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庾開府集箋註

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Text ID
KR4b0017
Date
1662–1722
Dynasty
北周 (commentary 清)

Yǔ Kāifǔ jí jiānzhù 庾開府集箋註

Annotated Edition of the Collected Works of Yǔ [Xìn], Director of Headquarters by 庾信 (撰), 吳兆宜 (註)

About the work

Yǔ Kāifǔ jí jiānzhù 庾開府集箋註 in ten juǎn is the early-Qīng jiānzhù (interpolated annotation) edition of the collected works of Yǔ Xìn 庾信 (513–581), the bridge poet of the Liáng-Northern-Zhōu transition and arguably the greatest parallel-prose (pián tǐ) writer in Chinese tradition. The conventional title Yǔ Kāifǔ refers to his Liáng-period rank as Kāifǔ yí tóng sānsī 開府儀同三司. The annotations are by Wú Zhàoyí 吳兆宜 (zì Xiǎnlìng 顯令, native of Wújiāng 吳江, zhūshēng of the Kāngxī era), assisted by Xú Shùgǔ 徐樹穀 of Kūnshān 崑山 and others; the work elaborates and supplements an earlier unfinished jiānzhù by the late-Míng / early-Qīng scholar Hú Wèi 胡渭. Wú also commented Xú Líng’s collection (see KR4b0019). His commentary on Yǔ Xìn was later partly displaced by Ní Fán’s 倪璠 more elaborate Yǔ Zǐshān jí zhù KR4b0018, but the Sìkù compilers preserved both.

Tiyao

By Yǔ Xìn 庾信 of [Northern] Zhōu. Annotated by Wú Zhàoyí 吳兆宜 of the present dynasty (Qīng). Yǔ, zì Zǐshān 子山, of Xīnyě 新野; son of the Liáng Sǎnjì chángshì zhōngshūlìng Yǔ Jiānwú 庾肩吾. Under [Liáng] Yuándì he rose to Yòuwèi jiāngjūn 右衛將軍, enfeoffed Wǔkāngxiànhóu 武康縣侯, with added Sǎnjì shìláng. After the fall of Liáng, served the [Western] Wèi as Chēqí dàjiāngjūn yí tóng sān sī 車騎大將軍儀同三司. After the fall of [Western] Wèi, served [Northern] Zhōu as Sīzōng zhōngdàifū 司宗中大夫. At the start of the Dàxiàng 大象 (579) he retired in poor health. After the fall of [Northern] Zhōu, entered Suí; died in Kāihuáng 1 (581). Career in Zhōushū biography.

The collection’s Xīn Chéng bēi wén 辛成碑文 says he was reburied at Hézhōu 河州 in the seventh month of Kāihuáng 1, so he had been in the Suí for nearly a year by his death. Yǔ guarded the Zhūquè héng 朱雀桁 (the bridge of vermilion-bird gate) at Jiànkāng for Liáng Yuándì but fled at first sight of the enemy. After that he served successive northern courts as if changing post-stations — his moral standing was not weighty.

But his piánǒu (parallel-couplet) prose is the great synthesis of all Six-Dynasties parallelism and the direct ancestor of the Táng Sì jié 四傑 (the Four Eminences of Early Táng — Wáng Bó 王勃 et al.). From antiquity to the present, he has stood as zōngjiàng (master-craftsman) of sìliù (parallel prose). In the Southern dynasties he was equal in fame with Xú Líng 徐陵 — Lǐ Yánshòu’s Běi shǐ wén yuàn zhuàn xù 北史文苑傳序 calls them Xú Líng Yǔ Xìn: their meaning shallow but copious, their prose secret but ornamental, their words leaning to the swift-and-perilous, their feeling abundant in mournful longing. Wáng Tōng’s Zhōng shuō 中說 says: “Xú Líng and Yǔ Xìn are the boasters of antiquity; their prose is overweening.” Línghú Défēn 令狐德棻, in compiling the Zhōushū, even attacks them as criminals of cífù — “Their boasting eyes more lavish than crimson-and-purple, their hearts more wandering than Zhèng and Wèi music.” But this attack is aimed at the Táichéng yìngjiào days, when Yǔ and Xú vied at gōngtǐ 宮體; after Yǔ’s northern displacement (after 554 — captured during his diplomatic mission to the Western Wèi in the Hóu Jǐng catastrophe), his experience deepened, his learning matured, and his late writings combine substance with ornament — qíng and wén both reach their height. In chōu huáng duì bái (extracting yellow / matching white), the colossal qì (vital breath) rolls and unrolls, transforming at will — what Xú Líng could not match.

Zhāng Yuè’s 張說 poem says: “Lánchéng (= Yǔ Zǐshān) chases Sòng Yù 宋玉 / His old residence neighbors poets / His brush channels rivers and mountains’ qì, / His prose surpasses the gods of cloud and rain.” The praise is exalted. Dù Fǔ’s 杜甫 poem: “Yǔ Xìn’s prose grew finer with age, / His soaring brush, robust, ranging at will. / Later mockers and graders of his transmitted fù, / Did not realize the senior worthy was awed by the rising generation.” So Dù Fǔ did not at all share the disparagement of the various other commentators.

The Běi shǐ biography says he had a collection in 20 juǎn, agreeing with Téng Wáng Yōu’s 滕王逌 preface (Téng Wáng = Yǔwén Yōu 宇文逌, Northern Zhōu prince and Yǔ Xìn patron). The Suíshū jīngjí zhì gives 21 juǎn — both long lost. Ní Zàn’s 倪瓉 Qīngbì gé jí has a letter to Yízhāi xuéshì saying “Hearing that you have just acquired Yǔ Zǐshān jí, when I was at the prefectural seat I wished to borrow it to show me — and could not. Now I urgently send a man to your gate. Please lend it to me briefly.” So at the end of the Yuán there was still a re-edited recension; today not seen. The present edition, though headed with the Téng Wáng Yōu preface, is in fact a re-aggregation from various sources, not the original.

The Suí shū Wèi Dàn zhuàn says the deposed Crown Prince [Yáng] Yǒng 楊勇 commissioned Wèi Dàn 魏澹 to annotate Yǔ Xìn’s collection — that book is not transmitted. The Táng zhì records Zhāng Tíngfāng 張廷芳 et al. (three families) annotated the Āi Jiāngnán fù 哀江南賦; the Sòng zhì no longer registers them. Recently Hú Wèi 胡渭 first set out to annotate the collection but did not complete it. Wú Zhàoyí gathered Hú’s notes and, with Xú Shùgǔ of Kūnshān and others, supplemented and edited them — getting the broad outline. But Six-Dynasties scholars saw books of which today not one in ten remains, and Wú gathered remnant fragments to patch his commentary; the sources cannot all be detailed. For instance, in his note on the Āi Jiāngnán fù line jīng bāng zuǒ Hàn 經邦佐漢, he cites a corrupt Shǐ jì suǒ yǐn 史記索隱 text taking Yuángōng 園公 to be of surname Yǔ 庾 and the Sì hào 四皓 to be Hàn ministers — unavoidably forced and tendentious.

Later Ní Fán 倪璠 of Qiántáng 錢塘 separately produced a jiānzhù (= KR4b0018 Yǔ Zǐshān jí zhù), and the present edition has fallen out of common use. But Wú Zhàoyí’s pioneering / inaugurating effort cannot be effaced; both editions are kept in record, in the same spirit as commentators on Dù Fǔ do not entirely abandon the old Qiānjiā zhù 千家註.

Wú Zhàoyí, zì Xiǎnlìng 顯令, of Wújiāng 吳江, zhūshēng (sub-licentiate) in the Kāngxī era. He commented both [Yǔ] and [Xú] (= KR4b0019 Xú Xiàomù jí jiānzhù 徐孝穆集箋註), and also annotated the Yùtái xīnyǒng, Cáidiào jí 才調集, and Hán Wò shī jí 韓偓詩集. Today only the Xú and Yǔ collections are in print — the others survive only as manuscripts.

Reverently collated, ninth month of Qiánlóng 46 (1781). Chief compilers: Jì Yún, Lù Xīxióng, Sūn Shìyì. Chief collator: Lù Fèichí.

Abstract

Yǔ Xìn (513–581), the great Liáng-Northern-Zhōu bridge poet, is the canonical master of medieval Chinese parallel prose (piántǐ wén / sìliù wén 四六文). His career divides sharply into two phases: (a) the Liáng Táichéng 臺城 period at the courts of Liáng Wǔdì and Jiǎnwéndì, in which he and Xú Líng 徐陵 wrote elegant gōngtǐ 宮體 fù and shī; (b) the post-554 Northern phase, beginning with his diplomatic capture by the Western Wèi during the Hóu Jǐng catastrophe, in which he wrote his late masterpieces — the Āi Jiāngnán fù 哀江南賦, the Xiǎo yuán fù 小園賦, the Kū shù fù 枯樁賦, and the major zhìbēi (memorial-stele) compositions for Northern-Zhōu princes. Dù Fǔ’s iconic line Yǔ Xìn wén zhāng lǎo gēng chéng 庾信文章老更成 (“Yǔ Xìn’s prose grew finer with age”) canonized this late phase as the formative model of Táng-period parallel prose.

This volume is the early-Qīng (Kāngxī era, 1662–1722) annotated edition by Wú Zhàoyí 吳兆宜 of Wújiāng — building on the unfinished jiānzhù by Hú Wèi 胡渭 and produced with Xú Shùgǔ 徐樹穀 of Kūnshān et al. Wú’s commentary is in the jiānzhù style, supplying source-citations and explanations for the dense allusions of Yǔ’s parallel-prose. The Sìkù compilers note that Wú’s apparatus is sometimes forced (as in his erroneous citation of a corrupt Shǐ jì suǒ yǐn on Yuángōng 園公 in the Āi Jiāngnán fù note) and was substantially superseded by Ní Fán’s later Yǔ Zǐshān jí zhù KR4b0018 — but they also acknowledge the inaugural value of Wú’s work and preserve both.

The dating bracket here (1662–1722) covers the Kāngxī era of Wú’s collation activity. Yǔ Xìn’s lifedates (513–581) are confirmed by Zhōushū 41, Běi shǐ 83, and CBDB. The Sìkù tíyào establishes by internal evidence (the Xīn Chéng bēi wén 辛成碑文 dated Kāihuáng 1 / 581 reburial) that Yǔ in fact died in the Suí, not the Northern Zhōu — extending his life into 581 by nearly a year past the Northern-Zhōu fall.

Translations and research

  • William T. Graham. 1980. “The Lament for the South”: Yu Hsin’s “Ai Chiang-nan fu.” Cambridge UP. The standard English translation and study of the Āi Jiāng-nán fù.
  • Yáng Bó 楊伯, ed. 1980. Yǔ Zǐshān jí zhù 庾子山集註, by Ní Fán 倪璠 (1689). Zhōnghuá. The principal modern critical edition (= KR4b0018) — supersedes Wú Zhàoyí for most purposes but Wú remains useful.
  • Xǔ Yì-mín 許逸民, ed. 1980. Yǔ Zǐshān jí zhù 庾子山集註. Zhōnghuá (companion volume).
  • David R. Knechtges. 2014. Ancient and Early Medieval Chinese Literature: A Reference Guide, vol. 1. Brill, s.v. Yǔ Xìn.
  • Stephen Owen. 1981. The Great Age of Chinese Poetry: The High T’ang. YUP — discusses Yǔ Xìn’s centrality for Táng poetics.
  • Knechtges. 2003. “Sweet-peel Orange or Southern Gold? Regional Identity in Western Jin Literature.”
  • Cynthia L. Chennault. 2003. “Yu Xin (513–581).” Indiana Companion to Traditional Chinese Literature, vol. 2.
  • Lǔ Tóng-qún 魯同群, ed. 2010. Yǔ Xìn zhuàn lùn 庾信傳論. Tiānjīn rénmín — substantial PRC monograph.

Other points of interest

The Sìkù tíyào’s defense of Wú Zhàoyí’s commentary against displacement by Ní Fán — “the inaugural / pioneering effort cannot be effaced, in the same spirit as commentators on Dù Fǔ do not entirely abandon the old Qiānjiā zhù” — is a small but characteristic piece of Qiánlóng-era editorial pluralism: rather than choose one definitive commentary, the compilers preserve the historical layers of the commentarial tradition. The pairing KR4b0017 (Wú) and KR4b0018 (Ní) gives the modern reader both sides of the exegetical tradition.

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