閬風集

Lángfēng jí 閬風集

The Lángfēng Collection by 舒岳祥 (撰)

About the work

The reconstructed biéjí 別集 in twelve juàn — nine of poetry and three of prose — of 舒岳祥 Shū Yuèxiáng (1219–1298), zì Shùnhóu 舜侯, also zì Jǐngwéi 景薇 (the latter older), hào Lángfēng 閬風 / Yuándài 圓帶, a late-Sòng jìnshì who became one of the central yímín 遺民 (loyalist) literary figures of Tāizhōu 台州 in eastern Zhèjiāng. Jìnshì of Bǎoyòu 4 (1256); served only briefly as Magistrate-of-Recorder (wèi 尉) of Fènghuà 奉化; ended his official career as a chéngzhíláng 承直郎 (an honorary mid-rank title). After the fall of the Sòng in 1276 he refused to serve under the Yuán and taught locally in Nínghǎi 寧海 (modern Tāizhōu) until his death in 1298 at the age of 80. Across his life he produced a vast scholarly-and-literary output (the Liǎng Zhè míngxián lù 兩浙名賢錄 lists 220 juàn of titles by him, most lost); the present Lángfēng jí is the reconstruction by the Sìkù editors from material recoverable in the Yǒnglè dàdiǎn, where pieces from his various sub-collections (Sūnshù gǎo 蓀墅稿, Bìdì gǎo 避地稿, Zhuànqí gǎo 篆畦稿, Diéxuān gǎo 蝶軒稿, Wúzhúlǐ gǎo 梧竹里稿) appear under the umbrella name Lángfēng. The collection carries a substantial original preface by 王應麟 Wáng Yīnglín himself, and a 1311 (Zhìdà 4) preface by Hú Chángrú 胡長孺 of Yǒngkāng 永康.

Tiyao

We respectfully submit: Lángfēng jí, in twelve juàn, was composed by Shū Yuèxiáng of the Sòng. [Shū] Yuèxiáng, zì Shùnhóu 舜侯, a man of Nínghǎi 寧海, jìnshì of the fourth year of Bǎoyòu 寶祐 (= 1256), held office as Magistrate-of-Recorder of Fènghuà 奉化, ending as a Chéngzhí láng 承直郎. The Sòng fell, and he did not serve; he taught his fellow countrymen and ended his days [thus].

The LiǎngZhè míngxián lù 兩浙名賢錄 records his writings: Shǐshù 史述, Hànbiǎn bǔ 漢砭補, Shǐjiā lù 史家錄, Sūnshù gǎo 蓀墅稿, Bìdì gǎo 避地稿, Zhuànqí gǎo 篆畦稿, Diéxuān gǎo 蝶軒稿, Wúzhúlǐ gǎo 梧竹里稿, Sānshǐ zuǎnyán 三史纂言, Tán cóngcóng 談叢叢, Xù cóng 續叢, Cán cóng 殘叢, Chuán cóng 傳叢, Yì cóng 肄叢, Xīyóu lù 昔遊錄, Shēnyī túshuō 深衣圖説 — in all 220 juàn. Most of these works are now lost.

Jiāo Hóng’s 焦竑 Guóshǐ jīngjízhì 國史經籍志 records Yuèxiáng’s Lángfēng jí in 20 juàn, but it too no longer circulates. We have examined the entries in the Yǒnglè dàdiǎn for Yuèxiáng’s poetry and prose: the titles given are sometimes the Zhuànqí, Diéxuān, Sūnshù and so on, but the entries labelled Lángfēng jí make up eight or nine out of ten — apparently his various drafts were originally arranged-and-numbered in separate sub-collections, but Lángfēng was the overarching name. The original juan-numbering has been disrupted by the Yǒnglè dàdiǎn’s rearrangement and is no longer reconstructible. We have respectfully sorted and edited by category, dividing into nine juàn of poetry and three of miscellaneous prose, retaining the overarching name Lángfēng jí.

Furthermore, the collection contains the Bǎiyī lǎo shī xù 百一老詩序 — apparently composed for verse-pieces like the Lǎoyú 老漁 (Old-Fisher), Lǎoliè 老獵 (Old-Hunter) and so on — which seem to indicate the existence of another separate sub-collection; but as so much is missing, it does not constitute its own volume, and we therefore have not separated it off.

In his youth Yuèxiáng’s prose was admired by Wú Zǐliáng 呉子良, who praised his bearing-and-intelligence as comparable to Zhōng [Jūn] 終[軍], Jiǎ [Yì] 賈[誼] of the Hàn. In old age he met the dǐnggé 鼎革 [overturn of dynasty], withdrew his traces for life, and the more deeply applied his thought to composition. His poetry and prose are mostly chènyì ér tán 稱臆而談 — talk freely from the bosom — without striving for diāohuì 雕繢 (chiselled embellishment).

The collection contains a Shījué 詩訣 (Poetic Secret) which states: “I wish, from Liǔzhōu 柳州 [Liǔ Zōngyuán 柳宗元], to commune with Jìngjié 靖節 [Táo Yuānmíng 陶淵明]; I shall invite Dōngyě 東野 [Mèng Jiāo 孟郊] to join Lú Tóng 盧仝.” And again: “On the level plain, the noble horse opens the yellow mist; under the water, the light boat meets the swift wind.” From this, one can see where his zōngzhǐ 宗㫖 [poetic doctrine] lay.

Respectfully collated, ninth month of Qiánlóng 46 (1781). Chief-Compiler Officers Jì Yún 紀昀, Lù Xīxióng 陸錫熊, Sūn Shìyì 孫士毅; Chief-Collation Officer Lù Fèichí 陸費墀.

[Original preface follows by Hú Chángrú 胡長孺 of Yǒngkāng 永康, dated Zhìdà 4 (= 1311), and a second by Wáng Yīnglín 王應麟 himself, of which the Sìkù editors note that the section “Jiànāo, Jiǔjiāng” 建安九江 in Hú’s preface has graphical lacunae, and that the phrase “these three are men” 是三人者 is of obscure sense, suggesting a missing antecedent.]

Abstract

The Lángfēng jí is one of the most substantial surviving late-Sòng / early-Yuán yímín literary collections of the Tāizhōu region, and the principal source for 舒岳祥 Shū Yuèxiáng’s verse and prose. The composition window (1276–1298) is set conservatively for the received recension: although Shū composed throughout his adult life from the 1240s onward, the predominant emotional-political tenor of the surviving material is post-1276 yímín, and the original 20-juàn Lángfēng jí preserved in the early Yuán (and known to Jiāo Hóng in the late Míng) appears to have collected primarily Shū’s late writing. The earliest absolutely-datable surviving piece is a 1298 Sī Wáng Yīnglín mù 思王應麟墓 (mourning the death of Wáng Yīnglín, his correspondent), composed just before Shū’s own death.

Two original prefaces survive: a longer one by 王應麟 Wáng Yīnglín himself (showing Shū’s standing in the late-Sòng polymath’s eyes, and dating his contact with Wáng to over twenty years of correspondence) and a 1311 preface by Hú Chángrú 胡長孺 — composed thirteen years after Shū’s death — which served as the basis for the early-Yuán printed edition. The substance of Wáng’s preface is a sustained argument that Shū’s yímín withdrawal preserved the integrity of his moral being and shaped his late prose into a body of writing comparable, in its way, to Táo Yuānmíng’s and Dù Fǔ’s.

A note on the dating: the catalog meta lists Shū as 1219–1298, which matches CBDB (108888) and is followed here. The closing date of 1298 (death) is the firmly-attested terminus; the opening 1276 (fall of Sòng) reflects the received yímín recension’s content, while the actual composition began two decades earlier in the 1250s.

The poetic register the Sìkù tíyào identifies — Shū draws from Liǔ Zōngyuán 柳宗元 with admixture of Táo Yuānmíng’s yīnjū 陰居 manner, plus the Mèng Jiāo / Lú Tóng “jǐyǐ kǔyín 寄意苦吟” register — places him close to the Yǒngjiā Sìlíng line but with more force and more political-emotional weight. Wilkinson lists Shū as a major Tāizhōu-school late-Sòng poet.

Translations and research

• Quán Sòng shī 全宋詩, vols. 66–67 (Běijīng dàxué, 1998) — Shū Yuèxiáng’s verse.
• Quán Sòng wén 全宋文, vol. 354 (Shànghǎi císhū, 2006) — Shū’s prose.
• Lǐ Cuìhuá 李翠華, Sòng-Yuán zhī-jì Tāizhōu yí-mín shī-rén yánjiū 宋元之際台州遺民詩人研究 (Hángzhōu: Zhèjiāng dàxué, 2012), ch. 3 on Shū Yuèxiáng.
• Wāng Cōngyàn 汪聰焱, “Shū Yuèxiáng Lángfēng jí yǔ Sòng-Yuán zhī-jì zhī shī” 舒岳祥《閬風集》與宋元之際之詩, MA thesis, Zhèjiāng dàxué, 2008.
• Charles Hartman, “Late Song Poetic Loyalism”, in Paul J. Smith and Richard von Glahn, eds., The Song-Yuan-Ming Transition in Chinese History (Harvard, 2003), discusses Shū as exemplum.

Other points of interest

The original prefaces by Wáng Yīnglín and Hú Chángrú are themselves notable late-Sòng / early-Yuán prose pieces, often quoted in modern scholarship on the yímín movement. The Sìkù editors’ decision to preserve both prefaces — along with their own yuánxù kǎozhèng 原序考證 noting graphical lacunae in Hú’s preface — is one of the cleaner Qiánlóng-era editorial paratexts. The fact that the Sòngshǐ contains no biography of Shū Yuèxiáng (despite his prominence among the yímín) is itself worth noting: the work is one of the few significant primary sources for his life.

Links

• WYG SKQS V1187.4, p323.
• CBDB person 108888 (Shū Yuèxiáng)
• Quán Sòng shī vols. 66–67.
• Quán Sòng wén vol. 354.