List of Abstracts
Sarah Allen, Harvard University
"Oral Sources and Written Accounts: Authority in Tang Stories"
In this paper I will explore the tension between oral and written as sources of authority in stories of the eighth and ninth centuries. Accounts of the (written) composition of stories often emphasize the oral origins of the stories. Writers claim the authority to record a textual version because they heard the story orally, either directly from someone who participated in the events described or (more typically) from a close friend or relative of a participant. These claims are used to bolster the immediacy, and hence accuracy, of the writer’s sources rather than to acknowledge the possibility of distortion through shaky memories unaided by a written text. The written records themselves are presented as secondary, lingering traces of a primary oral world. Yet such claims also call attention to the written text by staging the act of writing itself. A number of the stories that cite oral sources are themselves intricate texts that are clearly much more than just written transcriptions of an oral source. Moreover the evidence suggests that in some instances story writers did draw on prior written texts without acknowledging them. And of course it is as written texts that the stories have come down to us today. This points most fundamentally to the fluid boundary between oral and written contexts found in a manuscript culture, but also to the ambiguous status of these stories as marginal texts in need of justification, often based on gossip yet themselves much more than gossip.
Robert Campany, University of Southern California
"Hagiographies and Anecdotes; or, Anecdotal Hagiographies"
Extant accounts of the lives of religious virtuosi in early medieval China are largely made up of strings of anecdotes of the words and deeds of their subjects on particular occasions. My paper will ponder the significance of this fact. I will ask about the rhetorical effects of this feature of hagiographies and about the nature of the events thus narrated. I will also argue that many of these hagiographic anecdotes had their ultimate source in gossip—oral storytelling on the part of the hagiographic subjects and of many others.
Jack W. Chen, University of California, Los Angeles
"Knowing Men and Being Known: Social Networks in the Shishuo xinyu"
The anecdote is often identified as yu語, or "talk," which both indicates the oral nature of the genre and its casual manner. At the same time, there is a moral interest in the recording of such talk, as the character of the speaker can often be discerned through his words. This is one of the underlying assumptions of the Lunyu論語, in which the disciples either attempt to understand the Master’s teachings through interpretation of his often gnomic words, or are themselves the subjects of brief character evaluations. This might constitute one link between the sacred text of the Lunyu and the much more frivolous-seeming Shishuo xinyu世說新語, a collection of anecdotes about literary personalities from the Wei-Jin period. This paper will examine the significance of character, not only as it is revealed in word and act, but perhaps more importantly, through the narrative construction of the anecdote.
Cheng Yu-yu, National Taiwan University
"The Geographical Scale of Traditional Poetic Language: On the Use of Allusion in Huang Zunxian's Poems on Miscellaneous Subjects in Japan"
Although Huang Zunxian's Poems on Miscellaneous Subjects in Japan are written in a form of zhuzhi ci similar to popular songs and not strict in their tonal prosody, they are still rich in terms of historical allusion. But how can one use a semantic range bound closely by allusions to confront the circumstances of a new age? If what we would like to discuss is Huang Zunxian's poetry, and not just his biography, his poetic language may be more relevant than his personal experiences: though the first level of poetic language describes contemporary people and events, at another level his poetic language is a multilayered web of meaning that one comprehends only by means of allusion. Allusions relate events, times, and places from past and present (at least two but sometimes more). They relate one fact from previous knowledge, the content of the allusion, to another fact previously unknown, using this analogy to "name" a new event or object. This allusion is not merely a translation or reference for a single fixed object: behind an allusion, properly understood, lies a whole set of different ways of understanding the world, and relations that make sense of disparate events. When the writer selects an allusion, he has actually already chosen the relevant site where some foreign historical event, institution, or custom "occurs," and this is not necessarily a site that one can identify on a map. Since the site where new objects or events are enacted must be determined by a pre-existing body of knowledge, there will almost certainly be some cases of discretionary translation, or even mistranslation, in the process, but at the same time, the translation of these new concepts can also conflict with the prior body of knowledge, and end up reinterpreting the "untraditional" components of "tradition." Huang Zunxian served as an intermediary who created new links between the traditional poetic language and the new age he lived in. Traditional poetic language was like a set of measuring equipment, convenient for sketching whatever "conformed to scale," but sometimes the scale provided by traditional poetic language could be too short or too long, too wide or too narrow. Distinctions that lay beyond the scale could in turn invest traditional poetic language with new significance.
Ronald Egan, University of California, Santa Barbara
"Shen Kuo Chats with Ink Stone and Writing Brush"
One of the interesting directions in Northern Song period biji is that away from court-centered anecdotes, even away from the entire subject of the bureaucracy, moving instead toward entires on merchants, artisans, entertainers, etc. Such entries are already found in Tang period biji. What may be new in the Song is that interest in merchants and artisans is evident even in biji written by men who were themselves at the pinnacle of the official class. This paper explores the nature of this new interest in non-elites, looking at the ways it manifests itself and possible motives behind it. The focus is on biji (or biji type writings) by Ouyang Xiu, Su Shi, and Shen Kuo.
Michael Fuller, University of California, Irvine
"From Plots to Fields: Rethinking the Interpretive Privilege of Narrative"
One of the truisms of our times is the centrality of narrative in framing meaning. We have master narratives and grand narratives; we have the narratives of the fall and redemption of individuals, of the rise and decline of nations, and on and on. Narrative, however, is not the only possible frame for meaning: in the Chinese tradition, the distinction between "event" shi事and "inherent pattern" li理provides the large-scale structure for framing the meaning of events. Li have a temporal dimension that can encompass what we typically think of as narrative, but the temporal is only one aspect of the nexus of patterns and processes that li unify as a coherent imaginative whole. My paper explores li as the manner of framing events within the textual tradition by beginning with the ordering of occasional poetry (poetry written about a particular event) and then considering a longer "narrative" poem. Next, I look at the "narrative" framing of a poem in the anecdotal tradition that develops in the Tang, and finally I look at historical writings. In each case, I stress the multiplicity of intersecting patterns that situate events and distinguish this strategy of representation from the "thread" of causality that typifies narrative.
Mark Halperin, University of California, Davis
"Accounts of the Adept: Daoism as Seen in Song biji"
As is well known, the Daoist religion flourished during the Song dynasty, thanks in part to imperial and literati patronage. This paper will examine the representation of the Daoist clergy and the Daoist religion in anecdotal collections from the tenth through the fourteenth centuries. Particular attention will be paid to issues of practice, scripture, and authority, and the presentation of how these questions and issues change over time.
Robert Hymes, Columbia University
"Gossip as History"
This paper will examine the work of Hong Mai in the Yijian zhi and the Rongzhai suibi. I will develop further an argument I had previously been developing in a different paper (now finally published in the last issue of Studies in Chinese History), that Hong Mai intended the Yijian zhi to be understood as something approaching historiography. I will go on to place the Yijian zhi and Rongzhai suibi in a developing Song (and much older) practice of the collection, recording, and generation of gossip and to talk about the place of gossip in Song historical knowledge and understanding, in the process drawing in a supplementary way on other authors’ suibi collections.
David Knechgtes, University of Washington
"Secrets of the Western Han Court Exposed: Anecdotes in the Xijing zaji"
The Xijing zaji 西京雜記 (Miscellaneous Notes about the Western Metropolis) is a collection of 132 anecdotes pertaining to the Western Han period. It purportedly is based on a 100-juan "History of the Former Han"¯ by the late Western Han scholar Liu Xin 劉歆, and edited by the Jin dynasty polymath Ge Hong 葛洪 (283-343). Scholars have also attributed it to either Wu Jun 吳均(469-520) or Xiao Ben 蕭賁 (ca. 495-550) of the Southern Dynasties. Although the historical reliability of the work has long been disputed, the Xijing zaji is one of the earliest repositories of the yishi 逸事 (fait divers, anecdote) in the Chinese literary tradition. In this paper I will examine how these anecdotes portray the "secret doings"¯ of the Western Han court.
Lee Fong-mao, Academia Sinica
閒話與奇傳：一個非常的觀點 李豐楙
從說話到閒話的「話」，在非日常的休閒、遊戲活動中，如何成為一種藝文創造，這就是「奇傳」文體的出現，早期文人就想在正史正傳的傳記體外，另行開出另類傳記，從發潛德幽光到敘述「怪異非常」之記。這種筆「記」、雜「傳」到了宋、元之後又有新的發展，在「閒話」的說話傳統下，已不再滿足於「小說」一個小小的「悽惋欲絕」情事，如一枝花「話」之與李娃「傳」；而是想要「大說」一個大事件，就採取擴充了「傳」、「記」體，主要原因是說「閒」話的非日常休閒，從時間、空間到經濟生產，都是可支持一種非日常體制的完成：勾欄、聽說書、衝州撞府的戲班演出。因而如何「擴大說話」的形制，就逼使一些詩「話」」評「話」翻轉為奇傳，這種奇傳文體較奇書文體，明顯需要一種「非常」的傳記體：非常人物、非常事件，也就是其人奇、其事奇。這就需要休閒的社會文化機制，既要有充裕的經濟生產力支持，也要有敘述夠大的連篇好話，才能滿足視、聽的心理需求。亦即休閒活動的非日常性；生產條件與時空氣氛，直接刺激◎人的視、聽習慣，諸多書會才女與藝文才子被激發新的創作方式。這就是明清的奇傳體小說的形成。如何說「大」話？就需要尋獲一個籠罩全局的敘述架構，道教的謫凡神話與出身修行傳，正是中國敘述學上的一大創造，可以解說非常「人」、非常「事」的怪異性、神異性。這就是閒話體的最高成就，在遊戲活動中推動了中國敘事學的完成，也印證了閒、遊戲為何是藝術創作的基本動力。
"Idle Talk and Qizhuan奇傳 ("Marvelous Tales"): A Perspective on the Extraordinary"
How the word hua話 — taken in the senses of shuohua說話 (speech) and xianhua閒話 (idle talk) — has become a form of literary creation within leisure-time is the origin of the genre of qizhuan奇傳 ("marvelous tales"). From early on, literati sought to chronicle events outside the purview of official histories and records, and to disseminate extraordinary narratives of hidden virtue and brilliance. And, at the end of the Song and Yuan, no longer satisfied with insignificant details of longing and desire in the "small talk" (xiaoshuo小說) of love stories (such as the Tang "Tale of Liwa"), literati sought instead the "big talk" (dashuo大說) of significant events. The main reason for this lay in the idle (xian閒) talk of leisure, which, from the factors of time and space to economic production, all converged to support the creation of extraordinary forms, such as tea-houses and sensationalist writings. Thus, the expansion of the concept of speech (shuohua) brought about the transformation of various "talks on poetry" (shihua詩話) and "critical talks" (pinghua評話) into qizhuan. The qizhuan genre obviously required extraordinary topics: that is, extraordinary people and extraordinary events. Just how are these big stories told? Here, I will investigate, from within a comprehensive narrative framework, Daoist tales of banished immortals and esoteric self-cultivation.
Dore Levy, Brown University
"The Retributory Power of Gossip in The Story of the Stone"
If The Story of the Stone is the great cultural compendium of the Qing, then the significance and effects of gossip, loose talk and innuendo therein is emblematic of the perception of these elements in the lives of Qing social elites. In a household in which imagination displaces direct communication, and fear that the image presented to society will crack is chronic, gossip is often the catalyst of major confrontations within the Jia family. But even in the sanctuary of the Garden of Total Vision (Daguan yuan), those characters with the least regard for outside appearances, Bao-yu and Dai-yu, are susceptible to the rumors that bring their karmic destinies to their ends. For example, Jia Zheng, whose sense of personal inadequacy and unbending rectitude makes him treat Bao-yu as a stranger, succumbs to tittle-tattle and erupts in violence toward his son. Another near-fatal mishap is catalyzed by the thoughtless whispering between two maids, too quick to believe that Bao-yu has been betrothed to someone outside the family, sending their mistress Dai-yu into a near-fatal bout of anorexia. She is rescued from the brink of death by the counter-rumor, again accidentally overheard, that the first news was wrong. Dai-yu’s final, fatal bit of news comes from a compromised source, a mentally handicapped maid, who finally tells her the truth about her marriage fate.
Liu Yuan-ju, Institute of Chinese Literature and Philosophy, Academia Sinica
Self, Voice, and Gaze: Faxian's Search for Buddhist Scriptures and His Anecdotes
This paper is primarily an investigation of Records of the Buddhist Kingdoms, China's first travelogue of a monk journeying to India in search of Buddhist scriptures that is written in his own voice. I will compare Faxian's anecdotes with the relevant biographies of the time, such as "The Biography of Faxian." Through this, I will attempt to explore in these narratives the following questions and issues: (1) Strategies of representation: What is shown? What is kept hidden? What are the authors' strategies for expressing these? (2) Self-orientation: Is Faxian's self orientation fixed or mobile? What are authors trying to show us by these? What are they trying not to show us? (3) Viewpoints and outlook: Who exactly is doing the looking? What do different viewpoints and outlooks reveal? What do the narratives conceal? These problems will be addressed by a careful examination of Faxian's historical context.
Andrew Miller, University of California, Los Angeles
"Place, Space, and Li Daoyuan’s Storytelling Repertoire"
Many of the stories recorded in the Shuijing zhu are intimately connected to a place of local historical significance. This paper will explore how the local nature of the stories affects Li Daoyuan’s retelling of them as well as how it shapes his own repertoire. Using the historical details of his life, we can verify that Li personally visited some of the sites for which he records local legends. In the compilation of his annotations to the Shuijing, we need to ask how his personal experience with local legends influences his inclusion in the Shuijing zhu of written records of local legends for places unfamiliar to him.
Graham Sanders, University of Toronto
"The Myth of the Timeless Poem Belied by Anecdotes"
Chinese lyrical poetry (shi) has often been characterized as timeless, as somehow freezing a moment in time for eternity, but this is only true for a very narrow range of poems. The shi poem has an intimate relationship with time, evoking the past, flowing through the present, envisioning the future. This complex relationship is sometimes revealed in the poems themselves, but the extent of poetry’s temporal nature is only fully revealed when it is read in the context of an anecdotal narrative that purports to capture the occasion of a poem’s composition, performance and reception. This paper will discuss how a poem creates a secondary narrative that is intertwined with and brought to fruition by the primary narrative told in an anecdote. The two types of narrative exist in symbiosis, each justifying and enriching the other, persisting to the present day as a reflection of the occasional nature of Chinese lyrical poetry. Examples will be taken from the Tang anecdotal collection, Yunxi youyi (Friendly conversations at Misty Brook), compiled by Fan Shu (fl. 870).
David Schaberg, University of California, Los Angeles
"Word of Mouth and the Sources of Han History"
Both in the Hanshu and in the sections of the Shiji that have to do with Han history, it is apparent that the historians have drawn freely upon stories passed around by word of mouth. As gossip, these stories purport to tell the secret inside story, either of events that took place in the seclusion of the inner court or of events that took place in some distant or obscure setting. As word of mouth, however, these stories tend to reflect the needs and desires of their users and transmitters. This paper is an investigation of the contributions of gossip and its special characteristics to the material of Han historical writing.
Anna Shields, University of Maryland, Baltimore County
"Alternate Views of Literary History: A Study of the Yuanhe Reign Period as a Literary Moment in Tang and Five Dynasties Anecdotal Texts"
The Yuanhe reign period of the Tang (805-820) has come to be seen as a watershed moment for Tang literature. In this paper, I test that view in the alternate versions of history found in ninth- and tenth-century collections of anecdotes and literary gossip. In writing the literary history of the Tang dynasty, contemporary scholars work with and against inherited chronological frameworks and hierarchies of talents. Many of these frameworks emerged in the Northern Song and hardened in the Southern Song and early Ming; they require new scrutiny and contextualization. Studying the historical development of the frameworks—tracing the creation and use of epithets over time, for example, such as the history of the term "Ten Talents of the Dali [Reign Period]"—is a first step in this process, and a further step is to compare competing visions of the same literary historical problem. In this study, my goal is to contrast the very local and contemporary perspective of early ninth-century writers such as Han Yu and Bai Juyi—who, I argue, had a very clear sense of the Yuanhe as a distinct historical moment—with the perspectives of anecdotal accounts in the hopes of broadening our sense of the early Song understanding of Tang literary development. Beyond the narrow focus of the Yuanhe, I also hope to shed light on the tension between two common approaches to literary history—writing the literary past as a genealogy of talents (a constellation of caizi) versus seeing literary history as an organic evolution of changing tastes.
Richard Strassberg, UCLA
"Glyphomantic Intepretation in Chinese Dream Anecdotes"
Writing about dreams goes back to the earliest known phase of Chinese literature in the oracle bone inscriptions of the Shang dynasty. Of the thousands of dream anecdotes that were written in classical Chinese, many have been transmitted down to the present. Typically, they utilize a tripartite structure of a narration of a dream experience, an interpretation, and a confirmation of the interpretation. The use of glyphomantic (chaizi) and other kinds of special linguistic interpretations suggests a mode of paranormal reading that raises interesting questions about the nature of language and consciousness in China. Examining examples of such readings provides an opportunity to identify the rules involved in constructing alternate meanings and to consider the place of dream narratives within the larger context of the historiographical style of narrative.
Xiao-fei Tian, Harvard University
"Tales from Borderland: Anecdote, History, and Literature in Early Medieval China"
In the fourth century a young man named Pei Qi collected a number of anecdotes into a volume entitled /The Forest of Words/. It was, at least for a while, the "best-seller" of the day and later became one of the sources of /Shishuo xinyu/, /A New Account of Tales of the World/, compiled by the prince Liu Yiqing in the fifth century. One notable "new" feature of Liu Yiqing's work is to classify the anecdotes into various categories. The anecdotes are thereby organized in an orderly fashion and neatly labeled and filed away. But an anecdote is by nature fragmentary, sketchy, indeed "anecdotal." It "produces the effect of the real," and "the real" is often messy and defies control. What exactly is the function of "anecdote"? What is its relation to history and to literature? This paper offers some preliminary reflections on the form of anecdote by examining different kinds of writings, including anecdotal collections, dynastic histories and travel accounts, from early medieval China.
Stephen West, Arizona State University
"Telling It Like It Was and Wasn’t: Travel Diary Reportage during the Song and Jin"
This is an examination of conversations reported from travelers to the Jin court, and what they reflect about the relationship of place to cultural memory, nostalgia, as well of the instrumental use of place as a medium by which to dehumanize or demonize foreigners. The focus of the paper will be on the four major travel diaries of Southern Song to the Jin: Lou Yue’s Beixing rilu, Cheng Zhuo’s Shi Jin lu, Zhou Hui’s Beiyuan lu, and Fan Chengda’s Lanpei lu. Other materials from similar diaries to other northern tribes or states will also be used, as will poetry written by emissaries to the Liao and Jin.
