven has ordered me to destroy the two criminals.” Once they were killed, the spirits’ task was completed. Even Zhao did not know how he had acquired his powers. His several hundred followers were also fated to die. Even if they had not joined Zhao’s forces, there is no guarantee they would not have died just the same. Given the spirits’ awesome powers, why could they not secretly inflict punishments on the two evildoers? Why did they have to seek recourse through Zhao’s army? This was to publicize Heaven’s punishments and make plain the warning against evil. At this time, the fields were filled with swords and spears, and roads were blocked with the corpses of the slaughtered. Countless Jiangxi people had died. Yet these few hundred men alone were able to slay the two ringleaders. This truly was heroic! But there are many in the world guilty of fomenting chaos and deserving of death, so why was punishment directed especially at these two culprits? The answer lies in the degree of provocation. When men are driven to the limits, then the spirits are moved and prodigies are engendered. If you rub stones together, sparks will fly; if water is pounded, it will splash—this is all produced by a disturbance. Those villains brandished the enemy’s weapons in murdering their masters and massacred their townsfolk as though they were slaughtering sheep and pigs. Their abominable crimes reached such an extreme that the spirits’ anger was provoked, and so it happened to find an outlet through a carpenter. It is not that the spirits are strict in one case and lax in another. There was a Huizhou man who chased his mother, wanting to kill her. When she sought refuge in a shrine, the god jumped down and killed the son. Everyone was astounded by the sight of the god’s fallen weapon and shifted position. It was not that the effigy of a local god itself possessed magical powers, but that ghosts had responded to human provocation. “The Master did not speak of

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anomalies, disorders, and spirits,” but incidents like these cannot really count as anomalous, they cannot really count as strange. 23

By drawing attention to striking examples of evil punished and good rewarded by supernatural means, Xu by implication seems to be asserting the ephemeral nature of political and social domination by the new dynasty. Many of his tales go further than this story in embracing the assumptions of popular Buddhist religion and predicting the inevitability of retribution for wrongdoing. 24 A third major area of interest in Xu’s stories involves unusual personalities of low social status, men and women whose heroic exploits upstage conventional behavior. 25 A bandit proves to be a model official when he takes on the job of administering a district in Guangdong; 26 a beggar shows scrupulous integrity by returning lost property to its owner with no expectation of reward; 27 a hermit forsakes all worldly possessions and takes up residence in the mountains, unperturbed by the company of tigers and snakes; 28 a Jiangxi woman, abducted by marauding soldiers, engineers her escape by executing a brilliant deception. These and other tales reflect the disillusionment with the educated elite common among men of Xu’s generation. 29 ————— 23. Xuanta bian, 3.47a–49b. The episode involving the Huizhou man is recorded in detail in the narrative that immediately follows this one in Xuanta bian, “The Tale of the Divine Halberd” 神鉞記, reprinted in Yu Chu xinzhi, 4.72–73. 24. See, e.g., Xu’s story about the son of Jiao Hong 焦竤 (1541–1620), in Xuanta bian, 6.18a–19a. 25. Lynn Struve has drawn attention to a somewhat similar tendency among scholars of the mid-Kangxi period in “Ambivalence and Action: Some Frustrated Scholars of the K’ang-hsi Period,” in From Ming to Ch’ing: Conquest, Region, and Continuity in Seventeenth-Century China, ed. Jonathan D. Spence and John E. Wills, Jr. (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1979), p. 333. 26. Xuanta bian, 4.30a–31a; Yu Chu xinzhi, 5.95. A somewhat similar tale involving Xu’s friend Xiao Yun 蕭韻 was written by Yang Hengxuan 楊衡選, another early Qing author: see Yu Chu xinzhi, 7.127–28. 27. Xuanta bian, 3.30a–32b; Yu Chu xinzhi, 5.93–94. Unusual beggars were a popular subject in this period: see Wang Zhuo’s “Xiaogai zhuan” 孝丐傳, and Mao Jike’s 毛際可 “Li gai zhuan” 李丐傳, in Yu Chu xinzhi, 15.275, 283–84. 28. Xuanta bian, 3.27a–29a. 29. In the essay “Sanmin lun” 三民論, written in 1641, Xu had argued forcefully that scholars no longer constituted a distinct social category, since, given their preoccupation with material gain and lack of moral scruples, they were essentially indistinguishable from members of the merchant class, or perhaps even worse (Xuanta bian, 1.12a–16b).

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Xu’s “Tale of a Remarkable Woman” 奇女子傳 is perhaps the most interesting of this group of stories: The remarkable woman was the daughter of a Mr. Yang of Fengcheng and was married to the son of a Mr. Li. When Tan’s army laid siege to Nanchang, 30 detachments of cavalry roamed through the outlying areas, seizing adult males as army conscripts. Li’s wife fell into the hands of a lieutenant named Wang. A native of Shandong, he already had a wife of his own. The abducted woman waited on her with deference and thereby established a cordial relationship with the principal wife. In due course she had a son by the officer. Soon afterward, as the family fortunes declined, Lieutenant Wang left to take part in a new military campaign. The woman embarked on a deception by saying to Wang’s wife: “Now that the outlook is so poor, I wish I could grow wings.” “What do you mean?” asked the wife. “My former husband was originally of a prominent family, and his father left him a large inheritance. He secretly buried several cases of gold and jewels in a hidden anteroom. Now my husband has died and I have been abducted and our house has been razed, and the treasure will have been buried underneath the tiles and stones. If I were able to transport the wealth back here, we would have no further cause to fear for our welfare.” The wife was entranced by the prospect. “If that is the case, why not send somebody to dig up the treasure?” “I am the only person who handled the goods. Nobody else would know where to look.” So the wife had to give up with a sigh. Some time later the wife again questioned her about it and the woman said: “I have been thinking about it, and if we want to recover the money, there is no option but for me to go. But as a woman how can I make such a long journey? I would have to change my costume, and it would take several months to make the trip there and back. How could I think of leaving my baby for such a long time?” The wife happily told her: “Go ahead and make the journey, I will look after your son myself.” The woman made a show of great reluctance to leave her child, but the wife urged her all the more forcefully. So, on a selected day, she exchanged her woman’s hairpins for a man’s hairstyle, and clad in boots and trousers, with bow and sword at her waist and two soldiers in attendance, she spurred her horse and headed south.

————— 30. A reference to the campaign of 1648–49 against Jin Shenghuan by the Manchu general Tantai. For details, see Nanchang fuzhi (1789 ed.), 19.22a–24b; and Lynn A. Struve, The Southern Ming, 1644–1662 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1984), pp. 136–38.

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Once they had crossed the Zhang jiang and were some ten or twenty miles from her home, they stopped at a tavern. She toasted the two soldiers with good wine, and once they were drunk, she arose stealthily in the night and cut both their heads off. Then she galloped to her home neighborhood and, knocking on the door to her house with her whip, called on the occupants to come out. Her husband peeped out through a chink in the window and, seeing that it was a young general, dared not show his face. A few elders who lived nearby cautiously edged forward to inquire the visitor’s mission. She told them: “It’s my own business. It has nothing to do with you.” When the door opened, she rested her horse in the courtyard and took a seat, summoning her former husband with all the more urgency. The neighbors suspected some problem afoot and, fearing that they themselves might be implicated, collectively urged the husband to come out. When he finally emerged, he bowed his head obsequiously and threw himself headlong on the ground before her, not daring to rise. She said to him: “You recognize me, don’t you?” “Your humble servant fails to recognize Your Excellency,” replied her husband. “Try to recall,” said the woman. Her husband protested that he would never dare and squinted timidly at her, but was completely bewildered. “You really do not recognize me!” exclaimed the wife, and thereupon pushed her table aside and went forward to embrace her husband and pull him to his feet, weeping piteously: “I am not who you think I am—I am your abducted wife, of the Yang family.” And she told him the full story of her change of costume and her ingenious escape. The incident caused a sensation in the neighborhood, and relatives and acquaintances crowded to visit her and congratulate Mr. Li on the return of his wife. The news was reported to the district magistrate, who issued a notice applauding her feat. Gentry of integrity admired the woman’s righteousness and competed to write poems singing her praises, all saying, “What a remarkable woman! What a remarkable woman!” This happened in the jiawu year [1654]. Commentary: The Changes has it: “The duty of women is to be faithful until death.” A woman of a post station, offended by some petty insult when she was fondled on the wrist, picked up a knife and cut off her arm: would such a person have been prepared silently to submit to abduction and bear a son in slavery? When a woman behaves as this one did, one can hardly make any claims about her chastity. However, it is a tendency among people to cling to those close at hand and become estranged from and desert those who are remote. This woman belonged to the delicate gender of kerchief and scarf and was carried off helplessly to an alien province, separated from her home by a thousand miles of natural barriers, and her circumstances seemed to rule out any return; but she was able to weave deceptive spells, disarm suspicion from

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within her wretched prison, and secure release from her fine-mesh cage, hoodwinking the foolish wife as easily as if she were rolling dice, disposing of the young toughs as easily as if she were trimming dead wood: her profound intelligence and unshakeable courage would surpass those of many a bold man. Tai Liu had to depend on the aid of the Inspector, and Lechang had to seek the sympathy of Half-mirror: compared to their desperate panic, how much more admirable was this woman! Remarkable is the only word one can use to describe her. During the suppression of Gan prefecture, an elder of the area was given the task of transporting a boat for the army. The boat carried dozens of abducted women, who had dolled themselves up in finery and makeup and were chatting and giggling to one another, not one of them with the slightest expression of distress on her face. The elder could only sigh as he left. In another village a young married woman was allocated to a junior officer. Her husband heard about it and, after much difficulty, succeeded in securing permission to see her, offering to ransom her with a large sum of money. When his wife saw him, she glared at him and cried: “This is not my husband!” The husband fled in alarm, and only just managed to get out alive. The fickleness of human loyalties may reach to such extremes! And there is no shortage in the world of those who will abandon the old partner when they find a new mate, develop a hostility to their husband and not deign to give him a second glance. But then, as Mr. Liu’s biography of the woman of Hejian shows, it has always been that way. Someone said: “It was right for the woman not to forget her husband. But wasn’t it callous of her to abandon her son?” The Scholar of the Eastern Sea replied: “This is what was so remarkable. Without this son, she could not have won the trust of the wife and could not have been reunited with her former husband. The son of a slave is a slave. The reason why people in the world cannot emulate this woman is that they all have something they are not prepared to abandon. When she dazzled the wife with gold and pearls, this was a remarkable plan; when she donned armor over her woman’s costume, this showed remarkable courage; when at night she got the two soldiers drunk and cut off their heads, this showed remarkable strength; when she arrived home and did not immediately reveal her identity, but first made her husband kneel in alarm before she broke into tears—from start to finish there is nothing that is not remarkable about this story. But the most remarkable thing of all was her abandonment of her child. For it is only through this abandonment that she was able to gain something.” 31

Here, as often in Xu’s work, the narrative is followed by reflective remarks attributed to a variety of commentators—Master Yushan, the ————— 31. Xuanta bian, 3.20a–23b; Yu Chu xinzhi, 7.133–34.

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Scholar of East Mound, 32 the Scholar of the Eastern Sea, 33 and so on—all personae adopted by the author in order to represent a range of viewpoints. In many of his stories, the commentary carries a good deal of weight, introducing a perspective on contemporary affairs not communicated by the story itself. In “The Heart Transplant” 換心記, Xu Fang tells of an astonishing incident in which a dullard’s heart is surgically removed by a sympathetic god and replaced with a new organ, thereby transforming him overnight into a young man of prodigious intelligence. Xu’s commentary opens with a fairly traditional formula but soon takes on a note of withering scorn: This story was told to me in detail by a younger member of the lineage, employed by the prefectural administration, whom I met in gengchen [1640] on the road in Shandong. No other report exists throughout time of a heart transplant—this is the first such incident. The remarkable acuity of the metropolitan graduate-to-be was induced by his remarkable stupidity—wisdom existing, as they say, in a handicap. Some might comment: “These days, there are so many hearts that call for transplants—could such an operation really be undertaken in every single case, replacing the hearts of the cruel to make them humane, replacing the hearts of the corrupt to make them honest, replacing the hearts of the treacherous and wicked to make them loyal and upright?” Master Yushan remarks: “Were that to happen, the god’s ax would never be idle the whole day through! What is more, since all the hearts in today’s world are of the kind you mention, where would one find the organ donors to supply the humane, honest, loyal, and upright hearts?”

In terms of the literary tradition of the classical Chinese tale, Xu Fang’s anecdotal writings occupy an important place. Anecdotal collections of the late Ming—Xie Zhaozhe’s Zhu yu 麈餘 (Whisk remnants, 1607) and Qian Xiyan’s 錢希言 Kuai yuan 獪園 (Garden of cunning, 1613), for example—are largely casual and desultory in nature, revealing little engagement with social and political concerns. The works of such authors as Liu Yuanqing 劉元卿 (1544–1609) and Jiang ————— 32. See, e.g., the postscript to “The Leizhou Bandit,” in Xuanta bian, 4.31a; and Yu Chu xinzhi, 5.95. This pseudonym reflects Xu’s identity as a Ming loyalist, for it alludes to the story of Shao Ping, Marquis of Dongling under the Qin, who made a living selling melons under the Han. 33. Another name redolent of loyalist sympathies, for it refers to Lu Zhonglian’s threat to drown himself in the Eastern Sea if Qin ever came to rule the world; see Shiji, 83.2461.

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Yingke 江盈科 (1553–1605), which include a number of imaginative fables and allegories satirizing trends in the Wanli period, are perhaps the most immediate forerunners of Xu Fang’s personal brand of narrative. 34 In making strange events and remarkable personalities the focus of attention, and through them articulating a serious and highly individual outlook on contemporary affairs, Xu Fang demonstrated the potential of the classical tale as a vehicle for social commentary, a potential that Pu Songling would explore more fully in the decades to follow. 35 The stories of another author featured prominently in Yu Chu xinzhi (in juan 16–19) reflect the different atmosphere of the mid-Kangxi era. Niu Xiu (original name Bi 泌, zi Shucheng 書城, hao Yuqiao 玉樵) was a native of Wujiang county in Suzhou prefecture. The son of a licentiate, he was awarded the bagong degree in 1672 and held a succession of posts as district magistrate, in Henan (1680–83), Shaanxi (1688–95), and Guangdong (1698–1704), earning a reputation as an energetic and honest official. One of the episodes cited in his biography reveals his bold administrative style: When in Xiangcheng 項城, he was assigned jurisdiction over Chenqiu 沈丘, and on arrival there he reviewed the prison records. He learned that six men and women had been held in custody there for seventeen years and, after further inquiries, ascertained that all of them had been implicated in a Jiangnan case. Xiu promptly released them. Reporting the situation to his superiors, he enabled them to return to their home district. His predecessor as magistrate received a transfer to the post of erudite of the Court of Imperial Sacrifices, and as he set off for this new position, he called on Niu and bowed to him in respect, saying, “In my thirteen years in office I dared not take action in this case, but you released them within three days of your arrival. You are vastly my superior in talent and insight.” 36

Niu Xiu’s Gusheng 觚 賸 (Leftover tablets), the collection from which Zhang Chao reprinted selections in Yu Chu xinzhi, was written during the last few years of Niu’s life, when he was serving as district ————— 34. See Allan H. Barr, “Jiangke Yingke’s Place in the Gong’an School,” Ming Studies, nos. 45–46 (Spring–Fall 2001): 41–68. 35. We have no firm evidence that Pu Songling was familiar with Xu Fang’s work, although it is certainly a possibility: Xuanta bian was published more than ten years before Pu wrote his preface to Liaozhai zhiyi. 36. See Niu’s biography in Qingshi liezhuan 清史列傳, appended to Gusheng (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1986), p. 255.

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magistrate of Gaoming 高明, Guangdong. It may have been inspired in part by Qu Dajun’s 屈大均 (1630–96) Guangdong xinyu 廣東新語 (New words on Guangdong), a book Niu rated highly. 37 Like Qu Dajun’s work, which is devoted to the culture of Guangdong province, the first collection of Gusheng entries (preface dated 1700) also has a distinctive regional focus, bringing together anecdotes about five localities familiar to Niu Xiu from his upbringing and career, namely Jiangnan, Beijing, Henan, Shaanxi, and Guangdong. The second installment of Gusheng, which followed in 1702, was organized according to a different principle; the entries were arranged under the headings “Words,” “People,” “Incidents,” and “Things.” In many ways, Niu Xiu’s work is more conventional than that of Xu Fang, being for the most part a random collection of miscellaneous notes about places and individuals reflecting both his literary interests and his curiosity about life. An anecdote entitled “The Human Hedgehog” 人蝟 is typical of his work. Xiangfu county’s Monastery of Three Teachings is over ten li from the county seat, tucked away in the wilds, with no other inhabitants in the vicinity. It happened that in August 1682 a military licentiate surnamed Wang was heading home alone from a distant place after visiting a friend. Feeling terribly thirsty in the summer heat, he stopped for a rest at this monastery. A monk gave him tea, and after he had drunk it, he fell into a stupor and found himself unable to speak. All he could do was stare ahead blankly, as still as a carved figure. A monk then came and implanted into his left wrist a needle about two inches long. At first he felt a slight pain, and then gradually he lost consciousness. They then stripped off his clothes and shaved the top of his head. After this, they inserted a hundred needles into the flesh of his torso, creating a dense mat that covered his shoulders, back and chest, so that he looked like a human hedgehog. They carried him out of the monastery in a willow chair and paraded him through the villages, reciting Buddhist imprecations and telling people, “We will pull out a needle for each charitable donation we receive.” It attracted a large crowd of donors. By the time they reached the county town, spectators were packed as tight as a wall. A man in the crowd pressed up close and had a long look at him, then suddenly cried out: “This is my cousin, student Wang! How did he end up like this?” The monks immediately ran off in alarm. The city folk seized hold of them and reported the incident to the magistrate. An antidote was administered, and when all the needles had been extracted, the student regained consciousness. Huang Huyun 黃岵雲 of Puqi

————— 37. Niu Xiu alludes to Qu’s work in Gusheng, 7.145, 8.165.

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was magistrate of Xiangfu at the time, and having established the facts of the case through investigation, he sentenced the monks to the death penalty. 38

An accomplished author in a variety of genres, Niu Xiu was well connected, and his writings demonstrate a familiarity with a number of prominent intellectuals and officials of his day. 39 Niu Xiu took a keen interest in their activities, writings, and witticisms, as we see in a piece entitled “The Specialties of Suzhou” 蘇州土產. Once, when Wang Dunweng 汪 鈍 翁 of Changzhou was in the Hanlin Academy, all his fellow academicians were waxing lyrical about the products of their native districts. The ivory of Guangdong, the furs of Shaanxi, the silks and seafood of Shandong, the fine wood of Hunan and Henan—all these were catalogued in lavish detail, and everyone found this very entertaining. Only Dunweng stayed mum, not saying a word. Everybody started poking fun at him, saying: “Suzhou likes to think of itself as a famous place, and you’re from Suzhou—don’t you know about the specialties of Suzhou?” Dunweng said: “Suzhou has very few products—just two that I can think of.” “What are they?” everyone asked. “The first,” said Dunweng, “is actors.” Everyone clapped their hands in enthusiastic agreement, and Dunweng fell silent. When they badgered him to tell them what the second product was, he slowly said, “Zhuangyuan.” Hearing this, they all felt sheepish, and the party broke up. 40

Although a dedicated servant of the Qing state, Niu Xiu showed a lifelong respect for the older generation of Ming loyalists, and much of the opening chapter of Gusheng pays tribute to their memory. As a boy, Niu had received instruction from Wu Zonghan 吳宗漢, a scholar who had chosen a life of retirement in preference to serving under the Qing, 41 and through him Niu came to know other like-minded scholars, in particular Wu’s nephew, the gifted historian Wu Yan 吳炎, who was later arrested during the inquisition arising from the Zhuang ————— 38. Ibid., 5.94–95. 39. Linyetang ji 臨野堂集, a collection of Niu’s prose and poetry, has prefaces by such well-known literati as Pan Lei 潘耒, Li Yindu 李因篤, and Jiang Chenying 姜宸英. 40. Gusheng xubian (appended to Gusheng), 4.248. Dunweng was the cognomen of Wang Wan 汪琬, who served as a Hanlin compiler from 1678 to 1681. 41. Gusheng, 1.1. For a short biography of Wu Zonghan, see Xie Guozhen 謝國楨, “Gu Yanwu yu Jingyin shishe” 顧炎武與驚隱詩社, in idem, Mingmo Qingchu de xuefeng 明末清初的學風 (Beijing: Renmin chubanshe, 1982), pp. 187–88.

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Tinglong 莊廷鑨 history case and executed in Hangzhou in 1663. 42 Although most writers of the Kangxi period exercised great caution in alluding to this case, Niu Xiu boldly referred to it, and Gusheng includes the text of poems exchanged in prison by Wu Yan and Pan Chengzhang 潘檉章, another victim of the purge. 43 Niu also related the circumstances surrounding the martyrdom of the Ming loyalist Zhang Huangyan 張煌言 (1620–64) and reproduced the handful of Zhang’s poems that remained extant after his execution and the burning of his writings. 44 Niu thus made special efforts to transmit the moral and literary legacy of the loyalist generation. 45 By the time that Niu was working on Gusheng, over thirty years had passed since the traumatic Ming history case; the memories of that tragedy were not erased, but the outrage that he had expressed in the immediate aftermath of the inquisition had become muted. In Gusheng Niu recalled that his friend Sun Ying 孫偀 was embittered by the purge and passed the next several years in high dudgeon, finally committing suicide. 46 Niu could sympathize with such a position but did not identify with it, and both his life and his work demonstrate an adaptable and positive outlook. So although Niu did not shy away from recording episodes reflecting the precariousness of life in the early Qing, he often favored an upbeat ending that counterbalances the disturbing events that open the story. Here is one example: In the coastal crisis of 1659, the gentry of Jintan suffered a terrible persecution. The name of Wang Mingxin 王明信 was among those charged with sedition. He was executed, and his family banished. A concubine of his happened to be

————— 42. Zhuang Tinglong had edited a history of the Ming dynasty that employed terminology viewed as seditious by the Qing authorities. All those associated with the production of the work were sentenced to death, and their families were banished. For a summary of the case, see Arthur W. Hummel, ed., Eminent Chinese of the Ch’ing Period (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1943–44), pp. 205–6. 43. Gusheng, 1.6. Niu’s collected works include several pieces commemorating the victims of the purge. See Linyetang ji, 1.14b, 4.1a, 12.12a; cf. Deng Zhicheng 鄧之誠, ed., Qingshi jishi chubian 清詩紀事初編 (Hong Kong: Zhonghua shuju, 1976), 3.381–82. 44. Gusheng, 1.5. 45. The candor of his references to persecutions and massacres in the early Qing was to lead to the proscription of Gusheng in the Qianlong period. 46. See Gusheng, 1.24–25; Linyetang ji, 4.4a. Sun Ying had been a student of Zhang Juan 張雋 (hao Xilu 西廬), another of the scholars executed in 1663.

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pregnant, and when her party reached Honghuapu in Shandong, she gave birth to a son in a tavern there. An old servant named Yang told her in secret: “In an overturned nest there can be no unbroken eggs. The line’s sole thread lies with this infant. It is not far from here to the home of Feng Yidu 馮益都. 47 My master was a student of his and enjoyed his warm support. If I rush and explain the situation, and beg him to keep the child in hiding, he is bound to take him in.” The concubine approved of this plan. Yang then concealed the baby in his jacket and ran weeping through the night and knocked on Yidu’s door. Mr. Feng happened to be on furlough at the time and responded to the appeal with a heartfelt assurance. Saying, “Leave this to me,” he quickly waved Yang away. He instructed a maid to nurse the baby and gave him the name Xieyi 協一, to show that he would be treated no differently from his own children. When Xieyi was a young man, Minister of Justice Xu 徐 of Kunshan, out of respect for Yidu’s gallantry, betrothed one of his nieces to Xieyi. 48 The story circulated inside and outside the family by word of mouth, and everyone who heard it thought it a marvelous story. Now, on the basis of Yidu’s hereditary privilege, Xieyi has reached the position of prefect of Guangzhou, and the children of the Jintan Wangs have, after the payment of a ransom, been able to return from beyond the pass. For the family to remain intact and also to enjoy official position—all this is due to Yidu’s goodness in raising the orphan. 49

The contrast to the world of Xu Fang’s stories could hardly be more striking, for here it is the Han officials who are loyal servants of the Qing court that are depicted as staunch defenders of the age-old cultural values of compassion, righteousness, and courage. An even more notable example of this phenomenon is found in Niu’s most celebrated story, “The Encounter in the Snow” 雪遘. In this tale, the appalling loss of life exacted by the 1663 inquisition is acknowledged, but it is secondary to the uplifting drama that takes center stage. The story revolves around the fellowship between Wu Liuqi 吳六奇 (1606–65), a military man and erstwhile vagabond, and the Zhejiang scholar Zha ————— 47. Feng Yidu is Feng Pu 馮溥 (1609–92), a native of Yidu district in central Shandong, not too far from the post station of Honghuapu. 48. Minister Xu is Xu Qianxue 徐乾學 (1631–94), with whom Niu Xiu enjoyed close ties. 49. Gusheng, 1.24. Zhao Zhishen 趙執信, who wrote a tomb inscription for Feng Xieyi after his death in 1737, gives 1661 as his year of birth, but says nothing about the incidents related by Niu Xiu; see Yishan wenji 飴山文集, Sibu beiyao 四部備要 ed., 8.12b. For another story of a courageous intercession to protect the victim of an imperially sanctioned purge, see the story “Zhang Yujun,” in Gusheng xubian, 2.206–7.

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Jizuo 查繼佐 (hao Yihuang 伊璜, 1601–76). Tales of their friendship seem to have begun to circulate during Zha’s lifetime, and Niu Xiu’s narrative is one of five accounts recorded by writers of the day. 50 Like its analogues, Niu Xiu’s tale records, and indeed celebrates, the bond between Zha, an unconventional scholar with Ming loyalist sympathies, and Wu, a man who played a key role in the Qing conquest of Guangdong. Provincial graduate Zha of Haining district in Zhejiang had the courtesy name of Yihuang. A man of dazzling talent and unrestrained feelings, he would often say that society was full of mediocrities not worthy of his association, and that remarkable heroes in the world could be found only in the dust. Living at home at year’s end, he called for wine and was drinking alone. Soon dark clouds filled the sky, and snow fell to the depth of a man’s palm. He strolled to the doorway, hoping that some entertaining visitor might be inspired by the scene to come and enjoy the snowy spectacle with him. He spied a beggar sheltering from the snow under the porch. When the beggar stood up erect, Zha scrutinized him for some time. Struck by his demeanor, he invited the beggar to join him and asked him: “I have heard that in the streets and markets there is a man that everybody calls Iron Beggar, who walks with no stick in his hand, silent as though with a gag in his mouth, who has tattered clothes and empty belly, yet gives no sign of being hungry and cold. Is that you?” “Yes,” said the man. “Can you drink?” Zha asked. “Yes,” he said. So Zha had the servant pour the wine that was left in the jug into a bowl for the beggar to drink. The beggar lifted the bowl and downed it in one gulp. Zha was delighted, and stoking up the charcoal to warm the unstrained wine, he proposed the following compact: “You drink by the bowl, and I’ll drink by the cup, and we won’t stop until we have finished it all.” After thirty bowls, the beggar did not appear the least drunk, while Zha lay sprawled on an easy chair. After he had been helped inside by his servant, the beggar promptly went off to spend the night under the porch.

————— 50. These include an account by a contemporary observer of the history inquisition of 1663, Fei Zhichi 費之墀, in his Gong’an riji 恭庵日記, published in Nanxunzhen zhi 南潯鎮志 (1858), 36.3b–13b; a brief synopsis in Wang Jie’s autobiography, “Sannong zhuiren guang zixu” 三儂贅人廣自序, in Yu Chu xinzhi, 20.396; a tale by Pu Songling entitled “The Strong-Armed General” 大力將軍, in Liaozhai zhiyi huijiao huizhu huiping ben 聊齋志異會校會注會評本, ed. Zhang Youhe 張友鶴 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1978), 6.758–60; and an account by the celebrated scholar-official Wang Shizhen 王士禛, in his Xiangzu biji 香祖 筆記 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1982), 3.61.

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The following morning the snow had cleared, and waking from his heavy sleep, Zha said to his servants: “Last night I had great fun drinking with Iron Beggar. I noticed that his clothes are extremely threadbare, and I wonder how they can possibly keep out this bitter chill. Hurry up and give him my padded gown.” The beggar threw it over his shoulders as he left, not bothering to call on Zha to thank him. The following year, Zha was lodging in the Changming Monastery in Hangzhou. One day in late spring, he went out on an excursion with friends on the West Lake and suddenly came across the beggar by the Pavilion of the Grazing Cranes. Sleeveless and barefooted, he was walking along alone, with his head held high. Zha invited him back to the monastery, and there inquired about the gown’s whereabouts. “It being spring now, I have no use for it, so I pawned it at the wineshop.” Taken aback by this comment, 51 Zha asked if he had learned to read and write. He replied, “If I hadn’t been able to read and write, how would I have ended up a beggar?” Zha was deeply stirred by this remark, and paid for a bath and a new set of clothes and shoes for the beggar. He gradually revealed his background, saying, “I hail from Yanling stock, and I revere the Marquis of Quni. 52 My home is by the sea of Yue, and my name is Liuqi. But because my father and brother died when I was young, and because of my love for wide learning, so it is that I have come to be a vagabond among the rivers and lakes, in the end wending my way here. But I am mindful that the saints of old could not always avoid knocking on doors to seek charity; so who am I to regard this as dishonor? Little did I know that I would encounter an enlightened gentleman such as yourself, who would favor me despite my bedraggled appearance and show me the kindness of sharing food and clothing with me. Although I am no youthful Han Xin, I would never dare forget the gift of a meal.” Zha jumped to his feet and seized him by the arm, saying, “Sir, you are one of the world’s remarkable men, and for me to treat you as a drinking companion was to do you an injustice!” He directed a monk to purchase a catty of Pear-blossom Spring, and through the day and night they drank to their heart’s content. After they had lingered there for several months, Zha gave him traveling expenses and sent him on his way back to Guangdong. Liuqi’s family was from Chaozhou. He was a descendant of circuit intendant Wu Daofu 吳道夫. He was quite conversant with poetry and prose, but he had a weakness for gambling. After he squandered all his assets, he found employment among the courier ranks, and so acquired a comprehensive

————— 51. It is reminiscent of a line in Li Bai’s famous poem “Bring in the Wine” 將進酒. 52. These literary allusions identify him as having the surname Wu and nursing ambitions as a military strategist.

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knowledge of the waterways and thoroughfares, obstacles and barriers. At this time the empire was newly settled, and the imperial forces were advancing from Zhejiang into Guangdong, sterns and prows wedged together. The procession of banners and flags and the clamor of gongs and drums extended a huge distance, and the inhabitants of all the towns and districts that they passed would run for cover in the villages and canyons, leaving the roads deserted. Liuqi alone went blithely marching out. Seized by a patrol and brought before the standard, he asked to see the commanding general. Describing in detail the topography of Guangdong, he told him that the province could be pacified with the issuance of a proclamation: “My thirty sworn brothers and I have a reputation for martial prowess. But it is only because the four seas have had no master that we have crowded together and held fast to our territory, like boys playing with weapons by a pond. Now the emperor is on the throne and the supreme army is coming south, and it is the moment when the populace is yearning for succor, the season for heroes to display their worth. If you use me to circulate your instructions in all directions, I will send them forth with urgent dispatch, distributing them among my many stalwarts. Once those close by surrender, those at greater distance will follow cue, and within a month the momentum will be irresistible.” This advice was followed, and the territory of Guangdong was all pacified. From this time on, Liuqi’s strategies were always greeted with approval, and with a courage founded on strength he was able to capture any stronghold. He achieved a series of notable successes in the campaigns in Fujian and Sichuan, and within a few years he had reached the position of provincial military and naval commander. When Liuqi was down and out, he had thought himself doomed to perish in obscurity, but after provincial graduate Zha proffered his gown in his own home, pressed on him money in the monastery, and lauded him as one of the world’s remarkable men, he felt a surge of joy and pride, and was thus inspired to distinguish himself in the ranks and win promotion to a leadership post. He would say, “Nobody has a friend anywhere who can compare with provincial graduate Zha.” At the beginning of the Kangxi era, when engaged in regional inspections, he sent a company commander to Zha’s home with a sum of three thousands taels, and also sent him a letter inviting him to visit Guangdong. Liuqi laid on boat and carriage, and everything was of the utmost comfort. As Zha was about to cross the Plum Range, Wu’s son was already waiting by the side of the road, and he treated Zha with the most respectful courtesy. As they followed the current of the Xujiang southward, every one of the civil and military officials in the areas they passed through wanted to meet Mr. Zha. They competed to be first to give him presents, and there was no way to keep count of all the satchels of silk and bags of pearls. At a point twenty li from the prefectural city, Wu personally came to greet him, an eight-horse escort ahead of him, a company of a thousand soldiers behind. The size of the honor guard

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was comparable to that for a marquis or prince. Once he had welcomed Zha to his headquarters, he prostrated himself and knocked his head on the ground, saying: “How could the lowly beggar of yesteryear enjoy today’s distinction, were it not for you, sir! Now, when you do me the honor of visiting me, to dice up this beggar’s body would not adequately repay your kindness.” During the year that Zha spent there, among all the multifarious military questions, Wu would immediately accede to any suggestion from Mr. Zha, and the money Zha received for his righteous intercessions amounted to many thousands. When the time came for him to go home, Wu again gave him three thousand taels, saying, “I would not presume to claim that I have recompensed you. This is nothing more than an expression of the gratitude that Han Xin felt when recalling his youth.” Now, prior to this, there was a rich man of Huzhou named Zhuang Tingyue 莊廷鉞 who had bought Minister Zhu’s Historical Survey, and he had engaged noted scholars from all over Sanwu to expand, improve, and polish the work. When it was published, the names of over ten individuals were listed at the beginning as proofreaders. Because of Zha’s high reputation, his name was also included. Before long, the private history inquisition was launched, and all those with any association with the book were sentenced to the ultimate penalty. Wu submitted a memorial strenuously defending Zha’s innocence and thus secured his release. Thereafter Zha devoted himself with all the more abandon to poetry and wine and emptied his savings in order to purchase twelve pretty girls, whom he then taught to sing and dance. Often he would host a party at night, and in front of the curtains and lamplight their pearl voices and flower-like faces would bewitch their audience. Zha’s wife had a superb command of music and would personally beat time and correct their mistakes, and in consequence the Zha household actresses became known as one of Zhejiang’s most famous troupes. Earlier, during Zha’s sojourn in the Guangdong residence, among the many splendid sights in Wu’s garden was a remarkable Yingde rock over twenty feet in height. It was exquisitely hollowed, as though wrought by supernatural agency. Zha thought it marvelous and gave it the name “Crepe Clouds.” When he went to look at it again a few days later, it had disappeared, and he learned that Wu had given instructions for the rock to be transported to Zha’s home on a barge. To move it over hill and stream cost a small fortune. Now Zha has passed on, his ladies scattered, his gardens gone to seed, but the magnificent rock still stands there proudly. 53

————— 53. Gusheng, 7.131–33. The tale is found in juan 16 of Yu Chu xinzhi under the title “The Story of General Wu Liuqi.” Although it is Zhuang Tinglong whose name is principally associated with the Ming history, contemporary accounts make clear

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Although set in the years immediately preceding and following the Qing conquest, the same period when Xu Fang was writing his tales, this story in many ways reflects the values and orientation of the 1680s and 1690s, the period when it began to enjoy wide circulation. The pained questioning of moral values in the wake of the Qing invasion that was such a persistent theme in Xu Fang’s stories has been replaced by a resounding affirmation of the principles of loyalty and reciprocity embodied by Wu Liuqi’s relationship with Zha Jizuo. Pu Songling in his postscript to his version of the story hailed Zha as a hero who lived up to the highest standards of ancient days and described Wu’s bold generosity of spirit as unprecedented throughout history. 54 A central motif of the story is the affinity between Wu Liuqi and Han Xin, marquis of Huaiyin, the general and strategist whose victories were instrumental in enabling Liu Bang, founding emperor of the Han dynasty, to overcome his rival, Xiang Yu. According to the famous account in the Shiji, Han Xin, when down on his luck early in life, was fed for some twenty or thirty days by an old washerwoman. Years later, after the defeat of Xiang Yu and after Han Xin’s installation as the king of a feoff, he is said to have sought out his benefactress and given her one thousand catties of gold as recompense. For Qing readers of the Wu Liuqi story, Wu’s generosity to his former patron forcibly recalled the Han Xin episode, and the story only gained in interest from the replacement of the simple laundry lady by the intriguing figure of Zha Jizuo. As one commentator on the story was to put it, “It outdoes reading ‘The Biography of the Marquis of Huaiyin.’ ” 55 Another similarity between Wu Liuqi and Han Xin is pointedly overlooked in all Qing accounts of Wu Liuqi’s friendship with Zha Jizuo. Han Xin had for some time been a member of Xiang Yu’s entourage, and his valuable services to Liu Bang were performed after he ————— that, as Niu Xiu indicated here, his younger brother Tingyue was largely responsible for publishing the final edition of the book. 54. There is no question that Zha Jizuo and Wu Liuqi were friends, but whether the relationship between the two men followed the pattern outlined in these accounts is a matter of doubt. Zha Jizuo is said to have once confirmed the basic veracity of the story, but on other occasions he officially denied that he knew Wu Liuqi when Wu was down and out and claimed that the beggar he befriended was someone else entirely; see Lu Eting 陸萼庭, Qingdai xiqujia congkao 清代戲曲家 叢考 (Shanghai: Xuelin chubanshe, 1995), pp. 16–23. 55. Liaozhai zhiyi, 6.763.

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defected to Liu’s camp. Wu Liuqi similarly had held the rank of regional commander in the Southern Ming resistance to Qing authority. What is glossed over in Niu Xiu’s story is the fact that he in effect changed sides and threw in his lot with the Qing invaders. 56 The question of dynastic loyalties, so much an issue in Xu Fang’s tales of the early Kangxi period, has here become submerged. Instead, in this mid-Kangxi narrative, the drama of the Ming-Qing transition provides an opportunity to celebrate hallowed human values that survived the trauma of the mid-seventeenth century apparently unscathed. Despite such differences in outlook, Niu Xiu’s tales are recognizably part of the early Qing interest in storytelling so conspicuously displayed in Yu Chu xinzhi. Like Xu Fang, Niu was more than a casual recorder of anecdotes, and the ornate parallel-prose prefaces he composed for his two Gusheng volumes testify to the importance he attached to this part of his literary activities. For later readers, the early Qing tended to be seen as the heyday of memorable prose tales: it is notable that both Yu Chu xuzhi 虞初續志 (Yu Chu’s continued records), compiled by Zheng Shuruo 鄭澍若 (preface dated 1802), and Guang Yu Chu xinzhi 廣虞初新志 (Yu Chu’s new records, expanded), compiled by Huang Chengzeng 黃承增 (1803), closely follow the pattern set by Zhang Chao’s collection. Although compiled a hundred years later, they give precedence to writings from the early Qing and include relatively few pieces by eighteenth-century authors. For these early nineteenth-century editors, Zhang Chao and the writers of his day had set a standard not easily matched by more recent literature.

————— 56. See the biographies of Wu Liuqi in Qian Yiji 錢儀吉, ed., Guochao beizhuan ji 國朝碑傳集 (n.p.: Jiangsu shuju, 1893), 114.8b; and Qing shi liezhuan (Shanghai: Zhonghua shuju, 1928), 78.66a. In the latter work, his biography is found in the section on turncoat officials. These historical sources place his surrender in the year 1650.

Fictional Reunions in the Wake of Dynastic Fall 7 Tina Lu If there is a single archetypal narrative in Chinese, it would be the family reunion. Reunion’s reach into Chinese culture extends far beyond literature, as Charles Stafford suggests in Separation and Reunion in Modern China, an anthropological study of reunions in contemporary social life: “Chinese patrilineal ideology repeatedly and very strongly celebrates the notions, or fantasies, of reunion and unity.” 1 Within literature, reunion is so powerful a paradigm that the final act to a chuanqi drama—where everyone is restored to his or her proper place—is called a tuanyuan 團圓, or reunion. A full investigation of reunions would have to tackle many of these norms of reunion. In this chapter, I examine a few reunions in short fiction, both classical and vernacular. The generic forces pushing a narrative toward a perfect reunion are much weaker in short fiction than they are in drama. In fact, all the reunions discussed here are flawed in one way or another. In the short narrative that opens the late Ming huaben “Fan Jiuer’s Double Mirror Is Reunited” (“Fan Jiuer shuangjing chongyuan” 范鯦 兒雙鏡重圓), the twelfth story in Jingshi tongyan 警世通言 (Common words to warn the world; published in 1624 by the late Ming writer and editor Feng Menglong 馮夢龍), a happily married couple, a husband named Xu Xin and his wife, Ms. Cui, flee before the invading Jurchens. Unfortunately, they encounter a troop of Song deserters marauding, ————— 1. Charles Stafford, Separation and Reunion in Modern China (Cambridge, Eng.: Cambridge University Press, 2000), pp. 27–28.

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robbing, and raping their way through the populace. In the chaos, the two are separated. After searching for her in vain, Xu Xin has no choice but to continue on his journey. At an inn, he encounters a woman sitting on the ground, with disheveled hair and wearing only a shift. Wang Jinnu is about his wife’s age and not too dissimilar from her in appearance. She explains that she became separated from her husband, and after a few days of walking, her bound feet are so swollen that she cannot move. The deserters took all her clothing and abandoned her. Xu Xin feels sympathy for her, and since he has some money, he stays with her for a few days at the inn until her feet heal. Then they set off together, now as husband and wife. Three years later, with the Song having re-established order, the two of them are at a teashop. Xu Xin notices a stranger staring intently at his wife (Wang Jinnu is too modest to notice). Eventually, Xu Xin takes him aside and discovers that the man is Wang Jinnu’s former husband, Lie Junqing. He, too, has married again but would like to see his old wife for one last time. Xu Xin invites him and his new wife to visit the next day. The new wife turns out to be none other than Xu Xin’s former wife, Ms. Cui. She tells her story, the couples embrace, and Xu Xin and Lie Junqing swear friendship. That night, each husband reclaims his former wife, and from then on, the two couples become the best of friends. In this narrative, the wife exchange takes place with extraordinary ease, leaving no trace. No other parties are involved, other than the four; no children are born of either the original or the new couplings to challenge the remarriages. In fact, what happened to Ms. Wang before she is rescued by Xu Xin is carefully left out—all we are told is that she was “abandoned” by the deserting soldiers, but nothing is said about what those soldiers did to her before the abandonment. Whatever happened can be erased entirely (or perhaps, one might argue, both couples even gain a little by acquiring new friends). Had his new wife not been Xu Xin’s old wife, Lie Junqing would have regarded his ties with his old wife severed; only the coincidence of the perfect exchange allows for the restoration of the old marriage. In fact, narrative plays an internal role as well within the exchange. To Lie Junqing, the act of telling his story to Wang Jinnu almost takes the place of a permanent reunion. He tells Xu Xin: “If I could meet her briefly just once to tell her of all my sufferings, then I could die without

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regret.” 2 Narrative can at least partly resolve what ultimately cannot be assimilated, the dissolved marriage. That family members might simply separate and drift until they are connected to new partners is a terrible Confucian nightmare, somehow assuaged by the telling. Suggestively, although the two couples were originally separated because of the Northern Song’s fall, the ultimate dénouement of the family drama is essentially unconnected to dynastic happenings. This sort of reunion ultimately makes no comment on the dynastic transition. Some of the stories discussed below address what would happen if Lie Junqing’s new wife turned out to be a stranger. What happens when no exchange can be made that restores everything to just as it was before? What happens when the past cannot be recuperated? Huaben often consist of two narratives, one short and one long, that somehow reflect on each other. Xu Xin’s story serves to preface the longer “Fan Jiuer’s Double Mirror,” another fantasy of a reunion achieved with perfect ease. Also set during the fall of the Northern Song, this story tells of an official’s daughter kidnapped by bandits who ends up marrying the scion of a bandit ringleader’s family. The groom does not agree with his own family’s politics. When the bandits are ultimately defeated, husband and wife are separated. But miraculously they are reunited, and her husband is (with the simple trick of changing his name) able to serve the empire and be promoted. His past history is simply forgotten. No one’s chastity is besmirched, no one’s loyalty is impugned, and the polity heals itself seamlessly. But all this was written before the fall of the Ming dynasty. Well before the fall of the Ming, the separation of family members had become a trope of Chinese literature and strongly associated with dynastic transitions. The dynastic collapse both causes and mirrors the family’s separation. But although the dynasty can be and must be replaced, the family—whose existence both is legitimized by and legitimizes the dynasty—brooks no substitutes. Unlike the dynasty, the family has to be reconstituted as much as possible with the same components; 3 ultimately, a profound disjuncture arises between two ————— 2. Feng Menglong, Jingshi tongyan (Beijing: Renmin wenxue chubanshe, 1956), p. 165. 3. In fact, even the restoration of proper family order can be the subject of a narrative. In Shidian tou 石點頭 1 (also attributed to Langxian), all that is at stake in the reunion is family order: a father passes thirty-third in the jinshi examinations in the capital, and his long-lost son (whose mother was abandoned by the father while

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structures into whose parallelism so much has been invested. In the following, I skip from writer to writer and treat this kind of narrative primarily as a problem in political philosophy: How can a family once fractured come together again? In a few stories, the notion of families separated—of people wandering through the polity—is explicitly connected to the fear of incest. In the twenty-fifth story of the Xingshi hengyan 醒世恆言 (Constant words to awaken the world; published in 1627), identified by Patrick Hanan as probably having been written by Langxian 浪仙, a husband and wife are separated for three years, as the husband, Dugu Xiashu, travels into Shu to find a patron. The story, “On His Way Home, Master Dugu Has a Bad Dream” (“Dugu sheng guitu naomeng” 獨孤生 歸途鬧夢), follows the dreams of both husband and wife, without identifying them as such until the end; the dream frame is what we perceive to be the real frame (and this is what most scholars have found most interesting about this story). The two characters are husband and wife, and any sexual contact between them would be entirely proper—yet they are reintroduced to each other in a very peculiar fashion. In the wife’s dream, after three years of waiting, she decides to follow her husband into Shu. On her journey, a gang of young ruffians drag her to a temple. In her husband’s corresponding dream, he finds himself in a temple not far from home. Soon, a group of young men come into the temple, accompanied by a woman. Dugu Xiashu hides and tries to figure out what is going on: I was guessing that it’s got to be some rich young men out to enjoy the spring, and that’s what they are. If this woman is an official entertainer, or a top courtesan, why do they have to keep urging her? Could it be that she is a woman of good family who came here willingly to carouse with them? Might it be that they have kidnapped her and brought her here by force? Or tricked her into coming here? 4

————— pregnant) passes thirty-fourth. The entire last section of the story concerns not just the reassembling of this family but its proper ranking (fully as much energy is spent describing how the two women of the household—the concubine whose son is a successful examination candidate and the childless official wife—assume their proper positions within the family). 4. Feng Menglong, Xingshi hengyan, ed. Gu Xuejie (Hong Kong: Zhonghua shuju, 1987), p. 514.

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Only upon closer inspection does he realize that the woman is his wife, Bai Juanjuan. Clearly, he is witnessing a rape of some form—of his own wife, no less—and yet he does not do the obvious thing, namely, rush out from hiding to rescue her or call out to her (he reckons that he is far outnumbered, but he also does not seem to have seriously entertained thoughts of rescue). Instead, in a scene with a transgressive and illicit sexual charge, he takes on the role of a voyeur as the ruffians’ torment of his wife continues for pages and pages. Still in hiding and increasingly filled with rage, he watches as the men compel her to sing song after song and then to drink. Finally he reaches a breaking point, and picking up two bricks, he flings one at the ringleader and then one at his wife’s forehead. In a flash, the whole scene vanishes—clearly a figment of the imagination—but in his mind at least he has killed not only her chief attacker but also his wife. Or take the seventeenth story of Gujin xiaoshuo 古今小說 (Stories old and new; ca. 1620, also collected and redacted by Feng Menglong), “Shan Fulang’s Happy Marriage in Quanzhou” (“Shan Fulang Quanzhou jiaou” 單符郎全州佳偶), which takes place during the fall of the Northern Song. A daughter of an official is kidnapped and sold into prostitution. Her onetime fiancé happens to be stationed where she is working, and they meet when he takes a liking to her at a banquet. Later in the story, the two have sex—and only then discover that they were once an affianced couple. Later still, the two marry and live happily ever after. Dugu Xiashu’s emotional detachment before he realizes the woman’s identity leaves open the question of his reaction if the woman had been a stranger. Would he have joined in? Is there something almost incestuous about raping your own wife in the guise of being a stranger? The gross impropriety of such an act is suggested by one of the biographies in the Lienü zhuan 列女傳—in which after a long absence from home, Qiu Huzi tries to seduce a woman who turns out to be his wife. But Dugu Xiashu’s potential participation in a gang rape seems even worse. In such an encounter, before they are fully restored as husband and wife, he would be both family and stranger. In fact, the encounter smacks of incest, if we think of incest as luanlun 亂倫, or confusing the normative relations; if he had participated unknowingly in an attack on his wife, Dugu Xiashu would have been a husband taking on the guise of a stranger assuming the role of Bai Juanjuan’s

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husband. The reunion between family members seems fraught with a very specific kind of danger—it takes place only through narrowly averted acts of inappropriate sexual congress. Although no impropriety takes place here, it is avoided only by having Dugu Xiashu recognize his wife and, with even more finality, by having this entire transgressive encounter happen in two simultaneous and intersecting dreams. Another late Ming writer, Ling Mengchu 凌濛初, tells two stories of the dangers of reunion, and once again, a sexual transgression is the only way for the family order to be restored. Notably, both of the short introductory narratives of these two huaben tell, not of ordinary people, but of aristocrats. In fact, as I have written elsewhere, how various members of the Ming imperial family were separated from and reunited is a subject of great interest in yeshi 野史 literature of the early Qing; this is, it seems, a minor subgenre. Ling Mengchu’s aristocrats are torn from their families following the collapse of the Northern Song. One story tells of a commoner infiltrating her way into the royal family, and the other relates the fate of a young noblewoman sunk into prostitution, discovered by the Emperor Qinzong. When he encounters this young woman, he seems to be soliciting her for sex—and just as with Dugu Xiashu, a sexual encounter in these circumstances straddles the line between what is acceptable and what is not. In fact, he is actually probing her for information, although it looks like a sexual approach. As Ling Mengchu tells it, the moment when separated families are reunited is fraught with a very specific sexual danger. In the seventh story of the Erke Pai’an jingqi 二刻拍案驚奇 (Slapping the table in amazement, second collection; 1632), a young girl finds herself separated from her family when her father dies on his way to his official posting and her stepmother begins an illicit affair with another official they met while sailing to the posting. Her stepmother elopes with the man (identified only by his surname Lü) without contacting her first husband’s family, and the young girl loses all touch with her family. Years later, on the way to take up a new office, her cousin Zhu Donglao—a son of her mother’s brother—is fêted by a local magistrate. At the banquet, Zhu Donglao notices one courtesan who seems out of place. When the head courtesan offers him wine, he refuses and instead asks her who the one standing by the pillar is. The head naturally assumes that he is soliciting the girl’s services. She laughs and asks: “Do you like her?” Donglao replies, “It’s not that I like her. It’s that she

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looks different from the rest of you, and I wondered about her, so I asked.” 5 To the other characters, Donglao’s interest in the young prostitute has a simple explanation, despite his continued protests: “From what I can see, she doesn’t look like the rest of you. I was curious, and so I asked her boss. Now, could I have any other intention?” Nonetheless, his host rearranges the seating, so that Donglao can have maximum access to the woman and so that she can serve him during the banquet. He ends up confirming that she is his cousin—but only after giving the impression to all around him that his interest in her is sexual. As cousins of different surnames, they might in fact marry (indeed we are told that for generations the Zhus and the Dongs have intermarried)— nonetheless, the prospect of one cousin taking another as a prostitute is disturbing. Certainly by allowing her to serve him wine and entertain him, he has accepted something of her services. Why should the only way to identify his cousin be to approach her sexually? Once a relationship is untethered from any familial moorings, the argument seems to go, the door to all sorts of sexual deviancy—whether knowing or unknowing—is open. A related problem was of interest to traditional writers from Mencius onward: how society was initially formed out of groups of people who did not understand the proper relations between father and son or husband and wife. What existed prior to those relations? Were all matches between people acceptable? (Was something like the transgressive sexual contact we witness here omnipresent? Did it characterize that primal state?) In the second story of Pai’an jingqi, this sexual danger is even more explicit; a young bride Yao Dizhu runs away from her stern in-laws. On the way back to her natal home, she is kidnapped and eventually sold as a concubine to a rich man. Meanwhile, neither her in-laws nor her parents know where she has gone; each blames the other and the two families file suits. Years later, a friend of the family tells Dizhu’s brother where his sister is. The brother finds the young woman standing in a doorway and beckoning passersby, but she does not respond at all to him. Could it be, her brother wonders, that she so enjoys her life as a prostitute that she has written off her family? The friend explains her lack of response: ————— 5 . Ling Mengchu, Erke pai’an jingqi, ed. Wang Gulu and Chang Peiheng (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1983), p. 151.

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“You don’t know. Those pimps are harsh! Since she comes to them dishonestly, they must guard her really tightly—so she’s afraid to let anyone know and show face to face that she recognizes you.” 6 The friend then makes a most peculiar suggestion—the brother should solicit the apparent Dizhu’s services. Then, having taken her away from her pimp, he will be able to determine her identity: “Look her over carefully. If it is your sister, then you can privately have a reunion and then figure out what you’ll do. If it’s not your sister, spend the night with her and then let her go.” 7 Yao acts on this plan. A close examination convinces him that the woman, who goes by the name Zheng Yue’e, is his sister; only when she opens her mouth does her regional accent give her away as someone else. The instant he makes that determination, they do something peculiar: the two have sex. She is, after all, a prostitute, and he has paid for her services. Afterward, Yao confesses the whole story to her, including the fact that she is an exact double for his sister. The two devise a plan—the prostitute will pass as his sister, and the family’s legal problems will come to an end. And so, even as he continues to sleep with Yue’e, Yao brings her back home and convinces everyone that she is his long-lost sister. Eventually, the truth comes out; the real Dizhu rejoins her family, and her brother is punished with military exile. Yue’e offers to go with him, and the two of them marry, with the result that sister and sister-in-law are virtually exact doubles of each other (and only met because the brother thought his wife might be his sister). Actual incest is neatly averted, but sexual transgression that hints strongly at incest is certainly the order of the day. The quasi-incest here is the reverse of that of the story in Xingshi hengyan: Dugu Xiashu approaches his wife in the guise of a stranger; here, young Yao approaches a stranger in the guise of a family member. In both these stories from the Pai’an jingqi, the status of a woman who has left her family immediately approximates that of a prostitute, and she is rendered vulnerable to incest. In fact, the only way she can return to her family is through some form of proxy incest, whether it actually takes place or not. A male cousin seemingly invites everyone around him to mistake his interest for desire; a couple who are deemed ————— 6. Ling Mengchu, Pai’an jingqi ( Taipei: Shijie shuju, 1962), p. 42. 7. Ibid.

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to be brother and sister by all around them furtively have sex. In the latter narrative, the two might be brother and sister. Is there no way to approach his potential sister other than through sexual relations? No sooner does the brother confirm that Yue’e is not his sister than he hops into bed with her; it is as if sex is almost demanded of him to prove that she is not his sister. Moreover, this odd union, with its persistent hint of incest, is ultimately legitimized and integrated into the family—sister and sister-in-law, doubles for each other, one found because of her resemblance to the other, are destined to be members of the same family for life. Of course, the possibility and the reality of separated families and of raped women are central to all ways of imagining a dynastic transition. No account seems complete without some mention of the threat of rape: it is almost incidental to the plot in the eleventh story in Doupeng xianhua 豆棚閒話 (Idle talk under the bean arbor; circa 1668) (a virtuous wife kills herself when a group of bandits steal her away). All the stories discussed so far were written in the late Ming; in the wake of the dynastic fall, these issues became invested with an altogether different weight. The two most famous early Qing collections of huaben, Doupeng xianhua and Zuixing shi 醉醒石 (The sobering stone; from the late 1640s) do not contain reunion stories, perhaps because, in the wake of the real fall of a dynasty, the possibility of a fractured polity reassembled imperfectly is far too real. On the contrary, plenty of narratives assert that nothing has happened, choosing not to emphasize the fracture that separated families always represent and to valorize instead claims of seamlessness: chastity and loyalty. Perhaps for similar reasons, the few narratives of separation in Xihu erji 西湖二集 (Second collection of West Lake stories; from the mid-1640s) are noteworthy only for their blandness. For reunions in real life (or in other literary genres) are nothing like the ones we have seen. In various biji accounts, reunions are flawed or questionable. In “Wang Baihong qie Hu Shi xiaozhuan” 王白虹妾胡氏 小傳 (A short biography of Prince Baihong’s concubine Ms. Hu), for example, the scholar and poet Shi Runzhang 施閏章 (1618–83) wrote of a young woman whose life closely resembles one of the narratives in this chapter: a native of Jiangxi province, she is kidnapped at the age of eight sui and passed along until she ends up as the concubine of a Manchu prince, who dotes on her. Nonetheless, she mourns the fact

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that she was separated from her parents at such an early age, and she remembers enough from her childhood that her husband is able to track down her mother. Compare this supposedly nonfictional reunion scene with those in other accounts: When she got there, mother and child did not recognize each other. Lord Xing’an [her husband, who was magistrate of Xing’an] pointed at them and said, ‘How can you be suspicious about this? Your appearance and your air resemble each other’s so much! So how can you suspect otherwise?’ At this they embraced each other and wept. 8

This reunion—possibly engineered by a husband to appease a depressed concubine—seems open to questioning and flawed in a way that probably tainted many a real-life reunion but none of the fictional ones treated in this chapter. Two of the stories in Li Yu’s 李漁 collection of short stories Shier lou 十二樓 (Twelve towers; 1657) deal with reunions in the wake of the Ming dynasty’s fall. In the eleventh story (later reworked by Li Yu into the chuanqi play Qiao tuanyuan 巧團圓 [The miraculous reunion]), a family is paradoxically not separated but reunited because of the Mongol invasion—giving the lie to the conventional description of political chaos, that even “fathers and sons will not watch out for each other” ( fuzi bugu 父子不顧). The plot unfolds over decades; after the only child of Yin Xiaolou and his wife, Ms. Pang, vanishes, the couple suppose that their son was taken by a tiger. After failing to conceive another child, they begin to consider adoption. They are rich people who live frugally, and naturally they are wary. Even under the best of circumstances, they think, an adopted son cannot be compared to a natural one in his feelings for his parents. And given their wealth, they are especially afraid that someone will take advantage of them. So Yin Xiaolou comes up with a plan. Dressing himself in rags, he wanders around from town to town seeking a well-to-do orphan interested in adopting a concerned parent. A placard around his neck announces his intent, but instead of taking him up on his offer, the people Yin Xiaolou encounters jeer at him. Finally, a young man, Yao Ji, comes to his rescue and buys him. ————— 8. Shi Runzhang, “Wang Baihong qie Hu Shi xiaozhuan,” in Yu Chu xuzhi 虞初 續志, ed. Zheng Shuruo 鄭澍若 (Shanghai: Shanghai shudian, 1986), 7.11.

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The two live in perfect harmony for a while, although Yin Xiaolou continues to conceal his real name and wealth. But then the Mongols invade, and the Song troops rebel. The new father and son prepare to flee, but the son insists first on finding a young woman, Miss Cao, whom he regards as his fiancée. Strictly speaking, she is not, as even Yao Ji acknowledges; she is the daughter of his former patron, and both parties only considered an engagement before it fell through. The two men hear that rebelling soldiers are abducting women, and Yao Ji decides that he must rescue Miss Cao. Once they reach their destination, however, the two men are separated—before Yin Xiaolou has a chance to divulge his real name to his now beloved adopted son. After losing his father, Yao Ji continues his pursuit to find his fiancée. The rebelling troops have set up a market to sell the captured women, and Yao Ji, with a few taels of silver in hand, decides that he will buy back Miss Cao. But things do not turn out quite as planned. The rebelling troops foresee that all the buyers will want the young and pretty women, leaving them with the old and unattractive. So instead of auctioning off the women, they decide to sell them by weight. Each woman is bound and wrapped in a bag, so that no buyer can possibly know her identity, her age, or her appearance. Yao Ji finds himself in surreal circumstances, somehow redolent with significance; surrounded by the bags of women, all faceless, to be measured and purchased only according to their weight, transformed from people into a pure form of commodity. Only after he enters this marketplace does he read a notice: “In this marketplace of people, passersby are not permitted to come in and peek. Anyone who does not buy and leaves empty-handed will be investigated for fraud and will be executed for the crime of smuggling. There will be no lenience. By special directive.” 9 In other words, now that he has entered, he is stuck. He cannot leave without buying. Not only must the choice be random—but it must also be made. Yet from this assortment of unidentifiable bags, he is to find in the next few pages first a woman who becomes his mother and then one who becomes his wife. How does that happen? Partly it happens because Yao Ji is openly undiscriminating. Obviously he sets off for this marketplace in the hopes of finding a specific ————— 9. Li Yu, Shier lou (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1986), p. 253.

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woman—but with only money enough in his pocket to buy one woman, he rationalizes that so long as he manages to pick a reasonably attractive and young woman, he will be happy to make her his wife. And when the woman who emerges from the bag turns out to be not fair-skinned and young, but white-haired and old, he makes do. His experience with his adopted father has been so good that perhaps, he thinks, this woman inappropriate to be his wife can serve him as adopted mother—and maybe even marry his new father. The old lady takes to him, too. After Yao Ji confesses his original goal, she tells him that she and Miss Cao became friends during their captivity and gives him the clue to finding his fiancée. Miss Cao always carries a thin jade slab in her sleeve; by poking the bags and feeling for the hard slab, he should be able to find her. The old woman’s suggestion works, and Yao Ji finds Miss Cao, carrying what turns out to be the jade ruler that Yao Ji had given her as a keepsake. The three of them—new mother, son, and daughter-in-law—head for the old woman’s home. Once there, Yao Ji is shocked to discover his beloved adopted father. To him, it is coincidence—but of course Yin Xiaolou has simply returned to his own house and his wife, Ms. Pang, who happens to be the old lady Yao Ji has adopted as his mother. As they are joyfully reunited, Yin Xiaolou and his wife show the son each adopted separately around their house. Yao Ji is surprised, because the room he is shown comes straight out of his dreams of childhood. Aloud, he recollects all the toys he associates with the room, and the two old people are stunned. This could only be their own son, who disappeared in early childhood. Yao proves his identity by pulling his pants down and revealing that he, like the boy lost so many years ago, has only a single testicle. All four celebrate their miraculous reunion and live happily ever after, generation following generation in prosperity and fruitfulness, with all the sons and grandsons marked by a single testicle. The joke is fairly obvious: both normal family relations and usual literary conventions are inverted here. A family is put together backward: a son adopts a father and finds a wife for him; a mother chooses a daughter-in-law before she has a son. In another inversion, a family reunion is described precisely as if it were a romance. By the middle of the seventeenth century, one sort of romantic comedy was already a cliché: two young people who are betrothed to each other in childhood fall in love through coincidence in early adulthood, only to find out at

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the end that they were engaged all along. A union created through choice turns out to be sanctioned by orthodoxy. Here, Yao Ji treats the old man and old woman with filiality and respect before he discovers that they are in fact his true parents. And finally, the reunion takes place in the midst of the Mongol invasion of China; paradoxically, without the intercession of the Mongols and total political chaos, there would be no family reunion. The most disturbing aspect of this story is the image of Yao Ji standing in the midst of all the bags of women. The story undoes the power of that image, as if it is too disturbing to be allowed to rest: Yao Ji does not in fact draw his wife randomly. The apparent randomness of the choice ends up being partly defused by the fact that there is nothing at all random in who ends up forming the family. In the field of bags, both chance and deliberation play a role in what happens. The first day he has no chance of finding his intended, since all the bags that day are filled with old women. And when he returns the second day, he knows the secret to identifying Miss Cao and can single her out even though she is covered by a bag, thus foiling the rules of the rebelling troops who would insist that every choice be random. In other words, Yao Ji both cheats and plays fair: he is lucky enough to pick the one woman who will enable him to be reunited with his family, except that it is not the woman he hopes it might be. But consider Yao Ji’s circumstances if he had not been so blessed with outrageous luck and the wherewithal to cheat. Aren’t his circumstances simply those in which every man finds himself? Certainly in one sense the dynastic transition is a moment precisely when men are surrounded by bags of women—when the polity has been fragmented so thoroughly that reassembling the family is more an act of assigning fixed roles to randomly procured women than finding the right women to assign those titles to. Each bagged woman possessed a prior identity—as someone’s daughter, certainly, but also perhaps as someone’s wife or someone’s mother. In wartime all that is taken away, and people are simply commodities, bodies stripped of personhood, capable of sexual union with anybody who buys them. For a brief moment, we have returned to the world before the sages, before fathers and sons and before husbands and wives. In some sense, the scene in which Yao Ji is faced with these bags of women is a staging of the sort of sexual danger that Langxian and Ling Mengchu describe as central to the family re-

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union: here, too, the identity of the women is determined only after they have been purchased for sexual consumption. Of course, these circumstances may not be limited to moments of dynastic collapse; perhaps every man in a society of arranged marriages is ultimately surrounded by faceless bags, forced to accept a random choice. Obviously for a groom, who meets his bride for the first time on their wedding day, she might as well be in a bag, albeit one labeled with the name of her clan and her father. Is this every man’s relationship with every woman? Like Yao Ji, once a man ventures forward, he must make a decision. Or perhaps we are to understand this moment in the story as symbolic of the relation between men and women in some greater sense: men with names and identities choose (or buy, according to the story) women lacking any such markers. A personal identity is an attribute of the man—and only passed on indirectly to the woman. Primarily women are bodies, bought and sold without regard for the contents. The bagged woman acquires a primary identity through her purchaser. But this theory does not quite work either, since Yao Ji’s identity turns out to be an illusion. Our ideas about his identity turn out to be false: he thinks that he is an orphan by the name of Yao Ji, but turns out instead to possess living parents by the surname of Yin. The woman he discovers ultimately does not derive her identity from Yao Ji, but instead confers his real identity on him. For, of course, Yao Ji is not who he thinks he is, a fact known even by his erstwhile fiancée (at the end of the story, she explains that the engagement originally fell through because of her family’s uncertainty about his origins). Each member of the family is somehow free-floating, unmoored from any familial fixity, and yet each roots the others, and without the others is untethered from any firm identity. At any rate, the image of Yao Ji, armed with enough funds to buy only one woman, forced to make a selection from among the bags of anonymous women, seems to have a symbolic reach that the story’s specifics attempt to undo. The troubles of Yao Dizhu’s brother and Zhu Donglao pale before those of Yao Ji; in their stories, the mechanics of determining who belongs to a family—and who does not—take center stage almost immediately. In contrast, for Yao Ji, only a miracle saves him from ever knowing for sure whether he has committed incest. And what of all the other men shopping for women at the same market? The image of the man standing before the bags of women is a

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powerful symbol of how a patriarchy’s means of maintaining the mechanics of exogamy can be thoroughly and perhaps permanently disabled. Aside from the miracle of Yao Ji’s family, we cannot feel particularly sanguine about the future of this polity. New dynastic structures might be imposed, but new familial ones cannot. How that patriarchy—and not just Yao Ji’s family—can be put back together is left unclear. Can a family be reconstructed out of such random components? The tenth story in the Shier lou features a family with an unusual history. For seven generations, the line of succession among this branch of the Shu clan has been preserved only by the tenuous thread of a single son. Lacking brothers, “of the five cardinal relations they were missing one.” 10 The only son of the seventh generation, a learned scholar, marries a beautiful and virtuous woman, but they do not have a child until both are thirty. Nonetheless, the birth of this muchawaited son so necessary to the continuation of this family shocks the rest of the community, since the story takes place precisely at the moment of the Ming’s fall when bandits and rebels are rampaging through the south. The narrator relates that, since at this time the bodies of pregnant women were rendered for fat, and babies were used for target practice, nine out of ten pregnant women aborted their fetuses, and nine out of ten babies born were killed by their own parents to spare them from suffering. In deciding to give birth to this baby, Mrs. Shu appears to the community not as virtuous and nurturing but as sly and conniving. In such times, so pretty a woman with a baby must surely expect to sacrifice either her chastity or her child’s life. Hence her seemingly natural desire to have a child must have some licentious ulterior motive. We are meant to understand that in such times all norms of behavior have been undone. In fact, immediately after the boy’s birth, Scholar Shu begins to fret over the future of his family. His wife asks him what he wants her to do, since it seems clear that she will face an impossible choice between two different moral imperatives, each, it seems, equally absolute. Should she sacrifice her life to preserve her chastity, consequently leaving her helpless nursling to starve? Or should she do whatever she must to save the baby’s life? ————— 10. Ibid., p. 227.

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Mrs. Shu points out that chastity is the ultimate virtue for a woman; Scholar Shu responds that that might be the case in times of peace, but certainly not now. Mrs. Shu objects that if she were to yield to circumstance, they could never reunite in a time of peace. In other words, even before their ties are fragmented, husband and wife worry about how this relation is to be reconstituted. Since nothing short of her chastity—and the future of the Shu line— hangs in the balance, the discussions cannot remain private. Any decision that she surrender her chastity to save her son must at once be announced and made public beforehand—and it also must clearly not be of Mrs. Shu’s choosing. What follows permanently externalizes what had been private, both the conversations between Scholar and Mrs. Shu and Mrs. Shu’s own decision-making process. Scholar Shu calls a meeting of his clan and relates the discussions between husband and wife. His wife is then brought into the clan temple. and all the clansmen urge her to do whatever she needs to do to keep the baby safe. Mrs. Shu continues to protest. What if, she asks, she loses her virtue and the baby still dies? Finally, she insists on asking the ancestors their opinion. To that end, two slips are prepared, one reading “Preserve Chastity” and the other “Save the Child”; “Save the Child” is drawn. One gathers that a cold-blooded decision to submit to the bandits would have been too radical even for Li Yu. Every effort is made to represent her submission to the will of the clan as involuntary. (Ming and Qing law also made proving rape the victim’s responsibility.) This part of the story is perhaps the grimmest version imaginable of the late Ming debate over which of the five normative relations—marriage or filiality—ought to be given primacy (and gives some indication of the high stakes animating those discussions). Shortly thereafter, she is indeed captured, along with her nursling. Months later, after the establishment of the new dynasty, it is announced that the captives—most of whom by this time have found their way into the hands of the Qing armies—have begun to be ransomed and returned to their families. Scholar Shu liquidates everything he owns and sets off to find his family—but even as all the families around him reunite, he fails to find his wife and child. Gradually he sinks into total destitution and is taken captive. His wailing disturbs a general’s lady, who (separated from Scholar Shu by a curtain) interrogates him as to his identity and his mission. Then she orders him shackled until the general arrives to decide his

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fate. The lady who issues this command turns out to be none other than Mrs. Shu, now attached to the general. For four days of rain, Scholar Shu suffers horribly in his shackles. By the time the general returns and orders the shackles removed, they have rusted and become stuck to his ankles. At first, it seems they will not come off, and when they finally do, they tear off his flesh. Mrs. Shu has masterminded this torture to demonstrate to the general that, in his absence, there was not even the slightest hint of impropriety. In fact, the severity of Scholar Shu’s wounds even dates the length of his confinement, proving that there was no opportunity at all for any hanky-panky. Had there been, the suspicious general would have killed Scholar Shu without even asking any questions. In other words, she tortures her husband to save his life. Virtues are again turned on their heads. Mrs. Shu finds herself in a position in which any expression of feeling for her husband would demonstrate a lack of chastity to another man, who would then kill her husband; paradoxically, loyalty becomes a supremely disloyal act. At this moment, only by treating her husband as a perfect stranger can she be a dutiful wife. Any display of affection would have been considered licentious fornication—and he would have been killed for being an adulterer. Once again, a couple is reunited after a barely averted sexual encounter, but with a twist; this time, a wife avoids even the appearance of adultery with her husband. Earlier, Mrs. Shu had told the general that her son was the last of a long line of only sons. Should her husband ever return, the child must be returned to his family. The child’s fate has thus already been decided; but what of the woman? She responds to the general’s query by repeating her comments to her husband about what would happen if she lost her chastity: “It goes without saying that I cannot go with him, but even if I did want to go with him, how would I be able to face him?” 11 Explaining the incredible lengths to which Mrs. Shu went to keep the child alive, the general hands him over to Scholar Shu, who is immensely grateful: “I count getting this boy back as immeasurable good fortune. How could I even hope to get my wife back? With this, I will bid farewell.” 12 Of course, on the journey home he weeps, thinking of his long-lost wife; as they sail off, a messenger from the general catches up to them ————— 11. Ibid., p. 237. 12. Ibid.

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and tells them that the instant they had departed, his wife had hanged herself. When they cut her down, she was already dead, but the general forced medicine down her throat and managed to revive her. The general asks her why she attempted suicide when he offered to return her to her husband. She explains that she had promised that, if forced to lose her chastity, she would kill herself after saving the child. The general says, “Now you have already died once; so it can be said that you have not gone back on your word.” 13 The general sends word to Scholar Shu that Mrs. Shu’s return is the general’s own decision and has nothing to do with her own desires. Once again, the story stages the internal; what transpires must be proved to be against her will. The general concludes with a suggestion to Scholar Shu for how the couple might make things right: “When you get back, say that your first wife died, and that you’ve married another beauty. Set up a memorial arch to that virtuous woman, so that you can commemorate her name to future generations.” With that, the general prepared a boat and filled it with all the things that Mrs. Shu used in her daily life—her clothes, her jewelry, household goods—and gave it to them as a dowry. Then the newlyweds—along with their boy—set off for the return home. 14

Like all the texts discussed above, this one questions how reunion can take place, whether something heterodox must take place for the family to be joined together again. The moment of neatly skirted transgression lies embedded in this story as well. But here Li Yu posed an additional question, which in the latter half of the seventeenth century was, I think, necessarily a charged political one: whether the reconstituted families are the same as the ones that existed before. This is the world of that field of bagged women—where recovering true families apparently depends upon a miracle. Li Yu concluded by explaining: “This act of righteousness was the first notable act after the founding of the dynasty; I only regret that the name of the general could not be established. Not daring to give him one without authorization, I have referred to him here simply as ‘the general.’ ” 15 Li Yu left the general nameless, but he is clearly not a bandit (as the people who capture Mrs. Shu and run everyone out of their homes so clearly are and with whom the general contrasts so radically). Instead, he seems ————— 13. Ibid., pp. 238–39. 14. Ibid., p. 239. 15.Ibid.

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to be one of the victorious Manchus or a Ming general who has gone over to the Manchu side. The “act of righteousness” to which Li Yu referred is obviously part Mrs. Shu’s and part the general’s (although he is not the paragon that Mrs. Shu is, and his participation seems somewhat halfhearted). The general says he can have any woman and certainly does not need to despoil virtuous ones ( jiefu). But that explanation seems inadequate to account for the extremes of his change of mind. Initially portrayed as a rabidly jealous husband, of the sort who would tally the days Scholar Shu had been shackled by measuring the severity of his wounds, he undergoes a strange transformation over the course of the story: he ends up taking on the role of her father, preparing a dowry for her and advising Scholar Shu. Without the general, the wife could not have returned. Obviously she would have died if he had not resurrected her. Moreover, her return cannot be her own idea. Instead, just as the sacrifice of her chastity had to be left to her husband’s clansmen (and the fates that chose the right chit), her return must be at the general’s command. Perhaps we can only really read this reunion as a metaphor for dynastic change, although precisely how we would map it at a dynastic level remains vague, perhaps by intention. Reunion and dynastic change beg for comparison with each other: whether a family is the empire writ small, or whether what occurs at the familial level is simply at the mercy of the imperial. The comparison between wifely loyalty and loyalty to the state is one of the oldest in Chinese literature. Does this general stand in somehow for the new regime? If Mrs. Shu’s first dowry was arranged by her father, the second union is sealed with a dowry provided by the general. The Shus’ union can only be stitched back together and recovered through the general (and whatever it is he stands for). Long before their separation, Mrs. Shu asks rhetorically how she and her husband could ever reunite if she lost her chastity. The answer turns out to be through the general or the new order he represents. Take, for example, Mrs. Shu’s resort to torture when she encounters her first husband again. Chastity to her new husband and chastity to her old husband demand precisely the same behavior; at least initially, it is impossible to determine whether her behavior arises from loyalty to the first or to the second husband. (This sort of loyalty is quite unusual—it is hard to find other examples of exemplary loyalty whose

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object is unclear.) This version of loyalty seems close to that encouraged by the Qing dynasts a few generations later, when they valorized Ming loyalists like Shi Kefa 史可法 who died opposing them: loyalty is loyalty, they argued, and its object is unimportant. The story may appear to end just as it begins, with a husband, his chaste wife, and their son. But it is made excruciatingly clear that the return is far from seamless and has exacted a great cost. The dynastic transition cannot be shown to be too easy. Mrs. Shu had to make a choice: either rejoin her husband or die for chastity. In other words, the marriage with which we began needs to become two marriages, just as the order that has fragmented and yet remains the same must be marked by the two dynasties. There is another effect as well: the general who supplies a dowry and forces the couple back together has been permanently rewritten into their union. This new marriage has no legitimacy without him. And what does that general, who represents the new order, get for all his troubles? He earns Li Yu’s praise, for “the first act of righteousness” in the new dynasty. In relinquishing the woman, he earns legitimacy. Or perhaps rather than two marriages, there may be two women, both of whom might be called Mrs. Shu (which might explain Li Yu’s reticence about her name, in such a long and involved story, in which her subjectivity and volition are so important). “Mrs. Shu,” the name Li Yu uses contrary to the usual practice of referring to a married woman by her natal surname, covers both the virtuous woman whose death is commemorated by the arch and, as the general says, the new beauty with the new dowry. Scholar Shu is married to both women. What takes place between the general and Scholar Shu is in some senses a wife swap: beneath everything else, some sort of complicated exchange takes place between the men. The general emerges with legitimacy (and divests himself of blame for the wife who dies for her chastity, even though of course he is her rapist), while Scholar Shu comes out with a brand-new wife, with no blemish on her reputation. Each gives away something to receive something else; in some sense, two women are necessary for this particular act of legitimation to occur, as the narratives with which I conclude this chapter make clear. A few decades into the Qing dynasty, when the new dynasty had been well established, the problem looks quite different, and it is the specifics of the exchange that become of interest. Li Yu’s nightmare of a world—where only a miracle vouchsafes Yao Ji’s family and an ex-

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emption from possible incest—has been skirted. I conclude this chapter with a discussion of two short classical narratives that pick up where some of the Shier lou stories leave off. As with virtually all such accounts (and this might be said of the stories from Shier lou as well), the extent to which these are based on actual events cannot be determined. I treat all these narratives as constructed and filtered through the prism of some shared concerns. Certainly, these accounts do not represent the norm of lived experience in this period. In “Baowu sheng zhuan” 寶婺生傳 (Biography of the young scholar from Baowu) in the biji collection Beishu xuyan 北墅緒言, Lu Ciyun 陸次雲 (1636–1702+) wrote about a man of Shangshan who lost his wife in the chaos only to have her become the wife of a Manchu soldier. 16 That same Manchu soldier also lost his wife, who then married the man of Shangshan. Running into each other, the two men swap wives; both of the old marriages are restored, and each couple proceeds on its way. Precisely how this could have happened defies the imagination: surely opportunities for two such peculiar couples to present themselves and then examine each other in public must have been few indeed, since for the swap to have been made it would have been necessary for all four to have been present simultaneously; any other combination of the four parties leaves the coincidence undiscovered. As in the tenth story from the Shier lou, there is a Manchu here who has been emptied of all content: no longer culturally different, seemingly not responsible for the fall of the Ming, just a marker for a new order that has been recreated and claims some continuity with the old (since the loss of his wife makes his position equal to that of the man from Shangshan). His marriage is just as necessary to the restoration of order as is the man of Shangshan’s. This stripped-down narrative seems almost an allegory for a smooth dynastic transition: after a blip in which a central Confucian norm has been violated (like Mrs. Shu, these wives are not even widows when they take up with the other men), all is restored as if nothing had happened. Just as loyalty to a new dynasty can be instituted after a moment of supreme disloyalty, after that moment—in which all participated equally—all participants have their ————— 16. Shi Runzhang, who wrote of the dubious reunion between mother and daughter I mention above, recorded this reunion in a long narrative poem, entitled Tusi fuping pian 兔絲浮萍篇, which Wai-yee Li translates as “The Dodder and the Duckweed.”

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past indiscretions wiped away. One effect of this exchange—one wife for another—is to naturalize the Manchu conquest; it has been integrated fully into the very unions out of which the Chinese polity is created. Shier lou 10 concludes with a wife swap, executed with only one wife; here, the swap is much more explicit. Like a huaben, this biji account breaks into two, the second of which is simply the wife swap. The first half is a longer and more complicated meditation on the sexual politics of dynastic fall, which makes a better match for the Li Yu stories. Lu Ciyun describes how an unnamed couple from the Jiangnan region barely survive the conquest: the man is forced to hide among a stack of corpses, and in the course of her flight, the woman is captured by Manchu soldiers. After hurrying to the place she was last seen, her husband slumps down in despair at a nearby inn when he discovers that she and her captors have disappeared. After asking him a few questions, the innkeeper hires him on the spot to keep the books. The young man is so clever and organized that after he begins working for the inn, its profits soar. The innkeeper even offers his own daughter in marriage (an offer the young man deflects without explanation). One day, a patron hurries in for a quick meal at the crack of dawn and leaves a mysterious package behind. Opening it up, the young man finds fifty taels of gold, which he keeps in a safe place until the customer returns. When the forgetful customer returns in a panic, he explains that the money is for his wedding. Taking the money, he hurries off again. In a few days, the young man and the innkeeper receive an invitation to the wedding. Without the brideprice, the wedding could not have taken place, or as the invitation says, “This wedding you gave to me.” 17 The innkeeper declines but sends the young man in his stead. Once there, he catches a glimpse of woman in a boat; it is the bride, dressed in wedding finery. She so resembles his missing wife that he collapses in shock on the riverbank. She too collapses. After the boat reaches its destination, the woman explains that she saw a man who looked just like her former husband, and she describes his appearance and his attire. The prospective groom quickly searches for the man singled out by the woman; he is still collapsed on the riverbank unable to speak. The ————— 17. Lu Ciyun, “Baowu sheng zhuan,” in Qingdai xiaoshuo xuanyi, ed. and annot. Jiang Dongfu and Xu Guiting (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1990), p. 113.

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groom then says, “I know. This woman is your wife. Since you found the gold, it’s your gold. By returning the gold, you ransomed your wife, and this is the way that heaven is commanding me to take your place to restore your marriage. Do not be sad! I’ve been moved by your righteousness. Could I dare not to recompense you?” 18 We finally get some sense of what makes this wedding such an unusual one; the brideprice of fifty taels of gold was not for the woman’s parents, as would usually be the case in a match, but, we presume, for her captors. The fortuitous discovery and return of the gold allows the prospective groom to assume a position like that of the bride’s parents and give the bride away—back to her husband. The original husband is reluctant to accept such generosity, and his employer the innkeeper is brought in to decide what to do. The innkeeper agrees that each man has done the other a good turn: “He who returns money is a righteous man; the act of returning a wife is no less righteous than returning money.” Their good turns are equal—which might leave them even, except that the prospective groom has spent fifty taels of gold for a bride that he now has renounced any claim to. But the innkeeper has a way to make it all work out: he offers up his own daughter, the very one he had been offering to his bookkeeper. Now the original husband and wife can be reunited, and the prospective groom is not deprived of a wife. The original husband is rewarded for his good deed by the return of his wife, and the prospective groom is rewarded for his generosity with the substitution of another, equally suitable one. The innkeeper seems to have taken a loss by giving his daughter away with no brideprice, but he is simply paying back the original husband for having earned so much money through his accounting skills and business acumen. In other words, the original husband owes the gift of his wife to the prospective groom and to his boss. (The fifty taels of gold, however, still ends up with the wife’s captors.) It all works out perfectly—but not in such a way that these ties can ever be severed. The two marriages that are constituted seal those ties for good. These accounts are filled with details that beg for some explanation. Obviously, real-life women who were spoils of war were commonly disposed of neither in the bags of Shier lou 11 nor in the elaborate wedding ceremony described in this biji narrative. Fifty taels of gold for ————— 18. Ibid., p. 113.

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one woman seems to have been the going rate for a good-looking woman (or so at least one gathers from one of the narratives I discuss at the end of this chapter). However, one would be shocked to find a bride acquired in such a heterodox fashion bedecked in wedding finery. It makes no economic sense to spend money on a woman one was simply selling. After all, an elaborate wedding gains her sellers no credit and no glory. Or is she being married off by surrogate parents? The prosperous innkeeper seems an unlikely figure to be selling his daughter into concubinage; he clearly means for his daughter to become the wife of the prospective groom, which leads one to imagine that the prospective groom had been aiming to acquire a wife. Consequently, the story revolves around one enormous lacuna. How the wife manages to go from captive of Manchu soldiers to a legitimate bride commanding a lofty price boggles the mind. Even though wife-selling was illegal throughout the late imperial period, and was especially harshly punished during the eighteenth century, it was a practice of people so poor as to have no other options, as Matthew Sommer has shown. 19 The prosperous small business owner here and the original husband with his gift for bookkeeping are unlikely to engage in wife-selling. All signs point to a legitimate wedding. So who is marrying her off and getting that sum of fifty taels? In a peculiar way, just as she has too many husbands, the unnamed wife also has too many parents. Who is her natal family? Her Manchu captors seem rather miscast in that role, but like the general with whom Mrs. Shu takes up, somehow they are implicated in this marriage, which is, if anything, more right than what existed before. Once again, I think we are virtually bound to read this, if not as allegory, then as microcosm of what is to happen after the conquest. Just like Li Yu, Lu Ciyun employed this venerable trope to articulate a political anxiety connected to dynastic transition. In the huaben cited at the beginning of this chapter, the neatly averted incestuous union represents a kind of neatly averted fragmenting of the family. Li Yu and this biji narrative pose slightly different questions: How can we put together again what has actually been fragmented? What happens to families when the mandate changes hands, if the legitimacy of the ————— 19. Matthew Sommer, Sex, Law, and Society in Late Imperial China (Stanford; Stanford University Press, 2000), pp. 57–64; and personal communication.

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emperor both formally resembles and is intimately tied to the legitimacy of families? In that light, it is absolutely essential that these separated family members happen to be husband and wife, rather than parent and child or siblings, precisely because the relation between husband and wife does allow for interlopers and substitutes in a way that those other familial relations do not. In that sense, the marital relation resembles that between liege and vassal. Marriage is the one tie among the wulun, or Five Cardinal Relations, whose moment of origin can be easily pinpointed (a situation spoofed by Li Yu in Shier lou 11). This woman now reunited with her husband has violated her chastity (we cannot even begin to guess what might have happened to her during the period of her captivity, but even the suspicion of such doings led many a late imperial woman to suicide). Nonetheless, her marriage to her original husband is restored seamlessly, except for one detail. Through the exchange of a dowry and a brideprice, marriage ties two families together. In this narrative of the innkeeper, no less than four parties are involved and necessary—the original husband and wife, the prospective groom, and the innkeeper himself, father of the other bride. Reunion that takes place through transgression creates something new. Normatively, gift exchange and continued contact through marriage forges ties between two families, creating one where there were two. To an anthropologist, such a marriage is founded on dyadic, or closed, exchange networks. In other words, the tie that binds the bride’s and the groom’s families together excludes all others, nor is it potentially open to others. Writing about the Gawa of New Guinea, the anthropologist Nancy Munn speculates as to what would happen if all exchanges took place simply between two parties: If partners formed relationships with each other only in terms of skwayobwa [a simple exchange], each dyad in which a man participated would constitute an isolated intersubjective spacetime of repeated reciprocities with its own internal timing of transactions relative to his other hospitality relations; but there would be no formal connection (or potential for connection) between these separate spacetimes. 20

————— 20. Nancy D. Munn, The Fame of Gawa: A Symbolic Study of Value Transformation in a Massim (Papua New Guinea) Society (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1986), p. 57.

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Marriages work the same way as the Gawans’ skwayobwa, creating binary connections. One marriage bears no particular connection to another. Each one marks a connection between two parties. So how is one to imagine a polity constructed of marriages, if each is independent of all others? The trick in imagining a polity constructed out of such marriages is to visualize an infinity of different binary connections, existing simultaneously with other connections like parenthood and siblinghood, linking all together in a complex web. But what of moments— like that of dynastic transition—when that imagined simultaneity has been disrupted, and when, as character after character tells us, parenthood and sibling relations have also been disabled? Clearly a dyadic exchange would seem insufficient in imagining the regeneration of such a complex network; a pair is only a tiny bit better than two separate individuals. A tie that binds just two but can be imagined in parallel over infinity loses its imaginative grip at a time of dynastic fall. In this narrative, however, the ties created by marriage function differently, binding four together. Just as with the two, the financial obligations and new familial ties make these bonds impossible to tear asunder. And the old narrative trope of reunion turns out to recapitulate in sexual terms all the complexities of the political transition. Perhaps the four can stand for the broken polity as a whole. These exchanges are further complicated all the more in Zhou Lianggong’s 周亮工 (1612–72) “Shu Qi Sanlang shi” 書戚三郎事 (A record of the Qi Sanlang affair), which also tells of how a man whose wife is captured during the fall of the dynasty eventually comes to be reunited with her. Posthumously defamed as an erchen 二臣, or official who served both dynasties, Zhou Lianggong probably wrote this piece while in prison under suspicion of corruption; nonetheless, there is nothing loyalist or even ambivalent about this piece. Instead, it reads as a mini-account of a polity woven back together, partly through the restoration of old normative ties like marriage and partly through the creation of a new web of relations. The entire tale is filled with peculiar transactions, half-trades and aborted trades; the market economy is confronted with an entirely different logic of exchange. And finally, somehow, two men are able to ransom their wives without any money and at a time, as they repeat

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mantra-like, when “their towns are ruined and their families destroyed.” 21 The first half of this complicated classical tale is a story, not of separation and reunion, but of miraculous survival. Qi Sanlang, who with his wife and son made his home near a temple to Guan Yu, attributes his survival to the god and his devout service to the temple. After he is captured and separated from his wife, he is attacked by soldiers and left for dead. Two old neighbors bring him home and care for him. Only when he wakes up from his coma does he realize that all along his caretakers have been dead. Other than his young son, he is alone with two corpses. He goes to find workmen to help him make coffins for his two ghostly benefactors, and they, too, turn out to be ghosts who end up making coffins, not just for the two who nursed Qi Sanlang back to life but also for themselves. This narrative foreshadows the longer one to come. One debt—in this case, Qi Sanlang’s to the neighbors who rescue him—is discharged in a way that defies simple dyadic exchange. He owes just two old people, but in paying them back, a slew of others find their final resting places as well. The story then turns to Qi Sanlang’s efforts to reunite with his kidnapped wife. One night in a dream, the god Guan Yu tells Qi Sanlang where he will find a boat to take him to her. Hidden among the willows at a nearby ford is a boat with a man waiting inside: like Qi Sanlang, Cheng San is on a mission to find his wife, also captured and taken to the south. Cheng San is looking for a companion and takes Qi Sanlang on immediately because he is so impressed by Qi Sanlang’s tale of magical survival. Together they proceed to Shengzhou, where at a crossroads Qi Sanlang puts up a public notice identifying himself and promising a reward in gold to anyone who can help him find his wife. A Mr. X comes forward—at which point, Qi Sanlang is forced to confess that he has lied about the reward money. Instead, Qi Sanlang and Cheng San tell Mr. X all about how Qi Sanlang has made it this far: how divine protection has manifested itself first in his salvation and then in his dream. The story takes the place of the reward, and Mr. X even helps Qi Sanlang earn some gold, by copying sutras for a certain nobleman. ————— 21. Zhou Lianggong, “Shu Qi Sanlang shi,” in Yu Chu xinzhi 虞初新志, ed. and comp. Zhang Chao 張潮 (Shanghai: Shangwu yinshuguan, 1937), p. 63.

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Mr. X takes Qi Sanlang to the household of a Mr. He, and Qi immediately goes to the women’s quarters to ask Mrs. He whether she knows anything about his missing wife. Mrs. He proposes a straightforward trade: “Give me the gold, and I will give you your wife.” 22 After Qi Sanlang gives Mrs. He the gold, Mrs. He simply disappears within the house, only to emerge pretending that she had never received any gold. When they protest, she accuses them of lying. Qi Sanlang returns to his friend with neither gold nor wife. Next morning, Cheng goes to call on Mr. He. With nothing left to trade, Cheng bargains with the only thing he has left, his life. Whipping out a dagger from his shoe, he says: “If you do not give Qi his wife, you will be splattered with the blood as I slit my throat.” 23 Mr. He goes into the house, and as Cheng San and Qi Sanlang kneel outside begging him to stop, Mr. He scolds and beats his wife. He returns with the ten gold pieces, which he throws on the ground. Cheng speaks for both: the gold is not important, but the return of the woman is, and Mr. He should keep the gold. Mr. He is so moved by Cheng’s righteousness and his willingness to lay his life on the line for his friend’s wife that he has the woman in question come out. When Ms. Wang emerges, she does not look familiar to Qi. Instead, Cheng rushes forward to embrace her, and the two weep with joy: she is his wife, and not his friend’s. Mr. X has misidentified her: after she was kidnapped, she managed to leave a message on a wall identifying herself, her husband, and Mr. He, her kidnapper. Over time, pen strokes had faded from the character cheng 成, leaving only the character wu 戊, which Mr. X had misread as qi 戚. Everyone knows Cheng San’s efforts on behalf of his friend were sincere and that the mix-up was an honest one. If the woman had indeed been Mrs. Qi, the tale would be at an end. The ransoming of Cheng San’s wife leaves some complicated debts outstanding. Cheng San explains why he is now even more embroiled in this situation: “But the gold came from Qi, and the woman is coming to me. How can I go? If I leave, then Qi’s gold will not be returned, and I will truly have just fought for myself.” 24 Mr. He takes the ten pieces of gold in exchange for the woman, and Cheng San and Qi Sanlang once again are penni————— 22. Ibid. 23. Ibid. 24. Ibid., p. 64.

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less. This time, Mr. He recommends Cheng to a General Zhang, and Cheng indentures himself and his wife to Zhang for twenty gold pieces. With that twenty gold pieces, Cheng San intends for his friend to find his wife, but instead of taking the gold and buying his wife back in a straightforward way, Qi Sanlang insists that General Zhang keep the money and that Cheng instead continue to help in the search for Ms. Wang. Cheng San has not sold himself at all, but instead—Mauss-like— bestowed himself as a gift to General Zhang. Relegated to cleaning the latrines for General Zhang, Cheng happens to hear women speaking in his native dialect. He walks over to the wall and, hoping that the women will overhear, mentions his friend Qi Sanlang, who is looking for his wife, née Wang. That night, a woman walks over to the latrines and leaves a note; she is indeed Qi’s wife, Ms. Wang. Mr. He, Cheng San, Qi Sanlang, and Qi’s young son go to General Zhang to tell him that Qi’s wife is on his premises. Zhang checks their report with his harem of captured women—and who should be at their head but Ms. Wang, Qi Sanlang’s wife. When she emerges, she and Qi Sanlang are dumbfounded; both are paralyzed by the depth of their feelings, and neither approaches the other. But General Zhang—unlike everyone else Qi Sanlang has met on his journey—does not cooperate in the reunion. Virtually everyone Qi Sanlang has encountered on his quest has refused to accept payment or participate in a simple exchange, thus freeing Qi Sanlang to continue on his way. We are almost expecting General Zhang to be so impressed by all that Cheng San and Qi Sanlang have gone through that he will return Qi’s wife free of charge. Instead, even though the general agrees that Ms. Wang is indeed Qi’s wife, he asks to be reimbursed: “This woman has some beauty. Therefore, I made her the head of my harem. She is worth approximately fifty pieces of gold. Half of that would still be insufficient. Do you expect to get your wife back?” 25 Qi Sanlang repeats the plea that he has used before—with “cities fallen and families ruined,” he has no way to earn any money. General Zhang refuses, countering with the logic of the market: if he releases one woman for so much less than her market value, what will he do when others approach him for their wives? At this point, General Zhang has both the twenty gold pieces and Qi Sanlang’s wife. Qi Sanlang has nothing else to give, and he points out ————— 25. Ibid.

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once again that this is no ordinary sum of gold—his friend Cheng and his wife have exchanged themselves for these twenty pieces. Qi Sanlang weeps and beseeches heaven. His weeping sets off a chain reaction: pretty soon, everybody—his wife, their child, Mr. He, all of Zhang’s retainers, all of the women, and finally even hard-hearted General Zhang himself—is weeping. Finally, General Zhang agrees to participate: he will forgo payment and return Qi Sanlang’s wife to her husband. He concedes that Qi’s story indicates divine intervention; unless he is willing to be generous, Qi Sanlang and Cheng San will be stuck in a cycle of mutual debt, with neither man able to pay the other back. He tells Qi Sanlang: “Because of you, Cheng sold himself to me. If you, husband and wife, are to return and Cheng remains and Cheng does not resent you, how will you pay him back?” 26 He had possessed both the twenty gold pieces, the woman, and both Chengs. Rather than participating in a trade and keeping some of these, he is now prepared to give everything back, leaving Qi Sanlang, Cheng San, and their wives to use the money for traveling expenses. But there is one thing that Qi Sanlang has that General Zhang does want. Even with all the women in his harem, he has no son, and he would like to adopt Qi Sanlang’s son as his own. Qi Sanlang and his wife agree; the general fêtes them as relatives and sends them on their way. Over the next few years, the general stays in touch with Qi Sanlang, often showering him and his wife with presents. Later still, the general dies, and his clansmen seize his estate, forcing his adopted son to return to his own parents. The harem of women send young Qi on his way with many gifts and goods, and for generations thereafter, the Qis are a prosperous clan who make a point of continuing to serve the god Guan Yu faithfully. In premodern China, buying a concubine to bear children was common, and of course money and the exchange of gifts were central to all premodern Chinese marriage practices, at all levels of society. In other words, under normal circumstances, money played an important, necessary, and entirely legitimate role in the construction of family. To buy a person with money was simply to participate in the market economy of the times, but each of these men—the husband of whom Lu Ciyun writes, Qi Sanlang, or Cheng San—steadfastly avoids doing ————— 26. Ibid., p. 63.

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just that. Why not construct a tale around a husband’s repurchase of his wife? Perhaps the husbands eschew using money partly because that sort of straightforward redemption of loved ones touches too closely on what actually happened, the random, haphazard buying back and replacing of the missing. (Recall Yao Ji’s situation again—in real life, such a person would simply have had to resort to buying a new woman, as Yao Ji himself is perfectly willing to do.) With the missing replaced at random with new individuals, the reconstructed society hardly seems continuous at all with the old. Indeed, as we are told over and over, society is not simply rebuilt through the buying back and replacing of women into their old positions. Sometimes, these deferrals appear highly formulaic, as when Cheng San’s threat to kill himself convinces Mr. He to return the woman believed to be Qi Sanlang’s wife. That moment, in which someone in the position of a liege is coerced through a demonstration of virtue, is highly reminiscent of earlier literature, such as Sima Qian’s “Cike liezhuan” 刺客列傳 (Biographies of the assassin-retainers). In this story, however, the motivation for this moment is quite different: if Mr. He keeps both the money and the woman, the story comes to an end. Ostensibly Cheng is hoping for the return of either the woman or the money—as would be fair in a market economy—but in reality, Cheng San demands the return of both. As Cheng San puts it, “Without our families, we die. Without our wives, we die. Without this gold, we also die.” 27 It is key that we think of Qi Sanlang as nothing but a body stripped down. Qi Sanlang begins with only two things of value, his person and his story of miraculous survival. (Every time the little boy is mentioned, it comes almost as a surprise that he has been along for the entire journey.) Cheng San and Qi Sanlang are penniless, with no means of earning money other than selling themselves—which, of course, is a zero-sum proposition that defeats the entire purpose of reuniting both couples. Qi Sanlang even acquires his friend Cheng San through his story. After all, Cheng San is the one with the boat—although the value of that object is never mentioned again. Logically, a boat might even be worth as much as a woman, but that trade cannot enter into the calculus of this tale, and the boat is abandoned without explanation. ————— 27. Ibid., p. 64.

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Qi Sanlang and Cheng San are engaged in almost a kind of shell game, where each trades himself for the other. But each trade leaves the pair short. By offering his own life, Cheng San demands that Mr. He participate in this cycle—Mr. He essentially makes a gift of Cheng San’s wife and of Cheng San himself to the next patron down the line—which would not be the case if Mr. He had kept either the woman or the gold. Someone is always in bondage for someone else’s freedom; in fact, by the time they reach General Zhang’s, all the pair’s work has accomplished is the bondage of both Cheng San and his wife, instead of just his wife. If General Zhang had agreed to their proposal and accepted twenty pieces of gold for Ms. Wang, the story would still not end until Qi Sanlang and his wife had bailed Cheng San and his wife out. And simply selling themselves to free Cheng San and his wife would leave the foursome in the same bind. How to redeem all four, if they themselves are the only things of value? Qi Sanlang’s two articles of value (himself and his story) defeat the rules of commercial transaction; neither can be sold cleanly, in such a way that they cannot be sold again or so that the relationship between buyer and seller is concluded with the purchase. For example, when Qi Sanlang shares his story of miraculous survival, it serves to bind him more strongly with the listener, and he is able to “sell” his story again and again. Instead, purchase after purchase is refused, or in some way complicated. Sometimes, Qi Sanlang defuses the sale of himself or of Cheng San by managing to convince people with his story of divine intervention; at other times Cheng San or Qi Sanlang simply refuses to participate in the purchase (as when Cheng indentures himself, but Qi then refuses to accept the price). These deferrals continue all the way to the young boy. One person is traded for another—even though we are told that all are indispensable to a true reunion—until the little boy, who is somehow coded as dispensable (in contrast, Scholar Shu ranks his son above his wife, and both regard the boy as the single indispensable unit in their family). Nonetheless, the story ends happily because even this final trade—Ms. Wang for the little boy—ultimately fails, and young Qi returns to his biological parents to continue a line of prosperous and successful Qis. In other words, none of the trades go through, and the story can resolve the problem of trading only by deferring it continually. All these trades are nullified with the harmless perfidy of the general’s clansmen.

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Not only do Qi Sanlang and Cheng San not buy anything, but they also refuse to sell anything. Despite their complaints about the impossibility of earning money, twice, Cheng and Qi actually refuse gold: instead of having money in hand, they prefer that the powerful men Mr. He and General Zhang owe them indeterminate favors. To me, that suggests we are in a world of ritualized exchange and gift giving, whose rules are articulated specifically in contrast to those of the market. After all, General Zhang’s attempt to introduce the logic of the market—what would happen to the value of all the women he holds should he sell one woman below market value—falls on deaf ears. Instead, all the men and women who weep when Qi Sanlang beseeches heaven for help—and whose response eventually forces General Zhang into submission—proudly declare themselves bound by another brand of logic. They shame General Zhang into abandoning market logic, and he is essentially coerced into giving Qi Sanlang his wife as a handsome gift, worth fifty taels of gold. The self-consciousness with which characters ally themselves with the gift system on the one hand and the market system on the other suggests something of the sophistication with which late imperial people approached such matters. If marriage is usually based on closed, dyadic exchange, here the circulation of men and women takes on a very different form. Li Yu makes the reunion between Scholar Shu and Mrs. Shu work by introducing two more parties (even though one woman plays two roles, sacrificial victim and new bride); Lu Ciyun describes a marriage with four parties. What takes place in “Shu Qi Sanlang shi” is even more complicated. Both men and women approach the status, not of gifts that bind a giver and a recipient together, but of Munn’s kula shells. They are passed along as gifts rather than exchanged as commodities. None is ever truly sold. Munn describes some closed exchanges, of the model that Marcel Mauss most famously described and explained, such as the hospitality offered to a traveler who will reciprocate when his hosts visit his island later. However, her main focus is a very different kind of exchange, that of kula shells, which circulate around a ring of islands. The giving of kula shells, ceremonial items of great symbolic value, confers great honor on the giver, but unlike gestures of hospitality—food, for example—the gift of kula shells cannot be reciprocated by the recipient, because kula shells circulate only in a single direction around the large chain of islands. No one who gives a specific kula shell (and kula shells

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are so prized and individual that they even have names) can ever expect a return from the individual to whom he gave the shell. The goal is not to bind giver and recipient but to forge a much broader network, which will not come to fruition until possibly years after the giving of the kula shell: Although kula shell transactions also entail dyadic exchange units, in that a man and an immediate partner exchange shells of opposite categories, these transactions are not restricted exchanges or closed spacetimes. The shells that the two men transact travel beyond them, and these travels may be sequentially followed and defined in any given instance as the path (keda) of a shell. 28

In other words, the giver participates in this cycle of giving and receiving only because he can imagine a finite circuit of space and time in which these shells circulate. Without this imagined “spacetime” (as Munn calls it), gifts like kula shells make no sense. Why else give to an individual who will never return your present? As I have discussed elsewhere, anxieties associated with reciprocity are a literary commonplace in this period, whether, for example, it is ever possible adequately to requite a gift of righteous behavior. 29 Here, however, the gifts—or the debts and credits—create a chain of people, all bound to one another. Unlike kula shells, the focus here is not simply on the givers, although they do seem obligated to continue this cycle of generosity. One by one, Mr. X, Mr. He, and General Zhang are placed in a position in which each owns either Qi Sanlang or Cheng San but cannot assume control over his property; the rules of society demand that the property be passed on as a gift. Each time, one sacrifice leads to another: Cheng San offers his life up for the woman he thinks is Qi Sanlang’s wife; Qi Sanlang offers up all he has for Cheng San’s wife; Cheng San offers up himself and his wife for Qi Sanlang’s wife; and finally, Qi Sanlang’s little son is offered up for both Cheng San and his wife. By the end, we have a complicated series of debts and credits involving not two men, nor two men and their wives, but a whole series of benefactors and their wives. Does Qi Sanlang owe Cheng San a debt of gratitude or vice versa? Whom has Mr. He or General Zhang saved? To whom do Qi and Cheng owe their good fortune? If the trope of a man and wife separated during a dynastic ————— 28. Munn, The Fame of Gawa, p. 57. 29. Tina Lu, Persons, Roles and Minds: Identity in “Peony Pavilion” and “Peach Blossom Fan” (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2001), p. 187.

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fall is a way of indicating the primal fear of society torn to its fundaments, with all manner of sexual horror now possible, it also—in this narrative from the 1660s—becomes a way of imagining how links that have been destroyed might be restored or how the empire might be reconstructed in the wake of dynastic tragedy.

Dreaming the Past Memory and Continuity Beyond the Ming Fall

7 Robert E. Hegel When historical visibility has faded, when the present tense of testimony loses its power to arrest, then the displacements of memory and the indirections of art offer us the image of our psychic survival. To live in the unhomely world, to find its ambivalencies and ambiguities enacted in the house of fiction, or its sundering and splitting performed in the work of art, is also to affirm a profound desire for social solidarity. —Homi Bhabha, 1994

The “Displacements of Memory” One of the more famous Ming sympathizers among important early Qing writers is the Zhejiang literatus Zhang Dai 張岱 (1597–1679). His best-known writings are nostalgic; significantly, many works produced decades after the Ming fall recreate events of the past as dreams, a model followed by others among his contemporaries. 1 But these dreamy ————— epigraph: Homi Bhabha, “Introduction: Locations of Culture,” in The Location of Culture (New York and London: Routledge, 1994), p. 18. Bhabha concludes this 1994 essay by referring specifically to Toni Morrison’s novel Beloved and generally to contemporary culture and writing; he does not utilize this perspective, as I intend to do here, to elucidate times past. 1. As Zhang wrote in his preface to Tao’an mengyi, “When I think back to my life then, those of days of glory and extravagance, what I’ve seen has all disappeared, and in these fifty years have turned into dreams” 因想余生平，繁華靡麗，過眼皆 空，五十年來， 總成一夢 (Zhang Dai 張岱, Zhang Dai shi wen ji 張岱詩文集, ed. Xia Xianchun 夏咸淳 [Shanghai: Shanghai guji, 1992], p. 111). I return to the various degrees of sympathy for the fallen Ming at the end of this chapter.

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representations were hardly limited to their authors’ own experiences: in their art, several late seventeenth-century writers turned to periods in the past that they apparently felt paralleled their own earlier lives. As Homi Bhabha suggests for other times and places, as traumatic events— or lost happier days—receded into the past, their art came to reflect on, rather than simply to reflect, their sense of loss. Many late seventeenthcentury writers wrote about the Tang. Was this choice of subject matter fully conscious? I am not prepared to say that it was; certainly previous writers had created fiction, plays, and poems about events remote in time. My point here is only to demonstrate that there exists a noteworthy consistency among this socially elite group in their writerly concern with the fall of the glamorous “High Tang,” sheng Tang 盛唐. For this group of late seventeenth-century literati, writing about the cultural destruction caused by the rebellions and extensive warfare of the mid-eighth century seems to have allowed an exploration of the discomfort they felt with their own new, seemingly diminished, era. Perhaps the cultural and personal losses of that earlier time provided some solace: High Tang poets continued to be remembered, recited, quoted, and admired. In short, those earlier writers had “survived” a period of political and social chaos through their art. The ambiguities of these later artists’ writings would seem to reflect what Bhabha has termed the “ambivalencies and ambiguities” of their own fading memories of destruction and loss. Using Homi Bhabha’s phrases, and his critical insights, as my guide, I make these ambiguities my concern here. Late in life Zhang Dai penned an “Epitaph for Myself” (“Zi wei muzhiming” 自為墓誌銘) on the model of a similar essay reportedly composed by the illustrious Six Dynasties poet Tao Qian 陶潛 (Tao Yuanming 陶淵明, 365–427) on his deathbed. Writing of himself in both the third and the first person, Zhang commented: In his youth, he was a silk-stocking dandy incurably addicted to luxurious living. He was fond of fine houses, pretty maids, handsome boys, gorgeous clothes, choice food, spirited horses, bright lanterns, fireworks, the Pear Garden [i.e., the theater], music, fine antiques, flowers, and birds. In addition he indulged himself in tea and fruit and was infatuated with books and poetry. For half of his life he had been busy with all these, but then everything turned into dream and illusion. 勞碌半身，皆成夢幻。 When he was fifty years old, his country lay shattered, his family was broken up, and he took refuge in the mountains. 年至五十，國破家亡，避跡

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山居。Nothing was left in his possession except a rickety bed, a battered desk, a damaged bronze cooking vessel, a lute out of tune, several slipcases of incomplete books, and a cracked inkslab. He began to wear plain clothes and eat simple food, and still he often failed to have regular meals. Looking back, those days of two decades ago seem to have belonged to some other age. 回首二十年 前，真如隔世。 Since the year 1644 I have lived as in a daze. I am neither able to enjoy life nor to seek death. With white hair fluttering all over my head, I am still among the living and breathing. I am afraid that I will one day disappear like the morning dew or rot away like grass and trees. 甲申以後，悠悠忽忽，既不 能覓死，又不能聊生，白髮婆娑，猶視息人世，恐一旦溘先朝露，與草木 同腐。 2

Surely there could be no more explicit feeling of living as an outsider, in an “unhomely world,” than that demonstrated here. Zhang had, by his own account, enjoyed a privileged life during the last decades of the Ming. He had traveled extensively in the lower Yangzi cultural centers, engaged in refined cultural activities, and made a name for himself as a prose writer. Then came the Manchu conquest, and this familiar world disappeared, and its “historical visibility” began to fade. Zhang’s world changed catastrophically. For a time after the Ming collapse, Zhang Dai sheltered the Prince of Lu 魯王 (Zhu Yihai 朱以海, 1618–62), a scion of the Ming ruling family, in his house in Shaoxing. Zhang also served in this pretender’s court briefly when the prince attempted to rally Ming loyalists against the invaders. (The Zhejiang scholar Huang Zongxi 黃宗羲 [1610–95] was among Zhu Yihai’s strongest supporters during that period.) But this idealistic vision of a dynastic restoration, too, vanished: one of Zhu’s generals kidnapped Zhang’s son and demanded a ransom; later the same general sacked Zhang Dai’s home, destroying much of his library. In the summer of 1646, Zhang fled Shaoxing to a retreat in the mountains, where he lived out the remaining decades of his life. The poverty he describes in his elegy was ————— 2. Tao Qian’s composition was titled “Zi ji wen” 自祭文. See “A Sacrificial Prayer for the Dead on My Own Behalf,” in Anthology of Chinese Literature: Beginnings to 1911, ed. and trans. Stephen Owen (New York: Norton, 1996), pp. 615–16; cf. “Elegy” in James Robert Hightower, Poetry of T’ao Ch’ien (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1970), pp. 5–6. For Zhang Dai’s essay, see Tao’an mengyi 陶庵夢憶, ed. Chen Wanyi 陳萬益 (Taipei: Jin feng, 1986), pp. 129–31; and Zhang Dai shi wen ji, pp. 294– 97; translation (slightly modified) from Yang Ye, trans., Vignettes from the Late Ming: A Hsiao-p’in Anthology (Seattle: University of Washington Press, 1999), pp. 98–101.

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not exaggerated; after a childhood of privilege, he now frequently suffered hunger and cold. 3 Zhang Dai’s years in retirement were spent in writing about his memories of the late Ming. Although he did comment on political and military events, he is far better known for his collection of reminiscences of life in the cultural centers of the lower Yangzi. This was his Tao’an mengyi 陶庵夢憶 (Dream memories of Tao’s hut). Topics for these sketches include parties on West Lake (Xihu 西湖) in Hangzhou, lovely and virtually unobtainable courtesans such as Wang Yuesheng 王月生, marvelous individuals including the storyteller Liu Jingting 柳敬亭 (Pockmarked Liu 柳麻子), flowers, beautiful sites, and characters from the novel Shuihu zhuan 水滸傳 (Men of the marshes), to mention only a few. 4 Some of the entries are unsettling, at least by modern standards. One such bad dream is the market in human flesh portrayed in his sketch of potential concubines in Yangzhou (“Yangzhou shouma” 揚州瘦馬) and how they were peddled by matchmakers there: Arriving at the house of the “lean horses,” the person would be served tea as soon as he was seated. At once the woman agent would come out with a girl

————— 3. For a biographical sketch of Zhang Dai by Fang Chao-ying, see Arthur W. Hummel, ed., Eminent Chinese of the Ch’ing Period (Washington, DC: Government Printing Office, 1943–44), pp. 53–54; see also Xia Xianchun’s sketch, “Qianyan” 前言, in Zhang Dai shi wen ji, pp. 1–7. Timothy Brook also follows the youthful adventures, and the later recollections, of Zhang Dai in his Confusions of Pleasure: Commerce and Culture in Ming China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1998), esp. pp. 234–37; his concern is Ming culture, not post-Ming memory. See the biographical sketch of Zhu Yihai by J. C. Yang in Hummel, Eminent Chinese, pp. 180–81. Zhu died on the island of Jinmen, where he had taken refuge in 1651. By 1653 he had given up all involvement in the Ming cause, however. For details, see Lynn A. Struve, The Southern Ming, 1644–1662 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1984), pp. 96 et passim. Huang Zongxi’s father had been executed in 1626 by the notorious eunuch Wei Zhongxian 魏忠賢 (1568–1627); see the biographical sketch of Huang by Tu Lien-che in Hummel, Eminent Chinese, pp. 351–54. Huang ultimately gave up his opposition to the Manchus; his major work, Mingyi daifang lu 明夷待訪錄, obliquely addresses the reasons behind the Ming fall; for a translation by Wm. Theodore de Bary, see Huang Tsung-hsi, Waiting for the Dawn: A Plan for the Prince (New York: Columbia University Press, 1993). 4. Zhang’s lengthy history of the Ming was entitled Shikui cang shu 石匱藏書 (Books stored in a stone casket); it may have served as an important source for later, more orthodox histories; see Hummel, Eminent Chinese, p. 54. For Zhang Dai’s entry on Wang Yuesheng, see Tao’an mengyi, 108–9, and Ye, Vignettes, pp. 95–96.

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and announce, “Guniang, curtsy!” The girl curtsied. Next was said, “Guniang, walk forward!” She walked forward. “Guniang, turn around!” She turned around, facing the light, and her face was shown. “Pardon, can we have a look at your hand?” The woman rolled up her sleeve and exposed her entire arm. Her skin was shown. “Guniang, look at the gentleman!” She looked from the corner of her eyes. Her eyes were shown. . . . “Guniang, you can go back.” As soon as the girl went in, another came out, and the same thing was repeated.

One might expect that Zhang Dai probably found nothing morally questionable about this practice of parading these young potential sex partners for the benefit of the prying—and paying—male gaze. But significantly, Zhang recorded that he found the experience exhausting and, in the end, somewhat distasteful—at least for the way the matchmaker took her leave: upon delivering the chosen girl and receiving her pay, she precipitously “rushed off to look for other customers.” 5 Obviously the text here was not written by a young Zhang Dai celebrating his recent sexual exploits; the author was the aging and disgruntled idler who had little but his memories to sustain him.

Deeper Visions One of the most revealing pieces in Zhang’s collection is the last, entitled “The Blessed Land of Langhuan” 瑯嬛福地; here we see Zhang’s attempt at a kind of psychic survival, his effort to recover a more serene and predictable state of mind, a dream quest for confirmation of his abilities and of the values that he had learned long before. Perhaps because of some previous karmic cause, in my dreams I often dream of a stone grotto hidden among masses of crags. Flowing in front is a rapid and

————— 5. Zhang Dai, Tao’an mengyi, pp. 76–77; translation (first line modified) by Lin Yutang in Victor H. Mair, ed., The Columbia Anthology of Traditional Chinese Literature (New York: Columbia University Press, 1994), pp. 597–98. In a note (p. 597), Mair identifies “lean horse” as “a local name for matchmakers.” However, an anonymous reviewer of this chapter correctly pointed out that the “lean horses” were the young women instead. Translations of Zhang Dai’s writings from his Tao’an mengyi can be found in Mair, pp. 594–98, including on pp. 595–96 his reminiscence of the well-known professional late Ming storyteller Liu Jingting (see Tao’an mengyi, p. 68). A more extensive set of Zhang Dai’s sketches in translation can be found in Ye, Vignettes, pp. 86–103. Ye (p. 132) explains that Zhang Dai greatly admired the reclusive poet Tao Qian and hence named his studio “Tao’s Hut.” Mair (p. 594) mistranslates the name as “Studio of Contentment.”

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winding stream, where water cascades down like snow. Ancient pine trees and oddly shaped rocks stand interspersed with prized flowers. I dreamed that I sat down inside. A boy served me tea and fruit. The bookshelves were filled with books. I opened a few at random to take a cursory look, and they were mostly printed in a kind of seal script that resembled tadpoles, the footprints of birds, or thunderbolts. Yet in my dreams I can read the script and seem to understand everything in spite of its abstruseness. On days when I have had nothing particular to do, I have often dreamed at night about the place. And after waking up, my thoughts are filled with it. I wish to own such a fine place. It would be a rock-ribbed small hill in the suburbs, with plenty of green bamboo growing on it. . . . At the end of the mountain path there would be an elegant-looking cave, where I would build a burial place for myself, in preparation for my exuviation. . . . The front gate would face a great river, with a small tower on its wing, on top of which one might command a view of Censer Peak, Jingting, and the other mountains. A gate would be constructed below the tower, with a horizontal board inscribed “The Blessed Land of Langhuan.” 6

The Blessed Land of Langhuan, according to the Yuan period writer Yi Shizhen 伊世珍 in his Langhuan ji 瑯嬛記, was visited by Zhang Hua 張華 (232–300) during the Jin 晉 period. It was a strange world inside a cave; arrayed in many rooms were books that chronicled events of highest antiquity. Amplifying this story in the second juan of his own prose collection, an entry significantly entitled Langhuan wenji 瑯嬛 文集, Zhang Dai recorded Zhang Hua’s response to these treasure troves as being “completely at a loss” (shuangran zishi 爽然自失). His aged host demurs when Hua asks to read the books, and once outside the cave all traces of its entrance disappear. Zhang Hua was a child prodigy at the court of Wei Emperor Wen 魏文帝 (Cao Pi 曹丕, 187–226); later he was to play a major role in the conquest of the Three Kingdoms on behalf of the Jin court. Ultimately, however, he took the losing side in a factional struggle and was executed; his was a time of intense political rivalry, civil war, and court struggles. Zhang Hua is best known for his Bowu zhi 博 物 志 (A display of all things), a compilation of anecdotes of the strange and curious, of interest alike to folklorists, historians, and students of fiction; it may have influenced the better-known col————— 6. Zhang Dai, Tao’an mengyi, pp. 118–19; translation (modified considerably) from Ye, Vignettes, pp. 97–98.

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lection Soushen ji 搜神記 (In search of the supernatural), which appeared some decades later. 7 Thus to a startling degree, Zhang Dai concluded his major collection of reminiscences with narratives of what can only be termed wishfulfillment dreams—in contrast to the events of the past that had taken on a dream-like quality. Explicitly, he would identify with that earlier writer named Zhang in finding the records of the past, a past in which he could lose himself as he might have done in his own collection before his library was looted and burned. The past that he seeks in this story is manifestly not that of his own memories. This “past,” events far removed in time and essence, constitutes a much more idyllic alternative to his own tawdry experiences during the Ming, itself so thoroughly remote from his present in the Qing that he can only fantasize about it. By concluding his Dream Memories of Tao’s Hut on this note of frustration, he suggested the sensation of displacement experienced by many survivors and their fruitless efforts to create a new and solid basis for psychic—and social—stability in the new age, toward the end of the seventeenth century, well after the Manchus had established firm control.

Displacements to the Tang Zhang Dai paraphrased the story of Zhang Hua and alluded to other early writers through the title of his collection of reminiscences and his studio name. Yet in his elegy for himself he followed a pattern that is ————— 7. See Ye, Vignettes, p. 131; and the entry on Zhang Hua in William H. Nienhauser, Jr., ed., The Indiana Companion to Traditional Chinese Literature (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1986), pp. 215–16. Zhang Dai included his narrative of Zhang Hua’s experiences under the title “Langhuan fudi ji” 記 in his Langhuan wenji; see Zhang Dai shi wen ji, pp. 148–49. Yang Ye does not acknowledge that Zhang also compiled a short Tao’an mengyi bu (Supplement) in which he recorded more recent marvels, including the smoking of tobacco (see Tao’an mengyi, pp. 120– 240); thus this account of a fantastic dream is not the way he ultimately concluded his reminiscences. The last entry of the Supplement purports to be a dream he had while painfully making his way out of the mountains to accept an invitation from Qi Biaojia 祁彪佳 (1602–45), a Shaoxing bibliophile and Ming official who drowned himself to avoid serving the Manchus. In this final dream, Qi advises him to return to his mountain hideaway and stay there (Tao’an mengyi, pp. 123–24). This anecdote would seem to be a self-justifying dream, authorizing his retreat by reference to a noted literatus who suffered martyrdom for the Ming cause.

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noteworthy for the frequency of its appearance in early Qing writings. That is, Zhang specifically referred to several Tang writers, poets of the early Tang—including Wang Ji 王績 (585–644), who lived through the fall of the Sui and the successive conquest, and the immortal Li Bai 李白 (701–62), a favorite poet at the self-destructing court of Tang Minghuang 明皇. As others have demonstrated elsewhere in this volume, certain early Qing writers looked to events of the Song as analogous to the turbulence they themselves had experienced. 8 But for many authors the more common approach was to refer to, or even to write extensively about, the Kaiyuan 開元 (713–41) and Tianbao 天寶 (742–55) reign periods, later known as the High Tang, when Li Long ji 李隆基 occupied the throne as Minghuang. A number of writers of the late Shunzhi and Kangxi reign periods apparently embedded the trauma of the Ming fall in their reflective re-visions of this much more distant past. Yet there was no single use of that historical period in their writings, no “obsession” with particular Tang events; their use of that particular period may have been the result of complex motivations. It is conceivable that some may even have been unaware of the parallels between the late Ming and the High Tang as represented in their writing. But why, then, did so many writers choose the Tang for their historical subject? It is significant that their topics are separated from them by a wall of time, nearly a millennium, over which they heard perhaps with less than perfect clarity, but that does not matter: their literary visions of past grandeur are freely invested with imagination, what Bhabha terms the “indirections of art.” This may have been why the distant Tang sparked their interest more than the relatively recent Song, to say nothing of painful memory fragments of the Ming itself. An age recorded as much in romantic poetry as by historians, the Tang offered “ambivalencies and ambiguities” that could be freely reused and adapted to familiarize their own “unhomely world” of the early Qing. Like the novel Sui Tang yanyi 隋唐演義 (Romance of the Sui and the Tang; ca. 1675, but printed only in 1695), many late seventeenth-century writings about the Tang have as their main theme seemingly irreparable loss, in which the distinction between that past time and their ————— 8. See Li Mei 李玫, Ming Qing zhi ji Suzhou zuojiaqun yanjiu 明清之際蘇州作家 群研究 (Beijing: Zhongguo shehui kexue chubanshe, 2000) for comments on plays written throughout the seventeenth century, especially during the Ming-Qing transition.

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present did not necessarily constitute an opposition or even a difference. In this, they seem to echo the strain heard through the reminiscences of Zhang Dai: although the past may be gone, it still lives in memory, dream, and art. One example of the way that Tang events were appropriated and appreciated can be found in Yu Huai’s 余 懷 (1616–96) preface to his own Banqiao zaji 板橋雜記 (Miscellaneous records of the Plank Bridge), first published in Zhaodai congshu 昭代叢書 in 1697. 9 These [anecdotes] are just woven together from the rise and fall of an age and all the feelings about a time. They are not only descriptions of the petty and minor or records of the pretty and attractive. Jinling has always been referred to as a place of great beauties; in dress and objects, it is the glory of the lower Yangzi region. It is pre-eminent within the seas for its rich culture and gay spirit. . . . I was born late and was not able to witness the “mists and flowers” of the south or the young rakes of Yichun [this region]. But in my youth I was fortunate enough to grow up in a time of peace, and I happened to ramble to a northern location. There beside the long Plank Bridge, with intoning and reciting I hoped to make a brave impression. . . . But since the dynastic transition, times have changed and things are not the same; my decade-long dream of the past has become no different from that one about Yangzhou. 此一代之興衰， 千秋之感慨所系，而非徒狹邪之是述，艷冶之是傳也。金陵古稱佳麗地， 衣冠文物盛於江南，文采風流甲於海內，白下青溪，桃葉團扇，其為艷冶 也多矣。。。。余生也晚，不及見南部之煙花、宜春之弟子，而猶幸少長 承平之世，偶為北里之遊，長板橋邊一吟一詠，顧盼自雄。。。。鼎革以 來，時移物換，十年舊夢，依約揚州一片。 10

Yu’s last line refers to a famous poem by the late Tang poet Du Mu 杜 牧 (803–53):

————— 9. See Hummel, Eminent Chinese, p. 942, for biographical information on Yu Huai and for the publishing date for Banqiao zaji. Patricia Sieber comments on the fascination felt by seventeenth-century literati, both before and after the Ming fall, in her “Getting at It in a Single Genuine Invocation: Tang Anthologies, Buddhist Rhetorical Practices, and Jin Shengtan’s (1608–1661) Conception of Poetry,” Monumenta Serica 49 (2001): 33–56; she draws attention to Jin Shengtan’s 金聖歎 (1610–61) compilation of and commentary on Tang verse late in his life on pp. 36–39. 10. Ding Xigen 丁錫根, comp., Zhongguo lidai xiaoshuo xuba ji 中國歷代小說序 跋集 (Beijing: Renmin wenxue chubanshe, 1996), pp. 440–41.

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robert e. hegel Ten years later I wake from my Yangzhou dream With no more than a reputation for my time in the brothels. 11

十年一覺揚州夢 占得青樓薄倖名

At least one modern bibliographer has placed Yu’s collection of anecdotes about his romantic adventures in Nanjing in the same category as the Tang collection of fictionalized reminiscences about the courtesan quarters in Chang’an, Beili zhi 北里志 (Notes on the Northern Precincts). Yu Huai himself identified this collection with the nostalgic Dong jing meng hua lu 東京夢華錄 (Dreams of the glories of the Eastern Capital), compiled during the Southern Song period. Yu’s friend You Tong 尤侗 (1618–1704) was to remark, “The lovely ladies of the south seem to be still before my eyes, and there can be no exaggeration of their glory to one who has seen them. Yet within my own lifetime these beautiful women have turned to dust. In a turn of the head it’s all a dream of past glories—how can one avoid lamenting its loss!” 南部煙 花宛然在目，見者靡不絕之。然未及百年，美人黃土矣。回首夢華， 可勝嘆哉. Despite You Tong’s ostensibly playful tone, his reference to well-remembered temptations hints at the feelings of loss and displacement from the past glories the two writers shared—and to the act of imagination involved in recovering this vision. 12 Yu Huai’s short collection of anecdotes about Jinling (Nanjing) prostitutes during the late Ming may well be his best-known writing. Banqiao zaji describes the splendor and riches of that now-lost place and time with nostalgic reverence for the women who served their male patrons along the Qinhuai River in the years before the Ming fall. But ————— 11. Cf. the rendering in Angus Charles Graham, trans., Poems of the Late T’ang (New York: Penguin, 1965), p. 123. 12. Ding Xigen, Zhongguo lidai xiaoshuo xuba ji, pp. 440, 441–42. Paul Rouzer discusses the Beili zhi in his Articulated Ladies: Gender and Male Community in Early Chinese Texts (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Asia Center, 2001), pp. 249–83. Despite his protestations that the account is not necessarily historically accurate, Rouzer relies on the Beili zhi to reconstruct relationships between historical literati and prostitutes during the post–High Tang era. Written as reminiscence, the piece reflects several character types conventional in contemporary chuanqi fiction; I conclude, therefore, that it is an imaginative re-creation to a large degree. I am confirmed in this conclusion by the fact that its author included a long anecdote about his relationship with a prostitute that “bears an uncanny resemblance in some respects to Yuan Zhen’s much more famous Tale of Yingying, particularly in the way it contrasts female and male perceptions of the same relationship” (see Rouzer, pp. 273–83).

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Yu Huai’s depiction is a highly controlled vision; he made no references to venereal disease and other less desirable facets of that “romantic” life. His loving descriptions linger over the general aura of these demure ladies, their abilities in music and the arts, and their refined tastes. The melodious notes of flutes and amorous songs that filled the evening air pervade his anecdotes. Even so—the appealing images of these young women and their companions notwithstanding—his stated purpose was to warn readers against this sort of self-indulgence. More likely his goal was to demonstrate, by combining dreamy memory with artistic elaboration, how much had been lost because of the conquest. 13

Prefaces to and About the Past Looking backward through time from the age of sixty, the Qing poet and administrator Wang Shizhen 王士禛 (1634–1711) confessed his love for old books and their contents. “Time has poured by at a gallop” 流光如馳, he declared, and yet “when I hold these old things, it is like meeting an old friend” 撫此舊物，如遇故人. His passion for books unabated through the years, he was still an avid collector of old volumes “to amuse me in my old age and to help me forget my poverty” 可以娛吾之老而忘吾之貧. Wang wrote prefaces and colophons for several, including one collection of historical anecdotes from the Tang. These brief comments by Wang share Zhang Dai’s concern with transience, with lost time and with lost times—which, as Wang observed, have been preserved, if imperfectly, in old books. He also indicated that even these treasures provided instructive comments (xun 訓) for his age. But unlike Zhang Dai, Wang Shizhen had easy access to books as physical objects, not primarily as the stuff of dreams inaccessible in waking reality. 14 ————— 13. See the introductory comments of translator Howard Levy in his Feast of Mist and Flowers (Yokohama: privately printed, 1967), pp. 4–5; Yu Huai “had deplored the destruction of the brilliant culture of the Ming through Manchu occupation” (p. 3). He and others who wrote on the pleasure quarters in other cities “felt an empathy for events gone by, mourned the inevitable passing of youth and beauty, and tried to preserve for posterity some inkling of the wondrousness of the renowned prostitutes of their age” (p. 4). Levy rightly refers to the work “mainly as a literary effort and secondarily as a historical contribution” (p. 13). 14. See Wang’s two colophons to Shishuo xinyu 世說新語, in Ding Xigen, Zhongguo lidai xiaoshuo xuba ji, pp. 266–67. The Tang work was by Gao Yanxiu 高彥休 (b. 854); since a major portion of it was lost, Gao titled it Tang que shi

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Wu Weiye 吳偉業 (1609–72), as a somewhat older man, was far more directly affected by the Ming fall. He was, of course, already mature when it occurred. In a 1655 preface to Yujian zun wen 玉劍尊聞 (Anecdotes as precious as a jade sword) by the seventeenth-century bureaucrat Liang Weishu 梁維樞, Wu contemplated one aspect of his personal loss. Like Liang, Wu had compiled a great collection of old references to the eccentric behavior of literati and their witty comments (like Yujian zun wen, presumably, on the model of the wellknown Six Dynasties compilation Shishuo xinyu 世說新語, of about 430). Others had chided him for his obsession, and as a result Wu burned his trove of materials. “Soon thereafter the world was in great chaos,” he wrote. High officials and old friends alike were dead or destroyed; those, like me, who were so fortunate as to survive were scattered and impoverished, utterly depressed in spirit. Even sitting among a group of my fellows, when we tried to recall a few of such old matters, no one could remember them any more, and so I began to regret that my book was gone and could never again be recovered. 未幾。天下大亂。公卿故人。死亡破滅。其幸而存如余者。流離疾苦。精 神昏塞。或於疇人廣坐間。徵一二舊事。都不復記憶。於是始悔其書之亡 而不可復及也已。 15

Wu Weiye likened the experience to the loss of classical writings during the wars of the Zhou and excused his humble words on the basis of his meager reading of late. The compiler of the collection he prefaced, on the other hand, was the scion of a learned house. Having served in two courts, he had seen and heard much, and his life provided the anecdotes in his collection. Wu Weiye wrote this before his historical study of late ————— 唐闕史 (An incomplete Tang history; 884). For Wang’s preface, see Ding Xigen, p. 318. It reads, in part, “It appears that this book, like Jianjie lu 鑒戒錄, must have been the work of some down-and-out scholar 措大; it appears to be far from the standard of Li Zhao’s 李肇 [history] Guoshi bu 國史補.” Wang also derided the work for the poor behavior it presents, making it unworthy for moral instruction. Wang Shizhen, in a 1691 preface to his own collection Chibei outan 池北偶談 (Random comments from north of the pond), commented with pride on how his random jottings about the people and events he had witnessed or heard about later in his life had accumulated to the point that they could constitute a separate section of this larger collection (see Ding Xigen, pp. 452–53). 15. Ding Xigen, Zhongguo lidai xiaoshuo xuba ji, pp. 445–46; for a brief biographical sketch of Wu Weiye, see Hummel, Eminent Chinese, pp. 822–23. See also Wai-yee Li’s perceptive chapter on Wu in this volume.

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Ming insurrections was banned and soon after he himself had taken a position in the new Qing government. That texts served as embodied, replacement memories for Wu Weiye and his peers is not surprising; many of them retreated into borrowed art apparently to relieve their sense of displacement, their sense of “unhomeliness” in being cut off from recent experience. Thus it is noteworthy that a number of late seventeenth-century writers sought to re-establish ties with the past—as experienced through texts—by writing prefaces to new editions as the publishing of books recovered something of its late Ming level. As Kai-wing Chow has observed, a preface “visually and spatially separated the paratext from the text proper. Its aesthetic and personal quality put the preface on a higher ground where opinion expressed there would merit exceptional attention.” Some prefaces were printed in facsimiles of their authors’ own handwriting. 16 Prefaces thus served as vehicles for the representation of deep feelings and profound interests as visually strong self-assertions. Large numbers of books in the broad xiaoshuo bibliographical category were reprinted early in the Qing; their prefaces, like those by Wang Shizhen, can provide a useful insight into literati attitudes toward times past as they relied on this paratextual position to shape how these old materials were to be read in their new era. Through their additions to earlier texts, these seventeenth-century writers appropriated earlier writings—often from or about the Tang—to re-establish their own artistic ties with what had been violently wrenched away by dynastic change.

The “Indirections of Art” in the “House of Fiction” Although I have written about Sui Tang yanyi on several occasions, I return once more to the late seventeenth-century historical novel. It is curious that of all the novels narrating the events of the Tang period this one work remained popular for more than three centuries; I have already advanced several explanations for why I think this was the case. ————— 16. Kai-wing Chow, Publishing, Culture, and Power in Early Modern China (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2004), chap. 2. I am grateful to Professor Chow for providing me with a manuscript copy of this excellent work. See also Frederick W. Mote, “Preface: Calligraphy and Books—Their Evolving Relationship Through Chinese History,” Gest Library Journal 2, no. 2 (Spring 1988): 15.

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In both organization and style, the novel is unsatisfactory compared to several of its predecessors in the historical novels genre and, especially, to the two novels from which its author, Chu Renhuo 褚人穫 (ca. 1630– 1703+), copied well over half its content. I have come to believe that the one significant way in which Sui Tang yanyi differs from these other works, and from its successors, is its innovative handling of the deaths of its protagonists. 17 To this extent, Chu’s novel may serve as an emblem of late seventeenth-century literati attempts to search in the “house of fiction” to recover something of what was lost, particularly their own past days of grandeur and art. As Chu wrote in his preface, he reincarnated one pair of characters, the historical Sui Emperor Yang 隋煬帝 (r. 605–81) and his fictional favorite consort, Zhu Guier 朱貴兒, to become a second pair, Yang Guifei 楊貴妃 and Tang Emperor Minghuang, in order to tie the end of the novel to its beginning. Appropriately, the second couple learns about their earlier existences through dreams. Chu Renhuo took the idea, he claimed, from a “lost history” 逸史, which has usually been interpreted as the title of a yet-undiscovered book. It may equally be a generic term indicating the insubstantiality of such a fantastic recovery. The novel has no other explicit unifying plot devices. Although superficially a relatively mechanical application of transmigration as a popular religious motif, reincarnation occurs as well in the anonymous novel Fengshen yanyi 封神演義 (The canonization of the gods; ca. 1620?). Chu Renhuo’s reprinting of that novel in 1695 may corroborate his interest in this narrative possibility. (Chu’s edition quickly drove out of circulation all earlier versions of Fengshen, it would appear; his is the basis for all later editions.) Reincarnation also figures centrally in the early proto-novel Sanguo zhi pinghua 三國志平話 (Plain tale on The Chronicles of the Three Kingdoms; printed edition 1321–23). In each of these three lengthy prose narratives, death is transcended; all appeared several ————— 17. I have argued that Sui Tang yanyi was popular because it preserved much of the text from the most imaginative late Ming novels about the Sui and the Tang and that it satisfied the early Qing fashion for a “balance” of story elements in works of fiction. Most recently I have discussed characterization in the novel in my essay “Conclusions: Judgments on the Ends of Times,” in Dynastic Decline and Cultural Innovation: From the Late Ming to the Late Qing and Beyond, ed. David Wang and Shang Wei (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Asia Studies Center, 2005), pp. 523–48. The edition I refer to is Chu Renhuo 褚人穫, Sui Tang yanyi 隋唐演義 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1956).

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decades after the traumatic fall of a dynasty, the Southern Song in 1280 and the Ming in 1644. These parallels suggest a level of meaning beyond the mere expediency of closing the narrative circle by tying the ends of stories to their beginnings, however simplistically. Nor were the two works published under the auspices of Chu Renhuo’s studio the only late seventeenth-century novels to rely heavily on reincarnation to avoid the finality of loss. The anonymous Xingshi yinyuan zhuan 醒世姻緣傳 (A marriage to awaken the world; ca. 1661) likewise stresses continuity through the rebirths of central characters and works out the karma of the first group through the lives of the second. 18 So, too, does karma “balance” the acts of the earlier couple in Sui Tang yanyi. One might even conclude that the juxtaposition of contrastive story elements (political intrigue, romance, the fantastic, the artistic) in Sui Tang yanyi has implicit political significance in this regard, as a means to reassert balance in a society and harmony in a world so devastated by war within the authors’—and their initial readers’—lifetimes. Yet it seems intuitively true that reincarnation might have been used by any Ming or Qing novelist at any time: it was a tenet of popular Buddhist belief, and it confirmed earlier conceptions of the moral structure of the universe. Novelists regularly availed themselves of materials from the full cultural spectrum in constructing their works, from the practices of the working folk to the philosophical speculations of the literati, and from the local to the nationally known. But in the case of Sui Tang yanyi, the rebirths of these protagonists obviate the need for any more conclusive ending. It also embodies an artistic hope for recovery in some dream-like, idyllic realm, when so much of significance has been lost in the human world. 19 Continuity in plot gives meaning to narrative in premodernist fiction, a point that literary theorist Peter Brooks has termed at once ————— 18. See Xingshi yinyuan zhuan 醒世姻緣傳, ed. Huang Suqiu 黃肅秋 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1981), in three volumes; the partial translation by Eve Alison Nyren, The Bonds of Matrimony / Hsing-shih yin-yüan chuan (Lewiston, ME: Edwin Mellen, 1995); and Yenna Wu’s lengthy study, Ameliorative Satire and the Seventeenth-Century Chinese Novel: Xingshi yinyuan zhuan—Marriage as Retribution, Awakening the World (Lewiston, ME: Edwin Mellen, 1999), especially chap. 4 on the novel’s date and authorship. 19. See my “Conclusions” on how this and other contemporary novels avoid creating conclusive endings. On his last pages, Chu Renhuo briefly suggested the appropriateness of a sequel, but he made no attempt to write one.

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banal and grim: “Man is ambulatory, but he is mortal. Temporality is a problem, and an irreducible factor of any narrative statement. . . . It is my simple conviction, then, that narrative has something to do with time-boundedness, and that plot is the internal logic of the discourse of mortality.” This conception has been articulated most clearly by Walter Benjamin, who reaffirms that just as death is the element that confers meaning on a life, in narratives endings supply needed retrospectivity and thereby suggest meaning for the events narrated. 20 By mechanically transcending even mortality in post-Ming narratives, reincarnation suggests continuity beyond the ending of any individual story, whether of an individual or of the cultural-political entity that was a dynasty in imperial China. Brooks has also observed: “We have [in the twentieth century] no doubt foregone eternal narrative ends, and even traditional nineteenth-century ends are subject to self-conscious endgames, yet still we read in a spirit of confidence, and also a state of dependence, that what remains to be read will restructure the provisional meanings of the already read” (italics added). 21 Brooks’s argument here concerns the essential features of plot in narrative generally, but his comments suggest a reason for the importance of this motif in late seventeenth-century Chinese fiction: reincarnation reflects on, and confirms, the validity of personal continuity beyond catastrophe and loss. In this, fiction resembles classical poetry, which provides life beyond the grave for the remembered poet. Thus like poetry, ————— 20 . Peter Brooks, Reading for the Plot: Design and Intention in Narrative (New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1984), pp. 21–22; on death and meaning in fiction, Brooks quotes Benjamin’s “The Storyteller” (“Der Erzähler”), in Illuminations, trans. Harry Zohn (New York: Schocken Books, 1969), p. 94. 21. Brooks, Reading, p. 23; this concludes his review of arguments about reading the preterite tense conventionally used in narrative in French as if it were “a kind of present.” Brooks also questions whether readers actually read the verbs of narrative conventionally presented in past tense in English as indicating completed action. Although completion of action is often not indicated in the Ming-Qing vernacular-narrative language style, this dependence on the narrative to provide meaning through closure is nonetheless present in premodern Chinese readings, in my reading. To my knowledge, the first to use the term “post-Ming” with this significance was Patricia Sieber in her “Turning Lethal Slander into Generative Instruction: Laws, Ledgers, and Changing Taxonomies of Vernacular Production in Late Imperial China,” in The Magnitude of Ming: Essays on Command, Allotment, and Fate in Chinese Culture, ed. Christopher Lupke (Honolulu: University of Hawai’i Press, 2005), pp. 205–24.

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fiction of the seventeenth century was also called upon as a vehicle for nostalgia and a means to reaffirm cultural confidence. Obliquely, fiction was employed to witness and lament the fall of the late Ming “high culture” through indirect and ambiguous artistic representations. 22

Changing the Melody Of the many Qing period narratives using the Tang as a temporal setting, those concerning the flautist Li Mo 李謨 were among the more freely adapted from their sources. In the oldest of these texts, Li Mo is simply the most outstanding musician of the High Tang. 23 Toward the end of the 100–chapter novel Sui Tang yanyi, the musician is given a series of new adventures. One night as he passes by the imperial palace, he overhears someone practicing an extraordinary melody; it is a celestial tune learned by the Emperor Minghuang during a dream. Quickly Li transcribes the notes. When subsequently he practices it himself, the emperor in turn overhears him and takes the musician into the imperial orchestra because of his exceptional skill. 24 Judith Zeitlin explores a nearly identical tale in Scene 14 of the contemporary chuanqi 傳奇 (southern-style) play by Hong Sheng 洪昇 (1645–1704), Changsheng dian 長生殿 (The Palace of Lasting Life; 1688). There Li Mo happens to learn of the existence of a wonderful new ————— 22. See Wai-yee Li’s Introduction to the Poetry section in this volume; she indicates how early Qing poets used poetry to intervene directly in literary debates of the Ming for the purpose of maintaining cultural continuity. Many of the early Qing poets reflected on or used as their models poets of the High Tang such as Du Fu and later Tang poets as well. 23. Yang Juyuan 楊巨源, Li Mo chuidi ji 李謨吹笛記, in Tang dai congshu 唐代 叢書, ed. Chen Liantang 陳蓮塘 (n.p.: Lieyuange, 1869), Third Collection, 6.1a–5a. Anecdotes in which Li Mo is bested by other, unearthly, flautists appear in Taiping guang ji 太平廣記 (Beiping: Wenyoutang, 1934; reprinted—Taipei: Minglun, 1974), 3: 1552–54; Feng Menglong 馮夢龍 quotes one in his redaction of that collection, Taiping guang ji chao 鈔, in Feng Menglong quanji 馮夢龍全集 (Nanjing: Jiangsu guji chubanshe, 1993), 9: 886–88. The story that Minghuang first heard the melody in a dream is adapted from another collection of materials about the Tang, Yang Taizhen waizhuan 楊太真外傳 by the early Song historian Yue Shi 樂史 (930–1007). This two-juan story appears in Tang dai congshu, Fourth Collection, 6.1a–9a and 7.1a–10a; and in Jiu xiaoshuo 舊小說, ed. Wu Zengqi 吳曾祺 (Shanghai: Shangwu yinshuguan, 1933; reprinted—Shanghai: Shanghai shudian, 1985), vol. 10, Ding ji (Fourth collection), sect. 1, pp. 24–36; this episode appears on pp. 27–28. 24. Chu Renhuo, Sui Tang yanyi, chap. 86, p. 668.

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melody being played in the imperial palace (the melody having been received from a celestial messenger by the dreaming Yang Guifei, not by the emperor). Anxious to learn it, the flautist stations himself at the palace wall just outside where the imperial musicians are practicing; in order to memorize it more effectively, he quietly accompanies the orchestra as they perform the melody. 25 It would appear that these writers have played on the ambivalence in Li Mo’s act of appropriation, and about the nature of the melody itself, to reflect on the past in divergent ways. But before exploring their separate nostalgic engagements with the past, we should consider the tune and its symbolic function in these two seventeenth-century narratives. To summarize Judith Zeitlin’s observations elsewhere in this volume, in Palace of Lasting Life it is the melody for the dance that captured so many imaginations, the Wu nishang 舞霓裳 (Rainbow skirts) performed by the beauteous Yang Guifei. Her feet are naturally so tiny that she can dance on a small platter or disk. The dance and its lost music represented the essence of court refinement during that most glorious period of the Tang. But of course High Tang culture collapsed ignominiously during the rebellion of An Lushan 安碌山 and the devastating wars that continued for years after his death. This is how the novel Sui Tang yanyi describes this process of transmittal. In Chapter 86, Minghuang is enjoying himself on a bright moonlit night by having numerous colorful lanterns hung around his palace. Soon the emperor hears a clamor from outside. These are the voices of the capital’s residents crowded into the street to enjoy the beautiful lanterns. The emperor’s first thought is to order them to be silent and to have a few punished to emphasize his command. But one of his courtiers suggests that the emperor share his enjoyment with his subjects by having the imperial orchestra play for them; this will surely quiet them. Although the noise does subside somewhat, the throng becomes subdued only when Li Mo begins to play his flute. The novel then explains this situation in a flashback introduced by addressing the reader directly, in the conventional guise of a profes————— 25. Hong Sheng 洪昇, Changsheng dian 長生殿 (The Palace of Lasting Life), ed. Xu Shuofang 徐朔方 (Beijing: Renmin wenxue, 1997). A rather unsatisfying English version is Hung Sheng, Palace of Eternal Life, trans. Yang Hsien-yi and Gladys Yang (Peking: Foreign Languages Press, 1955). See Judith Zeitlin’s chapter in this volume for an examination of the implications of his response.

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sional storyteller: 26 “How, you may ask, was Li Mo’s flute so marvelous?” This is because once in a dream the emperor heard a band of heavenly musicians play a haunting melody that they identified as Ziyun hui 紫雲迴 (The purple cloud turns); an immortal maiden invites him to memorize it, and he does. The emperor begins to practice it as soon as he awakes, and before long he has it down perfectly. Then several days later, when he is walking through the streets incognito with Gao Lishi, they hear the same melody being played some distance away. The emperor sends Gao to locate the musician, who turns out to be Li Mo. Li had been passing by the palace wall on the night the emperor began practicing the piece; struck by its beauty, he memorized it while writing it down with his fingernail. He had been practicing when the emperor overheard him. Thereupon Li Mo is summoned to become the leader of the Pear Garden 梨園部 orchestra in the palace and in this capacity he quiets the crowds with his extraordinary artistry. 27 Much later, after An Lushan rebels, Sui Tang yanyi gives Li Mo two further adventures. To evade the Tang armies during their disordered retreat, the flautist takes refuge in a temple. There he plays his flute to ease his mind. Before long a huge figure with the head of a tiger enters to demand another tune. When the weretiger falls asleep, Li Mo climbs a tree where he remains until morning, safely out of the reach of the monster’s band of more normal tigers. In the second episode, he is playing his flute one evening for a friend while sailing across a lake. An old man poles up in a light skiff to listen and offers suggestions on the tune the emperor had heard in heaven. This ancient figure is the one who had ultimately driven the tigers away. He is in fact an immortal, come to correct the human flautist’s errors in performance. 28 The chuanqi play inserts an additional artistic layer of poignant memory between the source and the remembering of this great melody. ————— 26. This conventional “storyteller’s manner” has been most completely described by Patrick Hanan, among other places, in his Chinese Vernacular Story (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1981), pp. 20–22. During the Wanli period, this set of rhetorical devices became the most common way for novelists to introduce the narrator’s comments and shifts of narrative line. However, the relationship between these turns of phrase and the stock elements of contemporary professional oral narration was not particularly close, it would seem. 27. Chu Renhuo, Sui Tang yanyi, chap. 86, pp. 667–68. 28. Ibid., chap. 95, pp. 730–33. Li Mo plays again for the emperor in chap. 98, but this time it is a new composition; see p. 757.

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In Scene 38 of Changsheng dian, Li Guinian 李龜年, former director of the Emperor’s Pear Garden conservatory, performs at a village market. Having survived the civil war by fleeing south to the Lower Yangzi region, the now-elderly Li is penniless and must sing for food. Among his audience is the musician Li Mo, who had learned part of the famous Rainbow Skirts melody surreptitiously years before. But he never learned the whole of it, and he hopes to do so by listening to this aging minstrel. During Li Guinian’s performance, Li Mo is moved to tears when he hears how Yang Guifei was put to death. A merchant standing at his side is surprised by his emotional response and exclaims: “This is just a performance—how can you take it so seriously?” 這是說唱，老 兄怎麼認真掉下淚來! 29 Li Mo ignores the comment as Li Guinian continues his descriptions of Yang Guifei’s burial and the desolation of the capital after the rebels sack it. By this time the audience has lost interest and has drifted away, leaving only Li Mo to offer shelter to the old man in return for instruction in the celestial music. In the following scene, Li Guinian and two former palace maids who have since become nuns weep over the “vicissitudes of fortune” (xingwang 興亡). 30 This is the last reference the play makes to these characters. Although further mention is made of the haunting melody, to me the musicians and their responses are far more interesting. The relevance of the melody here is that the pregnant memory of it—for Li Mo, an incomplete memory—motivates his actions and rationalizes his emotional responses. In Scene 36 he had seen and lamented over the stocking left behind when Yang Guifei’s corpse was buried; this is as close as he ever came to seeing the lady herself. For the older musician Li Guinian, who had frequently performed for her, the famous dance was directly connected with the rebel uprising and all the suffering, both personal and national, that it brought in its wake. Furthermore, Yang Guifei’s story as poetic narrative based on recollection moves only certain members of his audience. The listeners who are most deeply shaken by hearing the tale are those who lived through the historical events, those former members of the court who experienced the cataclysm directly and who can share in testimony of their loss. Others are simply less engaged by the tale. Memory is multifaceted and variable; its ————— 29. Hong Sheng, Changsheng dian, p. 200; my translation; cf. Hung Sheng, Palace, p. 234. 30. Hong Sheng, Changsheng dian, p. 207; Hung Sheng, Palace, p. 244.

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particularity, hence its validity, is thus thrown into question here: copious tears flow from those who were there, but Li Mo as the musician who merely went through the motions of learning the melody with his flute—who thus knows it only at second hand—remembers it only imperfectly. Moreover, his personal suffering was less intense. Consequently his emotional response is more moderate when he hears again of the Rainbow Skirts dance and what happened after it was last performed than when he saw the stocking, a physical object that serves as a synecdoche for persons now dead. His experience of the melody is primarily one of displacement from that romantic world, a world now reduced to art—for the artist, and for his audience.

The Survival of Art Of these two newly created adventures, the novel as textual medium focuses on the intellectual acts of memorizing and of transcribing into text, whereas the play as performance text further adapts the tale by having the musician embody its production in order to commit it to memory. Were there two versions in circulation earlier, or did these two authors freely draw on the same source, each adapting it creatively? If this latter alternative is so, as it seems to be, are the differences in the means of memorization significant? Is there some differential in value between these versions of how Li Mo learns the tune? Just what characteristics of this extraordinary musician attracted these two writers? 31 And what are we to make of this powerful scene from the play, this scene of recognition and commiseration through a (performed) text that represents memory? In contrast to the novel Sui Tang yanyi, which, despite its limited initial circulation among friends of the author, was intended to be printed and sold, this play was created for very select audiences, the wealthy and highly cultured. As Judith Zeitlin notes, it was performed for such worthies as the Kangxi emperor’s favorite Cao Yin 曹寅 (1658–1712), grandfather of the novelist who penned the immortal Honglou meng 紅樓夢. That this scene contains a performance is doubtless significant because it embodies the increasing displacement of present feelings from the events of the past through the passage of time ————— 31. Writing for a considerably different purpose, Homi Bhabha defines an approach that I find useful here nonetheless: “The critic must attempt to fully realize, and take responsibility for, the unspoken, unrepresented pasts that haunt the historical present” (“Introduction: Locations of Culture,” p. 12).

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and a lesser degree of personal involvement: meta-theatrically, it also shows its audiences how to view, and how to understand, the narration of tragedy. We see a range of responses, from idle curiosity from those who are temporarily moved by the tale to profound grief from those reminded of their own losses. But Li Mo, who tried to capture and then to recapture the culture of that now-distant time, becomes emblematic of both playwright and, I would suggest, the audience of Hong Sheng’s generation. By the waning years of the seventeenth century, art had crystallized the emotional essence of historical events and had provided a means of psychic solace—and perhaps social solidarity among literati—by representing commiseration with others over shared losses through frank expressions of grief.

Textual Memories, Textualized Memories To writers of the late seventeenth century, parallels between the collapse of Tang court life and the fall of the Ming were not difficult to find. But so, too, were differences. As recreated in Kong Shangren’s 孔尚任 (1648–1718) slightly later play Taohua shan 桃花扇 (Peach blossom fan; 1699), the Ming could not have been renewed—its rulers were far too immersed in pleasure-seeking and frivolity to offer an effective defense against either the rebels who overran Beijing or the invaders who suppressed them, the Manchus. 32 The Palace of Lasting Life represents Tang Emperor Minghuang’s successor as having the political resourcefulness and the military might to expunge the scourge and to restore some semblance of Tang authority. The difference between Changsheng dian and Sui Tang yanyi is constituted by how memory is represented and to what end. Hong Sheng used the story of Li Mo to represent recovery after a fall—of art in the form of music, which was degraded from heaven to earth but eventually restored. In the process, the music is further refined by Yang Guifei. But in Chu Renhuo’s version, the music loses its divine qualities to become just another object for exchange in the cultural marketplace. For Hong Sheng the melody is made perfect through divine intervention—in restoring what had been celestial artistry from the start. Re————— 32. See Kong Shangren 孔尚任, Taohua shan 桃花扇, ed. Wang Jisi 王季思 et al. (Beijing: Renmin wenxue chubanshe, 1991); and K’ung Shang-jen, The Peach Blossom Fan, trans. Chen Shih-hsiang and Harold Acton, with Cyril Birch (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1976).

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covery of this insubstantial, otherworldly melody is therefore complete. And to parallel this process, the losses and dislocations of the emperor and his court, the separation through death of the lovers, are made right again as the emperor joins his lady in heaven. The empire can return to a state of peace; the music, like the manifestations of the divine Yang Guifei, has come full circle. Perhaps because the novelist Chu wrote only thirty years after the fall of the Ming, his handling of the remembered music is more pragmatic, less refined, and more ambiguous. Interestingly, Hong Sheng was ten or so years younger than Chu Renhuo; he wrote his play a decade or more after the novel was completed. One might see them, to use Wilt Idema’s distinction presented elsewhere in this volume, as two different “generations” of writers, despite their similarity in age. Their responses to the political cataclysm, social upheaval, and cultural destruction—commercial practicality versus artistic transcendence—might have addressed different degrees of psychic need. Even so, these writers wrote from the same cultural space. They were at least acquaintances, perhaps friends. Both Chu Renhuo and Hong Sheng can be placed securely in a single Jiangnan literati community during the first half of the Kangxi period. Although Homi Bhabha writes in reference to cultures of the late twentieth century, a perspective borrowed from him may again help clarify this situation. The borderline work of culture demands an encounter with “newness” that is not part of the continuum of past and present. It creates a sense of the new as an insurgent act of cultural translation. Such art does not merely recall the past as a social cause or aesthetic precedent; it renews the past, refiguring it as a contingent “in-between” space, that innovates and interrupts the performance of the present. 33

The “border” area of the late seventeenth century, the period between the cultural glory of the late Ming and an as yet unclear future of art under Manchu control, necessarily provoked a kind of “newness” in expression. Within their community, these and other writers created a ————— 33. Bhabha, “Introduction: Locations of Culture,” p. 7. Bhabha (p. 5) clarifies that there is an “overwhelming evidence of a more transnational and translational sense of the hybridity of imagined communities” in that many cultures use events/ conflicts from other cultures as allegories for their own situations. I would suggest simply that early Qing writers used art from other times to create allegories of their own age.

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culture that was not based merely on recollections; a precise re-creation of the past was not a viable option. To them, and to their cohort, memory was surely tinged with nostalgia, and it had an implicit agenda, even if they were not fully aware of it. That is, their sense of loss of the cultural glory that was the Ming was displaced into writings about other periods, particularly the end of the High Tang, as well as into their numerous published recollections. Their inherent project was to heal the wounds, to create something new thereby—a culture that was reminiscent of the past but necessarily different from it. The early Qing was a different time from the late Ming; no literatus could harbor illusions to the contrary. These new cultural texts were hybrids, within which there were, as in our own present, dissonant strains and elements that were unfamiliar and disturbing. By demonstrating both the commercial uses and the ephemeral quality of art, these two texts suggest the ambivalence of narratives from and about the past as they are translated independently into disparate artistic forms. Their separate treatments of Li Mo’s melody suggest something of the intermediacy and indeterminacy of both novel and play concerning the traumas of memory as memory and of dream inextricably interwoven in their art.

Memory and Political Realities Playwright Hong Sheng was born in 1645, the second year of the Shunzhi reign period. The fighting involved in establishing the Manchu empire was to continue sporadically for decades, of course, but the new dynasty was in firm control of the capital by that time. Novelist Chu Renhuo was a teenager at the time of the conquest and surely could remember it or remember hearing of it from those caught in the vortex. Chu wrote of the Tang, and yet he eschewed narrating a conventional dynastic cycle incorporating both the rise and the fall of a ruling house. Instead his romantic tale of selected individuals leaves the Tang in a state of irresolution; his novel declines to comment explicitly on whether the cultural glory of Minghuang’s reign might ever be recovered. Given the circumstances under which he wrote, Chu’s decision to conclude his novel in a state of political indeterminacy can only have been deliberate. 34 ————— 34. For a discussion of this indeterminacy in relation to more conventional novels of the time, see my “Conclusions.”

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Wai-yee Li, in her chapter “History and Memory” in this volume, notes that Wu Weiye, in his long poem “Songshan ai” 松山哀 (The lament of Mount Song) questions the justification for the war that brought down the Ming. Elsewhere he “demonstrates how the concatenation of events that culminated in the Manchu conquest of China was fortuitous and avoidable, tied to accidental passions and obsessions.” This, too, is reminiscent of the passions that provoked the An Lushan rebellion that ended the High Tang era. Wu’s poem “Yonghe gong ci” 永和宮詞 (Song of Yonghe Palace) makes explicit comparisons between events of the late Ming and of the High Tang, Li observes, but “the fall from grace here [during the seventeenth century] is more traumatic, and the death and destruction more devastating.” Of the writers mentioned earlier in this chapter, Yu Huai spent the last decades of his life, after the fall of the Ming, in retirement in Nanjing. His friends included You Tong (mentioned above), the editor Du Jun 杜濬 (1611–87), and Du’s close associate, the playwright and impresario Li Yu 李漁 (1610–80). You Tong, by the way, wrote a preface to a portion of Chu Renhuo’s collection of anecdotes about, among other topics, members of this community, Jianhu ji 堅瓠集 (The hard gourd collections; 1691–1703). Clearly You was a part of this community, and, by extension, it would seem that Yu Huai would have considered him a peer as well. One element that has been used to divide and categorize these men was, of course, their expressed political affiliations. Zhang Dai had held office in the Ming administration; after the fall of that state, he chose never again to serve in any official capacity. Others, such as the then-young Wang Shizhen, quickly took posts in the new government. Wu Weiye and his cohort delayed joining the Qing administration and then poured out their feelings about their collective loss in powerful poetry. 35 Chu Renhuo’s case seems to be different from these. His informal or “courtesy” names, Jiaxuan 稼軒 and Xuejia 學稼 (Learn from Jia[xuan]), refer to the Song loyalist hero Xin Qiji 辛棄疾 (1140–1207), whose hao 號 was Jiaxuan 稼軒. Xin was a native of the Ji’nan region of Shandong, an area of armed resistance to the Jin invaders. At the age of twenty-one, Xin organized an uprising; then in 1162 he traveled to the Song capital of Hangzhou to beg the emperor to aid the peasant rebellion against the Jin that he had joined. Thereafter he petitioned the ————— 35. See the chapter on Wu Weiye by Wai-yee Li in this volume.

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Song throne on several occasions to conquer lost territories in the north, but his appeals always fell on deaf ears. His career was spent as a local administrator in the Yangzi region. Despite all this, his literary reputation is based on being the most prolific writer of ci poetry of the Song period. Many of these poems express his patriotic fervor. It would appear that Chu Renhuo’s use of this earlier poet’s name followed the pattern seen in Zhang Dai’s references to Tao Qian in his informal names, but like Zhang Dai’s, Chu’s names are ambiguous. That is, Chu’s family may have been generally supportive of the Qing cause, even though Renhuo apparently chose to represent significant ambivalence about the current regime. 36 One might conclude, therefore, that simple loyalty to the lost Ming was not the factor that motivated or shaped the appearance of nostalgic references in writings from the early Qing. Instead, such manipulations of memory—through dream, reminiscence, or ambivalent artistic re-creation—were the common response to the “unhomeliness” of this new situation of Manchu control, even decades after control was formalized and the government was functioning normally. Regardless of political stability and economic recovery, links with the cultural past had become attenuated by the disastrous fall of the Ming; the continuity of its transmission had been ruptured. And regardless of individual political allegiances, the hybrid cultural artifacts of this new age, especially the regular references to the mutability of cultural expression, reveal the culturally liminal space occupied by the writers discussed here, all of them survivors in one degree or another. It is not surprising that so many of them used the liminal space of dreams to seek avenues to psychic survival. Chapter 87 of Sui Tang yanyi begins with an exceptionally long discourse on fate. Not only are the births and deaths of humans fated, ————— 36. For an earlier discussion of Chu’s names, his family, and his acquaintances, see my “Sui T’ang yen-yi and the Aesthetics of the Seventeenth-Century Suchou Elite,” in Chinese Narrative: Critical and Theoretical Essays, ed. Andrew H. Plaks (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1977), pp. 139–71. See also the biographical sketch by Yu Shengting 于盛庭 in Zhou Juntao 周鈞韜 et al. eds., Zhongguo tongsu xiaoshuo jia pingzhuan 中國通俗小說家評傳 (Zhengzhou: Zhongzhou guji, 1993), pp. 167–76. Yu (p. 167) adduces evidence to suggest that Chu’s family members seem to have been Qing adherents from the beginning. I am grateful to Martin Huang for providing me with this reference and for very fruitful discussions about the nature of political resistance and accommodation among late seventeenth-century writers.

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but also the lives of the smallest of creatures are destined. But portents always appear that herald a person’s end, as they do for every sentient being. Nor can one struggle against destiny, the chapter’s introductory comment declares; wealth and rank may not be won by striving for them. Heaven is rational (li 理, “orderly,” “principled”). One who attempts to achieve wealth and rank through unprincipled means only serves to bring retribution down on himself, it concludes. Chu Renhuo ended his novel with an even more pointed discussion of heavenly retribution. Some would say that because suspicion had caused Minghuang to kill three of his own sons and because he had appropriated the consort of his son Prince Shou, he had offended proper human relations and thus deserved to lose his beloved consort and, in effect, his state as well. No event is fortuitous, the narrator declares; the “lost histories” record it all. The affairs of Tang Minghuang and Yang Guifei conclude at the end of the novel in order to demonstrate to readers the principles of cause and effect. 37 Again, why retribution as a way to conclude the novel? To give it structure? Surely the need for continuity, a sense of solidarity in the linkage between past and present, would be served through this injunction—if one could take it at face value. Yet the jocularity of some of the narrator’s comments seemingly undercut their seriousness. Is the “lost history” a book that the novelist received from an older contemporary? I suspect, rather, that it refers to an abstraction, to the sense of the past that was lost when the Ming fell, the stuff of artistically reconfigured memories Chu and his contemporaries sought to invoke through a variety of texts in which events of the past are so often embodied in fictional memories and dreams. Some of these dreams are nightmares; some seem to fulfill waking wishes. But, given the context, none are simple in their signification.

————— 37. Chu Renhuo, Sui Tang yanyi, p. 669. Other introductory sections explicitly addressing destiny are those for chap. 41, p. 306; chap. 49, p. 369; chap. 51, p. 385; chap. 57, p. 434; chap. 70, p. 542; chap. 80, p. 614; chap. 97, p. 744. See the introductory comments for chap. 100 on p. 766.

part iii

Drama 7

Drama After the Conquest An Introduction

7 Wilt L. Idema Drama developed remarkably during the last century of the Ming dynasty. Theater had been a major constituent of Chinese social life since the Song dynasty, but beginning in the Wanli period (1573–1619), the elite families of the Jiangnan region increasingly came to maintain their own private troupes, and many of their owners took an active interest in all aspects of the theater—some did not hesitate to mount the stage themselves to perform. Old and new plays became an important staple of the burgeoning publishing industry, which produced not only simple texts for performance but also increasingly luxurious editions for reading. And whereas little is known about the earliest authors (or editors) of southern-style (chuanqi 傳奇) plays other than perhaps their names, during the Wanli era, literati of various hues (including many who had passed the jinshi examination and served as officials) took to playwriting. As they did so, many of the philosophical and political issues of the day were reflected directly or indirectly in their works. An example is the glorification of qing 情 (feeling/passion) as the foundation of human nature by Tang Xianzu 湯顯祖 (1550–1617) in his Mudan ting 牡丹亭 (Peony pavilion) or the treatment of Wei Zhongxian’s 魏忠賢reign of terror in late Ming plays on contemporary events. And even while chuanqi increasingly dominated the stage, zaju 雜劇 made a comeback, as many leading literati of the final decades of the Ming, inspired by Xu Wei 徐渭 (1521–93), tried their hand at this genre. 1 ————— 1. For a more detailed summary of the developments in drama during this period, see Wilt L. Idema, “Traditional Dramatic Literature,” in The Columbia History

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In the eyes of later generations, deeply influenced by Kong Shangren’s 孔尚仁 (1648–1718) Taohua shan 桃花扇 (Peach blossom fan), the popularity of the theater in the final years of the Ming was deeply implicated in the fall of the dynasty. The Southern Ming court in Nanjing became the epitome of all the vices of the dynasty: as the defenses of the empire crumbled, the court was headed by an incompetent ruler (the Prince of Fu) infatuated with drama who eventually grew fed up with playing the role of emperor, while behind the scenes the regime was manipulated by a brilliant playwright (Ruan Dacheng 阮大成, 1587– 1646), who utilized his brief moment in power to oversee palace productions of his own plays. The nature of these plays, witty romantic comedies without a shred of redeeming social value, came to symbolize the court’s criminal dereliction of its duties. When Zheng Xie 鄭燮 (1693–1765) in the second quarter of the eighteenth century wrote his widely popular Daoqing shiqu 道情十曲 (Ten songs of Daoist sentiment), he only had to mention the titles of Ruan Dacheng’s plays Yanzi jian 燕子箋 (The swallow’s note) and Chundengmi 春燈謎 (Spring lantern riddles) to evoke all the corruption that led to the dynasty’s fall. During the decades immediately following the conquest, the theater continued to flourish. As before, plays were published in great numbers. However, many playwrights could not but comment on the collapse of the world of the Ming. As Zou Shijin 鄒式金 wrote in his 1661 preface to his Zaju sanji 雜劇三集 (A third collection of short plays), a collection of zaju almost completely made up of works written during the one and a half decades since the change of dynasty: In recent years the world has gone through cataclysmic changes, and there is hardly anyone who has not been deeply affected by these events. And so some, overcome by depression and filled by sorrow, gave expression [in their plays] to grief [over the fallen dynasty] by singing of the “wheat and millet” [now growing where palaces once stood] or of “bronze camels” [carried off by the victors], while others, frustrated and enraged, gave voice to their distress by drumming on a spittoon or tapping their swords. Yet others dealt with moonlight and dew, breeze and clouds, entrusting to these images their passions in drinking wine and cavorting with women, and then there were those

————— of Chinese Literature, ed. Victor H. Mair (New York: Columbia University Press, 2001), pp. 785–847.

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who presented snake-gods and buffalo-demons, manifesting their dreams of “questioning Heaven” and “roaming with the immortals.” 2

If “questioning Heaven” represents attempts to make sense of the trauma these playwrights suffered, “roaming with the immortals” alludes to their search for transcendence. No genre of literature provided a better opportunity to express the conflicting emotions concerning the collapse of the Ming and the subsequent conquest of the Chinese world by the Manchu Qing than drama. This may well explain why a number of well-established late Ming literati, as diverse in background and standing as Ding Yaokang 丁耀亢 (1599–1669) and Wu Weiye 吳偉業 (1609–72), took to drama only in the wake of the conquest. Poems and lyrics, even when they took a narrative turn, were predestined by their limited length to be one-sided utterances and allowed little room for ironies, doubts, and reversals. The many genres of discursive prose shared the same tendency, and fiction, especially vernacular fiction, despite its great popularity among some members of the elite, must have seemed lacking in the gravitas required for an issue of such existential concern. Ding Yaokang’s sixty-chapter novel Xu Jinpingmei 續金瓶梅 (A continuation of Plum in a Golden Vase) attempts to provide a panorama of the horrors of war and the ensuing peace, but despite its daring and scope, it did not succeed in capturing the imagination of the reading public. Drama, both zaju and chuanqi, enjoyed a higher status than vernacular fiction. Its shorter length allowed for a quicker reaction to events, and the genre was predisposed to the portrayal of conflicting emotions and views, allowing the playwright to air all the attractive options he might eventually reject. Drama also may have appealed to contemporary writers because the obvious fictionality of its characters gave authors the freedom to pursue clarity of expression in the dialogues. This freedom may well have been more difficult to obtain in genres, such as poetry, taken to be the direct expression of authentic feeling (and for that very reason subject to strict rules of decorum). It is no wonder, then, that plays reflecting on the political events of 1644 and 1645 and subsequent developments and the choices they forced on the authors and their friends started to appear soon after the events themselves, and sometimes even anticipated later events, as when Wu ————— 2. Zou Shijin 鄒式金, ed., Zaju sanji 雜劇三記 (Beijing: Zhongguo xiju chubanshe, 1958), “Yin” p. 3a.

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Weiye prefigured his own decision to accept an appointment with the Qing. Two of the chapters in this section deal with the plays of authors (Ding Yaokang and Wu Weiye) who reacted almost immediately to contemporary political developments. Although both authors avoided portraying the recent past explicitly, they chose settings that confronted their characters with situations quite comparable to the one in which they found themselves (in one case Ding Yaokang spelled out the correspondence in a preface), and usually one of the characters may be seen as a thinly disguised, idealized self-portrait of the author. These plays, arranged in chronological order, tend to reflect the development of the political standpoint of their author as it also may be reconstructed from other sources: whereas Ding Yaokang moved from bewilderment at the collapse of the Ming first to an acceptance of the existence of the Qing and then to a growing dissatisfaction with the new overlords, Wu Weiye’s plays of the late 1640s and the early 1650s move from a loyalist stance to an acceptance of the new situation. The chapters by Dietrich Tschanz and Wilt Idema bring out these opposite moves. The study of Qing drama is very much an underdeveloped field in Western sinology, and neither the plays by Ding Yaokang nor those by Wu Weiye have received much attention to date. This is regrettable. Both playwrights wrote highly original works, which in many ways presaged the more elaborate experiments that were to follow. Ding Yaokang’s Huaren you 化人游 (Ramblings with magicians) is an especially dazzling fantasy that in its rich imagination and bleak conclusion has almost no parallel in its own genre. It invites comparison across generic borders with Dong Yue’s 董說 (1620–86) equally unique Xiyou bu 西遊補 (Supplement to Journey to the West). The extent to which these early playwrights were outspoken critics of contemporary developments is quite remarkable. Ding Yaokang did not even hesitate in the 1650s to print a play rejected for performance at court, without worrying about censorship. When, about a decade later, his novel Xu Jinpingmei brought him into conflict with the Manchu authorities, his judicial problems had at least as much to do with local legal squabbles over landownership, as with the central government’s determination to crack down on dissident literature. Wilt Idema, in his chapter in this volume, also links Ding Yaokang’s outspokenness with “a Shandong tradition” in vernacular literature, stretching from the anonymous

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author of the Jinpingmei 金瓶梅 (Plum in the golden vase) to the anonymous author of Xingshi yinyuan zhuan 醒世姻緣傳 (A marriage to awaken the world). Dieter Tschanz focuses on the innovative endings of Wu Weiye’s plays, in which place enhances feelings of loss, and enlightenment may result in some form of accommodation to changed realities. The autobiographical impulse and the willingness to experiment with the formal features of the genre observable in the works of Ding Yaokang and Wu Weiye continued in the following decades of the early Qing, but as Manchu authority increased, direct references to sensitive contemporary issues decreased. One recent study that has stressed the autobiographical impulse in drama of the second half of the seventeenth century is Judith Zeitlin’s study of the works of You Tong 尤侗 (1618–1704). 3 The most extreme example of this autobiographical impulse was the eccentric Guangdong literatus Liao Yan 廖燕 (1644–1705), who presented himself under his own name as the main character in his zaju plays. 4 In the preceding section, Ellen Widmer introduced Huang Zhouxing 黃周星 (1611–80) and his Rentian le 人天樂 as yet another play in which the sufferings of the contemporary world are transcended by the author’s alter ego in the fictional and imaginary realm of the play. One explanation of this strong autobiographical bent in drama of this time may be that as the certainties provided by the trinity of state, ideology, and career collapsed with the demise of the Ming, the only reliable sureties left were personal experience and the self. In a world given over to the brutality of warfare and arbitrary rule by barbarians, only the author’s own experience could be counted on. This may also explain the sudden rise in memoirs during this period, a phenomenon so well studied by Lynn Struve in her many works on the Ming-Qing transition. 5 ————— 3. Judith Zeitlin, “Spirit Writing and Performance in the Work of You Tong (1618–1704),” T’oung Pao 84 (1998): 102–35. 4. Wang Ailing (Ayling) 王璦玲, “Siqing huagong—Ming Qing juzuojia zhi ziwo xuxie yu qi xiju zhanyan” 私情化公—明清劇作家之自我敘寫與其戲劇展演, in Yuyan mizhang: Zhongguo lishi yu wenhua zhong de si yu qing 欲掩彌彰—中國歷 史與文化中的私與情, ed. Xiong Bingzhen 熊秉真 (Taibei: Hanxue yanjiu zhongxin, 2003), pp. 81–157; Wang Ailing, “Ming Qing shuhuai xiefen zaju zhi yishu tezhi yu chengfen” 明清抒懷寫憤雜劇之藝術特質與成分, Zhongguo wenzhe yanjiu jikan 13 (1998): 37–120. 5. Lynn A. Struve, The Ming-Qing Conflict, 1619–1683: A Historiography and Source Guide (Ann Arbor: Association for Asian Studies, 1998), pp. 7–48.

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Elsewhere, Wai-yee Li has written extensively on the many ways in which the figure of the loyal and self-sacrificing woman became an emblem of Ming loyalism and was taken up in a number of plays of the 1660s and 1670s. 6 One of the earliest dramatic examples she discusses is Ding Yaokang’s Xihu shan 西湖扇 (West Lake fan). Another interesting case is provided by the writings of Meng Chengshun 孟稱舜 (1598– 1684). Meng Chengshun’s long life spanned the final decades of the Ming and the first decades of the Qing. He was a productive writer of both zaju and chuanqi throughout his life and an active editor and publisher. He is best known for his Jiao Hong ji 嬌紅記 ( Jiaoniang and Feihong) of 1638, now hailed as one of “China’s ten great tragedies” and one of the many late Ming plays that tried to outdo Tang Xianzu’s Mudan ting in its glorification of qing. The main character in this play is a young maiden who at the very outset of the play vows that she will marry only a man of her own choosing and die rather than give in to parental pressure to marry anyone unsuitable. As might be expected, a tragic story of premarital love unfolds, culminating in the death of the woman who lives only for passion. 7 However, Meng Chengshun is also the author of Zhenwen ji 貞文記 (The story of chastity and talent), a chuanqi play devoted to the life of the late Song / early Yuan female poet Zhang Yuniang 張玉娘, written around 1660 (even though the first edition carries the date of 1643—perhaps to mislead the censors). In this play, Zhang Yuniang remains stubbornly loyal to the fiancé her parents selected for her (her chastity is such that she does not avail herself of the opportunity to catch a glimpse of him when a chance opportunity offers itself). Following her fiancé’s death, she refuses all pressure to marry someone else and soon pines away. Her loyalty is contrasted to the behavior of those Chinese members of the elite who do not hesitate to seek employment with the new Mongol rulers: the examination they willingly subject themselves to is a humiliating test in acting in female dress. 8 ————— 6. Wai-yee Li, “Heroic Transformations: Women and National Trauma in Early Qing Literature,” Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 59 (1999): 363–444. 7. For a recent rendering into English, see Meng Chengshun, Mistress and Maid ( Jiaohong ji ), trans. and ed. Cyril Birch (New York: Columbia University Press, 2001). 8. Wilt L. Idema, “Female Talent and Female Virtue: Xue Wei’s Nü zhuangyuan and Meng Chengshun’s Zhenwen ji,” in Ming Qing xiqu guoji yantaohui lunwenji 明清戲曲國際研討會論文集, ed. Hua Wei 華瑋 and Wang Ailing王璦玲, 2

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Plays continued to be written on historical parallels to the Manchu conquest throughout the second half of the seventeenth century, but it would be simplistic to assume that the collapse of the Ming and the Manchu conquest were the only subjects for dramatists. Modern scholarship in the PRC for a long time has privileged those plays that manifested a serious purpose or a popular origin. The perceived combination of these elements has resulted in the considerable attention lavished on (some of) the plays of the “Suzhou group,” a cluster of very productive, most likely professional playwrights from that city active during the middle decades of the seventeenth century. The works by early Qing playwrights such as Li Yu 李玉 (1591?–1671?), Zhang Dafu 張 大復, Zhu Suchen 朱素臣, and Zhu Zuochao 朱佐朝 cover a wide range of themes, and some of them achieved a lasting stage popularity. 9 The valorization of serious purpose and popular nature also resulted in the long neglect and even condemnation of arguably the finest playwright of the 1650s and 1660s, Li Yu 李漁 (1611–80; also known as Li Liweng 李笠翁), whose well-made but risqué comedies were seen to lack all gravitas and to pander to the reactionary tastes of the new powerholders. It did not help Li Liweng’s reputation that he toured throughout China with his own all-female troupe, performing at the yamens of the highest provincial officials. Recent decades have witnessed a reversal in the verdict on Li Liweng, who now receives considerable attention in the PRC. 10 Li Liweng was far from the only early Qing playwright to continue the tradition of the light romantic comedy, even if he was the most successful. 11 ————— vols. (Taipei: Zhongyang yanjiuyuan, Zhongguo wenzhe yanjiusuo choubeichu, 1998), pp. 551–71. 9. Li Mei 李玫, Ming Qing zhi ji Suzhou zuojiaqun yanjiu 明清之際蘇州作家群 研究 (Beijing: Zhongguo shehui kexue chubanshe, 2000). 10. Patrick Hanan, The Invention of Li Yu (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1988); Eric Herny, Chinese Amusement: The Lively Plays of Li Yu (Hamden, CT: Archon Books, 1980). 11. Wang Ailing 王璦玲, “Mingmo Qingchu caizi jiarenju zhi yanqing neihan ji qi suoyinsheng zhi shenmei gousi” 明末清初才子佳人劇之言情內涵及其所引生 之審美構思, Zhongguo wenzhe yanjiu jikan 18 (2001): 139–88; idem, “Qingchu Jiang Zhe diqu wenren fengliu juzuo zhi shenmei zaojing yu qi wenhua yihan” 清初江浙 地區文人風流劇作之審美造境與其文化意涵, in Zhongguo wenhua kong jian de shuxie yu chanshi 中國文化空間的書寫與闡釋, ed. Li Fengmao 李豐楙 and Liu Wanru 劉菀如 (Taipei: Zhongyang yanjiuyuan, Zhongguo wenzhe yanjiusuo, 2002), pp. 701–818.

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Another important feature of drama, not as theater but as literature, in the early decades of the Qing was the eager reprinting of collections of plays compiled in the late Ming and the continued production of new collections. In the field of zaju, Zang Maoxun’s 藏茂循 (1550–1620) Yuanqu xuan 元曲選 (A selection of Yuan dynasty plays) of 1616/17 established itself as the representative collection of early zaju, and no new collections on that scale were attempted in the early Qing. But Sheng Tai’s 盛泰 (late Ming) Sheng Ming zaju (Short plays of the glorious Ming dynasty) and Sheng Ming zaju erji (A second collection of short plays of the glorious Ming dynasty), both printed during the Chongzhen period (1628–44), were followed after the demise of the Ming by a third collection, simply entitled Zaju sanji (1662). In the field of chuanqi, the crowning achievement in this respect was Mao Jin’s 毛晉 (1599–1659) Liushizhong qu 六十種曲 (Sixty plays), a collection of fifty-nine chuanqi along with Wang Shifu’s (active ca. 1300) 王實甫 Xixiang ji 西廂記 (Story of the Western Wing). This collection was first printed in the final years of the Ming or the early years of the Qing and has been in print ever since. The easy accessibility, in fine, beautiful editions, of almost all of earlier dramatic literature must have been perceived both as a boon and as a challenge to contemporary playwrights and may well be one reason for their increased willingness to experiment. Another challenge and stimulus was provided by the burgeoning body of drama criticism. Until the end of the Ming, drama criticism had consisted mostly of prosodic treatises and apodictic evaluations of plays. Some editions of plays like Xixiangji might carry extensive philological notes, but marginal comments, if any, tended to be minimal. This situation changed drastically in the early decades of the Qing. 12 Li Liweng provided a comprehensive dramaturgy, 13 and Jin Shentan 金 聖 嘆 (1610–61) published his extensively annotated edition of ————— 12. Ye Changhai’s 葉長海 seminal Zhongguo xijuxue shigao 中國戲劇學史稿 (Shanghai: Shanghai wenyi chubanshe, 1986) has since been followed by a host of more specialized studies. 13. Faye Chunfang Fei, Chinese Theories of Theater and Performance from Confucius to the Present (Ann Arbor: Michigan University Press, 1999), pp. 77–88, provides some excerpts in translation. For a complete translation of the relevant chapters from Li Yu’s Xianqing ouji 閑情偶寄, see Helmut Martin, Li Liweng über das Theater (Taipei: Meiya Publications, 1968), pp. 80–218.

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Xixiang ji. 14 Li Yu had no followers in this respect, but Jin Shengtan’s model was taken up by Mao Zonggang 毛宗崗 (ca. 1630–ca. 1700) in his annotated edition of Pipa ji 琵琶記 (Story of the lute) and later by the “three wives” of Wu Yiyi 吳儀一 (fl. 1680) in an annotated edition of Mudan ting. Under his own name, Wu contributed marginal comments to Hong Sheng’s 洪昇 (1645–1704) Changsheng dian 長生殿 (Palace of Lasting Life). 15 Although the works of the playwrights of the Suzhou group and of Li Yu (Liweng) may well have dominated the popular and elite stage for most of the second part of the seventeenth century, as works of literature their compositions were dwarfed by two plays of the final decades of the seventeenth century that do, each in its own way, return to the subject of the collapse of the Ming. These are Hong Sheng’s Changsheng dian and Kong Shangren’s Taohua shan, the subject of the chapters by Judith Zeitlin and Stephen Owen, respectively. These plays, manifesting a remarkable self-awareness as theater, may in many ways be considered the culmination of traditional dramatic literature; no later Qing author would ever even approach the level of these works. In Changsheng dian, Hong Sheng revisited the theme of the collapse of a dynasty by returning to the disastrous passion of Emperor Xuanzong of the Tang for Precious Consort Yang. But whereas the plays on the collapse of a dynasty by Ding Yaokang and Wu Weiye feature common citizens, literati, or officials as their protagonists, Hong Sheng chose the emperor and his favorite concubine. If the protagonists in the plays of Ding Yaokang and Wu Weiye struggled with the question of loyalty, Emperor Xuanzong and Precious Consort Yang enjoy the fullest extent of luxury and passion, only to be struck by total disaster, and a final reunion in Heaven. By choosing an emperor as his protagonist, Hong Sheng precluded the option of a strong autobiographical element, which is also lacking from Taohua shan. ————— 14. Sally K. Church, “Beyond the Words: Jin Shengtan’s Perception of Hidden Meanings in Xixiang ji,” Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 59 (1999): 5–78; John Chin-yu Wang, Chin Sheng-t’an (New York: Twayne, 1972). 15. Wang Ailing 王璦玲, “Pingdian, quanshi yu jieshou: lun Wu Yiyi zhi Changsheng dian pingdian” 評點詮釋與接受: 論吳儀一之長生殿評點, Zhongguo wenzhe yanjiu jikan 23 (2003): 71-128; Judith Zeitlin, “Shared Dreams: The Story of the Three Wives’ Commentary on The Peony Pavilion,” Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 54 (1994): 127–80.

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Kong Shangren dispensed with the dissembling veil of a comparable historical setting all together in Taohua shan: his dramatic chronicle of the collapse of the Southern Ming regime in Nanjing, featuring the Hongguang emperor (met above as the Prince of Fu) as a minor character, is remarkable for its widely researched fidelity to historical sources, conspicuously displayed by the long list of “works consulted” in printed editions (a comparable list is also found at the beginning of his fellow provincial Ding Yaokang’s novel Xu Jinpingmei). 16 Both plays, as is well known, were initially performed to great acclaim but eventually, for various reasons, created political problems for their authors. Yet, although their authors suffered, the plays remained in print, unlike the works of some earlier playwrights such as Ding Yaokang and Wu Weiye. Many scenes continued to be stage favorites in the Kunqu repertoire. In later centuries, Changsheng dian and Taohua shan simply came to represent the drama of the early Qing and the dramatic reflection of the collapse of the Ming. Both Changsheng dian and Taohua shan have attracted considerable critical attention in recent times. The chapters on these two plays in this volume therefore do not have the introductory character of those by Wilt Idema and Dieter Tschanz. Both Zeitlin and Owen focus on the concern manifested in these plays with role-playing and “theatricality” itself. Owen focuses on the way in which Kong Shangren in Taohua shan sees the very structure of society created by the conscientious role-playing of its participants, whose own social identity, whether as emperor or subject, is caught up in the willingness of others to continue to play their roles. From there, he looks into the contrast between the theater-besotted Hongguang emperor (who eventually ceases to want to play the emperor), and Li Xiangjun 李香君, the actress who completely identifies with the role she is trained to play on stage, with dramatic results. Zeitlin, in her study of Changsheng dian, inquires into the way the musical nature of chuanqi (after all, a kind of ————— 16. Wai-yee Li, “The Representation of History in The Peach Blossom Fan,” Journal of the American Oriental Society 115, no. 3 (1995): 421–33; Lynn A. Struve, “History and ‘The Peach Blossom Fan,’ ” Chinese Literature: Essays, Articles, Reviews 2 (1980): 55–72; Wang Ailing王璦玲, “Mingmo Qingchu lishiju zhi lishi yishi yu shejie chengxian” 明末清初歷史劇之歷史意識與視界呈現, in Shibian yu weixin: wan Ming yu wan Qing de wenxue yishu 世變與維新: 晚明與晚清的文學 藝術, ed. Hu Xiaozhen (Siao-chen Hu) 胡曉真 (Taipei: Zhongyang yanjiuyuan, Zhongguo wenzhe yanjiusuo, 2001), pp. 189–300.

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opera) is thematized in its description of the supernatural origin, the sublunary composition, the performance, and the return to heaven of the music of “Nishang yuyi” 霓裳羽衣 (Rainbow skirt and feather gown), the ballet music that for later generations came to exemplify the splendor of Xuanzong’s reign. Zeitlin stresses the correspondences between Hong Sheng’s own composition of his opera and his play’s depiction of Yang Guifei’s composition of “Nishang yuyi”—she first hears the music in the Moon Palace and then transcribes the music on her return to earth; this score, which includes her own improvements, is then corrected by the emperor, before it is performed by the palace musicians. Following the An Lushan rebellion, this enriched music is then again performed in heavenly spheres, leaving on earth only its memory, as history is turned into legend. This high degree of theatrical self-reflexivity in both plays is one aspect of an important difference between the playwrights who grew up during the Ming and wrote in the direct aftermath of the collapse of the Ming, and those of a later generation, who knew only the new regime. Whereas the earlier playwrights, confronted with existential choices, frantically dashed off their plays as they tried to sort out their conflicting emotions and thoughts under quickly changing circumstances, the later playwrights, accepting the fact of Manchu rule, could afford to allow themselves the luxury of a careful elaboration of their compositions (both Changsheng dian and Taohua shan were many years in the making and passed through many versions). As questions of good and bad, foreign and Chinese, treason and loyalty, were replaced by issues of true versus feigned, played versus authentic, the issue changed from how to behave in the wake of the conquest to how to view the collapse. Now aesthetics was at least as important as ethics. If the earlier authors at times tried to transcend their trauma through the construction of otherworldly utopias, the later generation transcended trauma by turning it into an object of aesthetic contemplation.

“Crossing the Sea in a Leaking Boat” Three Plays by Ding Yaokang

7 Wilt L. Idema Ding Yaokang 丁耀亢 (1599–1669) hailed from Zhucheng in Shandong province. Despite a short trip as a young man to the Jiangnan region, during which he met with the eminent art critic Dong Qichang 董其昌 (1555–1636) among others, he spent most of his adult life in Shandong until he was uprooted by the events of the 1640s. The many years of social disturbance in Shandong province preceding the collapse of the Ming gave him a perspective on the Manchu conquest different from that of the Jiangnan literati, whose experiences and opinions to a large degree continue to shape the modern understanding of this period. Whereas Jiangnan was spared the disruptions of large-scale rebellion during the final decades of the Ming, most of Shandong was ravaged by widespread banditry from the 1620s on, and even before 1644 the Manchus had repeatedly plundered the area. Whereas the Jiangnan literati were allowed sufficient time to organize an alternative government in Nanjing and an anti-Manchu resistance in 1644, the Shandong elite was willing to cooperate with any central authority that promised stability. Frederic Wakeman has noted how quickly an alliance developed between the local elite in Shandong and the Manchu conquerors. 1 In his writings, Ding Yaokang himself moved from bafflement at the collapse ————— 1. Frederic Wakeman, Jr., The Great Enterprise: The Manchu Reconstruction of Imperial Order in Seventeenth-Century China, 2 vols. (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1985), pp. 424–36. See also Yi Songgyu, “Shantung in the Shun-chih Reign: The Establishment of Local Control and the Gentry Response,” 2 pts., Ch’ing-shih wen-t’i 4, no. 4 (1980): 1–34; 4, no. 5 (1981): 1–31.

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of the Ming dynasty to a provisional acceptance of the new regime and, later, to increasingly strident criticism of the continuing social dislocation of the middle decades of the seventeenth century. Ding Yaokang is representative of a specific “Shandong tradition” in vernacular literature. From the appearance of Jinpingmei 金瓶梅 in the late sixteenth century to the publication of Xingshi yinyuan zhuan 醒世 姻緣傳 more than a century later, Shandong sustained its own tradition of vernacular literature apart from the Jiangnan area. Ding Yaokang himself would contribute significantly to this tradition with the publication of Xu Jinpingmei 續金瓶梅. 2 In its ferocious satire of social abuses, this tradition stands apart from the much more varied but milder Jiangnan production of vernacular literature, and offers a much bleaker view of Chinese society and culture. Although Ding Yaokang was well acquainted with contemporary Jiangnan culture, his outspokenness both in his novel and in his plays makes him very much a part of the Shandong tradition of forthright criticism. Despite the volume and variety of his literary output, Ding Yaokang is not a household name in Western sinology. He does not, for example, appear in The Indiana Companion to Chinese Literature (1984) or its recent sequel (1998). Perhaps this will change now that his collected works have been published in a three-volume modern edition under the title Ding Yaokang quanji 丁耀亢全集 (1999). The first volume comprises the six extant collections of poetry by Ding and his four surviving plays. The second volume is devoted to his novel Xu Jinpingmei, and the final volume to his miscellaneous writing, beginning with his Tian shi 天史 (Heaven’s history), a large, thematically arranged collection of historical events, intended to show the universal operation of retribution as an automatic and unfailing process. 3 This volume further ————— 2. In this connection, one has to mention not only Ding Yaokang’s own Xu Jinpingmei but also the anonymous short-story collection Zuixingshi 醉 醒 石 (ca. 1650). Other authors who should be mentioned in this connection are Jia Fuxi 賈鳧西 (1590/91–ca. 1676), a friend of Ding Yaokang, and Pu Songling 蒲松齡 (1640–1715), if not as the author of Xingshi yinyuan zhuan, then as the author of an important body of prosimetrical narratives. 3. Ding Yaokang 丁耀亢, Ding Yaokang quanji 丁耀亢全集, 3 vols., comp. Li Zengpo 李增坡, punct. Zhang Qingji 張清吉 (Zhengzhou: Zhongzhou guji chubanshe, 1999). Ding Yaokang’s extant plays had already been reproduced in a photo-facsimile edition in Guben xiqu congkan wuji 古本戲曲叢刊五集 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1985). This publication inspired Qin Huasheng 秦華生,

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includes a prose memoir of Ting’s experiences during the final years of the Ming and the first years of the Qing, entitled Chujie jilüe 出劫紀略 (A brief account of my escape from the kalpic disaster), and a study of the Book of Changes as a text for divination. The local pride behind the publication of the collected works of Zhucheng’s most famous son has also resulted in a flurry of publications concerning Ding Yaokang and his works. 4 Unfortunately, many of these recent publications are concerned with the thesis that Ding Yaokang authored Xingshi yinyuan zhuan (A marriage to awaken the world). This work was most likely written around the middle of the seventeenth century in Shandong, and its author chose to hide his identity under the pseudonym Xi Zhou sheng 西周生. Various identifications have been proposed over the years, Pu Songling 蒲松齡 (1640–1715) being one of the most frequently mentioned. 5 Zhang Qingji 張清吉, the scholar who, at great length and with a dazzling display of circumstantial evidence, put forward the thesis of Ding Yaokang’s authorship, 6 has since argued that Jinpingmei was not written by any one of the many candidates proposed so far, but by Ding Yaokang’s father, Ding Weining 丁維寧 (1546–1609), who, it is ————— “Ding Yaokang juzuo julun chutan” 丁耀亢劇作劇論初探, Xiju yanjiu 31 (1989): 62–90. Several modern editions of Xu Jinpingmei are available. 4. The papers of a conference held in 1997 were published as Li Zengpo 李曾坡, ed., Ding Yaokang yanjiu: haixia liang’an Ding Yaokang xueshu yantaohui lunwenji 丁耀亢研究: 海峽兩岸丁耀亢學術研討會論文集 (Zhengzhou: Zhongzhou guji chubanshe, 1997). For a detailed listing of Chinese studies on Ding Yaokang and his works, see Zhu Ping 朱萍, “Ding Yaokang yanjiu xiaoshi shulüe” 丁耀亢研究小史 述略, Jianghuai luntan 2001, no. 1: 99–105. 5. In “Xingshi yinyuan zhuan” zuozhe yu yuyan kaolun 醒世姻緣傳作者與語言 考論 ( Ji’nan: Qi Lu shushe, 1993), Xu Fuling 徐复嶺 puts forward Jia Fuxi, a writer of vernacular literature from Qufu and a friend of Ding Yaokang, as author of Xingshi yinyuan zhuan. 6. Zhang Qing ji 張清吉, “Xingshi yinyuan zhuan” xinkao 醒世姻緣傳新考 (Zhengzhou: Zhongzhou guji chubanshe, 1991); idem, “Xingshi yinyuan zhuan zuozhe zai bukao” 醒世姻緣傳作者再補考, in Li Zengpo, ed., Ding Yaokang yanjiu, pp. 66–73. For a summary of the debates on the date of composition of Xingshi yinyuan zhuan and the authorship of the novel, see Yenna Wu, Ameliorative Satire and the Seventeenth-Century Chinese Novel, “Xingshi yinyuan zhuan”—Marriage as Retribution, Awakening the World (Lewiston: Edwin Mellen Press, 1999), pp. 73–79. She concludes that the novel most likely was written between 1628 and 1661, and that the identity of its author remains a mystery.

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suggested, finished the manuscript in 1594. 7 Corroboration of these claims by hard evidence would, of course, establish the Dings, father and son, as one of the most important families in the history of Chinese vernacular fiction, but so far the evidence in support of Ding Yaokang’s authorship of Xingshi yinyuan zhuan and Ding Weining’s authorship of Jinpingmei is exclusively circumstantial. 8 Aside from this issue, works undeniably by Ding Yaokang have been little studied. Of the works known to me, articles on his plays can be counted on the fingers of one hand, despite (or because of) the fact that as early as 1938 they were evaluated relatively highly by the eminent drama scholar Zheng Qian 鄭騫: “All the plays he wrote combine the qualities of grave heroism and delicate beauty. In their inventiveness they surpass run-of-the-mill works in the Sixty Plays.” 9 And so, even without the inclusion of the Xingshi yinyuan zhuan in his corpus, Ding Yaokang may well merit a closer look. 10 In this chapter, I limit myself to a preliminary look at the three plays by Ding Yaokang that deal by historical analogy or fantastic allegory with the Manchu conquest. 11 ————— 7. Zhang Qingji 張清吉, “Jinpingmei zuozhe kao” 金瓶梅作者考, in Li Zengpo, ed., Ding Yaokang yanjiu, pp. 74–121. 8. Wang Jin 王瑾, “Lun Xingshi yinyuan zhuan fei Ding Yaokang suozuo” 論醒 世姻緣傳非丁耀亢所作, Guangzhou daxue xuebao (shehui kexue ban) 1, no. 10 (October 2002): 30–35. 9. Zheng Qian 鄭騫, “Shanben chuanqi shizhong tiyao” 善本傳奇十種提要, Yanjing xuebao, Dec. 1938, pp. 142–43; see pp. 140–48 for summaries of Huaren you 化人游 (Ramblings with magicians), Chisong you 赤松游 (Ramblings with Red Pine), and Ranshe dan 蚺蛇膽 (A boa constrictor’s gall). After 1949 Zheng Qian taught on Taiwan. 10. On the relative neglect of Ding Yaokang’s dramatic works, see Zhang Bing 張兵, “Ding Yaokang yanjiu de huigu he sikao” 丁耀亢研究的回顧和思考, in Li Zengpo, ed., Ding Yaokang yanjiu, p. 32. 11. For brief summaries of all of Ding Yaokang’s plays, see Guo Yingde 郭英德, Ming Qing chuanqi zonglu 明清傳奇綜錄 (Shijiazhuang: Hebei jiaoyu chubanshe, 1997), pp. 564–72; and Li Xiusheng 李修生, Guben xiqu jumu tiyao 古本戲曲劇目 提要 (Beijing: Wenhua yishu chubanshe, 1997), pp. 414–16. See also Sun Kaidi 孫楷第, Xiqu xiaoshuo shulu jieti 戲曲小說書錄解題 ( Beijing: Renmin wenxue chubanshe, 1990), pp. 315–16. For brief discussions of Ding Yaokang’s plays in the context of Qing drama, see Zhou Miaozhong 周妙中, Qingdai xiqu shi 清代戲曲史 (Zhengzhou: Zhongzhou guji chubanshe, 1987), pp. 32–37; and Liao Ben 廖奔 and Liu Yanjun 劉彥君, Zhongguo xiqu fazhanshi 中國戲曲發展史 (Taiyuan: Shanxi jiaoyu chubanshe, 2000), 4: 273–77.

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1 The Dings were one of the prominent families of Zhucheng district in Shandong province. 12 Ding Yaokang’s father, Ding Weining, eventually reached the rank of censor in the imperial bureaucracy. Ding Yaokang was his fifth son. He and a younger brother were born to Weining’s second wife. His father died when Ding Yaokang was only ten. After Ding Yaokang had obtained the xiucai degree, he traveled to Jiangnan. In 1619 he studied with Dong Qichang, and in the next year he spent some time in Suzhou. After his return from the south, he took part in the provincial examinations of 1621, 1624, and 1630; his lack of success was attributed to his “unconventionality.” During the following years, 13 he compiled the Tian shi. The belief in retribution as an unavoidable process, preferably operative within a single lifetime, was widespread in late Ming times. 14 Ding Yaokang appears to have been firmly committed to this belief, since it is an important element in his plays and fiction. I am inclined to view the late Ming obsession with retribution as an expression of an optimistic belief in the malleability of one’s personal future, a belief that fits the general mood of the times. However, for many during the first decades of the Qing, retribution may well have been the last resort for making sense of the otherwise inexplicable, widespread atrocities of the conquest period. ————— 12. The following outline is based mainly on Shi Ling 石玲, “Ding Yaokang,” in Zhongguo gudai xiqujia pingzhuan 中國古代戲曲家評傳, ed. Hu Shihou 胡世厚 and Deng Shaoji 鄧紹基 (Zhengzhou: Zhongzhou guji chubanshe, 1992), pp. 488– 97; and Li Zengpo 李曾坡, “Qianyan” 前言, in idem, ed., Ding Yaokang quanji, pp. 5–12. For a detailed survey of the life of Ding Yaokang, see Zhang Qingji 張清吉, Ding Yaokang nianpu 丁耀亢年譜 (Nanjing: Nanjing daxue chubanshe, 1996). For some corrections to this work, see the extensive biographical sketch of Ding Yaokang by Chan Hing Ho (Chen Qinghao) 陳慶浩, “Hainei fenshu jin shi Ding—Ding Yaokang shengping jiqi zhuzuo” 海內焚書禁識丁—丁耀亢生平及其 著作, in Wenxue, wenhua yu shibian 文學文化與世變, ed. Li Fengmao 李豐楙 (Taipei: Zhongyang yanjiuyuan, Zhongguo wenzhe yanjiusuo, 2002), pp. 351–94. 13. Local legends collected in recent times in Zhucheng portray Ding Yaokang during these years as a wit and a painter; see Sun Yuming 孫玉明, “Ding Yaokang qiren qishi” 丁 耀 亢 其 人 其 事 , in “Jinpingmei” yishu shijie 金 瓶 梅 藝 術 世 界 (Changchun: Jilin daxue chubanshe, 1991), pp. 311–12. 14. Cynthia Brokaw, The Ledgers of Merit and Demerit: Social Change and Moral Order in Late Imperial China (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1991).

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By the late 1630s, when the Jiangnan region was still safe from the horrors of war for another few years, Shandong already was affected by widespread banditry and the wars between the Ming dynasty and the Manchus. 15 In 1639 the Manchus attacked the provincial capital, Ji’nan, killing indiscriminately. In 1642 they attacked and occupied Zhucheng, wreaking carnage. Ding Yaokang’s younger brother and a cousin died defending the town, and Ding Yaokang and his mother fled for safety to a small island in the sea. During these years, Ding Yaokang may have served on the staff of Wang Han 王漢 (Zifang 子房, d. 1643), one of the Ming commanders fighting the rebellions led by Li Zicheng 李自成 (ca. 1605–45) and Zhang Xianzong 張獻忠 (1606–47) in central China. 16 In the spring of 1644, Ding Yaokang once again fled to the sea for safety and later traveled south in an unsuccessful effort to organize combined operations by troops in Shandong and Jiangnan. He thereupon joined the staff of a subordinate of Liu Zeqing 劉澤清 (d. 1648), a leading southern general, and took part in various military operations. 17 Following the collapse of the Southern Ming regime in Nanjing in the fifth month of 1645, Ding Yaokang returned to Shandong. Because of the widespread destruction in Zhucheng, Ding Yaokang drifted from town to town. A further trip to the south brought no results. 18 ————— 15. For a brief discussion of the widespread social disintegration in parts of Shandong province as of 1620, see Wakeman, The Great Enterprise, 1985, pp. 424–32. 16. Shi Ling 石玲, “Ding Yaokang juzuo lun” 丁耀亢劇作論, in Li Zengpo, ed., Ding Yaokang yanjiu, p. 227. For a general description of the late Ming peasant rebellions, see James Bunyan Parsons, Peasant Rebellions of the Late Ming Dynasty (Tucson: University of Arizona Press, 1970). The troops of Li Zicheng and Zhang Xianzhong never crossed the Yellow River into Shandong; troops of Li’s Da Shun dynasty were only briefly active in Shandong in 1644. 17. For a description of Liu Zeqing’s less than glorious role in 1644 and 1645, see Lynn A. Struve, The Southern Ming, 1644–1662 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1984), pp. 15–59. 18. Ding Yaokang left a detailed description of his movements during these hectic years in various essays of his Chujie jilüe; see Ding Yaokang quanji, pp. 265–91. Lynn A. Struve (The Ming-Qing Conflict, 1619–1683: A Historiography and Source Guide [Ann Arbor: Association for Asian Studies, 1998], pp. 208–9) describes its contents as follows: “In the first half of this memoir, the author, a free-spirited literatus of Zhucheng, Shandong, gives a vivid account of how he and some family members managed to survive the Manchu incursions of 1639 and 1642 as well as the mixture of bandit depredations, Qing encroachments, and Ming military diffidence in Shandong from 1644 through 1647. Mainly he and his family took refuge on small coastal islands. Particularly interesting is Ding’s ineffectual cooperation with

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Eventually, in 1648, Ding Yaokang traveled to Beijing, where friends helped him to obtain the gongsheng degree, whereupon he was appointed as an instructor ( jiaoxi 教習) in the Bordered White banner. His patrons during these years included such important officials as Wang Duo 王鐸 (1592–1652), Fu Zhanglei 傅掌雷 (d. 1666), Zhang Tangong 張坦公, Liu Zhengzong 劉正宗 (d. 1662?), and Gong Dingzi 龔鼎孳 (1615–73). Ding Yaokang would serve as an instructor until 1651. Thereupon he was appointed an instructor ( jiaoyu 教諭) in Rongcheng county, a post he would assume only in 1654. During the years in Beijing, Ding Yaokang became active as a playwright. His first published play, Huaren you 化人游 (Ramblings with magicians), was both a deliverance play and an elaborate allegory of the dynastic transition. Earlier, in 1643, Ding Yaokang had started to write Chisong you 赤松游 (Ramblings with Red Pine), a dramatization of the life of the Han general Zhang Liang 張良(Zifang 子房) written to commemorate his friend Wang Han 王漢 (Zifang 子房), but would not finish the play until 1649. His next extant play is Xihu shan 西湖扇 (West Lake fan; 1653), which is based on a contemporary event and was written at the request of one of the protagonists; however, the historical setting was changed from the Manchu conquest of Jiangnan to the first years of the Southern Song dynasty. These three plays are discussed below. Ding Yaokang served for five years in Rongcheng, which was close enough to the capital to allow for frequent trips there. Here he wrote not only Xu Jinpingmei but also another surviving play, Ranshe dan 蚺蛇膽 (A boa constrictor’s gall). This play is a reworking of the famous anonymous sixteenth-century play Mingfeng ji 鳴鳳記 (The cry of the phoenix), which describes in detail the intrigues of the infamous minister Yan Song 嚴嵩 (1480–1567) and his son Yan Shifan 嚴世蕃 (1513–65), as well as the sufferings of the officials who dared to protest their abuse of power such as Yang Jisheng 楊繼聖 (1516–55). When the Shunzhi emperor expressed a desire to see a play that gave a more prominent role to the moral exemplar Yang Jisheng, a number of playwrights prepared new versions. Ding Yaokang, basing himself on Yang Jisheng’s annalistic biography, made Yang Jisheng the single ————— a commander who was subordinate to Liu Zeqing. Also included is a sketch of his experience as a tutor of Chinese to young Manchu bannermen in Beijing in 1650–51.”

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central character of the play, but his patrons at court took offense at his strongly worded criticisms of abuses at the Ming court and in the Ming bureaucracy. When Ding Yaokang refused to tone down his language, the play was not presented to the throne; this did not stop Ding Yaokang from having it published. 19 To indicate Ding Yaokang’s unbridled character (mu wu guren 目無古人—he recognized no authority), many modern authors quote the following anecdote from Ding’s years at Rongcheng: Once, when Ding Yaokang was serving as instructor in Rongcheng, he suddenly thought of his old friends in the capital. He mounted his long-eared donkey, and braving wind and snow, he rode a few hundred li in a single day. When he arrived in his [former study] Boat on Land in the Huayan monastery, he invited over all his noble friends and hermits, the zither-players and sword-masters. Sitting without any order, they drank heartily, laughing and joking and angrily cursing. . . . But as soon as the urge [to see his friends] was gone, he mounted his donkey and went home. 20

In 1659 Ding Yaokang was appointed magistrate of Hui’an county in Fujian province, close to the home base of Zheng Chenggong 鄭成功 (Coxinga; 1624–62). He traveled south, and by New Year’s Day, 1660, he had reached Suzhou. From there he traveled to Hangzhou, where he made arrangements for the cutting of the printing blocks of Xu Jinpingmei, which he must have written during the preceding decade. This novel, as its title makes clear, is a continuation of the Jinpingmei and follows the fortunes of the remaining members of the Ximen Qing household through the years of the Jürched conquest of northern China—those who already had died in Jinpingmei are reincarnated in order to suffer a greater punishment. The work intends to improve on its predecessor by making sure every one of them gets his or her just ————— 19. A modern edition of Ranshe dan (also known as Biaozhong ji 表忠記 [Loyalty displayed]) is included in Ding Yaokang quanji, pp. 911–1007. On the history of its composition, see Guo Fen 郭芬, “Bianyan” 弁言, ibid., p. 914. For substantive discussions of the play, see Kong Fanxin 孔繁信, “Ding Yehe xiqu chuangzuo jianlun” 丁野鶴戲曲創作簡論, in Li Zengpo, ed., Ding Yaokang yanjiu, pp. 208–15; and Shi Ling, “Ding Yaokang juzuo lun,” pp. 240–49. See also Zhou Yibai 周貽白, “Ding Yaokang Ranshe dan” 丁耀亢蚺蛇膽, in idem, Zhou Yibai xiju lunwen xuan 周貽白戲劇論文選 (Changsha: Huanan renmin chubanshe, 1982), pp. 300–304. 20. Quoted from Jin Shishuo 今世說, in Xue Liang 薛亮, comp., Ming Qing xijian xiaoshuo huikao 明清稀見小說匯考 (Beijing: Shehui kexue wenxian chubanshe, 1999), p. 239.

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reward and testifies to the author’s belief in the efficacy of retribution. The novel is a remarkable formal experiment. It presents itself as a commentary on the Taishang ganying pian 太上感應篇, a popular moralistic tract reprinted by imperial command in 1656, and many of its sixty-four chapters open with a quotation from that text. Before resuming the narrative proper, many chapters, influenced by the late Ming vernacular short story, start with anecdotes in support of the quotation. The novel is a scathing indictment of the collapse of all values in the wake of the conquest and blames this social disintegration on the highest in the land. The novel also testifies to Ding Yaokang’s wide-ranging knowledge of all varieties of vernacular and performative literature. 21 This first edition of the novel was a deluxe production, with one full-page illustration for each chapter. It also included a portrait of the author, who made little attempt to hide his identity and described himself (in Chapter 62) as a “red-crested snow-white crane,” that is, as a Ming loyalist in mourning for the defunct dynasty. Ding Yaokang spent most of 1660 in Hangzhou, selling his novel. In Hangzhou he also met his fellow poet-playwright-novelist Li Yu 李漁 (1610–80). Late in the year, Ding Yaokang started out toward Hui’an but then suddenly handed in his resignation and, despite all pressure, refused to take up his post. Eventually, he left the printing blocks of his novel in Suzhou and returned to Zhucheng in the third month of 1661. While looking after his family’s affairs and involved in various lawsuits, he was accused in 1664 by a local enemy of having slandered the Manchus in his novel. For safety he fled Zhucheng and traveled widely in Hebei and Henan. In 1665 Ding Yaokang was summoned to Beijing, where he was jailed for 120 days. 22 Thanks to the efforts of Gong Dingzi and Fu Zhanglei, he was eventually pardoned (“because he had ————— 21. Li Zengpo, ed., Ding Yaokang yanjiu, contains the following articles on Xu Jinpingmei: Wang Rumei 王汝梅, “Ding Yaokang de Xu Jinpingmei chuangzuo jiqi xiaoshuo guannian” 丁耀亢的續金瓶梅創作及其小說觀念, pp. 157–63; Luo Derong 羅德榮, “Xu Jinpingmei zhuzhi suojie” 續金瓶梅主旨索解, pp. 164–75; Kong Fanhua 孔繁華, “Liangfu choupi’nang, yifu chouzuilian: Xu Jinpingmei, Jinpingmei zhong Ying Bojue xingxiangtan” 兩副臭皮囊一副丑觜臉: 續金瓶梅金瓶梅應中伯 爵形象談, pp. 176–82. 22. Modern folktales from Zhucheng tell that Ding Yaokang escaped arrest either because he blinded himself or because he had grown blind by the time the court’s agents arrived; see Sun Yuming, “Ding Yaokang qiren qishi,” pp. 312–13.

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turned himself in”), 23 but the novel was ordered to be burned. 24 Ding Yaokang returned to Zhucheng, where, according to some, he went on to write the novel Xingshi yinyuan zhuan, taking care this time to hide his authorship. He died in Zhucheng in the last month of 1669. A portrait of the elderly Ding Yaokang, now in the Zhucheng museum and entitled Ding Yehe xingle tu 丁野鶴行樂圖 (Ding Yaokang enjoying himself), shows an elderly gentleman, seated at ease behind a stone table on which is placed a lute. A servant stands to his right, and a servant boy crouches over a portable stove, heating water for tea. The central figure leans his right elbow on the table and looks us directly in the face. His face sports a full black moustache and a flowing beard, but his age is shown by his baldness and his wrinkles and world-weary smile. On its back the painting carries the following inscription: “Hey, who are you, with your bald pate and no headdress, your hoary brows and long beard? Pine and rock are your neighbors, flowering peaches crowd the banks: without a worry, your mind is at ease; with your zither before you, you sip your tea as you have fully understood Heaven’s truth. Amid ten mu of mists and clouds, you hear the rustling mountain brooks from where you sit.

————— 23. Gong Dingzi was serving as president of the Ministry of Justice at the time. For Chinese translations of Manchu documents relating to the case, see An Shuangcheng 安雙成, “Shun Kang nianjian Xu Jinpingmei zuozhe Ding Yaokang shoushen an” 順康年間續金瓶梅作者丁耀亢受審案, Lishi dang’an 78 (2002, no. 2): 29–32. 24. This government order appears to have been executed quite thoroughly, since no fully complete copy of the original edition of Xu Jinpingmei has been preserved. The copy of the original edition reproduced in Guben xiaoshuo jicheng 古本小說集成 belonged to the modern scholar Fu Xihua 傅惜華; missing sections have been replaced from a surviving manuscript copy. Later re-editions of the 64–chapter novel removed materials that might offend the Manchu censors. Some existing manuscripts of the novel are based on these later editions, but one of these manuscripts may be the fair copy of the author on which the original printing was based. See Sun Yancheng 孫言誠, “Xu Jinpingmei de keben chaoben he gaixieben” 續金瓶梅的刻本抄本和改寫本, in Jinpingmei yishu shijie, pp. 319–32. The Gelian huaying 隔簾花影 edition became the most popular version of the novel; in this adaptation all chapters devoted primarily to describing the brutality of the Jürched conquest had been deleted, and the novel was reduced to 48 chapters. This version was later translated into German by Franz Kuhn. In the early years of the twentieth century, the deleted chapters were restored, but the “superstitious” chapters now were struck; this 60–chapter version goes by the title Jinwu meng 金屋夢. After the novel had been burned, Ding Yaokang recorded in one of his poems that a copy of his novel had been taken to Liuqiu and might still be preserved there.

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Ah, are you a person of the age of Lord No-Cares? Or perhaps of the age of Lord Getian?” 25

This painting was done in 1660 in Hangzhou by the painter Chen Longyun 陳龍運. 26 Apparently Ding Yaokang did not suspect what the 1660s would have in store for him. Throughout his life, Ding Yaokang was a most prolific author, in a variety of genres. Six collections of his poetry, each covering a number of years, have been preserved. He also left an autobiographical prose record of his most important experiences during the final years of the Ming and the first years of the Qing. In the last fifteen years or so of his life, he wrote numerous plays and a long novel. Whereas his poetry provides a record of his day-to-day reactions to his experiences, his prose memoir, his plays, and his novel may be read as attempts to organize these personal experiences into a larger whole and to link the personal with the social in an effort to make sense of the traumatic collapse of the dynasty, the destruction of the community, and the annihilation of all personal security. It therefore comes as no surprise that the same incidents crop up in works belonging to quite different genres and that the author introduces himself in various guises in his novel and his plays. At a time when all public certainties fail, authority, it would appear, can be derived only from the personal. Perhaps this is the reason Ding Yaokang included his own portrait in Xu Jinpingmei, his last and most ambitious work. In his plays on the conquest, the author more modestly displayed himself through one of the characters.

2 Chisong you, a dramatized chronicle of the life of Zhang Liang (Zifang), one of the founding generals of the Han dynasty, was written to commemorate Ding Yaokang’s good friend and patron Wang Han, who had assumed the style name of Zifang out of admiration for Zhang Liang. Both Wang and his elder brother served in the military. Wang Han rose to high rank but died fighting rebels in Henan. Ding Yaokang completed the play only after receiving help and instruction from theater professionals following his move to Peking in 1648, as he men————— 25. Zhang Qingji, “Xingshi yinyuan zhuan” xinkao, pp. 331–32. 26. Chan Hing Ho, “Hainei fenshu jin shi Ding,” pp. 10–11.

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tions in his preface. A good student, Ding Yaokang preceded his play with a summary of the insights in the craft of playwriting that he had gained. These prescriptions for an effective play have earned him a modest place in the history of Chinese drama criticism. 27 Chisong you is not the first play to deal with the materials concerning the founding of the Han dynasty. The stories of the wars between Xiang Yu 項羽 and Liu Bang 劉邦 were very popular with Yuan playwrights. 28 On the Ming stage the stories of Zhang Liang and Han Xin 韓信 remained popular. The life of Zhang Liang was the main topic of an anonymous chuanqi entitled Chisong ji 赤松記 (The story of Red Pine). The title is derived from the fact that Zhang Liang’s immortal teacher, Master Yellow Stone, is considered to be a manifestation of the ancient immortal Master Red Pine. Although in many ways Ding Yaokang’s play shows the continuing influence of these earlier plays, he made great efforts to base his adaptation on the Shiji as a canonical historical source. 29 For this reason, the play may be read as yet another manifestation of the growing concern for historical reliability in plays on historical subjects observable throughout the seventeenth century and culminating in the detailed documentation of Kong Shangren’s 孔尚仁 (1648–1718) Taohua shan 桃花扇. This growing concern for historical reliability may well be seen as a counterpart to the increasing awareness of the fictionality of most drama and fiction, a fictionality emphasized in Jin Shengtan’s 金 聖 歎 (1608–61) mid-seventeenth————— 27. Ding Yaokang quanji, pp. 806–8. For a partial translation of these comments into English, see Faye Chunfang Fei, Chinese Theories of Theater and Performance, from Confucius to the Present (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press, 1999), pp. 75–76. For brief discussions of Ding Yaokang’s theoretical pronouncements, see Ye Changhai 葉 長 海 , Zhongguo xijuxue shigao 中 國 戲 劇 學 史 稿 (Shanghai: Shanghai wenyi chubanshe, 1986), pp. 354–56; and Huang Lin 黃霖, “Lüetan Ding Yaokang de xijuguan” 略談丁耀亢的戲曲觀, in Li Zengpo, ed., Ding Yaokang yanjiu, pp. 196–202. The printed edition of the play also carries a preface by the well-known Ming loyalist and theater buff Zha Jizuo 查繼佐 (1601–76). Zha also may have contributed a preface to Ding’s Xu Jinpingmei; see Shi Ling 石玲, “Xu Jinpingmei de zuoqi ji qita” 續金瓶梅作期及其他, in “Jinpingmei” yishu shijie, pp. 336–37. 28. See W. L. Idema, “The Founding of the Han Dynasty in Early Drama: The Autocratic Suppression of Popular Debunking,” in Thought and Law in Qin and Han China: Studies Dedicated to Anthony Hulsewé on the Occasion of His Eightieth Birthday, ed. W. L. Idema and E. Zürcher (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1990), pp. 183–207. 29. Ding Yaokang, “Chisong you benmo” 赤松游本末, in Ding Yaokang quanji, p. 805.

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century criticism. 30 An essential element in Ding Yaokang’s characterization of Zhang Liang is Zhang’s retirement from office in order to pursue the study of immortality; Ding drew attention to this departure from his source in the final act of the play: Because Sima Guang, who, when he was writing his history, noted down the sentence “The Marquis of Liu Zhang Liang died,” later people say that the divine immortals are a fraud. So now I have written a play entitled Ramblings with Red Pine, in order that people in this world may see with their own eyes how he and his wife ascended to heaven in broad daylight, and so will believe that loyalty and filiality are the roots of immortality. 31

Since Ding Yaokang wanted not only to provide a chronicle of the life of Zhang Liang (and his wife—we are dealing with a chuanqi after all), but apparently also to fill out the historical background by including all major events of those eventful years, the play, especially the first two juan, is crowded. The play consists of forty-six acts, divided into three juan. The first juan (Acts 1–16) is devoted to the early career of Zhang Liang, before he joined Liu Bang. As a scion of a family of high officials in the state of Han 韓, Zhang Liang is animated by a burning desire to take revenge on the First Emperor of Qin for his annihilation of the state of Han. He finds a strongman willing to attack the carriage of the First Emperor with a heavy hammer, but despite all their careful preparations this attempt on the First Emperor’s life fails. 32 Zhang Liang thereupon meets with Master Yellow Stone (Red Pine), who discerns in his outstanding loyalty the right materials for an ————— 30. See John Ching-yu Wang, Chin Sheng-t’an (New York: Twayne Publishers, 1972). 31. Ding Yaokang quanji, p. 906. Sima Guang 司馬光 (1019–83) is the author of the Zizhi tong jian 資治通鑒, suggesting that Ding Yaokang’s view of Zhang Liang may be derived not only from Sima Qian’s Shiji, but also from Sima Guang’s chronicle (or one of its numerous digests). 32. This is dealt with in Act 7. The attempt fails because the strongman hits the wrong carriage with his hammer. After the failed attempt, Zhang Liang and the strongman flee and go their separate ways. The strongman re-enters the play in Act 36, now as a Buddhist monk. He informs the audience that he has visited India, seen the holy sites of Buddhism, and achieved enlightenment. This allows Ding Yaokang to celebrate the unity of the Three Teachings at the end of his play. At the same time, the strongman’s conversion reflects the choice of many Ming loyalists to become Buddhist monks rather than submit to the Manchus once further military resistance offered no hope.

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immortal. Once Zhang Liang demonstrates the required humility, he receives a book with secret military teachings. The scenes featuring Zhang Liang are interspersed with scenes of the great events of these years, such as the First Emperor touring his realm and erecting stone inscriptions, the announcement of his speedy death, Liu Bang’s beheading of the White Dragon, the burning of the books, and, in the final scene of this juan, the uprisings of Xiang Yu and Chen She 陳涉, which are contrasted with the careful preparations of Liu Bang. The next sixteen acts constitute the second juan. Zhang Liang decides to come out of hiding in order to join Liu Bang in his campaign against the Qin. He pacifies Xiang Yu after the banquet at Hongmen and advises against the reinstatement of the descendants of the former kings. At the battle of Gaixia, he plays on his flute the songs of Chu, inducing the massive defections of Xiang Yu’s troops. Once Liu Bang has become emperor and enfeoffs his meritorious officials, Zhang Liang accepts the title “Marquis of Liu” but not the income that goes with it. When Liu Bang grows enamored of Lady Qi and wishes to depose the crown prince in favor of her son, Zhang Liang is forced by Empress Lü (who holds his wife as a hostage) to devise a plan to prevent this— Zhang Liang does so by inviting the Four Graybeards of Mount Shang to the capital as guests of the crown prince. These scenes are interspersed with scenes of Xu Fu setting out for Liuqiu, Zhao Gao having Li Si and his son executed, Ying Bu arriving at the Han camp, and Lady Yu and Xiang Yu committing suicide. The third and final juan (Acts 33–46) begins with the execution of Han Xin by Empress Lü; in act 34, Zhang Liang receives a piece of pickled meat from the body of Peng Yue, another meritorious official in the establishment of the Han who has been unjustly executed. Zhang Liang refuses to eat it and has it properly buried. He thereupon decides to retire from public life. Many of the remaining scenes are devoted to this long and involved process, which takes so much time because the emperor repeatedly refuses Zhang Liang’s earnest requests to leave. And while Zhang Liang is visiting his hometown to restore the graves of his own ancestors and of the former kings of the state of Han, Liu Bang, who is visiting his own hometown after killing Ying Bu, laments that he has no heroes left to defend his realm. Eventually, after practicing austerities at home for many months, Zhang Liang is allowed to leave the court. After some further complications, he meets with

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Master Red Pine, and at the end he and his wife are inducted into the ranks of the immortals. 33 The tripartite division of the play reflects three stages in the career of Zhang Liang against the background of a changing political situation. The first juan, set during the Qin dynasty, shows the futility of Zhang Liang’s attempts as an individual to avenge the extermination of the kingdom of Han by the Qin. The second juan is set during the chaotic years following the death of the First Emperor; Zhang Liang assists Liu Bang, the destined founder of the new dynasty, in exterminating the Qin and vanquishing his foes. In this way, Zhang Liang achieves his revenge on the Qin. The third and final juan is set against the first years of the Han dynasty; while disclosing the ingratitude and cruelty of the new rulers (in which Zhang Liang is forced to participate to some extent), it highlights Zhang Liang’s noble and unselfish motives, exemplified by his simple lifestyle and earnest desire to leave the court. Throughout the play, it is stressed that Zhang Liang acts only out of loyalty toward the now-defunct kingdom of Han, not out of a desire to make a name for himself or out of a deep commitment to the Han dynasty (even though he realizes that Liu Bang is destined to become the founding emperor of a new dynasty). Ding Yaokang, in his preface to the play, explicitly drew a parallel between Liu Bang’s annihilation of the Qin and the Manchu conquest: “The entry [into China] of Our Great Qing and suppression of the rebels from Qin truly was in the style of the entry into the [Hangu] Pass of Gaozu of the Han!” 34 This turns Zhang Liang into a noble model for the ideal Chinese collaborator of the Manchu regime: such a collaborator would serve the Qing dynasty only in order to take revenge for the Ming dynasty, not out of a desire for self-aggrandizement, and would be expected to retire from service once the rebels had been exterminated and the Ming had been properly avenged. In this scheme, the Qin dynasty stands for the Shaanxi rebel Li Zicheng, the old kingdom of Han for the Ming dynasty, Xiang Yu in his shortsighted stupidity for the Southern Ming ————— 33. Zhang Liang’s departure from court was also the subject of a vernacular short story in the sixteenth century, remarkable for the number of included poems. This story was included in Qing ping shantang huaben 清平山堂話本 but also circulated separately; see Tan Zhengbi 譚正璧, ed., Qingping shantang huaben (Shanghai: Gudian wenxue chubanshe, 1957), pp. 102–14; and Jingben tongsu xiaoshuo deng wuzhong 京本通俗小說等五種 (Nanjing: Jiangsu guji chubanshe, 1991), pp. 1–8. 34. Ding Yaokang, “Chisong you benmo,” in Ding Yaokang quanji, p. 805.

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regime, and the Han dynasty for the Qing dynasty. Since the Han dynasty is one of China’s great dynasties, this historical comparison flattered the Manchu regime and may well have reflected the fact that in northern China, which had suffered so greatly from Li Zicheng and his armies, the Manchu claim that they had come to avenge the Ming carried considerable conviction, at least in the first years following the collapse of the Da Shun regime. 35 The comparison to the Han dynasty is, however, flattering only to a very limited degree. Liu Bang and his wife Empress Lü were notorious for exterminating the meritorious officials who had helped them to conquer the empire, in some cases against better advice. In inserting scenes devoted to the deaths of Han Xin, Peng Yue, and Ying Bu, Ding Yaokang made his second major departure from the historical sources. Both the second and the third juan include an elaborate underworld scene. In Act 21, ghosts appear on stage carrying a huge abacus, the symbol for the automatic and unfailing efficacy of retribution. Judge Cui then explains the many ways in which retribution operates and announces that the victims of the Qin conquests will be repaid by the annihilation of the Qin armies following the collapse of the dynasty. In Act 41, Han Xin, Peng Yue, and Ying Bu complain to the underworld judge against Liu Bang; however, Xiang Yu turns out to have accused them of treason. Eventually the ruler of the Underworld, the bodhisattva Ksitigarbha, enters to pronounce his verdict: all the protagonists in the wars between Chu and Han will be reborn at the end of the Han dynasty to receive their just deserts. 36 By inserting these scenes, Ding Yaokang stressed the violence and injustice involved in the founding of a dynasty, whether Han or Qing, and its limited duration. Between 1643 and 1649, Chisong you changed from a commemoration of a Ming general and a paean to loyalty to the existing dynasty to a ————— 35. Another reason for Manchu interest in a play on Zhang Liang might well be that a military treatise traditionally ascribed to Yellow Stone, Huangshi gong sanlüe sushu 黃石公三略素書, was one of the first Chinese books translated into Manchu. The Manchu translation was completed before 1632. See Walter Fuchs, Beiträge zur mandjurischen Bibliographie und Literatur (Tokyo: Deutsche Gesellschaft für Natur- und Völkerkunde Ostasiens, 1936), p. 40. 36. The notion that Cao Cao, Liu Bei, and Sun Quan are the reincarnations of Han Xin, Peng Yue, and Ying Bu is already found in the opening scene of the Yuan dynasty Sanguozhi pinghua 三國志平話; see Ding Xigen 丁錫根, ed., Song Yuan pinghua ji 宋元平話集 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1990), pp. 747–51. In later times, the tale also circulated separately.

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meditation on the circumstances under which service to a new and foreign dynasty might be defensible. Both this change in focus and the need for more schooling in technical playwriting skills may explain the long gestation period. Once the historical parallel is clear, however, one may not only pursue the details of the criticisms of the Li Zicheng regime and of the Southern Ming regime in the depictions, respectively, of the First Emperor and his court and of Xiang Yu and his advisers, but also ponder the implications of some minor scenes. Act 18, for example, is devoted to the adventures of Xu Fu. Ordered to find the islands of the immortals, Xu Fu decides not to return to the mainland with his large fleet but to sail to the large island of Liuqiu. If Ding Yaokang had written his play some fifteen years later, a Dutchman would of course read this as a reference to Zheng Chenggong’s conquest of Taiwan. Should we now read it as a reference to the Zheng family forces on Quemoy and Amoy? Or as a more general reference to the departure of a number of Ming loyalists to Japan? Or as a bow to the common topos of escape to the “margins of utopia”? 37 In Act 31, Empress Lü’s elder sister, Lü Xu, first advises her to invite Zhang Liang’s wife to the palace so that the empress can hold her hostage while asking Zhang Liang for advice on how to strengthen her son’s position, and next proceeds to lay a curse on Lady Qi with a shamanistic ritual. Are we entitled to read such a scene as reference to the, in Chinese eyes very backward, Manchu practice of shamanism? How much weight should we assign to the remarks of the Four Graybeards in Act 32: “Because the King of Han [Liu Bang] is arrogant and overbearing and refuses to treat gentlemen with due respect, we will urge Zhang Liang to return to the mountains”? 38 Is this a call to former Ming officials now serving the Manchus to resign? Or is it a plea to the new Manchu rulers to avoid the bad example of Liu Bang? Although Zhang Liang may be characterized as an exemplar for the former Ming officials serving the Qing and while it may have pleased some of Ding Yaokang’s highly placed patrons to see themselves portrayed as latter-day Zhang Liangs, Zhang’s career would appear to be much too different from that of Ding Yaokang for Zhang Liang to be a ————— 37. Cf. Ellen Widmer, The Margins of Utopia: “Shui-hu hou-chuan” and the Literature of Ming Loyalism (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University, Council on East Asian Studies, 1987). 38. Ding Yaokang quanji, p. 872.

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self-projection of the author, as some Chinese scholars have suggested. Nor does Ding Yaokang intimate such an identification in the body of the play. However, he went on to include a character very much based on his own experiences in Xihu shan.

3 The main plot of Xihu shan, a chuanqi in 32 acts, apparently was based on an actual occurrence, which was the talk of Beijing in 1649, as is borne out by a poem by Ding Yaokang (“Everybody in the capital talks about this affair”). Although the action is set during the early years of the Southern Song, this is only a thin disguise, as Manchu institutions such as the banners are repeatedly and explicitly mentioned. Ding Yaokang’s son Ding Shenxing 丁慎行, in his 1674 preface to the reprint of the play, revealed that his father wrote the play while in Beijing at the request of a certain Shiqu xiansheng 石渠先生. 39 In the play itself, Shiqu is given as the style of the male protagonist, Gu Shi 顧史. The actual Gu Shi was a certain Cao Erkan 曹爾堪 (style Zigu; 1617–79). He hailed from Zhejiang province, passed the jinshi examination in 1653, and had a distinguished career in the Hanlin Academy. He was famous both for his lyrics and his poems and consorted with the most famous poets of his time. 40 In the play, Gu Shi is a Hangzhou licentiate, who falls in love with both the highly literate Hangzhou courtesan Song Juanjuan 宋娟娟 and the equally literate young lady Song Xiangxian 宋湘仙. Each of them is separately captured during southern forays by plundering Jürched troops and transported to Beijing. During their trip north, each woman writes a poem on the wall of the same post station, hoping Gu Shi will read it—which he does. 41 In Beijing, Song Juanjuan is as————— 39. Ding Shenxing 丁慎行, “Chongke Xihu shan chuanqi shimo” 重刻西湖扇傳 奇始末, in Ding Yaokang quanji, p. 741. 40. Shi Ling, “Ding Yaokang juzuo lun,” p. 234. 41. Wai-yee Li (“Heroic Transformations: Women and National Trauma in Early Qing Literature,” Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 59 [1999], p. 423) notes the popularity of the topic of abducted women leaving a poem on a wall with the writers of the early Qing dynasty and mentions You Tong’s Diao pipa 弔琵琶 as another play based on such an event. Cf. Judith T. Zeitlin, “Disappearing Verses: Writings on Walls and Anxieties of Loss,” in Writing and Materiality in China. Essays in Honor of Patrick Hanan, ed. Judith T. Zeitlin and Lydia Liu (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Asia Center, 2003), pp. 73–132.

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signed to a weaving factory, and Song Xiangxian is awarded to the lecherous but henpecked Jürched general Lou Shi as his concubine. Her virginity is saved, however, when the general’s wife finds out about her, takes her away from her husband, and assigns her the most physically demanding work as a maid. Eventually, she escapes to a Buddhist nunnery in the capital, where she meets Song Juanjuan. When the general tries to abduct her from the nunnery, Gu Shi’s examination success is announced. The general now lays his complaint before the court, offering as evidence a fan, which he had snatched away from Gu Shi at the nunnery. This fan had been inscribed by Song Xiangxian in Hangzhou. She had lost it during a trip to West Lake, where it had been picked up by Gu Shi. He and his friends and Song Juanjuan had it inscribed with their own lines, and then he had given the fan to Song Juanjuan as a pledge of his love. Song Juanjuan had kept the fan with her during the trip north but had dropped it at the post station when she was startled by one of the guards. At the post station, it was picked up again by Song Xiangxian. But Song Xiangxian lost the fan again when it was stolen by Gu Shi, who found her sleeping when he came to the nunnery to implore her to help him rendezvous with Song Juanjuan. When the three of them meet at the nunnery on Qingming and prepare to venerate the fan for bringing them all together, it is snatched away by General Lou. The emperor assigns the case to the empress for final adjudication, who establishes the purity of the three southerners’ love and orders Gu Shi to marry both Song Juanjuan and Song Xiangxian. The play ends with a grand wedding scene. Ding Yaokang’s Chisong you does not depict the establishment of the Qing dynasty as a conquest of the Ming. In line with the official Qing standpoint, it pictures the Manchus as avenging the Ming. By the simple fact of selecting the period of the Jürched onslaught as the temporal setting of Xihu shan, Ding Yaokang also revised his view of the establishment of the Qing. The historical parallel now suggests an overthrow of the Ming by the Manchus, thus making the issue of loyalty an even more pressing concern than in the earlier play. However, Xihu shan’s formal hero Gu Shi displays little political awareness throughout the play. Once he has obtained the juren degree, he just wants to enjoy himself. After being captured by Jürched troops, he serves as secretary to one of the generals, and once he has come to Beijing, he decides to take up his studies again in order to pursue a career as an official. He is

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contrasted throughout the play with Ding Yaokang’s alter ego, Chen Daodong 陳道東. Chen Daodong, evidently Ding’s invention, is introduced as a friend of Gu Shi. As a simple student in the National Academy, he leads a collective protest by the students against the appeasement policy of Qin Kuai and the shameful tribute payments of the Song to the Jin. When this collective protest is fruitless, he sends a memorial to the throne concerning these same points. Qin Kuai thereupon orders Chen Daodong and his friends arrested. When Gu Shi and Song Juanjuan separately flee Hangzhou, they are captured by Jürched troops. Qin Kuai tries to get rid of Chen Daodong by sending him as an envoy to the Jin and orders him to travel by sea, hoping that if he does not die at sea, his stubborn character will anger the Jürched so much that they will kill him. When Chen Daodong arrives in Beijing, he refuses, in Act 14, to see any Jin official in private before he has delivered his formal message to the ruler. When eventually he is received by the Jürched crown prince Wuzhu, he refuses to kowtow and berates Wuzhu at length for his presumptuous behavior toward the Song. Wuzhu is indeed enraged but is eventually persuaded not to kill Chen Daodong but to banish him to Liaoyang. After Chen Daodong, who consistently compares himself to Su Wu 蘇武, the Han dynasty envoy who refused to serve the Xiongnu, has arrived in Liaoyang, he agrees to the request by a high official to become a teacher (“Fortunately, when the highest official locally learned of my loyalty and rectitude, he invited me to teach his sons and younger brothers. This may be counted a case of spreading the great way of the sage to the ends of the earth!”). 42 In a hilarious scene, his barbarian students display their limited understanding by turning selected passages from the Analects into farcical nonsense. 43 They proceed ————— 42. Ding Yaokang quanji, p. 774. The relation of a teacher to his pupils is, of course, different from that of a servant to his master: an official is a slave of his lord, a teacher never. Ding Yaokang was not the only loyalist who was willing to serve as an instructor. Another loyalist dramatist who did so was Meng Chengshun 孟稱舜 (1598–1684). Once Ding Yaokang was appointed a magistrate, his relation to the Qing dynasty may well have changed in his eyes to such an extent that he eventually decided he could not take up the post. Interestingly, one of the accusations against Ding Yaokang in 1664–65 would be that he had portrayed himself under an assumed name as a teacher of Manchus in his Xu Jinpingmei; see An Shuangcheng, “Shun Kang nianjian Xu Jinpingmei zuozhe Ding Yaokang shoushen an,” pp. 29–32. 43. For a detailed discussion of this scene, see Qin Huasheng, “Ding Yaokang juzuo julun chutan,” pp. 77–78.

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to question the relevance of “those old geezers Kong and Meng” to the north, quoting the example of earlier conquest dynasties that did quite well without the teachings of the sages: “Teacher, may I ask you? That Master Kong (Kong fuzi 孔夫子), even though he was living during the Spring and Autumn period, still said he wanted to live among the nine eastern barbarians and travel to the southern barbarians. Later at the end of the Jin, the empire was divided into north and south, and later it was divided into Five Dynasties. When we come to the Liao and the Jin, they even became major states. So it would seem that the sages of the north are as good as those old geezers Kong and Meng (Kong Meng laotou’er 孔孟老頭 兒)!” 44

Chen Daodong counters by claiming the universal relevance of the Way and stressing the importance of peace over warfare. 45 Chen Daodong is reunited with Gu Shi only when his students take him to Beijing. One of Chen Daodong’s students turns out to be Yelü Chucai 耶律楚材 (1190–1244). The historical Yelü Chucai was a Jürched who served (and civilized) the Mongols, but here he is introduced as a Mongol in the service of the Jürched. Together with Gu Shi and Yelü Chucai, Chen Daodong takes part in the examinations (in an examination act that is notable for not being farcical) 46 and succeeds with highest honors. He still refuses to accept office from the Jin (“I, this envoy, belong to the Song court and am serving out my punishment in the north; I dare not accept an office”) 47 and is allowed to return to the south with full honors. The day of Gu Shi’s wedding is simultaneously the day of Chen Daodong’s departure. Theatrical convention prescribes that a grand wedding scene be the final act of the play. The act features Gu Shi and his two wives in bridal ————— 44. Ding Yaokang quanji, p. 775. Cf. Struve, The Southern Ming 1644–1662, p. 61: “Dorgon retorted that the Manchus too had a system of social and ceremonial norms which should not be dismissed as inferior to that of China” in 1645, when Chinese officials protested the imposition of the queue. 45. Chen’s name may be read as “Expounding the Way to the East.” Here “east” refers to the Guandong area, the homeland of the Manchus. 46. For a brief discussion of the conventional examination scene, see Wilt L. Idema, “Female Talent and Female Virtue: Xu Wei’s Nüzhuangyuan and Meng Chengsun’s Zhenwen ji,” in Ming Qing xiqu guoji yantaohui lunwenji 明清戲曲國際 研討會論文集, ed. Hua Wei 華瑋and Wang Ailing 王璦玲 (Taipei: Zhongyang yanjiuyuan, Zhongguo wenzhe yanjiusuo choubeichu, 1998), p. 557. 47. Ding Yaokang quanji, p. 793.

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dress and would have provided a fitting grand finale in performance. For Ding Yaokang, the preceding act would have been the most important. Here Chen Daodong’s students see him off as he is about to depart for the south. The identity of Chen Daodong as Ding Yaokang is hinted at, and the formerly obstreperous students now gratefully acknowledge the transforming value of Chinese civilization. Yelü Chucai declares: “Ever since we have received your instruction, all these Mongol students to a man have intensively studied the Classics and Histories and gradually have come to display a Chinese manner (Zhonghua qixiang 中華氣像).” Chen Daodong replies by stating: “The Great Way makes no distinction between north and south.” 48 Both Gu Shi and Chen Daodong are men of passion. But whereas Gu Shi enjoys a life of luxury and loves (literate) women, Chen Daodong’s passion is fully directed toward the Confucian teachings and the dynasty he serves, if only as a student. Gu Shi is quite willing to shift political allegiance, whereas this is impossible for Chen Daodong. One wonders to what extent Ding Yaokang as a Shandong man was criticizing the Jiangnan literati willing to serve the Qing as luxury-loving turncoats. Even while Chen Daodong succeeds in civilizing and sinifying the northern barbarians, he remains steadfastly loyal to the Song. 49 As a result, the final act is a tuanyuan of a very special kind: the final reunion of the lovers is for the friends a definitive parting of the ways. It has been noted a number of times that Xihu shan as a romantic melodrama, featuring as its central prop a fan and dealing with the issue ————— 48. Ibid., p. 797. 49. This characterization of Chen Daodong may be compared to the story of the steadfast loyalty of the Southern Song envoy Hong Hao 洪浩, which was retold by Ding Yaokang in Chapter 58 of his Xu Jinpingmei as a foil to the treachery of Qin Kuai (Ding Yaokang quanji, pp. 465–69). The description of Chen Daodong’s diplomatic mission may also have been indebted to the events of the embassy from the Nanjing court to the Manchu government in Beijing in the second half of 1644. This mission, headed by the unyielding Zuo Maodi 左懋第, ended in dismal failure. See Struve, The Southern Ming, 1644–1662, pp. 39–41. In the Xu Jinpingmei, Ding Yaokang would appear to have presented a more modest but still idealizing portrait of himself in the character of the honest educational official Liu 劉, who in Chapter 12 returns to Ximen Qing’s widow the fifty taels of silver he had earlier borrowed from her husband. Educational official Liu eventually reaches the rank of district magistrate but then opts for a life of retirement.

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of loyalty, presages in many ways Kong Shangren’s Taohua shan. 50 It is certainly not impossible that Ding Yaokang’s play influenced his fellow provincial. As a work of literature, I would argue, Xihu shan certainly is a great improvement on Chisong you, and the fact that it was reprinted in 1674 suggests that it enjoyed a certain popularity at the time, at least locally. If we focus only on the love interest, the ending of Xihu shan would appear to be much more conventional than that of Kong Shangren’s play, which surprisingly concludes with a final meeting and separation of the lovers. However, if we redirect our gaze to the separation of friends as the “actual” final scene of the play, the correspondence with the unconventional final scene of Taohua shan becomes striking. The two female protagonists of Xihu shan do not show any explicit political awareness (beyond comparing themselves repeatedly to Wang Zhaojun 王昭君 and Cai Yan 蔡琰, famous examples of women who in earlier times had been forced to marry a barbarian) and in this respect are no match for Li Xiang jun in Taohua shan. However, if conquest is rape, 51 both women are remarkable for their chaste loyalty. As such, they set an example for men in a time of adversity. 52 It is interesting to note that both the courtesan and the young lady are portrayed as highly literate. This portrayal may be inspired by plot requirements, but it also seems to reflect the mid-seventeenth-century interest in writing women and their works. 53 In contrast with the steadfast chastity of ————— 50. Qin Huasheng, “Ding Yaokang juzuo julun chutan,” p. 79; Shi Ling, “Ding Yaokang juzuo lun,” pp. 239–40. 51. Wai-yee Li (“Heroic Transformations,” p. 424) quotes a song from Act 6 of Xihu shan in which Jürched soldiers describe the conquest of Hangzhou and West Lake as the rape of Xi Shi. 52. When Wai-yee Li (ibid., p. 434) writes that in plays such as Ding Yaokang’s Xihu shan “protagonists serving the new regime as erstwhile subjects in conquered dynasties are not criticized,” this may be correct insofar as explicit criticism of Gu Shi is not to be found. However, the contrast with Chen Daodong and with Song Juanjuan and Song Xiangxian would seem to imply strong criticism. 53. In Chapter 53 of Xu Jinpingmei, Ding Yaokang commented at length on the prevalence of literacy among the women of Yangzhou. In the opening pages of this chapter, he linked this high degree of literacy to the Yangzhou trade in “svelte foals” (concubines) (Ding Yaokang quanji, pp. 418–20). On p. 426 of the same chapter, he briefly discussed Huizhou, where, according to him, the men learn just enough characters to pursue business, whereas women study poetry and are eager to have their works published. This chapter, on the Jürched conquest of Yangzhou, culminates in the description of an examination for women, organized for the se-

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Song Juanjuan and Song Xiangxian, Ding Yaokang described in Act 30 all the (Chinese) palace ladies in the (Jürched=Manchu) palace as lesbians and whores: (Old female and clown enter as palace ladies) clown: I am Li Ruhua. Ever since my youth I have suffered misfortune, and I have especially been unhappy in marriage. Since I have been abducted and put in the palace, the fires of my desire time and again start to burn. Whenever it burns, whenever it burns, we get up at midnight and “polish our mirrors.” old female: I am Zhang Ajiao. As a child I came from Yangzhou, where I learned to powder my face and oil my hair. My master called me a “svelte foal,” but others all would call me a “fat cow.” When I was trained to play the zither, I would snap the strings, and when I had to play go, I would steal the stones. My master just wanted to make money from my marriage and didn’t care that my years passed by. Only when the army came through town, I got oil to add to my fire. All the soldiers of the whole regiment did their thing with me, and the old general too regularly had his way with me. Now they have me dress as a palace lady and let me unbind my feet and coil my hair. But if you have to serve tea and heat wine all day like me, you are better off as a Taoist or Buddhist nun. 54

We may assume that the author trusted that such a passage would be read not as a criticism of the loose morals in the inner apartments of the Forbidden City but as a jibe at former Ming officials overeager to serve the Manchus. The Manchu conquest brought not only the Manchus into China but many other foreigners from Central Asia. In the first act of the second juan, a prominent role is played by a Buddhist lama from “Western India,” who enters on scene filled with compassion for all humankind. When he meets with Gu Shi, who recently has arrived in Beijing, he predicts the final reunion of the formal main protagonist with his two loved ones. Later, the celebration of special rituals by this monk at the Huanggusi during the Lantern Festival is the occasion for Gu Shi and Song Juanjuan’s first meeting. Then this foreign monk ————— lection of women for inclusion in the harem. In this examination women are tested on literary composition, beauty, and performance skills. Song Juan[ juan] makes a cameo appearance in this novel as she takes part in the examination and finishes as “Head of the List” (zhuangyuan 狀元) because of her essay on “Yang Guifei at Mawei slope” (pp. 426–28). 54. Ding Yaokang quanji, pp. 794–95.

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drops from the story—he does not, as one might expect, reappear spectacularly in the final act. A comparable foreign monk, this time said to originate from “the Western Oceans,” is also featured in Act 7 of Ding Yaokang’s Huaren you. In view of the later sensitivity of both Manchus and Westerners regarding the kowtow (the Manchus insisting that foreign ambassadors should perform the kowtow, and some representatives of Western powers refusing to do so), 55 the scene of Chen Daodong refusing to kowtow to the Jürched ruler becomes highly interesting. Throughout this scene, Chen Daodong’s behavior is contrasted with that of his fellow envoy, who is only too eager to kowtow. Later in the play, the lecherous but henpecked Jürched general Lou Shi is made to kowtow to his wife in an inversion of natural hierarchy. It is clear from these scenes that kowtowing was never seen as a mere formality, even though it might have been presented to Westerners in that way in order to obtain their compliance.

4 As Chen Daodong and his fellow envoy travel by sea from Hangzhou to Tianjin in Act 10 of Xihu shan, his fellow envoy gives expression to his fears: “Master Chen, Just look! Vague and distant in the southeast, you can make out Japan and Liuqiu. But once we enter into the great ocean, there is no correct way, and we can only drift with the wind. In the sea you also have big monster fishes that can gobble up boats. If we would end up in the belly of such a fish, that would be yet another play like Ramblings with Magicians!” 56

And indeed, soon they are overtaken by a storm as dragon gods and yakshas circle the stage. Chen Daodong remains seated, even if shaken, as his spineless fellow envoy rolls about. But soon the skies clear, and they arrive safely at their destination. ————— 55. For the reflection of these protocol clashes and misunderstandings in early Qing fiction, see W. L. Idema, “Cannon, Clocks, and Clever Monkeys: Europeana, Europeans, and Europe in Some Early Ch’ing Novels,” in Development and Decline of Fukien Province in the 17th and 18th Centuries, ed. E. B. Vermeer (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1990), pp. 473–76. 56. Ding Yaokang quanji, p. 761.

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Ding Yaokang’s own ocean voyages apparently made a great impression on him and inspired him to write his most original work in drama. Huaren you was written almost immediately after the establishment of the Qing since it has prefaces dated 1647 by Gong Dingzi and 1648 by Ding Yaokang’s fellow-provincial Song Wan 宋琬 (1614– 73). Song Wan took pains to stress the nature of the following work as a fable: Ramblings with Magicians is not just a play. It is a fable by a certain friend of mine for ferrying the people of his generation [to enlightenment] that he has written in the form of a play. The things in this world that one cannot describe in words, one entrusts to chant and song. Those that one cannot even describe in song and chant, one entrusts to plays. Now [my friend] is of the opinion that all the plays of the present are only about the romantic affairs of gents and ladies and that their sad songs and clichéd postures are incapable of giving vent to his own hidden thoughts and fantastic imaginations, and so he entrusted these to his unbridled and fantastic ramblings through miracles, but in fact these are not unbridled and fantastic ramblings through miracles. Those who understand will take this play as the writings of the Lacquer Garden (Zhuangzi), as Encountering Sorrows, as the records of conversation of the Chan sect and the Taoist Canon, and as the Autobiography of the Grand Historian—they are the people who can join the Ramblings with Magicians. 57

Although this preface seems to suggest that the text should be read first as the literary self-expression of a misunderstood and frustrated soul, 58 it appears that Ding Yaokang also had performance very much in mind. The play proper is preceded by a long list of dramatis personae, for each of which Ding specified not only his or her historical period and claim to fame but also role type and required costume. In formal terms, Huaren you is a ten-act zaju. The play consists of ten, mostly lengthy, acts, in which prose is at least as important as the arias, since it takes up about two thirds of the page. (In the printed version of the play, each act is followed by brief critical comments by a number of readers.) The play tells the story of a certain student by the name of He Gao 何皋, who is usually designated as He sheng 何生 (Anyone) and should be considered an alter ego of Ding Yaokang. The play opens ————— 57. Song Wan 宋琬, “Zongping” 總評, in Ding Yaokang quanji, p. 761. 58. The full title of the play, Huaren you ciqu 化人游詞曲, also seems to stress its nature as song and therefore self-expression rather than as drama.

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with the entrance of Cheng Lian 成連, the zither-immortal of the Eastern Sea, and the Wuling fisherman of Peach Blossom Grotto fame. After having decried that many people are still too deeply entangled in hindrances to achieve enlightenment and that the kalpa-disasters have not yet come to an end, Cheng Lian introduces the action of the play: “Now standing on this mountain I see far in the distance a flash of blue ether. This means that the extraordinary person Anyone will come here to rent a boat in order to seek for immortals at sea. So I will have to call out that fisherman of Wuling, the Master of Dark Truth, to disguise himself as a boatman renting out his boat in order to welcome him. We will have him experience all the beauties of past and present and enjoy all the pleasures of music and sex, so that afterward he may lay his mad nature to rest and return to immortal truth.” 59 And indeed, Anyone enters, looking for a boat that will take him beyond the world. After he has rented his boat, he is joined by the famous historical magicians Wang Yang 王陽 and Zuo Ci 左慈, who promise a bevy of beauties and a group of lofty poets. In the next act, the most famous beauties of Chinese history and a number of eminent poets of the past gather for the trip. The poets include Li Bai 李白, Du Fu 杜甫, Cao Zhi 曹植, and Liu Zhen 劉楨, and the group includes such other luminaries as the wit Dongfang Shuo 東方朔, the master cook Yi Ya 易牙, and the tea connoisseur Lu Yu 陸羽. Later the famous swordsman Kunlunnu 昆侖奴 joins them. The ladies range from famous and infamous imperial concubines such as Xi Shi 西施, Zhao Feiyan 趙飛燕, and Zhang Lihua 張麗華 to famous courtesans such as Lu Mochou 廬莫愁, Xue Tao 薛濤, and Taoye 桃葉. In Act 3, when all the guests have arrived, the boat takes to sea. The captain is told to drift with the wind, as the passengers entertain themselves by writing linked verses and playing hide-and-seek. At the beginning of Act 4, the ao, a turtle-like mythic sea monster of huge proportions, orders the whale ( jing/qing 鯨) 60 to gobble up Anyone with the boat and all. A storm has arisen, and the main boat with all its passengers anchors below the mountains of the Weak Waters. Anyone discovers a small boat lying nearby and leaves the big boat to go fishing by himself. As he drifts away from the big boat, he is ————— 59. Ding Yaokang quanji, p. 709. 60. While jing is the common modern pronunciation of the character 鯨, the earlier pronunciation was qing (second tone).

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swallowed by the whale and finds himself inside its stomach. His boat has become much smaller, and he carries it around on his back. In Act 5, the Great King Fishbone (Yugu dawang 魚骨大王), the supreme ruler of the worlds in the belly of the fish, orders the swordsman Fish Intestine (Yuchang jianshi 魚腸劍士) to kill Anyone. However, when Fish Intestine tries to do so, he finds that his sword is useless against Anyone, who truly has reached Enlightenment. The swordsman thereupon takes Anyone to see the only other human inhabitant of the belly of the fish, Qu Yuan 屈原, who recites lines from his poem Lament for Ying. The swordsman next brings a giant orange, offered as tribute by the Southern Seas. When it is split open, they see two old men engaged in a game of go. As Anyone goes on, he finds that everything that had been there before has disappeared. All he sees in the distance is a pile of fish bones that have been made into a great temple. (The commentary to this act notes that the whale gobbled up not only Anyone but also all his fellow travelers: “How detestable that old whale! He has swallowed a whole boat full of people, taking them down to the deep sea!” 61 ) The next act then takes place in a barren landscape. Anyone enters, carrying his boat. He leaves the small boat behind, looking for the big boat, but to no avail. Anyone will not reach the Fishbone Temple until Act 7. Fishbone Temple is said by its keeper, a Buddhist monk from the Western Ocean, to have been built in Chaozhou out of the bones of a beached whale and to feature a statue of the Fish-basket Mahasattva (Guanyin), who provides enlightenment by holding out the promise of carnal pleasure (or actually providing it). 62 Anyone arrives in Chaozhou on the fifteenth of the Seventh Month, the day of the Ghost Festival. When Anyone asks the foreign monk for directions, the latter disappears, leaving a gatha directing him to Iron Boat Peak. Anyone now meets a Taoist nun, a transformation of Xi Shi, who describes the iron boat to him as half buried in a mountainside: it will sail off as soon as someone reaches it. Together they start out for the iron boat (later we learn that the big boat may be identified with this bottomless iron boat). In his commentary to this act, Song Wan remarked: “As the whale has been transformed into an ancient monastery, the lonely ————— 61. Ding Yaokang quanji, p. 726. 62. Chün-fang Yü, Kuan-yin, The Chinese Transformation of Avalokitesvara (New York: Columbia University Press, 2001), pp. 419–38.

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boat into a misty peak, and Xi Shi into a wandering Taoist nun, Anyone’s foolish karma of music and sex suddenly has been completely finished off.” 63 As Anyone now realizes the relativity and emptiness of both boat and fish, he is invited in the short Act 8 by Zuo Ci and Kunlunnu to board the big boat once again in preparation for the two final acts of pageantry that conclude the play. In Act 9 the whale describes at great length to a shrimp the bodily problems he encountered when he found out that he was unable to digest Anyone. The whale and the shrimp are next ordered by the dragon king to make preparations for the reception of Anyone and his party. When Anyone arrives, the dragon king shows him all the wonders of the sea. The whale uses this opportunity to ask Li Bai for instruction in writing poetry. Next, in Act 10, the big boat takes the whole party to Penglai. All the poets and beauties leave on the boats they originally arrived on, and Anyone remains on Penglai. Huaren you is a brilliant fantasy that, in developing the simile of a ferry for enlightenment, draws widely on Chinese lore concerning oceans and boats, dragons and whales. 64 Each of these elements merits a more detailed study than is possible within the confines of this chapter. Ding Yaokang may well have derived the idea for his play from the folktale Eight Immortals Crossing the Sea, but in that story the Eight Immortals are already enlightened, a status that does not stop them from getting into a fight with the dragons of the Eastern Ocean. 65 Huaren you’s closest counterpart as fantasy in mid-seventeenth-century Chinese vernacular literature is Dong Yue’s 董說 (1620–86) Xiyou bu 西遊補. 66 In this novel, Monkey finds out at the end that all through ————— 63. Ding Yaokang quanji, p. 730. 64. For a study of the lore of the Vessel of the Dharma in popular Buddhism during the Ming and Qing, see Yu Songqing 喻松青, “Fachuan jing yanjiu” 法船經 研究, in idem, Minjian bimi zong jiao jing juan yanjiu 民間秘密宗教經卷研究 (Taipei: Lianjing, 1994), pp. 323–43. 65. The original edition of Xu Jinpingmei contains in its description of the turncoat Liu Yu in Chapter 34 the following poem: Crossing the sea in a leaking boat, all of a different mind: That’s how the Song lost the Central Plain to the Jin. Whenever since ancient times too many enemies share a single boat, Persons belonging to the same family will kill one another. This poem is not found in later editions of the novel. 66. It has also been argued that Xiyoubu was written not by Dong Yue but by his father Dong Sizhang 董斯張 (1587–1628) and that Dong Yue added only the con-

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the weird adventures of the sixteen chapters of the novel, he had been in the belly of a mackerel (qing 鯖), a fish whose name is homophonous with “passion” (qing 情). 67 The Chinese word for “whale” (qing/jing) and the word for “passion” are homophonous too, and when the whale is designated a “whale-fish” (qingyu 鯨魚), the name is homophonous with the expression “passion and desires” (qingyu 情欲). If we may identify the word for fish ( yu) with desire ( yu) in the allegorical scheme of Huaren you, then the Fish Intestine Swordsman (Yuchang 魚腸) stands for “eternal desire” ( yuchang 欲長), and the Fishbone Temple (Yugu damiao 魚骨大廟) stands for the marvelous power of withered desire ( yugu damiao 欲枯大妙). Being overcome by emotion, being swallowed by passion, then, as a deeply personal annihilation, is an extremely harrowing experience. At the same time, it frees one to achieve the highest insight and the enjoyment of transcendent wonders, taking one from the pleasures of this world with its women and song to a solitary world of mystical joy. In the Analects, Ding Yaokang’s fellow provincial Confucius considers the option of taking to the sea on a raft to escape the chaos of his times. In Chisong you, Xu Fu decides to look for a safe haven beyond the seas in order to avoid the cruelties of Qin and the ensuing warfare. Such parallels suggest that Anyone’s journey may have had a political dimension. “The author has not described the great national events of the change of dynasty, but in fact has truthfully recorded the emotional turmoil stirred in his own mind by these huge historical changes.” 68 One reason to read Huaren you not only as a description of a personal experience but also as a reaction to the social experience of the Manchu conquest is the nature of the whale as a symbol. As a leviathan big enough to gobble up ships, 69 the whale has been used in Chinese lit————— cluding sixteenth chapter; see David L. Rolston, Traditional Chinese Fiction and Fiction Commentary: Reading and Writing Between the Lines (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1997), p. 276. 67. In Xiyou ji Monkey occasionally ends up in the belly of his opponents, but he never meets any intellectuals there. 68. Shi Ling, “Ding Yaokang,” p. 492. 69. The capacity of the whale to swallow whole ships is, among other places, referred to in Chapter 11 of Chen Chen’s 陳忱 Shuihu houzhuan 水滸後傳 (1664). In this chapter, the remnant heroes of Liangshanpo kill a whale that threatens their safe passage from China to Siam. Zhao Yushi 趙與時 (1175–1231) in Bintui lu 賓退錄 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1983, p. 97), while summarizing Hong Mai’s

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erature primarily as a symbol of powerful states occupying their neighbors’ territory. In one of the first poems in the collected works of Bai Juyi 白居易, “Ti haitu pingfeng” 題海圖屏風 (Inscription for a screen with a painting of the sea), the implied reader (the emperor) is warned against the danger of internal wars, since it may provide the whale with the opportunity to swallow (a) ship(s); that is, provide foreign powers the opportunity to encroach on Chinese territory. 70 And in a well-known classical simile, the ruler is compared to a boat, and the people to the water that keeps it afloat. The Chinese word for “whale” is homophonous not only with the word for “passion” but also with the name of the Manchu Qing dynasty. The whale swallows both Anyone and the whole Chinese nation. So it should come as no surprise, then, that the only human Anyone encounters in the belly of the whale is the great patriotic poet Qu Yuan, forever lamenting Qin’s destruction of the capital of his country. Qu Yuan, who, overcome by grief, committed suicide by jumping into a river, 71 appears to be forever fixed in his sorrows, locked in his emotions, and so is buried in the belly of passion incarnate, the whale. In the following decades, Qu Yuan would often be featured as the protagonist in plays by loyalist literati, who used his persona to vent their own passions and emotions. 72 However, for Ding Yaokang Qu Yuan does not represent the final word on reacting to the collapse of one’s country; the commentary by Qiu Chaicun 丘柴村 appended to this act even exclaims: “What kind of being is this pedant Qu that he desires to be buried in this belly forever?” 73 At the end of Act 7, Ding’s alter ego Anyone concludes: “Now today I don’t see the big boat anymore and I have discarded the small boat. Even the sea has disappeared from sight. I cannot return empty-handed to the old country; so I can only forge ————— 洪邁 prefaces to the various installments of his Yijianzhi 夷堅志, records the tale of whale swallowing a ship and all its passengers. 70. Gu Xuejie 顧學頡, coll., Bai Juyi ji 白居易集 (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1979), p. 5. 71. To drown is often described as to be buried in the belly of (a) fish(es). However, earlier stories do not associate Qu Yuan with the whale. When Li Bai drowned himself, he was, according to later legend, carried off on the back of a whale. 72. For a brief discussion of Qu Yuan in early Qing drama, see Laurence A. Schneider, A Madman of Chu: The Chinese Myth of Loyalty and Dissent (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1980), pp. 79–84. 73. Ding Yaokang quanji, p. 726.

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on ahead and find my way.” 74 The “old country” (guguo 故國) is intended, I suppose, to refer to both Anyone’s home district and the defunct dynasty. If we are allowed, as I believe we are, to read Anyone’s fateful encounter not only as personal experience but also as a reflection of the Manchu conquest, then his prior ramblings with poets and beauties may be read both as a description of his personal involvement in these pastimes and as a criticism of the Jiangnan literati’s indulgence in high living. After all, Anyone claims to hail from Wushan. Although much more modest in scale, the games played by the poets and beauties at the beginning of the trip point to the elaborate descriptions of games and pastimes in Li Ruzhen’s 李汝珍 Jinghua yuan 鏡花緣, which have been read by C. T. Hsia as a celebration of traditional literati culture. 75 But in Huaren you these games and pastimes are presented as an indulgence of passion that leads to the whale. As the commentary of Zhang Cichen 張詞臣 points out: “After such riotous ramblings, hereupon has to follow the kalpic disaster of the swallowing of the boat.” 76 One is tempted to draw a comparison between Ding Yaokang’s memories of pre-conquest life and Zhang Dai’s 張岱 (1597–1679) memoirs of the irrevocably gone conspicuous consumption of Jiangnan literati, a life of plays and poetry. But whereas Zhang Dai was nostalgic, Ding Yaokang seems more critical. The poets and beauties are dismissed at the end of the play, and it is now the whale who wants to practice poetry: (Male [dragon] addresses young male [Li Bai]) Master Li, You are famous for all eternity because of your talent, and now that we meet today, we must have a poem from you. Please leave a poem behind to subdue this watery realm.

————— 74. Ibid., p. 728. 75. C. T. Hsia, “The Scholar-Novelist and Chinese Culture: A Reappraisal of Ching-hua Yüan,” in Chinese Narrative, Critical and Theoretical Essays, ed. Andrew Plaks (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1977), pp. 266–305. 76. Ding Yaokang quanji, p. 720. The inaction of the court of the Yongli emperor in Yunnan in its final years was described in contemporary sources as “singing drunkenly in a leaking boat” (Struve, The Southern Ming, 1644–1662, p. 169, quoting Qiuye lu 求野錄, a short chronicle of the Yongli court’s demise sometimes attributed to Deng Kai 鄧凱, a commander of the guard that protected the imperial household). In the early years of the twentieth century, Liu E 劉鶚, in the first chapter of Lao Can youji 老殘遊記, also used the image of a ship in danger as a metaphor for China.

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clown (whale): Ever since I this old whale left my old bones behind and changed the embryo, I have gulped down a few of those sour pedants and learned a few verses and oily tunes. I would make so bold as to ask your instruction. Please do not laugh at me. young male: As you wish. clown (acts out reciting poetry): A hundred feet the pool is deep, ten thousand feet the dragon! young male: How can such a hundred-feet-deep pool hold a ten-thousandfoot-long dragon? This doesn’t make sense. clown: How is there any place in the world nowadays that is wide enough to hold you? And Master Li, you have said in one of your poems: “White hairs grow thirty thousand feet” but where do I find those now? Moreover, this dragon has transformational powers, so if there are ninety-nine thousand nine hundred feet of dragon still up in the air, this would still be quite possible. young male: Please recite the next line! clown (acts out reciting): With thunder and with lightning he descends from Heaven’s Palace. clown: This is the style of Blue Sea Dragon–grabbing Li Panlong 李攀龍; so it is all about impression. So let me now finish the poem in the style of the Jingling school. (Acts out reciting) But as the dark-blue sea has turned into the brownest dust, / I’ll turn myself into a loach and find my joy in mud. young male: Why are you suddenly belittling yourself so, with the result that head and tail don’t match? clown: Master, you may not know, but nowadays in the world everything is great at the beginning but small in the end. This is surviving by adapting oneself to the circumstances, submerging oneself in water and mud. Please give me your comments! young male: What should be the topic for my poem? male: Please use the full moon as your topic. young male (acts out reciting): The full moon—for how long has it existed? / I raise my wine and ask the sky this question. / I don’t know in which year the moon tonight / May be there, high up in the sky? / I rise and dance and with my shadow play:/ Quite different from the world of mortal man. male: A fine poem, too bad it has been copied by Su Dongpo 蘇東坡. 77

What is Ding Yaokang doing here? Is he just making fun of contemporary schools of poetry and has his whale by this time been reduced to a shrimp as an entertaining fixture of the traditional stage? Or is he making fun of Manchu attempts to acquire a smattering of Chinese ————— 77. Ding Yaokang quanji, pp. 733–34.

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culture? Does he find his work as a banner instructor futile and is he despairing of the effectiveness of his teaching? If the latter is the case, he would come to voice a much higher opinion of his function by the time he finished Xihu shan. An even bleaker vision of the immediate post-conquest world may well be implied in the opening of Act 7. Following his entry song, the monk from the Western Oceans recites two lines of verse: When the moon rises above the forest of Meditation, mountains and rivers are white, After the floodtide of the ocean recedes, heaven and earth are dark. 78

The first line, with its evocation of the brightness of the moon and an empire clad in white, may well suggest the notion of mourning for the Ming dynasty. The second line might then imply that after the destruction of the flood, the whole world now belongs to the Qing (the word I have translated as “dark” in Chinese is qing 青, which has the same pronunciation as the name of the dynasty). In his selfintroduction, the monk calls the building made of fish bones a monastery, but earlier it had been called a great temple (damiao), an expression often used metonymically to refer to a dynasty. 79 The building is made out of the bones of a beached whale, but the word for “fishbone” ( yugu) is homophonous with the expression “remnant bones” or “ample bones” ( yugu 餘骨). And if we suppose that the occupant of the building is said to be from the Western Oceans in order to stress his foreign nature and his repulsive appearance, the vision of the newly established Qing dynasty becomes one of a depopulated wasteland, in which the imperial palace is built out of the dried bones of the many victims of the devastating wars, the throne being occupied by a foreign devil in disguise. One may also wonder why the term “Western Oceans” is used here. Although there is some mix-up in terminology between “Western regions” (xiyu 西域) and “Western Oceans” (xiyang 西洋), in general the latter term was used in the seventeenth century to refer to Europeans and not to persons who reached China from Central Asia. Since Western cannon were widely blamed for the greater destructiveness of ————— 78. Ibid., p. 728. 79. The chao in Chaozhou 潮州 is homophonous with the word for “court” (chao 朝).

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warfare in the second half of the seventeenth century in China, perhaps the term is used to imply destructiveness and cruelty. 80 Anyway, in the play the foreign monk does little to help Anyone and leaves him in care of Xi Shi, a woman who ruined if not two kings, at least one. If Xi Shi stands for the former Ming officials now serving the Manchus, one may well wonder whether they would be pleased with such a characterization. However, if they did not recognize themselves in this figure, we may well be indulging in overinterpretation. 81 ————— 80. Idema, “Cannon, Clocks and Clever Monkeys,” pp. 459–88. The presence in both Xihu shan and Huaren you of a “Western” monk is quite remarkable. One may, of course, interpret his presence as a sign of Ding Yaokang’s fascination with Jinpingmei, in which the aphrodisiacs of a foreign monk bring about the demise of Ximen Qing. One is also tempted to link their prominent presence in these plays with the presence in Beijing of Jesuit missionaries, but these missionaries presented themselves systematically as “Western scholars.” The foreign monk, spreading his foreign creed, has his counterpart in the figure of the teacher Chen Daodong, who brings Confucianism to the barbarians. The only explicit reference to a Jesuit missionary in Qing drama known to me is found in the late seventeenth-century play Hukou yusheng 虎口餘生病 (Surviving the tiger’s maw) ascribed to Cao Yin 曹因 (1658–1712). In this play, which deals with the collapse of the Ming defense against the onslaught of Li Zicheng’s rebel army, Adam Schall von Bell (Tang Ruowang 湯若望) has a tiny role as a soothsayer at the court of the Chongzhen emperor during its final days. He is ordered to accompany Li Jiantai 李建泰 at his request on his campaign against the rebels approaching Beijing in Act 20; in Act 21 “the Western scholar who exorcises disasters Tang Ruowang” reports for duty and correctly reads a flagpole snapped in two by a gust of wind as an unlucky omen, but that is all we hear from him; his advice is not heeded, and the campaign ends in disaster. See W. L. Idema, “In the Shadow of Peach Blossom Fan: Peking in 1644 on Stage in East and West,” unpublished paper (a Chinese version was published as Yi Weide 伊維德, “Zai Taohua shan yinying zhong—1644 de Beijing zai dongxiyang wutai shang” 在桃花扇陰影中—1664 的北京在東西洋舞 台上, trans. by Jiang Zhai, in Xiju yishu, no. 39 [1987]: 32–44). 81. The memory of Huaren you has resulted in the following folktale collected in Zhucheng: When Ding Yaokang was fleeing for his life, the gate of the city was guarded by a soldier of the Qing, who did not allow him to pass. Ding Yaokang said to him: “Let me tell you a story, and let me get out of the city when you have heard it.” After the soldier guarding the gate had agreed to the deal, Ding Yaokang started to tell his story: “Once upon a time there was a bunch of people, who were traveling on a big boat, and on that boat they had erected a stage for the performance of a play. Now in the sea there was a big fish that gulped that boat down to his belly with a single gulp. The people on the boat noticed that it suddenly had turned dark, so they assumed that the sun had set, and lit candles

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In an interesting article published in 1989 on Ding Yaokang’s plays, Qin Huasheng 秦華生 sees them characterized by the “violent exteriorization of subjective consciousness.” 82 In this respect, Ding Yaokang is a precursor of a trend that includes later writers such as Wu Weiye 吳偉業 (1609–72), You Tong尤侗 (1618–1704), and Liao Yan 廖燕 (1644–1705). Qin Huasheng has no qualms identifying the protagonists in each of Ding Yaokang’s plays with the author and sees them giving voice to the author’s rage at the world. In his abhorrence of imitation, still according to Qin Huasheng, the author embraced the fantastic and was willing in his social criticism even to ridicule the emperor himself. Qin looks for an explanation of this attitude in Ding Yaokang’s historical background. Ding’s extensive experience of the horrors of war and the influence of the Ming enlightenment contributed to his sharp eye for the abuse of power by officials and filled him with sympathy for ————— and continued their performance of the play, without realizing that they had entered the belly of a fish. When the fish had eaten his fill, he went to the beach to sun himself. Now a big bird came flying by, and in its turn swallowed the fish. When this big bird had eaten its fill, it alighted on a black mountain to rest. But this black mountain was a woman’s chignon. The woman grabbed the bird, put it in a shoe and gave it to her child to play with. Suddenly they heard the noise of an opera performance from inside the belly of the bird. Thereupon the woman cut open the belly of the bird, where she found a fish. When she next cut open the belly of the fish, she discovered there a big boat. The woman said to the people on the boat: ‘You guys are still performing your play, but your boat has been eaten by a fish, and that fish again has been eaten by a bird, and you want me to believe that you don’t know?’ All the people on the boat were flabbergasted, shook their heads and said: ‘No wonder there was such a stench and we didn’t see the light!’ ” When the soldier guarding the gate had heard this story, he allowed him to leave the city. Sun Yuming (“Ding Yaokang qiren qishi,” pp. 313–14), who recorded this story, points out that “the stench” refers to the barbarian Manchus, and “the light” (daming 大明) to the Ming dynasty. 82. Qin Huasheng, “Ding Yaokang juzuo julun chutan,” p. 66. Yenna Wu (Ameliorative Satire and the Seventeenth-Century Chinese Novel, p. 59) comments on Ding Yaokang’s Xu Jinpingmei: “While playing the role of a preacher, Ding is even more interested in self-dramatization than Xi Zhou Sheng. By referring to himself in the novel and particularly to his previous incarnations, Ding shows that he is a living example of the ongoing cosmic process of reincarnation, thereby lending further authority to the Taoist and Buddhist messages he is promulgating.”

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the suffering masses. Qin Huasheng discerns in Ding Yaokang’s plays a nostalgia for the Ming and an ambivalence toward the Qing: although grateful for the recognition he received in the tangible form of official appointment, he was also filled with rage at the national humiliation. Ding Yaokang, Qin Huasheng argues, sought to escape these strong tensions in his search for Taoist bliss, even while he argued the unity of all three teachings (most strongly in Chisong you) or the emptiness of all Three Teachings (in Xu Jinpingmei). In a more recent study of Ding Yaokang’s plays, Shi Ling 石玲 discerns a development in Ding Yaokang’s political attitude as the Qing dynasty became more and more established. Whereas his Huaren you gave expression to his bewilderment, his subsequent plays moved from Ming loyalism (Chisong you) to an acceptance of the new dynasty (Xihu shan) and even to its praise. This scholar also notes the strong religious elements in Ding Yaokang’s works as shown in his concern with immortality and retribution. 83 Both Shi Ling and, in a jointly authored article, Chen Meilin 陳美林 and Wu Xiuhua 吳秀華 deplore the fact that Ding Yaokang, despite his insistence in his aphoristic theoretical pronouncements on the stageability of plays, paid little attention to the stagecraft of his own works, condemning them to existence as closet dramas. In view of the lack of any information on the performance history of these plays, this conclusion may well be premature. 84 The fact that Ding Yaokang wrote a total of thirteen plays and was invited to try his hand at a new version of Ming feng ji for performance at the imperial palace may well imply that his plays enjoyed a certain measure of success on stage in his own time; a careful reading of the plays also shows that Ding left detailed prescriptions for the enactment of his works. Chen Meilin and Wu Xiuhua appear to contradict their own conclusion by first praising Ding Yaokang for the poetic quality of his arias, the fine construction of his plays, their successful characterization, and their rich imagination. They see his work informed by the tangled feelings of a Ming loyalist, who, despite his vivid descriptions of Manchu violence, is torn between a desire to serve the new rulers and a ————— 83. Shi Ling, “Ding Yaokang juzuo lun,” pp. 246–49. 84. Ibid.; Chen Meilin 陳美林 and Wu Xiuhua 吳秀華, “Lun Ding Yaokang de xiju chuangzuo” 論丁耀亢的戲劇創作, in Li Zengpo, ed., Ding Yaokang yanjiu, p. 194.

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desire to flee the world. In a recent paper reacting against such views, Chan Hing Ho has argued that Ding Yaokang’s works show little signs of “a national consciousness” or “loyalist sentiments.” He instead stresses Ding Yaokang’s strong religious feelings (Ding Yaokang considered himself a reincarnation of the famous legendary immortal Ding Lingwei 丁令威) and his obsession with retribution. 85 This chapter’s discussion of Ding Yaokang’s works appears to contradict Chan’s conclusion. Ding Yaokang’s outspoken religious bent did not negate his political concerns at all. Ding Yaokang lived through the collapse of the Ming dynasty and the Manchu conquest of China. Perhaps sooner than many Jiangnan literati, he came to accept the Qing dynasty as the new dispensation. Lynn Struve has noted that few of the officials who went over to the Manchu side left memoirs. Strictly speaking, Ding Yaokang never served the Ming but clearly felt bound to it as a student and the son of a high Ming official. This created a dilemma: How could a loyal servant of the Ming serve the Qing in re-establishing a moral world? The problem was compounded by the fact that Manchus were foreigners from beyond the pale of Confucian civilization. In his memoir, his plays, and in his novel, this problem recurs again and again. In Huaren you the image of Qu Yuan trapped in the belly of the whale derides the uselessness of self-indulgent immersion in grief. Whereas Chisong you illustrates the contradictory message that service under the Qing should be informed by loyalty to the Ming, Xihu shan creates in the character of Chen Daodong the exemplar of a Confucian teacher who successfully spreads the Confucian message among the barbarians—it is Chen Daodong’s integrity as shown in his loyalty to the Song that makes him an effective teacher among the Jürched and Mongols. For Ding Yaokang, just as for the Jiangnan literati, the seventeenth century was not a continuum. The collapse of the world as they knew it and its transformation into the realm of barbarians traumatically fissured their experiences. In the case of Ding Yaokang, this trauma and the resulting dilemma made him explore new genres and styles and speak out with a new and strident urgency, as he moved from bewilderment at the collapse of the Ming and an initial acceptance of the Qing as avengers of the Ming to a more dis————— 85. Chan Hing Ho, “Hainei fenshu jin shi Ding.”

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tanced and critical attitude toward the new masters as foreign (and brutal) conquerors. 86 As a dramatist and novelist of the immediate post-conquest decades, Ding Yaokang perhaps may be most fruitfully compared to Chen Chen 陳忱 (1614?–1666+) and Li Yu. Like Chen Chen, he used the format of a sequel to a major novel to inquire into the state of society under foreign occupation, but whereas Chen Chen held out the possibility of a utopian alternative beyond the borders of the empire, 87 Ding Yaokang, despite his island experiences, saw no alternative to the operation of the karmic process in China itself. This firm belief in the working of karma separates Ding Yaokang from Li Yu, who was committed to “the primacy of pleasure.” Both of them produced classical poetry and prose, drama and fiction. Both of them fully exploited the unprecedented freedom of expression created by the anomie of the chaotic immediate post-conquest decades. However, whereas Li Yu in his prose celebrated the pleasures of gardens and the theater, luxurious living and young concubines, Ding Yaokang recorded his harrowing experiences during and in the immediate aftermath of war. Whereas Li Yu as a writer of fiction has been characterized as a “paradoxical farceur” and “comical erotiker,” Ding Yaokang stressed the horrors of war and the degradation of poverty. 88 While Li Yu found there materials to display his outrageous wit, Ding Yaokang was outraged. Whereas Li Yu as a dramatist was a “virtuoso of fine stitching,” Ding Yaokang’s plays burst at the seams because of all the materials he felt obliged to include. If Li Yu was the perfect entertainer, Ding Yaokang in all his works remained a moralist who confronts his audience with the dilemmas that tortured him. Written to address strongly felt issues of his own time, Ding Yaokang’s plays may have been more popular in his own time than it is now easy to imagine (among his patrons at court were some of the most ————— 86. In this respect it may also be interesting to take into consideration Ding Yaokang’s Ranshe dan. Did his harsh criticism of abuses in the Ming bureaucracy offend his patrons because it was a description of contemporary abuses, or were they offended because Ding Yaokang suggested that the downfall of the Ming was due not to the evil machinations of a few villains but to widespread corruption throughout the bureaucracy? 87. Cf. Widmer, The Margins of Utopia. 88. These characterizations of Li Yu are offered by Patrick Hanan, in The Invention of Li Yu (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1988).

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important poets of the age), but as the urgency of the dilemmas receded more and more with every decade of Manchu rule, his works may have lost their appeal with the appearance of a new generation. That new generation would be served by Taohua shan and Changsheng dian. Without denigrating in any way Kong Shangren’s and Hong Sheng’s masterworks, one could perhaps claim that whereas loyalty and service were existential problems to Ding Yaokang and his generation, they had become aesthetic ones to this younger generation. Whereas Ding Yaokang summarized his dramaturgical insights in a few short paragraphs, both Hong Sheng and Kong Shangren thematized the theatrical nature of politics and drama in their own plays. That increased distance to the immediate issues of loyalty or service may well have contributed to the literary qualities of Taohua shan and Changsheng dian and, in consequence, their lasting popularity as works of dramatic literature. By the last quarter of the seventeenth century, the rage, the irreverence, and the outspokenness of Ding Yaokang were no longer feasible, as he himself experienced in his final years when he was jailed and almost executed for his novel and his book was burned. Writers would become increasingly circumspect in their publications, as the Manchus’ suspicion of slights and opposition continued to grow as they strengthened their grip on power and their command of Chinese culture, and as these writers themselves would come to see the Manchu presence as a fact of life.

Wu Weiye’s Dramatic Works and His Aesthetics of Dynastic Transition 7 Dietrich Tschanz In the early Qing, few playwrights other than Wu Weiye 吳偉業 (1609– 72) documented and explored in depth the theme and experience of dynastic transition. 1 This holds true even though in 1653, the year Wu published his last play, it was by no means clear that the Manchus would be able to establish permanent rule over all of China. 2 Wu, ————— An earlier version of this paper appeared in Chinese under the title “You shikong guannian lun Wu Weiye de Meicun yuefu sanzhong” 由時空觀念論吳偉業的梅村 樂府三種, Zhongguo wenzhe yanjiu tongxun 9, no. 4 (1999): 117–26. I thank the participants of the workshop as well as the two anonymous readers of this volume for their constructive criticisms. 1. The most prominent among these playwrights are You Tong 尤侗 (1618–1704) and Ding Yaokang 丁耀亢 (1599–1669). For a discussion of three of Ding Yaokang’s plays, see the chapter by Wilt Idema in this volume; for discussions of You Tong’s plays, see Xue Ruolin 薛若鄰, You Tong lungao 尤侗論稿 (Beijing: Zhongguo xiju chubanshe, 1989); and Judith T. Zeitlin, “Spirit Writing and Performance in the Work of You Tong 尤侗 (1618–1704),” T’oung Pao 84 (1998): 125–35. 2. For detailed histories of the Ming-Qing transition, see Lynn Struve, The Southern Ming, 1644–1662 (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1984); and Frederik Wakeman, Jr., The Great Enterprise: The Manchu Reconstruction of Imperial Order in Seventeenth-Century China (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1985). In addition to these two scholars, important work has been done by Jonathan Hay, who has explored this period from the vantage point of early Qing cultural history and the history of painting. See in particular his article “Ming Palace and Tomb in Early Qing Jiangning: Dynastic Memory and the Openness of History,” Late Imperial China 20, no. 1 (1999): 1–48, in which he shows how Qing authorities tried to legitimize their regime by using certain sites in early Qing Nanjing to effect a symbolic closure of the Ming dynasty. This process extended well into the 1680s.

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however, was clearly increasingly apprehensive that this might actually become the case. His three plays document his changing understanding of his time, chronicle his shift from defiance to resignation and finally to accommodation, and testify to the predicaments the Ming-Qing transition posed for literati like Wu. In this chapter, I read Wu’s three dramas as a closely related set 3 and argue that the plays not only reveal Wu’s changing understanding of his and the nation’s situation but also represent distinct stages in his construction of an aesthetics of dynastic transition. This aesthetics is most clearly manifested in the closing scenes of Wu’s plays, and for that reason I limit my discussion to the endings of these plays. This emphasis is also justified by the unconventionality of these conclusions in terms of the genre in which they were written. Partly because of this, the plays gain most of their significance from their endings. In addition, all three are about endings and the ways we make sense of them. As I will show, the three most important components of Wu’s aesthetics are place, time, and a mourner who connects a specific place and time. An additional element is the theme of enlightenment (variously, chaotuo 超脫, jietuo 解脫, jiewu 解悟). Although the protagonists find true enlightenment elusive, the places featured in all three plays transform them, mainly because their locations somewhere between the mundane and the divine allow the protagonists to dwell on the threshold between these two spheres.

Wu Weiye and the Ming-Qing Transition Wu Weiye’s plays cannot be understood properly without some knowledge of his life during the Ming-Qing transition. 4 Born in 1609 in Taicang 太倉, Jiangsu, Wu Weiye was thirty-five when the capital fell to the advancing army of the rebel leader Li Zicheng 李自成 (1605?–45) ————— 3. Wu Weiye’s plays appeared first as separate publications before they were printed together as a set of three plays during the Kangxi period. Throughout the late imperial period, the plays were known and read in this configuration, and it was only in the early twentieth century that Zheng Zhenduo 鄭振鐸 (1898–1958) recovered and published the original versions. 4. There are several good biographical treatments of Wu Weiye; among them are Wang Mian 王勉, Wu Weiye 吳偉業 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1987); Ye Junyuan 葉君遠, Wu Meicun nianpu 吳梅村年譜 (Nanjing: Jiangsu guji chubanshe, 1990); and idem, Wu Meicun pingzhuan 吳梅村評傳 (Beijing: Shoudu shifan daxue chubanshe, 1999).

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and the Chongzhen emperor 崇禎帝 (Zhu Youjian 朱由檢, 1611–44; r. 1628–44) hanged himself on Coal Hill on the nineteenth day of the third lunar month of 1644. When the news of the emperor’s death reached Taicang in early June, Wu Weiye became so distraught that he considered committing suicide but desisted when his mother implored him to remain alive for her sake. Some Ming subjects were expected to perish together with their ruler, but Wu Weiye did not belong to this group: he was not serving at the frontier, nor did he currently hold a government position. In addition, his parents were still alive. 5 Nonetheless, Wu Weiye evidently felt obligated to die. Because his family had produced a number of mid- to high-level officials throughout the Ming, Wu Weiye saw a close connection between the fortunes of his family and the Ming ruling house. Wu Weiye also felt a close personal connection with the Chongzhen emperor, who was about the same age as himself. Zhu Youjian succeeded to the throne in 1628 and sparked hope of a new beginning after the disastrous factional strife during the previous Tianqi reign 天啟 (1621–27) between members of the Donglin 東林 party and the clique around the eunuch Wei Zhongxian 魏忠賢 (1568– 1627). In 1629, encouraged by some of the first actions of the Chongzhen emperor, Zhang Pu 張溥 (1602–41) and other literati from the south established the Fushe 復社 (Revival society) to foster the revitalization of true learning and moral integrity in politics. Zhang Pu was Wu Weiye’s teacher and fellow Taicang resident. He involved Wu Weiye in many of his scholarly and political activities, and in time Wu Weiye came to be seen as one of the leaders of this group. The society received a major boost in 1630 and 1631, when many Fushe members placed high in the provincial and metropolitan examinations. Among the successful members were Zhang Pu himself and his disciple Wu Weiye, who ranked twelfth in the provincial examination, first in the metropolitan examination, and second in the palace examination of 1631. With this success Wu Weiye rose overnight from obscurity to public fame. ————— 5. The questions who could or should commit suicide after the death of the Chongzhen emperor and when and under what circumstances were hotly debated by many early Qing scholars. For a comprehensive discussion of this issue, see Ho Koon-piu, “Should We Die as Martyrs to the Ming Cause?” Oriens Extremus 37, no. 2 (1994): 123–51.

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Success, however, was not untarnished. Not long after the palace examination, Wu Weiye was accused of having obtained the jinshi degree by fraudulent means. The Chongzhen emperor then personally reviewed Wu’s examination papers and exonerated him. In addition, the emperor granted Wu a leave of absence to return home to marry his fiancée. Wu Weiye was deeply grateful to the emperor for these acts and cherished the memory of them even after the emperor proved to be less capable than Wu and other Fushe members had hoped and even turned against them. After Zhang Pu’s premature death in 1641, Wu Weiye retired from politics and spent most of his time in Taicang and the surrounding Suzhou area. In 1644–45, he served briefly at the Southern Ming court of the Prince of Fu 福王 (?–1646) in Nanjing but soon became pessimistic about the prospects of this court and found an excuse to return to Taicang. During the Manchu conquest of the Jiangnan area in 1645, Wu Weiye went into temporary hiding in the Lake Tai region. He returned to Taicang after the town had surrendered to the Manchus. Unlike many Fushe members, he did not join the resistance movement; nor did he seek an official post under the new regime as many others did. 6 While keeping a low profile during the first few years of the Shunzhi 順治 reign period (1644–61), he quickly became involved in the literary world of the post-conquest era. In 1653 he finally succumbed to pressure to serve at the Qing court in Beijing. When he looked back at the end of his life, he was filled with regret for accepting an official position under the new regime and with shame for betraying the loyalty he believed he owed the Chongzhen emperor and those of his friends who had died for the Ming cause. 7 In terms of literary output, the period between 1645 and 1653 was probably the most productive time in Wu Weiye’s life. Many of his most famous narrative poems, such as “Song of Yonghe Palace” (永和 宮詞; 1645), “Song of Pipa” (琵琶行; 1646), “Yuanyuan’s Song” (圓圓曲; ————— 6. In the first group are martyrs for the Ming cause such as Chen Zilong 陳子龍 (1608–47); the second group includes “turncoats” such as Qian Qianyi 錢謙益 (1582– 1664). 7. See his autobiographical text “Yu zi Jing shu” (與子暻疏) in Wu Meicun quanji 吳梅村全集, ed. Li Xueying 李學穎 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1990), 3: 1133. For a fully annotated translation of this important text, see Dietrich Tschanz, “Early Qing Drama and the Dramatic Works of Wu Weiye (1609–1672)” (Ph.D. diss., Princeton University, 2002), pp. 279–86.

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1651), and “Song of Lake Yuan” (鴛湖曲; 1652), were composed during this period. 8 Most of his longer ci 詞 lyrics (慢詞 or 長調) were also written after the fall of the Ming, and they, even more than his shi poetry of this period, are artfully crafted dramatizations of his response to the Manchu conquest. 9 Besides these two poetic genres, which Wu Weiye had practiced before 1644, he began to write in a new genre— music-drama. During this period, he composed three plays, two short ones in the “variety play” (雜劇) genre and a long one in the “southern-style” (傳奇) genre. Although he was never to write another play, he nevertheless remained interested in drama and wrote prefaces to the important early Qing anthology Zaju sanji 雜劇三集 (1661); 10 the authoritative collection of northern arias, Beici guangzheng pu 北詞廣 正譜 (1660); and to plays by such early Qing playwrights as Li Yu 李玉 (zi Xuanyu 玄玉, 1591–1671), You Tong 尤侗 (1618–1704), and Wang Long 王鑨 (1608–72). 11 Moreover, arias from his chuanqi drama, Moling chun 秣陵春, were included in the authoritative formulary of southern-style arias, Nanci xinpu 南詞新譜 (1655), an honor that attests to Wu Weiye’s mastery of the dramatic form. As he did with shi poetry and the ci lyric, Wu Weiye appropriated the dramatic form in a distinct way and imprinted his artistic vision on it. ————— 8. For a discussion of the first three poems, see the chapter by Wai-yee Li in this volume. “Song of Yuan Lake,” most likely written in 1652, recounts Wu Weiye’s visit to Wu Changshi’s 吳昌時 ( jinshi 1634, d. 1643) former lakeside villa and weaves descriptions of the ruined site with memories of past visits and reflections on the destructiveness of late Ming politics. All poems are dated according to Ye Junyuan, Wu Meicun nianpu. 9. For discussions of some of his ci lyrics, see David R. McCraw, Chinese Lyricists of the Seventeenth Century (Honolulu: University of Hawai‘i Press, 1990), pp. 25–40. On general changes in the ci lyric during the dynastic transition, see Kang-i Sun Chang, The Late-Ming Poet Ch’en Tzu-lung: Crises of Love and Loyalism (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1990). 10. In addition to the preface, Wu Weiye’s two variety plays were included in this collection, one under his hao 號, Wu Meicun 吳梅村, and one under a biehao 別號, Guanyin zhuren 灌隱主人, which he also used for his chuanqi. 11. Except for his preface to Wang Long’s play, the text of the other prefaces can be found in Wu Meicun quanji, 3: 1211–16; Wu Weiye’s preface to Wang Long’s chuanqi is quoted in part in Lu Eting 陸萼庭, Qingdai xiqujia congkao 清代戲曲家 叢考 (Shanghai: Xuelin chubanshe, 1995), p. 57. Lu (pp. 64–84) also discusses the influence of Wu Weiye’s plays on two of his students, Wang Bian 王抃 (1628–1707) and Huang Zuzhuan 黃祖顓 (1633–72).

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Linchun ge Linchun ge 臨春閣 (Facing Spring Pavilion) is a variety play in four acts. 12 The exact date of its composition is unknown, but internal and certain external evidence suggests that Wu wrote this play between 1645 and 1647. 13 The play is set against the transition from the Chen 陳 (557–89) to the Sui 隋 dynasty (581–618; destroyed Chen in 589). Its main protagonists are two women: Lady Xian 冼夫人, a tribal chieftain in Lingnan; and Zhang Lihua 張麗華, the favorite of the last Chen ruler, Chen Shubao 陳叔寶. 14 The play follows most of the conventions of the zaju genre, with two notable exceptions: first, in contrast to the Yuan variety play, in which only one role type ( juese 角色) has a singing part, in Wu Weiye’s play both Lady Xian, the main female lead (dan 旦), and Zhang Lihua, the secondary female lead (xiaodan 小旦), sing. Because arias are often used to express the inner life of characters, by having two singing roles Wu Weiye avoided the asymmetry in the depth of characterization between singing and nonsinging role types typically found in Yuan variety plays. Second, whereas many Yuan variety plays peak in the third act, Wu Weiye delays the climax of the play until the fourth and final act. The consequences of this rearrangement are discussed below. The play can be summarized as follows. In Act 1, at the order of the Chen emperor, Lady Xian summons a meeting of regional chiefs, foreign envoys, and pacification commissioners to ascertain their loyalty to the dynasty. Lady Xian is shown to be stern but just and comfortable in her role as female military commander despite constant challenges from her male colleagues. She inherited this position from her deceased husband and intends to relinquish it to her sons when they are old ————— 12. For the text of this play, see Wu Meicun quanji, 3: 1362–87. For an annotated version of the play, see Wang Yongkuan 王永寬, Yang Haizhong 楊海中, and Yao Shuyi 么書儀, eds., Qingdai zaju xuan 清代雜劇選 (Zhengzhou: Zhongzhou guji chubanshe, 1991), pp. 1–39. For a lengthy discussion of the play, see Wai-yee Li, “Heroic Transformations: Women and National Trauma in Early Qing Literature,” Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 59, no. 2 (1999): 378–93. 13. For a review of this evidence, see Tschanz, “Early Qing Drama,” pp. 19–23. 14. All three main characters are historical personalities with biographies in Beishi 北史 (Lady Xian), Nanshi 南史 (Zhang Lihua, Chen Shubao), Chen shu 陳書 (Chen Shubao), and Suishu 隋書 (Lady Xian). However, the relationship between Lady Xian and Zhang Lihua and the events of the play are entirely fictional.

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enough. In Act 2, the Chen emperor grants Lady Xian an audience in Nanjing and, for her outstanding services, confers the honorary title of Protector-General of Lingnan on her. Lady Xian befriends Zhang Lihua, and the two women feel an immediate and strong affinity. In Act 3, Zhang Lihua and Lady Xian visit the Clear Spring Monastery 清溪寺 in the vicinity of the capital and listen to a sermon by the monk Zhisheng 智勝. The audience learns that both Zhang and Xian were immortals in former lives and were deities honored in this monastery, but the two women are oblivious of this fact. The monk attempts both to enlighten them about their true identity and to make them realize that the fall of the Chen dynasty is imminent. Although Zhang and Xian fail to grasp the monk’s message fully, they nonetheless have a premonition of the future and part from each other with a strong sense of unease. This sets the stage for the fourth and final act of the play. In Act 4, Lady Xian and her troops rest at the foot of the Yuewang Terrace 越王台 (near present-day Guangzhou) on their way to reinforce the defense of Nanjing against enemy troops. Lady Xian worries about Zhang Lihua and ascends the terrace to ease her distress. While climbing the terrace, Xian laments the fall of Nanjing and deplores her separation from Zhang. During the night, Zhang Lihua visits Lady Xian in a dream. Zhang confides her difficult situation at the court and hints that she is blamed by male courtiers and officials for the fall of the dynasty. Awakened from her dream, Lady Xian seeks to ascertain the current state of the Chen capital and, after much denial, has to accept the fact that Zhang died during the occupation of Nanjing. After receiving a poem from Zhisheng in which he reveals her and Zhang’s true identity, she resigns and cedes her position to her son. In a powerful symbolic act, she takes off her armor ( jie jia 解甲) and vows “to enter the mountain and practice the Way” (rushan xiudao 入山修道). 15 But although she acknowledges personal defeat, in the moving final words of the play she challenges her male detractors to fulfill their promises to rescue the country. 16 ————— 15. Wu Meicun quanji, 3: 1386. 16. See ibid.: “(Lady Xian, mimics taking off her armor and sighs) ‘Alas! Once military commissioner of the Six Regions, I return home now to be an ordinary old woman, ah, what a pity! [Coda] During my twenty years as commander for the region beyond the Ling Mountains, / I still mended the military robes of my sons. / After all, for us womenfolk it is difficult to determine who is stronger or weaker; / let’s wish, then, that you, who know how to determine who is stronger

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Act 4 has several salient features. First, it consists of a song suite normally reserved for the third act in zaju drama. Although there is considerable flexibility in the arrangement of individual modes and suites, they tend in practice to be associated with certain acts. The Yue mode (yuediao 越調), for example, of which the last act of Linchun ge is an example, occurs predominantly in the third act, which is generally the point of greatest tension and therefore carries a lot of weight. Wu’s departure from established practice turned what normally was an anticlimactic moment into the culminating point of the play. This rearrangement has two major consequences: first, the dramatic buildup takes place over three acts instead of the usual two. This allowed Wu to develop the play at a slower pace and to include more details. Second, since Act 4 is the last act of the play, there is no additional act to diffuse the emotional impact of the final scene. Because of this, the emotional tension remains high even after the resolution of the play’s action, and the reader or audience does not experience the conventional release of the final act. A second feature of the last act of Linchun ge is its preoccupation with place and memory. The Yuewang Terrace, or Terrace of the King of Yue, plays an important role in this. An actual structure, the terrace dates to the second century bce. It was built by King Zhao Tuo 趙佗 (?–137 bce), originally a northerner who married a woman from the Lingnan region and became ruler of Nanyue 南越 (present-day Guangdong, Guangxi, and parts of northern Vietnam). During the early Han dynasty, King Zhao Tuo is said to have ascended the terrace on the first and fifteenth of every month to bow in the direction of the north to show his reverence for the Han emperor. 17 From early on, the terrace was identified with other kings of the south, some of them semidivine. 18 At the end of the Southern Song dynasty (1127–1279), Wen ————— or weaker, show us the derring-do of true men.’ (Exits.)” (旦解甲嘆介) 咳!我六州 節度使, 還去做個老嫗, 豈不可嘆! [尾] 俺二十年嶺外都 知統, 依舊把兒子征袍手 自縫.畢竟婦人家難決雌雄, 則願你決雌雄的放出個男兒勇. (下) 17. Xu Xu 徐續, Lingnan gujin lu 嶺南古今錄 (Hong Kong: Shanghai shuju, 1984), p. 6. See also Edward H. Schafer, The Vermilion Bird: T’ang Images of the South (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1967), pp. 15, 274n75. Schafer points out that, technically speaking, Zhao Tuo offered distant homage to the Han emperor on a different terrace rather than from the Terrace of the King of Yue (if he did at all), but these two terraces were often confused and their lore merged into one. 18. Schafer, The Vermilion Bird, p. 29.

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Tianxiang 文天祥 (1236–83) wrote a series of poems in which he referred to the terrace. Wen was kept captive in the Guangzhou area by the Yuan collaborator Zhang Hongfan 張弘範 (1238–80), and in 1279 was escorted from Guangzhou to the Yuan capital in the north. In a poem entitled “Grief over Myself” (“Zi tan” 自嘆), Wen wrote: 19 “The orphaned official laments the lost country, / The traveler sighs over his homelessness. / . . . / Gazing from the Yuewang Terrace, [I see] my home and country at the edge of the sky” 孤臣傷失國, 游子嘆無家 . . . 越王台上望, 家國在天涯. All three references situate the terrace as a special place at which the fate of individuals intersects with the rise and fall of kingdoms or empires. In addition, as the terrace figures in the stories of Zhao Tuo and Wen Tianxiang, it is a place that can be used to establish a connection between two places or people, even if this connection is merely imaginary. In the play, both characteristics of the terrace are operative. By ascending the terrace, Lady Xian is able to connect with her soul mate and communicate with her in a dream. This sequence beginning with Lady Xian’s ascension of the terrace and ending with Zhang’s departure is framed by two descriptions of the sacked capital city of Nanjing. The first, by Lady Xian, conveys her worries for the well-being of Zhang. The second, and more important, one is by Zhang Lihua. In her last aria before she leaves the stage, Zhang remarks that Lady Xian probably knows that all the places they visited together have been destroyed. Lady Xian nevertheless asks her to describe the places, and Zhang complies: 20 [Tu si er 禿廝兒] The Facing Spring Pavilion, painted beams desolate in evening rain, sighs. The flowers in the Rear Courtyard make for wilted lotus on the Chu River.

臨春閣嘆暮雨淒涼畫棟 後庭花做楚江蕭瑟芙蓉

————— 19. Wen Tianxiang quanji 文天祥全集, ed. Xiong Fei 熊飛 et al. (Nanchang: Jiangxi renmin chubanshe, 1987), p. 541. This poem appears in the first juan, second part, of Wen Tianxiang’s second poetry collection, Zhinan houlu (指南後路, 卷 一下). For a discussion of the poems of Wen’s journey to the north, see Yoshikawa Kojiro, Five Hundred Years of Chinese Poetry, 1150–1650, trans. John Timothy Wixted (Princeton: Princeton University, 1989), pp. 48–57; and Yuan-fang Tung, “Poems of Two Journeys to the North: A Comparative Study of Wen T’ien-hsiang and Wu Mei-ts’un” (Ph.D. diss., Harvard University, 1994). 20. Wu Meicun quanji, 3: 1384.

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歌殘玉樹聽曉鴻 少不得綺窗外又風融融

The Linchun ge and Rear Courtyard were located in the Chen palace. Zhang and Xian had spent time in both during Xian’s visit in Nanjing. These were also places known for the banquets of Chen Shubao and his courtiers. “Jade Trees and Rear Courtyard Flowers” 玉樹後庭花 was a song composed by Chen Shubao and came to stand for the decadence of the Chen court. 21 Interestingly enough, in Act 2, the banquet in the Rear Courtyard was not emphasized at all, and this place is not described. It is only here, after the destruction of the courtyard, that we get a description of the site, now in its deserted form. The banquet scene in Act 2 is nonetheless important for the creation of the elegiac mood in Act 4 because the contrast between the past splendor and the present destruction of the site gives rise to Lady Xian’s melancholy and makes it convincing. The meaning of the site (and hence of its destruction) is complicated by the fact that it is shrouded in ambiguity. Although the site was certainly a manifestation of the splendor of the southern court culture and was an expression of a particular aesthetic sensibility and refinement, it also epitomized the self-indulgence and moral and political weakness that characterized those short-lived courts. Below, I return to this aspect in my discussion of Moling chun and the connections between Nanjing, the southern courts, and Wu Weiye’s aesthetic of dynastic transition. On a psychological level, Lady Xian’s ascension of the terrace and her dream allow us to look into her soul and share her apprehension and worries. This portrait contrasts sharply with her earlier image as a stern but just commander (Act 1) and as the mostly silent companion of Zhang Lihua (Acts 2 and 3). In the earlier acts she is active; Act 4 depicts her in contemplation. The setting for this is carefully crafted. Lady Xian ascends the terrace during a bivouac on her mission to rescue the southern capital. This rest gives her the opportunity to reflect on the past and the present. The scene is set at night, and besides the soldiers on watch, everybody else is asleep and the bustle of the day has given ————— 21. Cf. the translation of this poem in J. D. Frodsham, An Anthology of Chinese Verse: Han Wei Chin and the Northern and Southern Dynasties (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1967), p. 198.

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way to silence. Since the night covers the camp with darkness, Lady Xian’s gaze turns inward and becomes self-reflective. She is not disturbed by anyone else; no servants or soldiers attend to her. The silence and her solitude intensify her experience of the moment and move her to a state of mind somewhere between waking and sleeping. It is in this liminal state that she is able to defy time and space and communicate across the divide between the living and the dead. Significantly enough, she attains this liminal state through her first two arias. Although the night setting and ascension of the terrace are important elements in her attaining this state, it is her expression of her worries and sorrows in song that transports her beyond everyday experience. In other words, it is the lyric that enables her to step outside herself. This is, I believe, an important point because I see Wu Weiye here making a strong argument for the transformative power of poetry. In a way, Wu shows us how we are to read the text in order to enter into a communion with it and with the experience of its author. 22 A third salient feature of the last act is its preoccupation with enlightenment. Although this theme is present in Act 3 in which Zhisheng attempts to enlighten the two women, it is only in Act 4 that it moves center stage. Unlike the other two plays by Wu Weiye, in which the protagonists actively seek enlightenment as a form of adjustment to the current situation, in Linchun ge enlightenment is forced on the two protagonists. Linchun ge is structured like a “deliverance play” (dutuoju 度脫劇). In a typical deliverance play, low-ranking divinities are reborn as mortals because of their worldly longings. As mortals, they are oblivious of their divine identity and initially fail to be enlightened about their true identity. Only a reversal of fortune brings insight and removes their initial blindness. 23 For Zhang, this reversal of fortune is death; for Lady Xian, the reversal is fate’s forceful message that she is not in charge of things. Enlightenment is an end point; it is, like closure, an attempt to come to truth, to settle things ————— 22. Wai-yee Li (“History and Memory in Wu Weiye’s Poetry,” draft for the Harvard conference in 2000, p. 34) makes a similar point in her discussion of Wu Weiye’s “Song of Pipa”: “The topos of performance allows Wu Weiye to present remembrance as cathartic ritual, spiritual communion, and aesthetic communication.” 23. See Wilt L. Idema, The Dramatic Oeuvre of Chu Yu-tun (1379–1439) (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1985), p. 63.

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once and for all. It is supposed to be a cathartic moment. But as in this play, and in the other two plays, it can also be the acknowledgment that there can be no such point and that history never comes to an end—as much as we might want it to do so.

Tongtian tai Wu Weiye’s second variety play, Tongtian tai 通天台 (The Terrace of Communication with Heaven), 24 consists only of two acts instead of the usual four. As such, it is a prime example of the diversification of the variety play form that began in the latter half of the sixteenth century and was in full swing in the seventeenth century. This formal diversification went hand in hand with the literarization of the genre and its almost complete divorce from the stage. Many plays written after the mid-Ming lack a compelling dramatic conflict and read more like extended poems. 25 The date of composition of Tongtian tai is unknown but two plausible dates have been suggested. One is 1649, 26 and the other one is between 1654 and 1656. 27 For the purposes of this ————— 24. For the text of this play, see Wu Meicun quanji, 3: 1388–402. An annotated version of the play is available in Wang Yongkuan et al., Qingdai zaju xuan, pp. 40–64. 25. For a summary of these developments, see Idema, The Dramatic Oeuvre of Chu Yu-tun, p. 32; and Zeng Yongyi 曾永義, Ming zaju gailun 明雜劇概論 (Taipei: Xuehai, 1979), pp. 73–84. Wang Yuzhang’s 王玉章 anthology Zaju xuan 雜劇選 (Shanghai: Shangwu yinshuguan, 1935) is a convenient source on the diverse forms of the genre. This anthology contains the second act of Tongtian tai (pp. 65–73). Wang singles this play out as a representative example of a two-act variety play. 26. See Ye Junyuan, Wu Meicun nianpu, p. 201n26. Ye refers to a poem by a friend of Wu Weiye, which he dates to this year. 27. Xu Fuming, pers. comm.; and Wang Mian, Wu Weiye, p. 115. Both Xu Fuming and Wang Mian point to the parallel between Shen Jiong’s and Wu Weiye’s situation during their respective transition periods and read the play as Wu Weiye’s plea to be released from his duties at the Qing court in Beijing. Shen Jiong was detained in the Western Wei capital of Chang’an after the Western Wei captured the Liang capital in 554 and established a puppet ruler of what came to be known as the Later Liang dynasty (554–87); he was allowed to return home in 556. Wu Weiye was pressured into serving the Qing in 1653 and spent the years 1654–56 in the capital before he was granted a leave to take care of the funeral arrangements for a paternal aunt. In addition, both the Western Wei and Qing rulers were of non-Han origin, Tabgatch (Ch. 拓跋) and Manchu (Ch. 滿族), respectively.

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chapter, the dating of the play is of minor significance. I believe, however, that 1649 is the more likely date. 28 Tongtian tai is set at the end of the Liang 梁 dynasty (502–57). During the long reign of the founding emperor, Wu 梁武帝 (464–549, r. 502– 49), the Liang court became a center for literature and scholarship. The most notable achievement of the literary and scholarly activities of the court was the compilation of two anthologies, the Wen xuan 文選 (Selections of refined literature) and the Yutai xinyong 玉臺新詠 (New songs from the Jade Terrace). 29 The Wen xuan in particular came to be “one of the primary sources of literary knowledge for educated Chinese in the premodern period.” 30 In addition to the arts, Emperor Wu was also a patron of Confucian and Buddhist learning and attracted many scholars and monks to his court. However, toward the end of his long life, increasing pressure from the northern kingdoms and internal feuds among imperial family members began to unravel the peace and splendor of the dynasty. In 548, an Eastern Wei general, Hou Jing 侯景 (503–52), who had defected to the Liang the year before, rebelled successfully against the aging emperor. Although Hou’s rebellion would be quelled within a few years, the ensuing infighting among the Liang princes made the kingdom even more vulnerable to outside aggression. In 554, the Western Wei 西魏 (535–57) took advantage of the Liang dynasty’s weakness and annexed the Liang capital, which had been moved from Jiankang 建康 (present-day Nanjing) to Jiangling 江陵, in Hubei province. Almost the entire population of the capital was forced to move north, among them many Liang officials. One of these officials is the main protagonist of Tongtian tai, Shen Jiong 沈炯 (502–60). Shen was a southerner from Zhejiang province. He held several official po————— 28. For a more detailed discussion of the date of composition, see Tschanz, “Early Qing Drama,” pp. 113–15. 29. The Wen xuan was compiled under the editorship of Liang Wudi’s oldest son, Xiao Tong 蕭統 (501–31); the Yutai xinyong was compiled by Xu Ling 徐陵 (507–83) under the auspices of Xiao Tong’s younger brother, Xiao Gang 蕭綱 (503–51). For a discussion of the these two anthologies, see David R. Knechtges, “Culling the Weeds and Selecting Prime Blossoms: The Anthology in Early Medieval China,” in Culture and Power in the Reconstitution of the Chinese Realm, 200 –600, ed. Scott Pearce, Audrey Spiro, and Patricia Ebrey (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Asia Center, 2001), pp. 200–241. 30. David R. Knechtges, Wenxuan or Selections of Refined Literature, vol. 1, Rhapsodies on Metropolises and Capitals (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1982), p. 1.

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sitions under Emperor Wu, and he remained loyal to the emperor even after Wu’s premature death in 549. While detained in Chang’an, the capital of the Western Wei, Shen was treated with respect and even given a merit title. He feared that he was being kept captive because of his literary abilities and fame, and consequently he would not associate with anyone. In 556 Shen was finally allowed to return to the south to rejoin his elderly mother. He later served under the first two emperors of the Chen dynasty and related his experiences between 554 and 556 in a rhapsody entitled “The Returning Soul” (歸魂賦). 31 Tongtian tai tells of an outing by Shen Jiong to the wilderness outside Chang’an, where he cries his heart out in order to release his pent-up frustrations. On his stroll, he comes across an ancient site and recognizes it as the Terrace of Communication with Heaven. This structure was originally built by Emperor Wu of the Han 漢武帝 (r. 140–87 bce) to communicate with the spirits and achieve immortality. Shen ascends the terrace and laments the fate of his former lord, Emperor Wu of the Liang. He then drafts a memorial addressed to the previous owner of the terrace, Emperor Wu of the Han, asking the Han emperor to make it possible for Shen to return to the south as soon as possible. Shen hopes that the Han emperor can help him because the emperor had let two of his courtiers return home. At the end of the act, Shen turns toward the south and prostrates himself in the direction of the Terrace City in Nanjing, where the Liang emperor had died. Wu Weiye derived the content of this act from Shen Jiong’s biography in Nanshi. According to this biography, on a solitary walk, Shen by chance passed the Terrace of Communication with Heaven and wrote a memorial addressed to the Han emperor (經通天臺奏漢武帝表) in which he expressed his longing to return to his native land. 32 The text of the memorial is only alluded to in the play and is not quoted. ————— 31. For Shen Jiong’s biography, see Li Yanshou 李延壽 (fl. 650), Nanshi 南史 (Beijing: Zhonghua shuju, 1975), 59.1677–79. Shen’s life story during this period parallels that of many other southern literati such as Yu Xin 庾信 (513–81). Yu Xin’s rhapsody “Lament for the South” (哀江南賦) is the most famous literary account of this period and may have been influenced by Shen Jiong’s rhapsody, according to Chen Yinke; see Ma Jigao 馬積高, Fu shi 賦史 (Shanghai: Guji chubanshe, 1987), p. 232. However, William T. Graham (“The Lament for the South”: Yü Hsin’s “Ai Chiang-nan fu” [Cambridge, Eng.: Cambridge University Press, 1980], p. 43) disputes this influence and labels Shen’s rhapsody as “very minor work.” 32. See Nanshi, 59.1678, which includes the complete text of the memorial.

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In Act 2, we enter the dream world of Shen Jiong. Shen is joined on stage by Emperor Wu of the Han and a small retinue of courtiers. The Terrace of Communication with Heaven, we are told, is Emperor Wu’s capital in his new realm, the Land of the Huaxu 華胥, which he was given after he ascended to the immortals. The Land of the Huaxu can be reached only by a spirit journey (shenyou 神遊) and is inhabited solely by dreamers. The inhabitants of this land have no affections, predilections, or ambitions and live a life of constant merriment. Writers like Jia Yi 賈誼 (200–168 bce) or Yang Xiong 揚雄 (53 bce–18 ce), the most outspoken authors of their time, write nothing but trite and lifeless literature in their new home land. Unimpressed by the lackluster performance of these famous writers, the Han emperor is immediately attracted to Shen Jiong’s passionate lament for Emperor Wu of the Liang. He wants Shen Jiong to enter his service, but Shen declines his offer. Emperor Wu tries nonetheless to persuade him to accept the position by showing him that the Liang emperor was a former Buddha of the West; the “native land” (故國) to which he wants to return no longer exits, and Shen’s commitment to his first ruler is now obsolete. He also tries to convince Shen that, contrary to his popular image, he suffered more than the Liang emperor. Shen, however, remains steadfast and insists on his loyalty to Emperor Wu of the Liang as well as his duty to his mother, whom he had to leave behind in the south. Unwilling to compromise, he even threatens to commit suicide if forced to serve the Han emperor. The Han emperor finally lets Shen Jiong go and even accompanies him to the Hangu Pass, a gateway to the south. When they arrive at the pass, at first they are not allowed through since they lack proper identification. (Emperor Wu’s credentials are no longer valid; this shows his powerlessness.) Finally, Shen is allowed to pass. At this moment, Shen awakens and realizes that his encounter with Emperor Wu was nothing but a dream. However, the dream has transformed him. He has seen through the illusory character of his attachment to the Liang emperor and thanks the Han emperor for delivering him from his useless pain. Therefore, at the end of the play Shen has made peace with himself and his situation. The ending of Tongtian tai shares many similarities with that of Linchun ge. Their differences, however, reveal much about Wu Weiye’s evolving aesthetics of closure. Like Linchun ge, Tongtian tai features a place for remembrance—the terrace—and an urge for enlightenment. As in the previous play, the

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terrace links the world of the dead and the living. It makes communication between the two possible. The dead are attracted by the lamentation and mourning of the living. However, in Linchun ge, the terrace itself serves mainly as the stage for the meeting between Lady Xian and Zhang and the former owner of the terrace, the King of Yue, is not involved; in Tongtian tai, on the other hand, the site itself is more important, and its previous owner, Emperor Wu of the Han, is a major character in the play. The Terrace of Communication with Heaven was not just an elevated place from which one could view the surrounding landscape; it was an expression of the Han emperor’s desire to defy death and attain immortality in life. As such, it is an appropriate setting for Shen Jiong’s reflections on death and life. In Linchun ge, the emperor played a minor role; in Tongtian tai emperors loom large and are even at the heart of the play. The central position given to the terrace in Tongtian tai is not coincidental. Enlightenment is an important element in Linchun ge, but it is even more important in Tongtian tai. Lady Xian is preoccupied not with reflection—as Shen Jiong is—but with action. She wants to make things happen, and it is only after she reaches the limits of her action-centered approach to life that she retreats and vows to retire. This difference has much to do with the fact that the action in Linchun ge proceeds from an era of dynastic glory to the seemingly sudden demise of the dynasty. Action still makes sense in this context, although the play shows that the final demise of the dynasty was inevitable. Tongtian tai, on the other hand, is set under the new dynasty, and the former dynasty lives on only in the memories of the survivors. There is no sense of resistance or hope for the revival of the former dynasty. 33 Action makes way for mourning, remembrance, and contemplation. Enlightenment is forced on Lady Xian through historical circumstances; it is something Shen strives for. This is a major shift in perspective. There is no hope of changing the world; rather, one has to change one’s relation to the world and find some accommodation. With modification, this is also the perspective that characterizes Wu’s last play, Moling chun. ————— 33. The historical situation was a bit more complex: after the Liang capital, Jiangliang, fell, two Liang generals who had rid the Liang dynasty of Hou Jing moved a surviving member of the Liang imperial family to Nanjing and established him as the new Liang emperor. However, within three years, one of the two generals, Chen Baxian 陳霸先 (503–59), usurped the throne and founded the Chen dynasty. The play omits these complicating factors.

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Moling chun Wu wrote Moling chun (Springtime in Moling) sometime between 1651 and 1653 and had it published in the early fall of 1653 before he was pressured into serving the Qing. 34 The play is Wu Weiye’s most ambitious attempt to come to terms with the theme of dynastic transition and is indicative of his changing attitude toward the post-conquest situation. My discussion of this play focuses on its final act, in which Wu presents himself as mourner of the defunct dynasty. The story of Moling chun is set in the early Northern Song (960– 1127), right after the fall of the Southern Tang dynasty (937–75, capital at Nanjing), and centers around two lovers, the talented student Xu Shi 徐適 and the beauty Huang Zhanniang 黃展娘, both offspring of high officials of the Southern Tang. During a banquet at which the last Southern Tang emperor, Li Yu 李煜 (937–78), entertained the fathers of Xu Shi and Zhanniang, the emperor pledged to find a suitable mate for Zhanniang. Although Li Yu was unable to make good on his promise during his lifetime, he subsequently orchestrates the union between Xu Shi and Zhanniang from his heavenly court. For this purpose, he uses a jade cup and magic mirror to introduce the two lovers and marry them in his heavenly palace. After their “heavenly marriage” (xian hun 仙婚), however, they have to return to earth and overcome a series of obstacles before they can consummate their relationship. In contrast to the two earlier plays, Moling chun is a chuanqi drama, the dominant dramatic form of the late Ming and early Qing. Most of these were romantic plays. They could be as long as fifty or more acts and followed a set structure. The final act normally consisted of a grand reunion scene (da tuanyuan 大團圓): the hero and heroine finally were allowed to consummate their love relationship, and thereby a new social equilibrium was established. 35 In Moling chun, Wu Weiye went beyond this established model and broke new ground in the last act. The main character of Act 41, “The Shrine of the Immortal” (Xian ci 仙祠), is Music Master Cao 曹善才. This character was introduced ————— 34. For the text of this play, see Wu Meicun quanji, 3: 1235–361. 35. For a more detailed description of these conventions, see Cyril Birch, “Some Concerns and Methods of the Ming Ch’uan-ch’i Drama,” in Studies in Chinese Literary Genres, ed. C. Birch (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1974), pp. 220– 58; and Christina Shu-hwa Yao, “Cai-zi Jia-ren: Love Drama During the Yuan, Ming, and Qing Periods” (Ph.D. diss., Stanford University, 1982).

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early in the play, in Act 6 and makes another appearance in Act 27, but it is only in the last scene that he becomes the focus of the play. In this final act, Cao is looking for a temple to live out his life and chances on a meeting of Xu Shi and Huang Zhanniang, the male and female lovers, at the newly completed memorial shrine for Li Yu in Nanjing. Xu Shi’s father was an official at Li Yu’s Southern Tang court, and on an outing to a monastery outside Nanjing Li Yu promised to look for a wife for Xu Shi. In the play, the emperor’s ghost arranges the marriage between the male and female protagonist. It is the third day of the third month, the tenth anniversary of Li Yu’s death. After Cao introduces himself to Xu Shi, Xu asks him to sing about the Southern Tang and hands him the scorched-tail pipa (shaocao pipa 燒槽琵琶), an instrument previously played by a consort of Li Yu. Cao then sings six short arias, each of which is dedicated to one person represented in the play: Li Yu, Xu Xuan 徐鉉 (Xu Shi’s father), Huang Baoyi 黃保儀, Liu Chang 劉昶 (the Southern Han ruler and opponent of Li Yu), Huang Ji 黃濟, and the Daoist priestess Geng 耿先生. 36 After finishing these arias, Cao suggests that the pipa should be placed in the shrine for Li Yu “to make a story of the Tang house” (作個唐家故事). He volunteers to take care of the pipa and to stay in the shrine for the rest of his life. At this point, heavenly music is heard, and Li Yu descends from heaven. On his way to the annual Spiral Peach Banquet given by the Queen Mother of the West, he hears music and stops at the shrine to see ————— 36. Except for Huang Ji, all other characters are historical personalities with biographies in Nan Tang shu 南唐書 and Nan Han shu 南漢書. The historical Xu Xuan (917–92), best known for his scholarship and redaction of the Shuowen jiezi 說文解字, left no sons. Xu Shi was therefore not his son; the character was based in part on a son of his younger brother Xu Kai 徐鍇 (921–75). Aoki Masaru 青木正兒 (Zhongguo jinshi xiqu shi 中國近世戲曲史, trans. Wang Jilu 王吉廬 [Taipei: Shangwu yinshuguan, 1989], p. 331) suggests that the model for Xu Shi is a historical personality of the same name active in the early Southern Song period. His great-grandfather Xu Huiyan 徐徽言 died a martyr’s death in the conflict between the Jin 金 and the Song, and Xu Shi, following Xu Huiyan’s example, perished in the same conflict. Aoki hypothesizes that Wu Weiye fabricated the father-son relationship between Xu Xuan and Xu Shi in order to draw an implicit parallel between the Jin 金 ( Jurchen) and Qing 清 (Manchu), both non-Han invaders of the Chinese realm. This explanation, albeit possible, seems unlikely; Wu Weiye incorporated several details of the source on Xu Kai’s son into his play and in general was most interested in dynastic transition periods before the Song. As in Tongtian tai and Linchun ge, the characters in Moling chun are drawn from history, but their relationships and the events depicted, with few exceptions, are entirely imaginary.

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who is playing. When he recognizes Music Master Cao, he asks him to recount what had happened to some of his favorite places and objects he enjoyed in his palace in Nanjing. Cao obliges his former master’s wish, and they have the following exchange: 37 li yu (speaks): What happened to the Hall of the Purified Heart? (小生)我那澄 心堂? [Houting hua 後庭花] cao (sings): At the Hall of the Purified Heart horse fodder is piling up. (外)澄 心堂堆馬草. li yu (speaks): The Palace of Crystallized Essence? 凝華宮呢? cao (sings): The Palace of Crystallized Essence is overgrown with wild grasses. 凝華宮長亂蒿. li yu (speaks): The many trees in the Imperial Flower Garden? 御花園許多樹 木呢? cao (sings): The trees, all cut and burnt as firewood. 樹木呵, 砍折了當柴燒. li yu (speaks): Those books I loved most dearly? 那書籍是我最愛的? cao (sings): Those calligraphies have been dispersed; there is no one left to mount them. 書呵, 拆散了無人裱. But fortunately, you have a son-in-law so skilled, a laureatus so handsome, he secured you this pagoda and shrine. As for me, I will serve you in this shrine as priest. 虧了個女婿粧喬, 狀元波俏, 纔掙這塔兒香火廟. 善才 也做廟裏道人了. li yu (speaks): This is too much to ask of you. 這也難為你 cao (sings): The Three Islands of the Immortals swept off by furious billows, 三山捲怒濤 Black crows flap against the branches, 烏鴉打樹梢 Empty cities reverberate with the cries of wronged ghosts. 城空怨鬼號 Fearing that you might sit alone in sorrow, 怕的君王愁坐著,則把俺 I will play the pipa until daybreak. 琵琶彈到曉

After this exchange, the emperor and the young lovers go their way, and Music Master Cao remains alone on stage to sing the final aria of the play. Like the two plays discussed above, the play ends in an unconventional way. The last act is an ending after the ending, a coda attached to the play proper. Because Wu opted for this ending rather than the conventional one, the last act goes beyond the reader’s or audience’s ————— 37. Wu Meicun quanji, 3: 1358.

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expectation and therefore has a particular weight, something a conventional ending does not have. As in the two previous plays, the last act centers around the thematic cluster of place and memory. Like the terraces in Linchun ge and Tongtian tai, the shrine in Moling chun serves to connect the dead and the living. The shrine differs from the terraces, however. First, it is a new structure expressly built to commemorate the last Southern Tang ruler; second, it can be inhabited; and third, it is situated in Nanjing. The first point is important because, unlike the terraces, which originally served other purposes, the shrine by definition is about commemoration. It is a place of remembrance. It regulates the potentially dangerous relationship between the dead and the living by supplying a place to appease the ghosts of the dead with sacrifices and prayers. As such, the shrine has a stabilizing function. The second point is important because unlike the terraces, which are places to visit but not to stay, the shrine serves as final abode of Music Master Cao. It is his final resting place. He considers himself a companion of the deceased emperor and fills the shrine with his memories of him and the former dynasty. Although Cao is not dead, he occupies a space situated between the dead and the living. It is as if he, a living being, is symbolically buried together with his dead master whom he has followed into death. The third point is important because Nanjing or the south was referred to only in the last acts of the other two plays but does not play a prominent role in them. This is radically different in Moling chun. The title of the play itself refers to Nanjing—Moling is an old name for Nanjing—and several key scenes of the play take place in that city. One of these is, of course, the last act of Moling chun. Nanjing is a highly symbolic place, and its name evokes a complex chain of associations. 38 On the one hand, Nanjing evokes images of the literary refinement and cultural splendor of the Southern courts during the Six Dynasties period (317–589) since it served as the capital of several of these dynasties. On the other hand, Nanjing also brings to mind the quick rise and fall of those same Southern courts. Nanjing was also briefly again the capital in the early Ming and remained an auxiliary capital throughout the Ming. In addition, because the first Ming ruler was buried in Nan————— 38. See Stephen Owen, “Place: Meditation on the Past at Chin-ling,” Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 50, no. 2 (1990): 417–57.

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jing, there was a close association between Nanjing and the Ming. Throughout the Qing, Nanjing came to stand for the fall of the Ming and the pain that was inflicted on the national body through that event. It is the combination of these three points that makes the shrine a powerful symbol, much more powerful than the terraces in the two previous plays, although they, too, link place with memory. Because Moling chun is a romantic comedy, the theme of enlightenment plays a less important role than in the two previous plays, but it is nonetheless important. For one thing, Music Master Cao decides to renounce the world and stay in the shrine to serve his former master. For another, Music Master Cao’s decision to stay in the shrine gives Xu Shi the peace of mind to pursue a career under the new dynasty. Viewed from this perspective, the last act is necessary for the fulfillment of the romantic comedy because the genre requires not only final conjugal bliss but also success in the civil service examinations and prospects for a successful official career. Loyalty to the former dynasty would have kept Xu from fulfilling this generic expectation. Music Master Cao frees the hero and heroine from their obligations toward Li Yu and enables them to get on with their lives without having to feel guilty for their pursuit of worldly goals. With this, the tensions in the play are resolved, and a true sense of finality is achieved. The last act, with the shrine at its center, is emblematic of this resolution.

Wu Weiye’s Aesthetics of Dynastic Transition The last acts of Wu Weiye’s plays highlight elements of his aesthetics of dynastic transitions. One prime element is the choice of a suitable transition period. Wu chose periods from pre-Song history but not the Song-Yuan transition, which in many ways would have been more analogous to the unfolding Ming-Qing transition than the earlier ones. We can only speculate about Wu’s reasons. He was probably more familiar with the earlier period, given his teacher Zhang Pu’s predilection for writers of the Han through Six Dynasties. The Tang and Southern Tang could be seen as parallels to the Ming and the offshoots of the Ming after 1644. The Song-Yuan transition might have been too close an analogy and perhaps too politically sensitive. Also, it would have been difficult to center such a play around the southern capital, Nanjing. This, however, is the second most important element of Wu’s aesthetics of dynastic transitions. Nanjing is at the center of all three plays,

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even if it is only evoked in Tongtian tai and makes only a brief appearance in Linchun ge. As I mentioned above, in the early Qing Nanjing came to stand for the Ming and the traumas inflicted on the Ming empire by the foreign invaders. Nanjing was the capital of many Southern courts during the Six Dynasties period and came to represent the literati’s ambivalent feeling toward the splendor and decadence of those short-lived courts. This was all the more so because many of these courts were headed by emperors who patronized the arts and maintained a refined literati culture despite frequent political upheavals. In addition, many of the emperors were writers themselves and were portrayed as having lost their kingdoms because of their infatuation with literary refinement and the life of the senses. Nanjing therefore could be evoked both as nostalgic reference to a lost world of refinement and a rare sensibility and as a form of self-criticism for past self-indulgence and blindness. A third element of Wu’s aesthetics of dynastic transitions is an elevated site like a terrace or a temple that connects people and places. This site is conducive to contemplation and introspection. It focuses and intensifies moods and thoughts and ultimately enables people to enter a liminal state. The site alone, however, is not sufficient to transport people to that state. It is only after intoning words and conjuring up images of the other that the individual can reach this state. Literature is thus the medium that effects communication between the living and the dead. Once in this state, temporal and spatial limitations are suspended, and communication across the divide between the living and the dead is possible. A final element in Wu’s aesthetics is the search for enlightenment. In all three plays, the main protagonists’ ultimate goal is to transcend their mundane condition and free themselves from their individual predicaments. Although, in the end, this goal eludes all of them, they are transformed by the search itself and attain some level of reconciliation. Although all these elements are present in the three plays, they manifest themselves slightly differently in each play. In Linchun ge, the dominant tone is one of defiance. The main emphasis is on two related aspects. On one hand, Wu extolled the virtue of the two female protagonists and created two powerful female characters. Lady Xian is a larger-than-life female commander and a national heroine. Zhang Lihua is presented as unjustly vilified by generations of historians and poets; her conventional, negative image of her is replaced with a much more

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positive one. 39 On the other hand, the play delivers a scathing criticism of male generals and courtiers, who are condemned for not assuming responsibility for their failures and blaming women instead for the demise of the dynasty. In this play, Wu clearly vented his anger toward Ming generals and officials who, because of factional strife, failed to defend the Ming against the foreign invaders. The play challenges them to make good on their promises to restore the Ming order. In Tongtian tai, incomprehension and resignation dominate. The play consists of an extended meditation on the scope of human agency in the historical process. Shen Jiong’s main question is why the pleasure-seeking Han emperor enjoyed a life of comfort and luxury when the devout Buddhist Liang emperor was forsaken by his own sons and died a miserable death in Terrace City in Nanjing. He addresses this question to heaven following the model of Qu Yuan’s 屈原 Heavenly Questions (Tianwen 天問). The Terrace for Communication with Heaven is the platform on which Shen Jiong delivers his questions. Linchun ge is preoccupied with the present; Tongtian tai focuses on larger historical issues. Hence Shen’s questions appear all the more pressing and reveal his deep sense of helplessness and displacement. These feelings of alienation and anomie make him question the very foundations of his existence as a literary man or literatus (wenren 文人) and doubt the value of the intellectual tradition to which he belongs. The probing quality of this play is accentuated by the fact that it consists only of two acts and is almost devoid of action. Moreover, the play’s central consciousness is coextensive with Shen’s mind; therefore, what we as readers or spectators of the play witness is a “theater of the mind.” Because Shen is a male character, it seems natural to identify Shen with the author Wu Weiye himself and to read the play as a direct reflection of Wu’s thoughts. In this, Tongtian tai is very different from Linchun ge. Whereas the latter is dominated by female characters, and only an indirect identification of the characters with the author is possible, in Tongtian tai such identification is almost ————— 39. For a discussion of the early Qing topos of the heroic woman, see Wai-yee Li, “Heroic Transformations,” pp. 363–443 (pp. 378–93 are on Linchun ge); on Wu Weiye’s identification with the “suffering woman,” see Kang-i Sun Chang 孫康宜, “The Idea of the Mask in Wu Wei-yeh (1609–1671),” Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 48, no. 2 (1988): 298–311; and idem, “Wu Meicun de ‘nüxing’ rentong” 吳梅 村的女性認同, in idem, Gudian yu xiandai de nüxing chanshi 古典與現代的女性 闡釋 (Taipei: Lianhe wenxue, 1998), pp. 165–80.

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unavoidable. Its autobiographical nature is intricately linked to the convention in lyric poetry (shi 詩) to identify the persona of the poem with the poet him- or herself. 40 Because of this identification strategy, it was much easier for male readers to identify with the male protagonist and his author, and it is therefore no coincidence that Tongtian tai received much more attention from traditional (male) readers than Linchun ge. Moling chun is the most complex of Wu’s three plays, and its meaning is much more ambiguous than that of the other two plays. There are many reasons for this complexity and ambiguity. First, it is written in a much more expansive genre than the two previous plays and therefore contains many more dramatic strands than they do. For example, Moling chun foregrounds the theme of dynastic transition in a genre in which historical context is of secondary importance at best. Although there are earlier examples of plays in which the themes of romantic comedy and dynastic transitions are closely interconnected—Liang Chenyu’s 粱晨魚 (ca. 1519–ca. 1591) Huansha ji 浣沙記, for example—Moling chun is nevertheless the first play to focus on the integration of these two themes and to exploit the tensions that exists between the love story and the historical frame. Hong Sheng’s 洪昇 (1645–1704) and Kong Shangren’s 孔尚任 (1648–1718) later experiments with this form are clearly indebted to Wu Weiye. The chuanqi drama form also allowed Wu to introduce many more characters. In particular, this allowed him to feature characters of two different generations, most prominent among them Music Master Cao and Xu Shi. By introducing these two generations, Wu could paint a much more complex picture of the options and choices individuals could avail themselves of during a transition period. Second, chuanqi drama is a much more playful genre than zaju. In fact, chuanqi genre has a built-in self-parodic component, which is often used to highlight the sheer artificiality of the genre. In Moling chun, Wu used this generic feature in a double-take. On one hand, this feature allowed him to display his pleasure in constructing the theatrical illusion. This is most obvious in the proliferation of objects used to tie the lovers together. In a conventional chuanqi play, one object or, at most, two, such as a painting (in Mudan ting 牡丹亭) or a fan (in Taohua shan 桃花扇) are sufficient, but Moling chun has resort to four objects (a ————— 40. See Chang, “The Idea of the Mask in Wu Wei-yeh,” p. 298.

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mirror, a jade goblet, calligraphies, and the scorched-tail pipa) to put into motion a complex play of “separation and reunion, sorrow and joy” (lihe beihuan 離合悲歡). In addition, the symbolism of these four objects is embedded in the theme of dynastic transition. On the other hand, the self-parodic component also allowed Wu Weiye to show the danger of the form, that is, its tendency to delight in its own artificiality without taking into account the moral implications of such seemingly gratuitous artistry and playfulness. As such, Moling chun is a critique of a certain late Ming sensibility that fostered this kind of literary works. It is this complex use of the chuanqi drama form that sets it apart from earlier plays and makes it quite unique in the context of early Qing drama. Finally, what distinguishes Moling chun from the two other plays is the character of the site of memory. In the two previous plays, this site is a dilapidated terrace, a pre-existing structure with its own history and symbolic value; in Moling chun this site is a new structure built as a result of the unraveling of the play’s love story. This site is located in Nanjing rather than in Guangzhou or Chang’an and serves as the self-chosen final abode of Music Master Cao. The construction of this site could be interpreted in at least two ways. The construction of this site can be seen as expressing Wu Weiye’s wish to withdraw into a similar, albeit symbolic, sanctuary and live the life of a Ming loyalist. Many of his writings and actions between 1651 and 1653 could be used to support such an interpretation. For example, in 1652 Wu tried to dissuade a Qing official from recommending him to the Qing authorities. 41 And in the third lunar month of 1653, he participated in a gathering at the Bell Tower in Taicang to commemorate the ninth anniversary of the death of the Chongzhen emperor. 42 The site could also be seen as Wu Weiye’s attempt to part symbolically with the Ming dynasty and to allow himself to move beyond the “suspension of dynastic time.” 43 In this interpretation, Wu was unwilling to continue to ————— 41. See Ye Junyuan, Wu Meicun nianpu, p. 227. 42. See ibid., 252. 43. Jonathan Hay (“The Suspension of Dynastic Time,” in Boundaries in China, ed. J. Hay [London. Reaktion Books, 1994], pp. 172–74) coined this term to describe the situation of people who after 1644/45 remained loyal to the Ming dynasty and denied the legitimacy of the Qing mandate while conceding that the Qing had established itself de facto as ruler of the realm. As a consequence of this, for such

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mourn the demise of the Ming and the death of the Chongzhen emperor indefinitely; he may have thought that he had fulfilled his duty toward his former lord and now could change his allegiance to the current emperor and dynasty. Again, many of his writings and actions between 1651 and 1653 could be adduced to support such an interpretation. For example, there is a strong retrospective look in some of the projects he undertook during this time; this holds true for his brief historical account of the Fushe, Fushe jishi 復社紀事, and his poetry talks, Meicun shihua 梅村詩話, in which he discussed mainly the poetry of his friends, dead and living, as well as for Suikou jilüe 綏寇紀略, a detailed account of the various late Ming peasant rebellions and their devastating impact on the Ming empire. And in the third of month of 1653, he hosted a gathering of Jiangnan literati at the Tiger Hill in Suzhou. 44 He must have known that his prominent position as convener of this meeting would certainly come to the attention of the Qing authorities and could lead to an invitation to join the regime. 45 Whatever the case might have been, the ambiguity of the ending remains and cannot be neatly resolved.

Conclusion Although Hong Sheng’s Changsheng dian 長生殿 and Kong Shangren’s Taohua shan are the undisputed masterworks of early Qing drama, I hope to have shown that Wu Weiye’s three plays are of comparable importance and yield as much, if not more, insight into the literary world of the mid-seventeenth century. Wu developed in his three plays a distinctive aesthetics of dynastic transition that reflected his changing understanding of and approach to the Manchu conquest of China. He did so by harking back to earlier transitions and portraying women and men in situations similar to his own. Arguably the most salient characteristic of his aesthetics of dynastic transition is the connection between an elevated place and the memory triggered by that place. Featured in all three plays, the elevated place enables the protagonists to connect to a lost world to which they once belonged or with which they have a deep affinity. ————— remnant subjects of the Ming (明遺民) dynastic time was suspended, the time after 1644/45 being neither clearly Ming nor clearly Qing. 44. See Ye Junyuan, Wu Meicun nianpu, 251. 45. See Wakeman, The Great Enterprise, pp. 934–42.

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Although the place, the lost world, and the rememberer are necessary elements in enabling communication between the living and the dead, they are in themselves not sufficient. In the end, what makes communication possible is the incantation of words. It is the chanting of words that directs Zhang Lihua to Lady Xian; it is the chanting of words that attracts Emperor Wu of the Han to Shen Jiong; and it is the chanting of words to the accompaniment of the pipa that attracts Li Yu to Music Master Cao’s description of a lost world. Wu Weiye very much believed in the power of words and was convinced that, if he was to be known to later generations, it would be because of and through his poetic voice. 46 Although Wu’s poetry and plays were read throughout the Qing and continue to be read up to the present day, there was probably no period other than the late Qing and early Republican era during which a generation of literati saw in him a kindred spirit and read his work with the passion and pain of near-contemporaries. 47 For readers at the turn of the twenty-first century, such immediate rapport to Wu’s work is difficult, if not impossible to attain. However, although such rapport is no longer possible, an understanding of Wu’s aesthetics as explicated in this chapter can serve as a bridge to Wu Weiye’s work and his period.

————— 46. Wu Weiye wanted his tombstone inscription to read “The Tomb of Wu Meicun, the Poet” 詩人吳梅村之墓; see ibid., p. 1078. 47. Notable examples among scholars of traditional Chinese drama are Wu Mei 吳梅, Wang Jilie 王季烈, and Xu Shoubai 許守白.

Music and Performance in Hong Sheng’s Palace of Lasting Life 7 Judith T. Zeitlin “In opera,” writes Carolyn Abbate, “the characters pacing the stage often suffer from deafness; they do not hear the music that is the ambient fluid of their music-drowned world. This is one of the genre’s most fundamental illusions: we see before us something whose fantastic aspect is obvious, since the scenes we witness pass to music. At the same time, however, opera stages recognizably human situations, and these possess an inherent ‘realism’ that demands a special and complex understanding of the music we hear.” 1 Abbate, a musicologist who specializes in nineteenth-century European opera, has in mind Verdi and Wagner, but her insight that the theatrical illusion of opera is predicated on a simultaneous affirmation and denial of perceiving music is as relevant for the sung drama of the Chinese stage as it is for the European one. This insight is also relevant for understanding the long playtexts of Ming and Qing chuanqi 傳奇 (southern romantic comedy), considered both as reading material and as written guidelines for full-length performance, at least until the practice of performing single-scene excerpts or highlights came to dominate the stage around the mid-eighteenth century. 2 Although in chuanqi, spoken dialogue (performed mainly in a ————— 1. Carolyn Abbate, Unsung Voices: Opera and Musical Narrative in the Nineteenth Century (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1991), p. 119. My deep thanks to Isabel Wong and Hai Zhen for their advice on musicological questions. 2. Zhezi xi 折子戲 were also performed prior to the eighteenth century, and new plays were still written and performed after that date; the point is that zhezi xi becomes the norm during the eighteenth century and the composition of new plays

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stylized recitative-like fashion) commingles with sung arias, the artifice that the story is enacted primarily through lyrics sung by characters unaware that they are making music remains a theatrical convention so basic that most of the time it escapes us. This artifice comes to the fore, however, whenever the processes of performing or listening to music are made an explicit part of the dramatic action rather than simply the transparent medium through which the drama unfolds. Abbate calls such instances in opera “phenomenal” performance, which she defines as “a musical or vocal performance that declares itself openly, singing that is heard by its singer, the auditors on stage, and understood as ‘music that they (too) hear’ by us, the theater audience.” 3 Such occasions of “phenomenal” music in chuanqi can be fleeting (the sound of an instrument heard offstage, for instance), 4 but they can also be fullblown scenes of performance, in which case they assume some of the characteristics of “a play within a play,” those embedded moments when theater self-consciously reveals itself as theater. 5 As in European opera, these interludes serve the important function of adding variety to the entertainment by introducing other spectacle (such as dance) or musical genres (such as a ballad), but on another level, they also provide an opportunity for music to reflect on itself and its performance. Herbert Lindenberger has called attention to the number of operas in the European repertory that are self-referential in this way and therefore “remind us that opera tells about the nature of performing through the very processes by which performers perform.” 6 ————— becomes relatively rare. See Lu Eting 陸萼庭, Kunju yanchu shigao 昆劇演出史稿 (Shanghai: Shanghai wenyi chubanshe, 1980); and idem, “Qingdai quanbenxi yanchu shulun” 清代全本戲演出述論, in Ming Qing xiqu guoji yantao hui lunwen ji 明清戲曲國際研討會論文集, ed. Hua Wei 華瑋 and Wang Ay-ling 王璦玲 (Taipei: Zhongyang yuanjiuyuan, Wenzhe yanjiusuo choubeichu, 1998), pp. 327–63. 3. Abbate, Unsung Voices, p. 5. 4. The convention in chuanqi playtexts is to write in this sort of action as a stage direction that calls for some instrument to be played backstage (nei 內), but, in fact, the regular orchestra seated in view of the audience played these sound cues just as they did ordinary music. 5. Patrice Pavis, Dictionary of the Theatre: Terms, Concepts, Analysis, trans. Christine Shantz (Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1998), especially entries for “metatheater,” “mise-en-abyme,” “a play within a play” “illusion,” “fiction,” and “denial.” 6. Herbert Lindenberger, Opera: The Extravagant Art (Ithaca: Cornell University Press, 1984), p. 141.

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Whenever professional or amateur musicians are characters in a chuanqi, whenever musical instruments are present onstage as props, whenever musical composition, instruction, rehearsal, transmission, playing, or listening is the subject of the dramatic narrative, we enter this self-referential realm. We have only to think of the chuanqi that feature the name of a musical instrument in their titles, such as Gao Ming’s 高明Story of the Lute (Pipa ji 琵琶記) or Kong Shangren’s 孔尚任 and Gu Cai’s 顧彩 collaborative effort Little Thunderclap (Xiao hulei 小忽雷; a Tang dynasty stringed instrument), or chuanqi whose titles feature music in the title, such as You Tong’s 尤侗 Celestial Court Music ( Juntian yue 鈞天樂), or chuanqi whose plots involve professional musical entertainers, such as Kong Shangren’s Peach Blossom Fan (Taohua shan 桃花扇) or Wu Weiye’s 吳偉業 Spring in Moling (Moling chun 秣陵春), which Stephen Owen and Dietrich Tschantz discuss in this volume, to realize how common a tendency this is in southern drama. 7 Nonetheless, in this chapter I argue that Hong Sheng’s 洪昇 (1645– 1704) historical drama Palace of Lasting Life (Changsheng dian 長生殿) represents an extreme case, one in which music is overtly thematized throughout the drama as part of a sustained reflection on the nature of the playwright-composer’s craft and its relationship to performance.

1 Hong Sheng labored over Palace of Lasting Life for more than ten years, reworking it three times before completing it around 1688. 8 At fifty acts, Hong Sheng’s opus is long but well within the norm for chuanqi. 9 The play tells the tragic story of the Tang dynasty Emperor ————— 7. The interest in this sort of character is especially keen in chuanqi written in the first decades after the fall of the Ming. 8. For this dating, see Xu Shuofang 徐朔方, “Introduction” to his annotated edition of Changsheng dian 長生殿 (Beijing: Renmin wenxue chubanshe, 1986 [1958]), p. 4. All references to the text of Changsheng dian in this chapter are keyed to Xu’s edition, henceforth cited as Changsheng dian; unmarked page references in the body of the chapter refer to this edition. Page references to the commentaries for Changsheng dian are keyed to the Nuanhong shi Huike chuanqi 暖紅室彙刻傳奇 edition (pub. Liu Shiheng 劉世珩, 1919) and are prefaced by Nuanhong shi. 9. Tang Xianzu’s Peony Pavilion runs fifty-five acts. Fifty acts is by no means unusual, but by the Qing, plays of thirty or so acts were more common.

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Minghuang’s (唐明皇) love for his beloved concubine Lady Yang (Yang Guifei 楊貴妃 or Yang Yuhuan 楊玉環). When An Lushan 安祿山 rebelled in 755 and took the capital Chang’an in 756, the emperor and his retinue fled to Sichuan. En route, his soldiers mutinied at the Mawei 馬嵬 post station and murdered the hated Prime Minister Yang Guozhong 楊國忠, a cousin of Lady Yang’s, and then forced the emperor to acquiesce to Lady Yang’s execution at the site. Although the rebellion was eventually quelled, the emperor was forced to abdicate in favor of the crown prince, and he lived out the remainder of his days in grief and remorse pining for her. This was the historical nucleus of the story. According to legend, however, it was later revealed to the emperor that in a former life Lady Yang had originally been an immortal, and after her death, she achieved apotheosis and became an immortal again. This legend is considerably elaborated and expanded in Hong Sheng’s play, which achieves the happy ending mandated for a chuanqi by staging the reunion of the emperor and Lady Yang, now both immortals and together for eternity, in the other world. Hong Sheng’s foreword to the play says that his work quickly became publicly known through associates who read the manuscript and through actors who borrowed his script and performed it. A “gala performance” in Beijing the following year during a period of imperial mourning became a famous scandal that resulted in Hong Sheng’s being stripped of his status as a stipendiary student in the National Academy and kicked out of the capital. 10 The scandal seems to have increased the reputation of the play rather than suppressing it. Palace of Lasting Life continued to be in demand on the stage, and it was partly to counteract “vulgar” alterations in the many productions of the play, Hong Sheng ————— 10. Before the play was banned, it was staged in at least two different venues in Beijing: a public theater (the Zhalou 查樓) and a private household (Sungong yuan 孫公園), but we cannot ascertain where the performance that got Hong Sheng into trouble took place. See Zhou Huabin 周華斌, Jingdu gu xilou 京都古戲樓 (Beijing: Haiyang chubanshe, 1998), pp. 102–4. The phrase “gala performance” is Ay-ling Wang’s, in “The Artistry of Hong Sheng’s Changshengdian” (Ph.D. diss., Yale University, 1992), p. 2. Wang’s is the fullest account of the scandal in English, but she probably overstates the Kangxi emperor’s objections to the Han nationalist, Ming-loyalist implications of the play’s content as the underlying reason for his reaction. Wang’s account is based on Zhang Peiheng 章培恆, Hong Sheng nianpu 洪昇年譜 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1979); and Chen Wannai 陳萬鼐, Hong Sheng yanjiu 洪昇研究 (Taipei: Taiwan xuesheng shuju, 1970).

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tells us, that he published his own authorized version of the text, volume 1 in 1700 and volume 2 in 1704, the year of his accidental death by drowning. Critics have uniformly praised Palace of Lasting Life for its exceptional musicality, that is, for the marvelous fit between the words and the tune patterns Hong Sheng employed. 11 Despite the centrality of vocal music in traditional Chinese theater of all periods, there were no composers as we understand the term. Rather, “poet-scriptwriters” selected pre-existing tunes from a stock repertory and wrote new lyrics for them, arranging the resulting arias into suites to fit the “dramatic and structural demands of each scene.” 12 Among the literary men who turned their hand to playwriting in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, Hong Sheng is considered to have worked hardest to master the musical side of things. One anecdote tells of his having worn deep grooves in the surface of his desk from continually beating out the rhythm of the music as he wrote. 13 Another story regards a full performance of the play staged in 1704 by Cao Yin 曹寅, textile commissioner of Nanjing (and grandfather of Cao Xueqin 曹雪芹, the future author of Dream of the Red Chamber), which lasted three days and three nights. Hong Sheng was invited as honored guest and, together with his host, watched the entire performance with script in hand, making corrections to the words whenever he detected violations in the rhythm as the performers sang. 14 Hong Sheng prided himself on this sort of technical perfection, partly in response to the criticism leveled against Tang Xianzu 湯顯祖, the greatest playwright of the preceding age, for his alleged disregard of the prosodic and musical rules of the reigning kunqu operatic style in the composition of his masterpiece, The Peony Pavilion (Mudan ting ————— 11. For a summary of these views, see Ye Changhai 葉長海, Zhongguo xijuxue shi 中國戲劇學史 (Taipei: Luotuo chubanshe, 1993), pp. 449–50. 12. Bell Yung, Cantonese Opera: Performance as Creative Process (Cambridge, Eng.: Cambridge University Press, 1989), p. 3. 13. Ay-ling Wang, “The Artistry of Hong Sheng’s Changshengdian,” p. 23. A similar anecdote was related about Gao Ming’s composition of Pipa ji: by the time he had finished the play after three years, he had worn a hole in the floor from tapping time as he wrote (see Xu Wei 徐渭, Nanci xulu 南詞敘錄, trans. K. C. Leung, Hsü Wei as Drama Critic [Eugene: University of Oregon, Asian Studies Program, 1988], pp. 62–63). 14. Zhang Peiheng, Hong Sheng nianpu, pp. 365–66.

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牡丹亭). 15 Although the sensibility and plot of Palace of Lasting Life are deeply influenced by The Peony Pavilion, Hong explicitly distanced himself from Tang on musical grounds: “I would be the first to admit that my literary talent is no match for Tang Xianzu, but in my strict attention to rhyme and melody, I venture to say I somewhat surpass him” 予自惟文采不逮臨川，而恪守韻調， 罔敢稍有逾越. 16 Hong credited his success in this area to his musical advisor, Xu Lin 徐麟, a Suzhou native and expert on kunqu, “with whom I checked word tones and adjusted the musical scales—no word escaped our care” 予與之審音 協律， 無一字不愼也. 17 Whereas Tang earned notoriety in some quarters for declaring: “As long as I can express my thoughts to the fullest, I don’t care if I crack the throat of every actor under heaven,” 18 Hong strove for the kind of acoustic pleasure in which “the musical tones float sinuously from the singer’s throat,” as one friend described it. 19 Palace of Lasting Life has also been extolled for its acute attention to every aspect of production and dramaturgy. As Wang Jilie 王季烈, the important early twentieth-century theater historian and critic, put it in an often-quoted remark: “In terms of stagecraft ( paichang 排場) in ————— 15. In fact, scholars now argue that The Peony Pavilion was not originally written for kunqu 崑曲, the musical system that developed in the Suzhou area, but for haiyan qiang 海鹽腔, the musical system of Tang Xianzu’s home district of Yihuang 宜黃 in Jiangxi; see Catherine Swatek, “Peony Pavilion” Onstage: Four Centuries in the Career of a Chinese Drama (Ann Arbor: Center for Chinese Studies, 2002), pp. 3–5. 16. Hong Sheng, “Liyan” 例言 in Changsheng dian, p. 1. Unless otherwise indicated, all translations are my own. 17. On Xu Lin’s considerable contribution to the musical side of the play, see Fu Xueyi 傅雪漪, “Qianqiu yi qu wu nishang—tan Changsheng dian zai yinyue fangmian de chengjiu” 千秋一曲舞霓裳—談長生殿在音樂方面的成就 (reprinted in idem, Kunqu yinyue xinshang mantan 昆曲音樂欣賞漫談 [Beijing: Renmin yinyue chubanshe, 1996], pp. 97–124). 18. Translated by Edmund Yee in his entry on Shen Jing in The Indiana Companion to Traditional Chinese Literature, ed. William H. Nienhauser, Jr. (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 1986), p. 676. For the original, see “Da Sun Siju” 答孫俟居, in Tang Xianzu shiwen ji 湯顯祖詩文集, ed. Xu Shuofang 徐朔方 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1982), 2: 1299. 19. Zhu Xiang’s 朱襄 preface is reprinted in Cai Yi 蔡毅, ed., Zhongguo gudian xiqu xuba huibian 中國古典戲曲序跋彙編 ( Ji’nan: Qi-Lu shushe, 1989), pp. 1586–87.

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chuanqi, nothing tops this work.” 20 Indeed, Palace of Lasting Life is almost unique in the degree to which every detail is spelled out in Hong Sheng’s copious stage directions. His intense concern with both musical technique and stagecraft is further reinforced by the full-length pingdian 評點 commentaries included in his authorized imprint of the play. The technical commentary by his musical advisor Xu Lin deals exclusively with the finer points of pronunciation, prosody, and music, and the interpretive commentary by his close friend and publishing associate Wu Yiyi 吳儀一 exhibits an almost unprecedented interest in staging alongside more common literary concerns such as narrative structure and authorial intent. 21 For example, Wu’s comments to one scene admonish actors to “convey the spirit of the author’s stage directions” and “under no circumstances to be careless or negligent” 以上 科介俱細細傳神，演者切莫潦草 (Nuanhong shi 2.49a, Scene 37). Wu’s attention to staging is surely related to his abridgement and revision of the play specifically for performance, presumably for the benefit of actors and especially for the patrons of drama troupes. In his foreword, Hong Sheng explained that actors had found the play difficult to perform because of its length and complexity, and Wu, indignant at the lousy stage adaptations cropping up to fill the demand for a more easily performed version of the play, had undertaken one of his own. (Unfortunately, Wu’s twenty-eight-scene “performance text” is ————— 20. Wang Jilie 王季烈, Yinlu qutan 螾廬曲談 (Taipei: Shangwu yinshuguan, 1971), 2.30. Paichang 排場, which I am translating as “stagecraft” for lack of a better word, includes, in Wang’s formulation, the arrangement of musical keys and modes, the assignment of role types and plot construction, ease of performance for actors, and rapture for the audience. My own sense is that he uses the term to encompass the entire theatrical effect of a chuanqi designed by the playwright. 21. On Wu’s involvement with the publication of Changsheng dian, see Liu Hui’s 劉輝 introduction to Hong Sheng ji 洪昇集 (Hangzhou: Zhejiang guji chubanshe, 1992), pp. 4–5; and his excellent biographical article on Wu, “Lun Wu Shufu” 論吳舒鳧, Xiju yanjiu 37, no. 1 (1987): 108–17. The publication of volume two was postponed for four years because of Wu’s mother’s death. Hong Sheng lacked the financial resources to publish his work, and it is likely that Wu, who had experience in drama publishing, helped come up with the necessary funds. Wu had undertaken the publication of Wu Wushan’s Three Wives’ Commentary on “The Peony Pavilion” (Wu Wushan sanfu heping “Mudan ting” 吳吳山三婦合評«牡丹亭») in 1694, and his correspondence reveals that he was also involved in publishing medical works. Wu always presents himself as a scholar involved in family-press type publishing, but it is likely that he was more involved in commercial publishing than he lets on.

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not extant, but according to Hong, it could be comfortably performed over two days.) At the end of his foreword, Hong Sheng specifically addressed a number of the more egregious errors in current stagings of the play, ranging from inappropriate costuming to the wholesale addition of new episodes. Both playwright and commentator were clearly troubled by “misperformances” of the play, and their publication of a definitive edition of the play was undoubtedly an attempt to reassert the playwright’s control over his material in a society without the legal safeguard of copyright. 22 The elite critical discourse on chuanqi reveals a constant awareness—and anxiety—that performers could and did alter the playwright’s work. 23 But Hong Sheng’s endorsement of Wu’s adaptation for performers “seeking simplicity and brevity” shows a pragmatic acceptance of the notions that writing for the theater meant writing for multiple audiences and uses and that productions and scripts of the same play might differ radically depending on the occasion and the performers. He understood that the playwright’s complete, original version was destined for the most part to become a “desktop” drama (antou xi 案頭戲), a book to be read in private and only occasionally a script to be staged in full. In this regard, the proliferation and complexity of stage directions in Hong Sheng’s imprint of Palace of Lasting Life can be understood as indications that he was consciously writing for two art forms, for reading as well as for performance, with the clarification that “performance” could range from “pure singing” (qingchang 清唱) of the arias to full-scale productions in private homes or public theaters. 24 ————— 22. The lack of such safeguards plus the political risks involved in writing for the stage (as exemplified by Hong Sheng’s traumatic experience in the capital) may be among many reasons that elite authors, for the most part, had abandoned the enterprise by the Qianlong period. 23. There are too many examples to cite. In his drama treatise, Wang Jide 王驥德 cautions that arias and scenes cannot be too “lax” (man 漫) or actors will cut them (“Lun xiju” 論戲劇, in Wang Jide qulü 王驥德曲律, ed. Chen Duo 陳多 and Ye Changhai 葉長海 [Changsha: Hunan renmin chubanshe, 1983], p. 154). Kong Shangren noted that he reduced the number of arias per scene in his play to forestall actors’ cuts (“Taohua shan fanli” 桃花扇凡例, in Taohua shan [Beijing: Renmin chubanshe, 1961], p. 11). 24. And he succeeded. In addition to the many scenes that remained in the performing tradition, full texts of Palace of Lasting Life remained in print in dif-

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In what follows, I argue that Hong Sheng’s awareness of the variable relationship of performance to script and the changing nature of performances and playtexts over time and space underlies the representation of musical experience in Palace of Lasting Life.

2 For developing music as an explicit theme in opera, Hong Sheng picked his source material well, for Emperor Minghuang was the founder of the celebrated Pear Garden Ensemble (liyuan 梨園), the court entertainment bureau that specialized in music and dance. Although Emperor Minghuang’s eighth-century Pear Garden predated the emergence of full-fledged drama in China by several centuries, by Hong Sheng’s time the term had long become standard nomenclature for both actors and the theater. Emperor Minghuang was famous in history not only as a connoisseur of music and dance but as a composer and musician in his own right. 25 Indeed in recognition of his special link with the performing arts, Emperor Minghuang had, at least by the eighteenth century, been adopted by professional actors as one of the tutelary trade gods of the theater (xishen 戲神). 26 (A recent study of the non-state-run commercial opera troupes that have arisen in rural Taizhou 台州 in Zhejiang province found that the practice of making offerings to Emperor Minghuang as the patron god of a troupe has revived along with many other old religious and ritual practices associated with the theater.) 27 ————— ferent formats to serve as both reading material and scores for amateur singers well into the 1920s and 1930s. 25. One of Hong Sheng’s major sources for his play was Yao Shi 樂史, Yang Taizhen waizhuan 楊太真外傳 (in Kaiyuan Tianbao yishi shizhong 開元天寶遺事 十種, ed. Ding Ruming丁入明 [Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1985]), which organizes many of its episodes around Emperor Minghuang’s composition of songs. This work was compiled in the Northern Song but drew on many Tang materials; see Li Jianguo 李劍國, Songdai zhiguai chuanqi xulu 宋代志怪傳奇敘錄 (Tianjin: Nankai daxue chubanshe, 1997), pp. 27–29. 26. On the Qianlong date for Tang Minghuang as a xishen, see Sun Minji 孫民紀, Youling kaoshu 優伶考述 (Beijing: Zhongguo xiju chubanshe, 1999), pp. 183–86; and Li Qiao 李喬, Hangye shen chongbai 行業神崇拜 (Beijing: Zhongguo wenlian chubanshe, 1999), pp. 488–92. 27. Fu Jin 傅謹, Caogen de liliang—Taizhou xiban de tianye diaocha yu yanjiu 草根的力量—台州戲班的田野調查與研究 (Nanning: Guangxi renmin chubanshe, 2001).

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Music had long played a fundamental role in representing the story of Emperor Minghuang and Lady Yang. The poet Bai Juyi’s 白居易 famous “Song of Lasting Regret” (“Changhen ge” 長恨歌), which Hong Sheng used as his blueprint for the plot of Palace of Lasting Life, condensed the destruction of Minghuang’s glorious reign into a single couplet: “War drums from Yuyang shook the earth / and shattered the tune of ‘Rainbow Skirts, Feather Robes’ ” 28 漁陽鼙鼓動地來，驚破霓 裳羽衣曲. Although Bai Juyi was the first to link this most famous tune of the era to Lady Yang, it was forever after closely allied with her in the Chinese imagination. The contrasts between different types of music embedded in this couplet (court versus barbarian, civil versus military, high versus low, among others) were a crucial tool for Hong Sheng in increasing the density of metaphorical meanings at his disposal and in creating the rapid alternation between mood and place so prized in the composition of chuanqi. Hong Sheng’s foreword tells us that the title of an earlier draft of his play was The Dance of Rainbow Skirts (Wu nishang 舞霓裳). Although he abandoned this title in the final version, the central position this piece of music occupies in the narrative structure and symbolic economy of the play is readily apparent. The music of “Rainbow Skirts,” no less than the conventional lovers’ tokens of filigree box and gold hairpin, works as a “material symbol” in the drama. One of the technical devices customarily used to provide unity to a sprawling chuanqi was the material symbol, some concrete object that reappears in several scenes, exchanged from one person to another, and that takes on emblematic significance during the course of the action. Deftly handled, a material symbol assumes more than one guise in a play so it may evoke differing (or even conflicting) sets of images and meanings. “Rainbow Skirts” functions in just such a protean manner in Palace of Lasting Life, where it also helps link the two worlds in which the play’s action takes place, the sublunary realm of men and the lunar realm of the immortals. It is first performed for Lady Yang in Scene 11 (“Hearing the Music” [“Wenyue” 聞樂]) when she is summoned to the Moon Palace in a dream; then it is transcribed from memory after she awakes in Scene 12 (“Fashioning the Score” [“Zhipu” 製譜]), where it is ————— 28. Although it is fair to say that “Rainbow Skirts” was “number one on the music charts” during Minghuang’s reign, Bai’s ballad is the first source to link the song with Lady Yang.

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read approvingly by the emperor. Next, we are told, on the emperor’s orders, Lady Yang teaches it orally to her two maids, who also make a copy of the score, so they can instruct the Pear Garden musicians how to play it. During the Pear Garden Ensemble’s rehearsal in Scene 14 (“Stealing the Melody” [“Touqu” 偷曲]), it is overheard from outside the palace walls by Li Mo 李謩, a flutist, who secretly memorizes it by softly echoing each line of the music on his flute. In Scene 15 (“Dancing on a Disk” [“Wupan” 舞盤]), it is played by the Pear Garden Ensemble at a grand court banquet, with Lady Yang performing a dance to the music. Much later in the play, after Lady Yang’s death, resurrection, and apotheosis, she retranscribes the score from memory in Scene 40 (“Immortal Remembrance” [“Xian yi” 仙憶]). This transcription is sought by the Moon Palace, because Lady Yang’s version is deemed superior to the “original” performance in the lunar precincts that Lady Yang had attended in her dream. The play ends ten scenes later with a triumphant reprise of “Rainbow Skirts” in the Moon Palace (“Reunion in the Moon” [“Chongyuan” 重圓]), now based on Lady Yang’s score, to celebrate the permanent reunion of Lady Yang and the emperor, now both immortals, in the otherworldly realm. Ay-ling Wang and Wai-yee Li have elegantly sketched the many changes “Rainbow Skirts” undergoes in the course of the action, but they do not single out what seems to me the most striking aspect of Hong Sheng’s conception of this piece, namely, that it is presented both as a performance heard and seen by characters in the drama and as a physical text that is written and read by characters in the drama. 29 Seen in this light, “Rainbow Skirts” can be understood as expressing the dual nature of drama in this period, both as an embodied performance to be experienced by a theater audience and as a manuscript or book composed by a playwright to be perused by a reading public. Given the weight that Hong Sheng placed on music, it is highly significant that he made Lady Yang not only a dancer of “Rainbow Skirts” but its composer. Hong Sheng extensively researched the historical, literary, and legendary sources on Emperor Minghuang’s regime and Tang music. He was certainly aware that several Tang and Song dynasty accounts credit Emperor Minghuang as having had a ————— 29. Ay-ling Wang, “The Artistry of Hong Sheng’s Changshengdian,” pp. 176–80; and Wai-yee Li, Enchantment and Disenchantment: Love and Illusion in Chinese Literature (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1993), pp 79–81.

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major hand in reworking this tune of Central Asian provenance. 30 Some Tang and Song legends do ascribe a divine origin to the melody of “Rainbow Skirts,” but in these accounts it is Emperor Minghuang who hears it being performed by a troupe of celestial maidens in a dream and who brings it back to earth from the moon. 31 This legend continued to be a source of theatrical inspiration during the seventeenth century. Zhang Dai’s 張岱 memoir of the late Ming entertainment world describes a private, all-female performance of Emperor Minghuang’s dream voyage to the moon, complete with the kind of spectacular lighting, scenery, and stage effects we seldom associate with Chinese theater in this period. 32 The tableau Zhang Dai described may be related to a scene in Tu Long’s 屠隆 well-known chuanqi, Brush of Stylistic Brilliance (Caihao ji 彩 毫 記 ), composed between 1598 and 1600, in which the emperor, Lady Yang, and the poet Li Bai 李白 are wafted up to the Moon Palace and hear “Rainbow Skirts” performed. This scene was undoubtedly a direct source of inspiration for Hong Sheng, but again in Tu Long’s treatment only the emperor reacts to the music he has just heard. 33 The Old Standard History of the Tang ( Jiu Tangshu ————— 30. The fullest account of the music for “Rainbow Skirts” is Wang Zhuo 王灼, Biji manzhi 碧雞漫志 (in Zhongguo gudian xiqu lunzhu jicheng 中國古典戲曲論著 集成, vol 1. [Beijing: Zhongguo xiqu chubanshe, 1982]), a twelfth-century work. The earliest source is Bai Juyi’s poem “Nishang yuyi ge” 霓裳羽衣歌. As the Biji manzhi itself notes, the available earlier sources do not give a uniform picture of what the music was like. The most extensive modern study of “Rainbow Skirts” is Endō Jitsuo 遠藤實夫, “Chōgon ka” kenkyū 長恨歌研究 (Tokyo: Kensetsusha, 1935), pp. 367–88. 31. Yao Shi, Yang Taizhen waizhuan, pp. 131–32. For the popularity of this legend during the Tang, see Changsheng dian jianzhu 長生殿箋注, ed. Takemura Noriyuki 竹村則行 and Kang Baocheng 康保成 (Zhengzhou: Zhongzhou guji chubanshe, 1999), Scene 12, pp. 82–83n10. 32. For the description of the spectacular production of “Emperor Minghuang’s Trip to the Moon,” see Zhang Dai’s 張岱 essay “Liu Huiji nüxi” 劉暉吉女戲 in his Tao’an mengyi / Xihu mengxun 陶菴夢憶/西湖夢尋 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1982), 5.49. Translated in Faye Chunfang Fei, Chinese Theories of Theater and Performance (Ann Arbor: Michigan University Press, 1999), pp. 71–72. Although Zhang did not mention “Rainbow Skirts” in his description, since the piece was an integral part of the legend concerning the emperor’s visit to the Moon, it is likely that it figured in the performance. 33. Tu Long 屠隆, Caihao ji 彩毫記, in Guben xiqu congkan, chuji 古本戲曲叢刊 初集 (Shanghai: Shanghai guji chubanshe, 1954), Scene 15 (“Youwan yuegong” 游玩 月宮). Xu Lin’s preface to Changsheng dian critiques Caihao ji as one of the precursors to Hong Sheng’s play (p. 259).

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舊唐書) credits Lady Yang with a knowledge of music, and many Tang poems depict her skill as a dancer, but making her the composer of “Rainbow Skirts” was entirely Hong Sheng’s innovation. 34 In thinking about this shift and how it remakes Lady Yang into the artistically talented, creative heroine required in Chinese romantic comedy, particularly after The Peony Pavilion, we should bear in mind that Hong Sheng himself was involved with a prominent circle of literary women in Hangzhou, which included both his wife (who was skilled at music as well as poetry), his concubine (a talented singer), and his daughter (who wrote a colophon for The Peony Pavilion). 35 His only other extant dramatic work, Four Fair Ladies (Si chanjuan 四嬋娟), which consists of four one-act plays in northern style (zaju 雜劇), each of which focuses on a famous female poet or painter from history, also attests to his keen interest in the fashionable figure of the talented woman. 36 Superficially at least, Scene 12 in Palace of Lasting Life (“Fashioning the Score”) occupies the same position as the famous self-portrait scene in The Peony Pavilion, in which the heroine Du Liniang paints her own likeness as recalled from a dream and inscribes the picture with a quatrain of her own composition. Like the self-portrait, Lady Yang’s version of the score is instrumental in imbuing the heroine with subjectivity and turning her into a culturally privileged “author” in accord with seventeenth-century taste. But consider the complex nature of Lady Yang’s “authorship” of “Rainbow Skirts,” music overheard in a dream, which is not only written down but also altered by her for the better in the course of her ————— 34. See Takemura and Kang, Changsheng dian jianzhu, Scene 12, p. 83n10, for a discussion of these points. One Song dynasty source characterizes Lady Yang as being able to compose music but does not credit her with “Rainbow Skirts.” 35. Zhang Peiheng, Hong Sheng nianpu, pp. 18–19, 219–20. On this circle of Hangzhou literary women, which included members of the Banana Garden society, see Dorothy Ko, Teachers of the Inner Chambers (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 1994), pp. 234–50; my “Shared Dreams: The Story of the Three Wives’ Commentary on The Peony Pavilion,” Harvard Journal of Asiatic Studies 54, no. 1 ( July 1994): 148–49; and Wilt Idema and Beata Grant, The Red Brush: Writing Women of Imperial China (Cambridge, MA.: Harvard Asia Center Publications, 2004), pp. 471–92. 36. Ay-ling Wang, “The Artistry of Hong Sheng’s Changshengdian,” pp. 51–52. Si chanjuan survives only in a single manuscript copy; for a facsimile reprint, see Qingren zaju 清人雜劇, ed. Zheng Zhenduo 鄭振鐸 (1936); for a modern typeset edition, see Ming Qing zaju juan 明清雜劇卷, ed. Dai Shen 戴申 (Beijing: Huaxia chubanshe, 2000).

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transcription. Again, recall how musical composition functioned in Chinese opera, in which there was no “composer” per se, at least in the sense we understand this job in European opera as the author of music; instead, pre-existing tunes were adapted by the playwright-composer to suit the dramatic and structural purposes of the play, so that one is always in the position of writing new words to music that is already somehow “out there.” 37 This in fact is how Hong Sheng described his own efforts in the opening scene, “Outlining the Play” (“Chuan’gai” 傳概), which, according to chuanqi convention, announces the playwright’s intentions and summarizes the plot of the play: “And we have borrowed Lady Yang’s history and set it to music with new lyrics to the tune of love, and nothing more” 38 吾儕取義翻宮徵。借太真外傳 譜新詞，情而已. Lady Yang uses the same terms fan (翻, “to set to music”) and pu (譜, “to score,” “a score”) in conjunction with the adjective xin (新, “new”) to describe how she fashions the score in Scene 12: “I intend to write a new score ( fan xinpu) to while away the long summer days” 擬翻新譜消長夏 (p. 60), and, as she announces later in the scene: “I have finished notating the new piece” ( pu cheng xin qu 譜成新曲) (p. 61), strongly suggesting that this scene can be interpreted reflexively as a miniature of the playwright-composer’s own labor in crafting his opera. Before Lady Yang begins work on the score in this scene, she explains the significance of the “Rainbow Skirts” dream in terms of her own rivalry with Lady Mei (Mei fei 梅妃) for the emperor’s favor. Tradition cast the legendary Lady Mei as a poet and a composer, and she is portrayed as such in The Startled Swan ( Jinghong ji 驚鴻記), an important sixteenth-century play about the An Lushan rebellion cast————— 37. Bell Yung (Cantonese Opera, p. 3) terms this a main characteristic of Chinese opera. The arrangement Kong Shangren describes for his first chuanqi, Xiao hulei, in which he provided the dramatic plot and structure and his friend Gu Cai provided the music and lyrics for the arias, sounds something like the familiar division of labor in Western opera between composer and librettist, although of course it is not identical (see Kong Shangren’s fanli to Taohua shan). 38. My translation of this passage has been influenced by Stephen Owen’s translation in An Anthology of Chinese Literature (New York: Norton, 1996), p. 975: “And we have taken Tai-zhen’s story, / new lyrics, new score / which is love, and nothing more.” Owen has translated nineteen or so scenes of the play, which far surpass in accuracy and quality the only complete English translation of the play, Yang Hsien-yi and Gladys Yang, The Palace of Eternal Youth (Beijing: Foreign Languages Press, 1980).

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ing Lady Mei as the female lead, to which Hong Sheng was also deeply indebted. 39 As Lady Yang puts it in an extended passage of dialogue and song, as she follows the stage instructions to “act out fashioning the score” (zuo zhipu jie 作製譜介): It’s just that the emperor has so lavishly praised the “Startled Swan” dance that Lady Mei composed. I’ve been wanting to compose a melody of my own to best hers. In the midst of deliberating over what to choose, last night I suddenly dreamed that I went up into the Moon Palace, where from beneath the cassia tree, I saw a group of immortal maidens costumed in white jackets and red skirts. The music they played was sublime! When I awoke, I could still recollect the melody and rhythm vividly. . . . (Sings to the tune “Shuazi dai furong”:) Lotus scent floods the silk-covered window, as I slowly smooth out the phoenix-patterned paper, and lightly take up my brush of rhinoceros horn. Proceeding to score the pure tones from the Moon, I delicately reveal my own heart’s inspiration. Even though this tune derives from the Moon Palace, there are some excessive shifts in the music. I still need to apply some serious scrutiny to those places where the melody twists most subtly. (Sings:) The placement of each word must be adjusted in accordance with the rules, each stanza must harmonize and blend together. These few notes still require some fine tuning—they’re out of sync with the rhythm. How can I make them fit? (From offstage comes the trill of an oriole. The female lead performs the gesture of listening while holding her brush.) Ah, how marvelous! (She performs the gesture of correcting the score.) (sings) Listen to the palace oriole: each note perfectly accords with the clapper’s meter. (Throws down her brush) The score is finished!

————— 39. On the Mei Fei legend and the influence of Jinghong ji on Changsheng dian, see Takemura Noriyuki 竹村則行, Yō Kihi bungaku shi kenkyū 楊貴妃文学史研究 (Tokyo: Kenbun shuppan, 2003).

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只有梅妃驚鴻一舞，聖上時常誇獎。思欲另只製一曲，掩出其上。正在推 敲，昨夜忽然夢入月宮。見桂樹之下，仙女數人，素衣紅裳，奏樂甚美。 醒來追憶，音節宛然。。。。 [刷子帶芙蓉] [刷子序] 荷氣滿窗綃，鸞牋慢伸犀管輕拏， 待譜他月裏清音， 細吐我心上靈芽。這聲調雖出月宮，其間轉移過度，細微曲折之處，須索 自加細審。 安插，一字字要調停如法，一段段須融和入化。 這幾聲尚欠調 匀，拍个个个怎下？(内作驚啼，旦執筆聽介)呀，妙阿！ (作改介)[玉芙蓉] 聽宮 鶯，數聲恰好應紅牙。(擱筆介)譜已製完 ！ (p. 61)

Although Scene 11 began with Chang’e, the Goddess of the Moon, announcing that she has summoned Lady Yang’s dreaming soul to the lunar precincts because she wants to send the music of “Rainbow Skirts” down to earth, Scene 12 portrays the dream, and by extension the music, as the fruit of Lady Yang’s own desire and inspiration. Here is another example of the richness afforded in Chinese traditional thought—what we would call supernatural and psychological explanations are not mutually exclusive. The play can therefore present Lady Yang’s composition of “Rainbow Skirts” both as externally transmitted through divine intervention and as the product of her own inner consciousness and creativity. Since by Hong Sheng’s time, the music for “Rainbow Skirts” had already been lost for at least eight hundred years, he had considerable freedom in imagining how to portray this celebrated piece, although there were some historical guidelines to aid him. 40 “Rainbow Skirts” was revered as the most famous example of Tang daqu 大曲, a grand genre of court entertainment, which Rulan Pian has characterized as a kind of “dance suite with vocal accompaniment.” 41 Daqu was supposed to consist of three sections: an instrumental overture (sanqu 散序), a middle movement focused on song (zhongxu 中序), and a finale focused

————— 40. Jiang Kui’s 姜夔 Baishi daoren gequ 白石道人歌曲 of 1202 gives words and musical notation for a song entitled “Nishang zhongxu diyi” 霓裳中序第一, but the music was composed by a contemporary poet, Fan Chengda 范成大, and the lyrics were presumably by Jiang Kui himself. Hong Sheng would not have known the music, however, since Jiang Kui’s score was rediscovered and republished only in 1743; “the earliest attempt to decipher the popular notation in this book” was not undertaken until 1777. For a discussion and musical transcription of this piece, see Rulan Chao Pian, Sonq Dynasty Musical Sources and Their Interpretation (Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1967), pp. 33–36, 104–5. 41. Pian, Sonq Dynasty Sources, p. 73.

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on dance ( po 破). 42 The Tang and Song dynasty accounts of performances of “Rainbow Skirts,” with which Hong Sheng was familiar, describe only instrumental music and dance, however. They uniformly omit any mention of vocal accompaniment, and no Tang song lyrics for the suite were ever passed down. Nonetheless, throughout the play, Hong Sheng accepts the characterization of “Rainbow Skirts” as song and dance, based both on his understanding of the Tang genre of daqu and the demands of the operatic form in which he wrote. In the depiction above, Lady Yang seems chiefly to be setting the music to words, that is, “fashioning a score” (zhipu 製譜) as a chuanqi playwright would do. The task of the chuanqi playwright in “fashioning the score,” as one recent Chinese reference work defines this technical term, is “to adjust pre-existing tune patterns to fit the content, word pitch, and pronunciation of a set of lyrics in order to make the melodic contour of the old tune fit tightly with the new lyrics while preserving the melodic core.” 43 This definition comes close to describing what Lady Yang is doing in this scene, as she adjusts “the placement of each word according to the rules” (presumably set forth in a qu pu 曲譜, a manual for crafting dramatic arias), and as she “harmonizes” each stanza with the music. The scene dramatizes one moment in the process of ironing out discrepancies—Lady Yang’s correction of a place in the music that “is out of sync with the rhythm.” Pai qi 拍个个个, the obscure musical term Hong Sheng employs here, refers to the beat falling too soon or too late, and it is listed in seventeenth-century manuals as a technical fault to be avoided when fitting words to music in a dramatic aria. 44 By employing this piece of jargon, by including this scene at all, Hong Sheng suggests the extent to which Lady Yang’s effort is meant to evoke the creative process of the playwright-composer in fashioning a chuanqi. ————— 42. A further distinction is that percussion was absent from the overture but was added in the second and third parts, presumably to facilitate the singing and dancing. The scholarship on daqu is considerable. For a brief definition, see Zhongguo yinyue cidian 中國音樂詞典 (Beijing: Renmin yinyue chubanshe, 1984), p. 67. For a more extensive discussion, see Yang Yinliu楊蔭瀏, Zhongguo gudai yinyue shigao 中國古代音樂史稿 (Beijing: Renmin yinyue chubanshe, 1987), 1: 221–24. 43. Zhongguo quxue dacidian 中國曲學大辭典, ed. Qi Senhua 齊森華 et al. (Hangzhou: Zhejiang jiaoyu chubanshe, 1997), p. 692. 44. Wang Jide defines the term in “Lun banyan” 論板眼, in Wang Jide Qulü, p. 109.

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Hong Sheng employs musical jargon more extensively in Scene 16 (“Dancing on a Disk”) right before the performance of “Rainbow Skirts” at the imperial banquet. Again, this language of connoisseurship is put in Lady Yang’s mouth, and again the virtuoso display of technical language serves to reinforce Lady Yang’s identity as first and foremost the composer-author of the piece, who is not only the choreographer and performer of the dance to follow, but an expert on the complexities of the music. As she explains to the emperor: This suite consists of an overture in six sections; here the tempo is slow and relaxed rather than moderate. The middle movement also consists of six sections; here the tempo is moderate, but there is still no acceleration. These movements of the piece are not yet suitable for dancing. (Sings to the tune “Baxian hui penghai” with a variant opening:) Instead, the notes of the song float out, splendid and exhilarating. The singing will stop the colored clouds from drifting, as the lingering tones wind round the painted rafters. 45 As for the three sections of “Feather Robes,” these are called the “Embellished Accompaniment” (shizou 飾奏). 46 Every note, every word, contains movement for the dance. There are the slow notes, the winding notes, the rolling notes: They must be clear and round, like black pearls on a string. There is the entrance to the finale, the development, and conclusion. So fitting for a thousand different graceful poses on the performance rug. And that’s not all: there are the “Daoist harmonics” (Daohe 道和) and the “ornamented variations” (huafan 花犯); 47 there are also the adjacent beat, the alternating beat, the accelerated beat, and the snatched beat.

————— 45. An allusion to an anecdote in Liezi 列子 about the vocal prowess of a female singer; even three days later, the aftertones of her song could still be heard “winding around the rafters.” “Floating” and “cloud-stopping” are poetic clichés for beautiful singing. Although this segment of the aria does not directly employ the word “song” or “singing,” these allusions and clichés make it clear that Lady Yang is describing the singing in the first two movements before describing the dancing in the third movement. 46. Zeng Yongyi 曾永義, whose annotations on the technical musical terms in this scene are the most detailed, explains shizou as referring to the accelerated tempo and increased complexity of the dance music in the final movement. See his complete edition of the play in Zhongguo gudian xiju xuanzhu 中國古典戲劇選注 (Taipei: Guojia chubanshe, 1985), p. 620. 47. My translations of these two obscure, perhaps even invented terms, are guesses. During the Tang, religious music, both of the Daoist and of the Buddhist

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So many resonances arise along with the slow dance, expressed together with the languorous song. 此曲散序六奏，只有歇拍而無流拍。 中序六奏，有流拍而無促拍，其時未 有舞態。[八仙會蓬海] [換頭] 只是悠揚，聲情俊爽。 要停住彩雲飛繞虹梁. 至羽衣三疊，名曰飾奏。一聲一字， 都將舞態含藏。 其間有慢聲，有纏聲， 有滾聲， 應清圓驪珠一串， 有入破，又攤破，有出破， 合嬝娜氍毹千狀。 還有花犯，有道和， 有旁拍， 有間拍， 有催拍， 有偷拍，多音響， 皆與 慢舞相生，緩歌交暢。 (pp. 85–86)

Lady Yang’s discourse on music shows off the erudition not only of her character but of Hong Sheng himself. Rather than reflecting contemporary music practice, Lady Yang’s speech is mainly a learned pastiche of terms drawn from the sources on Tang music available in Hong Sheng’s day (although its patter-like form also evokes lists of arcane musical terms in connoisseurship texts on opera). 48 As Wu Yiyi commented: “Her exhaustive discussion covers the interesting aspects of the song and dance but it also incorporates factual records about ‘Rainbow Skirts’ ” 論歌舞極盡情致。霓裳實錄在其中 (Nuanhong shi, 1.63b). 49 The emperor is suitably impressed: “You have described all the fine points of the song and dance” and commands the Pear Garden Ensemble “to play the music according to the score.” 50 The emperor’s role here as the ultimate arbiter of musical knowledge echoes his earlier role in Scene 12, where coming upon Lady Yang’s newly finished score, he marvels that not a single note is out of place and declares it to be “the most amazing piece of music produced in a thousand years” 真乃千古

————— variety, was incorporated into secular court entertainment, such as daqu. I therefore interpret dao 道 here to mean “Daoist” in musical origin. The term fan 犯 (violation) is used in descriptions of Tang music for modal and melodic variation. See Zhongguo yinyue cidian, entries under daoqu 道曲 (p. 73) and fandiao 犯調 (p. 101). 48. Such as the lists of technical terms provided in Wang Jide’s “Lun banyan,” in Wang Jide Qulü, pp. 108–11. 49. Takemura and Kang’s (Changsheng dian jianzhu, pp.121–22) annotations to this scene demonstrate not only how much technical jargon Hong Sheng borrowed from these sources, particularly Biji manzhi, but also how Hong Sheng freely adapted, altered, and invented jargon to suit his own needs. 50. Trans. Owen, Anthology of Chinese Literature, p. 1025; Changsheng dian, p. 86.

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奇音 (p. 62). Lady Yang modestly protests that the score is only a hasty draft with many mistakes and asks him to help her correct it. In a lovely, romantic moment, the stage is emptied and the couple sit side by side, editing the music together. Classical Chinese abounds in expressions that depict conjugal love in musical terms. For instance, the phrase “lute and zither” (qinse 琴瑟) denotes deep harmony between a couple; 51 a widower is someone whose lute string has broken (duanxian 斷絃); his remarriage is “rejoining the lute string” (xuxian 續絃), and so on. Throughout the first half of the play, Hong Sheng fully exploits this rich metaphoric subtext to represent the love between the emperor and Lady Yang. Theirs is a fully musical relationship, one that involves not only reading scores together and discussing the finer points of music, but also performing duets together. (Of course, on another level, as the leads in a chuanqi, the two actors spend most of their time together on stage singing to one another.) In Scene 24 (“Startled by Revolt” [“Jingbian” 驚變]), the supreme happiness—and decadence—of their life together is captured in a joint performance of “phenomenal music,” to use Abbate’s term again. At the emperor’s request, Lady Yang sings a lyric by the famous court poet Li Bai and beats time on the clappers while the emperor accompanies her on a jade flute. 52 (This works particularly well since the flute is the leading instrument in a kunqu orchestra and the sound of the flute caressing the vocal line is probably the most distinctive feature of the kunqu operatic style.) Afterward, the emperor, in his delight and excitement, toasts Lady Yang and forces her to have one cup too many. The mood is abruptly shattered by the thunder of drums offstage—a ————— 51. Li Yu 李漁 glosses this phrase and sketches an idyllic scene of musical conjugal bliss in his section on musical training for women in his Xianqing ouji 閒情 偶記 (Hangzhou: Zhejiang guji chubanshe, 1999), 3.137. A poem written for Hong Sheng by a friend paints just such a fetching picture of Hong Sheng’s musical and domestic harmony, in which the husband is busy writing a new score for “Rainbow Skirts,” while his wife plays a stringed instrument and his concubine sings: 丈夫工 顧曲，霓裳按圖新。大婦和冰絃，小婦調朱唇. The poem is by Jiang Jingqi 蔣景祁 and is cited in Zhang Peiheng, Hong Sheng nianpu, p. 222n4. On the basis of this and other poems, Fu Xueyi (Kunqu yinyue xinshang mantan, p. 109) speculates that Hong Sheng’s wife and concubine provided practical assistance to him in working out the music for his opera by being on hand to play it for him. 52. The lyric is rewritten so it conforms to a qupai 曲牌 and could be sung as an aria.

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literal re-enactment of Bai Juyi’s couplet, “War drums from Yuyang shook the earth / and shattered the tune of ‘Rainbow Skirts, Feather Robes.’ ” To underscore this point, the couplet is recited by the messenger who enters at this very moment to announce that rebellion has broken out. Since, in current abridged stagings of the play, Scene 24 (“Startled by Rebellion”) and Scene 16 (“Dancing on a Disk”) are often elided, the interrupted court music actually is that of “Rainbow Skirts” rather than Li Bai’s lyric. 53 But the use of musical pairings in Hong Sheng’s lengthy original play is far more complex and extensive. The grand court performance of “Rainbow Skirts” displays the public and glorious side of the couple’s “harmonious” relationship; in contrast, the couple’s duet of Li Bai’s lyric reveals the private, intimate artistry of their love. These two instances of music making, especially the court performance of “Rainbow Skirts,” although idealized in the play, are also criticized, not only through the obvious acoustic contrast with the “war drums from Yuyang” but also through the subtler one with a fortuneteller’s lowly song in Scene 15 (“Presenting Lychees” [“Jin guo” 進果]). Interjected between the rehearsal for “Rainbow Skirts” and its court performance, Scene 15 exposes the havoc that the emperor’s absorption in his love for Lady Yang unwittingly unleashes on the country. A shipment of lychees he has ordered for Lady Yang’s birthday (which corresponds with the date set for the premiere of “Rainbow Skirts”) results in the death of an old blind fortuneteller, who is trampled to death by the envoy in his rush to get the fruit to the capital in time. In this scene, Hong Sheng inserts another duet by a couple, but one from the very bottom of society, so that his critique is woven into the musical fabric of the play. The blind fortuneteller makes his entrance “holding a bamboo clapper,” accompanied by his blind wife, who is “plucking a guitar” (p. 79). The opening aria he sings follows the dramatic convention of providing a self-introduction to the audience, but as a fortuneteller’s ditty advertising his skills to drum up a clientele along the road, it is also a clear instance of “phenomenal” song, intended to be heard by characters in the play. But this song—or more to the point, its silencing under the hooves of the envoy’s horse—cannot ————— 53. This is the case in both performances I have seen, one held at the Suzhou Kunqu festival in the spring of 2000, the other a videotaped performance by the Beijing Kun Opera Troupe.

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be heard in the confines of the imperial court, preoccupied with preparations for the “Rainbow Skirts” premiere. Nor, of course, can the rumblings of rebellion from the border. Given this critique of imperial power, it is significant that at the premiere in Scene 16, the emperor is not content with his designated function as chief audience for the piece but insists on joining in as a percussionist too. An early twentieth-century woodblock illustration of this scene executed in an earlier style (Fig. 1) is excellent for imagining how the emperor would simultaneously occupy the positions of both audience and instrumentalist. The regular orchestra is seated in front of the rug that designates the stage, with Lady Yang toward the back of the rug dancing on her disk. The emperor sits on the platform behind her beating a drum in front of a screen, not with the orchestra on the rug. He occupies an elevated position (shangzuo 上座, as it is designated in the stage directions) not only because he is the emperor but because he is occupying the honored spectator’s position at a private theatrical. Illustrations of drama in Chinese playtexts seldom depict a scene as it was performed on stage but simply illustrate the plot or the action of a scene in the same way as a novel; illustrations that accompany scenes that feature “plays within plays” are some of the exceptions because here the theatrical spectacle is part of the action. A second illustration (Fig. 2) is particularly valuable for helping us understand the spatial arrangement in “Dancing on a Disk” because it appears in a pictorial autobiography (nianpu tushi 年譜圖詩) rather than being an illustration made to accompany a playtext. The illustration is a picture of a performance by You Tong’s household troupe of his play Celestial Court Music at a banquet held in the 1660s in honor of his father. The basic spatial arrangement in this picture is similar to the illustration of “Dancing on a Disk.” The honored guests—the playwright and his father—are seated at the back of the hall in front of a screen (although in this case there are additional guests seated on all sides). The actors occupy the middle ground (there is no rug demarcating the stage here), and the orchestra is placed in the foreground below them. The presence of an internal audience on stage who stands in for us, the real audience, is often taken as one of the chief markers of a meta-theatrical scene. In “Dancing on a Disk” and even more strongly in the earlier scene “Stealing the Melody,” this internal audience shifts

Fig. 1 Early Republican woodblock illustration of Scene 16, “Dancing on a Disk” (“Wupan” 舞盤) (source: Changsheng dian, Nuanhong shi edition, 1919), 1.61b.

Fig. 2 Illustration from You Tong 尤侗, Nianpu tushi 年譜圖詩 (source: Xitang yuji 西堂餘集, ce 冊 20, 9b, in idem, Xitang quanji 西堂全集, Qing edition, Regenstein Library, University of Chicago).

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roles, becoming in turn a participant in the performance, listener and player at once. In this vein, the staging in “Stealing the Melody” is particularly ingenious. The Pear Garden Ensemble has convened for a moonlit rehearsal of “Rainbow Skirts.” Li Mo, an expert on music and a skilled flutist unaffiliated with the court, has gotten wind that a marvelous new piece has been created within the palace, but since the “secret score” is unobtainable, he stealthily positions himself outside the palace wall to eavesdrop on the musicians. (The stage directions instruct that a red curtain be hung to represent the wall.) The entire scene is portrayed through Li Mo’s eyes—or rather ears. He pulls out his flute and secretly harmonizes along with the palace singers and orchestra, reinforcing his playing with a sung refrain: “And the mind, in a flash, has learned the notes.” 54 They are deaf to his music, but we, of course, are not, especially because here again, Hong Sheng brilliantly makes the musical signature of kunqu opera—the flute/vocal combination—into an explicit part of the dramatic illusion. Li Mo’s main aim through this act is not to make music but to steal the music, “memorizing” each note with his flute, with his body, to capture the inaccessible score. This moment more forcefully than anywhere else in the play shows a fantasy of musical performance as a form of embodied writing. Wu Yiyi’s comments cite with approval an elaboration on the staging of this scene, which explicitly brings out this subtext: “I’ve heard that when the Ye household troupe in Suzhou performs this scene, outside the red wall they add a weeping willow shading a perforated garden rock. Li sits there playing his flute and taking notes with a brush at the same time” (Nuanhong shi, 1.54a–b). The notion that memorization of music, as a form of internal appropriation, involves some sort of bodily theft, even in the case of an “authorized” transmission, is also implied in Scene 11. After the highly condensed performance of “Rainbow Skirts” in her dream (the whole suite is conveyed to her over the duration of a single aria), Lady Yang sings of her technique for capturing the music: “I steal [the rhythm for] each word with a light tap of my phoenix slipper / and I memorize calculations for the notes with my finger tips” 將鳳鞋輕點，按宮商掐 ————— 54. Trans. Owen, Anthology of Chinese Literature, pp. 1012–13; Changsheng dian, p. 74.

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記指尖兒 (p. 56). 55 This physical memory is what enables her to transcribe the score—to transfer oral music to written form—in the subsequent scene.

3 Kunqu performance practice in Hong Sheng’s day did not have extended instrumental interludes without vocal accompaniment. In this respect, seventeenth-century kunqu differed not only from European opera but even from Peking Opera and from current stagings of kunqu in China. 56 The requirement that all major musical passages in kunqu be sung to words naturally shaped the playwright’s conception and organization of his chuanqi; the need to supply a steady stream of lyrics and dialogue at all times, also, of course, facilitated the playtext’s independent existence as reading material. In the case of “Rainbow Skirts,” the need for Hong Sheng to portray each of the four performances in Palace of Lasting Life through the medium of sung lyrics introduces a considerable amount of ambiguity, since in Chinese drama, arias may not only further the action and express the characters’ inner feelings but also describe what is simultaneously unfolding on stage. Are the lyrics sung by the performers during the performances of “Rainbow Skirts” meant to be taken simply as descriptions of what is going on and therefore part of the operatic medium only? Or are the lyrics also meant to be understood as “phenomenal” song and therefore part of “Rainbow Skirts” itself? In his multiple renderings of “Rainbow Skirts,” Hong Sheng was not striving for what we might today call a “realistic” or “mimetic” representation of a piece of music, one that would be recognizable by a listening audience or reading public as the same “phenomenal” music ————— 55. This line probably alludes to the technique of hand mnemonics, which was applied to music and many other disciplines such as medicine and divination in China; see Marta Hanson, “ ‘Understanding Is Within One’s Grasp’ (Liaoran zaiwo): Hand Mnemonics in Classical Chinese Medicine” (unpublished paper presented at The Disunity of Chinese Science Conference, University of Chicago, May 10–12, 2002). 56 . Independent instrumental interludes in Peking opera and other posteighteenth-century operatic styles are called guomen 過門, but such interludes were never used in earlier operatic styles such as kunqu (Zhongguo dabaike quanshu: xiqu, quyi 中國大百科全書:戲曲曲藝 [Beijing: Zhongguo baike quanshu chubanshe, 1983], p. 103).

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performed from scene to scene. Given the kinds of formal prosodic and musical constraints governing the arrangement of individual scenes in chuanqi, it is highly doubtful whether repeating a fixed tune with fixed lyrics in different scenes would have been possible, much less desirable, and there was certainly no concept of a leitmotiv, of a recurring musical theme with a literary referent, for him to draw upon. Instead, Hong Sheng took full advantage of the freedom to imagine different, rather than recurring, performances of “Rainbow Skirts” and to vary the dramatic and musical setup for each occasion. 57 The historical descriptions of “Rainbow Skirts” as a long suite divided into different movements aided him in this goal. On one level, there is no direct overlap between specific performances of “Rainbow Skirts” in the play because the same segment of the suite is never repeated. The two earthly performances, the rehearsal in Scene 14 and the court production in Scene 16, are explicitly discussed in the dialogue as different movements, the overture to “Rainbow Skirts” in the former, and the second segment of “Feather Robes” in the latter. The conceit that “Rainbow Skirts” and “Feather Robes” are the names of distinct movements of the piece, rather than an omnibus name for all sections of the piece, is entirely Hong Sheng’s invention. For the lunar dream sequence in Scene 11 and the rehearsal in Scene 14, Hong Sheng was content to write new lyrics to established tune patterns, but in the case of the grand court performance in Scene 16 and the triumphant lunar finale in Scene 50, he utilized the main technique at an aria writer’s disposal to create new tunes: the method of jiqu 集曲 (composite tune making), which involved piecing together individual lines from separate but musically compatible tune patterns to create a “patchwork melody” with a new title. 58 Most commonly, the new title was a composite itself, consisting of a character taken from each of the ————— 57. Isabel Wong, who has transcribed into Western musical notation the gongchi 工尺 score provided for Palace of Lasting Life in Ye Tang’s 葉堂 Nashuying qupu 納書楹曲譜 (published 1794), confirmed for me that the music for each of the “Rainbow Skirts” performances in the play is utterly distinct. 58. For a definition of the jiqu “composite” compositional method, see Marjory Bong-ray Liu, “Tradition and Change in Kunqu Opera” (Ph.D. diss., UCLA, 1976), pp. 64–65, 67; and Zhongguo quxue dacidian, p. 699. “Patchwork melodies” is Pian’s term in Sonq Dynasty Musical Sources, p. 36. For a detailed demonstration of this technique, see Luo Jintang 羅錦堂, “Lun daiguo qu yu jiqu” 論帶過曲與集曲, in idem, Jintang lunqu 錦堂論曲 (Taipei: Lianjing chuban, 1977), pp. 478–93.

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titles of three or so of the cannibalized tune patterns. In these two cases, however, Hong Sheng gave the composite tunes titles based on their content and function in the play: “The Second Segment of ‘Feather Robes’ ” (Yuyi di’er die 羽衣第二疊) in Scene 16, and “The Third Segment of ‘Feather Robes’ ” (Yuyi disan die 羽衣第三疊) in Scene 50. 59 By restoring a literary significance to the ordinarily “empty” signifier of a tune title, Hong Sheng not only fosters the reader’s fantasy that here are bona fide portions of the lost “Rainbow Skirts” suite but reinforces the structural echoing between these two climactic scenes, even as he insists on their differences. Although the performance in Scene 50 carries the tune label of “The Third Segment of ‘Feather Skirts,’ ” the dramatic action announces it as “a run-through of the song and dance of ‘Rainbow Skirts, Feather Robes’ ” (p. 255) and not simply as a section of the suite as in Scene 16. 60 This, then, is a major distinction between the lunar and earthly productions of “Rainbow Skirts” in the play: the former are portrayed as full-length performances; the latter only as “excerpts.” Of course, since each of the four performances occupies only a portion of each scene, in practice Hong Sheng had to utilize a highly metonymic technique for all of them. Still, within the imaginary realm of the play, he builds in a temporal disjunction between the performing possibilities of the two worlds. It is as though the temporal constraints that normally govern performance, which dictated that long productions had to be performed sequentially over a period of days to be complete, operate only on earth; performance in the timeless eternity of the Moon is free from such constraints. In this and other respects, the differences between the two court performances of “Rainbow Skirts,” on earth in Scene 16 and on the Moon in Scene 50, are also underscored in the play. Wu Yiyi was quite ————— 59. The two “Feather Skirts” sets of arias are by no means the only instances in Palace of Lasting Life in which Hong Sheng employed the composite tune method, nor even the only instances when the new title he bestowed reflects the function or content of an aria. For instance, in Scene 16, the title for the composite tune following “The Second Movement of ‘Feather Skirts’ ” is “The Thousand-Year Dance of ‘Rainbow Skirts’ ” (“Qianqiu wu Nishang” 千秋舞霓裳; Changsheng dian, p. 87). The fullest analyses of qupai in the play are Zeng Yongyi’s 曾永義 annotations to the play in Zhongguo gudian xiju. 60. The Weaving Girl goddess, who presides over the action, commands the immortal maidens to go through the performance of “Rainbow Skirts, Feather Robes”: 把霓裳羽衣歌舞一番.

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explicit on this point in his comments on the performance in Scene 16: “This aria only describes the perfection and superlative beauty of Lady Yang’s dancing. It is not the transcendent music of ‘Rainbow Skirts’ from the Moon. Only in the ‘Reunion on the Moon’ scene, in the arias performed by the immortal maidens, do you get that music” (Nuanhong shi, 1.64b–65a). Dance is clearly the specific focus of Scene 16 (“Dancing on a Disk”), but it is also important in the two other performances of “Rainbow Skirts” in the play, written into both the stage directions and the lyrics of the arias. (Scene 14, which is only a rehearsal of the orchestra, includes no dance.) Stylized dance-like movements were part of the theatrical repertoire of gesture that accompanied singing on the Chinese stage, but the performances of “Rainbow Skirts” are instances of what we could call “phenomenal” dance; movements that are understood literally as “dance” by the characters on stage and by us, the offstage public. But in kunqu, dance is always something extra: it is not an integral part of the textual and musical medium that gives an opera its existence. As such, the uses of phenomenal dance in Palace of Lasting Life are comparatively simple and straightforward. Such is not the case with song. All four performances of “Rainbow Skirts” are preceded by stage directions or explicit instructions in the dialogue that call for the performers to sing the lyrics in question. In the lunar dream sequence, a bevy of immortal maidens enter holding musical instruments and singing; the rehearsal scene has Lady Yang’s maids Yongxin 永新 61 and Niannu 念奴 sing to accompany the Pear Garden Ensemble; Yongxin and Niannu sing again along with other court musicians during Lady Yang’s dance to “Feather Robes”; and during the finale, the immortal maidens return again holding instruments and singing. These are all instances of phenomenal song, and yet it seems unlikely that any of the sung lyrics—with the possible exception of the finale—can be taken literally as the actual words to “Rainbow Skirts” in the way, for example, that the Li Bai lyrics Lady Yang sings in Scene 24 are meant as the literal words of his song. Thus we arrive at a seemingly contradictory position in which the performers’ singing is designated part of the performance of “Rainbow ————— 61. According to the account in Wang Zhuo, Biji manzhi, 1.111, the historical Yongxin was the most famous female singer and composer in Emperor Minghuang’s court.

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Skirts,” yet the lyrics they sing are not necessarily the literal words of “Rainbow Skirts.” This conception of “Rainbow Skirts” also applies to Lady Yang’s “fashioning of the score” in Scene 12: there are no actual lyrics to “Rainbow Skirts” for her to set to music, yet the scene is written, as I have argued, as though she were scoring the vocal text of an aria.

4 In the last part of this chapter, I take up the reflexive relationship of music and narrative in the play by returning to Lady Yang’s composition of the score of “Rainbow Skirts.” Recall that when Lady Yang was pondering how to correct some infelicities in the meter, she found inspiration in the fortuitous trill of a palace oriole, which supplied the rhythmic pattern she needed. I explained this incident as showing that Lady Yang’s fashioning of the score was not mechanical transcription but involved technical mastery of music and creative input on her part. At the same time, however, this conceit shows how the “pure tones of the Moon” are mixed with the earthy sounds of the natural world. One of the extraordinary things in the overall conception of “Rainbow Skirts” in this play is that this hybridization is not conceived as sullying the transcendent music; instead the synthesis is presented as an improvement, an enrichment preferred by the Goddess of the Moon over the original. The point is that “Rainbow Skirts” does not remain a pristine lyrical expression existing in a timeless vacuum on the Moon; subject to change, it becomes a narrative record of Lady Yang’s own experience and a reflexive mirror of the play itself. This narrative component of “Rainbow Skirts” is crucial. In Scene 11, the Goddess of the Moon voices this idea as one reason she is sending “Rainbow Skirts” down to the world, so that “the celestial music of the immortals can remain on earth as a much-told tale” ( jiahua 佳話, also translatable as “legend”; p. 53). Once the tune is disseminated to the mortal world and becomes part of the human condition, it is fundamentally transformed by time and memory. In this sense, the selection of the oriole rather than some other creature to emend the score is significant. The oriole is a symbol of springtime, love, and innocence, and by incorporating its trill, Lady Yang literally writes those halcyon days in the palace into the score. As a text, the score is further altered by the editorial corrections the em-

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peror and Lady Yang make together, registering the material traces of their intimacy and harmony in a readable form. From the outset, the score of “Rainbow Skirts” is associated with Lady Yang’s memories of her own experience. It is, after all, the recollection of her initial dream that leads her to set pen to paper and transcribe the score. The score’s association with memory becomes even stronger in the second half of the play after Lady Yang’s death and the end of Emperor Minghuang’s rule. Memory is the explicit subject of Scene 40 “Immortal Remembrance.” Despite Lady Yang’s new status as an immortal who should be able to transcend the past, her compulsion to remember leads her to retranscribe her lost score of “Rainbow Skirts.” This retranscription is no mechanical copying job either; once again she introduces changes so that her recollection of the tragic outcome of their love also becomes part of the material texture of the score. When Hanhuang 寒簧, 62 the emissary from the Moon Palace, comes to borrow her score, Lady Yang demurs, pointing out that her copy is not fit to submit because she has sullied the score in the painful ————— 62. Hanhuang, whom none of the commentators on the play has been able to identify, is the “spirit” name of Ye Xiaoluan 葉小鸞 (1617–32), a young Suzhou poet, who died on the eve of her marriage. Her family and others came to believe that she had achieved apotheosis after her death and become a transcendent. Her father, Ye Shaoyuan (1589–1648), circulated accounts of séances in which his daughter revealed that her “spirit” name was Hanhuang and that she now held a post in the Moon Palace. The playwright You Tong, who was obsessed with Ye Xiaoluan, had given the name Hanhuang and the same post in the Moon Palace to the female lead in his play of 1655, Celestial Court Music (see my “Spirit Writing and Performance in the Work of You Tong [1618–1704],” T’oung Pao [1998]: 127–29). Ye Xiaoluan’s story was well known but Hong Sheng’s use of this name must derive from You Tong’s play, which deeply influenced the otherworldly fantasy in Palace of Lasting Life. You Tong’s play used the necromantic quest for Lady Yang’s soul in Bai Juyi’s “Song of Lasting Regret” and Chen Hong’s 陳鴻 prose version of it as a template for several fantastic scenes; several other scenes are set in the Moon Palace, including one in which Hanhuang watches Chang’e dance “Rainbow Skirts” at a celestial banquet (Scene 26, 2.32a). These scenes provided inspiration to Hong Sheng in crafting the fantastic parts of his play that had no counterpart in previous dramatic treatments of the Lady Yang legend. You Tong does not mention any such literary debt, however, in the preface he wrote for Palace of Lasting Life at Hong Sheng’s request (reprinted in Cai Yi, Zhongguo gudian xiqu xuba, 3: 1583–84). Zhang Peiheng (Hong Sheng nianpu, pp. 334– 36) dates the preface to 1697, when Hong Sheng was in Suzhou, You Tong’s hometown, to attend a special performance of Palace.

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process of retranscribing it, and she sings: “See how the notes blur into ruin, lines smudged and broken, all stained by tracks of tears.” 63 “It doesn’t matter,” replies the lunar emissary and takes the score away. But it does matter. It is precisely this retranscribed copy with its additions and imperfections, each a memory trace of Lady Yang’s experience, that the goddess wants as the score for the repeat performance of “Rainbow Skirts” in the Moon Palace to bring the play full circle. On earth, although the material score has vanished along with the physical remains of the person who wrote it, the cultural memory of the music persists in the persons of two survivors from the old regime—Li Guinian 李龜年, a former pipa-mandolin player in the Pear Garden Ensemble, now reduced to eking out a living as an itinerant balladeer who performs stories to music, and Li Mo, the flutist who stole the melody. The two refugees meet in Scene 38 (“Popular Ballad” [“Tanci” 彈詞]) when Li Mo happens upon Li Guinian singing the tragic history of Lady Yang and the emperor to amuse a plebeian audience at a temple fair in Nanjing (Fig. 3). This is the prime moment in the play in which the two main temporal orders of historical drama, the past of the story being told and the present of the playwright and audience, are self-consciously superimposed to ironic effect. Once again phenomenal music (rather than a play within a play) is the main vehicle Hong Sheng uses to raise meta-theatrical issues in his opera. The oral genre of prosimetric storytelling to stringed accompaniment that Li Guinian performs in this scene is called tanci 彈詞. This genre, which I translate as “Popular Ballad,” comes into prominence in literary sources only in the sixteenth century, although other prosimetric forms of popular storytelling to music preceded it. 64 Tanci is presented in this scene not only as a lowly music form, a “comedown” for musicians who once performed the exalted music of the court, but also as a “recent” form of entertainment, in contrast to the reimaginings of medieval Tang music that dominate the opera. As one of the vulgar fairgoers, a traveler from Shaanxi played by a painted face role, asks his companion, a whore, played by a clown: “Hey, Sweetie, what kind of tune is he going to sing? Will it be like our country————— 63. Trans. Owen, Anthology of Chinese Literature, p. 1090; Changsheng dian, p. 209. 64. J. D. Schmidt, “T’an-tz’u,” in Indiana Companion, p. 747.

Fig. 3 Illustration of Scene 38, “Popular Ballad” (“Tanci” 彈詞) (source: Shenyin jiangu lu 審音鑒古錄, 1834 edition; image courtesy of the Beihai Branch of the National Library of China).

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western songs?” 他唱的是甚麽曲兒, 可就是喒家的西調麽? And she replies: “Just about” 也差不多兒 (p. 198). Or as another of the fairgoers objects as the ballad is going full swing: “Listening to this old geezer tell how pretty Lady Yang was, it’s so vivid, it actually sounds as though he’d seen her with his own eyes. I reckon it’s nothing but lies” 聽這老 翁說的楊娘娘標致，恁般活現，倒像是親眼見的，敢則謊也. Retorts the traveler from Shaanxi: “As long as what he sings sounds good, who cares if it’s nothing but lies?” 只要唱得好聽，管他謊不謊 (p. 198). These deliberate anachronisms open the door to a whole range of comic deflations of the play’s historical illusionism and reminds the external audience that the nostalgic tale of splendor and fall that the storyteller sings is really meant to evoke memories of the recent trauma of the Ming dynasty’s collapse only a few decades before. The pipa player’s retelling of Lady Yang and the emperor’s story here is doubly reflexive, as music and as narrative, because it reencapsulates in song the main plot of the play on earth up to that point. Central in this retelling is the saga of the tune “Rainbow Skirts,” which dominates the ballad. We are again taken step by step through Lady Yang’s composition and performance of the score, through its interruption and abortion by the “war drums of Yuyang.” We are even shown moments glossed over earlier in the play, such as Lady Yang’s singing of the finished score to instruct her maids: “Unfurling her pure white hand, she beat the scented sandalwood clapper; with her vermillion lips and sparkling teeth, she mouthed each word. The notes of the song were so well-rhymed and in harmony, they were just like black pearls on a string” 舒素拍香檀， 一字字都吐自朱晨皓齒間。恰便似 一串驪珠，聲和韻閒 (p. 199). In this “contemporary” scene, Hong Sheng shows how, as the Goddess of the Moon planned, “Rainbow Skirts” ends up lingering in the world of men as a “much-told tale,” but even more, he shows how the tune, as a microcosm of the play itself, becomes an updated and changing version of the historical events it relates and the music it employs.

“I Don’t Want to Act as Emperor Any More” Finding the Genuine in Peach Blossom Fan

7 Stephen Owen Play within play and performance within performance are resources that dramatic traditions in many cultures have used to explore the boundaries of artifice and to represent (or index) some secondary territory of the genuine or “real.” It is usually discovered that the enemy party has a large and covert presence in each territory: there are artful performances in the realm of the supposed genuine and the policies of the genuine may be carried out under the disguise of artful performance—although it is unclear if the second case, the double negation, merely performing performance, represents the genuine or a third case. Double and triple agents are everywhere. The play itself is the guarantor of the genuine, the “real” world; eventually the actors will leave the stage and take off their costumes, and the audience will go back to a space that is not facing the stage. Theater occurs in bounded spaces and at fixed intervals that should define what is and is not the artifice of the stage. But the theater infects that alternative “real” world with its representations, and soon society too has it “roles,” its “clowns,” and its “tragedies.” Society, even “all the world,” becomes a stage, a theatrum mundi; and “not acting” (troublingly close to nonaction) becomes a hypothetical and edenic state of being often posed as the beginning and end of all action. Then the penetration of the “real” by theatrical artifice can itself return to be itself represented upon the stage, as happens in Peach Blossom Fan (Taohua shan 桃花扇).

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I have cast this relation between theatrical artifice and the “real” world as a political struggle, of warring kingdoms each bent on the subversion and conquest of the other. Peach Blossom Fan takes place on top of an account of just such a war and the collapsing boundary of an overtly theatrical regime, the Southern Ming. The contest between artifice and reality is, in this context, truly political—a struggle for legitimacy and the meaning of legitimacy. Does wearing the crown make the person who wears it a king, or is it only a stage prop? We might consider here one of the less famous acts in Peach Blossom Fan, “Plundering the Jewel” (“Jiebao” 劫寶, 37). The scene is set in the camp of the Ming general Huang Degong. Loyally carrying out the orders of the corrupt Southern Ming court, Huang has just defeated the virtuous but disloyal Ming general Zuo Liangyu, who was marching on Nanjing to remove the villains Ma Shiying and Ruan Dacheng from power. In loyally obeying the orders of his evil superiors, Huang and the generals of two other Ming armies have left Huainan undefended and the way open for the Manchus. The Manchus cross the Huai River, sack Yangzhou, and march unopposed on Nanjing. Hearing this, the Hongguang emperor, the court, and many of the Nanjing elite flee the Southern Ming capital. The Hongguang emperor, a puppet of Ma Shiying and Ruan Dacheng, is soon deserted by his entire retinue, and when he seeks protection, people pretend not to recognize him. He comes on stage, riding a horse (which is, of course, only the representation of a horse) and accompanied by only the eunuch Han Zanzhou (who presumably has the essential missing parts underneath his theatrical costume). He knocks at the gate of Huang Degong’s camp and announces his imperial presence, to the immediate disbelief of the gatekeeper. The emperor responds: “You just call Huang Degong, and you’ll learn the truth of the matter” 你喚黃得功來，便知真假. The “truth of the matter,” zhenjia 真假, literally the “real and the feigned,” is exactly what is at stake for the Hongguang emperor. The proposed moment of recognition deserves some context, for the Hongguang emperor, formerly the Prince of Fu and not immediately in the line of succession to the Ming throne, had become emperor only by being recognized as such by others. In a hilariously staged-managed production concocted by Ma Shiying and Ruan Dacheng (they simply copy the names from the Official Registry onto a petition asking that the Prince of Fu take the throne), “the [imperial] coach was welcomed”

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迎駕 by Ma, Ruan, and all the officials they could muster, and the prince was set on the throne. Huang Degong had been one of the Ming generals who initially “recognized” this unlikely prince as emperor. In “Plundering the Jewel,” Huang Degong comes out to see who this person is at his gate claiming to be the emperor, and he does indeed recognize him, with an outburst denouncing the faithlessness of the other ministers and generals. Hongguang replies: “Regrets do no good when things have reached the present state; I just hope you will protect my [imperial] person” 事到今日，後悔無及，只望你保護朕躬. Huang Degong’s answer to Hongguang’s plea for protection is interesting: Huang points out that when the emperor was in his palace in Nanjing, surrounded by the apparatus of state, he was willing to serve the emperor to the utmost of his ability; but now that Hongguang has fled, Huang is helpless either to advance or retreat. Hongguang says that his only concern is “my [imperial] person,” zhengong 朕躬. But Huang cannot operate outside the political structure authorized by the imperial presence at its center. The “imperial person” may still be recognized, but without a state structure to authorize provision, command other generals, and such pressing matters, the emperor becomes merely an “imperial person” or, as the title of the act suggests, a “jewel.” At this point Hongguang makes the statement that gives this chapter its title: “I just want to stay alive somehow; I don’t want to act as emperor any more” 寡人只要苟全性命，那皇帝一席，也不願再作了. In this vortex of political performances on the verge of collapse, the ironies are rich here. Using the imperial first-person guaren and hence invoking the authority of the imperial voice that makes wishes commands, Hongguang says that he no longer wants to “act as,” zuo 做, emperor. Hongguang is unrecognizing himself, and in doing so divesting himself of the very thing that entitles him to protection and makes his wishes commands. Yixi 一席 came to mean a “position” or “place” in the Qing, but like the term “role” in the discourse on society, it proclaims the separability of person, gong 躬, and his social function. It may be that “my imperial person,” zhengong 朕躬, is an oxymoron. By unrecognizing himself, moreover, Hongguang simultaneously strips Huang Degong of his legitimacy and authority: he becomes not the “last loyalist general,” but the head of an illegitimate armed group. The obvious response for Huang Degong here is: “It’s all over then! The dynasty is finished, and the only reason I had to protect you and

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the authority I commanded to do so were because you were emperor.” But we are not in a situation here in which those on stage can simply take off their costumes and become their “persons,” gong—even to save their lives. As we will see later, this can and does occur with other characters. Once “recognized,” an emperor can abdicate or be deposed only when there is another emperor (or state structure of authority) at hand to take his place. If the emperor gets up and walks off the political “stage,” the entire structure of political and social roles collapses—thus he has to speak as emperor to unrecognize himself. Rather than giving up, Huang Degong continues to address Hongguang as emperor: “The world is the world of your ancestral line—how can Your Majesty abandon it?” 天下者祖宗之天下，聖上如何棄的. And so long as he is addressed as emperor, poor Zhu Yousong must remain the Hongguang emperor: Ludovicus rex cannot undress and become paunchy Ludovicus. In contrast to other characters who can change roles, the emperor discovers the compulsory identity of “person” and role. Still addressed as emperor after trying to escape and become a “person” who is not emperor, Hongguang returns to his doomed role, and answers: “Whether I abandon it or not depends on you, General” 棄與不棄，只 在將軍了. Determination of role is mutual: if Hongguang is to continue to act as emperor, then Huang Degong must continue to play the loyalist general supporting the throne to the end. Huang Degong declares his devotion, and Hongguang responds (wiping away tears): “I had never expected that you, General, would turn out to be a loyal servant of the throne” 不料將軍倒 是一個忠臣. I am sure he is wiping away tears because he is moved, but there is a perverse temptation to think he is weeping out of sheer frustration at being forced to remain on this very perilous throne. This is a moment to step aside and reflect. Everyone reading or watching knows—if not from history, then at least from the earlier acts of the play—that Hongguang was utterly inept, self-indulgent, and the pawn of corrupt power. They also know that Huang Degong was a blustering hothead whose blind pride ruined Shi Kefa’s attempt to unify the Ming defenses and whose misguided loyalty to the Nanjing regime destroyed the virtuous general Zuo Liangyu. On one level Huang Degong, more than anyone, is responsible for the collapse of the Southern Ming. In the enclosure of dialogue with its acts of mutual recognition, there is a purity of role here: the “last Ming emperor” and his “last loyal general.” At the same time readers and audience know

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that this scene is being played out by characters that are not up to their roles—they are compelled to it by dialogue. A particular kind of gap is opened between “character” and the role played by the character. It is not hypocrisy or mere social convention—these kinds of performances are also represented in the play. Rather, it is a process by which being recognized in a given role absorbs the character helplessly into that role; it is neither artificial nor genuine performance but a vanishing point where the distinction breaks down. The dialogue is not realistic: it is determined by this mutual process of compelling roles on others. Hongguang is recognizing Huang Degong as a “loyal servant of the throne” when he phrases the sentence: “I had never expected that you, General, would turn out to be a loyal servant of the throne.” We might ask why, if Hongguang didn’t anticipate that, he turned to Huang for protection. Hongguang’s “I never expected” is the confirming act of recognition. At this point Huang Degong sends the emperor off to bed and reflects upon his own position in history: “Three hundred years of the dynasty’s fate hinge on this moment, and the fifteen provinces of the royal map come to this spot of land.” This unlikely hero speculatively considers himself as the potential protagonist of a historical romance. His focal vision of his present position is at the same time his presence alone on stage. Kong Shangren rarely permits such theatrical performances to last long without ironizing them and exposing the limits of their self-absorption. Huang’s second-in-command, Tian Xiong, enters and reminds his general that having the Ming emperor in his possession is not a particularly good idea at this historical moment and on this spot of land: the Manchus are close at hand, and everyone is surrendering to them. Tian’s phrasing is significant: “This emperor does not seem like a vehicle to bring us good fortune.” He refers to Hongguang as “this emperor,” zhewei huangdi 這位皇帝: the demonstrative here is significant, articulating the present version of “emperor” against all possible versions, in contrast to Huang Degong’s sense of Hongguang as “the emperor.” The knowing audience realizes that soon there will be quite a few “Ming emperors” scattered through south China. Huang Degong responds to Tian Xiong’s pragmatic view of the situation by berating him and reminding him of his duties. At this point two other Ming generals, Huang’s colleagues, arrive in camp to congratulate Huang for having “gotten the jewel” (哥哥得了寶貝). To

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them Hongguang is a commodity that can be traded to the Manchus for high position. Huang Degong is predictably outraged and struggles with them to protect the emperor; under the pretext of trying to defend Huang, Tian Xiong shoots him in the leg. Tian then goes into the emperor’s chamber and comes out carrying the emperor on his back (the emperor bites him); then Tian throws him on the ground before the other two generals with the unforgettable phrase of a deliveryman (and not quite translatable) Huangdi yimei fengsong 皇帝一枚奉送, roughly “Here you go, one emperor.” Linguistically we have an interesting question of the proper measure word for an emperor. Emperors usually don’t take measure words. Hongguang himself introduced the possibility with his yixi 一席; he ends up as yimei 一枚. His imperial identity is now neither genuine nor artificial; he is neither performing nor being; he is now generally “recognized” as emperor by the cast onstage, but he is an imperial commodity. There are many ways to think about performance. One version certainly involves a self-consciousness, seeing oneself being seen, being simultaneously subject and object, with the resultant trajectory toward absorption implied, an absorption in role in which the division disappears. Another possibility is to define performance in terms of timing, placement, and response. The play is supposed to begin at eight; the stage is the space where it happens, and there is an audience demanding the observance of these rules of timing and placement. The actor cannot begin speaking his lines at seven-thirty in the dressing room or walk offstage where the lines cannot be heard. He performs by virtue of being recognized in his role by the audience and being addressed by other characters, and those necessary others impose a contingency of situation and moment. Even if he breaks role in the middle of a monologue and walks offstage, he will not be recognized as a “person,” gong 躬, but as an “actor” engaging in a secondary level of performance. Just as he cannot “perform” except by virtue of being recognized as performing, in the contingency of the situation and moment of performance, the actor cannot not perform. Throughout Peach Blossom Fan we witness these processes by which characters are compelled into performative roles by acts of recognition on the part of other characters and by which performance is foregrounded as such, giving us a point of reference to measure absorption.

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The numerous scenes of professional performance in the play and the circulation of professional performers in the social world help to blur any distinction between the stage and the social and political world—an explicit conceptual commonplace that runs through the play (“Back then the genuine was a play, / today the play is as if genuine” 當年真是 戲，今日戲如真, “Solitary Chanting” 孤吟, supplementary 21). Like Honglou meng a half-century later, Peach Blossom Fan is part of a larger intellectual move to complicate—we might even legitimately say “deconstruct” here—the conventional opposition between the “genuine,” zhen 真, and “false”/“feigned,” jia 假, that had so preoccupied the late sixteenth and early seventeenth century. In the couplet above, “play,” xi 戲, has been inserted in the place of jia, but most remarkable is the historical claim made regarding the political transition from a time when the distinction had broken down, marked by the copula shi 是, to a present of simile (ru 如) when the distinction between zhen and jia is restored. But the matching couplet offers a third position: “One who twice has watched from the sidelines— / Heaven preserves him, the man with cold eyes” 兩度旁觀者，天留冷眼人. The cast creates its heroes and its villains. If Hongguang “doesn’t want to play the emperor any more,” it is clear in the early acts that the villain doesn’t want to be the villain and the male hero is not up to his role without a little prodding from the heroine. When we first see Ruan Dacheng, he is opportunistic but not evil; he wants very much to be accepted into the gentry society of Nanjing; and although he had earlier been associated with the government of the evil Wei Zhongxian, he claims to have allied himself with Wei to protect members of the Donglin 東林 party against Wei’s excesses. Ruan’s self-defense is consistently unexamined and never refuted. Rather, he is attacked at the Confucian ceremony (“Hongding” 鬨丁 3) and repeatedly humiliated by the self-righteous members of the Fushe 復社. Treated as an unredeemable villain, he truly becomes a conventional stage villain, malignant without nuance and destroyed in the end as the villain must be. Perhaps the finest moments of internal casting are those by which the hero and heroine receive their roles. In the second scene, “Teaching the Song” (“Chuan’ge” 傳歌), the painter Yang Wencong goes to visit his old friend, the courtesan Li Zhenli. Together they go up to the apartments of Li Zhenli’s adolescent daughter, who has just reached the age when she will be “married”; that is, her virginity sold off. On the walls of her apartments Yang sees poems by the famous literati of

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the city praising the girl’s beauty, along with the painting of an orchid by Lan Ying. Yang adds a painting of some rocks to complement the orchid and then asks the girl’s “name” (hao 號) so he can write the inscription. The girl tells him that she is too young to have a name, and Li Zhenli asks Yang to choose one for her. Drawing on the lore of the orchid, Yang Wencong names her Xiangjun 香君, “Lady of Fragrance.” The hao is, of course, her professional name. Although she must have had some child-name or proper name, we never know them: from this moment forward, she is Li Xiangjun. After this anonymous “young beauty” receives her name, Yang further inquires about her skills as a singer/actress; and Li Zhenli responds that she has been studying the plays of Tang Xianzu. At this point her singing teacher, Su Kunsheng, arrives; and Yang gets to watch her practice the famous aria from “Startling Awake from Dream” (“Jingmeng” 驚夢) from Peony Pavilion. xiangjun (seated opposite Su, sings): Coy lavenders, fetching reds bloom everywhere, here all given to this broken well and tumbled wall. Fair season, fine scene, overwhelming weather . . . su: Wrong! Wrong! “Fair” gets a beat and “overwhelming” gets a beat; don’t run the two clauses together. Let’s try it again. xiangjun: Fair season, fine scene—overwhelming weather. Where and in whose garden shall we find pleasure and the heart’s delight? Drifting in at dawn, at twilight roll away clouds and colored wisps through azure balustrades streaming rain, petals in wind . . . su: No, that’s not right again. “Streaming” carries a special weight in the melody; it should be sung from the diaphragm. xiangjun: streaming rain, petals in wind, a painted boat in misty waves,

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the girl behind her brocade screen has seen but dimly such splendor of spring. su: Excellent! Excellent! Exactly right! Let’s go on. xiangjun: Throughout green hills azaleas weep the cuckoo’s tears of blood; and out beyond the blackberry the threads of mist coil drunkenly. And though the peony be fair, how can it maintain its sway when spring is leaving? su: These lines are a bit rough. Try them again. xiangjun: And though the peony be fair, how can it maintain its sway when spring is leaving? Idly I stare where twittering swallows crisply speak words cut clear, and from the warbling orioles comes a bright and liquid melody. su: Fine! Now you’ve completed another suite of songs.

Here some of the most perfervid lyrics in the dramatic tradition are foregrounded as technical performance. In contrast to the numerous stories of young women who identified with the heroine of Peony Pavilion, Du Liniang, as the fictional counterpart of their “genuine” nature, here we have an adolescent girl given a name and learning to perform Du Liniang as a technically demanding “role.” The only twinkle of personality or identity she shows is shyness, a reluctance to perform in front of Yang Wencong. Her mother counters her resistance by reminding her that this is how she must make a living. “That’s stupid! For us of the Entertainment Quarters the singer’s and dancer’s sleeves and skirts are the land grants that feed us. If you’re not willing to learn to sing, what are you going to do?” 好傻話，我們門戶人家， 舞袖歌裙，吃飯莊屯。你不肯學歌，閒著做甚. Li Zhenli understands performance as merely performance; Li Xiangjun does not. Although we are shown the artifice by which she acquires her role, she soon “becomes” the romantic heroine of a chuanqi play. She is the dan 旦,

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the “female lead,” playing a dan. The girl is a vacancy that is filled by her role, without doubts, alternative perspectives, or nuance. And such is the power of her inability to “break character” that she compels those around her—characters who generally do have multiple perspectives and nuance—to perform their proper roles. To summarize an interval: after watching her perform the scene from Peony Pavilion, Yang Wencong proposes a match with the promising young scholar Hou Fangyu. Hou Fangyu is introduced to Xiangjun and is appropriately smitten; a date is set for their “wedding,” which is, of course, only the performance of a wedding because it does not bind the man as a “genuine” wedding does. As the courtesan Zheng Tuoniang reminds the wedding party, it is not the “standard form of the Entertainment Quarters” (俺院中規矩) to bow to Heaven, Earth, and the groom’s ancestors—precisely those parts of the wedding ceremony that make it binding. Xiangjun, of course, takes it as a proper wedding, and the perfection of her absorption in the role of legitimate wife makes it so. There is a problem of money. Hou Fangyu is poor, and this “wedding” will require a substantial sum as a bride-price, figured as wedding gifts from the groom. As mentioned above, Ruan Dacheng, despised by the Nanjing elite, is looking for a way to get into their good graces. Yang Wencong, a friend of Ruan, comes to him with a proposal. Ruan will give Yang the substantial sum of money to provide the wedding gifts for Hou Fangyu; then once the marriage is consummated, Yang will reveal the source of the gifts. Feeling indebted to Ruan, Hou Fangyu will then intercede with his friends on Ruan’s behalf. Ruan agrees, and Yang brokers, in several senses, the meeting and “marriage” of hero and heroine. In the early morning after the wedding night, Yang Wencong arrives to congratulate the couple. They chat pleasantly; then Li Xiangjun asks the obvious question left unasked in their hungry trajectory to bed: since Yang Wencong is not rich and since he is not a close friend, why has he provided such lavish wedding presents? Hou Fangyu, as if this little matter had never occurred to him, seconds the question. Little by little, Yang lets out that the wedding gifts were provided by Ruan Dacheng. Ruan, Yang says, has been misjudged by Nanjing society; he has repented of his former political associations and hopes that Hou Fangyu will speak to his friends on Ruan’s behalf.

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yang: Ruan Dacheng used to be associated with Zhao Nanxing and was one of our own. 1 When he later became associated with the faction of Wei Zhongxian, the eunuch, it was only to protect the East Grove faction. 2 He had no idea that once the Wei Zhongxian faction was defeated, the East Grove faction would treat him like an archenemy. Members of the Revival Society have recently advocated attacking him, and they viciously beat up and humiliated him. This is a fight within the same household. Even though Ruan Dacheng has many former associates, no one will try to explain his side of the story because his actions were so dubious. Every day he weeps toward Heaven, saying “It is painful to be so savaged by one’s own group. No one but Hou Fangyu of Henan can save me.” This is the reason that he now seeks so earnestly to make your acquaintance. hou: Well, in this case I can see why he feels such anguish, and it seems to me that he deserves some pity. Even if he was a member of Wei Zhongxian’s faction, he’s come around again and is sorry for his mistakes. We shouldn’t ostracize him so absolutely, and especially if there’s an explanation for what he did. Dingsheng and Ciwei are both good friends of mine. I’ll go see them tomorrow and try to take care of this. yang: It would be a great blessing for us if you would do this.

Until she started questioning Yang Wencong about the gifts, Li Xiangjun had said very little; in the previous seven acts, she seemed a sweet, shy adolescent girl without much personality. On hearing this exchange between Hou Fangyu and Yang Wencong, however, she starts tearing off her ornaments, dumping the rest of the trousseau on the floor, and eloquently denouncing Ruan Dacheng as an unredeemable villain. Hou Fangyu finds himself in a compromising situation, and he is, quite frankly, in a mood to compromise. Li Zhenli, Li Xiangjun’s mother, is delighted at the rich haul of gifts and watches in consternation as her daughter throws away what was, in crass terms, the price of her virginity. Both mother and lover suddenly find themselves with a romantic heroine on their hands. Hou Fangyu is shamed by Xiangjun and immediately changes his tune, refusing to have anything to do with Ruan Dacheng. Mama keeps reminding her that she has to earn a living. But Li Xiangjun is adamant. She vows to love Hou —————

1. Zhao Nanxing had been a senior Ming official who was unjustly denounced and sent into exile by the Wei Zhongxian faction. 2. The Donglin party was a group of late Ming intellectuals dedicated to reforming the Ming government. After they were purged, a successor group, the Fushe, was formed.

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Fangyu forever and wants nothing to do with Ruan Dacheng. The wedding gifts are returned. To be the “hero,” Hou Fangyu must be opposed to the “villain”; yet in this scene we come to the edge of an accommodation by which the hero might compromise, with the probable result that the villain would never quite attain his subsequent villainy. Li Xiangjun continues to compel others into roles. Later Ruan Dacheng, having come to a position of power and still stung by the insult she offered him in refusing his wedding presents, sends officers to force Li Xiangjun to remarry someone of his choosing. Here Xiangjun plays the “faithful wife about to be violated” and tries to kill herself by banging her head on the floor. Her mother, Li Zhenli, had been trying to persuade her to go ahead and remarry, but faced with Xiangjun’s determination, she is compelled to be the self-sacrificing mother, leading to still other roles: to meet the immediate demands of the officers sent by Ruan Dacheng, she pretends to be Xiangjun and permits herself to be carried off. Immediately following this is the scene in which Yang Wencong, visiting Xiangjun’s apartments while she sleeps, paints the bloodstains on Xiangjun’s fan into peach blossoms—the figure of blood and artifice that gives the play its title. The fan, Hou Fangyu’s modest wedding gift and the sole object that remains from the marriage transaction, has been splashed with Li Xiangjun’s blood when she dashed her head on the floor resisting the proposed remarriage; the ruined commodity, a gift of troth and sign of faith maintained, has been transformed by Yang’s painting into a sign of a different sort, which is also a palimpsest of her history. When Xiangjun wakes, there is a discussion, and Su Kunsheng, who is also present, volunteers to carry the fan as a message to Hou Fangyu. Here is another one of those remarkable moments in the play: fifteen acts intervene between the time Hou Fangyu is forced to flee Nanjing and his beloved and the scene in which he receives the fan. Hou appears frequently in those acts. Yet during those acts not once does he express longing for Li Xiangjun; he doesn’t even mention her. Out of sight, out of mind. Granted that Hou has more pressing problems to deal with—the Ming army is collapsing around him—but his complete neglect of the romantic plot is remarkable. Once Su Kunsheng brings him the fan, however, and he hears of Xiangjun’s faith to him, he is compelled into the role of “lover” again and goes back to Nanjing to find her.

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Explicitly dissolving the distinction between social and political behavior and performance, Peach Blossom Fan continually attempts to demarcate some position that is not performance. To represent a position that is not performance onstage, in the Chinese theatrical role system, is no easy task. If performance occupies the stage, the domain of non-performance must be found before, after, underneath, or outside the space of performance. And these distinctions must themselves be performed on stage. We have already seen the case of Li Xiangjun, who is more or less a blank before she learns the role of heroine that becomes her identity. Xiangjun is utterly absorbed into this role, which is recognizably theatrical within the Chinese dramatic tradition, but she has no identity outside the role to articulate it as performance. We must come to the troubling conclusion that she represents one version of zhen, the “real” or “genuine.” After her conversion and enlightenment at the end of the play, she disappears, apparently returning to the state of blankness from which she began. As in Elizabethan drama, the low characters offer another, equally problematic version of zhen, one that reveals the artifice of the high characters. In “Disrupting the Holy Day” (“Hongding” 鬨丁, 3), we have a solemn ceremony honoring Confucius carried out by the gentry of Nanjing; Ruan Dacheng participates unobserved, and when he is discovered, his presence is considered a corruption of the rite. This would be a simplistic and uninteresting act were it not for the opening scene in which the servants are onstage taking a comic inventory of the paraphernalia needed for the ritual, commenting on what a good sinecure they have. As do characters in many other scenes, their presence foregrounds the material basis of the sacred rite and provides a perspective that prevents it from being fully absorbing. This is exactly analogous to Su Kunsheng interrupting Xiangjun as she sings the aria from Peony Pavilion: performance is revealed as such by these pragmatic voices that supposedly stand outside performance. Another fine moment in which the low characters invoke a material stratum that frames performance is in the “wedding” scene, “Bedding Fragrance” (“Mian Xiang” 眠香, 6). The bawdy comments of the low characters punctuate the romantic love arias of the hero and heroine, which is traditional enough in weddings—but the act ends with an exchange of money for favors, reminding the viewer exactly where this “wedding” is taking place and the true nature of the wedding gifts.

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The next act begins the following morning, as a chambermaid passes through to clean the chamberpots singing a piece of doggerel, doggerel that reminds us of the problem of paternity in the Entertainment Quarter and the difference between this union and a real wedding. servant: Tortoise piss, tortoise piss spews out little tortoises, blood of turtle, blood of turtle turns to little turtles fertile. Tortoise piss and turtle blood, whose is whose I cannot guess; turtle blood and tortoise piss, can’t say if it’s that or this. Whose is whose I cannot guess, can’t say who the father is; who can tell one from another?— can’t say who’s the father’s brother.

The low characters pass through, reminding us of the bodily excretions and dirty sheets, and the random mixing of seed in the brothel that lies behind the theater of love arias swearing eternal devotion. Like most constructions of zhen, this is a negative move, securing the stability of its own position by exposing what is supposed to lie underneath the illusions of the lovers—the chamberpot under the bed, bliss and piss. A third way to mark out a space of the genuine is to leave the stage. Nanjing was the Southern Capital of the Ming, with a complete set of administrative buildings, ministries, and the officials to staff them— everything to make a government but an emperor. Before the fall of the North, it was an empty stage-set for an imperial government. Dynastic crisis brought the Prince of Fu, a theater-loving prince who was interested in performing, to act the part of emperor. He cared little for the details of the part: as his armies were crumbling, his “genuine” interest was in organizing palace theatricals. To end the “play,” to indicate a mode of being that is not acting, Kong Shangren has the characters gradually change their clothes and leave the stage of Nanjing. The first of these departures occurs when some actors refuse to be actors: the prominent singers and musicians of the Entertainment Quarter are being rounded up to be taken to the palace to form an acting troupe (“Denunciation at the Feast,” “Mayan”

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罵筵, 24). One of the best known of them, Bian Yujing, comes on staged dressed as a Daoist and sings a wonderful aria that declares her “true” nature and the unfortunate karmic wind that made her a performer. bian yujing: My home is in the Palace of Pistil and Pearl, and I hate how that wind from the Karmic Sea unexpectedly bore me lightly away to the “misty flowers.” The throat is raw, swollen from song, and the skirt at my waist has grown slack from dance, yet all my life my soul has remained in a cave on Wu Mountain.

Immediately after the aria, she introduces herself and asks rhetorically: “Why am I dressed up this way today?” 今日為何這般打扮. It is a fine question—to be dressed up (a theatrical term) in order to appear as the person you really are. She is leaving Nanjing to go off to the mountains to become the Daoist that she claims to already be. The next person to leave is the musician Ding Jizhi, also pulling out Daoist clothes in front of his two friends before he departs (二位看俺打扮罷，道人醒了揚 州夢). The next to go is the commander of the guard Zhang Wei, also changing his clothes, taking with him the bookseller Cai Yisuo, brought to him as a prisoner. And as the Manchus draw near the city, there is general flight, with Xiangjun escaping with the palace ladies, and Hou Fangyu escaping when the jails are opened. Everyone is, as the saying goes, “heading for the hills.” The ensuing scenes set in the Daoist monasteries in the hills demonstrate clearly how the representation of non-performance is reappropriated as performance. The final reunion scene in “Entering the Way” (“Ru Dao” 入道, 40) explicitly unmasks the lovers’ previous and current behavior as merely performance, gone wrong now because it is being continued after they have left the proper stage for lovers. It is mutual recognition that sets the lovers off into singing love songs, and the abbot Zhang Wei’s refusal to recognize them as lovers that breaks the spell. The recognition scene is staged so theatrically that it is ready for the irony that will befall it. On one side of the stage Li Xiangjun, still hoping against hope to find Hou Fangyu, enters with the former

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courtesan Bian Yujing, now a Daoist abbess. They have come to hear the sermon of Zhang Wei. On the other side of the stage the musician Ding Jizhi enters, followed by Hou Fangyu, still desperately searching for Li Xiangjun, but here for the first time entertaining thoughts about a spiritual life. Zhang begins his sermon: zhang wei (hitting his lectern): You good folk listening in the wings, you should abandon your worldly hearts utterly, for only then can you seek the path that will lead you upward. If you still have even a grain of base passion, you will have to endure a thousand more revolutions of the karmic cycle.

The inevitable happens: Li Xiangjun and Hou Fangyu catch sight of one another across the stage; they run to one another, clasp hands, and start singing—evidently they weren’t listening to the sermon. As they fondle the fan, declaring their mutual love, Zhang Wei comes down from the lectern in a rage, denounces their love talk in such a place, snatches the fan and—no doubt to the shock and horror of all who know the fan’s history—tears it up. The fan, on which the history of their love is inscribed in words, blood, and paint, is destroyed to mark the destruction of love’s illusion; but it is also just a prop—the manager will have a new one for each new performance. Even then Li Xiangjun and Hou Fangyu don’t seem to get it. They think they are acting in a different and more conventional play, and they know how such a play is “supposed to” end. They make love talk, introduce friends, and thank those who have helped them along the way. Zhang Wei again interrupts to remind them just where they are; and Hou Fangyu responds with the classical rhythms and diction of a Confucian schoolteacher, making a trite defense of romantic comedy: “A man and a woman founding a household has always been the primary human relationship, a focus for love through separation and reunion, through grief and joy. How can you be concerned about this?” 從來男女室家，人之大倫，離合悲歡，情有所鍾，先生如何管的? In response Zhang Wei successfully unrecognizes them as lovers, just as Hongguang tried unsuccessfully to unrecognize himself as emperor: zhang wei ( furiously): Aaah! Two besotted worms. Just where is your nation, where is your family, where is your prince, where is your father? Is it only this little bit of romantic love you can’t cut away? (Sings) Pathetic trifling of man and maid— the world turned upside down and you don’t care;

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stephen owen you babble on with wanton phrases, lurid words, tugging clothes and holding hands, declare a happily-ever-after to the gods. Don’t you realize that long ago your fated wedlock was erased from registries in Heaven. With thudding wingbeats mated ducks wake from dream and fly apart, the precious mirror of reunion lies in fragments on the ground, happy endings proved unsound. Blush at this bad performance of your scene, inspiring bystanders’ laughter— the great path lies before you clear, flee on it immediately!

The climax here is the exposure of performance as merely performance, with the possibility of enlightenment as a stable realm of nonperformance. “Blush,” sings Zhang Wei, “at this bad performance of your scene, inspiring bystanders’ laughter” 羞答答當場弄醜惹的旁 人笑. The lovers’ immediate enlightenment is quickly followed by a change of clothes and their final disappearance from the play and stage. For all the ideological determination to make the mountains a place beyond and after the ironies of performance, the entire act “Entering the Way” is the most obviously theatrical in the play, with its ceremonies lamenting the Chongzhen emperor, and its apparitions playing out the apotheosis of the virtuous and the punishment of the wicked. It is ritual, a stylized positioning and robing of the characters in which identity is a function of mutual recognition of how characters are dressed, where they stand, and how they address one another. In some sense this world is zhen, “genuine”; but the very fact that it is a version of zhen only reveals how many mutually exclusive versions of zhen there are—with their only unity to be discovered in being negations of jia, the feigned. There is no question that on one level this is the play’s ideological message: the zhen of enlightenment clears the stage of feigned and illusory performances. But this is not zhen as the “real,” the version of offstage that makes the stage the stage. In persuading the lovers to his version of zhen, Zhang Wei makes reference to that other, more pro-

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foundly negative version: “Just where is your nation, where is your family, where is your prince, where is your father?” At the beginning I spoke of the contest between theatrical performance and the “real” as a political struggle between warring kingdoms. Mapping this struggle on top of the war between the Southern Ming and the nascent Qing is not gratuitous. There is allegory here. Kong Shangren well knew that the representation of the “real,” especially on stage, subverts it: performance can only adequately represent performance. Throughout the play the Manchus are a negative presence, moving inexorably southward, dissolving armies, butchering Yangzhou, and literally driving the actors from the stage that is Nanjing. Sometimes reference is made to them, in cautious, quiet terms, but they are always there, predestined to end the play and all its intricate artifice. The “real” world is virtuous, grim, and deadly. Yet the play itself is represented as occurring within the “real” world of the Qing, in a fictive performance of 1684, antedating the play’s completion in 1699. The Ritual Master (zanli) praises the omens by which the Qing’s legitimacy is confirmed and swears, on seeing the performance, that this is how it “really” was. I close with a consideration of one of the most problematic acts in the play, “Choosing the Actors” (“Xuanyou” 選優, 25). It is an act of peculiar doublings in which significant moments reappear in acting that is “merely acting,” commanded by imperial whim and power. In some ways this is yet another version of the “genuine”—perhaps the genuine in inversion—in which the singing girl/actress appears as such, her performance commanded and her body sexually available. The sign under which this “professional genuine” appears is repetition—to sing the role of Du Liniang for a second man and, though it is never explicit, to be taken to another man’s bed. In the same way, the Hongguang emperor shows himself to be most at home in acting as an actor rather than as an emperor. Ma Shiying and Ruan Dacheng have sent a summons to the Entertainment Quarters to bring the best musicians and singers to the palace in order to stage Ruan Dacheng’s own hit play Swallow Note for the theater-loving Hongguang emperor. Once the players enter the palace, they will belong to the palace, thus effectively ending their careers outside. As mentioned earlier, this prompts the courtesan Bian Yujing and the musician Ding Jizhi to flee Nanjing for the hills. Li Xiangjun’s

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mother, Li Zhenli, has also been summoned. As we have seen earlier, Li Zhenli is no longer there, having assumed the role of Li Xiangjun to be taken away in a forced “marriage.” As a result Li Xiangjun is compelled in turn to assume the role of her mother and go to the palace in her stead. Interviewed by Ma Shiying and Ruan Dacheng, Li Xiangjun sings an aria about how her life has been ruined by the machinations of powerful enemies. In a wonderful piece of theater, Ma and Ruan are quite moved by her story—until they realize that they themselves are the villains of the song. Li Xiangjun is saved from punishment by the fact that she is destined for the Inner Palace, where she will presumably be sexually as well as musically available to the emperor; Ruan Dacheng, however, determines to be revenged on her by making her play the demeaning role of the clown, chou 丑. “Choosing the Actors” begins with two male musicians and two courtesan singers bantering in anticipation of the imperial favor that their performances might bring. The “favor” they anticipate is clearly sexual, with the charms of homoerotic attraction in competition with heterosexual ones. Ruan Dacheng enters and sends the players off to force the attendance of Li Xiangjun, still taken to be her mother, Li Zhenli. In their absence the emperor enters. Hongguang is bored with “playing emperor” and wants to enjoy himself with plays. Hongguang confesses to Ruan that there is “something that is bothering him” 一樁 心事. Ruan Dacheng tries to guess what this might be—perhaps the Manchu armies steadily advancing on Nanjing? perhaps the poor readiness of his armies opposing them? perhaps the rival pretender to his throne? These are reasonable hypotheses for imperial anxiety. But the answer is: none of the above. Hongguang is worried about having his cast thoroughly rehearsed for a performance of Swallow Note by the Lantern Festival. Beneath the broad satirical humor there is a finer point. For Hongguang being emperor is a role; he is not at home in it, so that it is jia 假, “feigned” as well as “false.” His genuine enthusiasm is for acting; and for the first time we see Hongguang not hypocritically “playing a role” but delighting in performance. Soon afterward, when the cast returns, Hongguang watches them rehearse scenes from Swallow Note, and he is so pleased that he joins them in a musical performance as a drummer. Thus an actor in the role of emperor at last becomes an actor in the role of emperor in the role of actor.

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Li Xiangjun, whom Ruan Dacheng has determined to cast in the role of chou, has entered with the other musicians. Since this is just a preliminary rehearsal the Chinese theater has been spared a crisis: how could one represent the dan playing a painted-face chou? On the level of Peach Blossom Fan’s own performance, however, the representation of miscasting is easy: the dan is on stage as a dan, and whoever suggests casting her as a chou is misreading the bounds of variation within a role type (only Li Yu could achieve such a metamorphosis). Hongguang may not be much of an emperor, but there is one area in which he can “get the names right” 正名; Hongguang knows a dan when he sees one. The opening scene in this act clearly linked imperial pleasure in theatrical performance with imperial sexual favors. And Hongguang’s immediate criterion for lifting Li Xiangjun from the prospective chou role is not her acting skills: “That young singing girl is exceptionally beautiful; it’s too hard on her to send her off to act the chou.” In Hongguang’s eyes she belongs to the category of “singing girl,” geji 歌妓, in which providing sexual favors was as much a part of her professional responsibilities as singing. At this point we should recall here the extraordinary lengths Li Xiangjun has gone to preserve her fidelity to Hou Fangyu and thus prove to be the “faithful wife,” which is the role the dan plays—rather than being a “singing girl,” which may be her offstage status. One can play the “faithful wife” only once; the second time she takes the role, she becomes pure “singing girl.” The peach blossom fan of the title plays a central part in the performance of the role of the faithful wife: it is Hou Fangyu’s “wedding” gift, inscribed with his poem, stained with her blood as she defends her honor, and painted into peach blossoms by Yang Wencong. In the aria that follows the painting, Li Xiangjun declares the peach blossoms painted there to be her self-portrait, and the fan is sent off to Hou Fangyu, re-establishing the “marriage” bond almost forgotten in dynastic upheaval. What, then, are we to make of the moment when Li Xiangjun faces the Hongguang emperor? emperor: That young singing girl is exceptionally beautiful; it’s too hard on her to send her off to act the chou. (Addressing her.) You, young singing girl, since you never learned Swallow Note, you may perhaps have learned something else? xiangjun: I’ve learned Peony Pavilion.

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emperor: That’s just fine—so sing something. (Li Xiangjun is too shy to sing.) Look how a flush of pink comes to her powdered face. It looks like she’s bashful. Give her a palace peach blossom fan, so that she can cover the spring beauty of her face. (Attendants toss a pink fan to Li Xiangjun, who takes it and sings,) xiangjun: Why does the goddess Yuzhen again trace her way up to that spring in Wuling?— it’s because the blossoms that dot the waters fly before her very eyes, Heaven’s Lord spends not a cent to purchase flowers, but we feel bitterness of heart at pink tears shed. Oh! we have been abandoned and betrayed by spring, by April, by May.

On hearing this, Hongguang determines to make her the dan; and just as the emperor’s sexual interest cannot be avoided, he requires her to learn Swallow Note, his favorite play and a work she had always disdained. Perhaps the most striking figure of duplication is the second “peach blossom fan,” appearing out of nowhere, with an implicit comparison of the peach blossoms and Li Xiangjun’s face, as had been made with the first fan. The first fan is a palimpsest of the history of her love for Hou Fangyu, the kind of history that accrues in sustaining the role of the faithful wife. The second fan is the mere duplicate, a theatrical prop, without a history. Hongguang says, “It looks like she’s bashful” 像是靦 腆. She is the singing girl, belonging to a world of semblance; real feelings are not at issue, and all commerce is transacted on the level of appearances that are putatively professional. No less remarkable is Li Xiangjun’s choice of aria, her second performance of Peony Pavilion in the play. Her first performance was from “Startling Awake from Dream,” treating Du Liniang’s first encounter with the garden and anticipating her sexual union with Liu Mengmei in dream there; this second performance is an aria of “Retracing the Dream,” (“Xunmeng” 尋夢), in which Du Liniang goes back to the garden the day after. The garden is figured as Peach Blossom Spring (“that spring in Wuling”), which in drama and song could be either a place of sexual bliss or a more historically accurate place of retreat from

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the world. Both versions of Peach Blossom Spring are found in Peach Blossom Fan, with the latter supplanting the former; but here, both in the context of Peony Pavilion and in its performance here, it is the place of sexual bliss. Here Li Xiangjun, the “flower” singing as Du Liniang, speaks as one returning to that place. The Hongguang emperor may properly hear an element of complaint in how “Heaven’s Lord” does not pay for his flowers; but while Li Xiangjun the faithful wife may be bemoaning her fate and imperial power, an issue of nonpayment for a fragile and transient commodity has been unmistakably raised. As bashfulness might be seen as artful pose requiring “appreciative remuneration,” shang 賞, so repeat performances of courtship require haggling and negotiation. In her first aria (as in her first sexual encounter) Li Xiangjun appears as the novice; here—and let us not forget that she is doubly in the role of her mother, the commercially canny Li Zhenli—Li Xiangjun shows mastery of the song as commodity. To any reader of Peach Blossom Fan as a whole, this is gross slander of Li Xiangjun; indeed, left alone at the end of this act, she bewails her fate in being locked up in the palace. Framed by adolescent blankness at the beginning and the blankness of enlightenment at the end, she does not change or break role throughout the play. But at this moment, faced with another actor playing a role of autocratic power, questions of theatrical and sexual repetition are raised. Here the “female lead,” the dan, for a brief moment truly becomes a dan; and the Hongguang emperor appropriately makes her his dan over Ruan Dacheng’s silent objections: “As I see it this singing girl is equally splendid in her looks and in her voice; one shouldn’t make inadequate use of great talents—so have her play the main female lead.” As I suggested above, among the many possible versions of the “genuine” proposed in the play, this may be the genuine in inversion. Li Xiangjun is the dan who wants to be the faithful wife and becomes so entirely absorbed in her role that she is “just like” the real thing. But here, verging on repetition and playing the role assigned her, she almost becomes the genuine dan, the actress who is an actress.

Index 7 Abbate, Carolyn, 454, 455 Ah Xuan, 192 Aina Jushi, 21; Doupeng xianhua (Idle conversations under the pea vines), 21, 318 Allegory (allegorical references): in drama, 390, 393, 505; in poetry, 32, 54n, 58, 59, 83, 84, 95, 147, 206; in prose, 299, 330, 333, 367n, 416; political, 32, 58, 95, 147, 206, 299, 330, 333, 367n, 390, 393, 416; and women, 58, 59 Anecdotal writings, collections of, 283, 298–99, 309, 350–51, 355. See also Niu Xiu, Gusheng ; Zhang Chao, Yu Chu xinzhi Anecdotes, 20n, 42, 53, 56, 89n; anecdotal literature, 22, 25–26, 33, 63 An Lushan Rebellion: comparison to fall of Ming, 39, 112, 115, 145–46, 369; cultural effects, 362; fiction on, 363; plays about, 39, 457, 467–68; poetic responses, 79, 146. See also Yang Guifei Autumn Willow Poetry Society, 95, “Autumn Willows” poems, 32, 94–95. See also Wang Shizhen Bai Juyi: “Changhen ge” (Song of lasting sorrow), 112, 113, 114, 463, 474; “The Girl Dancing the Huxuan,” 145n; as model for later poets, 80;

“Song of Pipa,” 140–42, 144n; “Ti haitu pingfeng,” 417 Bailianshe (White Lotus Club), 190–91 Beici guangzheng pu, 431 Beili zhi, 354 Benjamin, Walter, 360 Bhabha, Homi, 346, 352, 367 Bi Zhu, 26 Bian Sai (Daoist name: Yujing), 127–28, 138, 147 Biji, 22, 25–26, 33, 63. See also individual collections by title under the name of the author Bingtian shishe (Icy Sky Poetry Society), 68, 188–92, 196 Boxue hongci (outstanding scholars of vast learning) examination, 10n, 19–21, 91, 93n, 251 Boyi, 7, 14n, 20, 154, 179, 198 Brooks, Peter, 359–60 Buddhism: Beijulu zhou, 268, 273, 280; Caodong school of Chan, 150–51, 152, 175, 180; Jin’gang jing, 167–68; karmic retribution, 290–91; lay devotees, 166; monasticism, 10–12; poetry and Chan buddhism, 86, 91; reincarnation, 359 Cai Han, 242 Cai Yong, 205

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Caisheng, 48 Cao Erkan, 202, 404 Cao Rong, 19, 67 Cao Xin, 458 Cao Xueqin, 458; Honglou meng, 271–75, 278 Cao Ye, 113 Cao Yin, 365, 421n Chan Hing Ho, 424 Chan Buddhism: Caodong school, 150–51, 152, 175, 180; lay devotees, 166 Chang Hong, 119 Changping, Princess, 116, 118–19 Chao Mingsheng, 4–5, 18 Chen Bangyan, 169, 170 Chen Botao, Shengchao Yuedong yimin lu, 6n, 158–59 Chen Chen, 249, 425; Shuihu houzhuan, 40, 43, 225, 269–70 Chen Cisheng, 158 Chen Ding, 4n, 285 Chen Gongyin, 9n, “Yamen ye san zhong miao,” 45–46 Chen Hongshou, 137n, 286 Chen Hongxu, “The Colophon to the Reminiscences,” 239, 241 Chen Houzhu, 112, 115, 432–38. See also Chen dynasty; Zhang Lihua Chen Jiru, 283 Chen Longyun, Ding Yehe xingle tu, 396–97 Chen Meilin, 423–24 Chen Qubing, 65–66 Chen Rong, 158 Chen She, 400 Chen Weisong: biography of Wu Koukou, 236; and Chen Zhenhui, 17n; examination of 1679, 19; Furenji, 57; nostalgic writings, 53; poetry, 74, 90; “Preface to Wang Ranting’s Collection,” 93, 94; preface to Yuefu

buti, 9n; “Ting Baisheng tan pipa,” 139n, 142n; Yangxian school, 74 Chen Xinjian, 189 Chen Yinke, 16n, 22, 31, 32, 36n, 66–67, 82, 158, 159, 163, 215, 217 Chen Yuanyuan, 112 Chen Zhenhui, 17n, 232, 233, 236 Chen Zhilin, 26 Chen Zilong, 51, 54, 65, 85, 97, 200; “Dujuan xing,” 54n; “Qiuri zagan,” 44; and song lyrics, 54 Chen Zizhuang, 167, 169, 170 Chen dynasty, 432, 440. See also Chen Houzhu; Zhang Lihua Cheng Jiasui, 212; “The Portrait of the Bearded Military Advisor,” 105–6 Cheng Minzheng, Song yimin lu, 6 Chengzu, emperor, 42–43, 54n Chisong ji, 398 Chongzhen emperor: 33, 42, 50n; commemorations of death, 451, 452; Consort Tian and, 113, 114; death, 429; family, 116–20 passim; images in poetry, 130; interest in arts, 140, 144–45; lamentation of, 42, 140, 145; officials, 167; suicide, 1, 81n, 120; Tianqi-Chongzhen poetry anthology, 5; Wu Weiye and, 24, 130, 147n, 430 Chow, Kai-Wing, 357 Chu Renhuo, 20, 28, 368, 369–70; Jianhu ji, 30, 283, 369; Sui Tang yanyi, 39, 62, 225, 352, 357–66 passim, 370–71 Chuanqi drama: artifice in, 62, 454–55; Caihao ji (Tu Long), 465; Chisong you (Ding Yaokang), 393, 397–404, 405, 416, 423, 424; collections, 382, 431;

Index conventions, 467, 480; entertainers as characters, 42, 61, 456; heroines (dan), 496–97, 498; historical subjects, 398; in late Ming, 375; material symbols, 463; Moling chun (Wu Weiye), 61, 431, 443–47, 450–51, 456; music, 62, 64, 454–56, 470; musical references in titles, 456; performances, 461; “phenomenal” music, 455–56; playfulness, 450–51; popularity, 375; private readings, 461, 464; Qiao tuanyuan (Li Yu), 63, 319; reunions in final acts, 36–37, 63, 310, 443, 457; structure, 443; Xihu shan (Ding Yaokang), 39, 56–57, 380, 393, 404–11, 423, 424; Zhenwen ji (Meng Chengshun), 58, 380. See also Drama; Hong Sheng, Changsheng dian, Kong Shangren, Taohua shan; Huang Zhouxing, Rentian le Chuci, 51–52, 154 Ci, in early Qing, 9n, 74–75 Classical literature, 226–27 Classical tales, 282, 298–99, 330 Collecting, 134–35, 227–29 Concubines, 26, 31, 55, 236, 242, 348–49. See also Dong Bai; Gu Mei; Li Yin; Liu Rushi Confucius, 7–8, 15n, 126; Analects, 5n, 10n, 18n, 49n, 94n, 416; Spring and Autumn Annals (Chunqiu), 3n, 75, 76, 100n, 155, 156, 173 Courtesans: Bian Sai, 127–28, 147; in Chang’an, 354; characters in dramas, 56, 413; Dong Xiaowan (Dong Bai), 55, 231, 234–35, 236–38; martyrs, 56, 245–46; poetry by, 57; poetry on, 112, 138; in Qinhuai district, 234, 236, 243, 245–46, 354–55; as symbol of Ming dynasty, 248; women separated from families, 315–16. See also individual courtesans by name

513 Cui Zizhong, 137 Dahui Chanshi, 190 Dai Benxiao, 16 Dai Yixiao, 16 Dai Zhong, 16 Dance: “phenomenal,” 482. See also “Rainbow Skirts” Daodu, 150–51, 166, 170 Daoism, 86, 264, 267. See also Lü Dongbin Daqu (court entertainment), 469–70 Deliverance plays (dutuoju), 437 Deng Hanyi, 27, 29, 68, 252; Shiguan, 228 Deng Yu, 164, 171 Diaries, 59–60 Ding Jizhi, 29 Ding Shenxing, 404 Ding Weining, 389–90, 391 Ding Yaokang: in Beijing, 393, 395, 404; concern with retribution, 388, 391, 395, 423, 424, 425; exteriorization of subjective consciousness in plays, 422; family, 391, 392; folktale about, 421– 22n; influence on Kong Shangren, 409; life of, 387, 391–96, 422, 426; loyalism of, 25n, 423– 24; patrons, 393, 425–26; political attitudes, 422–23, 424–25; portrait of, 396–97; possible authorship of Xingshi yinyuan zhuan, 389; reaction to fall of Ming, 387–88; references to earlier dynastic transitions, 39; religion of, 424; service to Qing, 25, 393, 394, 395, 406n; utopian themes, 270–71 —, works: Chisong you, 39, 43, 393, 397–404, 416, 423, 424; Chujie

514

Index

jilüe, 389; Ding Yaokang quanji, 388– 89; Huaren you, 43–44, 378, 393, 411, 412–21, 423, 424; plays, 377, 397; poetry, 397, 404; prose, 397; Ranshe dan, 393–94; Tian shi, 388, 391; Xihu shan, 39, 41, 56–57, 380, 393, 404–11, 423, 424; Xu Jinpingmei, 40, 225, 377, 378, 388, 393–97 passim; Dong Bai (Xiaowan), 55, 231, 234–35, 236–38 Dong Qichang, 138n, 391 Dong Sizhang, 266 Dong Yue, 263; Huang Zhouxing and, 249, 252, 265–67; Mengshe yue, 267; Xiyou bu, 225, 266, 280, 378, 415–16; Zhaoyang mengshi, 265, 266 Dongjing meng hua lu, 354 Donglin faction, 24, 34, 209, 429, 494 Drama: artifice, 44, 62, 494; autobiographical, 279, 379; collections of plays, 382; on current events, 33, 34–37, 375, 393, 418–21; early Ming history in, 43; in early Qing, 376–85; fantasies, 43–44; fictionality, 398–99; functions of, 62; Hongguang emperor’s interest in, 60, 376, 501, 505, 506, 507; in late Ming, 375–76, 380, 382; meta-theatrical consciousness, 64; Ming dynasty, 398; performances, 475; portrayals of MingQing transition, 34–37, 376, 377–78, 393, 427–28; private troupes, 375; references to earlier dynastic transitions, 41; relationship to novels, 225– 26; self-reflexivity, 37, 385; status, 377; Yuan dynasty, 382, 398. See also Chuanqi drama; Zaju drama Drama criticism: Ding Yaokang’s preface to Chisong you, 398; in early Qing, 382–83; in late Ming, 382; Zhiqu zhiyu (Huang Zhouxing), 257, 258 Dreams: as compensation, 267, 271; as device in drama, 433, 435, 436, 441,

463–69 passim, 478, 480, 482, 508; as device in prose, 266, 274, 275, 276, 280, 288, 313, 336, 348; and memories, 11, 51, 53, 368, 370; and gardens, 50, and paintings, 60, 61; past events recalled as, 345–46 Du Fu: “Autumn Meditations,” 81–83, 214; as character in play, 413; “Bingju xing,” 81n; “Danqing yin,” 88n; “Guan Gongsun daniang dizi wu jianqi xing,” 146; “Jiangnan feng Li Guinian,” 145–46; “Ji Li Shier Bo ershi yun,” 195; “Lament of Chentao,” 109; early Qing views of, 84, 85; “Meditations on Ancient Sites,” 123; “Liren xing,” 83n; as model for later poets, 80–81; as poet-historian, 78–82; and Song style, 85n Du Jun: and Kong Shangren, 29; poetry, 53, 240; on poetry and history, 76; on rage, 94; and Qinhuai pleasure quarters, 53; relations with other literati, 29, 95, 151, 369; and Wang Shizhen, 95 Du Mu, 89, 124, 244, 353–54 Du Shuang, 156 Du Yilan, 27 Dynastic transitions: fall of Jin, 38, 99; fall of Northern Song, 40, 314, 315; Jurchen conquest of Song, 40, 310–12, 404–5, 406; literary tropes, 333–34; metaphors, 95, 145; separated families and, 312–13, 318, 328–29, 343–44; social disruptions, 335; stories of, 310–12, 319–24. See also Ming-Qing transition

Index —, as analogies for fall of Ming, 38–41; An Lushan Rebellion, 39, 369; fall of Han, 38; fall of Jin, 38; fall of Song, 39, 40–41, 171, 172–73; fall of Sui, 352; fall of Tang, 352–54, 366, 443, 447; fall of Yuan, 38–39, 207, 208; Jurchen invasions, 405; Mongol invasions, 39; Qin-Han transition, 39; Song-Yuan transition, 40, 447; southern dynasties, 39 Early Qing literature: biases in study of, 64–70; generational differences, 28–29, 285, 367, 385. See also Drama; Novels; Poetry Eight Immortals Crossing the Sea, 415 Enchantment and disenchantment, writings on, 275 Enlightenment, and poetry, 86; in Ding Yaokang’s plays, 412–15 passim, 422, 428; in Peach Blossom Fan, 29n, 502, 504, 509; in Wu Weiye’s plays, 428, 437–38, 442, 447, 448 Eremitism, 5, 7–10, 12–14, 36, 95, 116n, 136, 288 Escape, 11, 15, 40, 43, 44, 48, 51, 60, 61, 98, 127n, 128, 134–36, 142. See also Eremitism; Utopian imagery Exile: Hanke in Shenyang, 46, 62, 152, 153, 155, 178–86; as image of homelessness, 26; inner, 48–49, 50; Wu Zhaoqian in Ningguta, 46, 47n, 57n; in northeast, 68, 159; Qing officials, 26, 68, 183, 189; as theme in early Qing writings, 44–51 Families: fear of incest, 313–18; networks, 334–35, 342–43; separation of, 312–18, 343–44; shattered and reunited, 62–63. See also Marriage; Reunions Fan Jingwen, 211, 243, 246

515 Fang Shou, 67 Fang Yingqian, 67 Fang Yizhi, 17n, 236; as Buddhist monk, 11–12; criticism of, 14; in Qinhuai, 56; “Lingqian gao ai wen,” 2; loyalism of, 56; ordination, 52n, 233; political activities, 232; sons of, 16, 28; suicide, 51; “Xinmao Wuzhou zi ji wen,” 4 Fang Zhongde, 28 Fang Zhonglü, 28, 31n Fang Zhongtong, 16, 28; “Zeng Liu Aoshi,” 48 Feng Ban, 44, 83 Feng Menglong, 242, 283; Gujin xiaoshuo, “Shan Fulang Quanzhou jiaou,” 314; Jingshi tongyan, 310–12 Feng Pu, Jiashan tang ji, 93 Feng Shu, 83, 217 Fengshen yanyi, 358–59 Fiction, see Novels Fiction criticism, 226, 227 Four Treasuries, see Siku quanshu Fu, Prince of, 120, 209, 210. See also Hongguang emperor Fu Mei, 28 Fu Shan, 6, 14n, 18, 28, 67n Fu Zhanglei, 393, 395 Fushe (Revival Society): establishment, 429; impeachment of Ruan Dacheng and, 16, 232; influence, 15; meetings, 106; members, 34, 150; Wu Weiye and, 24, 82n, 429, 452 Gao Jie, 123 Gao Ming, Pipa ji, 456 Gao Qiqian, 104 Gaosai, 68

516

Index

Gardens: and dreams, 50; in Honglou meng, 271–75; Huang Zhouxing’s Jiangjiu yuan, 44, 249, 255–66 passim, 271–75, 280; as ideal imaginary space, 44; Mao Xiang’s Painted in Water Garden (Shuihui yuan), 16, 49, 233, 234, 236, 237; political meanings, 49; Qi Biaojia’s Yushan, 49, 50; relationship to loyalism, 49–50, 262–63, 271; relationship to remembrance and mourning, 140; Wang Shimin’s Southern Garden, 138–39, 140n; Wu Weiye’s Plum Village, 139; of Zheng Yuanxun, 232 Gawa people, New Guinea, 334–35 Ge Nen, 56, 245–46 Ge Zhengqi, 26 Gift giving, 342–43 Gong Dingzi: Ding Yaokang and, 393, 395; poetry, 23, 90; preface to Huaren you, 412; as Qing official, 23; relations with remnant subjects, 67; reputation, 204; wife of, 26 Gong Xian, 60, 151 Gong Yonggu, 117, 118 Gu Cai, Xiao hulei, 456 Gu Mei, 26 Gu Mengyou, 151, 153–54, 177; “New Year’s Eve, 1645,” 17, 45 Gu Yanwu, 2, 6n, 7, 14, 19, 26, 33, 59, 65, 67, 79, 84n, 97n, 126 Gu Youxiao, 13, 23 Gu Zhenli, 58 Guangdong: Qing conquest of, 48n, 304; remnant subjects from, 6; resistance in, 167, 169–74; writings on, 300; Zhu Yizun on, 47. See also Lingnan and individuals from Guangdong by name Gui Zhuang: Huang Zhouxing and, 252; “Jizhai ji,” 49; preface to Lidai yimin lu, 7; reaction to fall of Ming,

2–3, 4–5; “Wangu chou,” 41; writings of, 6, 32 Han Rizhuan, 150 Han Ruhuang, 150 Han Ruyan, 169, 170, 172–73 Han Tan, 231–32, 234, 242, 248 Han Xin, 308–9, 398, 402 Han Yu, 190 Hanan, Patrick, 313 Han dynasty, founding of, 39, 308, 397, 398, 400–401 Hangzhou, 121–22, 253–54, 395, 466 Hanjing (Han Lütai), 154 Hanke: arrest of, 149, 159; Bingtian shishe (Icy Sky Poetry Society) and, 68, 188–92, 196; birthday poems, 184–85, 191–92; death, 152; exile to Shenyang, 46–47, 62, 68–69, 152, 153, 155, 178–86; family, 150, 169–70, 173–74; friends, 17n, 183–84, 189, 192–96; image as Ming loyalist, 10, 73, 84, 153–60; loyalism in poetry, 160–78; modern views of, 158– 60; ordination, 150; Qianlong’s criticism of, 153, 157–58; reaction to fall of Nanjing, 151–52, 160– 63; relations with loyalists, 151; resistance activities, 10; southern identity, 150; speech on Ming loyalists, 178; trial, 152; theme of reconciliation, 84 —, works: “Bing gui cheng Li gong yi shi jian xun yong yun fengda,” 188; “Bingshen Shengri ershou,” 180; “Chu ru Ciensi,” 181–82; “Chu zhi Shenyang,” 181; “Da,” 177; “De Luofu xin sanshou,” 173–74; “Dingyou shengri ershou,” 184–85; “Du Liang Weiyang zeng Huo Jie-

Index sheng shi yougan yong yuan yun,” 168; “He ‘Qixian Shanju’ yun,” 182–83; “He Runji xiong linsi shi,” 172–73; history of Nanjing occupation, 149, 152; “Ji A Shui,” 174–76; “Jiechao,” 186; “Ji Jiangnan tongshe sishou,” 196–98; “Jishi,” 180; “Kugua,” 181; “Ou cheng,” 186; poetry, 46, 62, 69, 151, 152, 153; preface to Bingtianshe shi, 189–90; Qianshan shiji, 152, 156, 157, 174, 189; “Qiu yi bashou Yiyou yu Jinling zuo,” 160–63; “Rushan zayong ershi shou,” 186; Sheng shi (Shengren shi or Jinling ta), 153, 155, 156–57; “Shizhe quan yu bingzhong ba yin fu ci shi zhi,” 188; “Wang Yi, Wu, and Lü,” 182; “Wen shiren,” 176–77; “Wushu yuandan,” 185; “Yaoku Xuanzi,” 170–71; “You da,” 177; “You wen,” 177; Zai bian ji, 152; “Zai ji A Shui,” 175, 176; “Zai ji Xuezhai jingri,” 183–84; “Zhi Yongping,” 179 Hanshi, 151, 163, 169 Hao Yu, 156, 183 History: agency in, 37, 82, 110, 128; analogous moments in, 39–41, 64; of Chinese thought, 8; condensed as beautiful images, 88; compilation of Ming history, 37, 82, 91; continuum of poetry and, 75; to displace or transcend history, 74, 85, 86, 91, 92, 96–98; escape from, 43n, 61, 98, 128n; and fiction, 33, 62; literary history, 2, 5, 9n, 26, 47n, 66, 70, 74, 92, 96, 99; literary representation of Ming history, 41–43, 54; the Ming history case, 5, 6n, 20n, 63, 64; Ming History Office, 19n; of Ming and Qing dynasties, 82; of Ming-Qing transition and its representation, 1, 4, 25, 28, 30, 33, 34, 36–38, 44, 52–54, 61–64,

517 81n, 82, 124; as “monstrous,” 34n; of objects, 129–35; parallels between literary and political, 92; poet-historians, 38, 79–80, 82, 83, 85, 147; poetic engagement with, 73–74, 75–85; of the Qing, 21n, 89n; rejection of, 8; relationship with literature, 1–2, 74, 100; of remnant subjects, 6; of Southern Ming, 124, 142, 147; as subject in Wu Weiye’s poetry, 99–148; subjects of chuanqi drama, 398, of Wu’s family, 136; of Wuzhong, 136 Hong Chengchou, 108–11, 149, 150, 152 Hong Sheng: 39, 41, 43, 52, 64, 69; and generational difference, 28; life of, 368, 457, 458, 466; Si chanjuan, 466 —, Changsheng dian (Palace of Lasting Life): authorized version, 457–58, 461; foreword, 457, 460, 461, 463; historical characters and events, 39, 41, 52, 64, 69, 366, 457, 462–63; marginal comments, 383; musicality, 62, 458–59; opening scene, 467; performances, 457, 458, 460–61, 476; phenomenal performance in, 473, 474–75, 479; “Rainbow Skirts” music, 64, 361–62, 363– 67, 463–73, 474, 478–85, 487; relationship of music and narrative, 483–87; source material, 462–63, 465–66; stagecraft, 459– 60, 461, 482; summary, 456–57; Yang Guifei character, 56, 358, 362, 364, 366, 457 Hongguang emperor, 149; as character in Taohua shan, 384,

518

Index

489–93 passim, 506–9 passim; criticism of, 122–23; death, 162; fall of, 160–63; interest in theater, 60, 376, 501, 505, 506, 507; officials, 250; Wu Weiye and, 430. See also Southern Ming Hongren, 60 Hongzhi emperor, 136 Hou Fangyu, 17n, 24n, 29n, 232, 233, 236, 285, 497–99, 502–5, 507 Hsia, C. T., 418 Hsieh, Andrew, see Xie Zhengguang Hu Jie (Yanyuan), 11, 37 Hu Nianyi, 258 Huaben, 310–12, 318 Huang Chengzeng, Guang Yu Chu xinzhi, 309 Huang Daozhou, 163–64, 171 Huang Degong, 489, 490–93 Huang Ding, 36 Huang Xiangjian, 36–37, 63 Huang Yun, 29 Huang Yuqi, 213, 217 Huang Zhouxing: activities after fall of Ming, 18, 250–58, 263–64; artistic vision, 275–76; death, 261–62; delayed suicide, 4, 20, 51, 251, 281; duality in writings, 279–81; family, 250–51; friends, 251–52, 265–67; influences on, 265–71; interest in Lü Dongbin, 267–68; Jiangjiu yuan, 249, 255–66 passim, 271–75, 280; life of, 249, 250–58; literary illusions, 264–65; occultism, 264; playfulness in writing, 258, 263, 270; relations with other writers, 249, 256–57; reputation, 255; retirement, 250; selfportrait, 277, 278; utopian escape, 44, 50; writings of, 257–58; writing style, 224, Wu Jiaji on, 20

—, works: “Bu Zhang Ling Cui Ying he zhuan,” 254–55, 276; Chidu xinyu, 253–54, 256; Chugou zhai shiji, 278; “Hushang chunyu,” 255–56; Jiangjiu yuan ji, 255–62 passim, 271–75, 279– 80; “Jietui yin,” 261, 264; Mengxuan lüeke, 266; Rentian le, 44, 255–62 passim, 266–73 passim, 279–81, 379; Tangshi kuai, 256; Xiaweitang ji, 257, 264; Xihua bao, 252, 276–77; Xiyou ji, 226, 253; Xiyou zhengdao shu, 253, 263, 266, 276; Yudanyue song, 258, 263, 265; Zhiqu zhiyu, 257, 258, 262–63 Huang Zongxi, 10, 14, 65, 75, 93, 94; family, 232n; Lü Liuliang’s critique of, 14; Mingru xue’an, 42; Ming wen an, 42; Ming wen hai, 42; on poetry and history, 75, 77–79; Qianlong’s criticism of, 160; resistance activities, 10, 213, 347; on self-interest, 59; Sijiu lu, 16n, 18n, 54n; on Song style poetry, 84, 93; on learning in poetry, 84; on tension in poetry, 94 Huiyuan, 190–91 Immortality, 44, 143, 263, 268; immortals, 36, 43–45, 50, 61, 116, 118–19, 143n Ji Kaisheng, 189 Ji Liuqi, 57 Ji Songshi, 27 Jia Fuxi, 388n; “Lidai shilüe guci,” 41–42; Mupi ci, 41–42 Jia Yi, 441 Jiang Cai, 252

Index Jiang Gai, 56 Jiang Yingke, 298–99 Jiangnan: 9n, 29, 121, 124, 137, 146; classical tales, 282; and early Qing persecution, 6; as epitome of culture and refinement, 146; Hanke’s nostalgia for, 185; literature of remembrance, 29n; Manchu conquest of, 430; post-conquest, 47, 48; romantic remnant subjects of, 15; and symbolism of the south, 52; vernacular fiction, 388. See also Jiangnan literati Jiangnan literati, 6, 27, 47, 67: anthologies of, 5, 6n, 13, 23, 28, 42, 68, 69n, 283, 294n; criticism of, 418; Hanke and, 150, 151, 196–98; in Kangxi period, 367–68; persecution of, 5–6, 47; remnant subjects, 15–16; willingness to serve Qing, 408; and women writers, 27; Wu Weiye and, 452. See also individual Jiangnan literati by name Jiangxi, 165–68, 171, 287 Jianwen emperor, 42, 43 Jin Hechong, 22, 32 Jin Rongfan, 100, 102, 109–10, 120, 142, 146 Jin Shengtan, 226, 382–83, 398–99 Jin Yue, 242 Jin dynasty: fall of, 99; loyalists, 212; poetry, 212; remnant subjects, 38. See also Song-Jin transition Jing Ke, 109 Jin’gang jing, 167–68 Jinghong ji, 467–68 Jingling school, 97, 98 Jinling, see Nanjing Jinpingmei, 378–79, 388, 389, 390, 394 Jinshi, 158, 160 Jinwu (Ah Zi), 182–83

519 Jinxiu, 187 Jishe (Society of Pivotal Beginnings), 15 Jiu Tangshu, 465–66 Jurchen conquest of Song, 40, 310–12, 404–5, 406 Kan’ai Shūhin, 203–4 Kangxi emperor, 2n, 68n, 88n, 91, 93, 101n Kong Shangren: on drama on current events, 33; and generational differences, 28; and Jia Fuxi, 41–42; and yimin literati, 29; Xiao hulei, 456 Kong Shangren, Taohua shan: 17n, 60n, 69; artifice in, 62, 488–89; entertainers as characters, 41, 456; final act, 20, 41, 61; and the Garden of Peace, 33n; hero and heroine, 494–99; historical characters, 383–84, 489–93; historical events, 37, 69, 366, 398; impetus for creation of, 29; influence of, 376; influences on, 29, 409; low characters, 500– 502; and meta-theatrical consciousness, 64; musical performances, 495–97; mourning and remembrance, 52, 61–62; non-performance, 500–505; performances within, 493, 494, 504–9 passim; remnant subject characters, 20; reunion scene, 502–5; self-flexivity, 37; sources for, 34n. See also Hongguang emperor; Hou Fangyu; Li Xiangjun; Liu Jingting; Ruan Dacheng; Su Kunsheng Kou Baimen, 138, 147n Kuang Lu, Chiya, 56

520

Index

Kunqu opera, 458–59, 473, 478, 479, 482 Lan Ying, 61 Langxian, Xingshi hengyan, “Dugu sheng guitu naomeng,” 313–15 Le’an, Princess, 116–17, 119 Leng Shimei, 1n, 60–61 Letters, 59, 102; compilations of, 30, 227–28, 253–54, 283 Li Bai 李白, 51n, 83n, 88n, 109, 195, 352, 413, 465, 473 Li Bo 李柏, 6 Li Chengxiang, 156–57, 183, 189 Li Guang, 133 Li Guinian, 145–46, 364, 485 Li Kai, 7 Li Mingrui, “Comment at the End of the Reminiscences,” 241 Li Mo, 361–65, 366, 464, 478, 485 Li Qing, Taowu xianping, 34 Li Que, 1n, 12, 18 Li Ruzhen, Jinghua yuan, 418 Li Shangyin, 55n, 83, 147, 148n Li Suiqiu, 165–68, 233 Li Wen, 27 Li Xiangjun (character in Taohua shan), 56, 236, 384, 495–509 passim Li Yanshou, Nan shi, 115, 440 Li Yin, 26, 27, 59, 189 Li Yindu, 19 Li Yong, 6, 13, 14 Li Yu 李煜 (937–78), 443, 444–45 Li Yu 李漁 (Liweng; 1610–80): 25, 44, 62, 63, 224, 381; comparison to Ding Yaokang, 425; drama criticism, 382, 383; political poems, 25; Qiao tuanyuan, 63, 319; relations with other writers, 249, 369, 395; “Seven Ruses of the Female Chen Ping,” 58; “Shengwo lou,” 39; Shier lou, 39, 62, 319–29, 331, 334; writings of, 257–58;

writing style, 224; Wusheng xi, 58; Xianqing ouji, 258 Li Yu 李玉 (Xuanyu; ca. 1610s– ca. 1680s): 381, 431; Liang xumei, 36; Niutou shan, 41; Qian zhong lu, 35, 43; Wanli yuan, 36–37; Wanmin an, 35 Li Zicheng, 33–34, 115, 392, 400, 401, 428 Li Zunduan, 255 Liang Qichao, 214 Liang Qingbiao, 36n, 67 Liang Weishu, Yujian zun wen, 356 Liang dynasty, 439–40, 442 Liao Yan, 379, 422 Liaodong, 34. See also Shenyang Lienü zhuan, 314 Lin Gudu, 9n, 95, 151 Lindenberger, Herbert, 455 Ling Mengchu, Erke Pai’an jingqi, 315–18 Lingnan: exiles in, 190; Hanke’s family, 150; Hanke’s nostalgia for, 180–86 passim; loyalists, 168; plum blossoms, 164, 185; poets, 45–46, 51–52, 76, 88n. See also Guangdong Liu Bang, 308, 398, 400, 401, 402 Liu Ji, 38, 207, 208, 212–13 Liu Jingting, 41, 61, 138, 147, 286, 348 Liu Rushi: 16n, 22n, 82n; Chen Yinke on, 66–67, 215; poems on, 31–32, 56; loyalist activities, 82n, 215, 217; Qian Qianyi and, 31, 202–3, 210, 238; tomb, 202–3; writings of, 26, 59 Liu Shipei, 65–66 Liu Shu, 26, 59 Liu Yazi, 66 Liu Youfu, 116n, 117, 118, 119 Liu Yuanqing, 298

Index Liu Zeqing, 128, 392 Liu Zhaoguo, 240 Liu Zhengzong, 393 Liu Zuomei, 216 Longwu emperor, 163, 165, 169, 171 Lower Yangzi, see Jiangnan Loyalists: 35, 38, 39n, 40n, 406n; anecdotal writings on, 25–26, 56, 286–87, 301–2; dramatic portrayals, 35, 489; escapist writings, 271; honored by later Qing rulers, 200, 329; Jianwen, 41–43; Ming, 1, 6, 8, 10, 12, 15–16, 19, 22–23, 25–26, 31–32, 39–40, 45–46, 49, 51, 54, 56, 57n, 58, 65–67, 69–70; models for, 7, 42, 65–66. 179, 198; monk-loyalists, 47n; poetry on, 45–46; refuges, 49–50, 67–68; Song, 9n, 40, 45–46, 369–70; women loyalists, 26–27, 31, 58; loyalism, 26–27, 29; loyalist resistance, 30; women, 26, 27, 31, 58–59; writings of, 64–67. See also Remnant subjects and individual loyalists by name Loyalty, 290, 328–29, 330 Lu Can, 205–6 Lu Ciyun, 28, 285; Beishu xuyan, “Baowu sheng zhuan,” 330–34 Lu, Prince of, 163, 347 Lu Qi, 63; Mingbao lu, 290 Lu Shiyi, 36n, 49 Lu Xiangsheng, 102–5, 106 Lu Xinxing, “Laofu yunyou shimo,” 63 Lu Xiufu, 40, 45–46, 171, 172 Lü Dongbin, 259–69 passim Lü Liuliang: on distinctions between Chinese and barbarians, 2; criticism of Huang Zongxi, 14; Huang Zhouxing and, 252, 254; and Buddhism, 10–11; Qianlong’s criticism of, 160; refusal to serve Qing, 10; resistance activities, 213; and Song-style poetry, 93

521 Lü Xiong, Nüxian waishi, 43 Ma Fengzhi, 121 Ma Shiying, 60, 489, 505–6 Manchu conquest, see Ming-Qing transition; Qing dynasty Manchuria: exile to, 46–47, 68; shamanism, 403. See also Liaodong; Shenyang Mao Chaochu, “Colophon to Piqiang’s Elegy for Dong Xiaowan,” 241 Mao Guangsheng, 232 Mao Jin, 37n; Liushizhong qu, 382 Mao Qiling, 93 Mao Xiang, 29; and his anthology, 68; concubines, 55, 231, 234, 236, 242; death, 242; epitaph, 231–32; family, 231–32; and fengliu yimin, 16–17; friends, 246–47; and Kong Shangren, 29; life of, 231– 33; literary gatherings, 242–43; nostalgic writings, 53; poetry, 32; political activities, 246; responses to Yingmei an yiyu, 238–42; romantic activities, 234, 240, 247; Shuihui yuan (Painted in Water Garden), 16, 49, 233, 236, 271; Yellow Peony Poetry Contest, 232–33, 238; and Yu Huai, 55, 246–47. See also Dong Bai —, works: “Autumn Willow,” 32; “Preface to Zheng Maojia Zhonghuan shiji,” 232–33; Tongren ji, 55, 68, 233, 238–42; Yingmei an yiyu, 52–53, 55, 223, 231– 42 passim Mao Zonggang, 226, 383 Mao clan, 17, 231–32 Marriage: arranged, 323; importance, 325, 334; loyalty in,

522

Index

328–29; political differences in, 26; premodern practices, 339; remarriage for widows, 58; stories of separations, 310–18, 330–34; ties between families, 334–35, 342 Master of the Blue Lotus Chamber, Hou shuihu zhuan, 40 Mauss, Marcel, 342 McMahon, Keith, 225 Mei, Lady/Consort, 113, 467–68 Mei Lei, 17n, 240 Memoirs, 52–53, 59, 231, 379 Memory, 1n, 31n, 39, 51, 75; and dreams, 60; forgotten, 90; and imagination, 50; inner resistance and, 52–54; as justification for survival, 4; literary projects and public, 42; nostalgia and, 368; “Rainbow Skirts” music and, 484; Ming as receding, 19, 88–89; relationship with music and performance, 61–62; ritualization of, 37; secondhand, 28–29; self-conscious delineation of, 85; sites associated with, 121–27; in Wu Weiye’s plays, 434–37, 446, 451, 452–53; in Wu Weiye’s poetry, 121–48 Meng Chengshun, 380, 406n; Jiao Hong ji, 380; Zhenwen ji, 58, 380 Meng Qi, 79 Mengzi, 75, 76 Meyer-Fong, Tobie, 68, 223 Miao Fan, 288 Milosz, Czeslaw, 207–8 Ming dynasty: culture, 29–30, 59, 283– 84; drama, 375–76, 380, 382, 398; fall of, 1–2, 33–34; fictional treatments of fall, 33–37; historical writings on, 41– 42; history of, 37, 42–43, 91, 124; imperial family, 115–21, 315; imperial tombs, 126; military heroes, 34, 36; nostalgia for, 28–29, 53–54, 112, 345– 46, 348, 368, 370, 423; poetry on fall

of, 54–56, 101–11, 125, 206–7; rebellions against, 5, 33–34, 36, 82n, 107, 114, 117, 120, 392, 452; remnant courts, 1, 46. See also MingQing transition; Southern Ming; Yuan-Ming transition Ming feng ji, 393, 423 Minghuang (Xuanzong), Tang emperor: 62, 113, 145; as character in Changsheng dian, 456– 57, 464–65, 472, 475, 483–84; as character in Sui Tang yanyi, 358, 361, 362–63, 367, 368, 371; dream voyage to moon, 465; interest in music, 462–63, 464, 472; Lady Yang and, 367, 463, 473, 474; poets at court of, 352 Ming loyalists, see Loyalists; Remnant subjects Ming-Qing transition: acceptance of new regime, 5, 14, 23–25, 28, 63, 67–68, 424–25; accommodation process, 13, 27, 30, 62, 68n, 84, 223–24; analogies to previous dynastic transitions, 38–41, 207, 208, 352–54, 366, 405, 443, 447; battle of Julu, 101–5; battle of Mount Song, 108–11; collaborators with Manchus, 108–10, 149; change of clothing and hairstyles, 2–3, 3n, 10, 13n, 25, 37, 44, 176; cultural conflicts, 411; cultural continuity, 97; cultural legacy, 8, 42; debates on martyrdom and survival, 4–5; decline of clans, 17; dramas based on, 34–37, 376, 377–78, 393, 427–28; historical writings, 33; martyrs, 4, 26, 36, 51–52, 56, 102–8, 163–68, 211, 302; military leaders of resistance, 108–11;

Index name changes, 274; poetry written during, 76–80; resistance, 3, 5–6, 10, 16, 163–68, 213, 347; scandals, 5–6, 63, 301–2; stories set during, 12, 17–18, 30, 33, 62–64, 303–9, 324–29, 330–34; trauma of, 1–3; violence, 2, 89, 122; women’s choices, 25–27, 31, 58–59. See also Remnant subjects Mongol invasions, 39, 40, 99, 171, 173, 319–24 Munn, Nancy D., 334, 342 Music: in chuanqi drama, 33, 454–56, 470; daqu (court entertainment), 469–70; of High Tang, 361–65; jiqu (composite tune making), 480–81; metaphors for dynastic transitions, 145; performances in plays, 455, 495–97; of pipa, 138–47, 361–65, 485; tanci (popular ballad), 485–87; terms used to describe love, 473; use of existing tunes with new lyrics, 458, 467, 470; as vehicle of memory, 61–62, 64; Wu Weiye’s poems on, 138–47. See also “Rainbow Skirts” Nanci xinpu, 431 Nanjing: historical associations, 446–47, 448; imperial tombs, 126; Manchu conquest of, 22–23, 152, 160–63, 243, 428; occupation of, 149, 152; Southern Ming court, 42, 210, 250, 376, 501; in Wu Weiye’s plays, 446–48, 451, in Wu Weiye’s poems, 121, 124–27. See also Qinhuai pleasure quarters Nanjing academy, 125 National Essence movement, 65–66 Ningde, Princess, 116n, 117–19 Niu Xiu, 28, 30, 282, 299–300, 309; Gusheng, 299–308; “The Human Hedgehog,” 300–301; “Xue gou”

523 (The encounter in the snow), 64, 303–9 Northern Song, 40, 314, 315, 443–47 Novels: audiences, 225; classical, 226; commercial considerations, 224–25, 257–58; on current events, 33–34; on Ming dynasty heroes, 34, 43; quality of, 222–23; references to earlier dynastic transitions, 39; relationship to drama, 225–26; reunions in, 62–63, 310, 319, 335; scholar-beauty romances, 225; sequels, 225; vernacular, 224, 226, 269–70, 388. See also individual novels by title or under author’s name Officials, see Qing officials Opera: Chinese, 467; kunqu, 458–59, 473, 478, 479, 482; Western, 454, 455 Paintings: Cheng Jiasui, “The Portrait of the Bearded Military Advisor,” 105–6; poetry on, 60–61, 135–37; and transcendence, 60–61, 87 Pan Chengzhang, 41, 302 Pan Chonggui, 22 Pan Lei, 19–20 Pan Wenqi, 32 Pan Zongluo, 9 Passion (qing), 29n, 52–56, 61–62, 241, 242, 380, 416 Pear Garden Ensemble (liyuan), 33n, 44n, 462, 464, 472, 478, 485 Peng Shiwang, 77, 202 Peng Yue, 402 Phenomenal performance, 455–56, 473–85 passim, 495–97 Pian, Rulan, 469

524

Index

Plays, see Drama Plays within plays, 475, 478, 488, 494. See also Phenomenal performance Poet-historians (shishi ), 38, 79–80, 83, 85, 134, 147 Poetry: canonization, 73–74; collections, 228; historical engagement in, 37–39, 73–74, 75–85; images of “no place,” 44–48; immortality theme, 44; indirect political references, 32; meditations on past, 38, 121–27; on objects, 130; on paintings, 60–61, 135–37; reflections on history, 38; romantic and political themes, 54–55; responses to Ming-Qing transition, 37 Poetry societies, 15, 68, 95–96, 188–92, 196 Prose, 21, 40, 42, 221–29. See also specific categories of prose by name Pu Songling, 388n, 389; Liaozhai zhiyi, 275, 282, 288, 299, 308 Qi Bansun, 49 Qi Biaojia, 26, 49–50, 51, 351n; “Yushan zhu,” 50 Qi Lisun, 49 Qian Bingdeng, 10, 51, 83; “Difficult Road,” 11–12 Qian Cai, Shuo Yue quan zhuan, 40–41 Qian Qianyi, 29n, 217; comparison to Tao Qian, 209–10; criticism from Qianlong emperor, 22, 31, 160, 199–200, 201, 206, 213, 216; commemorative poems, 37; criticism of, 67, 202; disciples, 83, 199, 205; Dong Xiaowan and, 237–38; imprisonments, 209, 213; Liu Rushi and, 31, 202–3, 210, 238; loyalism in poetry, 205, 207, 217; on Madame Huang, 36; as Ming official, 208–9, 210, 217; modern views of, 69–70, 213–18;

place in history, 199–200, 202, 213–18; as poet-historian, 79, 82; on poetry and history, 75–76, 84; as Qing official, 21, 22–23, 24; references to earlier dynastic transitions, 38–39; rehabilitation, 214; reputation, 22–23, 69, 204–6, 213; resistance activities, 10, 22, 31, 82, 213, 215; retirement, 209–10; surrender to Qing, 22, 199, 202, 211–12, 217; on Shi Runzhang, 93; on Tao Qian, Liu Ji, and Yang Weizhen, 38–39; tomb, 202–4; as twice-serving official, 21; writings of, 6; Yellow Peony Poetry Contest and, 238; on Zhong Xing, 97 —, works: Chuxue ji, 207, 209–10; “Du Meicun gongzhan yanshi yougan shu hou sishou,” 54, 147; “Hou qiuxing” (Toubi ji ), 31–32, 46, 81–82, 211, 214–15, 217; “Jiashen duanyang ganhuai shisi shou,” 81; Liechao shiji, 42, 97, 207, 211–12, 228; Liechao shiji xiaozhuan, 205–6; Ming shi, 212; poetry, 23, 105, 206–7; preface to Wang Shizhen’s poetry collection, 85; “Shu Guang Song yimin lu hou,” 6, 7n; “Tao lu ji,” 38; “Xiaolao leixi zhijiu Caisheng xianbie kouzhan shi jueju,” 48; “Xihu zagan ershi shou,” 121–22; Youxue ji, 31, 205, 207, 214; “Zeng Huang Jieling xu,” 6n; “Zhu Li Yishan shiji xu,” 148n Qian Xiyan, Kuai yuan, 298 Qian Yong, 202–3 Qian Zeng, 31, 83, 214 Qian Zhonglian, 22, 215

Index Qian Zhongshu, 98, 218 Qianlong emperor, 30; admiration of Wu Weiye’s poetry, 23–24; condemnation of Hanke, 153, 157–58; criticism of early Qing writers, 160; criticism of Qian Qianyi, 22, 31, 160, 199–200, 201, 206, 213, 216; literary inquisition, 16n; on Ming martyrs, 65; “twice-serving officials,” 21–22, 200–201 Qin Huasheng, 422–23 Qin Liangyu, 56 Qing dynasty: censorship, 2, 24, 30–31, 66, 68, 101, 105, 158, 270; opposition in late period, 65–66. See also Ming-Qing transition Qing officials: criticism of, 26; exiles, 68, 183, 189; former Ming officials (“twice serving”) as, 5, 19–24, 27, 69–70, 200–201, 335; Han Chinese, 303; Ming zhusheng, 24–25; remnant subjects’ relationships with, 13, 14, 18, 19, 29, 67–68 Qin-Han transition, 39, 400–401 Qinhuai pleasure quarters (Nanjing), 231; burning of, 248; courtesans in, 234, 236, 243, 245–46, 354–55; nostalgic poems on, 29, 53; proximity to examination hall in the Ming, 16; Yu’s memoir of, 15–16, 52, 53–54, 57, 231, 245–46, 353–55; and Wang Shizhen, 29 Qiu Chaicun, 417 Qiu Yuan, Shu juan ti, 35–36 Qu Dajun: canonization of Hanke, 154–56, 158–59; Guangdong xinyu, 300; identification with south, 52; immortality theme, 44; monasticism, 11; on poetry and history, 76; “Praise of the Long-Haired Beggar,” 3; Qianlong’s criticism of, 160; refuge in Yushan, 49, 50; resistance ac-

525 tivities, 10, 213; “Ti Li sheng huace sheng shan hua qi caotang ming yue Luofu,” 45 Qu Yuan: as character in drama, 417; commemorations of, 178; influence, 52; as loyalist symbol, 51–52; loyalty, 154; poetry, 127; Tianwen, 449 “Rainbow Skirts,” 64, 114, 115, 145, 363–67, 463–73, 474, 478–85, 487; Li Mo and, 361–62; Tang and Song performances, 470 Reclusion, see Eremitism Reincarnation, as theme of fiction, 40, 42, 358–59, 360–61 Remnant subjects ( yimin): appraisal of poetry of, 77–79, 93–96; criticism of, 21; divisions within families, 67; and eremitism, 5, 7–10, 12–13, 288; exiles, 46–47, 51; famous, 6; female, 27; hereditary status, 28; interaction with society, 13–15; of Jin, 38; later interest in, 65–66; lifestyles, 12–19; literary communities, 15–16; meaning of term, 6–7; occupations of, 17–19, 224–25, 252–55, 257–58; painters, 60; persecution of, 5–6; poetry societies, 15, 95–96; political activities, 16; refusals to serve Qing, 5, 10, 17, 243, 287; regional distribution, 6; relationships with Qing officials, 13, 14, 18, 19, 29, 67–68; romantic, 15–16, 234, 240, 242, 248; self-censorship, 23–24; of Song dynasty, 77; special examination of 1679, 19–21, 91, 251; stories of, 65–66; suicides, 4, 20, 51–52, 151, 302; suspension of

526

Index

dynastic time, 451; in Taohua shan, 20; valorization of, 65–67, 69, 73–74; withdrawal, 48–49; writings of, 12, 30–31, 64–67, 73–74; of Yuan dynasty, 38–39, 146, 207, 208, 212–13. See also Loyalists Retribution: 42, Ding Yaokang’s concern with, 40, 388, 391, 395, 423, 424, 425; interest in, 290–91, 391; in literature, 371; Xu Fang’s tales of, 33, 290–94, in Zhang Dai, 53 Reunions: association with dynastic change, 328–29, 335; in fiction, 62–63, 310, 319, 335; in final acts of chuanqi drama, 310, 443, 457; nonfiction accounts, 318 Revival Society, see Fushe Roaming Unofficial Historian, Haijiao yibian, 34 Romantic yimin ( fengliu yimin), 15–16, 234, 240, 242, 248. See also Remnant subjects Rongchang, Princess, 117 Ruan Dacheng, 29n, 149; dramatic portrayals, 489, 494, 497–99, 500, 505–7, 509; impeachment of, 16, 232, 233, 246; plays written by, 376; in power, 246, 376; writings of, 60 Sanguo zhi, 142 Sanguo zhi pinghua, 358–59 Schmidt, J. D., 200 School of ineffable essence and resonance (shenyun), 85–92 Seal-carvers, 18, 252, 253 Self-elegies, 4, 59 Sequels, 40, 225 Sexual transgressions, 313, 315, 326, 334 Shandong: 29, 35n; and Manchus, 387, 392; vernacular fiction, 388. See also Ding Yaokang; Kong Shangren; Wang Shizhen

Shang Jinglan, 26, 50 Shao Yong, 54 Shaowu emperor, 169 Shen Deqian, 96, 206 Shen Guanguan, 13 Shen Hanguang, 6 Shen Jiong, 439–41, 442 Shen Shizhu, “Gongci ershisi shou,” 54 Shen Zhou, 136 Sheng Tai: Sheng Ming zaju, 382; Sheng Ming zaju erji, 382 Shenyang, 13, Hanke’s exile in, 46, 47n, 62, 68, 152, 153, 155, 178–86 Shi, see Poetry Shi Kefa, 35, 40n, 89, 123, 164, 329 Shi Ling, 423 Shi Runzhang, 57n, 63, 93; “Tusi fuping pian,” 63; “Wang Baihong qie Hu Shi xiaozhuan,” 318–19 Shi Tao, 60 Shijing, 132 Shishuo xinyu, 356 Shuqi, 7, 154, 179, 198 Shuihu zhuan, 40, 348 Shunzhi emperor, 2n, 393, 430 Sikong Tu, Ershisi shipin, 86 Siku quanshu, 22, 23, 30, 201, 288 Siku tiyao, 216 Sima Qian, 76–77; “Cike liezhuan,” 109, 340; Shiji, 79, 109, 289, 308, 398 Sommer, Matthew, 333 Song Huixiang, 57 Song Juan, 57 Song Qi, 80 Song Wan, 412, 414–15 Song Zhengyu, 27, 55 Song dynasty: poetry, 84, 93. See also Northern Song; Southern Song

Index —, fall of: comparison to fall of Ming, 39, 40–41, 171, 172–73; loyalists, 369– 70; martyrs, 45–46, 171; stories of, 310–12, 319–24; yimin poets, 77. See also Song-Jin transition; Song-Yuan transition Song-Jin transition, 39, 40–41, 369–70 Songs, ballads on Ming history, 41, 43. See also Music Song-Yuan transition, 40, 173, 447 Soushen ji, 119 Southern Ming, 22; comparisons to earlier dynasties, 39; culture, 60; fall of, 130, 149, 176, 392; Longwu emperor, 163, 165, 169, 171; Nanjing court, 42, 210, 250, 376, 501; Qian Qianyi as official, 210; resistance, 169–74; resistance to Manchus, 123, 163–68, 347; Shaowu emperor, 169; Yongli emperor, 159, 169, 176. See also Hongguang emperor Southern Song: fall of, 39, 435; literature, 354; loyalists, 171, 172–73; plays set during period, 404 Southern Tang, 443, 444–45, 447 Stafford, Charles, 310 Struve, Lynn, 12, 33, 65, 379, 424 Su Kunsheng, 42, 61, 138, 147 Su Shi, 38, 106n, 204; “Ti Xilin bi,” 217–18 Sui dynasty, 115, 124, 352, 432; Emperor Yang, 122, 358 Sun Chengze, 133, 134 Sun Chuanting, 106–8 Sun Ying, 302 Sun Jing’an, Ming yimin lu, 65 Sun Lin (Kexian), 56, 245–46 Sun Qifeng, 14 Sun Zhiwei, 19, 95 Suzhou: literati, 242, 246; playwrights, 35–36, 41, 381, 383; weavers, 35

527 Taichang emperor, 117 Taishang ganying pian, 395 Tanci (popular ballad), 120, 485–87 Tang Jue, 40 Tang Sai’er, 43 Tang Xianzu, 275, 284; Mudan ting, 375, 383, 458–59, 466 Tang Xiuye, 202 Tang dynasty: daqu (court entertainment), 469–70; early Qing literature set in, 346, 352–54, 361–67, 368; fall of, 366; fiction on courtesans, 354; High, 346, 352, 362, 368; music, 464–65; musicians, 361–65; poetry, 83, 87–88, 92, 97, 256, 346, 352, 353–54; Southern, 443, 444–45, 447. See also An Lushan Rebellion Tao Qian, 38, 61n, 185, 209–10, 346, 370 Terrace of Communication with Heaven, 440, 441–42, 449 Theater, see Chuanqi drama; Drama; Zaju drama Tian, Consort, 112–15, 128 Tian Hongyu, 128–29, 131 Tian Xiong, 492, 493 Tong, Madame, 26 Transcendence: 2, 10, 30, aesthetic, 60, 62, 136–37; aspirations of remnant subjects, 9–10; effects of time, 63–64; reconciliation theme, 62–63, of history, 92 Tu Long, 284; Caihao ji, 465 “Twice-serving” officials (erchen), 21–22, 27, 69–70, 200–201, 335 Utopian imagery, 40, 44, 51, 59, 142, 185, 258–61, 268, 270–71, 273, 280

528

Index

Verbiest, Ferdinand, 286 Wakeman, Frederic, Jr., 5n, 387 Wan Shouqi, 10 Wan Sitong, 19n, ballads on Ming history, 41 Wang, Ay-ling, 464 Wang Duanshu, 27, 51n, 57; Mingyuan shiwei, 228; Yinhong ji, 57 Wang Duo, 60, 393 Wang Fuzhi, 2, 8–9, 52, 65, 67, 85; Chuci and Qu Yuan as model, 52; critique of Du Fu, 83–85; critique of late Ming, 59; “Dongzhou taolang Xiao Xiang xiao bajing ci zhi san,” 61; immortality theme, 44; poems on fallen blossoms, 32, 52; poetry, 32, 54, 83; and song lyrics, 54; on the relationship between history and poetry, 83–85; reclusion, 5, 12–13 Wang Guowei, 65 Wang Han, 392, 393, 397 Wang Hongzhuan, 6 Wang Ji, 352 Wang Jie, 286 Wang Jilie, 459–60 Wang Long, 431 Wang Maolin, 242 Wang Qi: Chidu xinyu, 227, 253–54, 256, 268; Lüzu quanzhuan, 267; relationship with Huang Zhouxing, 249–57 passim, 264, 267–69; views on fiction and drama, 268–69 Wang Shifu, Xixiangji, 382 Wang Shilu, 87, 90, 240 Wang Shimin, 138–47 Wang Shizhen, 9, 43, 68–69, 285; anthologized work, 285; book collection, 355; canonical status, 91, 92, 96; criticism of, 98; disciples and students, 96; and generational difference, 28–29, 233–34; Hanke’s poetry

and, 156; official career, 91, 369; poetry, 64, 85–93, 243; Qian Qianyi and, 205; relationships with remnant subjects, 94, 95–96, 243; reputation, 91, 92; school of ineffable essence and resonance (shenyun), 85–92; visits to Mao’s garden, 233–34; on Zhong Xing, 97–98 —, works: “Autumn Willows” poems, 32–33, 94–95, 234; “Fourteen Miscellaneous Poems on Qinhuai,” 29; Juyi lu, 94; “Lovely Spring: Twelve Quatrains, No. 9,” 89–90, 95; prefaces and colophons, 355, 357; Tangxian sanmei ji, 87–88; “Temple of the Lady on Spirit Marshes at Jiao Cliff: Two Poems, No. 2,” 90–91 Wang Wan, 7, 21 Wang Youding, 6–7, 285 Wang Zaimin, 158 Wang Zhaojun, 48, 123 Wang Zhuo, 223, 252, 276–77, 283 Wang Zijia, 138, 146 Wang Zongyan, 158, 159–60 Wei Geng, 10, 49 Wei Guan, 183, 189 Wei Xi, 14, 49, 271 Wei Zhongxian, 33, 34–35, 231–32, 375, 429, 494 Wen, Wei emperor, 115, 350 Wen Tianxiang, 40, 45–46, 434–35 Wen Tiren, 209 Wen Zhengming, 17n, 136 Wen xuan, 439 Women: allegorical, 58, 380; chastity, 26, 56, 58, 63; heroic characters, 26, 56, 58–59, 448–49; images of displaced, 56–57; loyalty of, 328–29, 380; Ming loy-

Index alists, 26, 27, 31, 58–59; poetry by, 57, 59, 228; political choices in MingQing transition, 25–27, 31, 58–59; rapes, 26, 123, 318, 322, 325; readers of novels, 225; remnant subjects, 27; sales of, 332–33; victimized, 123; widows of martyrs, 26; writers, 26, 27, 50, 58–59, 255–56, 409, 466. See also Concubines; Courtesans; and individual women by name Woodcutter of the Lower Yangzi, Qiaoshi tongsu yanyi, 34 Woodcutting Daoist of the Seven Peaks, Qifeng yibian, 34 Wu, Han emperor, 440, 441, 442 Wu, Liang emperor, 439, 441 Wu Jiaji, 65, 79, 80–81, 95–96; “Jie laoweng,” 20, “Yechun jueju he Ruanting xiansheng,” 96n Wu Jishan, 36 Wu Koukou, 236, 242 Wu Liuqi, 64, 303–9 Wu Qiao, 83 Wu Sangui, 112 Wu Shan, 27, 255–56 Wu Weiye, 11n, 20n, 21, 36, 37, 44, 51n; aesthetics of dynastic transition, 41, 428, 447–52; anthologized work, 285; autobiographical plays, 449–50; on Chen Zilong, 97; closing scenes of plays, 428, 433–38, 441–42, 443–47; collection of references to eccentric behavior, 356; family, 429; historical writing, 356–57; later readers of, 453; life of, 428–30; lovers, 127–28, 147; loyalism, 201, 451; Meicun style, 80–81; mournful beauty style, 100; musical references in poetry, 61; at Nanjing academy, 125; place and memory in plays of, 434–37, 446, 451, 452–53; as poet-historian, 79, 82; poetic engagement with history,

529 99–121; on poetry and history, 76; ; and the Qianlong emperor, 24; as Qing official, 21, 22, 23, 107, 357, 377–78, 430; reaction to fall of Ming, 99–100, 356, 369, 430–31, 443; reaction to play on Wu Jishan, 36; references to southern dynasties in plays, 39; regrets at serving Qing, 23, 55, 62, 430; reputation, 23, 204; on Yang Weizhen, 39 —, works: “Beige zeng Wu Jizi,” 46; “Dushi zagan shiliu shou,” 81; Fushe jishi, 82n, 452; “Gongshan,” 129-130; “Jing jiang songyuan tu ge,” 136–37; Linchun ge, 56, 432–38, 441–42, 448–49; “Linhuai laoji xing,” 127–29; “Linjiang canjun,” 100–101, 102–6; “Loyang xing,” 120; Meicun shihua, 101, 106, 452; Moling chun, 61, 431, 443–47, 450–51, 456; “Pipa xing, bing xu,” 138– 47, 430; plays, 377, 427–28, 431; poems on entertainers, 137–38, 147; poems on fall of Ming dynasty, 100–148; poems on imperial family, 115–21; poems on Jinling and Yangzhou, 121, 122–27; poems on landscape paintings, 135–37; poems on martyrs, 102–8; poems on objects, 129–35; poetry, 23–24, 52, 54–55, 430–31; prefaces to plays, 431; preface to Qing zhong pu, 35n; preface to Yujian zun wen, 356; “Qinhe ganjiu sishou bingxu,” 54–55, 147; “Siling zhang gongzhu wanshi,” 112; “Song of Lake Yuan,” 24n, 431; “Songshan ai,” 108–11, 369; Suikou jilüe, 115n, 452; “Tianjia tieshi

530

Index

ge,” 129, 131; “Ti Cui Qingyin Xi xiang tu,” 137; “Ti Dong Wanjun xiaoxiang ba jueju,” 138, 240; Tongtian tai, 438–42, 449–50; “Tuigu ge,” 134; “Xiaoshi qingmen qu,” 112, 115– 20; “Xuanzong yuyong qiangjin xishuai pen ge,” 129, 131–34; “Yanmen shangshu xing,” 106–8; “Yinquan shan,” 112, 120; “Yonghe gong ci,” 112–15, 120, 369, 430; “Yuanyuan qu,” 112, 430; “Yu nanxiang yuansou ganfu bashi yun,” 124–27; “Zagan ershiyi shou,” 81 Wu Xiuhua, 423–24 Wu Yan, 301–2 Wu Yiyi, 383, 460–61, 472, 478, 481–82 Wu Yu, 136 Wu Zhaoqian, 46–47, 57n, 83; “Zeng Qi Yixi,” 47 Wu Zhenfang, Shuoling, 283 Wu Zonghan, 301 Wu Zuxiu, 205 Xia Yunyi, 51 Xiang Yu, 103, 308, 398, 400, 401–2, 403 Xianguo suilu, 290 Xiao Shi, 18 Xie Ao, 40, 77, 135 Xie Guozhen, 55, 66, 158, 159 Xie Zhaozhe, 284; Zhu yu, 298 Xie Zhengguang, 6, 55, 134n, 201, 217 Xihu erji, 318 Xin Qiji, 369–70 Xing Fang, 67, 151 Xingshi yinyuan zhuan, 359, 388, 389–90 Xu Can, 26, 59, 83 Xu Fang (1619–71), 3n, 67, 282; character, 287–88; comparison to Niu Xiu, 309; eremitism of, 12; livelihood, 18, 288; Huang Zhouxing and, 252; life of, 287; resistance activities, 10; stu-

dents, 20; work anthologized by Zhang Chao, 288 —, works: anecdotal writings, 287; Cangshan gao waibian, 288–98; “The Divine Army,” 291–94; “The Heart Transplant,” 298; preface to Shuying, 289; “Tale of a Remarkable Woman,” 63, 295–98; “Tale of Divine Halberd,” 33; Xuanta bian, 288–89 Xu Fang (1622–94), 3n, 12, 20, 67, 287n Xu Fu, 403 Xu Lin, 459, 460 Xu Lingyu, 45 Xu Qianxue, preface to “Yuyang xu shiji xu,” 92 Xu Qiu, Xu benshi shi, 53–54 Xu Shijun, 268 Xu Song, 252 Xu Taishi, 240 Xu Wei, 375 Xu Xudian, 215 Xu Ye, 32 Xuande emperor, 130, 131–33 Xuanzong (Tang), see Minghuang Yan Ermei, 6n, 10, 11, 35, 68n Yan Shifan, 393 Yan Song, 393 Yan Yu, 87n, 91–92; Canglang shihua, 86 Yang Guifei (Yang Yuhuan): as character in Changsheng dian, 56, 358, 362–66 passim, 457, 464–73 passim, 478–79, 483–85, 487; as character in Sui Tang yanyi, 367, 371; implied references in “Yonghe gongci,” 113, 115; Minghuang and, 367, 463, 473, 474; stories of, 465–66 Yang Jinlong, 216–17

Index Yang Jisheng, 393–94 Yang Shen, 83 Yang Sichang, 102–5 passim Yang Tinglin, 100–106 passim Yang Weizhen, 38–39, 146 Yang Xiong, 205, 441 Yangzhou: concubines, 348–49; literary communities, 68, 283; Manchu conquest of, 22, 23n, 35n, 89, 122; Wang Shizhen in, 68, 87, 89–90, 94; Wu Weiye on, 112–13, 121, 122–24; Zhang Dai on, 53, 348–49; in Xu Jin Ping Mei, 57 Ye Junyuan, 101, 114–15 Ye Mengzhu, 256, 261, 262, 264; Yueshi bian, 250, 255 Ye Shaoyuan, 17n; Jiaxing rizhu, 59 Ye Shizhang, Xunguo yi, 43 Ye Xiaoluan, 484n Yelü Chucai, 407, 408 Yesou puyan, 274 Yi Shizhen, Langhuan ji, 350 Yim, Chi-hung, 217 Yimin, see Remnant subjects Ying Bu, 402 Yongli emperor, 13, 159, 169, 176 You Huang, 269 You Tong: autobiographical dramas, 379; ballads on Ming history, 41; on courtesans of Chang’an, 354; Juntian yue, 279, 456, 475, 484n; Nianpu tushi, 477; poem on Huang Zhouxing, 253; relations with other writers, 249, 269, 369; writings of, 57n, 422, 427n, 431 Yu Binshuo, 28 Yu Huai: 9n, 20n, 26n; Banqiao zaji, 15–16, 52–57 passim, 223, 231, 245–46, 353–55; Banqiao zaji preface, 243–45, 353–54; Hanke and, 151; life of, 242–43, 369; Mao Xiang and, 55, 246–47; nostalgic writings, 15–16,

531 52–54, 56–57; poetry, 242; political activities, 16, 246; refusal to serve Qing, 243; son, 28 Yu Huang, 51 Yuan Haowen, 99, 212 Yuan Zhen, 80; “Lianchang gong ci,” 112 Yuan dynasty: conquest of Song, 40, 173; plays, 382, 398; remnant subjects, 38–39, 146, 207, 208, 212–13 Yuan-Ming transition, 38–39, 207, 208 Yuanshi, 83 Yue Fei, 40–41 Yun Shouping, 44, 60 Yutai xinyong, 439 Zaju drama: collections, 382, 431; in early Qing, 376–77; Huaren you (Ding Yaokang), 43–44, 378, 393, 411, 412–21, 423, 424; in late Ming, 375, 382, 438; Linchun ge (Wu Weiye), 56, 432–38, 441–42, 448–49; modes and suites, 434; Si chanjuan (Hong Sheng), 466; Tongtian tai (Wu Weiye), 438– 42, 449–50; Xihua bao (Huang Zhouxing), 252, 276–77 Zaju sanji, 382, 431 Zang Maoxun, Yuanqu xuan, 382 Zha Jizuo, 6n, 17, 64, 303–9; “Preface to Chisong you,” 39n Zha Shenxing, 202 Zha clan, 17 Zhang Binglin, 65–66, 214–15 Zhang Chao: 4n, 10; affinity with late Ming culture, 30, 284; associations with remnant subjects, 30; Chidu oucun, 228, 283; Chidu yousheng, 228, 283; edited works, 223, 227, 252, 283; letters,

532

Index

30, 228; life of, 28, 283; poetry, 256; relations with other writers, 223, 227, 228, 249, 252, 256–57, 283; on Ruan Dacheng, 60; Tanji congshu, 223, 252, 257, 276, 283; Youmeng ying, 30, 283, 284; Yu Chu xinzhi, 223, 227, 252–57 passim, 282–88 passim, 299, 309; Zhaodai congshu, 223, 252, 257, 283, 288, 353 Zhang Cichen, 418 Zhang Dafu, 381; Rushi guan, 41 Zhang Dai: life of, 347–48, 369; names, 370; nostalgic writings, 345, 418; resistance activities, 10 —, works: “Langhuan fudi,” 44, 50, 349–50; Langhuan wenji, 350; “Liu Huiji nüxi,” 465; Tao’an Mengyi, 52–53, 275, 348–51; Tao’an Mengyi bu, 351n; Xihu mengxun, 53; “Yangzhou shouma,” 348–49; “Zi wei muzhiming,” 4, 346–48, 351–52 Zhang Gangsun, 95 Zhang Hanru, 209 Zhang Hongfan, 435 Zhang Hua, 350–51 Zhang Huangyan, 57n, 302 Zhang Jiayu, 169, 170–71 Zhang Juzheng, 217 Zhang Liang, 39n, 393, 397, 398, 399–401, 403–4 Zhang Lihua, 56, 112, 115, 448–49 Zhang Ling, 254 Zhang Ping, 167 Zhang Pu, 16n, 35n, 105, 429, 430, 447 Zhang Qingji, 389 Zhang Shijie, 40, 45–46 Zhang Tangong, 393 Zhang Xianzhong, 36, 392 Zhang Xun, “Short Preface to Poem and Picture,” 239–40

Zhang Wei (Yaoxing), 29, 61 Zhang Yuniang, 380 Zhang Yuxing, 158, 159 Zhang Zhupo, 226, 227 Zhao Erbian, 239 Zhao Feiyan, 112 Zhao Jishi, Jiyuan ji suoji, 283 Zhao Yi, 99, 100, 213 Zhao Yun, 23 Zhejiang literati, 5–6, 15, 30, 283. See also individual Zhejiang literati by name Zheng Chenggong, 6n, 31, 213, 214, 394 Zheng Qian, 390 Zheng Shuruo, Yu Chu xuzhi, 309 Zheng Sixiao, Xinshi, 40, 173 Zheng Xie, 197–98; Daoqing shiqu, 376 Zheng Yuanxun, 232–33 Zhong Xing, 97–98 Zhong Yi, 164 Zhou Jixian, “In Memoriam Ode,” 239 Zhou Lianggong, 21–22, 67; Chidu xinchao, 227; “Shu Qi Sanlang shi,” 335–42; Shuying, 289; Yinren zhuan, 18 Zhou Qiong, 58 Zhou Shunchang, 35 Zhou Xian, 116–17 Zhu Changxun, 120 Zhu Da, 4, 60 Zhu Heling, 83 Zhu Suchen, 381 Zhu Tingzhen, 99 Zhu Yihai, 347 Zhu Yizun, 9, 13n, 19, 38, 39n, 51n, 66, 97; Ming shi zong, 42; Zhexi school, 74–75; “Zhujiang wuri guandu,” 47–48

Index Zhu Youjian, see Chongzhen emperor Zhu Yunming, 136 Zhu Zisu, Lidai yimin lu, 7 Zhu Zuochao, 381; Duo qiukui, 41; Xueying shi, 43 Zhuang Jifa, 216 Zhuangzi, 119, 132 Zhuo Erkan, Jinqing tang shi, 28, Ming yimin shi, 17n, 18n, 32n, 35n, 45n, 52n, 53n, 60n Zong Yuanding, 29

533 Zou Shijin: preface to Youxue ji, 205; preface to Zaju sanji, 376–77 Zuixing shi, 318 Zuo Liangyu, 123, 489 Zuo Maotai, 183, 192–96; “Cong Xuezhai gui,” 194–96; “Du Xuezhai xinshi,” 193, 195; “Jiu zuo Xuezhai,” 194, 195; “Ta bing guo Xuezhai,” 193

Harvard East Asian Monographs (* out-of-print)

*1. *2. 3. *4.

Liang Fang-chung, The Single-Whip Method of Taxation in China Harold C. Hinton, The Grain Tribute System of China, 1845–1911 Ellsworth C. Carlson, The Kaiping Mines, 1877–1912 Chao Kuo-chün, Agrarian Policies of Mainland China: A Documentary Study, 1949–1956

*5. *6. 7.

Edgar Snow, Random Notes on Red China, 1936–1945 Edwin George Beal, Jr., The Origin of Likin, 1835–1864 Chao Kuo-chün, Economic Planning and Organization in Mainland China: A Documentary Study, 1949–1957 John K. Fairbank, Ching Documents: An Introductory Syllabus Helen Yin and Yi-chang Yin, Economic Statistics of Mainland China, 1949–

*8. *9.

1957 10. 11. 12. 13. *14. 15.

*16. *17.

Wolfgang Franke, The Reform and Abolition of the Traditional Chinese Examination System Albert Feuerwerker and S. Cheng, Chinese Communist Studies of Modern Chinese History C. John Stanley, Late Ching Finance: Hu Kuang-yung as an Innovator S. M. Meng, The Tsungli Yamen: Its Organization and Functions Ssu-yü Teng, Historiography of the Taiping Rebellion Chun-Jo Liu, Controversies in Modern Chinese Intellectual History: An Analytic Bibliography of Periodical Articles, Mainly of the May Fourth and Post-May Fourth Era Edward J. M. Rhoads, The Chinese Red Army, 1927–1963: An Annotated Bibliography Andrew J. Nathan, A History of the China International Famine Relief Commission

Harvard East Asian Monographs *18. *19. *20. *21. *22. 23. *24. *25. *26. 27. *28. *29. 30. 31. *32.

Frank H. H. King (ed.) and Prescott Clarke, A Research Guide to ChinaCoast Newspapers, 1822–1911 Ellis Joffe, Party and Army: Professionalism and Political Control in the Chinese Officer Corps, 1949–1964 Toshio G. Tsukahira, Feudal Control in Tokugawa Japan: The Sankin Kōtai System Kwang-Ching Liu, ed., American Missionaries in China: Papers from Harvard Seminars George Moseley, A Sino-Soviet Cultural Frontier: The Ili Kazakh Autonomous Chou Carl F. Nathan, Plague Prevention and Politics in Manchuria, 1910–1931 Adrian Arthur Bennett, John Fryer: The Introduction of Western Science and Technology into Nineteenth-Century China Donald J. Friedman, The Road from Isolation: The Campaign of the American Committee for Non-Participation in Japanese Aggression, 1938–1941 Edward LeFevour, Western Enterprise in Late Ching China: A Selective Survey of Jardine, Matheson and Company’s Operations, 1842–1895 Charles Neuhauser, Third World Politics: China and the Afro-Asian People’s Solidarity Organization, 1957–1967 Kungtu C. Sun, assisted by Ralph W. Huenemann, The Economic Development of Manchuria in the First Half of the Twentieth Century Shahid Javed Burki, A Study of Chinese Communes, 1965 John Carter Vincent, The Extraterritorial System in China: Final Phase Madeleine Chi, China Diplomacy, 1914–1918 Clifton Jackson Phillips, Protestant America and the Pagan World: The First Half Century of the American Board of Commissioners for Foreign Missions,

1810–1860 *33. *34.

James Pusey, Wu Han: Attacking the Present Through the Past Ying-wan Cheng, Postal Communication in China and Its Modernization,

1860–1896 35. 36. 37. 38. 39. 40. 41.

Tuvia Blumenthal, Saving in Postwar Japan Peter Frost, The Bakumatsu Currency Crisis Stephen C. Lockwood, Augustine Heard and Company, 1858–1862 Robert R. Campbell, James Duncan Campbell: A Memoir by His Son Jerome Alan Cohen, ed., The Dynamics of China’s Foreign Relations V. V. Vishnyakova-Akimova, Two Years in Revolutionary China, 1925–1927, tr. Steven L. Levine Meron Medzini, French Policy in Japan During the Closing Years of the Tokugawa Regime

Harvard East Asian Monographs 42. 43.

Ezra Vogel, Margie Sargent, Vivienne B. Shue, Thomas Jay Mathews, and Deborah S. Davis, The Cultural Revolution in the Provinces Sidney A. Forsythe, An American Missionary Community in China, 1895–

1905 *44. *45. 46. 47. 48. 49. 50. 51. 52.

Benjamin I. Schwartz, ed., Reflections on the May Fourth Movement.: A Symposium Ching Young Choe, The Rule of the Taewŏngun, 1864–1873: Restoration in Yi Korea W. P. J. Hall, A Bibliographical Guide to Japanese Research on the Chinese Economy, 1958–1970 Jack J. Gerson, Horatio Nelson Lay and Sino-British Relations, 1854–1864 Paul Richard Bohr, Famine and the Missionary: Timothy Richard as Relief Administrator and Advocate of National Reform Endymion Wilkinson, The History of Imperial China: A Research Guide Britten Dean, China and Great Britain: The Diplomacy of Commercial Relations, 1860–1864 Ellsworth C. Carlson, The Foochow Missionaries, 1847–1880 Yeh-chien Wang, An Estimate of the Land-Tax Collection in China, 1753 and

1908 53. *54. 55. 56. *57.

Richard M. Pfeffer, Understanding Business Contracts in China, 1949–1963 Han-sheng Chuan and Richard Kraus, Mid-Ching Rice Markets and Trade: An Essay in Price History Ranbir Vohra, Lao She and the Chinese Revolution Liang-lin Hsiao, China’s Foreign Trade Statistics, 1864–1949 Lee-hsia Hsu Ting, Government Control of the Press in Modern China, 1900–

1949 *58. *59. 60.

61. 62. 63. *64.

Edward W. Wagner, The Literati Purges: Political Conflict in Early Yi Korea Joungwon A. Kim, Divided Korea: The Politics of Development, 1945–1972 Noriko Kamachi, John K. Fairbank, and Chūzō Ichiko, Japanese Studies of Modern China Since 1953: A Bibliographical Guide to Historical and SocialScience Research on the Nineteenth and Twentieth Centuries, Supplementary Volume for 1953–1969 Donald A. Gibbs and Yun-chen Li, A Bibliography of Studies and Translations of Modern Chinese Literature, 1918–1942 Robert H. Silin, Leadership and Values: The Organization of Large-Scale Taiwanese Enterprises David Pong, A Critical Guide to the Kwangtung Provincial Archives Deposited at the Public Record Office of London Fred W. Drake, China Charts the World: Hsu Chi-yü and His Geography of 1848

Harvard East Asian Monographs *65.

William A. Brown and Urgrunge Onon, translators and annotators, History of the Mongolian People’s Republic 66. Edward L. Farmer, Early Ming Government: The Evolution of Dual Capitals *67. Ralph C. Croizier, Koxinga and Chinese Nationalism: History, Myth, and the Hero *68. William J. Tyler, tr., The Psychological World of Natsume Sōseki, by Doi Takeo 69. Eric Widmer, The Russian Ecclesiastical Mission in Peking During the Eighteenth Century *70. Charlton M. Lewis, Prologue to the Chinese Revolution: The Transformation of Ideas and Institutions in Hunan Province, 1891–1907 71. Preston Torbert, The Ching Imperial Household Department: A Study of Its Organization and Principal Functions, 1662–1796 72. Paul A. Cohen and John E. Schrecker, eds., Reform in Nineteenth-Century China 73. Jon Sigurdson, Rural Industrialism in China 74. Kang Chao, The Development of Cotton Textile Production in China 75. Valentin Rabe, The Home Base of American China Missions, 1880–1920 *76. Sarasin Viraphol, Tribute and Profit: Sino-Siamese Trade, 1652–1853 77. Ch’i-ch’ing Hsiao, The Military Establishment of the Yuan Dynasty 78. Meishi Tsai, Contemporary Chinese Novels and Short Stories, 1949–1974: An Annotated Bibliography *79. Wellington K. K. Chan, Merchants, Mandarins and Modern Enterprise in Late Ching China 80. Endymion Wilkinson, Landlord and Labor in Late Imperial China: Case Studies from Shandong by Jing Su and Luo Lun *81. Barry Keenan, The Dewey Experiment in China: Educational Reform and Political Power in the Early Republic *82. George A. Hayden, Crime and Punishment in Medieval Chinese Drama: Three Judge Pao Plays *83. Sang-Chul Suh, Growth and Structural Changes in the Korean Economy,

1910–1940 84. 85. 86. 87. *88.

J. W. Dower, Empire and Aftermath: Yoshida Shigeru and the Japanese Experience, 1878–1954 Martin Collcutt, Five Mountains: The Rinzai Zen Monastic Institution in Medieval Japan Kwang Suk Kim and Michael Roemer, Growth and Structural Transformation Anne O. Krueger, The Developmental Role of the Foreign Sector and Aid Edwin S. Mills and Byung-Nak Song, Urbanization and Urban Problems

Harvard East Asian Monographs Sung Hwan Ban, Pal Yong Moon, and Dwight H. Perkins, Rural Development *90. Noel F. McGinn, Donald R. Snodgrass, Yung Bong Kim, Shin-Bok Kim, and Quee-Young Kim, Education and Development in Korea *91. Leroy P. Jones and II SaKong, Government, Business, and Entrepreneurship in Economic Development: The Korean Case 92. Edward S. Mason, Dwight H. Perkins, Kwang Suk Kim, David C. Cole, Mahn Je Kim et al., The Economic and Social Modernization of the Republic of Korea 93. Robert Repetto, Tai Hwan Kwon, Son-Ung Kim, Dae Young Kim, John E. Sloboda, and Peter J. Donaldson, Economic Development, Population Policy, and Demographic Transition in the Republic of Korea 94. Parks M. Coble, Jr., The Shanghai Capitalists and the Nationalist Government, 1927–1937 95. Noriko Kamachi, Reform in China: Huang Tsun-hsien and the Japanese Model 96. Richard Wich, Sino-Soviet Crisis Politics: A Study of Political Change and Communication 97. Lillian M. Li, China’s Silk Trade: Traditional Industry in the Modern World, 89.

1842–1937 98. *99. 100. 101. 102. 103. 104. 105. 106.

R. David Arkush, Fei Xiaotong and Sociology in Revolutionary China Kenneth Alan Grossberg, Japan’s Renaissance: The Politics of the Muromachi Bakufu James Reeve Pusey, China and Charles Darwin Hoyt Cleveland Tillman, Utilitarian Confucianism: Chen Liang’s Challenge to Chu Hsi Thomas A. Stanley, Ōsugi Sakae, Anarchist in Taishō Japan: The Creativity of the Ego Jonathan K. Ocko, Bureaucratic Reform in Provincial China: Ting Jih-ch’ang in Restoration Kiangsu, 1867–1870 James Reed, The Missionary Mind and American East Asia Policy, 1911–1915 Neil L. Waters, Japan’s Local Pragmatists: The Transition from Bakumatsu to Meiji in the Kawasaki Region David C. Cole and Yung Chul Park, Financial Development in Korea, 1945–

1978 107. 108.

Roy Bahl, Chuk Kyo Kim, and Chong Kee Park, Public Finances During the Korean Modernization Process William D. Wray, Mitsubishi and the N.Y.K, 1870–1914: Business Strategy in the Japanese Shipping Industry

Harvard East Asian Monographs 109. *110. 111. 112. *113. 114. *115. 116. 117.

Ralph William Huenemann, The Dragon and the Iron Horse: The Economics of Railroads in China, 1876–1937 Benjamin A. Elman, From Philosophy to Philology: Intellectual and Social Aspects of Change in Late Imperial China Jane Kate Leonard, Wei Yüan and China’s Rediscovery of the Maritime World Luke S. K. Kwong, A Mosaic of the Hundred Days:. Personalities, Politics, and Ideas of 1898 John E. Wills, Jr., Embassies and Illusions: Dutch and Portuguese Envoys to K’ang-hsi, 1666–1687 Joshua A. Fogel, Politics and Sinology: The Case of Naitō Konan (1866–1934) Jeffrey C. Kinkley, ed., After Mao: Chinese Literature and Society, 1978– 1981 C. Andrew Gerstle, Circles of Fantasy: Convention in the Plays of Chikamatsu Andrew Gordon, The Evolution of Labor Relations in Japan: Heavy Industry,

1853–1955 *118. 119. *120. 121.

Daniel K. Gardner, Chu Hsi and the “Ta Hsueh”: Neo-Confucian Reflection on the Confucian Canon Christine Guth Kanda, Shinzō: Hachiman Imagery and Its Development Robert Borgen, Sugawara no Michizane and the Early Heian Court Chang-tai Hung, Going to the People: Chinese Intellectual and Folk Literature,

1918–1937 *122. 123. 124. 125. 126. 127. 128. 129. 130.

Michael A. Cusumano, The Japanese Automobile Industry: Technology and Management at Nissan and Toyota Richard von Glahn, The Country of Streams and Grottoes: Expansion, Settlement, and the Civilizing of the Sichuan Frontier in Song Times Steven D. Carter, The Road to Komatsubara: A Classical Reading of the Renga Hyakuin Katherine F. Bruner, John K. Fairbank, and Richard T. Smith, Entering China’s Service: Robert Hart’s Journals, 1854–1863 Bob Tadashi Wakabayashi, Anti-Foreignism and Western Learning in EarlyModern Japan: The “New Theses” of 1825 Atsuko Hirai, Individualism and Socialism: The Life and Thought of Kawai Eijirō (1891–1944) Ellen Widmer, The Margins of Utopia: “Shui-hu hou-chuan” and the Literature of Ming Loyalism R. Kent Guy, The Emperor’s Four Treasuries: Scholars and the State in the Late Chien-lung Era Peter C. Perdue, Exhausting the Earth: State and Peasant in Hunan, 1500–1850

Harvard East Asian Monographs

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Susan Chan Egan, A Latterday Confucian: Reminiscences of William Hung (1893–1980) James T. C. Liu, China Turning Inward: Intellectual-Political Changes in the Early Twelfth Century Paul A. Cohen, Between Tradition and Modernity: Wang T’ao and Reform in Late Ching China Kate Wildman Nakai, Shogunal Politics: Arai Hakuseki and the Premises of Tokugawa Rule Parks M. Coble, Facing Japan: Chinese Politics and Japanese Imperialism,

136.

Jon L. Saari, Legacies of Childhood: Growing Up Chinese in a Time of Crisis,

137. 138.

Susan Downing Videen, Tales of Heichū Heinz Morioka and Miyoko Sasaki, Rakugo: The Popular Narrative Art of Japan Joshua A. Fogel, Nakae Ushikichi in China: The Mourning of Spirit Alexander Barton Woodside, Vietnam and the Chinese Model.: A Comparative Study of Vietnamese and Chinese Government in the First Half of the Nineteenth Century George Elison, Deus Destroyed: The Image of Christianity in Early Modern Japan William D. Wray, ed., Managing Industrial Enterprise: Cases from Japan’s Prewar Experience

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*141. 142. *143. 144. 145. 146. 147. 148. 149. 150. 151. 152.

T’ung-tsu Ch’ü, Local Government in China Under the Ching Marie Anchordoguy, Computers, Inc.: Japan’s Challenge to IBM Barbara Molony, Technology and Investment: The Prewar Japanese Chemical Industry Mary Elizabeth Berry, Hideyoshi Laura E. Hein, Fueling Growth: The Energy Revolution and Economic Policy in Postwar Japan Wen-hsin Yeh, The Alienated Academy: Culture and Politics in Republican China, 1919–1937 Dru C. Gladney, Muslim Chinese: Ethnic Nationalism in the People’s Republic Merle Goldman and Paul A. Cohen, eds., Ideas Across Cultures: Essays on Chinese Thought in Honor of Benjamin L Schwartz James M. Polachek, The Inner Opium War Gail Lee Bernstein, Japanese Marxist: A Portrait of Kawakami Hajime, 1879–

1946 *153.

Lloyd E. Eastman, The Abortive Revolution: China Under Nationalist Rule,

1927–1937

Harvard East Asian Monographs 154. 155. 156. 157.

Mark Mason, American Multinationals and Japan: The Political Economy of Japanese Capital Controls, 1899–1980 Richard J. Smith, John K. Fairbank, and Katherine F. Bruner, Robert Hart and China’s Early Modernization: His Journals, 1863–1866 George J. Tanabe, Jr., Myōe the Dreamkeeper: Fantasy and Knowledge in Kamakura Buddhism William Wayne Farris, Heavenly Warriors: The Evolution of Japan’s Military,

500–1300 158. 159. *160. 161. 162. 163. 164. 165. 166. 167. 168. 169. 170. 171. 172. 173. 174. 175. 176.

Yu-ming Shaw, An American Missionary in China: John Leighton Stuart and Chinese-American Relations James B. Palais, Politics and Policy in Traditional Korea Douglas Reynolds, China, 1898–1912: The Xinzheng Revolution and Japan Roger R. Thompson, China’s Local Councils in the Age of Constitutional Reform, 1898–1911 William Johnston, The Modern Epidemic: History of Tuberculosis in Japan Constantine Nomikos Vaporis, Breaking Barriers: Travel and the State in Early Modern Japan Irmela Hijiya-Kirschnereit, Rituals of Self-Revelation: Shishōsetsu as Literary Genre and Socio-Cultural Phenomenon James C. Baxter, The Meiji Unification Through the Lens of Ishikawa Prefecture Thomas R. H. Havens, Architects of Affluence: The Tsutsumi Family and the Seibu-Saison Enterprises in Twentieth-Century Japan Anthony Hood Chambers, The Secret Window: Ideal Worlds in Tanizaki’s Fiction Steven J. Ericson, The Sound of the Whistle: Railroads and the State in Meiji Japan Andrew Edmund Goble, Kenmu: Go-Daigo’s Revolution Denise Potrzeba Lett, In Pursuit of Status: The Making of South Korea’s “New” Urban Middle Class Mimi Hall Yiengpruksawan, Hiraizumi: Buddhist Art and Regional Politics in Twelfth-Century Japan Charles Shirō Inouye, The Similitude of Blossoms: A Critical Biography of Izumi Kyōka (1873–1939), Japanese Novelist and Playwright Aviad E. Raz, Riding the Black Ship: Japan and Tokyo Disneyland Deborah J. Milly, Poverty, Equality, and Growth: The Politics of Economic Need in Postwar Japan See Heng Teow, Japan’s Cultural Policy Toward China, 1918–1931: A Comparative Perspective Michael A. Fuller, An Introduction to Literary Chinese

Harvard East Asian Monographs 177. 178. 179. 180. 181. 182. 183. 184. 185. 186. 187.

188. 189. *190.

Frederick R. Dickinson, War and National Reinvention: Japan in the Great War, 1914–1919 John Solt, Shredding the Tapestry of Meaning: The Poetry and Poetics of Kitasono Katue (1902–1978) Edward Pratt, Japan’s Protoindustrial Elite: The Economic Foundations of the Gōnō Atsuko Sakaki, Recontextualizing Texts: Narrative Performance in Modern Japanese Fiction Soon-Won Park, Colonial Industrialization and Labor in Korea: The Onoda Cement Factory JaHyun Kim Haboush and Martina Deuchler, Culture and the State in Late Chosŏn Korea John W. Chaffee, Branches of Heaven: A History of the Imperial Clan of Sung China Gi-Wook Shin and Michael Robinson, eds., Colonial Modernity in Korea Nam-lin Hur, Prayer and Play in Late Tokugawa Japan: Asakusa Sensōji and Edo Society Kristin Stapleton, Civilizing Chengdu: Chinese Urban Reform, 1895–1937 Hyung Il Pai, Constructing “Korean” Origins: A Critical Review of Archaeology, Historiography, and Racial Myth in Korean State-Formation Theories Brian D. Ruppert, Jewel in the Ashes: Buddha Relics and Power in Early Medieval Japan Susan Daruvala, Zhou Zuoren and an Alternative Chinese Response to Modernity James Z. Lee, The Political Economy of a Frontier: Southwest China,

1250–1850 191. 192. 193. 194. 195. 196. 197.

Kerry Smith, A Time of Crisis: Japan, the Great Depression, and Rural Revitalization Michael Lewis, Becoming Apart: National Power and Local Politics in Toyama, 1868–1945 William C. Kirby, Man-houng Lin, James Chin Shih, and David A. Pietz, eds., State and Economy in Republican China: A Handbook for Scholars Timothy S. George, Minamata: Pollution and the Struggle for Democracy in Postwar Japan Billy K. L. So, Prosperity, Region, and Institutions in Maritime China: The South Fukien Pattern, 946–1368 Yoshihisa Tak Matsusaka, The Making of Japanese Manchuria, 1904–1932 Maram Epstein, Competing Discourses: Orthodoxy, Authenticity, and Engendered Meanings in Late Imperial Chinese Fiction

Harvard East Asian Monographs Curtis J. Milhaupt, J. Mark Ramseyer, and Michael K. Young, eds. and comps., Japanese Law in Context: Readings in Society, the Economy, and Politics 199. Haruo Iguchi, Unfinished Business: Ayukawa Yoshisuke and U.S.-Japan Relations, 1937–1952 200. Scott Pearce, Audrey Spiro, and Patricia Ebrey, Culture and Power in the Reconstitution of the Chinese Realm, 200–600 201. Terry Kawashima, Writing Margins: The Textual Construction of Gender in Heian and Kamakura Japan 202. Martin W. Huang, Desire and Fictional Narrative in Late Imperial China 203. Robert S. Ross and Jiang Changbin, eds., Re-examining the Cold War: U.S.China Diplomacy, 1954–1973 204. Guanhua Wang, In Search of Justice: The 1905–1906 Chinese Anti-American Boycott 205. David Schaberg, A Patterned Past: Form and Thought in Early Chinese Historiography 206. Christine Yano, Tears of Longing: Nostalgia and the Nation in Japanese Popular Song 207. Milena Doleželová-Velingerová and Oldřich Král, with Graham Sanders, eds., The Appropriation of Cultural Capital: China’s May Fourth Project 208. Robert N. Huey, The Making of ‘Shinkokinshū’ 209. Lee Butler, Emperor and Aristocracy in Japan, 1467–1680: Resilience and Renewal 198.

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Suzanne Ogden, Inklings of Democracy in China Kenneth J. Ruoff, The People’s Emperor: Democracy and the Japanese Monarchy, 1945–1995 Haun Saussy, Great Walls of Discourse and Other Adventures in Cultural China Aviad E. Raz, Emotions at Work: Normative Control, Organizations, and Culture in Japan and America Rebecca E. Karl and Peter Zarrow, eds., Rethinking the 1898 Reform Period: Political and Cultural Change in Late Qing China Kevin O’Rourke, The Book of Korean Shijo Ezra F. Vogel, ed., The Golden Age of the U.S.-China-Japan Triangle,

1972–1989 217. 218.

Thomas A Wilson, ed., On Sacred Grounds: Culture, Society, Politics, and the Formation of the Cult of Confucius Donald S. Sutton, Steps of Perfection: Exorcistic Performers and Chinese Religion in Twentieth-Century Taiwan

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David Anthony Bello, Opium and the Limits of Empire: Drug Prohibition in the Chinese Interior, 1729–1850 Hosea Hirata, Discourses of Seduction: History, Evil, Desire, and Modern Japanese Literature Kyung Moon Hwang, Beyond Birth: Social Status in the Emergence of Modern Korea Brian R. Dott, Identity Reflections: Pilgrimages to Mount Tai in Late Imperial China Mark McNally, Proving the Way: Conflict and Practice in the History of Japanese Nativism Yongping Wu, A Political Explanation of Economic Growth: State Survival, Bureaucratic Politics, and Private Enterprises in the Making of Taiwan’s Economy, 1950–1985 Kyu Hyun Kim, The Age of Visions and Arguments: Parliamentarianism and the National Public Sphere in Early Meiji Japan Zvi Ben-Dor Benite, The Dao of Muhammad: A Cultural History of Muslims in Late Imperial China David Der-wei Wang and Shang Wei, eds., Dynastic Crisis and Cultural Innovation: From the Late Ming to the Late Qing and Beyond Wilt L. Idema, Wai-yee Li, and Ellen Widmer, eds., Trauma and Transcendence in Early Qing Literature