拙軒集

Zhuōxuān jí 拙軒集

The Zhuō-xuān (Clumsy Studio) Collection by 王寂 (撰)

About the work

The reconstructed six-juàn literary collection of Wáng Jì 王寂 (CBDB 17425, lifedates uncertain — fl. through 1190s; zì Yuánlǎo 元老; shì Wénsù 文肅), a Jīn-dynasty jìnshì of Tiāndé 2 (1150) and ultimately Transport Commissioner of the Zhōngdū Circuit, native of Yùtián 玉田 in Jìzhōu 薊州. Wáng’s official career — not preserved in any Jīnshǐ biography — has been laboriously reconstructed by the Sìkù editors from internal dating in his own poetry and prose: from Dàdìng 2 (1162) Magistrate of Qíxiàn in Tàiyuán, to Dàdìng 15 (1175) Imperial Envoy to Báixí for legal review; mourning leave for his father’s death in 1177; rising to Zhēndìng shàoyǐn with concurrent Vice-Commander of the Héběixī Route, then Prefect of Tōngzhōu; Zhōngdū fù liúshǒu; from Dàdìng 26 (1186) winter Prefect of Càizhōu (after demotion on account of “factional speech” — preserved in his Dīngwèi sìshěng 1187 poem on Shìzōng’s amnesty); in 1189 Inspector of Liáodōnglù judicial affairs; recalled in Míngchāng (Zhāngzōng’s accession, 1190); ending as Transport Commissioner. Yuán Hǎowèn’s Zhōngzhōu jí preserves seven of his poems plus one in the Yáo Xiàoxī appendix; the Sìkù recovery from the Yǒnglè dàdiǎn adds the bulk of the present text. Wáng Jì’s Běiqiān lù 北遷錄 — his important travel record from the Liáodōng tour of 1189 — is lost. The Sìkù editors place him third in importance after Zhào Bǐngwén KR4d0417 and Wáng Ruòxū KR4d0418 in the surviving Jīn-dynasty biéjí canon, observing that of the 150+ Jīn-period figures listed in Zhōngzhōu jí only those three have transmitted collections — the rest extinct.

Tiyao

We respectfully submit: Zhuōxuān jí in six juàn was composed by the Jīn dynasty’s Wáng Jì. Jì’s zì was Yuánlǎo, a man of Yùtián in Jìzhōu. He passed the jìnshì in Tiāndé 2 (1150). He held office sequentially as Zhōngdūlù Transport Commissioner; shì “Wénsù.” The Jīnshǐ makes no biography for him. Yuán Hǎowèn’s Zhōngzhōu jí enters his poetry in the yǐ group, and his career-record only outlines the general shape. Now, taking Jì’s poetry and prose with their composed dated months and recorded events for mutual cross-verification, we know that Jì, from passing his examination onward — in Shìzōng’s Dàdìng 2 (1162) became Magistrate of Qíxiàn in Tàiyuán. In [Dàdìng] 15 (1175) he was once dispatched as envoy to Báixí (Liáodōng) for legal review. In [Dàdìng] 17 (1177), on his father’s death, he returned [home]. The next year he was raised again to Zhēndìng shàoyǐn concurrent with Héběixīlù bīngmǎ fù dūzǒngguǎn; transferred to Prefect of Tōngzhōu concurrent with zhījūnshì; further transferred to Zhōngdū fù liúshǒu. In [Dàdìng] 26 winter, from Hùbù láng he was sent out to guard Càizhōu. In [Dàdìng] 29 (1189) he was commanded to inspect Liáodōnglù judicial cases. In Zhāngzōng’s Míngchāng early years he was summoned back, ending in the office of Transport Commissioner.

[In] the collection’s Xiè dài hú biǎo (Thanks for being given the Sword-and-Tablet memorial) is the phrase “Shìzōng enjoyed [his] state; [your] minister is shamefully [among] the jiànyuán” — so [Wáng] also once held office as Remonstrating Officer. [In the Dīngwèi sìshěng poem] is the line “Many words mutually causing me to fall — your minister into the unfathomable depths”; and the Dīngwèi sìshěng poem has the line “the ten thousand lǐ Xiāngruì gets to renew himself” — Dīngwèi is Dàdìng 27 (1187); Shìzōng’s main annals records that in the third month of that year, [on] xīnhài, by reason of the Imperial Grandson receiving the [Heir] Investiture, a general amnesty was decreed — in accord with the collection. Thus Jì’s appointment as Prefect of Cài was due to others’ speech, and his departure from the capital; in the collection the affairs’ circumstances do not preserve the whole.

The Zhōngzhōu jí says Jì composed the Zhuōxuān jí and the Běiqiān lù. Now the Běiqiān lù has been lost in transmission; and what Hǎowèn selected of Jì’s poetry is only seven pieces, plus one appended to the end of Yáo Xiàoxī’s biography; the rest too has long been lost and not seen. Only in the Yǒnglè dàdiǎn’s contents are Jì’s poetry and prose still many. Although Hǎowèn’s plucked-out Liúbié Guō Xīmín poetic couplets and the Chángān kèhuà fugitive lines of the Lú Zhí mù (Lú Zhí Tomb) poem are not seen in full pieces, and [the recovery] cannot fully escape the omission [of the lost parts] — yet the various [poetic] bodies are completely present. [We] can obtain seven [tenths] of [the original work].

Jì’s poetry and prose are clear-sharp and chisel-revealed, having a jiájiá dúzào (sharp-and-distinctive, original-attainment) manner. In the Dàdìng / Míngchāng era, he stands out as not unworthy of being [called] a composer. Famous Jīn-dynasty literary figures seen in the Zhōngzhōu jí are not less than a hundred or more clans; today only Zhào Bǐngwén and Wáng Ruòxū’s two collections still have transmitted bases; the rest are mostly drowned and unpreserved. Only Jì’s compilation, fortunately at the remnant of [its] submerged-darkening and corroded state, has now re-appeared in the world; and the literary frame is likewise sufficient to walk in opposition with the Hūnán and the Fǔshuǐ. Respectfully editing and gathering [and] arranging, dividing into six juàn, to enable readers to grasp the outline — [they] may still by this verify the literary documents of the Jīnyuán. This indeed may be reckoned as precious.

Respectfully collated, eleventh month of Qiánlóng 40 (1775). 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.

Abstract

Wáng Jì (CBDB 17425; lifedates uncertain, fl. 1150 jìnshì through Míngchāng era 1190s) is, with Zhào Bǐngwén and Wáng Ruòxū, one of only three Jīn-dynasty biéjí authors whose collections survive in transmitted (not anthology-extracted) form. He is the most concretely documented Jīn-period administrative official whose career we can reconstruct from his own writings: a Héběilù and Zhōngdūlù magistrate-and-prefect-and-commissioner of the Shìzōng / Zhāngzōng reigns. His travel record Běiqiān lù (recording his 1189 inspection tour through Liáodōng) is lost; the Zhuōxuān jí was largely lost by the early Qīng and is here recovered from the Yǒnglè dàdiǎn. The composition window for the surviving material runs from Dàdìng 2 (1162, his earliest dated piece) through Míngchāng (1190s, the last). The Sìkù editors carefully reconstruct from internal evidence what the Jīnshǐ (which has no biography of Wáng) does not preserve. Wilkinson treats Wáng Jì in the Jīn-dynasty biéjí corpus (§29.1).

Translations and research

• Zhāng Bó-wèi 張伯偉, Quán-Jīn shī 全金詩 (Tiān-jīn: Nán-kāi dà-xué chū-bǎn-shè, 1995). Modern critical anthology of Jīn-period poetry; collates Wáng Jì from the Sìkù base.
• Hú Chuán-zhì 胡傳志, Jīn-dài wén-xué yán-jiū 金代文學研究 (Hé-féi: Ān-huī dà-xué chū-bǎn-shè, 2000), pp. 121–134 — Wáng Jì in the Dà-dìng / Míng-chāng literary milieu.
• Zhōu Huì-quán 周惠泉, Jīn-dài wén-xué shǐ 金代文學史 (Tái-běi: Wàn-juǎn-lóu, 1996).
• Yuán Hǎo-wèn 元好問, Zhōng-zhōu jí 中州集 — the foundational thirteenth-century anthology, with Wáng Jì’s biographical capsule.

Other points of interest

The Sìkù editors’ painstaking biographical reconstruction of Wáng Jì from internal poetic evidence — career-trajectory, factional grievance, Liáodōng mission — is a model demonstration of Qián-lóng-era kǎojù method applied to a partially-recovered biéjí. The case is particularly important historiographically because the Jīnshǐ has no biography of Wáng Jì at all: the biéjí alone preserves his administrative trajectory.

Links

• WYG SKQS V1190.1, p1.
• CBDB person 17425 (Wáng Jì)