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隨隱漫錄

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Text ID
KR3l0077
Date
1281–1308
Dynasty
宋

Suíyǐn mànlù 隨隱漫錄

Random Records of the Recluse-in-Idleness by 陳世崇 (撰)

About the work

A five-juàn bǐjì (miscellaneous notebook) by 陳世崇 Chén Shìchóng 陳世崇 (1245–1308; hào Suíyǐn 隨隱), son of the late-Sòng court-entertainer 陳郁 Chén Yù 陳郁 (d. c. 1275). The book combines three strands: (1) memoir of Lǐzōng — Dùzōng — Gōngdì court ceremonial and inner-palace usage, drawn from the author’s own Dōnggōng zhǎngshū 東宮掌書 (Crown Prince’s Lecture-Hall Secretary) tenure of 1263 and his father’s Jíxīdiàn yìngzhì 緝熙殿應制 service; (2) shīhuà and literary anecdote on contemporaries; (3) cryptic post-conquest reflection on the fall of the Sòng, framed (in juàn 2) as commentary on the Hàn empress Wángshì and the Jìn crown-prince’s consort, so as to avoid open speech of Sòng chén jiàng jūn rǔ 臣降君辱 (the ministers’ surrender and the ruler’s humiliation). Internal date references locate the composition firmly in the early Yuán (the xīnsì 辛巳 entry = Zhìyuán 18 = 1281). The work is a principal — for some items the only — source for late-Southern-Sòng court ritual and for the late-Sòng zájù 雜劇 (variety play) repertoire.

Tiyao

Your servants report: Suíyǐn mànlù in 5 juàn. The old title-page reads “by the Sòng Línchuān Chén Suíyǐn” — later editors, on the strength of the book’s self-reference Suíyǐn and of its calling Chén Yù 陳郁 “xiānjūn” (my late father), inferred a Línchuān man surnamed Chén; but in fact Suíyǐn is not a personal name. According to the book’s record of Qián Shùnxuǎn’s 錢舜選 poem, the author once, in Lǐzōng’s Jǐngdìng 4 (1263), served as Dōnggōng zhǎngshū (Crown-Prince’s Lecture-Hall Secretary) with mere commoner status; also the xīnsì 8th-month jǐchǒu entry is Yuán Shìzǔ Zhìyuán 18 (1281), so the man lived into the Yuán. Now, checking Liú Xūn’s 劉壎 Yǐnjū tōngyì 隱居通議, an imperial handwritten note of Sòng Dùzōng is preserved that reads: “Order to Cángyī: all the shīwéngǎo (poetry-and-prose drafts) of Chén Shìchóng are excellent; you may select several more pieces from among them and bring them tomorrow without fail. Qiānwàn qiānwàn. 4th month, 5th day, chénchū. Delivered to Chén Cángyī.” Xūn’s colophon notes that during the Spring Palace (= when Dùzōng was still Crown Prince), in his prime years and earnestly devoted to literature, he regretted not meeting YuánQǐ wing-protectors and so descended to seek out the humble father-and-son Cángyī. Cángyī is Yù’s zì; the son must therefore be Shìchóng — corroborated by the contents of the book. Suíyǐn is therefore Shìchóng’s hào. The book records much contemporary poetry and cí; on Southern-Sòng gùshì it is especially detailed — entries such as the Zǐchéndiàn shàngshòu yí (Birthday Ceremony at the Purple-Tenuity Hall), the Imperial Gift of Yùshí pīzhí Shūgé fūrén names, the number and forms of Háiér bān (Court Boy Troupe) costume, Mèngxiǎng jiàchū yí (Procession of the Imperial Carriage at the Winter Suburban Sacrifice), the Crown Prince’s Wènān zhǎnshū yí and Dàigé sānshíèr zhǒng (the thirty-two styles of belt-ornament) — many things the historians have not reached. The other entries on shīhuà and miscellany are likewise much worth gathering. The five entries in juàn 2, discussing the Hàn Empress Wáng (Píngdì hòu) and the Jìn Mǐnhuái Crown-Prince’s Consort and what follows, all borrow ancient matter to lodge meaning concerning the post-fall Sòng chén jiàng jūn rǔ (ministers’ surrender and ruler’s humiliation) and the causes that led to defeat — yet without one direct word of explicit denunciation. They still bear the Shǔlí poet’s grieving, loyal, generous bequest, surpassing what other shuōbù works can reach. Respectfully checked, Qiánlóng 43 (1778), 9th month. (Chief Compilers: Jì Yún 紀昀, Lù Xīxióng 陸錫熊, Sūn Shìyì 孫士毅. Chief Collator: Lù Fèichí 陸費墀.)

Abstract

Chén Shìchóng (1245–1308; CBDB id 29583), hào Suíyǐn 隨隱, of Línchuān 臨川 (Jiāngxī), was the son of 陳郁 Chén Yù 陳郁 (zì Cángyī 藏一; d. c. 1275), who served Lǐzōng and Dùzōng as Jíxīdiàn yìngzhì. In Jǐngdìng 4 (1263), still in commoner status, Shìchóng was appointed Dōnggōng zhǎngshū — Crown-Prince’s Lecture-Hall Secretary — to the future Dùzōng, a position confirmed both internally (the Qián Shùnxuǎn poem-entry) and externally (Liú Xūn’s Yǐnjū tōngyì preserves Dùzōng’s autograph note ordering Cángyī to deliver more of his son Shìchóng’s drafts). After the fall of Línān in 1276 he retired into the Línchuān hills; the xīnsì (= Zhìyuán 18 = 1281) dating of internal entries makes the work an early-Yuán composition by a late-Sòng court-survivor, with a likely composition window of c. 1281–1308 (i.e., between the latest dated entry and the author’s death). The dating bracket here follows that range; the catalog meta’s “fl. 1263–1281” reflects only the period directly attested in the work.

The book’s primary historiographic significance is twofold. First, on Southern-Sòng court ritual: as the Sìkù tíyào notes, the Zǐchéndiàn shàngshòu, the Háiér bān costume, the Mèngxiǎng jiàchū, the Crown-Prince’s Wènān zhǎnshū, and the thirty-two belt-styles entries supply institutional detail unrecorded in the Sòng shǐ Lǐyì zhì or the Dōngjīng mènghuá lù / Mèngliáng lù / Wǔlín jiùshì tradition; modern editors of the Southern-Sòng huìyào and of the Línān gazetteers treat Suíyǐn mànlù as obligatory. Second — and this is the contribution that made the work indispensable to twentieth-century scholarship — Chén Shìchóng preserves rare titles of late-Sòng zájù 雜劇 (variety plays) of the Háiér bān and palace troupes. Wáng Guówéi 王國維, in his foundational SòngYuán xìqǔ shǐ 宋元戲曲史 (1912), drew heavily on Suíyǐn mànlù (alongside Zhōu Mì’s Wǔlín jiùshì and the Mèngliáng lù) for the Sòng-side reconstruction of the zájù repertoire; the play-titles transmitted only through Chén Shìchóng underwrite the Sòng→Yuán xìqǔ developmental thesis that has structured the field ever since.

The book’s juàn 2 contains five entries on the Hàn Empress Wáng (Píngdì hòu), the Jìn Mǐnhuái Tàizǐ fēi, and other dethroned-empress-and-consort cases. The Sìkù compilers read these as a coded yímín 遺民 lament for the fall of the Sòng, comparing the author’s reticence to the Shǔlí 黍離 (Shījīng Wángfēng) trope of the surviving subject’s grief. This makes Suíyǐn mànlù one of the canonical yímín texts of the SòngYuán transition, alongside Wáng Yìnglín, Xiè Áo, Zhōu Mì, and Liú Xūn — though the indirection of Chén Shìchóng’s coding is more extreme than the others.

Standard modern edition: Suíyǐn mànlù in the QuánSòng bǐjì (Dàxiàng chūbǎnshè, 2008 series 8) and in the TángSòng shǐliào bǐjì cóngkān lineage (Zhōnghuá); also widely available in Cóngshū jíchéng and Sìkù quánshū electronic editions. The Àirìjīnglú 愛日精廬 cángshū of 1840 preserves a quality block-print.

Translations and research

  • Wáng Guówéi 王國維. Sòng Yuán xì-qǔ shǐ 宋元戲曲史 (1912; many reprints, e.g., Shàng-hǎi gǔ-jí 1998). The foundational use of Suíyǐn mànlù for late-Sòng zá-jù repertoire reconstruction.
  • West, Stephen H., and Wilt L. Idema. Monks, Bandits, Lovers, and Immortals: Eleven Early Chinese Plays (Hackett 2010). Cites Suíyǐn mànlù in the introductory survey of Sòng zá-jù titles.
  • Idema, Wilt L. Chinese Vernacular Fiction: The Formative Period (Brill 1974). Uses Chén Shìchóng’s play-title lists.
  • Wáng Hé 王河 et al. Quán-Sòng bǐ-jì (Dà-xiàng 2008–), series 8 volume. Critical text plus collation.
  • Davis, Edward L. Society and the Supernatural in Song China (UHP 2001). Cites for late-Sòng court entertainment.
  • No European-language translation of the work has been located.

Other points of interest

The book’s standing in modern Chinese drama studies is anchored by Wáng Guówéi’s 1912 use of it. Wáng’s argument that late-Sòng zájù and Northern Yuán zájù constitute a continuous developmental sequence (not, as earlier scholars argued, two unrelated theatrical traditions) depends in part on the Háiér bān and palace-troupe play-title lists transmitted through Chén Shìchóng — these titles allow a comparison of repertoire across the conquest divide. The work’s anonymity-as-Suíyǐn and the Sìkù compilers’ detective-work in identifying him as Chén Shìchóng (via Liú Xūn’s preservation of Dùzōng’s autograph order to Cángyī) is a classic kǎojù identification, now standard.

Father-and-son authorship of two surviving Sòng bǐjì — Chén Yù’s Cángyī huàyú 藏一話腴 (KR3j0131) and Chén Shìchóng’s Suíyǐn mànlù — is unusual in the Sòng bǐjì tradition; the two works are often read in tandem for the Chén-family view of the Lǐzōng → Dùzōng court.

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