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侯鯖錄

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Text ID
KR3l0047
Date
1100–1134
Dynasty
北宋

Hóuqīng lù 侯鯖錄

Records of the Five Wonderful Dishes [a literary banquet] by 趙令畤 (撰)

About the work

An eight-juàn compilation of gùshì and shīhuà by the Sòng-imperial-clan literatus 趙令畤 Zhào Lìngzhì 趙令畤 (1061–1134, zì Délín 德麟), great-great-grandson of Yānwáng Dézhāo (i.e., great-great-grandson of Sòng Tàizǔ’s eldest son). Held qiānshū Yǐngzhōu gōngshì under Yuányòu; entered the Yuányòu dǎngjí for his association with Sū Shì; in early Shàoxīng (1130s) restored to high imperial-clan office as Āndìng jùnwáng and tóng zhī xíngzài Dàzōngzhèng shì. The work’s title “Hóuqīng” 侯鯖 derives from the Hàn-era anecdote of a great banquet for five guests featuring five exotic dishes (Wǔhóu xīngjǐ; the Xījīng zájì KR3l0001 mentions it), here as metaphor for the work’s literary feast. The work is one of the most-cited Northern-Sòng shīhuà and is the principal early-Southern-Sòng source for the legend of Yīngyīng 鶯鶯 (the heroine of Yuán Zhěn’s Yīngyīng zhuàn) — juàn 5 contains the Yīngyīng gōngshàng diào poem-sequence (10 cí set to the Shāngdiào diéliànhuā tune) that became a foundational text in the Yīngyīng-to-Xīxiāngjì literary tradition.

Tiyao

Your servants report: Hóuqīng lù in 8 juàn, by the Sòng Zhào Lìngzhì. Lìngzhì zì Délín, great-great-grandson of Yānwáng Dézhāo. In Yuányòu he held qiānshū Yǐngzhōu gōngshì; on account of his association with Sū Shì he was fined and entered the dǎngjí; in the Shàoxīng beginning he succeeded to enfeoffment as Āndìng jùnwáng and tóng zhī xíngzài Dàzōngzhèng shì. The book collects gùshì and shīhuà in beautifully arranged form. But juàn 5 on the chuánqí Yīngyīng matter — several dozen entries, each closed by a cí — is rather yědàng (extravagant / lascivious). Ōuyáng Xiū through several cí compositions was slandered; Shì Wényíng’s Xiāngshān yělù defended Ōuyáng’s case — yet Lìngzhì’s present book records Ōuyáng’s holding-a-courtesan matter and includes the poems — almost approaching wū (slander). Zhū Yì’s Yījuéliáo zájì claims the increase of Shàngyuán lamp-lighting to the 17th and 18th nights was an edict of Jiànlóng 5, due to harmony and prosperity, seen in Tàizǔ shílù and the Sāncháo guóshǐ — Lìngzhì instead says Wúyuè in surrendering the tǔdì presented funds to purchase two more nights; this is unfounded. Further, Lìngzhì, though entered into the dǎngjí through Sū Shì, later attached himself to the eunuch Tán Zhěn for promotion — much contrary to the qīngyì (pure / disinterested public opinion); yet this book calls Lìngzhì himself “Yuányòu faction member, Dūfù (i.e., demoted)” — a kuìcí (shameful pretence). Still, the company Lìngzhì kept were all the eminent Yuányòu figures; ear-and-eye contagion has made him different, and what is recorded retains diǎnxíng (formal model). Not to be entirely dismissed.

Abstract

Zhào Lìngzhì (CBDB id 24925; 1061–1134) was an imperial-clan literatus whose closest non-clan literary association was with Sū Shì — Sū addressed two famous cí to Zhào and visited him at Yǐngzhōu in the Yuányòu period. The Hóuqīng lù’s Yīngyīng gōngshàngdiào ten-piece cí sequence in juàn 5 — re-narrating Yuán Zhěn’s Huìzhēn jì / Yīngyīng zhuàn in alternating prose-and-cí form — is the foundational text in the SòngYuán Yīngyīng literary tradition that culminates in Wáng Shífǔ’s Xīxiāng jì (Yuán zájù).

The work’s shīhuà content (in juàn 1–4 and 6–8) is high-quality: it preserves substantial Sū Shì huàyǔ (informal sayings on poetics), important Wáng Ānshí poetic anecdote (with the Yuányòu-perspective inflection), and connoisseurship observations on calligraphy and painting. Hú Zǐ’s Tiáoxī yúyǐn cónghuà and Wèi Qìngzhī’s Shīrén yùxiè draw on the Hóuqīng lù repeatedly.

The author’s later attachment to the eunuch Tán Zhěn (Tán Zhěn was a key figure in the late-Xuānhé — early-Jiànyán court) — for which the Sìkù compilers reprove him — is the basis of the qīngyì judgement against him in standard Sòng historiography.

Standard modern edition: collated in QuánSòng bǐjì; reproduced in Bǐjì xiǎoshuō dàguān.

Translations and research

  • West, Stephen H., and Wilt L. Idema. The Story of the Western Wing. UCP 1995. Discusses the Yīng-yīng gōng-shàng-diào of Hóuqīng lù as central source for the Xī-xiāng jì tradition.
  • Egan, Ronald C. Word, Image, and Deed in the Life of Su Shi (HUP 1994). Uses Hóuqīng lù extensively for Sū Shì biographical material.
  • Yáng Yì 楊億 et al. annotation tradition; selective Sòng shī-huà compilations.
  • No complete European-language translation has been located.

Other points of interest

The Yīngyīng gōngshàng diào sequence in juàn 5 — set to the Diéliànhuā tune — is widely regarded as one of the most beautiful sustained cí-narratives of the Northern Sòng. It re-narrates the Yīngyīng zhuàn with the Yīngyīng-perspective sympathy that Yuán Zhěn had not provided — a key moment in the literary tradition’s shift toward the heroine’s voice.

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