Ming Short Stories

1. Ming Short Stories • Ming authors: • versatile, experts of short stories, wrote various forms of fiction • Inherited some conventions of the “Transformational Texts”: • Unique verse-introducing formula • An episodic narrative progression • Homogeneity of language • Implicit or explicit illustration • Prosimetric structure (picture, verse, prose) • Buddhist themes fused with non-Buddhist ideas

2. The Most Famous Ming Writer • : Feng Menglong (1574-1646) • Most productive, celebrated writer, but an unsuccessful scholar—fared poorly in the civil service exam • Writer, editor-compiler of short vernacular fiction in Ming times • Writer of some pseudo-historical novels, including Xin lieguo zhi, Ping yao zhuan, Sansui ping yao zhuan, and a large number of plays, jokes, rule books for cards and games (even Majiang) • Best knownforthethree highly acclaimed short-story collections (Sanyan) • Jingshi tongyan (Illustrious Words to Instruct the World) or Gujin xiaoshuo (Stories Old and New) • Yushi mingyan (Plain Words to Warn the World) • Jingshi hengyan (Eternal Words to Arouse the World)

3. Feng’s Views On History and Fiction • Feng said in the preface of the Illustrious Words to Instruct the World: • “events (shi) in fiction do not have to be completely real or completely fictive. The story needs not be based on real events if it carries a positive social function and conveys some ultimate principles (li). In history, both events and principles have to be in accord with truth, whereas in fiction, the writer does not have to follow any specific events in the past if the story aims to exhibit some universal truths.”

4. Feng Promoted Fiction • Celebrated the end of “the reign of history” and the proliferation of stories, ie., fiction (xiaoshuo). • Fiction had existed in historical writings • Non-Confucians, unorthodox philosophers and humble roadside storytellers produced fictional writings • Stories have greater power to affect and transform the readers than history Confucian classics do

5. Feng’s Sanyan Stories • Feng: a Confucian moralist? • Audience of his stories: • Educated male literati, women of elite family • Feng’sattitude towards women: ambivalent? • showed indignant at the inequity of the heroine and softened the harsh moralism of his original sources • Condemned women who failed to live by the sexual strictures of the Ming era; directed fulsome praise towards virtuous wives who committed suicide rather than remarry. • Frequently alluded to femmes fatales in historical accounts—Ming storytellers’ stock-in-trade • Accepted conventional view of femmes fatales to rationalize male callousness.

6. Chinese allusions to femme fatale • Chinese: “One whose face ruins city and state” (Precious Consort Yang, qingguo qingcheng) • Europe: “A face that launched a thousand ships (Helen of Troy)

7. Righteousness Revisited:Female Chastity and Male Fidelity • Feng strikes a balance between female chastity and male fidelity • “The Lady Who Was a Beggar” is “Jin the Jade Slave Beats Her Callous Husband with Rods” in Chinese • Used Zhu Maichen’s story to explain the “Song of the Rejected Wife” • The moral: “do not scorn poverty and covet riches” • Wealth and poverty, fame and obscurity, each has its time • Moji is the personification of snobbishness

8. Feng’s Didacticism • Feng warns men that they get retribution for being adulterous • “The Pearl-Sewn Shirt” is “Jiang Xingge Reencounters the Pearl-Swen Shirt” • Poems are didactic: • “do not be deceived by wine and women” [should read “do not be greedy for wine and women] (p.45) • “not to defile the womenfolk of others” (p.45) • Poems trash women • “so with many a woman, fickle as water/ready to exchange her drake for a wild bird passing” (p. 77.)

9. The Way of Heaven • “…how clearly manifest are the workings of providence! It is a thing to tremble at!” (p.90) • “The ways of providence are clear and ineluctable…Clearly, a debt must be repaid with interest” (p.91) • “conscious of kindness, repaying it with kindness” (p.95)—Jiang’s ex-wife “how different from those others,who lusted or coveted riches” (p.96)--Magistrate Wu • “good and ill and retribution, scrupulously apportioned: Providence is near at hand, and need not be sought after” (p.96)

10. Heaven and Fate: Story of Ma Zhou • “Wine and Dumplings” is “Poor Ma Zhou Encounters the Dumpling Woman” in its original title • The framework of the story is based on historical account, including Confucian values • A historical fiction. The only creation is the “dumpling woman.” • Everything else is based on historical account, despite minor discrepancies • Everything, including a marriage affinity, is preordained by Heaven • “follow the word of the Lord of Heaven” (p.103) • “an affinity is predestined from a previous existence” (p. 109) • “this was a marriage affinity ordained by heaven, and not to be gainsaid” (p.113) • Repay kindness with kindness

11. Heaven’s Way and Confucian Values • “The Journey of the Corpse” is “Wu Baoan Abandons Family to Ransom [His] Friend” • A historical fiction • main facts follow historical account • Righteousness/Integrity finds expression in true friendship • “friendship, for the ancients, was a contract between hearts”“With hearts united, men will live and die together” (p.129) • Good deeds elicit rewards • “give but a melon and you will get something in return” (p.147)

12. Karmic Retribution (I) • “The Canary Murders” is “A Single Bird of Shen Xiaoguan Costs the Lives of Seven Persons” in Chinese • Buddhist theory of karma and • Chinese concept of bao—reward and retribution • Buddhist causation theory and the Sinicized Buddhist causation theory • Confucian values: • “Private words among men/Heard in heaven like thunder” (p.157) • “the evil doer fear the wrath of Heaven and earth/the swindler dread discovery by gods and demons” (p.158)

13. Karmic Retribution (II) • “Take no illegal good/commit no illegal acts” • “Do nothing of which you need feel ashamed: who, throughout time, has been allowed to escape?” • “Heaven, clear and profound, is not to be deceived/before the design appears to you it is already know/do nothing of which you need feel ashamed: who, throughout time, has been allowed to escape?” • “Store up good deeds and you will meet with good/store up evil and you will meet with evil/if you think about it carefully/ things usually turn out right

14. Men of the Ming: • Had fear of female dominance? • abhorred unbridled female sexuality (because of their Neo-Confucian value)? • Misogynistic?