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景文集

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Text ID
KR4d0021
Date
1061–1781
Dynasty
宋

Jǐngwén jí 景文集

The Jǐng-wén Collection (of Sòng Qí) by 宋祁 (撰)

About the work

Jǐngwén jí 景文集 is the 62-juǎn (in WYG; some Sòng witnesses recorded 100 juǎn) reassembled literary collection of Sòng Qí 宋祁 (998–1061, zì Zǐjīng 子京, posthumous Jǐngwén 景文), the celebrated co-compiler with Ōuyáng Xiū of the Xīn Tángshū KR2a0009 and one of the most famous cí-poets of the early Northern Sòng (the line “hóng xìng zhī tóu chūn yì nào” 紅杏枝頭春意鬧 in his Yùlóu chūn 玉樓春 earned him the nickname Hóngxìng shàngshū 紅杏尚書 — “Crimson-Apricot Minister”). Like his elder brother Sòng Xiáng’s Yuánxiàn jí KR4d0020, the Sòng-period collection lapsed and the Sìkù compilers reassembled the present recension from the Yǒnglè dàdiǎn. The two brothers’ collections share the imperial preface translated above.

Tiyao

We respectfully submit: the Jǐngwén jí in 62 juǎn was composed by Sòng Qí of the Sòng. Qí, zì Zǐjīng, of Kāifēng Yōngqiū. Took the jìnshì in Tiānshèng jiǎzǐ (=Tiānshèng 2 / 1024) with his elder brother Xiáng. Rose through office to Hànlín xuéshì chéngzhǐ; canonized Jǐngwén. His deeds are in the Sòngshǐ. Cháo Gōngwǔ’s Dúshū zhì says Sòng Qí’s poetry and prose has many strange characters; verifying with Sū Shì’s poems, the source of his “deep, dangerous, sometimes hard phrases” is documented. To today’s eye, this judgement was made because Sòng Qí compiled the Xīn Tángshū — carving and chopping, deliberately for difficulty — so the saying came down. In fact his poetry and prose are deeply allusive and elegantly sublime, with the manner of pre-Tang times; the lingering richness still feeds others without exhaustion. He cannot be wholly condemned as obscure. Chén Zhènsūn’s Shūlù jiětí says Qí himself in his sixties wished to burn what he had written when young. But examining Qí’s Bǐ jì he says, “At twenty-five I was favored by the Zǎixiàng Xià gōng [Sǒng]; tested at the Lǐbù, was praised again …” — the burning of youthful work seems the typical poetic-self-modesty of a xiánrén. The original 100-juǎn collection lapsed; the present is compiled from Yǒnglè dàdiǎn into 62 juǎn. Qiánlóng ?, respectfully collated.

Abstract

Sòng Qí’s literary stature is the higher of the two brothers — he is the central figure in the Tiānshèng literary generation just before Ōuyáng Xiū’s full ascendance. As historian, he was the principal compiler of the Lièzhuàn of the Xīn Tángshū (with Ōuyáng Xiū’s Běnjì and Zhì); his Tang prose-models — Hán Yù, Liǔ Zōngyuán, Lǐ Áo — are paramount in his style. As poet, he is one of the canonical Sòng cí-masters of the xiǎolìng: the Yùlóu chūn 玉樓春 with its “Crimson-Apricot” line is one of the most-quoted cí of the early eleventh century. As prose-stylist, the Sìkù tíyào (anticipating Cháo Gōngwǔ) acknowledges that Sòng Qí cultivated a deliberately recondite vocabulary — what some called “qízì” — and the famous Xīn Tángshū style, which Ōuyáng Xiū later regretted, descends in part from this. He was prefect of Yìzhōu (Chéngdū) in Jiāyòu 1–3 / 1056–1058, finishing the Xīn Tángshū there; he died at age 64 in Jiāyòu 6 / 1061, just months after the Xīn Tángshū was completed. Among other works he produced the Yìbù fāngwù lüèjì 益部方物略記 KR2k0109 on Sìchuān natural history, and the Sòng Jǐngwén gōng bǐjì 宋景文公筆記 (a celebrated bǐjì).

The transmitted text is the Sìkù reconstitution from Yǒnglè dàdiǎn, recovering 62 juǎn against the original 100 — comparatively a fortunate recovery rate. Contents include cègào, biǎozòu, xùjì, bēimíng, jìwén, and a substantial poetry corpus (the cí are preserved separately in anthology). The dating bracket marks Sòng’s death (1061) to the Sìkù reconstitution (1781).

Translations and research

  • Egan, Ronald C. 1984. The Literary Works of Ou-yang Hsiu. Cambridge UP. Treats Sòng Qí extensively as Ōuyáng Xiū’s collaborator.
  • Twitchett, Denis. 1992. The Writing of Official History under the Tang. Cambridge UP. Treats Sòng Qí’s Xīn Táng-shū.
  • Sargent, Stuart H. 2007. The Poetry of He Zhu (1052–1125). Brill. Discusses Sòng Qí’s cí in the early-Northern-Sòng tradition.
  • Yáng Tiān-yì 楊天宜. 2011. Sòng Qí jí jiào-zhù 宋祁集校注. Hé-běi rénmín. Modern critical edition.

Other points of interest

The “hóng xìng nào” episode — Wáng Guówéi 王國維 in Rénjiān cíhuà 人間詞話 made the line a locus classicus for the discussion of jìngjiè 境界 (“aesthetic realm”) in cí poetry — gives Sòng Qí’s cí an unusually vivid place in twentieth-century Chinese literary criticism. The relation between the Xīn Tángshū style (deliberately cryptic) and the Jǐngwén jí prose (more direct) is a productive site for studying the Sòng gǔwén / piānlì synthesis.

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